A recommendation for the_gardener

[randy_byers]

Recently in a thread about the best SF movies, the_gardener wrote, "Gattaca, on the other hand, is a genuine original. So original that no one else seems (yet) to have done anything like it!"



This gives me yet another opportunity in my ongoing crusade to recommend Code 46 far and wide, and high and low, till the genetically modified cows come home. It's my favorite SF movie of the past five years, vying for that honor with Mamoru Oshii's Avalon. Code 46 is an independent film directed by Michael Winterbottom and starring Samantha Morton and Tim Robbins. It played the festival circuit in 2003, and then it got a token release to theaters last year. It actually played for two weeks in Seattle, at two different tiny theaters, so I got to see it twice on the (relatively) big screen. I've watched the DVD once since then.

Like Gattaca, it's about genetics and about winners and losers (or insiders and outsiders) in a dystopic brave new world. However, my complaint about Gattaca was that it had the subtlety of a sledgehammer, and Code 46 actually manages to recomplicate its premise in much more interesting ways. Partly this is because it doesn't over-explain its world-building. There are little bits -- like the car wash that all vehicles pass through when coming into Shanghai, or the way the characters hold a coat over their heads as they run through the sunshine -- that we are left to interpret on our own. The movie trusts our common heritage of dystopias to help us understand.

The central dilemma of the story is based on a famous Greek tragedy. Again, it isn't discussed by the characters themselves, so the audience must wrestle with the implications themselves. The basic scenario is that an insurance investigator from Seattle arrives in Shanghai to investigate the forgery of "papelles" -- an official document, something like a passport, that allows people access to specific privileges. He has a fling with a young woman he meets, and then things get complicated.

Aside from the fact that it's a beautifully produced movie with great performances and clever dialogue (and funny throw-away bits like Mick Jones singing a karaoke version of "Should I Stay Or Should I Go"), the thing I like the most about it is that it respects my intelligence. It's very fannish that way, and very rare in SF film. The one false move comes at the very end, when a Cold Play song is wheeled out to sell soundtracks. Other than that, it takes up Gattaca's challenge of creating intelligent, thoughtful, small-scale SF (with not even one explosion!), and it does it even better.

One other note: as appropriate to a movie about genetics, it involves some relatively in-your-face (but not graphic) scenes of sex, including some strangely discomfitting nudity. Now if that doesn't sell you on it ...

Comments

[damienw]

ok, i will check it out. i hated gattaca with a fiery passionate hate.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Ah, but does it have men in skirts?

You should lend this to me some time. Also, I've got another receipt book to get to Denys at some point. Pity lunch was yesterday.

[the-gardener.livejournal.com]

Ah, but does it have men in skirts?

¿Que?

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

Do tell? I remember being underwhelmed, but nowhere in the fiery range.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

Well, part of it takes place in a fictional Middle Eastern city that may well have men dressed in caftans. Not quite the same, I realize.

I'll bring the DVD with me tomorrow, and perhaps we can arrange a stealthy exchange at some point.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Just making sure you're paying attention, dear.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Score! Good deal.

[the-gardener.livejournal.com]

Aykay yah!

[daveon.livejournal.com]

M and I thought it was excellent - a bit of a hidden gem, and I'd recommend being in the right mood for this kind of movie. It requires a certain degree of engagement.

[daveon.livejournal.com]

FYI - on the subject of DVDs, I plan to be back at the end of November and plan to come equiped.

I made a pack with myself not to fly anywhere in October. That included Seattle. :(

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

Yes, I meant to mention that it is very much an art film, and thus low on thrills. On the other hand, I really like the sense of humor that pops up throughout. But because it is elliptical, it does require you to pay attention. After three viewings, I'm confident there's stuff I still haven't quite made out. For example, how much of the story is she making up? Some of it has to be speculative on her part, I think, and she even narrates in the subjunctive at times.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Cheers! Even without DVDs it's always good to see you, but if you come packing, let me put in another word for Black Books. And anything else that strikes your fancy, of course. By then I should have verified that diddling our DVD player worked.

[the-gardener.livejournal.com]

It played the festival circuit in 2003, and then it got a token release to theaters last year. It actually played for two weeks in Seattle, at two different tiny theaters, so I got to see it twice on the (relatively) big screen.

It had a theatrical release in London, too, for a couple of weeks, perhaps earlier this year. (I remember seeing the posters for it in the Underground, but not when.) The critics seemed to find it enjoyable, but not quite a must-see.

In consequence, I didn't see it; it had gone before I could organise myself for a trip to an appropriate cinema.

But what I've noticed about almost all of Michael Winterbottom's films over the past four-five-six years is that they all play for a couple of weeks on a limited number of screens before disappearing. Presumably the distributors don't like his films; but if this is so, then the next question must be why studios keep paying him to make them.

Whatever the answer, it must be very dispiriting for Winterbottom.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

Actually, Winterbottom doesn't make movies for studios. He produces them independently. That's one reason they don't get much time in the theaters, although even studio films don't necessarily get much time in the theaters anymore. The bulk of profits are made on TV and video.

I'm really looking forward to his new movie, A Cock and Bull Story, which is an adaptation of Tristram Shandy with Steve Coogan. I'm also curious about his last movie, 9 Songs, which is about a short romantic affair, but with explicit sex.

[http://users.livejournal.com/doctor_k_/]

Dave and I went and saw 9 Songs a few months back. Dave loved it, I was bored witless. Sex interspersed with some really good bands - I just wanted to see more music. Dave enjoyed the non-traditional retelling of the course of a relationship. Or maybe the sex, who can tell?

24 Hour Party People rocked.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

Yep, I really like 24 Hour Party People too. Reactions to 9 Songs are so all over the place that I have no idea what I'll make of it, but I'll definitely give it a go when the DVD comes out.

The other Winterbottom films I've seen are The Claim, which is an adaptation of a Thomas Hardy novel (I think it's The Mayor of Casterbridge) but set in the California goldrush, and In This World, which is about two Afghani refugees trying to make their way to the UK from Pakistan. Neither really bowled me over, but I'd like to see both again. Some people think In This World is his best film, and he conceived of Code 46 -- with that sense of needing official papers to get into the land of plenty -- as they were making it.

[reverendjim.livejournal.com]

I mostly really enjoyed Code 46 though there were a few things about it that annoyed me. Unfortunately I can't really remember what they were, as it's been a while since I saw it. I thought the empathy virus was a bit of a plot device, for example. A damn good film for architecture though, which is always nice to see.
From stills I saw of Avalon before it came it I thought it looked ravishing but I didn't see anything but dud reviews, though admittedly not many of those as it was a very limited release. I'll have to look into the DVD.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

Agreed that the empathy virus is a bit of a plot device. It functions in a way similar to "telepathy" in pulp SF. However, I think they use it in very clever ways, including at least two very funny scenes. And yeah, the use of the architecture in modern Shanghai to represent the near future is brilliant. In general, I find it a visually hypnotic film.

Avalon got no theatrical release in the US that I know of. It apparently bombed at Cannes and then couldn't find a distributor here. It's about a virtual reality war game which becomes a Dickian questioning of the real. As in Ubik, every explanation of what's going on is undercut or recontextualized by the next development, and the different levels of the game become symbols of deeper levels of the ever-evasive truth. It's very arty and pretentious, but it's smart and mysterious enough to pull it off. There are some fascinating speculations on the web about what it all means. Also, it has many explosions, and most of them are way cool. Some of the best use of CGI yet (and I am of the opinion that most CGI is crap.)