Robin Hood (2010)

Kamis, 27 Mei 2010

Robin Hood (2010)

Robin Hood (Ridley Scott, 2010)

What is it with history that implores us to treat it with reckless reverence? It seems that humanity has devolved into needy orphans, unable to cope up with the problems of the present and always looking at the past for answers and reasons, or a semblance of a former glory that the messy world we currently live in can never provide. Filmmakers, those modern storytellers who more often than not are no longer motivated by the actual pleasure of the arts but by the promise of earning a shiny buck for themselves and for the corporations they make films for, have presented themselves to bridge the already bridged gap, telling new and old stories with perceived historical accuracy. What for? Surely, it is no longer for sheer spectacle or plain pageantry. When the likes of D. W. Griffith, whose The Birth of the Nation (1915) remains to be one of the most historically offensive yet grandiosely spectacular films of all time, or Cecile B. DeMille, who has made a career turning the silver screen into a time capsule that showcases the opulence of the past, are a rare if not extinct species in today's crop of filmmakers, historical accuracy has turned into a cosmetic cliché that begs and pleads for relevance and importance, rather than a spark for discourse.

Take Ridley Scott's appallingly unimaginative Robin Hood as an example. The character of Robin Hood persists in common knowledge as close to mythical, a conveniently moral bandit who is donned in the stereotypical archer’s outfit and goes about the business of stealing from the rich so that he can redistribute the wealth to the poor and is reinforced by the many cinematic reincarnations from Errol Flynn’s dashing and charming hero in Michael Curtiz’s The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938); to the witty fox garbed in green in Walt Disney Studios’ animated re-telling Robin Hood (1973); to Kevin Costner’s overly serious champion in Kevin Reynolds’ Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991). In an attempt to inject relevance to the overly familiar tale in the most unlikely way, Mel Brooks came up with a deliciously vicious satire, Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993), explicating how the hero, with his and his friends’ dated fashion sense and claim to fame, is actually a wellspring of gags and jokes.

In Scott’s Robin Hood, Robin Longstride (Russell Crowe) is an archer in the army of King Richard the Lionheart (Danny Huston), whose return to England to reclaim the throne is impeded by his death in battle. Disguised as Sir Robert Loxley who died in an ambush, Robin and his men return to England to relay the news of the king’s untimely death, which leads to the coronation of John (Oscar Isaac) as the new king of England, and start to lead the lives of their assumed identities, as son of the Sir Walter Loxley (Max von Sydow) of Nottingham and wife of Marion (Cate Blanchett). Burdened by contributions to Richard’s crusades and John’s abominable taxes which are being collected by Godfrey (Mark Strong), one of John’s trusted men, who turns out to be a double agent for the invading French, the people have gone poorer and poorer, making them more restless and resistant to the king’s abusive demands.

Placing the character in an exact place in history seems to be a good idea since it opens the character to further interpolation, placing his legendary motive of wealth distribution within a context of actual events instead of fictional scenarios. Although claimed to be based on researches and investigations on the very identity of the character, Scott’s Robin Hood feels more hokey than convincing. In fact, this undue insistence on historical accuracy, boxing him within the possibilities and probabilities of the time period, has turned the character into a fatal bore. As far as this film goes, the allure of Robin Hood --- the cunning and mischief mixed with chivalry, the adventurousness, the mystery --- is completely obliterated, turning the famous thief, at least in the eyes of the film’s viewers, into just another artifact of the past, excretable and forgettable. Not even the several astoundingly meticulously recreated set pieces can save a Robin Hood film whose Robin Hood is as ordinary as the next summer blockbuster action hero from obscurity.

As far as historical accuracy is concerned, Scott makes his audience believe that he has solved the riddle to the identity of the much-beloved Robin Hood. More than that, Scott has oversimplified Robin Hood, turning him into a palatable modern hero and a defender of democracy with the several back-stories on the trauma of the crusades, his father’s goal of uniting England with a declaration of rights, and his fate of mustering all the warriors of England to thwart the French invasion, instead of the moral conundrum that he really is, the prime example of the debate on whether or not the ends can justify the means. I personally prefer the latter; Robin Hood is simply bigger than the history or the culture that gave birth to him. By reinventing him by portraying him from a definite historical perspective in the mistaken belief that with history, comes newfound relevance, it can only lessen the character’s mystique. Of course, other than what I think is a bastardization of the enigma that is Robin Hood, the film, is, to put it plainly, just lousy, and probably the lousiest film ever done by Scott.

