On Vicky Cristina Barcelona and Other Insufferable Tosh

I posted on Twitter this morning about having watched Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona last night, and that I hadn't disliked a movie so much in ages. There were a few comments on my Facebook wall in response, so I thought I'd elaborate here, and tie it in to another topic that's been floating around the Interwebs in recent days.

Sometimes a film is poorly made; sometimes it has a turgid script, or bad acting, or uninspiring photography, or any number of faults. I can't say Vicky Cristina Barcelona (henceforth known as VCB) had any such flaws. It was certainly a well-crafted film, as one would expect from Woody Allen. But I used the word 'dislike'. There are many movies that I think are bad, but there are few I actually dislike. Because dislike is personal. Dislike means something in the film actually bothered me. One film I dislike, for instance, is The Devil's Own. I don't dislike The Devil's Own because it's a formulaic and predictable thriller; I dislike it because it displays a shocking ignorance of, and insensitivity to, its own subject matter.

I approached VCB with a positive frame of mind. For one thing, I have visited Barcelona three times, and it is one of my favourite places on earth. For another, I generally have a lot of time for Woody Allen. And yet another, the movie has an excellent cast, and not just in terms of eye candy. Thus, I was hopeful as I inserted the Blu-Ray into my player.

I think the fingernails-on-the-chalkboard feeling began about fifteen minutes in. The problem was this: these characters meant nothing to me. The story, in a nutshell, centres on two young women summering in Barcelona. They are approached and individually seduced by a local artist, and matters are further complicated by his unstable ex-wife. All well and good. But then my inverted snob started to rear his ugly head.

The two young women had no visible means of support. One is studying for a Masters in Catalan culture (as an aside, all the Catalan characters strangely spoke Castilian Spanish, rather than Catalan, which is the dominant language of the region), while the other had just spent many months making a twelve minute film. In other words, they were trust fund kids, living off their fathers' money while arsing about in Europe. In yet other words, they were feckless young adults who had grown up with no idea of the realities of life or the issues that affect most people day to day. While they're mooning around, whinging about the pain of love and desire and commitment, real people are working their guts out and wondering if they can make the next mortgage payment. When the intrusive narrator (and that was one specifically bad part I neglected to mention) tells us how the artist, played by the excellent Javier Bardem, bought his beautiful house with its rambling rooms and gardens from another artist, he neglects to tell us how the artist paid for it. I don't know a single artist who can afford anything other than a normal standard of living, at best, let alone a life of luxury. Then along comes Penelope Cruz, playing a deranged ex-wife whose deep love for the artist drives her to violent rage while she drives us to slap her about the head and shoulders.

So, despite their good fortune in life, these four characters are not a happy bunch. I wish I could afford to be that bloody miserable. While I didn't grow up in poverty, things were tough. I know my mother often went without so that us kids could have basics like shoes or milk money for school. I grew up in a house where a can of Coca Cola was a special occasion luxury. By special occasion, I mean Christmas, or the time I nearly lost my little finger to a school gate, and I got a can of Coke for being brave as the doctors worked on my damaged hand. How can someone like me (not to mention anyone who grew up in real hardship) be expected to feel anything but contempt for a cast of characters who are so vacuous and self-absorbed as those in Vicky Cristina Barcelona? Is there a film genre specifically for those privileged few who have been cushioned from reality all their lives?

As I watched the movie, all the time resisting the urge to just press the Stop button, I couldn't help but think of recent online debates on literary versus genre fiction. There was the Esquire article, and Jason Pinter's response, and then this little gem brought to my attention by Lisa Kenney via Facebook. The argument in that second piece was basically that if the unwashed masses would only give literary fiction a chance, we might have an epiphany and forever leave the intellectual deserts of our crime and romance books, and discover the delightful oases of cerebrally challenging and important works at the higher end of the market.

Bullshit.

There is good and bad in all fiction, whatever the genre. And whatever some might like to think, literary is just another genre, a means of organising the shelves in bookstores. I have read as many works from the literary shelf as any other genre. Some of it was brilliant, some of it was tosh. But here's the problem with literary fiction versus other genres: bad literary fiction is insufferable. I simply can't endure the kind of middle-class navel gazing that bogs down the literary field. Good crime novels are just as capable of shining a light on the human condition as good literary fare. Bad thrillers may be unbelievable, shallow, or even manipulative, but bad literary novels are self-important and pretentious. And worst of all, bad literary novels, and bad art-house movies for that matter, are just plain dull.

