"The things you're most afraid of have already happened."
Showing posts with label robin williams. Show all posts
Showing posts with label robin williams. Show all posts
Apr 26, 2014
Jan 9, 2014
UNSUNG HORRORS: THE NIGHT LISTENER
Every once in a while, a genuinely great horror movie—one that would rightfully be considered a classic, had it gotten more exposure and love at the box office—makes an appearance. It comes, no one notices, and it goes. But movies like this are important. They need to be treasured and remembered. If intelligent, original horror is supported, then that's what we'll begin to receive, in droves. We need to make these movies a part of the legendary genre we hold so dear. Because these are the unsung horrors. These are the movies that should have been successful, but were instead ignored. They should be rightfully praised for the freshness and intelligence and craft that they have contributed to our genre.
So, better late than never, we’re going to celebrate them now… one at a time.
Dir. Patrick Stettner
2006
Miramax / IFC Films
United States
“You're the kind of guy who needs proof. The hell of it is, we're only as loved as we think we are.”
We so often see “based on a true story” splashed across marketing efforts for genre films being released even today that it’s almost become a cliché. Not helping is that films using this claim have become increasingly absurd to the point that when we see that “true story” disclaimer, we’ve begun to accept it as the complete opposite. Even The Conjuring – a film I admittedly loved – exploited that pledge of authenticity. After all, since Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson were playing real people who really existed and who really investigate(d) paranormal phenomenon, I suppose they were right to cover every inch of their trailers and posters with the words “true story.” But when does that become a fair marketing ploy? What makes “it” a true story? That it actually happened, or that someone merely claimed it did?
What if it’s both?
That’s The Night Listener.
Robin Williams plays Gabriel Noone, a celebrated author and host of a late-night radio show called Noone at Night. Things aren’t going so well for him, as he’s currently separated from his longtime partner Jess (the always wonderful Bobby Canavale) and this separation is severely affecting his ability to continue on with his show. Instead, he dives headfirst into his work, trying to find something to distract him. Ashe (Joe Morton), a literary publisher and friend of Gabriel's, gives him a raw, unpublished manuscript; written by a teenage boy named Pete (Rory Culkin), it is a recounting of the disgusting abuse he suffered at the hands of his biological parents – his being forced to “star” in dozens of videos in which he was raped by friends of his parents. Riddled with disease following his abuse, Pete only has a couple months left to live, and in the meantime has been adopted by his social worker, Donna Logand (Toni Collete). Gabriel and Pete share an unlikely but sweet bond. Gabriel offers fatherly advice when he can, and Pete describes his day-to-day trials and tribulations of his hospital life. The two trade letters and phone calls, (ahem...Playboys), and talk smack on each other – just how friends would. Gabriel even receives a photo of Pete in a red sweater and simple bluejeans, finally giving a face to the name.
After Gabriel corresponds regularly with Pete and Donna on the phone for over a year – a year! – Jess hears Donna and Pete talk over speakerphone and plants a seed in Gabriel’s head that sets The Night Listener’s events in motion: Jess is pretty confident that Pete and Donna are the same person – that Donna is fucking with Gabriel’s mind, going at great lengths to convince him that Pete is real. Gabriel becomes obsessed with discovering the truth: if Pete Logand actually exists, or if Gabriel is one of the many victims of a psychologically unstable charlatan desperate for attention and trying to escape a history of abuse that perhaps did happen after all.
There are dozens of people who know them.
Doctors. There's a nurse who comes and stays at the house.
What about the photo?
There's ways to prove this...
Echoing what I said in my Unsung Horrors write-up for Insomnia, I love it when Robin Williams goes serious. With that, this, and One Hour Photo, Williams has consistently proven he can do dark drama just as easily as comedy (and far better). I wish I knew what it was about him as a performer that allows him to carefully shed the manic screwball persona he's had since the days of "Mork & Mindy" so I could more ably analyze what it is about him I love, but I've got nothing. The guy just is – he's just as at-home bouncing off the walls and doing his army of weird (kinda stupid) voices as he is using just his eyes and his sad smile to convey a hundred different emotions at once. He's so good, and perhaps underrated, though thankfully filmmakers keep giving him the chance to defy convention and go for the throat. It's resulted in one much deserved Oscar for the actor already (for Good Will Hunting).
It's difficult to applaud young Rory for his role as Pete, as he hardly ever appears on screen. Because of the whole "is he/isn't he real?" approach, it was wise to limit his physical appearance, except in scenes in which he is corresponding with Gabriel over the phone, and Gabriel is using his imagination to fill in the gaps and paint this picture of Pete he's attempting to assemble using random bits of information gleamed from their conversations. Most of his "presence" is his voice on the phone, and the filmmakers do a great job of switching back and forth between Culkin and Toni Collete, making us unsure as to who is who, and when.
