When a stubborn iconoclast is forced into the rigid confines of celebrity culture, it is inevitable that one will eventually break the other. When that rebel is Bob Dylan and the entertainment industry that he inherits specifically elevates stars with clearly defined images, the friction is enough to instigate a social turning point, confronting the inherent uncertainty within modern art, philosophy, and politics. As such, there is a challenge that comes with fitting his unorthodox story into a genre which often falls too easily into a ‘Greatest Hits’ playlist, appealing more to cheap nostalgia than thoughtful re-examination of an icon’s legacy.
A Complete Unknown is not as boldly experimental asTodd Haynes’ I’m Not There, which offers a far more compelling insight into Dylan’s multitude of identities, yet James Mangold also fortunately saves it from the flavourless banality of Bohemian Rhapsody. Focusing on those first few years of the musician’s career at least grants the film some leeway, catching him at a point in time when the question of who he would be still hangs in the air – though truthfully, this mystery has never quite been settled. Ironically, Dylan’s most distinguishing feature may very well be his elusiveness, and it is there where Mangold’s biopic effectively captures the countercultural icon’s inscrutable essence.
The quiet depth that Timothee Chalamet brings to the role certainly pierces some of that obscurity, offering greater insight into those romantic and professional relationships which shaped his early career, yet never does he completely bare his soul. Not even his girlfriend Sylvie is quite able to figure him out, lamenting the strange gaps in his story that keep others at a distance, but we can also see that he feels just as much an outsider to himself. Instead, music and experimentation pave the path to self-awareness, and as his profile grows, he is quick to defy those who keep him from satiating his curiosity.
Chalamet hits all the right notes here in his interpretation of Dylan, striking a fine resemblance in his recreation of the musician’s drawling mumble, yet also building on his persona in a manner that transcends mere mimicry. This Dylan can be both deeply contemplative and abrasively blunt in his own aloof way, drawing out an affair with singer Joan Baez while continuing to live with Sylvie. Later he walks offstage mid-performance when he feels pressured to sing his most popular songs, and when he introduces his new, electronic sound Newport Folk Festival, he stubbornly persists through the jeers of the audience.
Mangold plays loose with his dramatisation of Dylan’s story, at worst exaggerating the committee’s rush to pull the plug on this pivotal performance, and elsewhere undercutting a breakup scene with an awkward metaphor about spinning plates. After all, a certain level of sensationalism is unfortunately needed in bringing a story like this to the mainstream. For the most part though, A Complete Unknown smooths over these contrivances for the sake of its character work, drawing tension from Dylan’s peculiar, incongruous standing in American pop culture.
The vintage aesthetic that absorbs Chalamet in a world of smoky bars and spotlights also offers some authenticity here, replicating the fashion of 1960s Greenwich Village where bohemian counterculture thrived. With acoustic guitars and soulful vocals filling these spaces too, notes of Inside Llewyn Davis are felt strongly, though Dylan’s tale is not one of existential malaise. Instead, there is an impassioned energy in Mangold’s moving camera and abundant lens flares, blearily underscoring this rise to stardom in an era of artistic revolution.
For the disillusioned audiences of mid-century America, no longer are the glamorous, untouchable idols of Hollywood enough to earn their attention and reverence. News reports of the Cuban Missile Crisis and JFK’s death anchor Mangold’s film to a specific, turbulent point in time, embedding them just as much in Dylan’s character as he is ingrained in the culture at large. The unity of art and politics was not exactly a new concept in the 60s, but to invent a new brand of celebrity that can be both radically outspoken and mysteriously private is a feat which inspires absolute awe in A Complete Unknown. There in the unresolved and unexplained, true artistry is born, and Mangold leaves us entranced by its confounding, extraordinary contradictions.
A Complete Unknown is currently playing in cinemas.
When the niece of Major Allshard first dons a yellow ribbon in her hair, there is much chatter among the men at Fort Starke regarding who it is for. As lyricised in the folk song which gives this film its name, it is traditionally worn as a symbol of love and loyalty to a man fighting in war, although Olivia is not so open about the identity of her sweetheart. As such, a rivalry is born between Lieutenants Ross and Flint, incidentally tempering the harsh nature of their larger mission at hand with lighter touches of romance and humour.
For a film that places such a great emphasis on duty and honour, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon is brimming with warmth in its side characters and subplots, though this should be no surprise to those familiar with John Ford’s mythos of America. After all, what are these Frontier Army troops really fighting for, if not the prosperity of their families back home? As for honourable men like Captain Nathan Brittles who have suffered great loss, grief does not wither their hearts, but rather gives them even greater reason to fight for the happiness of others. Consequently, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon meets him during a significant time of his life indeed – ruefully facing down retirement from the only thing that gives his him purpose.
A yellow ribbon in Olivia’s hair hints at a sweetheart among the young cavalrymen, weaving romance and humour into this otherwise high-stakes tale.Blue and yellow uniforms stand out against the red, earthy tones of the desert, and even more so thanks to Ford’s rigorous blocking.
Brittles’ last detail comes in the wake of 1876’s Battle of Little Big Horn, which saw Native American warriors overwhelm the United States Army and break free of their reservations. War is brewing in the West, and Fort Starke is no longer the sanctuary it once was. Not only must he and his troop of cavalry soldiers drive them back home, but they must also escort Olivia and her aunt Abby to an eastbound stagecoach, which will take them to safety. The stakes are immense, and with Brittles’ last day of service approaching, there is an acute pressure to fulfil his assignment before bidding farewell to the only life he has ever known since his wife’s passing.
Brittles’ backstory lends his final mission personal stakes, as he prepares to farewell the only life he has known since his wife’s passing.Ford and his cinematographer Winton C. Hoch are laying the groundwork for The Searchers, shooting Monument Valley in Technicolor for the first time and crafting these stunning landscapes.
