Shooting the eyes of bad men

Continuing the Nicholas Winding Refn series they’re doing at the NW Film Center, last night I took in Refn’s first English-language film: 2003′s Fear X, starring John Turturro.

How to describe this film … Barton Fink by way of Suspiria, maybe. The similarities are superficial, granted, but that’s what I landed on after leaving the theater.

It’s hard to discuss this film without going into spoilers, and even then it’s a tricky film to unpack after just one viewing. So forgive me if my impressions are vague and unformed. I’ll say in terms of pure entertainment, this is a huge step up from 1996′s Pusher. The lead is sympathetic, the cinematography is good, and these elements — combined with a simple and straightforward story, a wonderful score, and a good performance from Mr. Turturro — all served to keep me in suspense for the bulk of the film.

That said, the use of color symbolism is handled with the deft touch of a college freshman who has just seen Vertigo for the first time, and — without spoiling anything — the ending is frustrating. I’m all for open-ended, ambiguous endings, but this is one of those conclusions that’s teetering right on the line between insightful and lazy, with just a dash of pretension thrown in for good measure.

I wasn’t bored, however, which is more than I can say for my 100 minutes with Pusher. Refn is already honing his craft with this, his third film, and already showing signs of the genius he would come to display in Drive.

NEXT: I missed the screenings of Pushers 2 and 3, sadly, so next up will be either Bronson (2008) or Valhalla Rising (2009), depending on both the schedules of the NW Film Center and myself. I’ll hopefully be able to catch a screening of Drive as well, but then, you already know how I feel about that.

The NW Film Center here in Portland is running a program at the moment called DRIVEN: THE FILMS OF NICHOLAS WINDING REFN. Refn, of course, is the genius behind last year’s Drive. I’ve been eager to check out his earlier work, and this seemed like the ideal opportunity to do so, so last night I went to the screening of Pusher, Refn’s 1996 feature debut.

And I gotta say, I wasn’t impressed. Maybe I’m holding it to impossible standards, since the only other Refn film I’ve seen is the near-flawless Drive, but even for a first outing, Pusher felt messy and amateurish. The cinematography is dark, past the point of style and into the realm of muddy, and Refn has apparently never heard of a steadicam or tripod. If “shaky cam” films like The Blair Witch Project or The Bourne Ultimatum make you queasy, this will make you lose your lunch. Like the lighting, the camera motion goes beyond style and into “geez, hand the camera to someone with steadier hands.”

More importantly, the protagonist, Frank, is unlikable, unsympathetic, and — most damning — uninteresting. Audiences like a protagonist who makes things happen, who drives the plot forward, who takes his destiny into his own hands (or at least attempts to). Frank, on the other hand, is not only a loathsome excuse for a human being with no appreciable redeeming qualities, he also spends a great deal of the film sitting on his ass doing nothing. Finding a loathsome protagonist engaging isn’t beyond the realm of possibility, or even that rare. But he has to do something, at least something other than being lazy and generally unpleasant to everyone around him. The laziness is especially frustrating, given that he has a deadline to meet and it’s his ass if he doesn’t, but it ultimately becomes incredibly boring, as well.

Lastly — and this may seem like a minor quibble, but it’s not — the subtitles were really poorly done. I’m not talking about the translation; that seemed fine, and, not speaking Danish myself, I’m not really qualified to judge. But the formatting; subtitles would regularly appear stacked on top of one another, even when the second line of dialogue wouldn’t come for several seconds. This combined with the muddy cinematography often made it difficult to tell who was speaking, and really messed with the flow of dialogue (and the film). There were large chunks of dialogue (mostly towards the end, as if the translator got lazy) that weren’t translated at all. And, in a rampant display of unprofessionalism, there was a “you’re / your” kerfuffle, which, as anyone who knows me can attest, I find unforgivable (only half-kidding, there). I’d be curious to watch the film on DVD, to see if there’s a new translation / subtitle production.

That said, despite the almost complete lack of storytelling skill on display here, there were hints of Refn’s future genius to be seen. I found the character of Radovan — a drug lord’s enforcer who is good at what he does, but also sickened by it — to be interesting, and the last couple (dialogue-free) minutes of the film were so well-executed they felt like they belonged in another movie. It’s these little things — along with the knowledge that Refn will at some point metamorphosis into the man responsible for Drive — that will bring me back for the rest of the DRIVEN festival, including tonight’s screening of Pusher II: With Blood On My Hands.

It will be very, very interesting, actually, to watch Refn’s journey from messy armature to the breathtaking auteur he will eventually become. Stay tuned; I’ll chronicle the evolution, and my impressions, here.