Movie: Bound (Lana Wachowski & Lilly Wachowski, 1996)
I think The Matrix is one of the greatest films of the 90''s, but having seen V for Vendetta and Cloud Atlas it's eeasy to be skeptical of the revisionism surrounding the Matrix sequels. Thankfully, Bound shows The Wachowskis aren't just one-trick ponies, even if their characteristic flourishes sometimes work against the film. Their grandly operatic style, full of slow motion, disorienting zooms and camera moves, and cuts that don't respect temporality and/or physics, is a perfect fit for a film that is all about discovering the vast unreality of our world, but less so for a tense neo-noir that takes place in mostly one location. The apartment in which the film takes place is a bit too much a purely stylistic invention; it sometimes feels as if the camera is creating spaces out of thin air, just to get an interesting shot. As a result no one can fault the film for having a dull look, but you do lose a bit of tension when you make a space appear this fake and contrived. The more characters feel bound by physical limits, the more you fear for their safety. One especially sloppy sequence shows two people leaving the apartment for another place, without showing them getting back and without making any significant visual distinction between the two places, resulting in confusion about how the action is progressing.
The apartment in question belongs to Caesar (Joe Pantoliano), a middle man for the mafia, whose bosses are much more willing to treat him as a sacrificial lamb if the need arises than he surmises. The dons are not his only problem. His wife Violet (Jennifer Tilly) hsa fallen for Corky (Gina Gershon), an ex-con hired to be a plumber at the apartment next door, and now the two women are conspring to steal maffia money from him. Joe Pantoliano has a lot of fun playing an irrationally confident irritant scheming frantically as he gradually realises how screwed and out of his depth he is. He is contrasted by Tilly and Gershon, giving more exact and distinct performances. Tilly is a confident seductress whose demeanor and actions mask her fear, while her husky vulnerable voice masks her willingness to act on her most dangerous ideas. She confuses not just Caesar, but also Corky - one of the things I liked about the film is how much Gershon emphasises ber skepticism about the choices she makes. She makes a conscious decision to act out of a potentially irrational love, knowing full well that it may be the wroing choice.
The film makes it easy to root for Violet and Corky. They are smart, sexy and charismatic, but also mostly decent people whose actions are informed by love and self-defense, However, they too are beset with an irrational confidence, bordering on arrogance, that leaves them more out of their depth than they realise. It's key to what makes this film work so well - everyone is constantly making decisions that you can anticipate going wrong, and when they do go wroing, Corky, Caesar and Violet all have to scramble and think fast and hard about their next actions, producing a film of unrelenting tense set-pieces in which everyone is constantly on edge. The few moments of peace mostly happen in bed between Violet and Corky. I complained earlier about how the apartment's interiors lack a coherent sence of place.The opposite is true for the love scenes which pay attention to the tiniest details of body movement.
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