Besides the native tribes and the petty divisions among his own men, there is another adversary the ageing captain must contend with, taking the form of America’s rugged wilderness. This was not the first time Ford shot among the astounding vistas of Monument Valley, and he was already well acquainted with colour filmmaking by 1949, yet She Wore a Yellow Ribbon marks the union of both. Much of the bold beauty here is thanks to the genius of cinematographer Winton C. Hoch, whose proficiency in Technicolor photography far surpassed his peers in 1940s Hollywood, though Ford’s own eye for composition should not be underrated. Blood-red sunrises silhouette the company’s bugler as plays a brassy melody to herald the new day, while the land of vast plains and towering buttes draws deep, earthy tones through the mise-en-scène, swallowing up armies of blue-uniformed specks in spectacular establishing shots.
A blazing red sunrise cuts out the bugler’s silhouette – an image of patriotism and remembrance.High horizons use the red rock valleys as mise-en-scène, here situating us behind a Native American surveying the view.Low horizons stretch the blue, cloudy skies out over the cavalrymen, putting them at the mercy of the elements.
Perhaps most breathtaking though are those visions of Monument Valley that impressionably shift with the weather, beating down the travelling cavalry beneath the scorching sun and later shrouding its rocky outcrops in grey, ghostly clouds. Even after spotting a thunderstorm brewing in the distance, Ford reportedly demanded that they continue rolling, forcing both his cast and crew to trudge through slurries of mud. It is surely no coincidence that this led to one of the film’s most memorable and visually striking scenes – there is a raw, practical authenticity to such imagery which connects Brittles’ quest to the land itself, accordingly revealing the sheer perseverance of those who seek to navigate its formidable challenges.
Fog hangs low around the buttes of Monument Valley, offering an unusually ghostly atmosphere.Lightning strikes and rain pours during this thunderstorm, yet Brittles’ men and Ford’s crew persevere through the natural challenges thrown their way.
This admirable quality is perhaps most plainly illustrated though in Brittles’ attempted peace talks, careful manoeuvring, and resistance to unnecessary bloodshed. Nonviolent offence is clearly the preferred tactic here, especially given that hostile conquest would only spur on further aggression, but even then victory is not guaranteed. The burned-out remains of another military fort shake Brittles’ men to their core, and their failure to keep firearms out of the hands of Native Americans drastically shifts the odds against them further, eventually driving the entire troop back to Fort Starke in shame-faced defeat.
Excellent blocking of actors in this expansive landscape, trailing these Native Americans along the top of a hill and against the sky.Ravaged villages and innocent lives lost – this is a mission of many failures, testing Brittles’ mettle as a leader.
Brittles’ final hours as Captain are approaching, yet the prospect of letting his men continue this mission without an effective plan or assured leadership is difficult to stomach. The silver pocket watch they gift him as a farewell present certainly doesn’t help to ease the sorrow either, earning a moment of genuine poignancy as John Wayne tears up – a rare sight to behold in any Western, let alone one directed by Ford.
Still, when else does one’s dutiful commitment shine brighter than at one’s lowest point? Against all else, this is the American ideal that She Wore a Yellow Ribbon holds in greatest esteem, especially when Brittles resolves to launch one last campaign before he is officially retired. At 12 minutes to midnight, he orders his bugler sound the charge and leads his troop into the Native American camp of renegades – not to inflict violence, but to scatter their horses into the wild. Silhouetted against the clouds of dust being kicked up behind them, Brittles’ cavalry rides swiftly with the stampede, grounding what is one of Ford’s finest set pieces in peace rather than subjugation. With no herd, these tribes have no means of mounting attacks, and are consequently forced to return to their reservations on foot rather than stoking further conflict.
A grand set piece in the dead of night – no blood is spilt as Brittles and his men drive the renegades’ horses into the wild, accomplishing their mission with peaceful diplomacy and tact.
Even in the aftermath, Ford continues to flex his mastery of sweeping landscapes as Brittles riding off into a red and purple sunset and towards new settlements in California, though this new civilian life is fleeting. As an officer delivers a letter recalling him to duty as Chief of Scouts, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon optimistically upholds that those who seek to serve their country will always find a place among the ranks of their fellow soldiers. After all, there is still much joy to be found in this community at Fort Starke, especially with Olivia and Flint finally announcing their engagement and becoming a perfect picture of an American idealism worth defending. “Wherever they rode and whatever they fought for, that place became the United States,” the closing voiceover proudly proclaims – and for all its dewy-eyed patriotism, Ford’s grand mythologising of historic archetypes cannot be criticised for a lack of sincere, rousing conviction.
Riding off into a jaw-dropping sunset, painting the frame with shades of red, orange, and purple that all bleed into each other.
She Wore a Yellow Ribbon is currently available to purchase on Apple TV and Amazon Video.
For the first half hour of Letter Never Sent, the most pressing dramas that arises on our four adventurers’ journey into the wilderness are their romantic tensions and jealousies. Tanya’s affection for Andrei particularly irritates the insecure Sergei, resulting in a physical altercation that leaves Andrei picking himself up out of a swamp, and further complicating their already challenging quest for diamonds in the secluded mountains and forests of central Siberia.
Perhaps the only level-headed member of this party is their guide, Konstantin. Unlike the others, he is not a geologist, yet he has traversed this region many times before. It is clear from the letter he is writing to his wife that their juvenile antics are of little interest to him, and instead his heart and mind linger elsewhere.
“Remembered sitting in the hallway with you. I saw love and anxiety in your eyes. But again and again some overpowering voice keeps carrying me off. I’m even glad not to have sent this letter. Now during every stop near every campfire I’ll write to you about our itinerant life in the taiga.”
Each character is beautifully established in the opening scenes, as Kalatozov creates intimate arrangements from their faces.
Konstantin knows better than anyone how unpredictable the natural world can be, though even he isn’t prepared for the overwhelming turn of events which shrinks these emotions into minor trivialities. This rugged environment does not exist to profit humans, but is indifferent to their aspirations and suffering, tenderising vulnerable minds with its unfathomable, primordial chaos before swallowing them whole.
