Roadside Attractions
Whenever a movie is intentionally in black and white, it makes you wonder if the point is to be thematic or artistic. Black and white on film is legitimately different than color on film, but digitally? It’s not really the same. Something like The Artist went black and white for a reason, as did Schindler’s List. Sometimes I think the point is to just look cool and be obvious thematically.
That theme is that the absence of color (or “colour”) represents a lack of something or an imbalance. But that’s behind the scenes — the truth is that the director chose black and white because she and her cinematographer liked the idea that lack of color allowed a more controlled focus on the faces and expressions of the actors.
The Party comes from writer/director Sally Potter, and falls in under a crisp 71 minutes. Yet it feels longer. She is responsible for the superior Ginger & Rosa, which is the movie where Christina Hendricks and Elle Fanning attempt British accents. In this movie, it’s set at the house of Janet (Kristin Scott Thomas) and her husband Bill (Timothy Spall) during a small party. Janet has just received a political promotion to a sort of Ministership, so she wants to celebrate.
Over the course of the party, people talk, people argue, and secrets are revealed. Before anyone else shows up, Bill is already practically catatonic, and is disturbing Janet, who tries to ignore it. The guests include April (Patricia Clarkson) and her older German beau Gottfried (Bruno Ganz) — April is highly opinionated and toxic, and naturally, they have their own disturbing news to share.
Another couple is Jinny (Emily Mortimer) and Martha (Cherry Jones), a couple only unusual in the age difference between them — and the secret they will soon reveal, naturally. The final couple to come are other friends, but at first only restless, nervous Tom (Cillian Murphy) arrives. And he seems to be hiding something too.
The concept here is fine, and many of the conversational segments are decent enough, but there is an ongoing languidness to the movie that makes it often boring to get through. There’s a lot of high drama, fighting, screaming, and hand wringing, but despite the clear acting talent, these aren’t characters I can manage to care about at all.
In a weird way, it feels too intimate, too closed in. It’s the sort of movie that feels more akin to a short play or a short story. The problem is that there’s no real cinematic feel here, and despite the focus of actors pushing forth serious acting vibes, at the end it feels like the thought of “oh, was that all?”
Kristin Scott Thomas anchors the real empathy of the movie, although Emily Mortimer does a decent job with a character who is mostly a good person. I found some of the philosophy talk to be pretentious and tiresome, and the twists and turns to be mostly dull instead of nail biting.
It’s not a bad movie, but to me, it’s a movie without any real point.
The Monkey King 3 has a run time of 1 hour 11 minutes and is rated R for language and drug use.
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