The Safety of Objects
- Szczegóły
- Nadrzędna kategoria: Filmy
- Kategoria: Recenzje filmowe z Guardiana
Artykuł pochodzi z pisma "Guardian"
Ensemble tragicomedies of American suburbia don't come more anaemic, more listless, more derivative or more plain tiresome than this: a type of American movie-making I can only describe as indie bedwetting. Rose Troche's third movie (after Go Fish and Bedrooms and Hallways) interweaves a collection of short stories by AM Homes, and that literary source material is unhappily transformed into something over-precious and thin-skinned.
A clenched and unhappy mom, Esther (Glenn Close) tends obsessively to her son Paul (Joshua Jackson) who is in a persistent vegetative state following a car wreck; his sister Julie (Jessica Campbell) rages at the way she is neglected; next door, Annette (Patricia Clarkson) is going through a nasty divorce; another neighbour Jim (Dermot Mulroney) is suffering a breakdown and the oddjob guy (Timothy Olyphant) has a weirdo problem of his own. All this elaborately contrived guilt and dysfunction stems from the accident that put Paul in his coma: a tragedy whose secret details are, of course, coyly withheld from us until the end to provide a spuriousand unsatisfying narrative resolution.
The ambient spaciness and strange alien beauty of the suburban landscape has been evoked with more wit in many a teen TV drama and certainly in movies like Todd Solondz's Happiness and Sam Mendes's American Beauty - all apparently an influence here, right down to scenes with people gazing longingly through neighbours' bedroom windows, and the obligatory overhead shot showing the banal yet homely quilt of gardens and swimming pools. The performances are workmanlike enough, but it all looks like the product of a creative writing class.
. VOCABULARY:
ambient - otaczający
breakdown - załamanie (także nerwowe)
clenched - zawzięty, zacięty
coma - śpiączka
to contrive - wymyślić, wykombinować,
coyly - cicho, nieśmiało
creative writing class - lekcja kreatywnego pisania
derivative - pochodny, wtórny
to evoke - przywołać
to gaze - przyglądać się, przypatrywać się
to interweave - przeplatać, przetykać
listless - apatyczny, bierny
nasty - paskudny, nieprzyjemny
to neglect - zaniedbywać, lekceważyć
oddjob - neologizm złożony ze słowa “odd” (dziwny) i “job”
persistent - trwały, stały; uporczywy
quilt - kołdra, wyściółka
to rage - złościć się, wściekać się
spurious - udawany, fałszywy
to stem from - pochodzić, wywodzić się z, wyrastać z
suburbia - przedmieścia, dzielnice domków jednorodzinnych na obrzeżach miasta
vegetative state - stan wegetacji, śpiączka
weirdo - dziwaczny
wit - humor, dowcip, swada
to withhold - nie udzielić, odmówić czegoś, powstrzymać
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