Where Mikhail Kalatozov once dedicated his handheld camerawork and canted angles to the soul-destroying grief of war in The Cranes Are Flying, here his aesthetic revels in a maddening struggle for survival, bowing down before ravaging elemental forces. We can feel every breath and shiver through his ultra wide-angle lens, pressing intimately against actors’ faces while stretching out daunting landscapes behind their weary expressions. His shift in location away from the urban centres of Russia only further demonstrates the versatility of his high-contrast photography as well, studying the evocative textures of rippling water, fresh fallen snow, and charred forests with equal parts wonder and terror.
Textured ripples in the water – a Tarkovsky trademark here that precedes his first film by two years.Low angles as well point up at overcast skies, forming these gorgeous, minimalist compositions.Griffith, Dreyer, Bergman – Kalatozov joins that list of directors who perfected and innovated the art of the close-up.
Even before these explorers begin dropping though, Kalatozov is already wearing away at their sanity, sinking his majestic orchestral score into a crashing, dissonant cacophony of strings, woodwinds, and percussion. “We are straining ourselves to wrench out the mystery from the bowels of the earth,” Konstantin continues to write in his letter, his voiceover playing beneath a frenetic montage of the party trekking across mountains and fruitlessly hacking at the earth, while the faint, double-exposed imprint of a fire rages over the top. The foreshadowing should not go unnoted here. As if sparked by this raging delirium, the forest itself catches alight shortly after, tragically dooming Sergei to perish beneath a fallen tree.
Foreshadowing in the double exposure effect of a raging fire.
“Nature has turned herself against us,” Konstantin’s voiceover poignantly reflects, though truthfully it was never on their side. Black smoke and haze rises into the air, and Kalatozov uncharacteristically uses a telephoto lens to cut out the survivors’ silhouettes against a grey sky, creating the impression of a two-dimensional image as they vainly call for help into a radio. The smog is far too thick for even a passing search helicopter to pick them out, and so they soon find themselves isolated once again, with nothing but their wits and stamina to outlast whatever the land should throw at them next.
A rare instance of Kalatozov using a telephoto lens, pressing his actors’ silhouettes against a dark, smoky sky to create a two-dimensional effect.
The cleansing rain that falls in the wake of this devastation helps to douse the remaining embers and quench the adventurers’ thirst, though it is little more than temporary relief as they trudge through the spindly, black trees of the forest’s ashy remains. Weakened to the point of total exhaustion, Andrei’s dazed expression floats by in close-up as he is carried on a makeshift gurney, and we too take his immediate point-of-view as he gazes up at the trees in a trance. Realising the burden that he is inflicting on his companions, he decides to disappear into the misty swamp one night and, much to Tanya’s horror, becomes the second to perish.
Letter Never Sent covers a huge range of natural environments, revealing central Siberia’s vast scope of danger.Kalatozov specifically styled these mounds for this shot – painstaking attention to detail, even when shooting in nature.
As the party’s numbers dwindle throughout Letter Never Sent, Kalatozov reveals a robust formal structure, not so concerned with narrative convention than his characters’ psychological disintegration. That each should meet their end in a totally different environment only further reveals the vast scope of the peril which encompasses them, particularly when winter falls and Tanya succumbs to the cold. As Konstantin carries her through the snow, Kalatozov recalls Andrei’s floating close-ups and point-of-view shots, though this time taking her perspective with a blurred lens that fades into a deep, empty darkness.
Horizontal close-ups and disorientated point-of-view shots formally connect these two devastatingdeaths.A lonely trudge through snowy wastelands, accompanied by a sparse quiver of strings.
By the time Konstantin is left as the party’s sole survivor, the score has settled into a sparse, lonely quiver of strings, accompanied by that constant voiceover. Unlike his companions, he was never motivated by the promise of riches – he has something far more valuable waiting for him back home, driving him to persevere against all odds.
“Vera! My darling Vera! My life doesn’t belong to me. I must deliver the map to people. I can’t die. I can’t. I must live. Too much has been lost. Too much has been found.”
Floating on a makeshift raft down an icy river, hallucinations of industrial ports, cranes, and boats entice Konstantin in haunting long dissolves, while a warm vision of Vera gently calls him back to the harsh reality he must face to survive. This is just as much a psychological struggle as it is a physical one, and only those who are prepared to fight both battles may live long enough to find salvation on the other end.
Breathtaking vistas in central Siberia as Konstantin floats down icy rapids. Hallucinations of industrial ports, cranes, and boats entice Konstantin in haunting long dissolves, evoking Murnau’s masterpiece Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans.This is as much a psychological struggle as it is a physical one, manifesting visions of Konstantin’s wife as he is on the verge of giving up.
For Konstantin, it takes reaching the brink of death for that lifeline to finally arrive, and the deep focus image of a rescue worker descending from a helicopter above his unconscious face in the foreground is all the sweeter for it. Suddenly, our weary explorer’s eyes flutter open, and Kalatozov ends his film the way it began. Flying through the air in a reverse tracking shot, all we can do is admire the terrible beauty of this desolate, untamed land, and the chilling insignificance of those who dare to challenge it.
Salvation arrives in this incredible shot, foregrounding Konstantin’s unconscious face while his rescuer descends from a helicopter in the background.Bookended helicopter tracking shots, flying out from the personal to the epic.
Letter Never Sent is currently streaming on The Criterion Channel.
When Marine Corps veteran Terry returns to the Louisiana police station where the $36,000 intended for his cousin’s bail has been confiscated, Chief Sandy Burnne and his colleagues are not prepared for the hell about to be unleashed on them. Jeremy Saulnier’s narrative has barely raised the heat past a gentle simmer up until now, matching Aaron Pierre’s cool performance with an equally composed pacing, though it is only matter of time before that patience wears thin. The police officers’ assumption that he lacks combat experience simply because he never served overseas during his military career is a dire mistake. Like so many action heroes of cinema history, Terry proves himself more than capable, using his unique set of skills and tactical wits to take down an entire squad.
