The Social Network

Written at the time of the film's release...(although, here, outdated links have been deleted and more relevant ones have been inserted...and then, I'll post the thing on "Facebook"...which is so "Meta")

"Saving Facebook" ("Every Creation-Myth Needs a Devil")
or
"There's Somethin' Happenin' Here (What It Is Ain't Exactly Clear)"

"O wonder!
How many goodly creatures are there here!
How beautious mankind is!
O brave new world,
That has such people in't!" (The Tempest, Act V, Scene 1)

Maybe it is too early to make a movie about Facebook (out of MySpace and Friendster) and the ramifications of our Brave New World of cyber-relationships. Maybe it is a little too "street-corner sage" to predict The End of the World As We are Sorta Familiar With it (But Not Really...More Acquaintances, Really). But, it is interesting to see a story about the Frankenstein behind the Monster, if only to see how each reflects the other.

And even though we're secretly rooting for The Monster.

And, at this point in time, there isn't a better team to make The Social Network than Aaron Sorkin and David Fincher. Sorkin, the mad savant behind some of the better TV shows of the past decade and a half, has always written about people and their "issues," and how personality impacts policy. Fincher has matured from an ILM tech (who was happy to fly cameras through coffee-maker grips**) to an intricate observer of societal pressures on the psyche. For the two of them to make this particular story is a Friend Invitation made in Hollywood Heaven.  "Accept" it. But, you can't "Ignore" it.

The movie begins with a date going badly between Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg, late of many movies with "...land" in the title) Harvard wall-flower, and Erica Albright (Rooney Mara—she'll play Lisbeth Salander opposite Daniel Craig in Fincher's big-budget version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), an acquaintance. Anyone familiar with the machine-gun dialogue that writer Sorkin is known for, had better duck for cover—or wait for this on DVD so you can...play...it...slooooowly—for he now has an automatic weapon for a word-processor, and a co-conspirator in Eisenberg who can milk every nuance out of a line, despite hyperventilating it at debate-competition speed. His Zuckerberg is a "no Dolby/no squelch" type of unreadable conscience, and Eisenberg plays it with a deadness behind the eyes that interprets the world as a problem, if not necessarily a challenge. He's a bit too candid for a first date, and she stomps off, which sends him on a mission, simultaneously trashing her on his blog (LiveJournal) and culling the pictures of every woman on campus to create a "Who's Hotter" web-competition that becomes so popular so instantly that it crashes Harvard's web-infrastructure.

He becomes both famous and infamous for the stunt, guaranteeing he'll never get a date in college, and attracting the wrath of the college's board, and the interest of two preppies attempting to create an exclusionary social network on the web. He goes them several steps better, making a system open to everyone on campus that trumps their attempts, and as it gains "friends," expands throughout the college system.

Hindsight is 20/20, and Sorkin constructs the film as a series of depositions after the fact (of Facebook's success) as everyone who thinks they've been burned by Zuckerberg testifies to his vague promises and dealings under the table.*** Of course, they have every right to sue—but they'd only sue if "The Facebook" was a success—and the underpinnings and double-dealings don't resemble a fight for satisfaction, or a Noble Quest, so much as resembling a snake eating its own tail. ****

Which brings us back to Frankenstein and his Monster. The film itself is expertly done—it is a complicated story of hidden motivations and the presentation of masks before public faces—and Sorkin and Fincher manage to navigate us through the maze of the story, even though one feels there is no cheese at the end. The experience is a bit hollow, which may be a part of the point.

Because the Facebook experience is hollow, as well. As hollow as Zuckerberg, as portrayed in this film, is. While it is nice that one has the opportunity to "re-connect" with old friends in a virtual environment and satisfy everyone's need to (as one friend commented on blogging) "talk about what you had for lunch," one wonders why one has to re-connect at all...especially if the relationship wasn't maintained in the first place. Not enough time in the world to meet? Because a "real" relationship takes time, takes effort, "gets messy?" Facebook provides the illusion of "staying in touch," without actually touching. Like Zuckerberg's abortive "date," a lot of time is spent broadcasting, but not interacting.

There are, of course, exceptions. But the fact of the matter is Facebook's cyber-community is not a "Brave New World" at all. Just the opposite. It provides a substitute in lieu of commitment. A panacea in a life thought to be full to bursting and without risk. The most precious commodity we can give is time—slices of our lives and our selves. Facebook is a pacifier—a mass-Hallmark card that we can spend a few heart-beats picking out, and send away without a thought and not even sweat the cost of a stamp.

