Claw of Desire

Year: 2016

Director: Yorgos Lanthimos

Cast: Colin Farrell, Rachel Weisz, John C. Reilly

Run Time: 1 hour 59 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

The Lobster is a preposterously divisive movie. The two movie review blogs I follow religiously gave it a 10/10 and a 0/10 respectively. The patrons at the theater I work at either walk out halfway through or come back for second and third helpings. It’s like – for lack of a better comparison – seafood. Some people despise the taste, but others can’t get enough. So with all this debate raging, of course I had to dive in there for myself and see what all the hubbub was about. 

Did I enjoy The Lobster? No. Do I regret it? Well, mostly.

I’m not allergic to shellfish, but I might be allergic to art films.

In The Lobster, love is mandated by law. Newly single people in The City are sent to The Hotel, where they must find a mate within 45 days or else they are turned into an animal. They also must hunt single refugees known as Loners who live in The Woods. If my disdain for all these oh-so futuristic capital letters isn’t already palpable, let me make it clear that the only thing stopping me from vomiting all over my keyboard right now is the fact that I really don’t feel like cleaning it.

One of these single people is David (Colin Farrell), a schlubby man whose wife has left him. While he struggles to find someone with whom he shares a Defining Characteristic, he ends up desperately pairing with a psychopath (Angeliki Papoulia) before escaping to The Woods and striking up a furtive courtship with Short-Sighted Woman (Rachel Weisz), igniting the ire of the strictly anti-partnership Loner Leader (Léa Seydoux).

Another thing I absolutely adore is movies that don’t give their characters proper names. More, please!

I see what The Lobster is doing. I really do.  A society that focuses so fundamentally and grotesquely on pair-bonding is shallow and conformist, with no wiggle room to be an individual. In terms of achieving the film’s intended effect of muting all personality from its characters and design, it’s a masterpiece of intention. The ensemble is perfectly cast, especially Colin Farrell, who intimately understands the mechanics of his severely isolated role and knows how best to wring comedy from the character when he can.

The world-building of this incredibly unique setting is likewise terrific, dumping you in with no context and allowing you to uncover the depths of detail as the movie progresses. It’s not quite as rich in history as the production design of a Mad Max: Fury Road, but it gets the job done with ethereal efficiency. And the beginning is an absolute winner, slamming you into the story with a gonzo, out-of-context image that leaves you slavering for more (although, the more you learn about this film’s world, the less sense this scene makes).

So while I see the point of The Lobster and understand the polished mechanics that make it tick, that doesn’t mean I see why anybody would find themselves entertained by this droning didacticism.

Ooh, burn! This Lobster is getting BOILED!

The Lobster is so subdued that it practically fades out of existence. It’s like absurdism on tranquilizers, the monotonous performances and color scheme relentlessly pounding your brain with a sledgehammer of boredom. It’s got the pace of a Kubrick film, the flatly literal dialogue of Invention of Lying, and the music of a murder mystery, the atonal shrieks only highlighting how uninteresting everything you’re watching actually is.

For the entire film, it feels like you’re in a doctor’s waiting room, wondering if they’ve forgotten about you. Then as soon as there’s a knock on the door and you perk up, the film ends. After all, they can’t let us get too excited, or else we’ll start to think this is a fun movie. As much as The Lobster claims to be a black comedy, it does everything in its power to stile any and all joy. The scattered chuckles that escape are almost incidental, owing to the fact that there really is a great concept at the heart of this story. Only one singular moment made me laugh out loud, and I get the sense that the movie actively lamented my enjoyment, because it immediately doubled down on ponderous contemplation and a liberal slathering of slow motion.

Seriously, entire scenes of The Lobster are slomo. Not just key action moments (ha! Like it has any), but full minutes. Minutes upon minutes of pretentious napalm, obliterating the pacing and tearing the storyline to shreds. Watching The Lobster is like being trapped in a nightmare. Your feet move like molasses as you run toward an exit that glides further and further away. And anytime something even microscopically interesting happens, it’s immediately chucked from the film like so much dead weight. The biggest conflict in the movie (between the Loners and The Hotel) is never resolved. Even though we see the two sides briefly clash, these scenes are immediately forgotten and never followed up on.

