Gone Girl
Review by John L. Ng
October, 2014
"Gone Girl" is a murder mystery about a flawed marriage. On its exterior surface, Nick (Ben Affleck) and Amy (Rosemund Pike) Dunne’s marriage seems so amiable. Handsome, in a chiseled body with dimpled chin charm, Nick is a journalist. Amy, tall, blond, rich, with cool beauty, is a writer. He woos, and she flirts with mutual wit. In time they become husband and wife. In an economic downturn, both become unemployed. They move back to his small Midwest hometown to care for his dying mother. With Amy's money, Nick buys a local bar and runs it with his sister. When we first meet Nick, he is killing time having a drink and playing a board game with his sister in their bar on the morning of his wedding anniversary. He is not anxious to spend it with Amy. Reluctantly, he goes home only to find his wife missing. With aplomb, he calls the police. At once, his duplicitous demeanor, betrayed by his disingenuous smile that cracks at too many inappropriate moments, makes him a suspect.
Its subsequent police investigation quickly exposes a failed marriage. After five years, in their subjacent interior, they have become adept liars to each other. Nothing true is ever out in the open. In fact, in flashbacks, we discover that they hardly know each other. The film opens with Nick's calm voice-over desirous to crack open his wife's skull to find out who she is inside. Both are laconic in conversations. When first interrogated as a person of interest by the police, Nick seems to know nothing about Amy - her blood type, daily routines or friends. Amy writes in her journal that "Nick uses me for sex. Otherwise I don't exist."
It is not possible to watch the investigation of Amy’s disappearance without witnessing, in flashbacks, the disintegration of her marriage. In Gillian Flynn's novel of the same title, the word “marriage” occurs more than hundred times. Obviously the book is about a flawed marriage. The movie, also scripted by Flynn, uses their marriage as the supra-narrative and Amy's disappearance as its sub-text. Nick's lawyer, the singular rational voice, renders with expletive explosive that they are the most mess up couple he has ever met. Like many marriages, theirs is complicated by economic, familial and cultural contextures. Their sudden unemployment and Amy's wealth and name on the bar's deed strain their relationship. Amy's disappearance feeds a ravenous social media that ravages chaos into their lives. Nick's care for his ailing mother and abusive, dementia father drains their emotive energy. Amy may move away but cannot escape her domineering and demeaning parents whose literary success overshadows her and her marriage.
These complications do not completely explain a broken marriage. When they first get married, everyone warns Amy that without hard work her marriage is doomed. But she coolly differs. She wonders out loud why shouldn't two people who love each other make their marriage work. When her marriage fails to work, naively she believes that having a baby will save it. And typically, Nick bails from his failed marriage to an illicit affair with a college student. Why a marriage fails so badly? On another occasion, Nick exasperates, "What have we done to each other! What will we do?" What makes a marriage work depends on what spouses do to each other. “Gone Girl” is a story of a bad marriage in a murder mystery where Nick’s reckless and Amy’s bizarre behaviors perpetrate macabre consequences. Ultimately they are personally responsible for what they do in their bad marriage, even if they get away with murder.
October, 2014
"Gone Girl" is a murder mystery about a flawed marriage. On its exterior surface, Nick (Ben Affleck) and Amy (Rosemund Pike) Dunne’s marriage seems so amiable. Handsome, in a chiseled body with dimpled chin charm, Nick is a journalist. Amy, tall, blond, rich, with cool beauty, is a writer. He woos, and she flirts with mutual wit. In time they become husband and wife. In an economic downturn, both become unemployed. They move back to his small Midwest hometown to care for his dying mother. With Amy's money, Nick buys a local bar and runs it with his sister. When we first meet Nick, he is killing time having a drink and playing a board game with his sister in their bar on the morning of his wedding anniversary. He is not anxious to spend it with Amy. Reluctantly, he goes home only to find his wife missing. With aplomb, he calls the police. At once, his duplicitous demeanor, betrayed by his disingenuous smile that cracks at too many inappropriate moments, makes him a suspect.
Its subsequent police investigation quickly exposes a failed marriage. After five years, in their subjacent interior, they have become adept liars to each other. Nothing true is ever out in the open. In fact, in flashbacks, we discover that they hardly know each other. The film opens with Nick's calm voice-over desirous to crack open his wife's skull to find out who she is inside. Both are laconic in conversations. When first interrogated as a person of interest by the police, Nick seems to know nothing about Amy - her blood type, daily routines or friends. Amy writes in her journal that "Nick uses me for sex. Otherwise I don't exist."
