I watched Bubble by one of my favoritist filmmakers, Steven Soderbergh who has decided to channel Gus Van Sant and there's nothing more perfect than Steven Soderbergh channelling Gus Van Sant. NOTHING. But that's another story.
Allright, so about Gus Van Sant...
I have been OBSESSED with Gus Van Sant lately. I cannot say enough good things about his recent trilogy (unconnected except in style) of Gerry, Elephant, and Last Days. I am so engrossed by what I call "the quiet film." Those films that are so slow, and quiet and deliberate so that they train you to look at the small things and small events drive these films. I knew about all three films but I'm so behind. One night several months ago, even though there were 100's of great films to rent I don't know why my girlfriend and I zeroed in on The Last Days. No expectations are the best expectations of all. HOLY JESUS SHIT is this film amazing, I mean, I couldn't control my excitement at how deliberate it was. Just an amazing work by Van Sant who I hadn't thought about much at all.
I think you can tell the maturity of a filmmaker when they know when to shut the fuck up. There's maybe a total of 15 lines of dialogue and maybe 30 shots, some of them so gorgeous i wanted to throw the tv out the window so that no other image would try to best what I had just seen. This would, of course, piss off my girlfriend because it was her tv. The dialogue, so natural, the shooting so free. The shot of Ricky Jay (casting Ricky Jay, can anyone say "bonus points"?) being driven down the lane just blew me away. In 100% of the movies besides Last Days the reflection of the sky and trees above a car's windshield are blocked off with a tarp hung off the towing rig so we can see the actors. Gus decided to ditch that filmic device in favor seeing the trees and sky slowly going by, it's so gorgeous. And it just keeps going on and on as Ricky Jay tells a very natural story.
It's just a story, like you came into a strangers conversation, he knows what he's talking about and we can figure it out, it's the best dialogue. No this stylized "great" Mamet/Tarantino dialogue which is supposedly naturalistic, this really is naturalistic.
Most of the film is Kurt Cobain (or some theorized facsimile of) walking around. Alone. For ninety minutes. And you cannot keep your eyes off the screen. I don't know shit about Nirvana except the day I opened the new arrivals at my college radio station and put on Nevermind. But I have this feeling that anyone that would kill themselves would feel very alone at those last moments and that's all this film does, present loneliness in 90 minutes. Factual? I have no idea. But it is fascinating to watch and I'm certain the tone of a very depressed man's last days was certainly captured.
The playful aspect of filmmaking is what really draws me in. You can tell the choices that Van Sant makes are all little experiments, and they all pay off. In contravention to most cinema, when a character walks out of frame they are sometimes not followed, only to enter frame again whenever he...walked back in that direction. There's an 8 minute dolly shot which pulls back from Kurt playing guitar, like the rest of the film, it's so gentle and quiet and natural. I really just loved every second. Glued to the set, which is a lot to say about a movie in which nothing happens, shots go on for 10 minutes and almost nobody talks. Films like this give me life as a filmmaker, not only because I really got what he was doing with every shot, but because the movie could cost $5 and be just as good. This was a very very small movie. I had to see more Van Sant, what had this man been up to since Good Will Hunting (which we'd all love if it failed and we all got to discover it on video).
And then I rented Gerry.
OH MY CHRIST!
Got to get to work, I'll continue the Gerry talk after lunch, wrap up my thoughts on Bubble and unveil the secret to life itself. You don't believe me do you?
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