The Hidden Depths of Genre

This post was inspired by two things. One of them was this very snotty and condescending piece at Esquire magazine's website, which masquerades as a review. Jason Pinter did a better job of critiquing this critique with his own much more intelligent piece.

The other was watching the movie Cloverfield over the weekend. On the surface, Cloverfield seems the very model of an Event Movie, a film driven more by hype and special effects than plot, dialogue or meaningful characterisation. A typical monster movie, in other words, albeit set apart from the crowd by the jerky camcorder photography (which transfers to the Blu-Ray format better than you might think). If we take Cloverfield at face value, then it is a brilliant example of its kind. It's breathlessly paced, lean as a 100-metre sprinter, and has all the crash-bang-wallop and scares you could want in its ninety minute duration.

But there's so much more to Cloverfield than the visceral spectacle of a monster levelling skyscrapers. While characterisation and real dialogue aren't a big part of the movie, and given its format and streamlined running time they aren't overly missed, it is certainly more than throwaway popcorn fare.

To anyone with half a brain, the movie's underlying theme is hardly subtle. But then neither was 9/11, the horrific event this film represents. Some scenes are so reminiscent of actual footage from 9/11 they must have been deeply disturbing for anyone who was there that day. Take, for instance, the scene where a group of people take refuge inside a drug store, sealing the doors just in time as a wall of dust and debris stampedes past the windows.

An obvious influence on Cloverfield comes from the other side of the world. The makers of this movie have openly stated it is an homage to Godzilla, a cinematic icon that has never successfully transferred to Western movies. But looking at the cultural context of Godzilla in Japan's history, there is a darker comparison. As Cloverfield acts as an analogy for 9/11, Godzilla is symbolic of Japan's coming to terms with the atomic bombs detonated over Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Both the first Godzilla and Cloverfield portray monstrous entities laying waste to entire cities less than a decade after both the respective countries suffered terrible attacks that were unimaginable before they occurred. Thus, what seems the most absurd of cinematic genres - the monster movie - is used to explore a horror that can't be expressed in a more literal, realistic way.

(A quick note before anyone points it out - the Cloverfield and Godzilla analogies are well worn, but I wanted to use them as known examples.)

And horror, as a genre, has always been used to explore more serious themes, from the 19th Century fear of scientific progress (Frankenstein, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde) to the pain of a developing adolescent sexuality (The Exorcist, Let the Right One In). Genre fiction, whether that be crime, horror, science fiction, romance, whatever, is perfectly capable of tackling themes that more literary work will struggle with.

In fact, the best genre fiction does exactly that; it shows us things that would be too difficult to contemplate in any other context. Remember that next time you feel belittled by some supercilious literary type who wouldn't stoop to such trash as genre fiction.

Gregory Mcdonald

The author Gregory Mcdonald died this week. Mcdonald wrote one of my favourite ever books, FLETCH, a lesson in economy, characterisation and tight plotting. While the first Fletch movie was enjoyable enough, I never felt it or Chevy Chase did the source material justice.

Fletch is one of the few books which I can distinctly remember buying and reading for the first time. I was in my mid teens, and I bought it from a charity shop in Ballycastle, along the Antrim coast from the seaside village of Cushendun, where I was staying with my best mate and his family. They have a beautiful cottage at the mouth of the river, overlooking the sea. On a clear day you can see the Mull of Kintyre across the water. I started reading the book in the kitchen, and I can remember pausing occasionally to show my friend the funniest passages. Twenty years on, we still sometimes repeat the phrase "Fuck Frank" for no apparent reason.

My copy of Fletch cost 40p (the price sticker is still on the cover), and that was excellent value for money considering I have read it at least once every couple of years in the two decades I have owned it. It stands alongside William Goldman's Marathon Man, Thomas Harris's Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs, Arthur C. Clarke's 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Mario Puzo's The Godfather as being among a handful of books I have read over and over, and will probably continue to read time and time again for as long as I have the ability to do so.

It's disheartening to read in some of the online obituaries that, despite his massive success, Mcdonald still had to fight to get published, and that his experience of having his books turned into movies was often negative. But he knew how to tell a good story in 200 pages, and that's an achievement in itself.

Swearing is Big and Clever: Cussing in Bruges

For anyone who enjoys some spirited comedy cussing, the movie In Bruges is a treat. Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson star as a pair of inept hitmen exiled to Belgium in the wake of an assassination-gone-wrong, with Ralph Feinnes as their cockney boss. The best extra feature on the DVD is this little compilation of all the swearing in the film.

