Dragged Across Concrete

Black and blue in Dragged Across Concrete

S. Craig Zahler's Dragged Across Concrete was among the more audacious American features of 2019. Along with Jean-Francois Richet's Blood Father, which also starred Mel Gibson, it is one of the few films to capture the unease of Trump era America. Because of his public image, Gibson is an easy stand-in for all white males who pulled the lever for Donald J. Racial conflict underpins the anxiety and unease, but also economic stagnation. Every major character in Dragged Across Concrete feels trapped by economic circumstances. Those that don't are psycho and sociopaths who don't see right from wrong. Into this moral void, the players of Dragged Across Concrete fall.

Moral culpability is the main theme of Dragged Across Concrete and Zahler upends genre conventions to underline this theme. Instead of a terse 90 minutes, the film unfolds over two and a half hours. Many scenes are of Gibson and Vince Vaughn riffing with each other during stakeouts, sharing egg salad sandwiches and breath mints. These two shot exercises in slow cinema work to develop these characters as rounded individuals, making their moral, and then, mortal falls more tragic. Gibson's character is paralleled with Tory Kittles' character. The two duel to the death in a climax that revolves around motivation more than gunplay. Zahler is trying to open up his cinema beyond the genre conventions of his previous films. The film is often rancid, but this expresses Zahler's feelings about the state of his country. The twisted story structure reflects Zahler's desire to try a more polyphonic approach to his material.

I find Dragged Across Concrete overly grim, lacking the variety and richness of great cinema. However, Zahler's command of his cast allows the film to open up and work against his bleak vision. Vaughn, Don Johnson, Udo Kier and Jennifer Carpenter all return to the Zahler oeuvre and do memorable work. Most compelling is Michael Jai White whose automobile conversations with Kittles are analogous to the ones between Gibson and Vaughn. White's performance gives a badly needed note of compassionate warmth to the film.

Though a commentary on America, Zahler tips us that he is not engaging in any attempt at realism. His cinematography is as color coded as any European art film. Certainly it is more complex and thought out than the tricolor of Noe's Climax, a film I enjoyed. What about the soundtrack, where Zahler and his co-writers trot out facsimiles to 70s Funk and Soul standards? What about naming the fictional city, Bulwark? Against what? Zahler wants the film to have a slightly expressionistic feel, almost subliminally so. Dragged Across Concrete was dumped by its distributor, not even bothering opening it in blue cities like Portland, Oregon (talk about color coding). It will look better in retrospect when its topicality fades.