It’s like listening to your grandfather tell a story.

The most extravagantly frustrating thing about The Lobster is that every now and then it shows flashes of asthmatic brilliance. It never exerts itself too much, but the occasional brutality nestled in this world of soft apathy is jarring and gut-wrenching in a magnificent way. One scene depicting the crowd’s blasé reaction to a particularly maudlin act of self-harm is coldly stunning, like an ice-chilled scalpel slicing down your spine. And then of course the film returns to flatly droning about how to properly launder a stain or the comparative weight of different sports equipment.

I GET IT. I do. But The Lobster really needs to take a chill pill. It’s so far up its own ass that it can see daylight. Everything good about the film (and there really is a lot of potential here) is quietly smothered with a scratchy, off-white pillow. I can see why this movie appeals to the Lonely Heart cinephiles of the world, but care as little about The Lobster as it does about me, or any of humanity for that matter.

TL;DR: The Lobster is a monotonous ordeal that stifles a pretty excellent absurdist premise.

Rating: 5/10

Word Count: 1055

Spy Another Day

Year: 2015

Director: Sam Mendes

Cast: Daniel Craig, Léa Seydoux, Christoph Waltz

Run Time:  2 hours 28 minutes

MPAA Rating: PG-13

Now, please keep in mind that I haven’t watched a James Bond movie since I was 14, so maybe they’re all brainless and repetitive and I had too much in common with them to notice. But considering that Goldfinger flits by at 1 hour and 50 minutes and the superspy’s latest effort – Spectre – rolls in creaking and groaning at 2 ½ hours, I daresay the original films didn’t take themselves quite so seriously.

Alas, I’m getting ahead of myself. Spectre is the 24th entry in the James Bond franchise, the fourth for Daniel Craig since Casino Royale rejuvenated the series back in 2006. It’s also the first to appear on the pages of this blog, and it makes a game attempt to ensure that it’s the last. I have enough fondness for the previous entries that I look forward to reviewing them one day, but Spectre’s strip-mining of Bond’s past glories is a recipe for half-baked rehash that leaves a sour taste in the mouth.

Coming soon: the Popcorn Culture Cookbook.

I’m going to streamline the plot as much as possible, because to go into detail would require an atlas, unflagging interest in the high-end car industry, and several gallons of Absolut. Here goes: James Bond (Daniel Craig) is an MI6 agent investigating an evil syndicate known as Spectre led by the shadowy Hans Oberhauser (Christoph Waltz), based on a clue left for him by the late M (Dame Judi Dench, in a cameo that she could have done from her living room).

Meanwhile, the current M (Ralph Fiennes, who I do believe was just trying to tear England apart with a group of wizard Nazis, so this is awkward) is battling through tangles of red tape thanks to C (Andrew Scott), a government official who wants to shut down MI6 and commence surveillance of the world’s digital traffic in alliance with several major world powers, bringing espionage into the 21st century. It is up to M, his secretary Moneypenny (Naomie Harris), and gadget guru Q (Ben Whishaw) to preserve the old ways and avoid going the way of the Walkman.

Oh, also Bond hooks up with Madeleine Swann (Léa Seydoux), the daughter of a previous bad guy who we’re expected to remember. They scoot across the globe, sticking together even though they have the chemistry of Elton John and a pair of sensible slacks.

I hope you don’t mind that I put down in words, how wonderful life is now you’re – eh, who are you again?

Spectre is a dense amalgamation of previous Bond films, both within the Craig tetralogy and the franchise as a whole, coming full circle within the reboot continuity while reintroducing classic characters and concepts. But as much as it’s beholden to the letter of the James Bond traditions, it fundamentally fails to capture the spirit, which flits away like a butterfly, always in sight but just out of reach.

Take the opening pre-credits scene. Bond takes a woman into his Mexico City hotel room, tells her he’ll be right back, and slips out the window. Thus ensues an explosive action sequence, taking Bond through crumbling mortar, the thrumming Dia de Los Muertos parade, and into the air over a teeming mass of bodies while a percussive drum beat smashes into and merges with the classic James Bond theme.

