| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| BaftaBaby |
Posted - 12/28/2012 : 22:54:50
SOME - tiny weeny spoilers which won't mar your enjoyment of the film, trust me.
Before addressing this complex and intriguing film by writer/director Peter Strickland, I want to enthuse about the quite magnificent performance of central character Gilderoy by Toby Jones.
He's having quite a good year, as it happens - one, it appears, that reveals just the ice-berg tip of his talents. If his embodiment of Alfred Hitchcock in the telly version of The Girl had been in contention for a film award, Jones would have blown Anthony Hopkins clear out of the water.
As Gilderoy he's entirely different, and I'm not talking make-up and fat suits. It's a quietly muscular transformation, yet equally convincing in a role of frustration and soft-spoken manners barely hiding inner rage.
For Jones' Gilderoy allows us so far into the mind of this post-production wizard, we're totally convinced by even the most puzzling moments we don't quite understand.
Of the latter there are plenty and a half!
I hope Jones makes it to the short-list of Best Actors, but, given the film's often bizarre and definitely non-mainstream realization, he'll probably be eclipsed by some of the more easily available performances [some of which certainly are awfully good].
The primary question asked by Strickland is where to find the mundane horrors of everyday life, sapping sanity and self-control. It depends, of course, on your definition of horror, and how far a film-maker wants to push the parallels.
Let's start from the character's name itself - Gilderoy, a name whose etymology tells of its Celtic origins, meaning son of a red-head. It's a name, too, that inescapably links to Gilles de Rey, aka Bluebeard.
Though it can partly be read as a pastiche of populist Italian horror, this film has far more in common with Shutter Island than Dario Argento's Suspiria or Trauma. And there are echoes, too, of Pasolini's Saldo, as well as Ken Russell, and David Lynch, all of whom are fascinated by the unpredictable and uncontrolled nature of reality and how much sanity we sacrifice in the face of it.
As for the title itself - Berberian refers to the Berber people, their origins and way of life. Think Barbary Coast, Barbary pirates - gateway to darkest Africa and the blood-soaked journeys of explorers who found it dense and unknowable.
As is this studio itself. The world of post-production was probably first brought to our attention in Denys Arcand's 1989 charming and disturbing Jesus de Montreal. Arcand's film proposed that the actor dubbing the voice of Jesus onto a low-budget film might actually be a real-life embodiment of the kind that prompted John Wayne to declare with a Texas drawl - surely this is the son of God.
Strickland's quasi-film-within-a-film leaves God alone, though it does appear to deal with the testing of witches, and in a disturbingly sexploitational way. All off-screen, of course, since we only get to hear not see.
Some things we do see have deliberate associations with institutional paraphernalia - such as replugging electrical connections, lingering shots of the chart-like schema that codifies the build-up of a soundtrack, and perhaps most potent, Gilderoy's professional party trick of creating the sound of a UFO using a light bulb. Enlightening the alien.
The premise of BSS involves a small indie sound studio, its stylish front of house leading to rather run-down corridors containing faulty and/or out of date equipment. The studio's key personnel [especially the producer of an Italian giallo film called The Equestrian Vortex,] seem to welcome Gilderoy to their inner sanctum. Giallo, btw, defines the Euro crime mystery genre. It might involve horror, but primarily it's about mystery.
But these studio folk behave, well, not quite right. In fact, they're all out of synch - inappropriate. Their communication or lack of it with Gilderoy should sound loud alarm bells. After all, he's come a long way because they specifically asked for him, seeming to value his expertise in overseeing all sound aspects of the post-production. But his failure to release any normal sense of outrage, he tries to justify by his English reticence as he negotiates the journey expected of him. And let's not forget what Vortex means.
In fact, he seems as powerless to resist as any inmate. And as if it weren't clear enough - his moments of repression are accompanied by a big red flashing light reading SILENCE. This, of course, is exactly what all locked studio doors display when any kind of shooting goes on inside.
Now silence is the opposite of sound. Another antonym is unsound. Strickland does not dangle such aspects by accident.
I think one of the biggest clues of what the film's about occurs in a phone-call Gilderoy has at the studio reception desk. He's been trying to find who's actually responsible for re-imbursing his flight expenses. Eventually, after giving up his ticket as a receipt, he's on the phone with the film's accountant.
It's not only the news he receives from this person to whom he must prove himself accountable, but how he reacts to it that leads to inevitable conclusions of the film's meaning.
Which is why it's essential not to take too literally the quasi-horror ambience of the studio environment and assume a horror genre. For completely technical reasons, of course, such places must be cut off from the rest of the world. What's being produced are all the elements that raise the credibility of what is a flat-screen world, into a sound sculpture that gives every aspect of a movie its definition.
Dialogue, music, and most particularly the less obvious touches. Composite effects such as footsteps, the rustle of cloth, the rhythms of breathing and more all conspire to make you the viewer believe in the fantasy unfolding in front of your eyes.
To achieve that - for it is one of cinema's great art/skills - everyone inside must leave the world behind.
In its intense concentration such a world mirrors the locked rooms of the mentally disturbed. And many critics have noted Jones' remarkable depiction of a man going mad.
But I go further. I believe the reality of the film is not a foreign sound studio but the very processing of Gilderoy's madness. As already mentioned, Strickland provides many clues, some in-jokes, others a challenge for the viewer's eagle eyes and ears.
I urge you to apply your eagle accomplishments and see this film.
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