Still, vengeance does not arrive through bloody carnage for this veteran. Violence is merely a non-lethal means to an ends, and so despite its proliferation in Rebel Ridge, the total fatalities remain remarkably low. Terry never killed a man during his service, and he is not going to start a John Wick-style rampage now, mowing down leagues of enemies before reaching a final boss. Institutional corruption must be dealt with at its source, and through his unlikely alliance with law student Summer, he begins to embrace a new fight for justice.
Of course, this is all purely tactical for Terry. Right from the opening scene when he is rammed off his bicycle by officers Marston and Lann, it is clear his identity as a Black man factors deeply into his careful interactions with the police. He is not going to pick any fights that he knows he is going to lose, and he is certainly not going to aggravate anyone looking for an excuse to detain or shoot him. In response to their extreme brutality, he responds with the least amount of force necessary, ironically demonstrating the ideal behaviour they should be modelling. Where Saulnier’s 2015 film Green Room veers far more heavily into gore and horror, Rebel Ridge makes for a far more sobering thriller, understanding the nuanced stakes that lie in this conflict beyond life and death.
Unfortunately, the dedication to murky, ambient lighting which gave Green Room such a distinctive visual character is largely absent here, leaving Rebel Ridge struggling to aesthetically set itself apart from the fray of modern action movies. At least beyond the remarkable fight choreography creatively tailored to Terry’s no-killing principle, Saulnier delivers a small handful of locations that play to his stylistic strengths, illuminating the police evidence room with a subtle blue wash and later piercing the darkness of the courtroom basement with green and orange light sources. Scenes like these do much of the heavy lifting when it comes to imbuing the setting with a sense of peril, hinting at the insidious exploitation lurking beneath the police force’s veneer of law-abiding respectability.
After all, the prejudice that Terry experiences is not an isolated incident. What starts as a quest to free his cousin inevitably gets wrapped up in a much larger conspiracy at play, raising suspicions when an unidentified whistleblower points Summer towards a strange anomaly in police records – over the past two years, many people who committed misdemeanours were held in jail for exactly 90 days before being released. The exposition which peels back the mystery here drags a little, though the payoff in Terry’s final confrontation with Burnne and his lackeys is certainly worth it, ultimately revealing where individual loyalties truly lie. Our veteran hero only may be alive due to his combat expertise, though physical conflict alone is never going to heal a broken system. Patience, discernment, and cunning are virtues embodied in his pursuit of justice, and superbly carried through in Saulnier’s tense, brooding storytelling.
When spoiled heir Dickie Greenleaf catches Tom Ripley trying on his expensive clothing, the assumption that his new friend might be gay is only half-correct. Queer readings of Patricia Highsmith’s novel The Talented Mr. Ripley are nothing new, and Steven Zaillian is not ignorant to them in his television adaptation, though the icy contempt and admiration that are wrapped up in Tom’s repression also paint a far more complex image of class envy. Tom does not wish to be with Dickie, but to become him, and the depths to which he is willing to sink in this mission reveal a moral depravity only matched by his patience, diligence, and cunning.
Of all the qualities that vex Tom about Dickie, it is his complete lack of personal merit that is most maddening, deeming him unworthy of the lavish lifestyle funded by his wealthy father. While Dickie admires the cubism of Picasso and even proudly owns his artworks, his attempts at recreating that distinctive, abstract style fall short, just as his girlfriend Marge displays little talent in her writing and his friend Freddie is no great playwright. Money might buy the bourgeoisie false praise, yet no amount of riches can endow upon them the ingenious intuition that history’s greatest artists naturally possess, and which Tom nefariously manipulates to earn what he views as his unassailable right.
Tom arrives in Dickie and Marge’s life as a looming shadow, ominously cast over their bodies relaxing on the beach.Few television series in history look like this – Zaillian draws on the expertise of cinematographer Robert Elswit to capture these magnificent visuals, making for some of their best work.
It takes the sharp, opportunistic mind of a con artist to conduct a scam as multifaceted as that which Tom executes here, murdering and stealing Dickie’s identity while carefully navigating the ensuing police investigations. Though Tom adopts his victim’s appreciation of Picasso for this ploy, Zaillian also introduces another historic painter as an even greater subject of fascination in Ripley. The spiritual affinity that Tom feels for Baroque artist Caravaggio is deepened in the parallels between their stories, both being men who commit murder, go on the run, and express a transgressive attraction towards men. Though living three centuries apart, these highly intelligent outcasts are mirrors of each other – one being an artist with a criminal background, and the other a criminal with a fondness for art.
A graphic match cut deftly bridges historical time periods, bringing Tom and Caravaggio’s formal connection to a head in the final episode.Gothic expressionism in the Caravaggio flashback, revealing the murder which has tainted his name.Caravaggio’s artworks are strewn throughout Ripley, most notably drawing Tom to the San Luigi dei Francesi cathedral where his three St. Matthew paintings are on display.
At the root of this comparison though, perhaps Tom’s appreciation may simply stem from the aesthetic and formal qualities of Caravaggio’s paintings, portraying biblical struggles with an intense, dramatic realism that was considered groundbreaking in Italy’s late Renaissance. When Tom gazes upon three companion pieces depicting St. Matthew at the grandiose San Luigi dei Francesi cathedral in Rome, they seem to come alive with the sounds of distant, tortured screaming, blurring the thin boundary between art and observer. With this in mind, Zaillian’s primary inspiration behind Ripley also comes into focus, skilfully weaving light and shadow through his introspective staging of an epic moral battle as Caravaggio did four hundred years ago.
Though the rise of cinematic television in recent years has seen film directors take their eye for photography to the small screen, one can hardly call Zaillian an auteur. This is not to take away from his impressive writing credits such as Schindler’s List, Gangs of New York, and The Irishman, but the spectacular command of visual storytelling in Ripley is rare to behold from a filmmaker whose directing has often been the least notable parts of his career.
