#18, The Picture of Dorian Gray

I really watched this movie entirely accidentally. I was flipping through the channels one night, as I am apt to do when procrastinating important work, and I stumbled upon it on some movie channel. Bravo, I think. Or maybe it was FX. HBO, perhaps? Whatever. Anyway, I watched it for a few minutes, got hooked, and decided that the film had enough gravitas behind it to merit a spot on the list (As opposed to the countless other crappy movies that latch a stranglehold onto my soul, and for some god awful reason I have to watch the whole damn thing).

So yeah, Dorian Gray was essentially a waste of time, but not so much as some of the other films I've accidentally wasted two hours of potential sleep numbing my brain upon. It wasn't particularly bad, but it lacked anything that stood out as particularly interesting, as well. Of all of the films I've watched, it's one of the ones I remember the least, full of perfectly legitimate filmmaking conventions, decent acting, capable directing, yada yada yada. It was just...bleh.

One of the great difficulties of Dorian Gray is that it's transparently limited by the Hollywood Code. Yes, the Code rears its head in a frustratingly limiting fashion, muddling especially the middle portions of the film that depict Dorian's descent into decadence. Granted, I'm sure that the innuendo was just as limited in the original novel by Oscar Wilde. Nevertheless, the vagueness of the references to his misdeeds, and the lack of change in his general demeanor made it difficult to buy the transition from the naive, compassionate young debutante to the cold, sadistic man. He was plenty cold, sure, but not all that sadistic. Basically, Dorian didn't make a very convincing villain, or even anti-hero. He was just kinda there, until towards the end of the film when we finally saw a few of his unsettling habits. Furthermore, his apparent agelessness was weakened by the fact that while his character didn't age, as time passed, neither did anyone else seem to. There was absolutely no sense of the progression of time in any aspect of the film.

What really held the film together was the overall plot, and the specific elements of it. While most of this should probably be attributed to Oscar Wilde's genius, director and screenwriter Albert Lewin did a commendable job of translating the story onto film. Perhaps the best moment of the film (and one of the few I remember distinctly), comes at Dorian's realization that he caused the death of a person close to him. Not only can we see this revelation hurl him into the black pits of spiritual and moral destitution in the immediate moment, but it provides a perfect cornerstone to the film's build to that point. Lewin links scenes and events succinctly and logically, and he did a good job of keeping me engaged by building upon plot elements bit by bit, advancing the story with subtle changes in the characters' attitudes and circumstances. It is somewhat disappointing then (and here once again we see the influence of the Code), when many of these plot elements resolve themselves with something of an unsatisfactory sense of gravity. Lewin is not able to balance the darkness of the story's concept with the restrictions of the code, and thus the entire film ends up feeling entirely unimportant.

Anyway, there's not much more to say. The use of color in Dorian's portrait is a welcome surprise, but I didn't like the palette all that much. It was jarring, sure, but came across as more psychedelic than sinister. This failure to set an appropriate tone pretty much sums up the entire movie, so by the end, one feels bad for poor old Dorian, but not much more. In fact, some of the supporting characters are far more motivated and interesting than he is. A wonderful concept and story, which great characters, which just sort of misses the mark.

Oh yeah, one more thing. While there's never any definite resolution to what Dorian's misdeeds are, there are strong implications that he engaged in homosexual behavior. While I can understand how taboo that was in society both at the time of Wilde and the Code, I don't like how it seems to be the primary critique against Dorian's character. Call me a crazy liberal.

Highlights: Great story and concept, brilliantly conceived and put together in a concise and engaging fashion. Distinct and fascinating characters, and offers an insightful portrait of a man descending into moral and spiritual decay.

Downers: Lacks any sort of innovation beyond the poor use of colored frames (Which is inconsistent at best, since the portrait is not colored in every shot it's in). No truly remarkable performances, and inconsistent use of story elements in relationship to the characters and their situations. None of the visuals stood out. Boring dialogue at points, boring shots, and a whole lotta non-action. Spectacularly mediocre.

4.5/10

Something I noticed

I just read over a few of my posts, and was somewhat surprised to notice how poorly written they were, at least to me. Hmm. I need to do a better job of proofreading in the future.

I'm only writting this as a means to procrastinate against my English paper. Godamn Chaucer.

#17, Beauty and the Beast

I'm back!

I've actually managed to find a few hours during my life where I'm either not busy or completely exhausted, so I decided I'd finally come back here after more than a month's absence. I'm a little surprised to see that my website has actually received almost 100 unique visitors. How many of those visitors have checked more than once, however, is another matter entirely. In any case, I want to apologize to anyone who has continued to check my website and continued to be disappointed. I'll try and amend that problem now.

I could spend a while talking about what's happened to me in the past month, since I like to think its' pretty interested (I'm in college now!), but instead I think I'll just start out with a review. So, without further ado...

Okay, this isn't the Beauty and the Beast that you grew up on, kids. It's a 1946 black and white French film, widely regarded as a classic (As far as I can tell, anyway. After all, it's one of the few films listed on both imdb.com's Top 250 AND the website I like, theyshootpictures.com. Pretty impressive for a film more than 50 years old). You would assume, then, that it would be a landmark in story-telling, aesthetic, direction, and acting. There must be something unique and powerful to it. At least, that's what I expected going in. After all, I'm a sucker for old foreign films.

Sadly, I was rather disappointed. I don't know, I just didn't like it very much. It was...ho-hum. For one thing, the voice of the actor who played the beast was consistently irritating throughout the entire film. Rather than any sort of low rumble or growl that you would expect, it was a kind of high-pitched, strangled rasp that caused me to burst out laughing the first time I heard it, and I could never quite get past it. Furthermore, I wasn't impressed by most of the acting. It was very hammy, especially from Beauty and Beast, though I do think the sisters did a good job (I also did not find the actress who played Beauty all that attractive, but that's a shallow, unnecessary sort of thing).

Another thing that bothered me was a seeming lack of temporal awareness in the film. I don't know whether it was intentional on Cocteau's part or not, but it was very difficult to get a sense of the progression of time, which was particularly frustrating when they would make specific references to its passage during the film (i.e. come back in a week). This only served to weaken the evolution of the story and the characters, and by the time the film started to wind down, I felt very dissatisfied by the development of the story. It seemed very threadbare.

There's really not that much more to say. The film was simply unremarkable. There were simply too many distractions to what seems like a very loosely held together film. Ontop of the Beast's voice and the skewed sense of time, the Beast's castle interior, while interesting on some levels, seemed mostly like an undecorated black box with an ill-conceived layout. The ending was confusing as hell, and the specifics of it did not tie very well into the plot elements or character traits demonstrated earlier in the movie.

The film wasn't terrible, of course. The camera work was certainly above average; excellent, even, with some captivating angles and beautifully composed shots, and the director did do a good job of creating an atmospheric sense of almost surreal fantasy (Perhaps this was the point of the lack of temporality) through set and costume design in addition to the cinematography. Still, it wasn't enough to save this thoroughly mediocre film, and I found myself dozing off at points. Why are French films automatically assigned enormous artistic worth just because they're French?

Highlights: Good cinematography with some exceptionally attractive shots, a well crafted-atmosphere, decent acting from some characters, French.

Downers: A few hokey set pieces, the Beast's voice makes you want to scratch your ears out, consistently confusing and simplistic.

5/10