"Messy Aliveness"

That's what Richard Kelly's Southland Tales has, according to Fernando F. Croce at Cinepassion. Picking up the ball that Manohla Dargis couldn't quite get past the line of scrimmage in her own Times review of Southland, Croce contrasts the Kelly film with No Country For Old Men and, while admitting Men is a "stupendously crafted exercise, unquestionably," and going on to say that "one hopes [it is] the beginning of a whole new phase in the Coens [sic] ouevre," he finally admits that Country "feels dead" to him, while the execrable, puling, adolescent Southland Tales "feels alive."

Which begs the question of why he would hope that No Country marks the beginning of a new phase for the Coens. He wants more dead-feeling films? Well, never mind; one might as well ask why Dargis calls No Country "a film I admire with few reservations" before she looks down her nose at the idea that she ought to "follow the example of the Coens and elegantly art-direct yet one more murder for your viewing pleasure and mine." One also might as well ask how Dargis got from watching a movie to directing one in the space of a single sentence. One might also point out that No Country in fact omits the depiction of several murders...but there's no point with picking apart the details of arguments that are based in bad faith to begin with. Instead, I'll have my little petty jollies with the concept of Mr. Croce's beloved "messy aliveness" by way of alternative examples...

Here's little Stuey Gluck (Alex Zuckerman), loathed troll fanboy of Alex Winter's 1993 Freaked, so determinedly and messily alive that he survives getting tossed out of a plane in mid-flight...

King of Comedy's Rupert Pupkin (Robert DeNiro), who's certainly got Southland director Richard Kelly's "never say die" spirit...

...then there are those putatively fake chickens in Lynch's Eraserhead, spewing whatever it is they spew, and enacting, for my money, a perfect visual metaphor for the entirety of Southland Tales. Messily alive, indeed.

Comments

[Ray]

Messiness . . . First, I'm willing to go along with Mark's comment from yesterday's thread, and drop the word "elegaic" (but boy, are we going to be handicapped if we ever get into a discussion of Latin poetry).

The word I'd like to see banned is "messy" used as a term of critical praise, or thinly veiled self-justification, as in "Sorry about the bombs, but democracy is messy . . ." Or "I'm sorry Ray, but love is messy. That's why I'm leaving you for a guy who doesn't use the word 'elegaic' all the time." Not that anybody ever said that to me--just, you know, an example.

Great screen grabs on this post! But, and I'm sorry to keep reverting to yesterday's thread, but GK, how did you get those shots from "No Country"? Do they give you advance DVDs or something?

[Glenn Kenny]

While I'm loathe, by and large, to give away trade secrets...yep, Ray, I have received a "for your consideration" screener of the picture. A perk for being one of David Poland's "Gurus o' Gold," no doubt...

[bill]

I think this more or less boils down to a lack of respect for genre films (and books). McCarthy's book got much the same rap when it came out, as I remember, with several critics calling the book "pulp" and basically saying it was beneath him.

One could argue (I wouldn't myself) that "No Country for Old Men" in either incarnation isn't genre material (it transcends the genre, don't you know), but clearly it's the stick the critics who aren't so enthusiastic about it are using to beat it. Because, after all, a good genre film can be nothing more than an "exercise".

As far as the praise being directed at "Southland Tales", well, I don't know. I haven't seen it. I still reserve the right to hate it, but I guess I can't comment on it.

[Fernando F. Croce]

I don't mind disagreement (even if, in GK's case, it leads to facile mockery rather than discussion), but I do mind the suggestion of disdain for genre films. "Pulp," as I see it, is in many ways the essence of film -- earthy, revealing, juicy, violent, emotional. In its insistent, dry, spurious straining for some kind of above-it-all "meaning," "No Country for Old Men" is the very opposite of it.

A great genre film is a masterpiece. An "exercise," meanwhile, is something people (filmmakers included) do to get in shape for better things: say, a feeling for life, "messy" or not.

[bill]

I'm with you on genre films (if that wasn't clear). I'm not with you on "No Country for Old Men". It is a genre masterpiece. No straining, no dryness, no spuriousness (if that is indeed a word).