It’s stylish, high octane perfection, but instead of Bond dusting off, casually adjusting his tie, and returning triumphantly to his lady, we cut immediately into Sam Smith warbling “Writing’s on the Wall” over a singularly uninspired credits sequence. Look, as much as Bond’s I Love Lucy chocolate conveyor belt of conquests is haphazardly misogynistic, it’s all part of the came charm of his character, and the missing button from that scene cuts Spectre off at the knees.

Plus, that lady probably racked up thousands in minibar charges while abandoned in that room for hours.

Admittedly there are a handful of moments that embrace the campy appeal of the character, many of which are pretty unequivocally the best moments in the film. However, the degree to which you are asked to turn your brain off is in direct conflict with the length and girth of the stick up Spectre’s ass. In grand Christopher Nolan tradition, Spectre shrouds itself in dark, gritty realism that blocks out the fun factor as effectively as a smothering layer of gold paint. In fact, the Dark Knight gloomsmith was actually approached to direct this film, so that should tell you where returning director Sam Mendes’ (of American Beauty, somehow) ambitions lay.

The amount of time Spectre spends on its knees kissing your boots, begging, groveling for you to take it seriously is its very downfall. It’s never a good idea to approach a Bond flick with an eye for realism, but with this particular entry – and its plot holes big enough to host bar mitzvahs in – it’s cinematic suicide. The second you boot up your brain, the threadbare patchwork of the plot unravels in your hands, leaving you to stare in perplexion at a disheveled mass of thread.

Of course, this is a spy movie, so a certain amount of narrative tomfoolery is permitted (arbitrary countdowns, Rube Goldberg death traps that permit the hero ample time to escape, and the like). It’s all in good fun, but Spectre’s deficiencies sink much deeper than the average espionage flick. Characters mysteriously vanish never to be heard from again, plot points are introduced but never followed up on, and many of the blistering actions sequences take place in preternaturally empty environs. Spectre’s Ghost Train rivals even Halloween II’s Silent Hospital in terms of normally bustling locations that appear to have been abruptly abandoned, leaving only the core cast and maybe a handsome porter for decoration. It’s like they filmed on the Bermuda Triangle or something.

Or maybe the European extras were just all on vacation.

There’s a lot wrong with Spectre, nearly all of which is showcased in the interminable third act (when only two trailers played before this film, I knew it was a portent of doom for my bladder). A vast majority of the plot is pointless wheel spinning and wearisome monologues that leave your adrenal glands parched and shriveled. 

Perhaps it would work better if it balanced on a different central couple, because the crude archetype that Madeleine is brutally crammed into during the finale is hardly appropriate for her character or her shallow relationship with Bond. Watching her blankly go through the motions of a more developed plot only draws attention to the anemic characterizations that populate the film.

Christoph Waltz gives a game attempt at overcoming the peculiar inadequacies of his character, who is rejected from the plot like a bad skin graft. But there is only so much menace he can breathe into the banal, chinos-clad villain with sharply defined motivation but a wicked plan so vague that one can only assume he’s working from a first draft.

But there’s one thing I haven’t talked about: the action. It isn’t particularly original, but it’s as dazzling as altogether too much money can buy. There’s only so many times I can watch a secret agent discover a hidden door or punch an indestructible henchman (this time a totally wasted Dave Bautista) in the face, but this is the one element where Spectre totally embraces its over-the-top pedigree. Armed with his pistol that has the range of a rifle and the delicacy of a dart, Bond sweeps through the massive, inexplicably varied setpieces with relative aplomb.

It’s not enough to fully redeem the film form its monotonous, triumphantly silly depths, but it’s a totally adequate night at the movies. It will hold your attention more often than not, and in today’s climate sometimes that’s the best you can get. If you come into Spectre with an open mind, it does give you some bang for its buck. While 300 million bangs can be exhausting, it’s still quite a spectacle to behold.

TL;DR: Spectre is an acceptable trifle, but a plodding, unsatisfying James Bond movie.

Rating: 6/10

Word Count: 1367