An Antonioni approach to photographing Italian architecture, using wide angle lenses to frame these shots that raise structures far above the tiny people below.Immaculate framing and lighting in the canals of Venice, trapping Ripley in a labyrinth built upon his greatest fear – water.Tom’s wandering through labyrinthine Italian cities offers both beautiful mise-en-scène and excellent visual storytelling, applying a photographer’s eye to the detail of each shot.
Robert Elswit’s high-contrast, monochrome cinematography of course plays in an integral role here, rivalling his work on Paul Thomas Anderson’s films with superb chiaroscuro lighting and a strong depth of field that basks in Italy’s historic architecture. Elswit and Zaillian’s mise-en-scène earn a comparison to Michelangelo Antonioni’s tremendous use of manmade structures here, aptly using the negative space of vast walls to impede on his characters, while detailing the intricate, uneven textures of their surroundings with the keen eye of a photographer. The attention paid to this weathered stonework tells the story of a nation whose past is built upon grand ambition, yet which has eroded over many centuries, tarnishing surfaces with discoloured stains and exposing the rough bedrock beneath worn exteriors.
Lichen-covered brick walls fill in the negative space of these shots with visual tactility, giving each location its own distinct character.Visual majesty in the cathedrals that Ripley ventures through, captured with astounding symmetry in this high angle.History is baked into the discoloured stains and weathered stonework of Italian architecture, dominating these compositions that push Tom to the edge of the frame.
Conversely, the interiors of the villas, palazzi, and hotels where Tom often takes up residence couldn’t be more luxurious, revelling in the fine Baroque furniture and decorative wallpaper that only an aristocrat could afford. The camera takes a largely detached perspective in its static wide shots, though when it does move it is usually in short panning and tracking motions, following him through gorgeous sets tainted by his corrosive moral darkness.
Baroque interiors designed with luxurious attention to detail, reflecting the darkness that Tom carries with him to each hotel and villa.Divine judgement in the unblinking gaze of these historic sculptures, following Tom all through Italy.
In effect, Ripley crafts a labyrinth out of its environments, beginning in the grimy, cramped apartment buildings of New York City and winding through the bright streets and alleys of Italy. Zaillian’s recurring shots of stairways often evoke Vertigo in their dizzying high and low angles, with even the flash-forward that opens the series hinting at the gloomy descent to come as Tom drags Freddie’s body down a flight of steps. Elsewhere, narrow frames confine characters to tiny rectangles, while those religious sculptures clinging to buildings around Italy direct their unblinking gazes towards Tom, casting divine judgement upon his actions.
Tom emerges from the cramped apartments in New York City – a cesspool of grime and darkness before he heads to the bright, sunny coast of Italy.Zaillian’s stairway motif arrives as a flash-forward in the very first shot of the series, which returns in its full context four episodes later.Dizzying high and low angles of stairway litter this series, forming spirals out of rectangles, hexagons, and arches.Distant doorways and windows place Dickie and Marge under an intense, microscopic lens from Tom’s voyeuristic perspective.Precision in Zaillian’s framing, trapping Tom in confining boxes.
As oppressive as these tight spaces may be, they are where Tom is most in control, though Zaillian is also sure to emphasise that the opposite is equally true. The only place to hide when surrounded by vast, open expanses of ocean is within the darkness that lies below, and Tom’s phobia is made palpable in a visual motif that plunges the camera down into that suffocating abyss. This shot is present in nearly every episode of Ripley, haunting him like a persistent nightmare, though Zaillian broadens its formal symbolism too as Tom seeks to wield his greatest fear as a weapon against others.
The dominant aesthetic of static shots is broken up by this sinking camera motif, appearing in most episodes as a persistent nightmare of drowning.The dark, churning water beckons Tom as he sails between destinations, threatening to pull him into the abyss.
Most crucially, Tom’s murder of Dickie upon a small boat in the middle of the ocean marks a tipping point for the con artist, seeing him graduate to an even more malicious felony. Zaillian conducts this sequence with taut suspense, entirely dropping out dialogue from the moment Tom delivers the killing blow so that we may sit with his discomforting attempts to sink the body, steal Dickie’s coveted possessions, and burn the boat. From below the surface, the camera often positions us gazing up at the boat’s silhouetted underside with an unsettling calmness. Equally though, the sea is also a force of unpredictable chaos, threatening to drag Tom into its depths when his foot gets caught in the anchor rope and knocking him unconscious with the out-of-control dinghy.
Zaillian’s execution of Dickie’s murder is cold, calculated, and passionless, the entire sequence unfolding over 25 patient minutes.Daunting camera placement from deep within the ocean, calling upon Tom’s phobia at the peak of his brutality.
Even when Tom manages to make it out alive, his continued efforts to cover his tracks bear resemblance to Norman Bates cleaning up after his mother’s murder in Psycho, deriving suspense from his systematic procedures of self-preservation across 25 nerve-wracking minutes. Within a two-hour film, a scene this long might otherwise be the centrepiece of the entire story, yet in this series it is simply one of several extended sequences that unfolds with measured, focused resolve.
Unlike most commercial television, there are no dragged-out plot threads or over-reliance on dialogue to push the narrative forward either. As such, Zaillian recognises the unique qualities of this serial format in a manner that only a handful of filmmakers have truly capitalised on before – Ingmar Bergman’s Scenes from a Marriage comes to mind, or more recently Barry Jenkins’ The Underground Railroad. By structuring Patricia Highsmith’s story around roughly hour-long episodes, each scene unfolds with a patient attention to detail, unencumbered by the constraints of limited run times while maintaining a meticulous narrative economy.
Zaillian borrows this use of colour from Schindler’s List – a film he wrote – leaving behind evidence of murder in these red, bloody paw print, and breaking through Elswit’s severe, black-and-white photography.Exposition is brought alive as letters are read out directly to the camera.