[Chris Goldstein]

Glenn, you'll have to forgive the Dargis' and Croces' of the world, for they have invested so much in Richard Kelly, hoping that by getting on board the Darko Express they may escape the doldrums of irrelevancy, maintain a semblance of their youth, because if the kids gobble it down then it must be tasty.

If Kelly gets wise he might have a shot at being a passable genre hack, banging out Dean Koontz adaptations with a modicum of style and class. But I don't think that's going to happen, as Kelly walked onto the yacht doing an impersonation of a visionary and I don't think he's going to ditch the costume no matter how much it funks up the wet bar. If he persists on seeing himself as the son of Lynch and Vonnegut, the least he could do is enroll at Pierce College and take some night classes in semiotics, because his understand of signs is remedial at best, i.e., don't cast some of the least talented SNL alum and then expect people to read your movie as a serious tractatus-logico on the state of Amerikkka. The two go together like whipped cream and ball bearings.

I don't know if the Coen's have made a sea change in the way they approach filmmaking, but I greatly appreciated how quiet No Country was. Southland Tales was loud, like listening to someone else's radio in traffic. There are ways of commenting on the vulagrity of our culture without adding to it. It's called critical distance. But that's in short supply right now. You would expect film critics like Dargis and Croce to apply this kind of rigor to how they approach the movies they are paid to see, but it sounds like they would rather spend time convincing themselves that they are not old, that they're still vital and alive, albeit ever so lovingly messy and disheveled, which leads me to believe that when they explain why they prefer Southland Tales they're really just trying to justify how they feel about themselves.

My dad is 70. His fourth wife is 32. She is alive. She is messy. She likes to talk talk talk. She also has nothing to say. My dad listens to her and he smiles.

[Glenn Kenny]

Just to address Fernando Croce above, I don't get where you infer a suggestion of disdain for genre films in my facile mockery. Someone who posts as obsessively about Mario Bava as myself could hardly be said to entertain any such notion. As for serious discussion, well, Cinepassion seems to lack a comments feature. But your review itself doesn't invite much—"one feels dead to me while the other feels alive," well, what's one going to say to that? "No, it doesn't"? You're talking about how something feels to you, and instead of making a case for those feelings, you use the meritriciously contrarian tactic of bludgeoning a superior film with the example of an inferior one. If you think "No Country" is "insistent" and "dry," show me how. I think one can make the argument. (See Roy Edroso's post on Alicublog, for instance.) I won't necessarily agree with it. But I'll respect it more.

[Steve]

This reminds me of the perennial touting of "Bring Me The Head of Alfredo Garcia", a movie I've tried to "get" 3 times to no avail, as a "drunken masterpiece".

[bill]

Steve - What's to get about that movie? It's a grim, nasty, hopeless crime film.

I admit the "drunken masterpiece" phrase is kind of silly. It reminds me of seeing authors described as writing "like hot-rodding angels" or "slumming angels".

[Fernando F. Croce]

Just a few clarifications.

Dear Glenn: The genre film comment was directed not at you (whose contribution to the analysis of genre films has been invaluable) but at Bill's assertion of my supposed "lack of respect for genre films."

Dear Chris: I did not get paid to review "Southland Tales," and my review of it is far from glowing. I hopped on no "Donnie Darko" express because it came out before I started my site, and because it sucked.

Thassit.

[bill]

My humblest apologies. You used the phrase "exercise", which raises my antennae, and pairing that with Darghis's above-it-all snarking, caused me to go into rant mode. I should have read more closely.

[Glenn Kenny]

My apologies too—reading comments out of order made me skip some. Dumb.

[S]

i've decided that "southland tales" was a result of richard kelly's seeing "the matrix" and thinking that, as a ripoff of grant morrison's "the invisibles," it didn't go far enough insofar as it failed to embrace structural incoherence.

this is true. regardless of whether or not kelly ever actually read "the invisibles."

also, i enjoyed "southland tales."

[S]

i've decided that "southland tales" was a result of richard kelly's seeing "the matrix" and thinking that, as a ripoff of grant morrison's "the invisibles," it didn't go far enough insofar as it failed to embrace structural incoherence.

this is true. regardless of whether or not kelly ever actually read "the invisibles."

also, i enjoyed "southland tales."

[S]

oops. sorry for the double post. computer snafu.

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