The Night Listener, however, is Toni Collete's film. She really is a powerhouse here – one minute she has our every sympathy, and the next we can't stand seeing how far she's willing to perpetuate her lie; at times we're nearly demanding the truth because we just can't take it anymore. "You've got a fucking lie for everything," Gabriel even tells Donna in an ugly confrontation. If it is a very unglamorous role. Her clothes are too big and her hair is greasy. Her "blind look," consisting of thick sunglasses, foggy blue contact lenses, and unkempt appearance create the look of a shut-in – one who never ventures out except to visit her normal stops and collect the sympathies of the folks in town who know her. She spends most of her role asking for and inviting this sympathy, but when she wants to be scary, she can be scary. I'll point to the scene towards the end in which Donna teases Gabriel with the "ending" his story requires and lures him to a motel – this after after she's emptied her Wisconsin house and moved, unable to be found. As he cowers in a dark corner and watches her leave, she slowly turns to look – look – at him out of the corner of her eye, as planes at the nearby airport scream in the background.
Chills every time.
Besides for “based on a true story,” another oft-overused and sometimes completely inappropriate phrase that inundates genre film marketing, once a critic utters the magic words, are “a Hitchcockian thriller.” If said phrase were reserved for actual students of Hitchcock, like Brian De Palma, or Richard Franklin, it could be forgiven. I think critics sometime forget that Hitchcock wasn’t just a storyteller, but a pretty renowned and stylistic director, too, which means it’s nonsense to describe any film that has a mystery as “Hitchcockian.” Cases involving mistaken identity, femme fatales, or quirky and potentially dangerous leads are hallmarks of Hitchcock filmography, let’s not shit ourselves, but that still doesn’t give you the right to label any old thing with the master’s name. Just because you can locate the most tenuous connection between a modern film’s gimmick and tie it back to that same trope once utilized by Hitchcock himself – sorry – that doesn’t suddenly mean the new Liam Neeson film in which he tears across Berlin kicking ass and trying to remember his name is a Hitchcockian thriller.
Even when filmmakers subject audiences to a story not as compelling as it should be, I am always struck much more by said filmmakers’ abilities to successfully channel the look and feel of a Hitchcock film. De Palma, no matter how outlandish his films have become, has this down in spades. He likely created the ultimate homage to Hitchcock with his 1992 film Raising Cain, turning John Lithgow into a psycho long before "Dexter" ever did. The Night Listener director Patrick Stettner seems a student of Hitchcock, but perhaps in less an obvious way. I love that a film with so much character interaction is still experienced solely through Gabriel's eyes and brought to life through his imagination. When Gabriel pictures Pete during a phone call, the boy is wearing the red sweater and bluejeans he's also wearing in his photo. And the first time Gabriel speaks to Donna, she doesn't have a face until Pete jokes that he's "got a thing for redheads" – and that's when we first see Donna, red hair and all. It's subtle, but effective if you realize the trick.
Every inch of The Night Listener is drenched in cold and pale tones. Effortlessly, it ups the bleak quotient and decreases any feelings of hope or joy. Pretty appropriate for a film in which not just Gabriel, and not just Gabriel's friends, but even a small Wisconsin town all fall victim to the lies of a deeply troubled woman. And every single one of them were in a small way guilty of helping to spread the lies and bring them legitimacy. It's interesting in that it forces us to take a step back and consider just how many things we hear on a day-to-day basis are actually falsities – either big or small – and how often we repeat them without actually knowing the truth.
So, better late than never, we’re going to celebrate them now… one at a time.
Dir. Patrick Stettner2006
Miramax / IFC Films
United States
“You're the kind of guy who needs proof. The hell of it is, we're only as loved as we think we are.”
We so often see “based on a true story” splashed across marketing efforts for genre films being released even today that it’s almost become a cliché. Not helping is that films using this claim have become increasingly absurd to the point that when we see that “true story” disclaimer, we’ve begun to accept it as the complete opposite. Even The Conjuring – a film I admittedly loved – exploited that pledge of authenticity. After all, since Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson were playing real people who really existed and who really investigate(d) paranormal phenomenon, I suppose they were right to cover every inch of their trailers and posters with the words “true story.” But when does that become a fair marketing ploy? What makes “it” a true story? That it actually happened, or that someone merely claimed it did?
What if it’s both?
That’s The Night Listener.