Warning: not for those with delicate ears. Seriously.

Poltergeist, and the Decline of Contemporary Horror

It's a while since I've posted because I've been an extremely busy boy. I took advantage of some down time this weekend to do a couple of nice things.

One: I watched Poltergeist.

I recorded it during the week on my Sky+ box, and watched it over the weekend. It's a long time since I've seen this movie, and it was a good print in the original aspect ratio (hooray for Turner Classic Movies). I'd forgotten how (almost) brilliant it is. As it unfolded I was conscious of something that might not have crossed my mind a year ago, and that is the depth of the story. Poltergeist was one of the first movies we rented when we first got a VCR way back in the early to mid eighties, and at the time, it was scary as hell. Watching it as an adult, it's still got a lot of power, and I wondered why this is so when most contemporary horror movies fail to raise my neck hairs.

I realised it's because buckets of viscera and sadistic violence do not a horror movie make.

The fear in Poltergeist does not stem from flying furniture, sparkly ghosts, or some guy peeling his own face off - it comes from watching a family deal with the loss of a child. Likewise, think of what is regarded by many as the greatest horror movie ever: The Exorcist. While spinning heads and pea-green vomitus may have scared the bejesus out of generations, it's the horror of watching a child held prisoner by evil that stays in the mind long after it's over.

There are only a couple of recent horror movies that genuinely horrify, at least in my view. And they both happen to be low budget efforts. Take the original Saw, for instance. This movie has plenty of sadistic torment going on, but that's not what makes it work. It's the tension in the room, and the fear for the family's safety that makes it work. It has real story, in other words.

The other that comes to mind is the Blair Witch Project. A camcorder plus three kids in a forest equals truly terrifying. No gore in sight, just real fear.

There have been quite a few decent horror movies in recent years (28 Days Later, The Descent and Hostel all come to mind) but few have any real resonance. And to achieve real terror, you need real resonance.

This is why a certain Stephen King is the master of the genre - his writing cuts deeper because it speaks to more personal parts of us than our fear of blood.

Oh, and in case you're wondering, I said Poltergeist is almost brilliant because the unnecessary finale (you know, the coffins spewing forth and so on) seems like a cynical ploy to get a few more jumps out of us - the real story was over a good twenty minutes before this.

Two: I wrote a short story.

I haven't written one in a while, and this came to me over the last couple of days. Like all my short stories, it was written in a couple of sittings with little or no planning. I've sent it to Elektra's Crapometer for critique, and I'll be curious to see how it fares as it's a spin-off from my recently completed novel. I wonder if it stands on its own, of if the reader needs to know the larger story for it to make sense.

Peep Show is back! Hooray!

I spent a quiet Friday night in last night because it was a special occasion - Peep Show is back for a new series! I don't watch much TV, and can rarely keep up with a series as I never remember to be in front of a telly at the same time every week, but I make an exception for Peep Show, the best British comedy since The Office. This is its fourth series, and I was a little worried it might have run out of steam, but no need - it was a classic episode. Welcome back, Mark and Jeremy, my wonderfully pathetic pals!

Intacto

A movie recommendation. I watched a favourite last night, a Spanish film called Intacto. Here's a little hook-writing practice:

Luck is not just a gift, but a commodity to be traded, lost and won. Federico, once employed at an isolated casino to steal luck from its customers, seeks out the only survivor of a plane crash, Tomas. Federico convinces Tomas to join him on a journey through a bizarre underworld where ordinary people, and whatever luck they posess, are gambled alongside money, houses, racehorses and cars. The ultimate prize is the chance to face the luckiest man in the world, Samuel (a chilling Max von Sydow), Federico's former employer, in the deadliest gamble of all: a game of Russian Roulette, a game Samuel has never lost. Federico knows Tomas might be the only one capable of beating Samuel, the man who stole his luck seven years before, and will risk everything to bring his new protégé and old mentor face-to-face.

:)

Anyway, here's a clip from the movie, a scene in which the competitors are running for their bid at facing Samuel...

2000 words a week - too slow! Word count 11,980 (wp) 15,000 (pr)

God, writing my new novel is like pulling teeth! After another week I'm only 2000 words along. I'm going to have to really knuckle down this weekend and get at least 4000 or 5000 more done. Monday's a holiday for St Patrick's day, so I'll at least have a bit of extra free time to spend on it.

No other news to report, except that if you like monster movies, and don't mind reading subtitles, then go and rent The Host. It's a Korean film and the best of its kind I've seen in a very, very long time.