It soon becomes a numbers game—a collection, like the celebration of the 1,000,000th friend portrayed in the film. But who are those million people?  Facebook doesn't know or care. It's just a number. A number of casual relationships, that may lead to something else, but probably won't. A collection, nice to look at, but more often, ignored. Trophies, and ones that don't need to be polished or buffed up.

It's a new world of blithely arrested development, in the image of its creator, where love and commitment do not compute, and the only thing close to it is "hope"—translatable as keystroke F5.

* Except for some dodgy freezing breath-work, the biggest special effect will be invisible to you until the closing credits.  Nice.

** Personally, I'd like to get back all those hours spent on "ZooWorld."

*** An image that kept coming to mind every time I thought of writing this review, where it would subsequently be published...on B/C-L's's Facebook page.

The Lost Daughter

O Mother, Where Art Thou?

or

"They Really Put Us Through it, Huh?"
 

Leda Caruso (Olivia Colman) is on a "working holiday" in Greece and for awhile, it's quite idyllic. She has the beach to herself and time is not an issue. She works on her studies—she's a professor—and when she tires of that, she sleeps in the sun or goes floating. There is no intrusion on her time, and, for awhile, there's no intrusion on her solitude. At first, there's only Will (Paul Mescal), the resort "boy" whose job it is to be solicitous. He's useful, when you don't know where to get a glass of water or when he offers an ice treat. Then, there's Lyle (Ed Harris), an ex-pat American who owns the resort, and is your typical ex-pat—he's helpful but a little stand-offish. He likes things the way he has them, carved out a life for himself by carving out everything else, and is basically living in the "now." His "now." He has a past, but he's not going back to it.

And, for awhile, it's good. The weather is temperate, the water is warm. Oh, there's that annoying light house that, when conditions are right, slashes light into the night of a room and "whooms" so incessantly that you have to sleep with a pillow over your head to try and drown out the sound. But, responsibilities are few. With very few invasions of privacy, it's perfect.

It can't last. It might with somebody else, but not with Leda. Soon, a family from New York shows up at the resort, and, to her, it feels like an invasion. She watches them suspiciously, as they talk loud and curse casually. Vasilli (Panos Koronis) and his young wife Callie (Dagmara Dominczyk) are the ostensible heads of the family, but there's also Toni (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) and his wife Nina (Dakota Johnson) and their daughter Elena (Athena Martin Anderson). Things get off on the wrong foot when Callie asks Leda if she'll move to another lounge chair so the family can all be together and Leda haughtily refuses. There's a lot of stink-eyes and muttering just within ear-shot, but Leda has been eying the family before.

At the same time, Leda watches them—and director Maggie Gyllenhaal keeps us locked in on her point-of-view so that it almost becomes claustrophobic—she starts to think back to when she was a young mother (Jessie Buckley takes over as Leda at this point) with two small girls. Two very needy little girls that tax Leda's time and her patience, taking her away from her translation work which takes a lot of concentration. There are little parallels between what she sees and what she remembers. And she catches every nuance of Nina's interaction with her child—the hesitations, the annoyances, the impatience, the reluctant giving-in—all to which she can relate.

Leda's "Kravitzing" does have a good result; when Nina is distracted by something, little Elena goes missing, and the family starts to panic, freaking out rather than trying to figure out where Elena could have wandered off. They're not organized at all. Leda, seeing Nina's distress and remembering a time when she experienced the same thing, assists in the search, and ultimately does find Elena to the relief and gratitude of the family. The earlier touchiness evaporates and Leda is empathetic enough that the family fairly embraces her. Nina, in particular, is drawn to Leda, seeing her as a kindred spirit who understands the pressures and toils of raising young kids. She does. But, Leda's approach is to internalize it as a burden, one that can come to a breaking point if allowed to fester.

Thank God for Olivia Colman. The Lost Daughter would be a very tough slog if it weren't for the excellent work done by her and the rest of the cast. Not that the movie is dull. It's that you have to spend so much time in Leda's head. It's a situation shared with the character. Leda is so internalized that there shouldn't be much of an exterior at all. All that studying, translating, her inner life is so much more fascinating to her than her external one. But, she indulges it to the detriment of those around her, be they friends, colleagues...family. And her obvious grasping for approval in the young Leda scenes contrasts with the less satisfying, messy, chaotic world of raising a child. Who gets acclaim for that?