Robin Williams plays Gabriel Noone, a celebrated author and host of a late-night radio show called Noone at Night. Things aren’t going so well for him, as he’s currently separated from his longtime partner Jess (the always wonderful Bobby Canavale) and this separation is severely affecting his ability to continue on with his show. Instead, he dives headfirst into his work, trying to find something to distract him. Ashe (Joe Morton), a literary publisher and friend of Gabriel's, gives him a raw, unpublished manuscript; written by a teenage boy named Pete (Rory Culkin), it is a recounting of the disgusting abuse he suffered at the hands of his biological parents – his being forced to “star” in dozens of videos in which he was raped by friends of his parents. Riddled with disease following his abuse, Pete only has a couple months left to live, and in the meantime has been adopted by his social worker, Donna Logand (Toni Collete). Gabriel and Pete share an unlikely but sweet bond. Gabriel offers fatherly advice when he can, and Pete describes his day-to-day trials and tribulations of his hospital life. The two trade letters and phone calls, (ahem...Playboys), and talk smack on each other – just how friends would. Gabriel even receives a photo of Pete in a red sweater and simple bluejeans, finally giving a face to the name.
After Gabriel corresponds regularly with Pete and Donna on the phone for over a year – a year! – Jess hears Donna and Pete talk over speakerphone and plants a seed in Gabriel’s head that sets The Night Listener’s events in motion: Jess is pretty confident that Pete and Donna are the same person – that Donna is fucking with Gabriel’s mind, going at great lengths to convince him that Pete is real. Gabriel becomes obsessed with discovering the truth: if Pete Logand actually exists, or if Gabriel is one of the many victims of a psychologically unstable charlatan desperate for attention and trying to escape a history of abuse that perhaps did happen after all.
There are dozens of people who know them.
Who?
You've only been told that.
It could be anybody.
Echoing what I said in my Unsung Horrors write-up for Insomnia, I love it when Robin Williams goes serious. With that, this, and One Hour Photo, Williams has consistently proven he can do dark drama just as easily as comedy (and far better). I wish I knew what it was about him as a performer that allows him to carefully shed the manic screwball persona he's had since the days of "Mork & Mindy" so I could more ably analyze what it is about him I love, but I've got nothing. The guy just is – he's just as at-home bouncing off the walls and doing his army of weird (kinda stupid) voices as he is using just his eyes and his sad smile to convey a hundred different emotions at once. He's so good, and perhaps underrated, though thankfully filmmakers keep giving him the chance to defy convention and go for the throat. It's resulted in one much deserved Oscar for the actor already (for Good Will Hunting).
It's difficult to applaud young Rory for his role as Pete, as he hardly ever appears on screen. Because of the whole "is he/isn't he real?" approach, it was wise to limit his physical appearance, except in scenes in which he is corresponding with Gabriel over the phone, and Gabriel is using his imagination to fill in the gaps and paint this picture of Pete he's attempting to assemble using random bits of information gleamed from their conversations. Most of his "presence" is his voice on the phone, and the filmmakers do a great job of switching back and forth between Culkin and Toni Collete, making us unsure as to who is who, and when.
The Night Listener, however, is Toni Collete's film. She really is a powerhouse here – one minute she has our every sympathy, and the next we can't stand seeing how far she's willing to perpetuate her lie; at times we're nearly demanding the truth because we just can't take it anymore. "You've got a fucking lie for everything," Gabriel even tells Donna in an ugly confrontation. If it is a very unglamorous role. Her clothes are too big and her hair is greasy. Her "blind look," consisting of thick sunglasses, foggy blue contact lenses, and unkempt appearance create the look of a shut-in – one who never ventures out except to visit her normal stops and collect the sympathies of the folks in town who know her. She spends most of her role asking for and inviting this sympathy, but when she wants to be scary, she can be scary. I'll point to the scene towards the end in which Donna teases Gabriel with the "ending" his story requires and lures him to a motel – this after after she's emptied her Wisconsin house and moved, unable to be found. As he cowers in a dark corner and watches her leave, she slowly turns to look – look – at him out of the corner of her eye, as planes at the nearby airport scream in the background.
Chills every time.
Besides for “based on a true story,” another oft-overused and sometimes completely inappropriate phrase that inundates genre film marketing, once a critic utters the magic words, are “a Hitchcockian thriller.” If said phrase were reserved for actual students of Hitchcock, like Brian De Palma, or Richard Franklin, it could be forgiven. I think critics sometime forget that Hitchcock wasn’t just a storyteller, but a pretty renowned and stylistic director, too, which means it’s nonsense to describe any film that has a mystery as “Hitchcockian.” Cases involving mistaken identity, femme fatales, or quirky and potentially dangerous leads are hallmarks of Hitchcock filmography, let’s not shit ourselves, but that still doesn’t give you the right to label any old thing with the master’s name. Just because you can locate the most tenuous connection between a modern film’s gimmick and tie it back to that same trope once utilized by Hitchcock himself – sorry – that doesn’t suddenly mean the new Liam Neeson film in which he tears across Berlin kicking ass and trying to remember his name is a Hitchcockian thriller.
