HEAVEN
“Heaven” was directed by “Run Lola Run’s” Tom Tykwer, from the last script by another late, great filmmaker, Krzysztof Kieslowski (“The Decalogue,” the “Three Colors” trilogy.) Unfortunately, the respective talents of each director, while considerable in their own rights, simply don’t mesh well together. Tykwer’s kinetic approach seems in direct opposition of Kieslowski’s more ponderous, ethereal style. The result is a film that, while not starved of great images, is little more than a banal exercise in art-house pretension.
The release of “Heaven” has been delayed, in part, because of post-Sept. 11 concerns. The plot concerns a Philippa (Cate Blanchett), a British teacher living in Italy, who sets off a bomb in an office building in an attempt to kill the man responsible for much of Italy’s drug trade — and who also, it seems, was involved in the death of Philippa’s husband. Only the man gets lucky, and instead of killing its target, the bomb kills four innocent people, for which Philippa is promptly arrested.
At her interrogation, she wins the sympathy of a young police officer named Fillippo (Giovanni Ribisi). He finds a way to communicate a plan of escape to her, although she doesn’t want to avoid punishment — in her eyes, she deserves the consequences for taking innocent lives. She only wants to get out to kill the man she was originally after.
The early scenes are similar to an episode of Kieslowski’s “Decalogue,” and contain elements that touch on that director’s fascination with moral ambiguity and the role of fate in our lives. But what starts as passable, if a bit slow and murky, becomes increasingly ridiculous. We follow Fillippo and Philippa on the lam, now sporting shaved heads that make them look similar — hammering home an already heavy-handed suggestion of some obscure, mystical link between the two (just look at their names). The final shot of the film is foreshadowed in the first and sums up the movie’s tendency toward beautiful imagery that attempts to be profound, but ends up meaning little or nothing.
Not helping matters much are the performances by the two leads. Ribisi and Blanchett have both developed reputations as daring, reliable actors, but here they seem to be mailing it in. It is as if Tykwer, whose films usually rely on their dynamism, wanted so badly to tone down his actors for this material that he sucked all of the life out of their performances in the process.
Ultimately, “Heaven” can be viewed as a failed experiment. There’s no telling what Kieslowski himself could have done with it, not to mention the other two planned films in the trilogy (those being, unsurprisingly, “Purgatory” and “Hell.”) But in the hands of a vastly different director, “Heaven” is a film that tries to convince the audience that it’s deep, but ends up fooling only itself.
-Dan Ciardi MUSE Staff
ABANDON
Stephen Gaghan, fresh from his Academy Award-winning script for “Traffic,” was obviously so well trusted after that film’s critical acclaim that he was given the opportunity to write anything and to direct it himself. This type of thinking has been successful in the past; just look at Alan Ball, who followed up his script for “American Beauty” with the highly unique, impeccably written HBO series “Six Feet Under.”
Gaghan’s follow-up, “Abandon,” just gets buried six feet deep. The story focuses on Katie (Katie Holmes), a studious and career-oriented senior at an anonymous, ultra-competitive Ivy League university. She sits around drinking coffee with her pseudo-intellectual friends, slaves over her senior thesis and nails interviews for high profile corporations. Katie is attempting to move on with her life, but her anguished past catches up with her when a detective (Benjamin Bratt, the only actor who survives this film unscathed) begins asking her questions about the mysterious disappearance of her wealthy, artistic boyfriend, Embry Larkin (Charlie Hunnam). She hasn’t seen Embry in two years and struggles to leave his memory behind, but eventually, she spots him around campus, leaving strange clues and messages.
Gaghan has created cliche characters that make you repeatedly ask yourself whether the film is supposed to be a thriller, and why. Katie’s boyfriend broke her heart and left her, so why is she scared when he finally returns? Wouldn’t she cry or slap him in the face for leaving creepy notes on her desk? In the scene where Katie finally does see Embry, she walks into a dark, run-down mansion full of leaky ceilings and flowing white curtains. As she approaches him, you are prepared for a chase, a fight, a scream even, but Katie just looks at him and says, “Do you know what you’ve been doing to me for the last two weeks?” The script defies logic on several occasions simply because Gaghan desperately wants to throw a cool and original surprise ending at his audience. But the only problem is that he’s unable to create a compelling, or even believable, story to support it.
The scenes that appear as if they will be the most suspenseful end up being the most anticlimactic, and the scenes that actually do work — which aren’t many — tend to be unnecessary. The plot has more holes than a PGA golf course, and the performances are weak and poorly directed. “Abandon” is a suspense film that lacks intelligence and, most of all, suspense.
It’s too bad Stephen Gaghan used his one and only “make any movie you want card” on something as amateurish as this film. His previous efforts have shown that he does possess some talent, but if films like this are what the Academy Award-winning writer of “Traffic” has to offer the cinema from now on, then he might as well “abandon” any hopes of future Oscar triumphs.
-Sean Lavery MUSE Staff