Girl, Interrupted

Released:  December 21^st, 1999

Rated:  R

Distributor:  Columbia

Starring:  Winona Ryder, Angelina Jolie, Clea DuVall, Brittany Murphy, Elisabeth Moss, Jared Leto, Jeffrey Tambor, Vanessa Redgrave, Whoopi Goldberg

Directed by:  James Mangold

Written by:  James Mangold, Lisa Loomer, Anna Hamilton Phelan

Personal Bias Alert:  read the book, likes the fuzzy line between sanity and mental illness

8 of 10

            There’s a great chapter in the memoir Girl, Interrupted that captures the way author Susanna Kaysen and her fellow psychiatric patients romanticized and ultimately came to terms with their illnesses.  It’s called Fire, and in four short pages it ruminates on a young woman named Polly who had poured gasoline on herself to “burn it out.”  ‘It’ is never specified, but remains emblematic of their collective pain and fear.  Of course, Kaysen can’t really be sure why Polly did it, but as a device, a way of showing how succumbing to mental illness can seem seductive but will ultimately scar you for life, it’s a brilliant piece of writing.  In adapting the book to the screen, the screenwriters have keyed in on this battle, and when the film hits its stride, it’s as captivating a piece of work as the four pages in Fire.

            As great as the source material is, the unsung hero of this film is casting director Lisa Beach.  Landing the cast, which includes Winona Ryder, Angelina Jolie, Elisabeth Moss, Jared Leto, and Whoopi Goldberg to name a few, is impressive, but what makes it heroic is how well each fit into their part.  The two big roles are near-perfect, with Ryder being an obvious choice to play the introspective Kaysen and Jolie being as magnetic as ever as the alleged sociopath Lisa, but it’s the smaller roles by Moss, DuVall, Redgrave, and others who fill in the world around the duo, giving them an arena with weight and substance to do their dangerous tango.

            The dance that these two characters engage in centers around Kaysen’s illness, with her trying to overcome it and Lisa tempting her to succumb to it.  Kaysen comes into the institution on the precipice of this choice, clearly indulging in her pain but unwilling to give up the pleasures of the outside world.  Lisa has already embraced her diagnosis and allowed it to become the focal point of her personality, simultaneously giving her a seductively care-free attitude but also condemning her to a long stay at the institution.  As they become closer, Kaysen is drawn into Lisa’s web of lifers, an almost cult-like subgroup of the patients who follow Lisa unequivocally and never seem to get out.  This dance, as Lisa draws Kaysen closer and closer, is the best part of the film thanks to Ryder and Jolie’s excellent performances and the thematic weight it carries.

            The trouble is that the memoir is pretty light on plot, mostly made up of little ruminations like Fire that lead to great thematic resolutions without a whole lot actually happening.  Most of the exciting goings-on in the film have been invented, because who honestly wants to sit around watching a bunch of young women gabbing on and on in a mental institution for two hours?  Most of these adventures work well enough, including a standout scene with Ryder and Jolie doing an impromptu rendition of Petula Clark’s Downtown that is almost certain to lift your spirit as much as it does Moss’s Polly.  Others, including the ending, go completely off the wall and lose the delicate tone that the rest of the film balances.  In the sweet spot, there’s a dark whimsy to the film, a sense that Kaysen may have found an entrance to Alice’s wonderland that is slowly closing after her.  The parts that don’t work lose this whimsy in favor of pure darkness, and not the sort where you’re seeing someone’s mental illness laid bare.  No, it’s more clunky than that, degrading characters, especially Lisa, into raging devils that spout nasty things simply to give Kaysen the push she needs.  These moments are really glaring errors, and it’s especially detrimental that it ends on one.

            Still, there’s so many things Girl, Interrupted does right, from the aforementioned acting to some stylish edits to a wonderful soundtrack that’s like a precursor to the hipster classic Garden State, that it’s easy to forgive the film’s flaws.  It’s really the moments that work, where Jolie is draining every ounce of her intense charm and the line between the girl’s sanity and insanity is wavering, that sticks in your mind.

            Other Notes:

Ø  Jeffrey Tambor looked remarkably like Dr. Phil.

Ø  DP Jack Green has a very interesting filmography, working on films like Twister, The Bridges of Madison County, Unforgiven, 50 First Dates, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, and Diary of a Wimpy Kid.

Ø  “Have you ever… stolen something when you have the cash?”  Winona Ryder has!

Heathers (1988)

Released:  March 31^st, 1989

Rated:  R

Studio:  New World Pictures

Staring:  Winona Ryder, Christian Slater

Directed by:  Michael Lehmann

Written by:  Daniel Waters

Personal Bias Alert:  likes dark comedies, went to high school post-Columbine

6 of 10

  

            I went into this film knowing remarkably little.  I thought it was just an ‘80s movie about a clique of popular girls who are overthrown by Winona Ryder’s Veronica, so I sat down expecting a John Hughes-esque version of “Mean Girls.”  Those of you who’ve seen “Heathers” are probably laughing at me, and rightly so considering what I was getting into.

            What the film ended up being was a darkly, darkly (did I say darkly?) comic take on high school movies, eschewing the traditional lampooning in favor of some killer satire.  It doesn’t make jokes as much as it blows everything slightly out of proportion, and in the very near reality of this world everything seems a bit silly.  Veronica’s mom is constantly making pâté, the hippy teacher says things like “I want you all to feel the pathetic beauty,” and pent-up frustrations are dealt with by murdering your fellow students and staging it as a suicide.  Yep, I said straight-up murder.