It's a tough thing to raise children. It is not easy and there can't be a consistent plan or syllabus to cling to. So, Leda lives her life in her head, playing mind-games with herself and others, just her against the world. At times you see what the character is doing and wonder why on Earth do that? I have suspicions—which have to do with control and punishment and teaching lessons—but to delve deeper would be to take some of the shocks out of it, and deprive the viewer of questions that will inevitably arise.

And that would be a pity because Colman wears Leda's neurosis so much on her sleeve that it's fascinating to see her mercurial performance playing across her face. At times, you're aware that not even she understands why she does what she does and the film becomes less about the issues she has with the world than about her own, and how she imposes them on the world, with the inevitable consequences, intended or otherwise, that become self-fulfilled prophecies. It's a psychological adjunct to all those Kubrick movies where smart people make bad choices, intellect be damned, and gives truth to the old saw that people can be too smart for their own good.

 

It's like the thing I read on Twitter today that was attributed to Nicola Tesla: “One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite insane.” The Lost Daughter walks that razor edge, fortunately, with Olivia Colman's nimbleness.

Black Mass (2015)

Alliance
or
The Flea-Bitten Bulger Instigation

The old saying goes that if you lie down with dogs, you wake up with fleas. Black Mass tells the story of how misguided loyalty can make a hash of good intentions when combined with vicious ambition and the manipulations of psychopathy.

It tells the mostly true story of a "Southie" law enforcement officer, John Connolly (Joel Edgerton) in the Boston racketeering unit of the FBI. The focus of their investigation was La Cosa Nostra—the Mafia—but there was a rival Irish mob called the Winter Hill gang, that was composed of a second-generation gang of street toughs who supplanted their bosses after they were convicted of gambling and bookmaking. This group expanded into drugs and money-laundering by expanding their reach out of state, while concentrating on eliminating any rivals in the local area. They weren't that "much," until Connolly used them to break up the Italians, protecting them from prosecution or investigation, leaving the Irish to fill the void left by the Mob and increase their influence and profits.

One of them stood out—Jimmy "Whitey" Bulger (played here by Johnny Depp) had done a stretch in Atlanta Penitentiary and Alcatraz and came back to Boston with an increased ruthlessness that was indiscriminate in who it targeted. It didn't matter if you a rival or part of the gang, if you looked at Bulger funny it was a death sentence. One of the ironic things about the story is that Bulger's older brother William (played in the film by Benedict Cumberbatch) was a fixture in Boston politics, a state Senator who would become Senator Majority Leader and President of the State Senate while his brother was essentially the power behind the most ruthless organized crime mob in his district. It is through William that Connolly reaches out to Jimmy agreeing to what semantically they agree to call "an alliance"—Whitey will give them pertinent information about the Angiulo mob, while Connolly provides interference with the feds' finding out about Bulger's activities. It's not being an informant, it's not "snitching," it's doing each other turns that will be mutually beneficial and helping a fellow local advance in their respective fields. One hand washes the other. But one of them is soaked in blood.

The film is told in chronological order in the form of deposition interviews with captured members of the Winter Hill Gang, presumably in an ongoing investigation into the whereabouts of Bulger who skipped town just as he was about to be arrested by the Bureau. Although the crimes and "hits" are the most inflammatory of the incidents in the movie, it runs a parallel path of telling Bulger's story of how he increased his stranglehold on crime and the Boston area to the point where he thought he was untouchable.

Absolute power corrupts absolutely...but if you're corrupt to begin with?

So, how's the film?  Not bad, actually. It may remind one of Martin Scorsese's The Departed (a film I didn't particularly like, but it did give Scorsese his first Oscar for directing so that's significant) which was a remake of the Japanese Infernal Affairs (and actually the series of Infernal Affairs movies, which, in turn, was inspired by Scorsese's gangster films) but incorporated the Irish mob of Bulger (with Jack Nicholson's Frank Costello inspired by the erratic Bulger) as the center of the gang activities. The Departed told the story of two informants—one for the police, one for the mob—that did a deadly dance around each other, trying to keep their identities hidden. There are no such complications in Black Mass. There's the mob and the FBI and they have "an understanding" to cooperate as long as they stay out of each others' way. Bulger can reveal Connolly's "deal" at any time; Connolly can merely choose to renege on his deal and let the FBI do its job. But, for neighborhood loyalty, and a chance to advance each other's careers, the "alliance" is allowed to proceed.

