Movie Review: Level 16 (2018)

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The dorms are named after flowers and the girls who live in them share their names with Golden Age movie stars.

Spending their days doing everything they can to stay sweet, clean, and submissive while reciting rules about feminine vice and virtues back to the adults in charge, the girls in writer-director Danishka Esterhazy's dystopian work of suspense graduate from one floor to the next and look forward to the day they get assigned to a family after they complete the eponymous Level 16.

A message movie with no shortage of ideas — most of which grow increasingly muddled as Esterhazy's film segues uneasily between feminist science fiction fare and dark thriller — while its origins reside firmly in The Handmaid's Tale, Level 16's wide-ranging plot elements recall everything from Never Let Me Go to 1984.

Running out of gas midway through the overly stoic feature, Level 16 fails to create a valid emotional connection between the film's audience and its characters.

Thus sadly, despite a strong turn by actress Katie Douglas who makes the most of what little she's been given in Esterhazy's meandering script, 16 changes course once again, ultimately morphing into a Shawshank Redemption styles ecape thriller after letting us in on a major foundational secret.

An ambitious if mostly uneven effort, although it's apparent early on that Esterhazy has an awful lot to say, with its chilly core and staccato plotting, the claustrophobic Level 16 feels more like a short lost in the running time of a feature film — or an old episode of The Twilight Zone starring an actress from Hollywood's Golden Age — than it does one cohesive and compelling 102 minute endeavor.


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Blu-ray Review: Never Let Me Go (2010)

Now Available to Own 

Whether it’s personally or professionally, in the words of Bob Dylan, we’ve all “Gotta Serve Somebody.”

And nowhere is this sentiment more prevalent than in the often deliriously poetic yet simultaneously devastating prose of Japanese born British novelist Kazuo Ishiguro who chronicled lives spent dedicated to the service of others at the literal and/or figurative expense of his dutiful characters in the ethically complicated and emotionally intricate works The Remains of the Day and Never Let Me Go.

The cinematic adaptation of Ishiguro’s Remains resulted in a masterful presentation of his romantic period drama about the cyclical nature of the sheltered lives endured by interchangeable butlers, maids and other members of a household staff that either stifled their emotions and sacrificed their own free will to please their “betters” or escaped service to embrace the unknown on their own.

Yet while Remains benefited considerably by airing out the mothballs often found in literary period costume dramas, unfortunately the same cannot be said for One Hour Photo director Mark Romanek’s undeniably breathtaking but surprisingly unmoving, chilly interpretation of Ishiguro’s acclaimed dystopian science fiction novel Romanek co-wrote with 28 Days Later screenwriter Alex Garland.

Set in a reconfigured not-too-distant past where breakthroughs in DNA, cloning, and organ transplants ignored stem cells altogether to create an entire race of live donors from birth on up, Never Let Me Go nearly removes the idea of free will from the equation completely so that the onscreen trio of Carey Mulligan, Andrew Garfield and Keira Knightley seem to be playing human robots rather than flesh-and-blood humans.

And even though the actors spend so much energy proving that their characters have a soul through their nuanced portrayals, because they’re continually forced not to acknowledge their feelings, everything about the work feels frustratingly shallow and protracted.

Likewise while the concept itself is shocking indeed, the most shocking thing about the film is just how unshocking it is as Romanek and Garland’s dull edged, vacuously clinical, claustrophobic translation that treats everything with a matter-of-fact candor without the good sense to respond to the facts presented.

Namely, aside from one sole dissenter in the form of a straight-shooting teacher played by Sally Hawkins who gets fired for revealing just what exactly the short future holds for the children in her class as well as one feeble attempt at bargaining by a main character, we’re left dissatisfied by the narrow scope of the film.

While the filmmakers attempt to involve us in the film’s central love triangle between our doomed leads in an adaptation that likewise seems to have been the result of a literary love triangle that’s equal parts Dickens, Kafka and Huxley, it always feels secondary to the topical elephant in the room that’s never being addressed.

