Eros saw Aviva was sore

One of the benefits of seeing films at the New York Film Festival is that there is (in most cases) a question and answer session with the director after the screening. Though the questions asked at these sessions are often asinine, there is usually an interesting tidbit or two gleaned from the director. However, there are cases where listening to the director can actually worsen one's opinion about the film -- and that's exactly what happened to Filmbrain after seeing Todd Solondz's latest, Palindromes. Filmbrain was a huge fan of both Welcome to the Dollhouse and Happiness, and he feels the latter is one of the best American films of the 90's. Though 2001's Storytelling was pretty useless, Filmbrain retained hope for the director, and he was excited when he read about Palindromes earlier this year. [Note that what follows reveals some details about the film -- not any plot spoilers (there are none), but rather the "conceit" (his word) that Mr. Solondz employs in the film.] A palindrome, as defined by the director, is an expression that collapses in on itself -- a fair assessment of the film, for that's exactly what happens. Palindromes touches on several themes that the director has explored in the past, particularly awkward pre-teen girls and pedophilia. In fact, the film has a direct link to Welcome to the Dollhouse -- it opens at the funeral of Dawn Wiener and follows the exploits of the palindromic Aviva, who happens to be Dawn's cousin. Though just twelve years old, Aviva has decided that she wants to have a baby, and she wants it now. Her self-centered New Jersey parents (Richard Masur and Ellen Barkin) will have none of this, and force Aviva into having an abortion once it is discovered that she is pregnant. Determined to try again, she runs away from home, where she meets and has exploits with a truck-driving pedophile and a family of evangelical Christians. Aviva will also become a pawn in both sides of the abortion issue, though that is one of the film's greatest failings. The film is broken up into short chapters, with each named after a character relevant to that scene. The first thing we discover is that the actress playing Aviva changes from scene to scene -- over the course of the film she'll be portrayed as white, black, skinny, thin, a boy, a 400-pound woman and even Jennifer Jason Leigh. While this is a bit disconcerting at first, it really doesn't add up to much in the end, and comes off as more of a gimmick than serving some actual purpose. The director, in an extremely condescending manner, told the audience that we have become complacent from watching Hollywood films, where the actors and actresses are all beautiful, do brave and proper things, and as a result we positively identify with them. He was going to have one over on us by having a 400 pound woman portray a child -- subtle, huh? He uses the same ham-fisted technique in the sequence with the Christian family -- Mama Sunshine is an evangelical woman who takes in all sorts of unloved and unwanted children, and she and her husband are pro-life activists (which includes planning the murders of abortion doctors). Yet in Mr. Solondz's hammer to the cranium approach, all of the children suffer from some sort of physical disability, but still manage to dance and sing to self-composed Christian pop. These are painful sequences to watch (but not in the clever way that Happiness was) and they border on exploitation. When asked at the press conference if he felt any responsibility for the kids, he answered, "Their parents are responsible for them." "You just feel uncomfortable because it offends your liberal sensibilities" was an accusation thrown at Filmbrain by a Solondz apologist. That statement makes no sense -- what Solondz does in this film is take cheap, easy shots that are beneath him. It's as if his misanthropy has manifested itself as contempt for the audience. There's a speech given in the film by Mark Wiener (Dawn's brother -- now accused of being a pedophile) on the predetermination of life and how people don't and can't change, no matter what outward modifications they may make (hair, face, even sex). It's simply a question of genetics or radomly assigned fate. At the Q&A the director said that this is his philosophy in a nutshell, and it shows. But whereas in Happiness he explored these ideas with slight traces of self-recognition (enough to draw us deep into the characters), the resulting effect in Palindromes results in our inability to get close to anybody in the film. Perhaps his disgust with the world has overtaken his artistic vision. The controversial subject matter (namely pedophilia and abortion) seems to be included solely for controversies sake. His handling of the pedophile as tortured soul in Happiness was both brave and deftly handled, but in Palindromes, it's just downright creepy. When Aviva tells Mark that she doesn't believe he's a pedophile because "pedophiles love children", what are we to take away from that? That a twelve year-old girl who has had anal sex with a truck driver in a motel room is sympathetic to the pedophile? There was a certain audacity in Solondz's responses, and the audience wasn't really buying his argument that Aviva was simply "an innocent" and was therefore unable to see these people for what they were. As one audience member put it, how can you proclaim simple adolescent innocence on a girl who encourages and assists in a murder? Though Solondz wanted to address both sides of the abortion issue, the resulting irony (if you can even call it that) is so overtly simplistic that it borders on the embarrassing -- the pro-choice family that forces an abortion versus the pro-life family that murders. Is this the best he can come up with? Palindromes is a bitter film, full of the director's loathing of just about everything. Where once he was able to turn those feelings into works of art that allowed us to reflect on our own lives, he now only seems capable of creating freak shows, full of hateful characters whose misery exceeds that of his own.