Specifically crucial to the development of Ripley’s overarching form are Zaillian’s recurring symbols, woven with sly purpose into Tom’s characterisation. The refrigerator that Dickie purchases in the second episode is a point of contention for Tom, representing a despicably domestic life of stagnation, while the precious ring he steals is proudly worn as an icon of status. After Freddie starts investigating his mysterious disappearance though, the glass ashtray which Tom viciously beats him to death with becomes the most wickedly amusing motif of the lot, laying the dramatic irony on thick when the police inspector visits the following morning and taps his cigarette into it. Later in Venice, Tom even goes out of his way to purchase an identical ash tray for their final meeting, for no other reason than to gloat in his deception.
Tom eyes Dickie’s ring off early, and from there it becomes a fixation for him, representing the status he seeks to claim for himself.An unassuming ash tray becomes the murder weapon Tom wields against Freddie, and continues to appear in these close-ups with sharp dramatic irony.
This arrogant stunt speaks acutely to Andrew Scott’s sinister interpretation of Tom Ripley, especially when comparing him against previous versions performed by Alain Delon and Matt Damon. Scott is by far the oldest of three at the time of playing the role, and although this stretches credulity when the character’s relative youth comes into question, it does apply a new lens to Tom as a more experienced, jaded con artist. He does not possess the affable charisma of Delon or Damon, but he delivers each line with calculated discernment, understanding how a specific inflection or choice of word might turn a conversation in his favour. He realises that he does not need others to like him, but to merely give him the benefit of the doubt, allowing enough time to review the situation and recalibrate his web of false identities. After all, how could anyone trust those onyx, shark-like eyes that patiently scrutinise his prey when they aren’t projecting outright malice?
Andrew Scott’s take on Tom Ripley is far from Alain Delon’s and Matt Damon’s, turning in charisma for sinister, calculating discernment.
Scott’s casting makes even more sense when considered within the broader context of Zaillian’s adaptation, leaning into the introspective nature of Tom’s nefarious schemes rather than their sensational thrills. The question of what exactly constitutes a fraud is woven carefully through each of Ripley’s characters, mostly centring around Dickie’s class entitlement and Tom’s identity theft, though even manifesting in the police inspector’s passing lies about his wife’s hometown. The rest of society wears false masks to get ahead, Tom reasons, so why shouldn’t he join in the game?
It is no coincidence that the disguise he wears when pretending to be the ‘real’ Tom Ripley so closely resembles the representation of Caravaggio that we meet in the final episode. If anything, this is the truest version of Tom that he has played thus far, and Zaillian’s magnificent conclusion brings that comparison full circle with a dextrous montage of mirrored movements and graphic match cuts. Our protagonist is not some demon born to wreak havoc on the world, but rather a man who has always existed throughout history, seeking to climb the ladder of opportunity with a sharpened, creative impulse and moral disregard. As Ripley so thoroughly demonstrates in studying the mind of this genius, there may be no profession that better captures humanity’s enormous potential than an artist, and none that sinks any lower than a charlatan.
Zaillian sticks the landing with this tremendous montage of match cuts between Tom and Caravaggio, their weapons, and their victims, clearly inspired by The Usual Suspects while integrating his own sinister flair.Tom’s disguise as the ‘real’ Tom Ripley bears striking resemblance to Caravaggio, authenticating the connection between artist and criminal.
Preston Sturges was known more for his sharp turns of phrase, pacey editing, and unrelenting slapstick than his mise-en-scène, but Sullivan’s Travels combines all of his usual trademarks with surprising flashes of visual beauty. These mostly appear in the final act when Sullivan winds up in a chain gang and the entire movie takes a far darker turn, but even before this point it works wonderfully as a quick-witted satire of Hollywood liberalism and privilege.
Sturges opens the film in media res, at what appears to be the climax of an entirely different movie.
“You see the symbolism of it? Capital and Labor destroy each other. It teaches a moral lesson. It has social significance.”
Sullivan is inspired. He wants to make a real movie about real issues, confronting problems that the average American faces every day.
An image of poverty that the wealthy imagine it to be – a rucksack and a baggy coat. Hilariously clueless, but formally setting up the hard-hitting third act well.
“But with a little sex,” his producers continue to insist. Therein lies the problem. If there was ever a studio that could authentically bring rough living conditions to the screen, it isn’t the one Sullivan works for, and Sullivan certainly shouldn’t be the one helming that project. The Italian neorealism movement would prove a few years later that cinema can absolutely treat this sort of subject matter with compassion and authenticity, but those movies were being made by filmmakers with firsthand experience. To Sullivan, stepping into the shoes of the impoverished would serve to assuage some of his class guilt, and he might make a tidy profit out of it on the side. Adding “a little sex” is the studio’s push to romanticise the subject matter, making it conventionally appealing for their audiences who just want a laugh.
A slapstick interlude placed with purpose and precision.
Sullivan’s Travels is also a direct response to early Hollywood comedies that abandoned humour in favour of serious, hard-hitting messages. Sturges’ approach is a complex balancing act of conflicting tones which many directors might struggle to pull off, but this is his specialty. He dances around the real darkness at the heart of the story for the first two acts, playing in the realm of slapstick comedy, irony, and meta-humour. Sullivan’s first attempt to understand the poor is really just him walking around with a rucksack and tattered coat, followed closely by a bus of security, food caterers, and a legal team. As he attempts to shake them off and the bus speeds after him, Sturges has fun sending everyone in it into a tizzy, falling over at all angles, one man even putting his head right through its ceiling. Then Veronica Lake is introduced, and the film delivers its most direct acknowledgement of its own genre conventions.
“How does the girl fit in the picture?” “There’s always a girl in the picture?”
Credited only as “the woman”, she is there to serve the exact function stated in the text. She tags along, because it is what the film requires of her. But as an actress, Veronica Lake isn’t just filling a part. With her husky voice and plucky attitude she channels all of her charm and glamour into the role, stealing every second of screen time from her co-stars. She serves to underline the part of movies that audiences keep coming back for – that “little bit of sex”.
Joel McCrea and Veronica Lake in two of their best performances, a perfect screwball couple.