Needless to say, a happy ending or even a contrived political subplot would’ve been out of place. Yet instead of an allegorical, existential call-to-action to reevaluate our lives or perhaps remind us that we’re all potential “donors” (and even the stance on this is shady!), the work is vague to the point that even the cast members have incredibly different ideas on what the film is about. Furthermore, ultimately you wonder if those in charge knew precisely why they were making the film in the first place.

While it’s all well and good to leave the final interpretation up to the viewers since cookie cutter conclusions are the death of cinematic creativity, the fact that it’s sadly way too easy to “let go” of Never Let Me Go is precisely the problem when you consider the overall plotline.

And despite the immense beauty of the sweeping production values from Adam Kimmel’s cinematography to Rachel Portman’s music which are both served well in this exquisite Blu-ray transfer, Romanek’s film about three twenty-somethings who know they’ve “Gotta Serve Somebody” ultimately neglects to serve the audience in the process.

Text ©2011, Film Intuition, LLC; All Rights Reserved. http://www.filmintuition.com Unauthorized Reproduction or Publication Elsewhere is Strictly Prohibited and in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.  

FTC Disclosure: Per standard professional practice, I received a review copy of this title in order to evaluate it for my readers, which had no impact whatsoever on whether or not it received a favorable or unfavorable critique.

Blindness (2008)

“This story does not have one truth, and all the different interpretations make sense…This is a story that must create a lot of questions, but give no answers… It raises issues about man’s evolution, makes us reflect critically, but points in no specific direction…”

– Director Fernando Meirelles as quoted
in the Miramax Films Press Release for Blindness

I begin with this quote in particular, not just because it sort of underscores the pretentious nature of the film, but more importantly because, I’m all for films that challenge the viewer in putting the pieces together, testing our intellect by making us come up with meaning whether it’s discovering a political allegorical subtext in No Country for Old Men or trying to figure out just what the hell is going on in Memento.

And while admittedly despite my high tolerance for art house fare that doesn’t offer an easy way out for the viewer, when we’re presented with something like the cinematic adaptation of Nobel prize-winning author Jose Saramango’s 1998 novel Blindness and adapted by Tony award-winner Don McKellar, we at least want the reassurance that the filmmaking team knows precisely the film they want to make. For--if it had been handled with far more clarity—no doubt the film would’ve resonated better with the audience. We get the sense that there’s a larger purpose to the epic scope of the storytelling, which surrounds a nightmarish outbreak that suddenly inflicts mankind when ordinary citizens begin losing their ability to see (view the trailer).

Beginning with an Asian motorist, soon the bizarre loss of sight (which at first we assume is some sort of nerve induced hysterical blindness) becomes something far more horrifying altogether. And soon-- with the pacing of an action film—more people are infected as they come in contact with the initial man until eventually Sandra Oh’s World Health Initiative quarantines them all into a militaristic compound where they’re left to fend for themselves in a situation that evolves into something resembling at first a prison and then eventually a concentration camp.

While I’m unfamiliar with Saramango’s source material, I understand that it did keep one major storytelling device in serving up a cast of nameless characters known only by a mere description whether it’s Alice Braga’s The Woman with the Dark Glasses or Danny Glover’s The Man With the Black Eye Patch.

The film’s protagonists consist of talented actors Mark Ruffalo and Julianne Moore as The Doctor and His Wife, respectively. While Ruffalo’s eye doctor loses his sight after trying to treat the first sufferer of what has been since dubbed the “White Sickness,” his devoted wife fakes the same condition in order to journey to the compound and take care of her husband.

Although initially Moore seems to be just playing the supportive and loving sidekick to Ruffalo’s heroic character who becomes the unceremonious "Ward Representative" of their first ward, intriguingly it’s Moore who becomes the true hero of the film. As the leader with sight, she fearlessly takes on Gael Garcia Bernal’s monstrous King of Ward Three—although much too late in this critic’s opinion—as the increasingly dangerous King begins holding the compound’s governmental resources for ransom in the form of money, jewelry, and eventually women.

It’s at about this time that the film seems to truly begin relishing in the utter degradation, depravity, and filth of the situation. Of course, heightened circumstances can bring out the best and worst in people when they are tested but the point could’ve been made in much less than 125 grueling minutes as we begin feeling utterly sickened by seemingly endless frames consisting of naked, dirty starving individuals, urine and fecal matter, a horrific group rape scene that outdoes Kubrick’s infamously brutal “Singin’ in the Rain” routine from A Clockwork Orange and more.