Even when filmmakers subject audiences to a story not as compelling as it should be, I am always struck much more by said filmmakers’ abilities to successfully channel the look and feel of a Hitchcock film. De Palma, no matter how outlandish his films have become, has this down in spades. He likely created the ultimate homage to Hitchcock with his 1992 film Raising Cain, turning John Lithgow into a psycho long before "Dexter" ever did. The Night Listener director Patrick Stettner seems a student of Hitchcock, but perhaps in less an obvious way. I love that a film with so much character interaction is still experienced solely through Gabriel's eyes and brought to life through his imagination. When Gabriel pictures Pete during a phone call, the boy is wearing the red sweater and bluejeans he's also wearing in his photo. And the first time Gabriel speaks to Donna, she doesn't have a face until Pete jokes that he's "got a thing for redheads" – and that's when we first see Donna, red hair and all. It's subtle, but effective if you realize the trick.
Every inch of The Night Listener is drenched in cold and pale tones. Effortlessly, it ups the bleak quotient and decreases any feelings of hope or joy. Pretty appropriate for a film in which not just Gabriel, and not just Gabriel's friends, but even a small Wisconsin town all fall victim to the lies of a deeply troubled woman. And every single one of them were in a small way guilty of helping to spread the lies and bring them legitimacy. It's interesting in that it forces us to take a step back and consider just how many things we hear on a day-to-day basis are actually falsities – either big or small – and how often we repeat them without actually knowing the truth.
The Night Listener is about escapism, and what we're willing to do and say – to ourselves and to each other – to perpetuate a lie and try to make things less unbearable. Jess confronts Gabriel in the film and demands he tell him where the couple were when Jess told Gabriel he was HIV-positive. Gabriel responds, "in the park in front of the guys playing drums." The real place was a crummy diner somewhere in the city. But Gabriel's version was more romantic, and it reads better on paper. A white lie, perhaps, but a lie all the same. Perhaps more telling, there's a scene on the plane while Gabriel is flying out to give Pete and Donna a surprise visit – fed up with the excuses being lobbed his way about why his previous invitation to visit them is being constantly rain-checked. Gabriel's seat mate on the plane asks him the purpose of his visit. Gabriel responds he's flying out to visit family: his son. Because he needs this. Now that Jess needs Gabriel a little less, Gabriel needs this idea of a new family more. It's no longer fact-checking the events of a pretty horrifying book – it's yearning for family, and not wanting to believe that's the last thing waiting for him at the airline's departure gate.
We tell lies because they're preferable to the truth, but sometimes we tell lies because the truth is just too painful to endure. We all wish we could live in the fantasy world we create for ourselves perhaps for only minute at a time – where the person for whom we pine wants us just as much, or the struggles we daily face are no longer existent. While nearly none of us are willing to hold onto lies and bring them to artificial life like Donna Logand, the only thing stopping us is a lack of conviction and the imagination to do so. And that's kind of scary.
Jun 27, 2013
UNSUNG HORRORS: INSOMNIA
Every once in a while, a genuinely great horror movie—one that would rightfully be considered a classic, had it gotten more exposure and love at the box office—makes an appearance. It comes, no one notices, and it goes. But movies like this are important. They need to be treasured and remembered. If intelligent, original horror is supported, then that's what we'll begin to receive, in droves. We need to make these movies a part of the legendary genre we hold so dear. Because these are the unsung horrors. These are the movies that should have been successful, but were instead ignored. They should be rightfully praised for the freshness and intelligence and craft that they have contributed to our genre.
So, better late than never, we’re going to celebrate them now… one at a time.
Dir. Christopher Nolan
2002
Warner Bros.
United States
"A good cop can't sleep because a piece of the puzzle is missing. A bad cop can't sleep because his guilty conscience won't let him."
Even to those who don't speak in film, Christopher Nolan, by now, must be a household name. His reformation of the Batman series, mixed with the storm-taking Inception, has proven he is a powerhouse. He is a man who has somehow mastered wowing both critics and audiences, reveling in their kind praise and their hard-earned dollars. His films are gorgeous, brooding, and filled with the kind of thought and reverence for genuine human emotion that many other filmmakers take for granted. If I were to tell you that his most unheralded film (perhaps even lesser known than his debut feature Following), was his best, you would not believe me. You may even argue with me. But there's no arguing when I tell you that this sleepy remake of the 1997 Swedish film of the same name is, by far, my favorite of his films. And that's saying lot, considering the man is also responsible for The Prestige and Memento, along with the before-mentioned Dark Knight trilogy (third chapter notwithstanding).