It is not possible to watch the investigation of Amy’s disappearance without witnessing, in flashbacks, the disintegration of her marriage. In Gillian Flynn's novel of the same title, the word “marriage” occurs more than hundred times. Obviously the book is about a flawed marriage. The movie, also scripted by Flynn, uses their marriage as the supra-narrative and Amy's disappearance as its sub-text. Nick's lawyer, the singular rational voice, renders with expletive explosive that they are the most mess up couple he has ever met. Like many marriages, theirs is complicated by economic, familial and cultural contextures. Their sudden unemployment and Amy's wealth and name on the bar's deed strain their relationship. Amy's disappearance feeds a ravenous social media that ravages chaos into their lives. Nick's care for his ailing mother and abusive, dementia father drains their emotive energy. Amy may move away but cannot escape her domineering and demeaning parents whose literary success overshadows her and her marriage.
These complications do not completely explain a broken marriage. When they first get married, everyone warns Amy that without hard work her marriage is doomed. But she coolly differs. She wonders out loud why shouldn't two people who love each other make their marriage work. When her marriage fails to work, naively she believes that having a baby will save it. And typically, Nick bails from his failed marriage to an illicit affair with a college student. Why a marriage fails so badly? On another occasion, Nick exasperates, "What have we done to each other! What will we do?" What makes a marriage work depends on what spouses do to each other. “Gone Girl” is a story of a bad marriage in a murder mystery where Nick’s reckless and Amy’s bizarre behaviors perpetrate macabre consequences. Ultimately they are personally responsible for what they do in their bad marriage, even if they get away with murder.
TV Series Review: Fargo
Review by John L. Ng
July, 2014
The FX cable channel’s ten-episode “Fargo” series is a dark comedy with a darker drama undertone. It is humorous entertainment with serious portraits of human nature. Conceptually adapted from the 1996 Coen brothers’ movie by the same title, this Fargo also offers eccentric characters with deadpan humor and with deadly evil. During an interview, its writer Noah Hawley described the series as a portrayal of what is best and worst in America. Set in the wintery rural town of Bemidji (I have been there in winter) in Minnesota. The best is the town folks’ common goodness. They are polite, kind, even-tempered, trusting and trustworthy. They grace their conversations with “aw jeez” when confused or embarrassed and “oh shucks” when things don’t go well or as expected. The worst is some folks' propensity for senseless brutality against others. Without remorse, they kill for no apparent justification.
Wrestling with the holocaust, Hannah Arendt coined “banality of evil” to make sense of it. At the trial of Adolph Eichmann, Arendt listened to the proceedings and concluded that ordinary individuals, like Eichmann, were capable of horrendous acts of evil by simply doing what they were told. They went about performing "ordinary evil" against other human beings out of duty. In Fargo, Lester Nygaard (Martin Freeman) is a meek and clumsy insurance salesman. He is a disappointment to his wife who chides him at every impulsive disdain. A chance encounter with Lorne Malvo (Billy Bob Thornton) at a hospital turns this innocuous wimp into a downward spiral deviant toward banal evil. Malvo is a mysterious, and goofy looking, drifter who enters this rural community and into Lester’s life with savagery beyond comprehension. He is a personification of rudimentary evil. Highly intelligent and mild mannered, he goes about his brutal killings as casually as a stroll in the snow.
Then there is Molly Solverson (Allison Tolman). She is a personification of goodness. A heavy set deputy sheriff, Molly is slow talking and slow moving with a quick wit. Although compassionate for others, gullible she is not when in the face of evil. Her goodness is nurtured soberly by what is bad in others. A conversation between Gus, a deputy sheriff of another town, and her offers how unsettling it is to live with banal evil. Gus: when a dog goes rabid, there’s no mistaking it for a normal dog. Us people, we’re supposed to know better, be better. Molly: must be hard to live in this world if you believe that. Gus: you have no idea.
The bumbling Sheriff Bill Oswald has no idea. At first, he refuses to let Molly investigate the brutal murders. He simply refuses to believe that a former fellow student, Lester, is capable of cold-blooded murder. But as the events unfold, even the hapless chief yields to the ruinous havoc of banal evil. Actually, in their own means, these folks cope quite well in a world severely broken. These simple folks simply do what is right without malice or slander. At times awkwardly, sometimes stupidly and other times naively, but at all times, they lead their lives in the midst of evil with integrity of heart and a steadfast goodness.
