Pairs

Rating: Null/10 (26 July 2003)

Spoilers herein.
Post 9-11 effects are nowhere as profound as in the wave of movies just hitting the theaters. This week, I have seen two films whose foundations are the upswelling of national identity since the attacks. But they are quite different. The first was "Red, White and Blond" which is lightweight, celebrates the simple platitude as truth, and has that respect for the stupid but well-meaning that characterizes Republican strategy. Enormously endearing, and I cried at all the patriotic parts.
And then there's this. Strong metaphors for a broken country given a second chance. A morality tale about the little guy against moneyed interests, about healing, about real compassion. In this case, the metaphor is made plain: history's popularizer David McCullough does a faux "Ken Burns" documentary within which we peer into this story of America revitalization from the destruction of greed. This is the other side of the patriotic coin, and we all cried at the patriotic parts here too.
Both of these are extremely well engineered, almost overengineered. In this one we have one of the simplest devices in the book, the rule of twos:
We have two men in whose hands this healing is wrought. The heart of the project is the heart of these two characters. They sought out two of the three male actors capable of a certain technique for this: the ability to anticipate the next scene. Acting is not the challenge of creating a character at all, it is the challenge of doing things that induce you as the viewer to create a character. That means that the actor has to create and maintain a channel between himself and the viewer; there are different styles, techniques and philosophies to do this. One -- rare but effective -- technique is to anticipate the future; it is what Chris and Jeff know how to do.
In this game, they each create two persons, the character who lives in the now of the story and the actor who knows that something is coming -- that it will all turn out all right if only the being of the actor can get past the flaws in the being of the character. They expose both of these beings to us and we watch them both. When we see Jeff's face in closeup -- and he literally tells us its all about the future -- we see half of him really does live in the future. These are superb actors, chosen because they each bring this linkage to the next scene. Cinematic storytelling, folks. Which, it must be said, has something to do with the strategy of racing that is described in redundant detail: let him see the partner so that he can race ahead.
Pairs throughout: we have the pair of the damaged: horse and rider, both as metaphor for the nation. This is so heavily and obviously pounded in, that it threatens the movie and only by repeated tests did they fine tune it: pushed only precisely so far and no further. "Bagger Vance" is an example of one that went over the line. Robert Redford.
The viewers have to be represented: here we have a pair of designated viewers -- standing in for us of course. The wife and the radio announcer. The wife duly soaks in the sweet platitudes and the radio guy (in addition to providing comic relief) provides an equally heavy metaphor for our own voyeurism. These bookends define the space for us to feel comfortable in. This announcer bit is also an example of repeated audience testing. It derives from the reporter-voyeur of the screwball comedy era, filtered through dozens of comedic versions in mostly baseball movies -- but with defining bumps in "Best in Show" and "Major League." Again it was pushed precisely as far as audiences could take before they had a reaction. An example of too far is Jennifer Leigh's reporter in "Hudsucker.
Pairs: the pair of patriotic approaches, the pair for us as Americans, the pair for us as patient husbanders of the good (each as the actor/character pair), the pair for us as moviegoers. Its called bracketing and is engineered cinematic storytelling at its finest.
Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 4: Worth watching.