Dionysus in
'69 [Brian De Palma & Richard Schechner, 1970]:
A highlight of De Palma's early, counter-culture period, of which the furious and very Godard-like Hi, Mom! (1970) remains a brilliant pinnacle. Many of the sequences here recall the infamous "Be Black, Baby" segment from that later film, with the improvisation, black and white cinematography and the influence of cinéma vérité combining both the hedonism and the tension implicit not just in this theatrical production, but in the era itself. Through capturing this performance, De Palma obliterates the dividing line between theatre and film, drama and documentary, performance and actuality; engaging the audience not just through the action on-screen, but through the disorientation of the split-screen effect. This technique forces the audience to connect with the drama - this filmed adaptation of a play by Euripides ('The Bacchae') as performed by these actors - as well as the no less significant appropriation of the filmmaking form. The contrast between the two 'screens' not only presents the same action from a different perspective - obscuring the idea of "authorship" in its acknowledgment of the two different viewpoints of Schechner (the theatre director) and De Palma (the film director) - it also creates a series of visual associations that enrich our perception of the action; adding a dramatic context or emotional subtext to something that is initially difficult to read.
The
stylisation of the film also deconstructs our reaction to the event
itself. Much like the on-screen
appearance of the audience, both as viewers and participants, the editing of
the film and the structure of these images remind us of the great deception that
the filmmakers employ to impose emotion and perspective; the way time and space
are structured and then re-structured through the management and manipulation of
the shots and cuts. In later films, De
Palma would continue his experiments with the split-screen format - most
notably in the flawed but still brilliant Snake Eyes (1998) - but here the
intention isn't so much to generate intrigue or suspense, but to confront the
way audiences view narrative cinema (or cinema in general) in the same
tradition as a film like the masterpiece Chelsea Girls (1966) by Paul Morrissey
& Andy Warhol, or Timecode (2000) by Mike Figgis. If the Schechner play is itself a provocation
intended to challenge the conventions of theatre, performance and the way an
audience might participate in both, then De Palma's filmed 'adaptation' is
similarly provocative and intended to challenge the way audiences approach the
moving image. Not as something passive
or safe, but as a descent into madness and obsession; a "happening", or
a sensory event.
Duvidha [Mani
Kaul, 1973]:
Those first
images. A flickering flame to suggest
celebration or a state of mourning. A
slow dissolve from the face of the actress; from mid-shot to close. During the transition, her enigmatic facade
is like the smile of the Mona Lisa, evoking the spirit of awareness - of omniscience
- as if she and she alone is somehow privy to the sad ironies of the story
about to unfold. To further amplify this
feeling of foresight, Kaul subtlety intercuts moments from later in the film
against the text of the opening credits. A daring idea that only becomes apparent on
reflection, but which is essential to understanding the progression of this central
character and her accepted role as a prisoner within the confines of this
culture (where women are subservient, even when alone). Decades later, Tony Scott would adapt the same
idea for his Man on Fire (2003), taking a series of shots from the final
sequence and intercutting them into the introduction of his protagonist;
implying in the process that the journey of this man was in some way pre-destined. An inescapable fate, part flashback, part
premonition. In both these films, the
use of the editing - creating associations through hindsight - is intended to establish
the idea of a higher power - fate or something more supernatural - but also to instil
the story with a sadness and a finality in order to give those rare moments of
happiness and contentment an even greater weight of feeling.
The story of
Duvidha is at first simple. Kaul
breathes deeper life into it by mixing together allegory with neo-realism;
finding an approach that combines the naturalism of early Rossellini with a
more "Bressonian" emphasis on alienation - creating authenticity through
the removal of superfluous adornments - and as such transforming it into
something that is both politically and ethically more complex. As the film begins, a newly married couple are
making their way home through the desert.