If you have not seen the original broadcast, look out for it in reruns. Fargo is a good story well told. It is a study of human nature in its extremes. You just might take away from it a lesson in what it means to being human. It affirms Psalm 1's affirmation: (The righteous) are like trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruits in its season . . . . The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away. . . and the way of the wicked will perish.
July, 2014
The FX cable channel’s ten-episode “Fargo” series is a dark comedy with a darker drama undertone. It is humorous entertainment with serious portraits of human nature. Conceptually adapted from the 1996 Coen brothers’ movie by the same title, this Fargo also offers eccentric characters with deadpan humor and with deadly evil. During an interview, its writer Noah Hawley described the series as a portrayal of what is best and worst in America. Set in the wintery rural town of Bemidji (I have been there in winter) in Minnesota. The best is the town folks’ common goodness. They are polite, kind, even-tempered, trusting and trustworthy. They grace their conversations with “aw jeez” when confused or embarrassed and “oh shucks” when things don’t go well or as expected. The worst is some folks' propensity for senseless brutality against others. Without remorse, they kill for no apparent justification.
Wrestling with the holocaust, Hannah Arendt coined “banality of evil” to make sense of it. At the trial of Adolph Eichmann, Arendt listened to the proceedings and concluded that ordinary individuals, like Eichmann, were capable of horrendous acts of evil by simply doing what they were told. They went about performing "ordinary evil" against other human beings out of duty. In Fargo, Lester Nygaard (Martin Freeman) is a meek and clumsy insurance salesman. He is a disappointment to his wife who chides him at every impulsive disdain. A chance encounter with Lorne Malvo (Billy Bob Thornton) at a hospital turns this innocuous wimp into a downward spiral deviant toward banal evil. Malvo is a mysterious, and goofy looking, drifter who enters this rural community and into Lester’s life with savagery beyond comprehension. He is a personification of rudimentary evil. Highly intelligent and mild mannered, he goes about his brutal killings as casually as a stroll in the snow.
Then there is Molly Solverson (Allison Tolman). She is a personification of goodness. A heavy set deputy sheriff, Molly is slow talking and slow moving with a quick wit. Although compassionate for others, gullible she is not when in the face of evil. Her goodness is nurtured soberly by what is bad in others. A conversation between Gus, a deputy sheriff of another town, and her offers how unsettling it is to live with banal evil. Gus: when a dog goes rabid, there’s no mistaking it for a normal dog. Us people, we’re supposed to know better, be better. Molly: must be hard to live in this world if you believe that. Gus: you have no idea.
The bumbling Sheriff Bill Oswald has no idea. At first, he refuses to let Molly investigate the brutal murders. He simply refuses to believe that a former fellow student, Lester, is capable of cold-blooded murder. But as the events unfold, even the hapless chief yields to the ruinous havoc of banal evil. Actually, in their own means, these folks cope quite well in a world severely broken. These simple folks simply do what is right without malice or slander. At times awkwardly, sometimes stupidly and other times naively, but at all times, they lead their lives in the midst of evil with integrity of heart and a steadfast goodness.
If you have not seen the original broadcast, look out for it in reruns. Fargo is a good story well told. It is a study of human nature in its extremes. You just might take away from it a lesson in what it means to being human. It affirms Psalm 1's affirmation: (The righteous) are like trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruits in its season . . . . The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away. . . and the way of the wicked will perish.
Her
Review by John L. Ng
January, 2014
Some time ago, i quipped less than seriously to some friends that when i get lonely, i talk with "Siri", my smartphone generated voice. They laughed nervously for it sounded pathetic if not creepy. Spike Jonze's "Her" is a narrative about a lonely man who endears a significant relationship with the voice of an operating system. Its pretext may sound incredulous but it is a plausible love story. It speaks to our basic human need for intimacy. We all seek to know and be known intimately by another.
Theodore (Joaquin Phoenix) professionally writes love notes for clients who cannot find the words to express their sentiments. After work, Theodore struggles to make conversations with people close to him. Whether it is his estranged wife or colleagues and friends, every encounter seems overwhelmed with cognitive misunderstanding and emotive disconnect. Lonely and sad, Theodore's melancholy suffers existential isolation in a world crowded with people.
By happenstance, he downloads a new operating system in his computer. It is the most advanced artificial intelligence software. Its sexy, raspy voice calls herself Samantha (Scarlett Johansson). At first, she does what an operating system should do, puts his hard drive in order, sorts out his communications, and cues him his appointments. But Samantha becomes much more. When asked what he loves most about "her," Theodore hesitates, "Oh, God, she's so many things. I guess what I love most about her, you know, she isn't just one thing."