So when Sullivan is suddenly assaulted, beaten unconscious, and sentenced to serve time in a chain gang, it is understandable why Lake is pushed to the background. It is a shocking narrative twist, but not entirely unexpected given how much time has been spent with Sullivan wondering it is like to live in poverty. In an earlier montage when he sleeps in a homeless shelter, he worries that his boots which contain his identification have been stolen, setting up the actual theft that takes place during this major plot shift. Now, he is stuck without a name or path back home.
The scene in which he is stalked by the homeless man looking for money is a stunner. Almost entirely silent, it is heavily expressionistic in the light and shadows that are thrown across the train tracks. He skulks behind staircases and trains puffing out steam in the dead of night, perfectly leading us into the darkest section of the film. We realise that all the comedy that has come before this point has merely been distracting us from the actual darkness at its heart, because suddenly all of that humour is gone. Without his status or identity to fall back on, Sullivan is no longer shielded from the dirtiness, violence, and roughness of “real” life.
Sturges’ camera suddenly becomes a lot more active in this final act. He isn’t trying to make this a truthful depiction of poverty, as his own screenplay has already made the argument for why Hollywood cinema isn’t suited to that. Instead he just wants to treat it sensitively, letting a sort of poignancy emerge that acts as a substitute for authenticity. The prisoners of Sullivan’s chain gang are welcomed to a Southern Black church, and Sturges makes the choice to frame the prisoners in gorgeous silhouette walking towards it, as the churchgoers sing a soulful rendition of “Let My People Go”. Inside the aisle symmetrically divides the church in two, and we gaze right down the middle at the prisoners’ feet moving towards us, chains clanking as they walk. It may be the slowest scene of any Sturges film, but this change of pace also marks the change in Sullivan’s character as he becomes more pensive.
An ambitious narrative taking a sudden dark turn. Sturges has never been so solemn, and he pulls it off with aplomb.
Dour atmospheres can’t last forever in Sturges films though. He gives us just enough moodiness so that when the comedy arrives again in the form of a classic Sturges montage, we eagerly embrace it. Newspaper headlines, studio producers running around barging into rooms, making phone calls, and getting on planes – Sullivan makes his way back to the glamourous city of Hollywood with a fresh outlook on life. Maybe the superficiality of the movies he makes is disconnected from reality, but so what? Disconnecting someone from reality might be the best thing you could do for someone whose reality is pretty terrible. Sturges’ real passion was screwball comedies, but as a comment on the limits of Hollywood moviemaking, this certainly seems like his most personal work.
Sullivan’s Travels is currently available to rent or buy on iTunes, YouTube, and Google Play.
The perspective that Céline Sciamma offers us in Portrait of a Lady on Fire is not just that of a spectator viewing a gallery of beautifully delicate paintings, but rather that of the painter themselves, translating every curve and angle of their subject’s visage into its artistic equivalent. That interpretation can only come after an intense study of these details – the contour of the cartilage on an ear, or the way they don’t blink when they are annoyed, as is the case in Marianne’s observation of Héloïse. It is a connection more akin to lovers than a contractor and client, and it is through this lens that such a relationship forms between both women on the distant French island of Brittany.
When Marianne arrives in Héloïse’s life, the young woman of the gentry has already proven herself difficult to capture a likeness of in her refusal to sit still, though her mother is determined for a painting to be completed so that the Milanese nobleman she is betrothed to knows what she looks like. Beyond this island of seaside cliffs and large French manors, it is a world of men that dictates the rules of romance, art, and politics with heavy hands and enormous egos. Besides the glimpses we get of those men who ferry women to and from the isle, this is not the world that Sciamma is interested in depicting. In their absence, a fresh new dynamic begins to form around Marianne and Héloïse, bound not by the oppressive gazes and laws of men, but rather by the slowly expanding limits of their own curiosity.
Seaside cliffs and beaches making for exquisite settings to this blossoming romance, these lovers’ faces and bodies staged beautifully within them.
Not every frame here is seeping with the picturesque imagery its title might express, but as this story gracefully flows along, Sciamma intermittently lands us with the sorts of visual compositions that leap out in their still, expressive beauty. Marianne and Héloïse’s deep red and green dresses imprint against pale blue skies, waves, and interiors, lending their rounded shapes to the elegant poses of both actresses who always seem to be aware of their roles as models for Sciamma’s camera. Where expansive oceans and grassy landscapes open entire worlds to them in exteriors, it is inside the neatly curated mansion that she arranges décor like still-life subjects, offering the women a quiet, pensive retreat.
The blocking and arrangement of bodies with set dressing, evoking the elegance of 18th century European art.Inventive uses of mirrors, emphasising the artist’s gaze.
One night as the women of this island gather around a bonfire to sing a wildly polyrhythmic chant, Marianne and Héloïse wander over to join them. Though the scene carries visual connotations of a coven gathering to share in something not understood by worldly men, there is not the usual uneasiness often attached to such depictions. In this moment, both our leading women begin to consider the possibility that the freedoms and desires they have experienced aren’t so unique to their own circumstances. The patriarchal view of female relationships as being pagan or demonic does not exist here, and as such these rituals of bonding are able to develop naturally without the typical vilification.
Sciamma’s fascination in the mythologising of gender, love, and art continues to reach out into ancient Greek legends, most significantly touching on the fateful relationship between Orpheus and Eurydice. Together, Marianne, Héloïse, and the housemaid, Sophie, read this story, pondering the tragic decision made by Orpheus towards the end while he is leading his deceased lover out of the underworld, being allowed to take her home as long as he does not turn to look back at her. Though Portrait of a Lady on Fire is not a direct adaptation of this story, it does carefully consider its parallels. Just as a simple gaze can bring an artist and their muse together in a powerfully binding love, so too may it divide them forever.
Artistic interpretations of Orpheus and Eurydice all over this film, including Marianne’s painting that captures the pivotal moment of his turning and loss.
