I had to re-rent Things You Can Tell By Looking At Her.
That is a very interesting movie in a number of ways. I enjoyed it a lot, and so did N, and it's not at all his kind of movie. Did you say that about Mr. X, too?
I have criticisms, too, but in belated honor of your anniversary, I'm not mentioning them, and also because if I do you'll call me Ms. Negativity.
This is what I liked most....
Well, first of all, the casting was great. Except for that execrable crazy homeless woman who could hardly have been worse. (Oops, that one slipped out.) Anyway, Glenn Close was perfect, and so was Calista Flockheart. You know, that frighteningly thin person is a really, really good actress?
And i liked the way it was filmed, the sort of monotones, and the way the backgrounds were muted, or white, so the characters were visually so central. There is a vocabulary for talking about movies, but I don't know it. I know the cinematography is what i'm talking about, but i don't know the vocabulary of it.
There were very literary moments, not editorialized, which in most American movies is not the rule. Somehow, unlike many foreign films, almost all American films are determined to instruct you what to feel, or that there is something to be felt, or thought about, in any given scene. If not with the sound track, with other big hints. Facial expressions. Camera use. When the older sister was putting on her blind sister's makeup, was one. And when she heard her blind sister, who brought that guy home, make the crack about her, "You'd be doing her a favor." And when Glenn Close takes her mother's earrings, and puts them on, and feels cheered up in that moment. And the minimalist way in which the situation with man at work who isn't returning her calls is treated -- no editorializing, nothing said, just her face, and the fact that a woman like her has called a tarot reader... desperation, and more to come, and all implied. And when the woman saw the dwarf's shoes lined up, so small, and when he raised his head and looked at her, that male look. There were many of those moments.
Maybe my favorite aspect of the movie was the particular way in which the lives met. That isn't a novel conceit, but the way in intersections were handled was very moving, somehow. It had... verite! A movie word! And there was no attempt to bring the parties together more than glancingly, and no significance attributed to the conjunctions other than the one you felt-- that anyone, everyone, you meet, has this life, and it is significant.
I just figured it out. That isn't an American movie, X, it's a French movie. |