After busting onto the scene with his second film, the mind-busting, non-linear Memento, Warner Bros. wanted to be in the Christopher Nolan business. With so many filmmakers of varying pedigree being assigned remakes of notable genre offerings during this time, Nolan signed on to direct (and perform an uncredited pass on the screenplay) of what would become Insomnia, a story of an unsolved murder in Nightmute, Alaska, a Los Angeles robbery and homicide detective (Al Pacino) brought onto the case in order to keep him away from the internal affairs investigation currently looking into his department, that same detective's honorable partner (Martin Donovan), and a small-town investigator in awe of the famed detective's career (Hilary Swank). Causing all this bloody ruckus is a small-time novelist and all-around murderer (Robin Williams), whose shy and quiet manner hides something far worse. The case seems routine until the investigation begins, and layer after layer is peeled back, revealing that nearly every single one of our characters has a secret they are keeping from everyone else. While these secrets pertain to careers, loyalty, or their very freedoms, it all soon comes tumbling down, bringing everyone down with it.
With respect to an admittedly living legend, Insomnia is Al Pacino's last great performance. His Will Dormer exists in a period of his career, following 1992's Scent of a Woman where he won the Oscar for shouting all the time, in which he...still shouted all the time. "Hey, they must like it!" he must have thought at that time. After a while, however, the very dynamic and hand-gesture loving Pacino starts to disintegrate as his lack of sleep begins to creep up on him. He starts to loose his mind, hallucinate, throw furniture against the window to block out that awful impenetrable Alaskan light. Everyday mundane things like a oscillating desk fan or windshield wipers have the power to unsettle him. (We've all pulled all-nighters at some point - it's a wonder what a lack of sleep will do to the human mind.) His voice grows weary and weak. He becomes exhausted - to the point it sounds as if he's using his voice for the first time. (Count how many times a character asks him if he's getting any sleep.) It's one of the best examples of a character's methodical destruction, and we witness it steadily. Aiding this is the lack of clear timeline. We know for how long Will spends in Alaska (six days - without sleep), but we never get a clear sense of what time of day it is. This is established in the beginning when Dormer requests to pull the murder victim's boyfriend out of class to question him, and he's told it's actually ten o'clock...at night. Something as simple as not knowing what time it is - if it's day or night, early morning or nearing midnight - is enough to set the audience on edge and fuck with their equilibrium. So imagine what poor Dormer must be going through with no sleep, a guilty mind, and a murderer on the loose.
A purposeful choice made early on, though at what point I couldn't say, effort is made to imagine Will Dormer as a less confrontational character with whom to sympathize. For those who have seen the original Swedish film, you'll remember that Stellan Skarsgård's iteration of the character was certainly darker. Granted, Pacino isn't exactly the most noble of investigators - especially during his interrogation scenes - but Skarsgård nearly dared you to root for him. (Quick example: Al Pacino shoots a dead dog to catch a sample bullet from his gun; Stellan Skarsgård shoots a live one.) Pacino plays it right down the middle: bad enough to not entirely trust, but good enough to know he's the one you want to see come out on top. In the final act, where he bares his soul to a nearly perfect stranger, he is no longer his larger-than life persona. He is a small man, withered from guilt and lack of sleep, with his biggest task still in front of him.
Between this and One Hour Photo, one thing is clear: Robin Williams is fucking amazing at playing a psycho. He was never a person for whom I much cared or had much respect. As a comedian, for which he was most famous, I found him painfully unfunny, so why should I have cared? But here, he is super duper creepy. With Walter Finch, Williams finds a way to offer a wide-eyed stare, hands folded, looking entirely innocent but out-of-his-mind guilty simultaneously. His performance is somewhat reminiscent of Kevin Spacey's John Doe from Seven, but certainly not as operatic or over the top. Even as he explains, in bits and pieces, what really happened, you can see him working it around in his mind, as if he's also trying to figure out how the fuck it all led to this. Things had started off so promising for him and for the girl whom he thought liked him - how could she be like that? How could she treat him in such a way after he had consoled her, showered her with gifts, and loved her?
The supporting cast are mostly great, the only side-step being Hilary Swank as Ellie Burr. Swank is normally a great actress, but she's a bit too Family-Von Trapp-ish here, filled with gee-gosh-gollies and doe-eyed infatuation. Though she's the one who eventually ties everything together, and obviously you're supposed to mentally steer her away from uncovering Dormer's indiscretions as an investigator, eventually you want her to just stfu. Each probing question can become maddening after a while; whether it's the performance or the character, I can't honestly say, but the effect is all the same.
Really, each minor character is refreshingly allowed to have actual personality.
Nicky Katt's Fred Duggar obviously fancies himself as the big fish investigator of his small town, and doesn't much care for guys from L.A. coming in to augment his investigation. A slight against his intelligence and capabilities as an officer, he takes it personally and acts (understandably) a little bull-headed...although his two-thumbs joke is aces. Genre favorite Katharine Isabelle (Freddy vs. Jason, the Gingersnaps trilogy) plays the requisite hot bitch - and a reminder that desensitized youth can be found anywhere...even in the smallest town. Maura Tierney, a relatively unknown and uncelebrated actress, does fine work against Pacino, delivering perhaps the most fitting line in the entire film: "There are two kinds of people in Alaska: Those who were born here and those who come here to escape something else. I wasn't born here." Such subtle dialogue provides a previously unseen layer to her character, all the while providing nothing at all.