And that is not to say that illustrating a dystopia on film doesn’t have value as Alfonso Cuaron’s brilliant Children of Men did this much better and even the less-than-stellar gore fests of 28 Days Later, I Am Legend and Stephen King’s The Mist raised far more questions about the dangers of scientific experimentation, group think, and discovering our true nature at the worst of times. Yet, structurally, something is awfully amiss in Blindness. And honestly, it’s an extremely disappointingly exploitative, utterly ugly film that instantly made me want to watch Meirelles’ first groundbreaking effort, City of God (one of the greatest films of the 00’s) and its Oscar winning follow-up The Constant Gardener just to remember the talent he possesses, not to mention do more research on the original book.

For, as we the press exited into the lobby from the darkness of the film which just sort of stops after a surprisingly important yet far too briefly explored plot point, we’re left wondering just what it all means and if Meirelles actually knew in the first place the type of film he wanted to make. My theory is that he was so fascinated by the idea and the topics therein that he neglected to fine-tune it into a workable thesis statement, thereby closing audience’s minds instead of opening them for discussion.

Although one critic joked that if he was forced to watch it again, he would kill himself and another said it was one of the worst films he’d ever seen, I wouldn’t go that far, yet it’s one of the biggest letdowns of 2008. In fact, trouble was predicted following its premiere as the Opening Night Selection at the Cannes Film Festival which left critics divided and Blindness was sent back for reworking (Entertainment Weekly, pg. 55; 8/22/08).

Yet despite the changes, we’re left not just thoroughly confused but realize at last that we really don’t care. And while I was charged with the argument that if it remains in your head hours later, it was a good film, I disagree. For it remained there precisely because it wasn’t a good film as my head was filled with the grotesque imagery of fecal matter and sexual assaults, and wondering why the celluloid was wasted in the first place.

Although my guess is that it will most likely be viewed as a religious parable, an indictment on governmental ineffectiveness in the wake of a tragedy, a commentary on the darkness of human nature, an allegory that illustrates the terror of Nazi like group think, or a warning about where we are headed. Yet, ultimately asking us to sit through something as endlessly bleak, overwhelmingly brutal as Blindness where in the end the questions it raised and the filmmaker’s intention are greater than the sum of its horrible parts, makes Meirelles’ opening quoted goal seem pointless, shallow, and a bit sadistic in the end.

Duck (2005)

Director:
Nic Bettauer




As I’m sure that Michael Moore will attest, one of the greatest challenges in setting out to make a "message movie" is that, no matter how admirable your intentions may be, you have to fight the urge to preach while reconciling the best way to tell the story. And while at least Moore has the advantage of working in the realm of nonfiction documentary filmmaking — despite critical accusations to the contrary — it’s far more difficult when you’re working in the field of narrative fiction features. For proof, look no further than writer/director Nic Bettauer’s award-winning festival favorite Duck.

The overwhelmingly melancholy Duck is set in the dystopian, not-so-distant future of 2009 where, under the rule of Commander-in-Chief Jeb Bush, social security has been abolished, recycling programs have been canceled, and public parks have been converted to landfills.

In hoping to avert the overwhelming sadness of the picture which opens with the plotted suicide of the elderly, widowed Arthur (Philip Baker Hall), Bettauer employs, as she notes in an exclusive DVD interview, a “slightly skewed absurdist [sense of] humor.” The initial result is surprisingly fresh and, given the dire opening, desperately welcome as Arthur changes his deadly plans when an intervention is staged by an unlikely source, namely a small baby duck who wanders over to our hapless hero. Having lost his entire family, the duck, who is later renamed Joe by Arthur, mistakes the human for his mother and eagerly charmed by his new feathered friend, Arthur ignores his landlord’s rule of no animals or plants and takes him to his apartment.