Comments

[Aaron]

WOW! This is really interesting because you and I seem to have utterly different reactions to this film. I won't go into detail here because I do plan to write about it myself, although I will say that like the woeful A.O. Scott, to me it seems you completely missed the point of the conceit, which was to make the character universal. I'm not sure which screening you were at, but he actually commented on this at mine, saying part of his reason was how so many very different people came up to him after DOLLHOUSE saying they were Dawn Weiner, and he wanted to create a character who was, literally, many different people. I also didn't find the SUnshine family heavy-handed at all. The one thing about Solondz which I think is more on display in this film than any of his others is that he writes and shows the subtext rather than trying to hide anything.

ButI am impressed that FINALLY there's a film we totally agree about -- HAPPINESS was, in fact, one of the best films of the '90s. Although I really enjoyed STORYTELLING too. Maybe this is the indie film divide -- those who appreciate the filmmaking artistry of a Solondz and those who appreciate that other crap done by Gallo. :-)

[FIlmbrain]

Well, Aaron, certainly not the first time we disagree!

Even if that's true (about the meaning of the conceit), it's still completely unsubtle, and not really that clever. And what does he mean by universal? The universality of twelve year-old girls? Of women? Of motherhood?

[girish]

Well, Filmbrain--

I have to say: "Palindromes" is one of the worst, most pretentious films I've seen in some time.

I speak as one who *loved* "Dollhouse" and "Happiness" and even kinda liked "Storytelling".

As for "liberal pieties", they were put to the test with much greater force in "Happiness".

And as for this brilliant device to connote "universality", the exact same device was used (with subtlety and compassion, not with sledgehammer obviousness) by Bunuel in "Obscure Object of Desire".

Finally, my biggest complaint against the film is that it is baldly, uselessly, pretentiously, misanthropic.

Ahem.

[Marleigh]

Color me completely bummed out. I loved Dollhouse and Happiness, and if this is as bad as you say it is, I might cry.

[FIlmbrain]

I think Girish nailed it perfectly.

Nobody loves a bit of misanthropy more than Filmbrain, but there are limits.

From an email received earlier today -- "How can you hate Palindromes but love Short Cuts."

Does that question even deserve consideration? Solondz is no Altman!

Marleigh -- I'd actually love to hear your take on it.

[wayne]

For you, I'd only use my hand.

[Nick]

"Solondz is no Altman"

ugh - thank you Filmbrain. I thought Solondz was Altman. Now I know he's not. By the way, if this is all you have to say about Palindromes, basically that you HATED it, why wasting your time writing about it?

[Filmbrain]

Of course Solandz is no Altman -- the statement was in response to the ridiculous email that had the audacity to compare Palindromes to Short Cuts.

Should my role, or the role of any critic, be simply to write about films they like? Naturally, I'm not going to waste time writing about the remake of The Stepford Wives -- everybody knows that is trash. But a film that plays a major film festival? Why shouldn't I express my dismay?

I believe it was you, in an earlier post, who attacked me for only writing about films I like.