Connolly's immediate boss (David Harbour) goes along with the idea, but the division head (Kevin Bacon) has several degrees of misgivings about it and wants to keep Connolly—and Bulger—on a very short leash. With Connolly's co-workers running interference, the FBI manages to take down the Angiulo mob in what is seen as a triumph, which only cements the unholy deal between Bulger and law enforcement. Even though the Angiulo ledger gets erased, Bulger's Winter Hill gang starts to rise in power, with a sharp spike in protection...by murder. Bulger's grab for power isn't subtle, and pretty soon the body count rises precipitously, with no regard to any consideration other than "you shouldn't've crossed Whitey." Only until a new broom Boston prosecutor (Corey Stoll) comes to town does the tangled web start to unravel and the truth comes out.

The strength of the film comes from the script (by Mark Mallouk and Jez Butterworth) which manages to keep a very complicated story simple and on-the-rails and in several key performances, the most prominent of them being Johnny Depp's. For fans of Depp, it may not be an entirely enjoyable experience. The chiseled pretty boy, that always seems to be below the surface no matter how elaborate his make-up, is gone. The high cheekbones and shaved hair gives it the appearance of a skull, and every time Depp shows off his teeth, there's an elaborate dental prosthetic that completely deglamorizes Depp, something he rarely does—even his John Dillinger in Public Enemies didn't mess with his looks. 

It's a steel controlled performance, that in its quieter more threatening moments, has more than a suggestion of older, restrained Jack Nicholson to it. It's in marked contrast to most of the other actors'—chief among them Cumberbatch and Edgerton—whose performances are a bit too "brahd" due to their florid "Bahston" accents that seem to travel all over Massachusettes. But Harbour, Stoll and especially Peter Sarsgaard, manage to seal the truth of their performances without worrying about whether they sound like townies. 

There's one scene in particular that works like gangbusters in showing the creepy malevolence of the situation, especially when dealing with a manipulator like Bulger. At one point, Harbour and Edgerton's agents are having a sit-down dinner with Bulger and his lieutenant, a little meet-and-greet among collaborators. The conversation (which is the basis of the preview clip below) turns to the meal and there's a palpable malevolence to the performances that turns casual conversation into threat—a little demonstration of what the consequences might be if Bulger decides that his "good buddies" might have any doubts about their conspiracy of silence. It's in small moments like it where Black Mass rises above its cops-and-robbers roots.

Fifty Shades of Grey

Grey's Anatomy
or
"OK, Where the Hell Did You Put the Key to the Handcuffs?"

So, okay, how is it?  

Short answer: surprisingly not bad. Certainly not as bad as I thought it would be. With this sort of material, the result can either be ludicrous or hilarious, evoking contempt or snickers. Fifty Shades of Grey did neither. Nor (boys), did it turn me on, in any way, shape or form.

But, also, it was not what I expected. Fifty Shades of Grey is a variation of the Harlequin Romance (of which I've never been a fan), a soft-core modern version of the Princess fairy tales, albeit with whips and bondage (didn't all those handsome princes live in castles and all of them had dungeons?). The Harlequins have a standard road map that is well-trod: capable but insecure woman finds herself in new surroundings, encounters a male of the species, capable but secure—that is, until he encounters this woman of said species. The two then cross paths in which they meet, engage, disengage, trade doubts, insecurities, and misunderstandings of each other and themselves until circumstances are made understandable and the road to romance is removed of barriers, mental and physical. FSoG follows this pattern, but (evidently) does so over three books, with ever-increasing complications that seem to have come from American soap operas. No doubt, the film-makers will split the third into two movies, padding it out with dwarves and protracted battles involving giant beasts.  
Anastasia Steele (Dakota Johnson), virginal student at Wazzu (Vancouver Branch—you know it's some kind of fairy tale, as there aren't any virgins at Wazzu) does her journalism student room-mate (going to the Edward R. Murrow School of Communications?) a favor by driving to Seattle* to interview young business tycoon Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan). It's never made clear what he is a tycoon of, but his office artwork suggests it has something to do with pandas or inkblots. All of his office workers appear to be Hitchcock blondes, right down to the gray suits.

Steele and Grey (notice the names—they're meant to be together) meet cute—she trips and face plants upon first entering his clean minimalist office (we're spared his quipping "Thanks for dropping in...") and the interview begins. She, of course, doesn't have a pen (or a laptop?—she's an English major, for godssake!) He gives her one with no snarky or suggestive comments. 

Grey is intense (you can tell because Dornan keeps his eyes creepily wide and locked like they were super-glued in his skull) and he often derails the interview with persistent questions (he is the one being interviewed) like about Anastasia's major: "What made you an English major—Jane Austen, Thomas Hardy or Charlotte Bronte?" If she were a real English major, she would have replied "What's the difference?" But give Grey points for being comfortable in his own fictional milieu.

