Closer To Perfection Each Time I See It

Rating: 10/10 (8 December 2004)

[WARNING: This review contains some language and a whole lot of senseless
blathering about how fantastic Mike Nichols is]
All right, Nichols, you win.
I've been looking, I guess, for a favorite director for some time now. It was jumbled between Polanski, Fuller, Allen, and even Takashi Miike for awhile, but they all wane (slightly, mind you, but still wane) in awe at Mike Nichols.
I was wondering how this movie, being a relationship movie, would stack up
with audiences, to quote the film, to "that witch we do not speak of."* To be honest, it was about as divided, but I think it's a clear sign that since most of the people who came out of Closer who either liked it or hated it spoke with such vocabulary and a surprising, staunch lack of grammar. True quote: "Fantastic
movie... must... defenestrate... DVD collection." People literally are entranced by this piece of pure, unmitigated CINEMA, damn it!
The story is sparse. It is more about the feelings of the characters than the actual plot, but here's my take: couples cheating on one another. That's pretty much all you need to know plotwise. The plot does not fail in any way. In fact, the
minimalism is key to the reflection in the mirrors that are the script and acting. WHOOOOLY HECK. The dialogue as stilted as hell, and guess what? It works,
like a charm. It feels very much like the play it was scripted on, and that just gets me thinking: relationships really are like a play going on before you, and that's why people say things as trite as "do you think I'm ugly?" or "please, don't leave me." In any other movie (like the one by the asterisk at the end), this dialogue would have faltered, but the pure frankness of the events that unfold and the way that they are portrayed is genius. Julia Roberts, who I really don't like, gives her best performance, bar none, and she's incredibly convincing. In one
particular scene, she and Clive Owen are both as frank, biting, and funny as the movie they star in. Jude Law's truly shone this year in his pictures, and he
shines the brightest here (yep, even better than in Huckabees, and he was
pretty damn good in that one). Natalie Portman, though not nude, is probably
the best of the foursome. Admittedly, she has the best lines of dialogue, but only she could make them as funny and as tragic as they are.
The best thing about Closer? No matter how straightforward it is with breakups and infidelity, it never loses its sense of surreality, which is tough to pull off if your name doesn't start with an "R" and end with an "oman Polanski." The way
the film is shot is perfect: any scene that involves infidelity or a question of infidelity, the camera angles become obscure (not too obscure) so that the
unfortunate events playing out on screen become that much more effective.
So in all, how is it? Three words: "Life On Screen" or "Pure F'n Cinema."
Yep, it's that good. :)
*The movie referred to was indeed Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. And
unless you don't have a funny bone and are not in relationship, Closer dunks
Eternal Sunshine's head in the toilet bowl 98 times, one for each minute of film.
YES: IT'S THAT GOOD. :D