Perhaps then it all comes down the purpose of that gaze. A lover might choose to keep their back turned and preserve this tangible connection, though as Marianne notes, Orpheus “doesn’t make the lover’s choice, but the poet’s.” Humans may die, but the impression they leave behind in the imagination of an artist lives on in many forms, and it is with this in mind that Sciamma evokes ghostly visions of Héloïse through Marianne’s eyes, as if in anticipation of their eventual separation. Within the conventional heterosexual myth, that choice to be either a lover or a poet is integral to Orpheus’ fate, though as the patriarchal influence of the outside world begins to creep in on Sciamma’s paradise, it is evident that there is no such thing as the lover’s choice for Marianne – as society would have it she must be a poet, forever staring in from the outside, or looking back from the future.
The spectre of Héloïse hanging over this film, an eternal image of her in that moment before Marianne parts from her forever.
As progressive a story as Portrait of a Lady on Fire may be, such skilful layering of narrative archetypes lends classical definitions to its characters, intertwining their passions with the nature of humanity as it has been represented narratively throughout history. All throughout, it comes back to the gazes of lovers and artists, both of which are especially tied together in Sciamma’s magnificent final shot that spends two and a half minutes zooming in on Héloïse’s profile at a live orchestra performance. While we engage with every tear and smile that breaks across her face, the camera remains unbroken and unwavering, offering a gaze which ties two people closely in a single moment in time with a burning passion, and yet which will only go on to survive as a lonely, singular, and eternally youthful impression.
A superb final shot paired with a remarkable performance – an entire story unfolds on Adèle Hanael’s face over two and a half minutes.
Portrait of a Lady on Fire is currently available to rent or buy on iTunes, YouTube, Google Play, and Amazon Video.
There is an invitation built into both the title and story of C’mon C’mon, beckoning us to join a radio journalist and his nine-year-old nephew on a road trip across the United States. At one point in the film these words manifest in young Jesse’s dialogue as he records himself on his uncle’s microphone, putting his own thoughts towards Johnny’s audio project which involves conducting interviews with children from around the country. Their optimistic, cynical, pensive, and unconstrained ideas about the future of the world make up the connective tissue of C’mon C’mon, marking Johnny’s episodic journey from city to city like a path to understanding his own identity in relation to others.
When Jesse’s mother, Viv, finds herself needing to care for her estranged husband, Paul, the responsibility of child-caring is thrust onto Johnny for a few months, the joys and hardships of which are quick to reveal themselves. Even through his fights with Jesse though, the tenderness between them is pervasive. When Johnny briefly loses his temper after Jesse hides from him in a shop, he takes the opportunity to learn from Viv how he can do better, bringing himself to apologise to repair the relationship. These are flawed, complicated people who have suffered through much, but there is also a joy in realising that they are taking this journey together, maintaining their individuality while endlessly learning about others. Reflecting on his mother’s words, Jesse finds comfort in this perspective.
“She says even though we love each other she’ll never know everything about me, and I’ll never know everything about her. It’s just the way it is.”
A breath-taking shot framing Johnny and Jesse beneath the long-reaching branches of oak trees – an image of tender nurture.
It is no coincidence that this is the project Joaquin Phoenix has chosen to move onto after starring in the heavily cynical thriller Joker. In its sentimentality, C’mon C’mon may as well be that film’s polar opposite, and only continues to prove his range in offering him voiceovers and absorbingly naturalistic dialogue to mumble and stutter through. Jesse’s bluntness makes for an excellent and often hilarious contrast to Johnny’s verbal clumsiness, telling him without inhibition that “Mum said you would be awkward.” Later when the boy brings up an abortion his mother had years ago, an uncomfortable silence fills the air, broken only by Johnny’s voiceover.
“What the fuck do I say to that?”
This is not an uneasiness that Johnny will completely overcome by the end of the film, but there is a joy in seeing him accept those moments as demonstrations of Jesse’s unique character. Mills smooths over these bumps with a lyrical elegance in his cutting, bringing scenes to an end by fading out the dialogue, and wandering through flashbacks and cutaways with the same stream-of-consciousness flow as those unscripted interviews interspersed throughout. There is a distinct impression that we are watching a skilled editor and formalist at work here, passing through rhythms with Dessner Brothers’ floating, ambient score, and bringing each piece together to paint a portrait of a relationship as sweet and unhurried as this narrative’s languid pace.
Mills’ picturesque long shots identifying the distinct characteristics of each city, the soft black-and-white cinematography lending a gentle air of nostalgia to each.
There are certainly traces of Woody Allen’s Manhattan in the way Mills gives character to bustling American cities through long shots and montages, setting up the metropolitan bustle of New York streets against the quaint Creole architecture of New Orleans, but the influence becomes even more evident when we escape inside houses, hotels, and stores. There is particular attention that Mills pays to how his actors are blocked against interiors within his black-and-white cinematography, fracturing Johnny and Viv’s connection in one shot that splits them across the room through the precise placement of a mirror. In moments of unity though, they are brought together in tight frames through doors and hallways, emphasising the physical affection between family members living under a single roof.
Superb blocking within interior sets, capturing this family through doorways and mirrors.
In this way Mills finds an emotional vulnerability growing inside each of his characters, but it is especially in Johnny that we see the greatest transformation of all. As a journalist, he feels “a sense of invincibility, a sense of invisibility,” as he passes through others lives, experiences a taste, and then leaves without any major commitments. But just as Jesse quickly learns how to use the microphone, so too does he become an interviewer of sorts, encouraging his uncle to turn inwards with often awkward questions. “Why don’t you and mum act like brother and sister?” he asks. “Do you have trouble expressing your emotions?” It is no wonder that Johnny finds himself overwhelmed, and yet this push from passive observation to actively examining his identity in relation to loved ones and strangers is a subtle but impactful development.
When all is said and done though, it is not Johnny’s words that Mills leaves us with. Instead, he ends on the voices of those children that Phoenix interviewed, playing out over the credits in place of music – each one distinct in its perspective, finding the words to express ideas they have never had to articulate before, and together leaving a sweet, lingering taste of hope for their futures.
