1.5 stars. Rated R, for graphic nudity, sexuality and profanity
By Derrick Bang
Goodness.
I haven’t seen a film this obtuse
and pretentiously arty since Peter Greenaway’s Prospero’s Books, back in 1991.
And it has been a good
quarter-century, being spared that sort of self-indulgent twaddle.
Italian filmmaker Paolo
Sorrentino’s newest effort, Youth,
has all the hallmarks of a Greenaway head trip: the same casually nude people,
randomly draped like living room décor from one moment to the next; the same
slow takes on still lifes, whether spacious, cow-laden fields or abandoned lawn
chairs; the same jarring application of frequently discordant music.
The same droning soliloquies and
dry-as-toast conversations by top-flight actors who appear to have been coached
not to show emotion, or react in a
manner that might be recognized by ordinary people.
In a word — no, in three words —
boring, boring and boring.
Retired composer and conductor
Fred Ballinger (Michael Caine) and defiantly vigorous film director Mick Boyle
(Harvey Keitel), friends for decades, are vacationing at an opulent hotel/spa
at the foot of the Swiss Alps. It’s the sort of Art Nouveau establishment —
complete with oddly detached and/or just plain weird staff members — that Wes
Anderson lampooned so deliciously in last year’s Grand Budapest Hotel.
(In fact, it’s the Berghotel
Schatzalp, a former luxury sanatorium built in 1900 for tuberculosis patients.
Make of that what you will, given how Sorrentino has chosen to use this
setting.)
Fred and Mick have reached their
twilight years: the point at which each has too many yesterdays to remember
with any accuracy, and too few tomorrows to anticipate with any degree of
pleasure. Casual conversation sticks to “good things,” which is to say they
tend to avoid topics that might get prickly, or that invade the other’s deeply
private space.
“Good things” also apparently
includes sharing their respective urinary accomplishments — or lack thereof —
and a series of ongoing bets over whether the couple at an adjacent dining
table, oddly silent evening after evening, ever will actually speak to each
other.
Fred is approached by an emissary
from Queen Elizabeth, who wishes to acknowledge her husband’s upcoming birthday
with a concert to be conducted by Ballinger, with a program confined to his
most acclaimed work, “Simple Songs.” But Fred stubbornly refuses to un-retire
himself, and besides; he doesn’t perform “Simple Songs” anymore. For personal
reasons.
Mick, in turn, is struggling with
the screenplay for his next film, fleshing out the acts with a coterie of five
nameless Hollywood wannabes. They’re never introduced; we never learn anything
about them, aside from the fact that two are in the early stages of falling in
love with each other. This quintet is just sorta vaguely anonymous, or just
plain vague ... like much of this film.
As it happens, Fred and Mick are
more than good friends; they’re also mutual fathers-in-law: Fred’s daughter
Lena (Rachel Weisz) is married to Mick’s son Julian (Ed Stoppard). Or at least
she was; we’ve only just been introduced to Lena when comes the news that
Julian has dumped her for a lusty little pop singer (Paloma Faith, essentially
playing herself).
Tears and recrimination from
Lena; nary a backward glance from Justin. Brief awkward silence between Fred
and Mick, but they’re too firmly bonded to let this interfere with their
friendship.
Lena’s bond with Fred, however,
is another matter. Her own personal heartbreak has unleashed a lifetime of
disappointment in a father who paid attention only to his music, too frequently
ignoring both his daughter and his wife. It’s a grand, spiteful speech, and
Weisz makes the most of it, getting the whole diatribe out in one long, furious
take.
It’s a welcome display of honest passion,
in a film that too frequently wanders off in odd directions, as if seeking its
bliss.
The tableau includes a few other
guests, most just window-dressing: a Buddhist monk (Dorji Wangchuk) who
supposedly can levitate; the reigning Miss Universe (Madalina Diana Ghenea) who
proudly displays her gorgeous curves; the ponytailed young masseuse (Luna Zimic
Mijovic) who manages to appear shy, plain and unexpectedly sexy, all at the
same time.
Then there’s Jimmy Tree (Paul
Dano), a successful American actor desperate to be taken seriously as an
artist, but forever haunted by a long-ago starring role in the blockbuster
action flick that made his career. Jimmy pretends to be vacationing with
everybody else, but in reality he misses little, apparently sizing up the
quirks, tics and hiccups displayed by all the other guests, as if deciding
which to appropriate for his upcoming character study.
All these folks wander aimlessly
about the spa hallways and grounds, occasionally intersecting each other’s
orbits in the manner of spinning electrons. Very little comes of such
encounters.
Actually, very little comes of
this entire film, which at 118 minutes is a torturous slog. Sorrentino clearly
intends this to be a revealing document on the often heartbreaking nature of
ageing, memory, desire and ambition ... but his own aggressively flamboyant
style too frequently calls attention to itself, utterly extinguishing even the
briefest flicker of plot or character dynamic.
Caine, usually an excellent actor
even under trying circumstances, struggles gamely to keep us involved in Fred’s
“great mystery”: Why won’t he perform
the work for which he’s best known? Dano does a bit better, his own quirky
approach more in synch with Sorrentino’s stylistic twitches.
We’re intended to become curious about
the answers to these various questions. What film role is Jimmy prepping? Will
Fred ultimately be persuaded to abandon retirement, if only briefly? Will Lena
find rebound happiness in the arms of a stoic mountaineer (Robert Seethaler)
who just sorta pops into these proceedings toward the end of the second act?
Do we care about any of this?
Highly doubtful. I sure as hell
didn’t.
Frankly, I knew we were in
trouble from the opening scene, where Sorrentino and cinematographer Luca
Bigazzi hold on the tight close-up of a singer — one of many performers hired
to entertain the hotel guests each evening — as she and her band slowly turn on
a revolving stage. This goes on interminably, as she delivers the whole ...
entire ... song. To no purpose.
Which pretty much sums up Youth: purposeless and pointless. All
aggressive style, virtually no substance. At least, none that makes any sense.
You’ll
feel very, very old, by the time this
film finally (praise God, finally)
concludes.
1 comment:
My wife and I saw it New Year's Eve. Reminded us both of movies we saw in the 60s. Kind of a head scratcher. It did give us something interesting to talk about.
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