He's sensitive (he really, really is) and he'd like to make you MORE sensitive

This is why I liked FSoG (of all the movies I saw this week, despite their pedigree)—it's smart enough to know it's dumb, it knows the genre, knows the tropes, and tosses in some nice visual sub-text to enhance it (that pen, the overabundance of flying scenes, the use of elevators, especially doors, for sexual metaphor). For the visual touches, credit Sam Taylor-Johnson (she made the quite good "Young John Lennon" bio-pic Nowhere Boy) for having fun with the material and lightening up her actors; Johnson is your typical awkward Cinderella, but not enough to evoke derision from the audience, and her character has a significant spine, and Dornan does eventually warm up and finds some casual humor in his scenes with her, but still suffers from disconnect when he has to express any ardor. His is the part of the "unknowable" man of mystery (which is romance-speak for your typically inconsistent male), although what's really unknowable is how he came to be more neurotic than Steele.** That is a bit refreshing, as it upends the traditional fairy tale so that the maiden saves the prince (or I'm giving the writer too much credit), rather than him trapping her in his castle...and, you know, dungeons?

Give the movie points, though, for having some fun with this stuff. For instance, Grey, once he targets Steele as a potential "partner" draws up a non-disclosure agreement ("no talking" and presumably—like most NDA's—she can't get in a relationship with anyone for a year after they break up) and a Terms and Conditions contract in which limits are set before entering into any sort of agreement. This sets up a mock-serious "Business Meeting" that is hilarious in its dialogue, before getting down to brass tacks (no, those aren't used) and the movie turns serious-serious with misunderstandings and mixed signals.

But, one wonders how all of this started.*** Is bondage "play" that popular, or is it just a thrill to read about it, like vampire novels and zombie shows. Does anyone buy into the pain-for-pleasure garbage (which is a given in "The Story of O" and "Emmanuelle" movies) which sounds like just a defense tactic for NFL abuse charges. Violence against women turns my stomach, especially if it's done "for love." This causes the movie to fall apart in the last twenty minutes or so, over a misunderstanding over the T's and C's, and the reality of just what they entail.

I can't be too delicate about the details: Steele and Grey agree to a spanking session with a belt. She says "yes." He re-iterates the "safe" words when she wants to stop—"yellow" for when things get too rough and "red" when she wants to stop. They begin, her counting off the blows (there are 13). It is, of course, traumatic and they stop. Grey tries to comfort her and she turns on him: "Don't you touch me!" The "relationship" breaks up over this.  

For him, it's a case of confusion—she had the "safe" words and didn't use them. For her, it's not confusing at all—yes, she had the "safe" words and (yes) she agreed to it, acquiesced to it (for whatever reason) but expected him to stop of his own volition, empathy, or conscience. He would have stopped (presumably) if she used the "safe" word, but she expects him to read her mind, her mood, her tears, and "be the man," and do the right thing. At least, the thing that would require him to man up and think beyond himself. Perhaps too much for her to expect given his proclivities, but you see where this is going. She's trying to "save" him from his indulgences, maiden to prince, and bring him to a normalcy. But, the first round is a big "fail," and she exits through those shuttering elevator doors, a clear visual "no" as the movies can present. The situation is unseemly, but I like that the character makes that choice, however too-optimistic her expectations may be. You find positive messages in all sorts of weird places.

And (if I may be indulged) can I venture to critique Grey's technique (beyond the kinky stuff)? There's no finesse, no foreplay, no interaction, it's just too direct and ham-fisted. His spanking (with hands) has no snap to it. Nothing has any "snap" to it. Verdict: the movie Christian Grey is no fun in bed. If I were her, I'd throw his own (borrowed) line back at him.

"Laters, baby."

* Well, it's Seattle in the aerial shots—you can tell because it's gray and traffic-jammed—the rest of it was filmed in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, Seattle's cheaper stand-in, as downtown Seattle doesn't have any curved streets, but is on a strict, though slightly cattywampus grid, and because Anastasia is able to find actual parking on the street.

** Apparently, given the next two books in the series, it's because he is less than neurotic or vengefully insane than everybody else in the world.

*** It started as "Twilight" fan-fiction, evidently, that was posted to a site for such things (until author Stephanie Meyer asked for it to be removed), then, after characters and situations altered in a comprehensive re-write, made it's way to e-books and self-publishing before become a phenom'.