Neighborly Characters

More on Syriana (and, to some degree, Munich): Mathias's comment to the last post has me nodding my head. I was also thinking that with a longer, more meditative film the violence, or other repercussions, have an inevitability that feels grounded in the characters, characters that have enough depth so that we can feel the inevitability of the consequences of their actions and beliefs. As much as I love a good shoot-em-up (for some reason, I'm thinking of the Die Hard series), it suffices for the characters to be, oh, wacky. That surface stands in for real character--for both protagonists and antagonists--and so the audience accepts any bizarre, coincidental ramping up of tension, violence, etc. But that structure (or lack of it) also allows us to accept the idea that people who inflict pain are simply crazy. They're monsters. Completely other in a scary, evil way. Munich and Syriana, and others of their ilk, demand (I hope, at their best, anyway) that we consider that other people make decisions that make them behave monstrously, but the people remain monsters. They further ask us to consider who qualifies for this title of monster and why. They suggest that we are all capable of horrifying acts, but only some of us choose to perform them. It's good to be reminded of these things.

It's also good to be reminded that we live in communities. Last night, D and I were taking a nighttime constitutional when we walked up on a woman on her front steps looking up for Mars (have you gotten this hoax email about Mars being as large as the full moon in the sky?). We started talking, and she invited us into her home to meet her dog (an old black lab) and her husband (a prof in the education department). We knew several people in common and just sort of hung out there, scratching her dog, for half an hour. A bit odd, but it's nice to meet the neighbors.

Comments

[mathias Svalina]

An extreme of this is Gus Van Sant's Elephant-- through the unrelenting ordinariness of the characters & the long (like Tarkovsky long) shots that refuse to let go the violence becomes a part of the setting, a result of walking down long halls of lockers. It might be the saddest movie I've ever seen, I've wanted to watch it again, but have been afraid to.