Gattaca (Andrew Niccol, 1997)
On DVD at home with Lucía, on 2 December, 2006, at around 21:00.
I get the impression that Andrew Niccol wants us to believe that people born from embryos prescreened for idealized genetic makeup are inclined to behave like Nazi androids. I feel that there’s an implicit idea in the film that genetic imperfections are a large part of what make us interesting as humans.
Less implicit is the notion that we are more than our genetic makeup, and that our genetic makeup is not a pure determination of our potential. In the future that Niccol paints for us, people are broken into two categories: an elite class of people born with optimal genetic makeup and an underclass of people born naturally. On the one hand, the film is very well directed and it plays out with a remarkable narrative economy that matches the cleanliness of the future that Niccol shows us (and the performances, I thought, were excellent). On the other hand, it seems like an adaptation of some unpublished Ayn Rand novel crossed with right-wing propaganda about messing with natural birth processes and giving ourselves over to science.
I can see why this film is mentioned as often as it is—Niccol seems to be big on thought-provoking high-concept stories (The Truman Show being another notable one), and Gattaca is a very pure and carefully laid out example of that. As much as I might dislike the politics of the film, or the propagandistic overtones, or the messages I infer from it, I wish there were more films that so clearly laid out their arguments as Gattaca and The Truman Show.
(*)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry, 2004)
on DVD at home with Lucía on 6 November, 2006, in the evening.
In comparing this to The Science of Sleep, I felt that this film had a more intriguing story, but the other one was much more imaginative, inventive, and visually engaging. In fact, The Science of Sleep bowled me over so much, that it was tough in a way to watch Eternal Sunshine as a follow-up, but it was still such a pleasant departure from the normal stuff of Hollywood that I can’t really complain. Kudos to Jim Carrey for twice setting aside his buffoonery for serious roles (this and The Truman Show). I feel that this film further confirms my suspicion that no H0llywood actor, no matter how annoying, is incapable of being turned into a powerfully compelling tragic figure in the hands of a capable director. And Michel Gondry is nothing if not a capable director. I consider this “casting actors against themselves,” in that those very details of Carrey’s (and in the case of Punch Drunk Love, Adam Sandler) behavior that make him a delight to some and an irritation to others can add a touch of irony that really packs a punch in the right film (in an obvious way in The Truman Show and Punch Drunk Love, and in much subtler ways in this film).
The premise of the story is pretty dumb, and this is a large part of the reason that after seeing the trailer I had no desire to see the film whatsoever. Nevertheless, Michel Gondry is able to explore all sorts of nooks and crannies around the premise in totally idiosyncratic ways. By this I’m referring to the more endearing scenes, such as when Carrey is hiding from the sitter under the table, or when he tries to punch another kid that’s mocking him, only to be knocked over (both scenes felt Woody Allen-ish to me, but in a good way), as well as the more tragic scenes where Carrey and Winslet are desparately clinging one another in anticipation of imminent obliteration.
The Science of Sleep was a lovely film, mostly sunny with darker patches, that ended in a predictably bittersweet way with tragic connotations (nothing good could happen after the final scene, though thankfully Stéphane is able to inhabit is own pleasant dreams). Eternal Sunshine, on the other hand, is a suffocatingly tragic film that ends rather happily, all things considered. Kirsten Dunst, who is given a pretty nothing character, is able to bring together our heros to give them another chance (though it’s somewhat unclear whether they would have gotten there on their own).
(*)