Every film in Nolan's career has contained an unrelenting darkness. The filmmaker has a natural interest in the darkness of human beings. From Following to The Dark Knight Rises, even when he's having fun, he likes to snap us back to reality and tell us point blank, "People may be ultimately good, but they are selfish and dangerous pricks leading up to it." And Insomnia is, by far, his darkest film - not even as far as the plot goes, but how he imagines it for us, and how he and DP Wally Pfister designed its look. How could Alaska, in the midst of days-straight sunlight, feel so fucking dank and dark? How could a genuinely beautiful place feel so depressing, morbid, and lonely?
A small dose of dark comedy helps break up the mounting dread, even with the surrounding dark circumstances. My favorite: Dormer breaks into Finch's apartment soaking wet, and Finch, over his own answering machine, tells Dormer there are clean towels in the bathroom. Dormer looks at the towel already clenched in his hand and offers this look of, "Are you fucking kidding?" It's just one example out of several where comedy comes out of nowhere and we find it surprisingly welcome.
The script is well constructed and multi-layered; its beauty is most obvious as we witness Dormer and Finch play cat and mouse games with each other. They each have a secret about which the other knows, and they, in person, pretend to come to an agreement on how to push forward that would benefit them both. But then one pulls a "wild card," as Finch calls it, surprising the other and watching him squirm with the newest turn in their twisted relationship. On more than one occasion Finch sends Dormer grasping at the nugget of information he has allowed him to have, even if it was a purposeful misdirection.
It goes without saying that Insomnia looks gorgeous, but having already mentioned Pfister, that should be no surprise. This film, the second of what would be many more collaborations between director and DP, is actually their most expressive. Beautiful though they may be, the look of The Prestige and the Dark Knight trilogy can sometimes get lost behind their London streets or tall cityscapes. But in Alaska, there's nowhere to hide. It becomes as much a character in Insomnia as Gotham did in The Dark Knight.
Being a fan of film music (but not quite in the adept ways as some of my musically-inclined colleagues), I imagine more people would recognize the pounding and stirring score Hans Zimmer brought to life in Nolan's Dark Night trilogy if they had already been familiar with Insomnia. Because composer David Julyan was already kinda doing it. Though he is a composer more comfortable using long, uninterrupted tones rather than full-on melodies, there is no denying the influence his music had on Zimmer's take on Batman. I have no idea if Nolan shepherded this desire for Batman's theme, or if Zimmer took it upon himself to study Nolan's previous films, but I defy you to listen to both films' scores during the sweeping, helicopter shots of Insomnia's landscape and Batman Begins' Iceland mountains and attempt tell them apart. You might falter.
Nolan just might be one of the first filmmakers to be featured here in Unsung who is arguably at the beginning of his career. With half-a-dozen films behind him already, he's a young and vibrant guy who shows no signs of slowing down. His name is a celebrated one in the film community and with your everyday movie-goer, and announcements of his new projects are met with immediate speculation. "What will it be about? Where will it be set? Will it star Michael Caine?" (Yes, it will.) His newest project, still in the casting process, is Interstellar - and appropriate for Nolan, no one knows shit about it (though it does star Michael Caine). As his career surely progresses, Nolan will become further removed from Insomnia. Though it feels somewhat like this already, eventually Insomnia will become nothing more than a bit of trivia one movie geek tells to another. "Did you know he once made a movie with Al Pacino?" It's sad in a way, but also kind of nice. Insomnia will always be one of my favorite secrets.
Even to those who don't speak in film, Christopher Nolan, by now, must be a household name. His reformation of the Batman series, mixed with the storm-taking Inception, has proven he is a powerhouse. He is a man who has somehow mastered wowing both critics and audiences, reveling in their kind praise and their hard-earned dollars. His films are gorgeous, brooding, and filled with the kind of thought and reverence for genuine human emotion that many other filmmakers take for granted. If I were to tell you that his most unheralded film (perhaps even lesser known than his debut feature Following), was his best, you would not believe me. You may even argue with me. But there's no arguing when I tell you that this sleepy remake of the 1997 Swedish film of the same name is, by far, my favorite of his films. And that's saying lot, considering the man is also responsible for The Prestige and Memento, along with the before-mentioned Dark Knight trilogy (third chapter notwithstanding).