Kaul's editing is jarring and fragmented; a series of close-ups, intercut
with freeze-frames and the use of alternating film stock to present a differing
point of view. On the soundtrack, male
and female voices speak hidden thoughts, feelings and fears in a way that draws
our attention to the idea of the story as 'fable', but also to the idea of
looking back on something that has already taken place. While Kaul's direction suggestions a
naturalism, the voice-over talks of the paranormal: introducing us to the pivotal
"ghost in the Banyan tree", dazzled by the unveiled face of this
protagonist. Later, the ghost will take
on the physical appearance of the absent husband; fooling his wealthy parents
and even seducing the lonesome wife. As a
parable, this suggests similarities to the Greek myth of Alcmene's seduction by
Zeus in the guise of her lover, Amphitryon; an illicit tryst that would
inevitably lead to the conception of the mighty Heracles.
The
development of the story here is similar but not identical. While Zues concealed his identity from Alcmene,
at least initially, the ghost of Duvidha is sincere in his intentions. The wife is well aware that this form is not
her husband, but in the absence of the man, this ghost becomes her only
comfort. That the woman eventually falls
in love with the ghost says a lot about the issue of identity - what it means
to be human, to be an individual - and our own capacity to give and to receive
love. Kaul uses this idea to create a further
commentary on the role of women in this society and the loneliness of women in
general. The spirit, who doesn't deceive
the woman, but respects her enough to make his intentions known, provides her
with a half-decade of love and satisfaction while the husband is away on
business. Rather than treat her as a
commodity, the spirit respects her and she loves him in return. However, in a society as rigid and as ordered
as this, such blasphemy (this obvious stand-in for adultery), can only lead to a
greater tragedy. So, the subsequent
banishment of this spirit on the husband's immediate return consigns the wife
to a hollow existence of loneliness and domestic servitude. The time of suspended tranquillity, happiness
and contentment in the presence of the ghost is surely over, though remains
forever in the memory, or on the lips of that inscrutable smile.
Bubble
[Steven Soderbergh, 2005]:
The title
fills the frame; confounding and enigmatic, mysterious but also a little banal. As a slogan, as 'brand', it suggests the
hermetic existence of these characters, who live to a routine of work and
domestic duty; who find little cheer in their lunchtime conversations or the
Sunday morning gospel, and who wish desperately to escape; to flee the confines
of the job, the house, this town - which crushes the spirit, slowly but surely
- and even the life itself. Beneath the
imprisoning appearance of the full-frame text that already evokes something
closed-off and suffocating - the microcosm of a world in miniature - we see the
image of a suburban cemetery in the early hours of the day. If we squint at it, we can make out an action
taking place in the distance. An
industrial digger unearths the soil to create a grave. Initially, this seems fairly innocuous,
perhaps even trivial. The first of
several dull observations that Soderbergh's direction picks out. It's only at the end of the film that we finally
realise the foreshadowing of this action; the balance between life and death;
the life of the dead and the living
death of its central character. The
connection is further reinforced by the transition between shots. A slow dissolve from this place of death and
resting into the first image of the film's protagonist, awake and still in bed.
Soderbergh's editing is already
presenting this character as someone haunted by death; by the promise of death.
In the brief
twilight of this dissolve, she is literally trapped between the world of the
living and the world of the dead; hovering, spectral-like, in a state of
trance. It's a moment that already
suggests from the very first scene the outcome of this character. This woman, Martha - who tends to the every
need of her ailing father; who spends her days sculpting and painting the
features of plastic dolls in a dreary factory; who finds her only respite from
this tedium in her lunchtime conversations with the twenty-something Kyle (her
only "friend") - is crushed by circumstances; by failure and the fear
of being alone. Throughout the film,
Soderbergh offers evidence for the deterioration of this character, with clocks
and watches signifying both lost time and the idea of the inescapable fate,
while imagery from the factory itself is like a macabre reminder of the absence
of life in the life of these people.
These plastic babies - dead and lifeless forms - evoke both abortion, as
a prelude to murder, as well as the character's own failure to become a mother;
time, like the biological clock, no longer ticking. Although the film is continually framed at a
distance, keeping the audience outside of the narrative - making the process of
viewing one of deliberate observation if not alienation - the progression of this
character, combined with the director's refusal to stand in judgement over her
actions, but to present them simply, as a truth, manages to offer a stark and
ultimately moving commentary on loneliness and frustration, failure and mental collapse.
