| |
|
Movie Archives:
Most Recent
| Highest
Rated |
Alphabetical
True Liars
 |
|
Closer
Mike Nichols, USA, 2004
Rating: 2.9
|
|
Posted: December 04,
2004
By
Laurence Station
The key line in Closer, Mike Nichols' adaptation of Patrick
Marber's play (Marber also wrote the screenplay), comes from self-described
caveman Larry (Clive Owen), when the straight-to-the-point dermatologist
describes the human heart as "a fist wrapped in blood." Such a line is
typical of the movie's very writerly dialogue, but it nonetheless succinctly
encapsulates the film's hard-edged look at relationships in the big city (in
this particular instance, London). For all of its blunt truths, however,
Closer is a uncomfortably stagey work that neither plumbs great depths
of understanding regarding male-female relations nor provides us a group of
people worth caring about.
Owen, portraying the most honest character, also gives the strongest
performance, managing to convey a needy brutishness and crafty intellect
from an otherwise everyday professional. Even when forced to deliver such
impossibly silly lines as "She has the moronic beauty of youth, but she's
sly," Owen stays true to the center of Larry's pragmatic, lustful nature.
The remaining players populating this contrived mess of a coincidental
foursome -- who swap partners but rarely exchange anything remotely
resembling genuine intimacy -- don't fare nearly as well.
Jude Law's obit-writer/novelist Dan comes across as a smug brat, jumping
wily-nilly between a pair of American beauties: the older, seemingly more
sensible Anna (Julia Roberts) and young, high-spirited Alice (Natalie
Portman). Dan's involvement with the two ranges from marriage (Anna) to
strip club pick-up (Alice). Rather than witness the four being particularly
close while playing musical beds (all of it "off-stage," by the way), we
spend most of the film listening to them debate the merits of telling the
truth and forgiving one another for past trespasses. The big message here
apparently deals with how everyone deceives those closest to him or her, no
matter if they're doing so explicitly or unintentionally. It's all a vicious
game of one-upmanship, where control and possession are primary goals -- as
opposed to, say, love and companionship.
In a film so dependent on relationships, it helps if there are actual sparks
between the lead characters. Law and Roberts have zero, while Owen and
Portman actually do manage to generate heat -- but that's almost by default,
as she is a stripper plying her trade for his pound notes in a
private room. Frankly, these aren't likable people. That doesn't necessarily
have to be a deal-breaker -- the annals of cinema are full of great films
about thoroughly despicable folks -- but some sort of connection to these
characters would certainly help us empathize when their love games devolve
into a cannibalistic emotional feeding frenzy. If misery indeed loves
company, as the old adage goes, it's got a full house to play with here.
Ultimately, Closer gambles its success on a jaded male perspective
that simply fails to pay off. Such depressively cynical material has been
better and, crucially, more entertainingly addressed, both recently in
Patrice Chéreau's Intimacy and some thirty-five years ago in Nichols'
own Carnal Knowledge. The heart may indeed by a fist wrapped in
blood, as Larry says, but it still requires a pulse in order to live.
Site
design copyright © 2001-2011 Shaking Through.net. All original artwork,
photography and text used on this site is the sole copyright of the respective creator(s)/author(s). Reprinting, reposting, or citing any of the original
content appearing on this site without the written consent of Shaking
Through.net is strictly forbidden.
|
|
|
|
|
|
