Guncotton - A personal look at films

What a pretentious movie this is; and how overrated. Based on a play that apparently knew great success on the US stage, the story pretends to be a merciless exploration to the sexual and emotional turmoils of two couples whose lives - and body limbs - intertwine over the course of several months. All very interesting on paper - or onstage - but absolutely boring onscreen. Because Closer is not a movie at all, it's filmed theatre. As a result, the impression I got was of laziness and lack of imagination.


Not the smallest effort has been made to adapt the play to the cinematic medium. I don't think the script involved a lot of work. Words are the only driver for the action here, defining the characters and marking the passing of time. The dialogues - lengthy and expositive, aimed to explain everything - are the fuel that make this movie go ahead. This is so evident that, at one point, I almost expected Derek Jakobi to pop out from behind a bush and start to talk in Shakespearian English, explaining where we are and what we are going to see, in case we didn't get it right the first time. I don't mind this when watching a play, but this is a movie!. Unlike onstage, in films you don't need to rely so strongly - or solely - on words to tell the story. And generally, a more economic use of dialogue results in a better movie - unless you are Eric Rohmer. In that case, you may pull the talking trick successfully, most of the time. Unfortunately, this is not the case.

Maybe it is that I didn't engage with any of the characters, so their endless blabber failed to move me. I didn't find them particularly alluring or capable or provoking such passions in others, so they seemed rather tiresome to me. When not dishonest bullies (Clive Owen's arrogant doctor), they were insufferably wimpy (Julia Robert's photographer and Jude Law's journalist). With regards of Natalie Portman's role - a feisty stripper - I still don't have a clue of what was going on with her. I don't even remember the names of the characters the actors play. In me, that's a bad sign; it means that I cannot care less about the whole thing.

Or perhaps it was the fact that I found the continued attempt of passing rude language and histrionics for a sincere exploration of the miseries of sex mildly irritating. Such cheap tricks put me off so much, that nothing of what came next managed to ring true. Call me old-fashioned, but I don't get it. This movie didn't make any sense to me.