American Gangster (2007)

Selasa, 15 Januari 2008

American Gangster (2007)

American Gangster (Ridley Scott, 2007)

Compared to the enthralling experience of viewing recently released culture-specific mob movies like Martin Scorsese's The Departed (2006), a remake of a popular Hong Kong movie set in Irish-dominated Boston which in my opinion surpasses the original, James Gray's We Own the Night (2007), a riveting reworking of a biblical parable set deep in the Eastern European mob scene of 80's Gotham, and David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises (2007), an auteur-powered contemplation on identity in Russian mafia-infested London, watching American Gangster, this Ridley Scott-directed fictionalized account of the rise and fall of notorious African-American drug lord Frank Lucas, is such a lugubrious chore. Clocking at a hefty 157 minutes, the movie has the typical Oscar-whoring and self-important pomp of a Brian Glazer-production (think sugar-coated gargantuan productions like A Beautiful Mind (Ron Howard, 2001), Cinderella Man (Ron Howard, 2005) and The Da Vinci Code (Ron Howard, 2006)) which would most likely divide viewers to those who are willing to give in to the crass Hollywood-ization of a historical figure and those who are just sick of the same tired although glittered routine, repeated and re-repeated year after year.

It helps that Scott is actually a competent director, with a convincing eye for detail. Under his helm, Vietnam War-era New York City with its overpopulated housing projects and streets crowded with discontent derelicts and junkies felt like the chaotic haven that is ripe for Frank Lucas' enterprising endeavor. New York is aesthetically grimy and gloomy with adequate references to the sounds and fashion of that era and its culture, with the newly-wealthy thugs storming in and out of jazz clubs wearing vivacious outfits on their bodies and scantily-clad femmes on their limbs. However, beyond this overproduction mounted to keep the mob tale consistently placed within its proper historical perspective is virtually nothing. American Gangster moves like a lecture on that obscure and possibly forgotten moment of American history, with its lecturer persisting on telling the most insignificant of details to utmost perfection but nevertheless fails to add anything new to the discourse.

As Frank Lucas, Denzel Washington plays the role with his typical suave and charm. While this very agreeable performance by Washington could have been adequate considering that Lucas has Harlem under his control by sheer charisma and lured Miss Puerto Rico into marrying him, it lacks the hidden or apparent wickedness (which Jack Nicholson had tons of in The Departed, but is sufficiently covered by both Moni Moshonov or Armin Mueller-Stahl of We Own the Night and Eastern Promises respectively) that would have made his unscrupulous rise to the top with several murders and other criminal activities on the side entirely believable. It is unfair to put the blame to hardworking Washington as Frank Lucas seems to have been written (by screenwriter Steve Zaillian) exactly the way he portrays him, a persistent gangster with a sure heart still tucked somewhere beneath all the unlawful acts and misdeeds. For some, it is an adequate if not glorious attempt by the filmmakers to give the notorious drug lord a dose of humanity. It probably is a step away from the mob lord caricature that has been inherited since The Godfather days. For me however, it is nothing short of insipid: confusing humanity with lily livered hold on ideals and morals and exchanging underworld viciousness with gentlemanly gestures and an entrepreneur-like grasp of basic economics.

Perhaps the biggest mistake of American Gangster is to delegate a chunk of the Frank Lucas storyline on the bravura efforts of Richie Roberts (Russell Crowe), detective made notorious by his surrendering nearly a million dollars of unmarked bills to his superiors and would later on be instrumental in the capture of Frank. Crowe, I think, gives the role enough justice. It's an unglamorous role, of a New Jersey cop nearing the unsavory twilight of a divorce while solving the case of his career in an unkempt office with a crew of determined yet unsightly men, and Crowe manages to keep his performance within the bounds of what is required of him. My problem lies in the fact that the alloted attention given to Richie is not commensurate to what he represents in the picture. He is merely a clever plot device, a character whose story's existence in the movie is to merely parallel that of Frank's. Other than that fact, he is merely another golden-hearted copper doing the right thing whose private life is unfortunately uncooperative (and compared to the coppers of We Own the Night who are balancing duty, family and love, Richie's fear of public speaking and risk of losing his family seem utterly unfit for cinema).

There is something about the story of an African-American gangster making it to the top at a time when the higher echelons of the crime scene seem reserved for White Americans that will make you stop and think. The undercurrents of the movie's thematic course seems to envelope the idea that the persevering efforts of American civil rights heroes are not reserved wholly for the virtuous nationalists but also those who subsist in leeching off the misfortune of a nation at war for their own personal gain. However, American Gangster is too busy storytelling and lecturing to convince me of these novel merits. Moreover, stories like American Gangster have been made over the years with more creativity and originality and less of the stuffiness this film seems bent on exuding. Had this film been made decades ago or had it been crafted with a clearer directive without the unnecessary plotlines, I would have brushed off my complaints and considered it a worthwhile achievement. But since it wasn't, I'll just add this to my growing list of cinematic letdowns.

******
This review is also published in The Oblation.