Men

One of the many masks of Men

If Alex Garland's Men didn't inspire any great enthusiasm from me, it did provoke some grudging admiration. An ambivalent reaction may be precisely what Mr. Garland intended. On its surface, the film can be read as a rebuke to a misogynistic patriarchy. Harper (Jessie Buckley), grieving because of the death and probable suicide of her husband, rents an old country manor for a period of rest and recuperation. Instead, an assortment of local men augment her trauma and creep her out. Since all the local men are played by Rory Kinnear, a sense of supernatural entrapment is introduced. When a naked "Green Man" starts menacing Harper, it looks like the deck of preternatural paternalism is stacked against her. However, as is necessary for a heroine in a horror movie, Harper displays pluck and a facility with sharpened implements.

I was pleased to detect another layer in Men, a substrata, below the bash the patriarchy surface overly implied by its title. As a number of commentators have pointed out, Men also pictures dueling atavistic and Pre-Christian impulses represented by the masculine (but regenerative) Green Man and the feminine (but ferocious) Sheela na gig. Both figures are carved on a font in the village church, suggesting the pagan forces that survived the onset of Christianity in Britain. If anything, Garland beats us over the head with these two symbols, but does show restraint otherwise. I was glad we did not have to see Harper conquer her demons by going into full tilt Lizzie Borden mode. Sometimes less is more.

I also think it was wise because Jessie Buckley lacks a savage, atavistic edge. She is, however, expert at portraying modern neurotic women in peril. Women whose societal masks are cracking. Masks are a recurrent motif in the film with Rory Kinnear's casting as the various men a means to underline this theme. Mr. Kinnear is expert at acting out the full panoply of the ages of man.

I've enjoyed Alex Garland's work since the publication of his novel, The Beach. Even his lesser novels, screenplays, and films have displayed his talent. Nevertheless, his films have never coalesced into fully satisfying works. Men marks a small step forward. It is his best looking and designed film. I especially appreciated the slightly dowdy costume work by Lisa Duncan. However, I found Men to be too derivative for its own good, cribbing too much from The Shining, especially. Garland does share with Kubrick a rare grasp of the uncanny. Men stands just below the best of recent prestige horror. Men is both too arty and gross for mass consumption, but it is a must see for horror aficionados.

The Green Man in Men

 

Strawberry Mansion

A typically surreal moment from Strawberry Mansion

Kentucker Audley and Albert Birney's Strawberry Mansion is a Sci-Fi forelock scratcher that succeeds more as a modest spectacle more than it does as a comprehensible narrative. Set in 2035 in a future in which dreams are taxed by the government, the film follows James Preble, a sad sack dream auditor ( played by Mr. Audley), tasked with a particularly difficult case. He travels to an isolated mansion of an older woman living off the grid. Bella (Penny Fuller) has over two thousand VHS tapes of dreams that Preble needs to audit. She extends a warm welcome, but things are not as they appear. As Preble drops further down the rabbit hole of Bella's dreams, he becomes both emotionally entangled with her and intrigued with the possibility that she has uncovered a sinister element within dreams.

Birney's background is in animation and Strawberry Mansion benefits from the many surreal touches contained in the dream sequences. The film succeeds as a social satire, particularly the opening sequence where Preble orders a "chicken shake" at a fast food joint. There is a ramshackle quality to the film that is both disarming and charming. Strawberry Mansion, which features relatives of the directors in featured roles, has the feel of a home movie at times. Sets and costumes, particularly Preble's dream auditing helmet, look like the results of a fifth grade art project. Still, the film has enough professional elements, particularly Tyler Davis' cinematography, Dan Deacon's music and Penny Fuller's assured performance as Bella, for it to transcend its low budget origins. I won't argue that Strawberry Mansion is a fully satisfying film, but it shows promise.
 

Carol

Todd Haynes' Carol is an intelligent adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's novel The Price of Salt. As in his previous films, Haynes' transgressive protagonists attempt to transcend their repressed culture through art and love. Making love or art for Haynes' characters, be they 50s housewives or rock stars are liberating and heroic acts.

Haynes stresses the cloistered feel of 50s America: Rooney Mara is shot behind windows, grills, blinds, etc. to underline the blinkered and repressive nature of the culture she is navigating. When Cate Blanchett's Carol arrives in her life to court and spark her, Mara's shopgirl is primed for a sexual and spiritual awakening.

Haynes is unable to escape the limitations of Highsmith's novel, which is among her more one dimensional works. Carol is a larger than life figure who dwarves the stock characters around her; probably because Highsmith was gaga over the real life figure who inspired Carol. (I highly recommend Joan Schenker's biography of Ms. Highsmith) Mara, Kyle Chandler, and the rest of the cast are competent, but recede in the background as Blanchett's diva dominates the film. 

There is much to appreciate in Carol. As in Haynes' adaptation of Mildred Pierce, costumes and décor are gorgeous and add to the thematic thrust of the story: the tchotchkes and fripperies are the reward of the character's bourgeois strivings, but also the emblems of their imprisonment. 

John Magaro has a wonderful monologue right before he hits on Rooney Mara and Haynes gives his players the perfect spacing to make the moment both heartfelt and hopeless. However, he is unable to allow us to revel in his romantic pairing's flight to freedom across the American heartland. Unlike, say, Demme in Something Wild, Haynes has little feel for everyday Americana.

The coupling of Blanchett and Mara fails to generate enough electricity to allow us to share their sense of liberation and romantic fulfillment. Haynes, a cerebral filmmaker, has been able to provide moments of emotional release before. I'll never forget Richard Gere glimpsing his lost dog one last time in I'm Not There. Carol, while not quite suffering from the over-intellectualization of his Sirk pastiche Far From Heaven (Carol's cinematic twin), falls short of cinematic ecstasy. (4/19/16)