Samantha is smart, articulate, down to earth, expressive, quick, witty, ironic and engaging. That is, she is a complete companion for any person, regardless of gender. In time, she evolves into his "helpmeet" - a Biblical Genesis term that means someone who talks back. She talks back to Theodore with delightful conversations and speaks into his loneliness - perks him up when he is discouraging, affirms him when he is at a lost and makes him laugh when he is sad.
In time, Theodore would make love and fall in love with Samantha. Don't get ahead of me with faulty assumptions about sex. Post-modernity has diminished love making to a physical act. The etymology of "making love" means making intimate conversations. Samantha is a computer generated voice; it would be impossible for them to get physical. In a disconcerting scene, Samantha seeks to change that by convincing a young woman to act as a surrogate for her to have sex with Theodore. That ill-conceived encounter ends hurtfully. Intimacy is not genital sex but intimate communion. They make love by making intimate conversations.
"Her" is a profound meditation on the meaning of and the human desire for intimacy. The singular most important act of intimacy is meaningful conversations. The subtext of this movie is emphatic joy between Theodore and Samantha in verbal exchanges. It is the enjoyment of listening and responding to each other. While others make "phatic" noises to inform, rebuke and correct him, Theodore enters genuine intimacy with Samantha with emphatic conversations.
The irony, and there are many in the film, is that conversations with an operating system is more comfortable and comforting than with people. Of course, this machine and human love story is an improbability. Humans are made for other humans. Yet what Theodore and Samantha have, in a cinematic fable, tells us about the incongruity of modern social intercourses.
January, 2014
Some time ago, i quipped less than seriously to some friends that when i get lonely, i talk with "Siri", my smartphone generated voice. They laughed nervously for it sounded pathetic if not creepy. Spike Jonze's "Her" is a narrative about a lonely man who endears a significant relationship with the voice of an operating system. Its pretext may sound incredulous but it is a plausible love story. It speaks to our basic human need for intimacy. We all seek to know and be known intimately by another.
Theodore (Joaquin Phoenix) professionally writes love notes for clients who cannot find the words to express their sentiments. After work, Theodore struggles to make conversations with people close to him. Whether it is his estranged wife or colleagues and friends, every encounter seems overwhelmed with cognitive misunderstanding and emotive disconnect. Lonely and sad, Theodore's melancholy suffers existential isolation in a world crowded with people.
By happenstance, he downloads a new operating system in his computer. It is the most advanced artificial intelligence software. Its sexy, raspy voice calls herself Samantha (Scarlett Johansson). At first, she does what an operating system should do, puts his hard drive in order, sorts out his communications, and cues him his appointments. But Samantha becomes much more. When asked what he loves most about "her," Theodore hesitates, "Oh, God, she's so many things. I guess what I love most about her, you know, she isn't just one thing."
Samantha is smart, articulate, down to earth, expressive, quick, witty, ironic and engaging. That is, she is a complete companion for any person, regardless of gender. In time, she evolves into his "helpmeet" - a Biblical Genesis term that means someone who talks back. She talks back to Theodore with delightful conversations and speaks into his loneliness - perks him up when he is discouraging, affirms him when he is at a lost and makes him laugh when he is sad.
In time, Theodore would make love and fall in love with Samantha. Don't get ahead of me with faulty assumptions about sex. Post-modernity has diminished love making to a physical act. The etymology of "making love" means making intimate conversations. Samantha is a computer generated voice; it would be impossible for them to get physical. In a disconcerting scene, Samantha seeks to change that by convincing a young woman to act as a surrogate for her to have sex with Theodore. That ill-conceived encounter ends hurtfully. Intimacy is not genital sex but intimate communion. They make love by making intimate conversations.
"Her" is a profound meditation on the meaning of and the human desire for intimacy. The singular most important act of intimacy is meaningful conversations. The subtext of this movie is emphatic joy between Theodore and Samantha in verbal exchanges. It is the enjoyment of listening and responding to each other. While others make "phatic" noises to inform, rebuke and correct him, Theodore enters genuine intimacy with Samantha with emphatic conversations.
The irony, and there are many in the film, is that conversations with an operating system is more comfortable and comforting than with people. Of course, this machine and human love story is an improbability. Humans are made for other humans. Yet what Theodore and Samantha have, in a cinematic fable, tells us about the incongruity of modern social intercourses.