            New student J.D. (Christian Slater) is behind the trend, and Veronica tentatively goes along with his plans to a point.  After several popular students appear to commit suicide, the school’s population becomes fascinated with the idea, and talking about or attempting suicide becomes almost cool.  It’s a biting indictment of trends and the mindless way some people will follow them, but the social commentary is more the filler to the comedy’s tasty goodness.  When asked the classic question against following trends, the one about jumping off bridges if everyone else did, a student responds simply and hilariously:  “probably.”

            Three paragraphs in and I’ve already thrown out two quotes.  I normally go an entire review without mentioning a single one, but writer David Newman crafted an irresistibly quotable little gem.  The film’s cult status is understandable simply by this calling card.  Remember, this movie was released before the internet was widely used, when you’d have to throw out little references in everyday speech and fish for a twinkle of recognition to find your people.  There’s no mistaking these quotes.

            Now I’m a young doe, so this film was fifteen years old when I was in school.  I didn’t watch it until long after my high school years, and I can’t help but feel that I missed the sweet spot for when this film should be viewed.  Don’t get me wrong, I still enjoyed it, but I couldn’t help rolling my eyes a bit at its over-the-top judgment of high school.  Not that I ever connected much with such depictions; my own high school experience was rather tame.  I had friends, we hung around, we fought, but the drama never really left the group.  I was by no means popular, but I don’t recall being picked on or teased.  This sort of thing must happen, though, or we wouldn’t be so inundated with depictions of high school as caddy, sadistic battlegrounds.

            “Heathers” violent streak, while oddly prophetic, doesn’t play well for post-Columbine kids like me.  The fear of gun-toting classmates was in full swing by the time I hit adolescence, and the lessons that taught me makes it hard to chuckle when J.D. and Veronica go all Bonnie and Clyde on people.  It doesn’t help that the humor is so pitch dark that it’s hard to tell when they’re joking and when they’re making a point.  Granted, those are often happening at the same time, but my brain simply has trouble finding anything funny when someone’s pulling out a gun in the school cafeteria.

Now while these violent images have taken on a new meaning, I’m sure this was still wildly inappropriate at the time the film was released.  I can imagine Newman, upon being asked why he took such an extreme approach to telling his story, shrugging and slyly answering with his own line:  “The extreme always seems to make an impression.”

            Other Notes

Ø  I’m sorry, but I can’t stand Christian Slater.  He fits the part well, but he’s just too slimy for me to understand the appeal.

Ø  So did this film kick off the overuse of “Que Sera, Sera” in female-centric movies, or was that already a thing?

Ø  Fakest cow-tipping ever.

The Iceman (2013)

4.5 of 10

Personal Bias Alert:  not a big fan of gangster movies, generally annoyed by David Schwimmer

            “The Iceman” is based on the true story of hitman Richard Kuklinski, who claimed to have killed over 100 people in a 38 year period.  His nickname has a double meaning, referring both to his cold demeanor and his habit of freezing victims to hide the time of death.  That a man like Kuklinski existed, and that he eluded detection for so long, is troubling.  A movie seems almost inevitable; bloody mob movies sell well, the true-life twist makes it more compelling, and Kuklinski’s troubled childhood gives the writers a motive audiences would understand.  Unfortunately, the film falls flat due to the simplistic script, unambiguous direction, and wooden characters.

            The film opens with Michael Shannon’s Kuklinski on a date with his girlfriend/future wife Deborah (Winona Ryder).  Kuklinski is delighted that Deborah’s there, and tries his best to keep up a conversation.  It’s the lightest you’ll see this character, and unfortunately, it’s the only time you’ll see him with any shading.  After a few minutes, the music takes on an eerie quality and he makes a flirtatious reference to Deborah being like Natalie Wood.  Because there’s nothing ominous about references to Natalie Wood.

            This scene sets up the rest of the movie well.  It lays its cards on the table early and often, never letting you develop any opinions of the characters or their actions independently.  The music is an obvious offender, being both prominent and lacking in subtlety.  The actors follow suit:  the bad guys leer, Ryder cowers, and Kuklinski’s girls waft angelically in the background.  Nothing about this film is novel, and most of it’s downright clichéd.  I mean, can you imagine Ray Liotta being cast as a mobster?

            Shannon plays Kuklinski with the passionless demeanor the real-life Kuklinski is known for.  Even the one thing he cares about, his family, is revealed to be a product of his childhood, not an actual connection between Kuklinski and his wife and family.  While this dispassion may be an accurate portrayal, it’s not a very cinematic one.  A character with no reactions seemingly has nothing that’s important to him, leaving the audience with no reason to care what happens to him.  Shannon’s Kuklinski seems fine with whatever, and so are we.

            The only character with any life is Kuklinski’s associate, a fellow hitman played by Chris Evans.  He reviles in the character’s blasé nature, bringing levity and humor to the nasty things they do.  It may not be the most normal of reactions, but at least it shows an awareness of the world around him, something Kuklinski never seems to acknowledge.

            A film with this kind of story behind it should be a slam dunk.  Lies, murder, and family is a winning combination that’s been used throughout time, and to mess it up this badly is almost impressive.  But then again, it’s kind of fitting that a film about a prolific murderer turned out this lifeless.

Other Notes:

Ø  What’s with James Franco being in everything?

Ø  Hey, it’s Ross from “Friends” with a terrible mustache!  And they pointed out the mustache with an incredibly ominous line!  Surely nothing bad will happen to him.

Ø  I’m so glad $10 million was spent on this film.