Two stars. Rating: R, for pervasive profanity, considerable drug use, sexual candor and fleeting nudity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.4.13
Viewers born after 1965, or
thereabouts, won’t have the faintest idea what writer/director David Chase is
trying to express in this film.
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| Expecting yet another generation gap-inspired lecture, Douglas (John Magaro, right) is surprised when his father (James Gandolfini) genuinely opens up to him. Enjoy this scene, as it's the only truly impressive display of acting, writing and directing in an otherwise inane and deadly dull drama. |
Heck, I lived through this
transitional period just like he did, and I barely followed this storyline.
Chase apparently assumes that the
1960s’ musical revolution, and all it involved, are somehow grafted into the brain
cells of every American, regardless of age. Granted, the obvious high points
have become (in)famous: the long hair, the mod clothes, the casual sex and even
more casual drug use, the ever-widening generation gap made worse by mounting
contempt for the violent quagmire in Vietnam.
But these are mere backdrop
elements, against which the main characters in Chase’s Not Fade Away play out
their restless angst ... and that’s where this film falls apart.
We’ve absolutely no sense of the
young people at the heart of this story: no concept of what they’re thinking
from one moment to the next, or why some of them are so rude and self-centered,
or why others are self-destructive. We get no back-stories, no insightful
clues, no confessional moments of lucidity. These characters speak in non-sequiturs
— when they speak at all — and free-associate stray thoughts with snarky
contempt, as if daring us to make sense of anything.
Chase apparently expects us to
read everybody’s mind, but that’s impossible; his stars haven’t the acting
chops to get anywhere near the level of introspective clarity we so desperately
need. And, as if aware of this problem, Chase and cinematographer Eigil Bryld
rely tediously, tiresomely on sulky, coldly aloof close-ups, as if searching for
significance in the pores of each face.
Where is the fire, the acting
gusto, that Chase brought to his work on HBO’s The Sopranos?
And slow? Oh, goodness; trends
could rise and fall during the time it takes this morose, 112-minute film to
drag to a conclusion.
The topper is an elliptical
“conclusion” that arrives several scenes after Chase blows an opportunity to
stop at a much more logical moment. Like several other recent films, Chase
hasn’t the slightest idea when to stop, and instead gives us several false
endings before settling on the least of the bunch.
I have learned, through long experience,
to be wary of intimate projects that are deeply personal to filmmakers; in most
cases, they can’t get out of their own way. The results are disappointing at
best, mawkish self-indulgent at worst. Not Fade Away most often leans toward
the latter.
