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Point of View with Barb
Sumner Burstyn - February 16 2004
Our male film reviewers are missing all
the points
What is it with film reviewers in this country?
Gaylene Preston's new film Perfect Strangers, a dark tale of a
woman kidnapped, the tables turning and then turning again, has
been heralded internationally as a major new work. But here, on
home turf, it has been panned by reviewers.
While the Sunday Telegraph in Britain called it a little gem,
full of great atmosphere, Alex Spence of the Sunday Star Times described
it as a black comedy that's neither funny nor especially menacing.
Spence goes on to depict the script as weak and messy, while the
Daily Telegraph described Preston's film as a macabre romance full
of surprises.
In the US, Variety, the film reviewers' bible, called the film
taut and well directed, and the ABC described Preston as a film-maker
at the height of her powers.
But Peter Calder in the Herald called the film impenetrable and
a cop-out.
Calder went on to batter the film for raising more questions than
it answers, and seemed perplexed by the oscillating behaviour of
Melanie, the lead character.
So what's going on here? Is the film really as bad as the New
Zealand reviewers would have us believe?
Or is it something else - that old tall poppy syndrome out in
force, or some kind of knee-jerk response to the post-feminism of
the film?
Maybe it's neither. What if it is simply the inability of two
male film reviewers to understand the deeper dynamic of human existence?
What if, in their reviews, the men reveal more about themselves,
about their own emotional barrenness, and thus their fear, than
they do about the film?
After all, oscillating, as Calder disparagingly called it, is
what real people do when caught up in conflict.
We not only oscillate, we about-turn, we dive deeper in the hope
of finding an exit we may not actually want to find, and we most
certainly don't adhere to the rules of naturalistic narrative.
This is perhaps the beauty of Preston's film; her ability to capture
the shimmering shifts in emotional allegiance that characterise
the fraught relationship, both on and off screen.
In Spence's review he sarcastically suggested he might be missing
something. He was.
There's no inexplicable leap from hostage drama to love story
as he states. Melanie, our heroine, knows her captor is her only
way out.
And in the struggle to survive that follows, she sees beneath
his brute force to the broken man beneath.
It is through her recognition of his very human pain she becomes
aware of her own moribund life, and it is this commonality that
forges her love, not some inexplicable leap.
And sure, she goes a little crazy, her inner fantasy taking over
from her external reality.
But truthfully, who of us, stuck in domestic and emotional hells,
have not retreated to that kinder place we create for ourselves.
Essentially this is a film about isolation, about psychological
injury and how the mind closes over emotional wounds in the effort
to survive.
Spence said Perfect Strangers was an idea in search of a story,
and it is - a very powerful story that reveals the essence of our
human vulnerability, not only to the power of the physical and emotional
landscape to overwhelm us, but to the way love, need and desperation
can worm their way in, undermining the veneer of emotional well-being
that many of us live so shallowly beneath.
But this film goes deeper: it deconstructs our cultural fantasy
of the perfect stranger, the perfect man.
It takes the persistent feminine narrative of being rescued and
turns it inside out.
In fact this film is all about being inside out, everything external
you see on the screen reflecting the inner turmoil of people grappling
with the emotion we're most reluctant to admit to - loneliness.
And living as we still do in the shadow of the emotionally impervious
good keen man, perhaps this is the reason for the bad reviews in
New Zealand.
So skip Perfect Strangers if you like your films delivered fully
cooked, with every end tied and all the mystery squeezed from every
frame; if, like Calder, you want a story that adheres to the rules
of naturalistic narrative; if, for you, emotional nuance is a mystery
and comfort lies in car chases, straightforward heroes, obvious
villains, easy conquests and always knowing the answer.
But if you thrive on complexity, if you're inclined towards a
movie that - as one international reviewer commented - is a work
of genuine film-making talent, of someone who has something important
to say, then go see this homegrown gem.
For the record, Perfect Strangers may not be the perfect film.
It is bleak, wrapped as it is in the dripping, encompassing bush
of the West Coast.
But compare it to the line-up for this year's Oscars - with the
exception of Lost in Translation.
There you will see overwhelming special effects, explosions, car
chases, formulaic love and adrenalined action, but you won't see
a lot of heart.
And Preston's film is all heart.
ENDS
© Barbara Sumner Burstyn, 2004
Send your comments to:
Barbara Sumner
Burstyn.
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