After busting onto the scene with his second film, the mind-busting, non-linear Memento, Warner Bros. wanted to be in the Christopher Nolan business. With so many filmmakers of varying pedigree being assigned remakes of notable genre offerings during this time, Nolan signed on to direct (and perform an uncredited pass on the screenplay) of what would become Insomnia, a story of an unsolved murder in Nightmute, Alaska, a Los Angeles robbery and homicide detective (Al Pacino) brought onto the case in order to keep him away from the internal affairs investigation currently looking into his department, that same detective's honorable partner (Martin Donovan), and a small-town investigator in awe of the famed detective's career (Hilary Swank). Causing all this bloody ruckus is a small-time novelist and all-around murderer (Robin Williams), whose shy and quiet manner hides something far worse. The case seems routine until the investigation begins, and layer after layer is peeled back, revealing that nearly every single one of our characters has a secret they are keeping from everyone else. While these secrets pertain to careers, loyalty, or their very freedoms, it all soon comes tumbling down, bringing everyone down with it.
With respect to an admittedly living legend, Insomnia is Al Pacino's last great performance. His Will Dormer exists in a period of his career, following 1992's Scent of a Woman where he won the Oscar for shouting all the time, in which he...still shouted all the time. "Hey, they must like it!" he must have thought at that time. After a while, however, the very dynamic and hand-gesture loving Pacino starts to disintegrate as his lack of sleep begins to creep up on him. He starts to loose his mind, hallucinate, throw furniture against the window to block out that awful impenetrable Alaskan light. Everyday mundane things like a oscillating desk fan or windshield wipers have the power to unsettle him. (We've all pulled all-nighters at some point - it's a wonder what a lack of sleep will do to the human mind.) His voice grows weary and weak. He becomes exhausted - to the point it sounds as if he's using his voice for the first time. (Count how many times a character asks him if he's getting any sleep.) It's one of the best examples of a character's methodical destruction, and we witness it steadily. Aiding this is the lack of clear timeline. We know for how long Will spends in Alaska (six days - without sleep), but we never get a clear sense of what time of day it is. This is established in the beginning when Dormer requests to pull the murder victim's boyfriend out of class to question him, and he's told it's actually ten o'clock...at night. Something as simple as not knowing what time it is - if it's day or night, early morning or nearing midnight - is enough to set the audience on edge and fuck with their equilibrium. So imagine what poor Dormer must be going through with no sleep, a guilty mind, and a murderer on the loose.
A purposeful choice made early on, though at what point I couldn't say, effort is made to imagine Will Dormer as a less confrontational character with whom to sympathize. For those who have seen the original Swedish film, you'll remember that Stellan Skarsgård's iteration of the character was certainly darker. Granted, Pacino isn't exactly the most noble of investigators - especially during his interrogation scenes - but Skarsgård nearly dared you to root for him. (Quick example: Al Pacino shoots a dead dog to catch a sample bullet from his gun; Stellan Skarsgård shoots a live one.) Pacino plays it right down the middle: bad enough to not entirely trust, but good enough to know he's the one you want to see come out on top. In the final act, where he bares his soul to a nearly perfect stranger, he is no longer his larger-than life persona. He is a small man, withered from guilt and lack of sleep, with his biggest task still in front of him.
Between this and One Hour Photo, one thing is clear: Robin Williams is fucking amazing at playing a psycho. He was never a person for whom I much cared or had much respect. As a comedian, for which he was most famous, I found him painfully unfunny, so why should I have cared? But here, he is super duper creepy. With Walter Finch, Williams finds a way to offer a wide-eyed stare, hands folded, looking entirely innocent but out-of-his-mind guilty simultaneously. His performance is somewhat reminiscent of Kevin Spacey's John Doe from Seven, but certainly not as operatic or over the top. Even as he explains, in bits and pieces, what really happened, you can see him working it around in his mind, as if he's also trying to figure out how the fuck it all led to this. Things had started off so promising for him and for the girl whom he thought liked him - how could she be like that? How could she treat him in such a way after he had consoled her, showered her with gifts, and loved her?
I only wanted to comfort her, hold her. I kissed her and... got a little exited. And then she started laughing at me. She didn't stop laughing. Did you ever have someone laugh at you, Will? When you're really vulnerable, laughing their ass off at you? Someone you thought respected you? Ever have that happen, Will? I just wanted to stop her laughing, that's all. I hit her. A couple of times, just to stop her. Let her know - a little respect... She's terrified, she's screaming her head off. I put my hand over her mouth. And then I get really scared, I mean, I'm scared shitless - more scared than I've ever been. And I'm more scared than her, and then... everything's clear. There's no turning back. After that, I was calm. Real calm.Williams plays insane with sadness, yet not regret, and with an evil genius' mastermind. His late-night phone calls ("Can't sleep, Will?") honest-to-gosh sound like one old friend calling another. His voice is calm and without confrontation - at times he sounds damn near sympathetic. For a performer who reveled (and revels) in over-the-top antics and cartoonery, Walter Finch is the anti-Williams. He is calm, reserved, and calculating. And he's fucking dangerous.