In the first of several irresistibly sweet-natured and charming sequences, Arthur tries to adapt to the duck and become a good host for his roommate. Initially filling his floor with papers including comics Arthur assumes will amuse Joe, he soon gives up upon realizing Joe has a mind of his own. Having offered shelter, Arthur proceeds to look after the rest of Joe’s immediate needs, by trying to tempt him with a variety of edible treats from popcorn to salad until remembering the old adage that everyone likes bread. Entertaining Joe with a beloved Tchaikovsky record and an impromptu picnic, the two become fast friends and bunk buddies and the exceptionally lonely Arthur sums it up best when he tells Joe, “I’m really glad you’re here,” since it makes him feel like he is, too. Soon Joe grows into a bigger duck and, after developing an allergy problem, Arthur helps ease his roommate’s sinuses by bathing him with bath salts to cure a sneezing fit.

However, just as quickly as Arthur makes the impulsive decision to bring Joe into his solitary life, the lovable tone of the film is speedily abandoned in favor of cruelly depicted, forced satire, and unrelenting darkness after the landlord Arthur's known his entire life, evicts him from the apartment, sending Arthur and Joe to the streets. While their ultimate goal is to head for the sea, along the way adventures ensue.

Unfortunately, instead of continuing in the same nearly improvisational, friendly set-up Bettauer teased us with in Arthur’s one-on-one scenes with Joe, the film derails completely. Ultimately, the last hour of Duck evolves into a clichéd, stereotypical, and overly indulgent mess as they meet one dysfunctional, dissatisfied, and disturbed character after another who are all too eager to stand on a soapbox and give a lecture, recite a canned propagandist speech, to teach a lesson or invite Arthur to do the same.

Admirably shot in just eighteen days, Duck was inspired by the director’s commendable compassion for humanity, given her impressive history of volunteerism working with those less fortunate in the areas of suicide prevention, rehabilitation, and helping the mentally and terminally ill. And although her film opens with tremendous creative potential and benefits from a consummately professional leading performance by the gifted Philip Baker Hall (Hard Eight, Magnolia), who in the DVD interview likened his character to a mad King Lear and Sir Galahad, in the end he’s wasted by the poorly developed second and third act.

I can only blame the culprit of having the very best of intentions as ultimately Bettauer’s unable to let go of what she described in the press release as her overwhelming and worthwhile purpose to warn us “where we’re heading in the hopes of creating… change,” that she forgets to question whether or not it works as a film.

Regrettably, as Bettauer shares in the press notes her passionate belief that the “one thing many homeless hang onto, to fight boredom and pass the time of day, is the dying art of storytelling,” the end result feels like nothing more than a liberal propagandist piece. It’s a term I don’t throw around lightly, as a proud liberal in my own right and therefore one who really was hoping for the best. But instead of preaching to those she wants to entertain, she would’ve best served her purpose and aided those for whom she truly cares by offering a film that inspires rather than drains and tells a story rather than pushes the narrative arc so far off into the distance, that all that is left is political spin.

Despite this, she definitely earns points for her ability to take a cue from the tagline and “think outside the flock,” in her decision to write in a duck, being that a dog would’ve made a far more obvious sidekick for an unlikely buddy comedy drama. And in fact, charmingly, the DVD, which features not only commentary and interviews with Bettauer and Baker Hall as well as desktop downloads, a photo gallery, bios and more, offers some delightful accounts from the filmmaker and star about the challenges and joys in working with several unpredictable ducks.

However, in aspiring to offer us a story about hope, Bettauer ultimately could’ve learned a lesson from some of the more subtle, less-is-more, quirky, moral, independent comedies that celebrate humanity and tolerance such as Lars and the Real Girl and The Station Agent. As an old screenwriting professor used to say, movies are a “show me” medium as opposed to the “tell me” medium of literature, therefore it came as no surprise when I discovered that Bettauer decided to expand Duck by writing a novella based on her script and the resulting film.

Unfortunately, she didn’t differentiate between the two beforehand, for — in the end — the best way to move us is while utilizing the cinematic medium to show us “compassion” rather than simply quacking about it for ninety-eight minutes. And while aside from the opening half hour, I can’t recommend the film, I have no doubt that Duck -- which was best suited for the “tell me” medium all along — will make one excellent book, since in that medium quacking is not only encouraged but required.