The supporting cast are mostly great, the only side-step being Hilary Swank as Ellie Burr. Swank is normally a great actress, but she's a bit too Family-Von Trapp-ish here, filled with gee-gosh-gollies and doe-eyed infatuation. Though she's the one who eventually ties everything together, and obviously you're supposed to mentally steer her away from uncovering Dormer's indiscretions as an investigator, eventually you want her to just stfu. Each probing question can become maddening after a while; whether it's the performance or the character, I can't honestly say, but the effect is all the same.
Really, each minor character is refreshingly allowed to have actual personality.
Nicky Katt's Fred Duggar obviously fancies himself as the big fish investigator of his small town, and doesn't much care for guys from L.A. coming in to augment his investigation. A slight against his intelligence and capabilities as an officer, he takes it personally and acts (understandably) a little bull-headed...although his two-thumbs joke is aces. Genre favorite Katharine Isabelle (Freddy vs. Jason, the Gingersnaps trilogy) plays the requisite hot bitch - and a reminder that desensitized youth can be found anywhere...even in the smallest town. Maura Tierney, a relatively unknown and uncelebrated actress, does fine work against Pacino, delivering perhaps the most fitting line in the entire film: "There are two kinds of people in Alaska: Those who were born here and those who come here to escape something else. I wasn't born here." Such subtle dialogue provides a previously unseen layer to her character, all the while providing nothing at all.
Every film in Nolan's career has contained an unrelenting darkness. The filmmaker has a natural interest in the darkness of human beings. From Following to The Dark Knight Rises, even when he's having fun, he likes to snap us back to reality and tell us point blank, "People may be ultimately good, but they are selfish and dangerous pricks leading up to it." And Insomnia is, by far, his darkest film - not even as far as the plot goes, but how he imagines it for us, and how he and DP Wally Pfister designed its look. How could Alaska, in the midst of days-straight sunlight, feel so fucking dank and dark? How could a genuinely beautiful place feel so depressing, morbid, and lonely?
A small dose of dark comedy helps break up the mounting dread, even with the surrounding dark circumstances. My favorite: Dormer breaks into Finch's apartment soaking wet, and Finch, over his own answering machine, tells Dormer there are clean towels in the bathroom. Dormer looks at the towel already clenched in his hand and offers this look of, "Are you fucking kidding?" It's just one example out of several where comedy comes out of nowhere and we find it surprisingly welcome.
The script is well constructed and multi-layered; its beauty is most obvious as we witness Dormer and Finch play cat and mouse games with each other. They each have a secret about which the other knows, and they, in person, pretend to come to an agreement on how to push forward that would benefit them both. But then one pulls a "wild card," as Finch calls it, surprising the other and watching him squirm with the newest turn in their twisted relationship. On more than one occasion Finch sends Dormer grasping at the nugget of information he has allowed him to have, even if it was a purposeful misdirection.
It goes without saying that Insomnia looks gorgeous, but having already mentioned Pfister, that should be no surprise. This film, the second of what would be many more collaborations between director and DP, is actually their most expressive. Beautiful though they may be, the look of The Prestige and the Dark Knight trilogy can sometimes get lost behind their London streets or tall cityscapes. But in Alaska, there's nowhere to hide. It becomes as much a character in Insomnia as Gotham did in The Dark Knight.
Being a fan of film music (but not quite in the adept ways as some of my musically-inclined colleagues), I imagine more people would recognize the pounding and stirring score Hans Zimmer brought to life in Nolan's Dark Night trilogy if they had already been familiar with Insomnia. Because composer David Julyan was already kinda doing it. Though he is a composer more comfortable using long, uninterrupted tones rather than full-on melodies, there is no denying the influence his music had on Zimmer's take on Batman. I have no idea if Nolan shepherded this desire for Batman's theme, or if Zimmer took it upon himself to study Nolan's previous films, but I defy you to listen to both films' scores during the sweeping, helicopter shots of Insomnia's landscape and Batman Begins' Iceland mountains and attempt tell them apart. You might falter.
Nolan just might be one of the first filmmakers to be featured here in Unsung who is arguably at the beginning of his career. With half-a-dozen films behind him already, he's a young and vibrant guy who shows no signs of slowing down. His name is a celebrated one in the film community and with your everyday movie-goer, and announcements of his new projects are met with immediate speculation. "What will it be about? Where will it be set? Will it star Michael Caine?" (Yes, it will.) His newest project, still in the casting process, is Interstellar - and appropriate for Nolan, no one knows shit about it (though it does star Michael Caine). As his career surely progresses, Nolan will become further removed from Insomnia. Though it feels somewhat like this already, eventually Insomnia will become nothing more than a bit of trivia one movie geek tells to another. "Did you know he once made a movie with Al Pacino?" It's sad in a way, but also kind of nice. Insomnia will always be one of my favorite secrets.
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