The Goddess of 1967 - Essay Example

?The Goddess of 1967 Introduction In my research essay, what I have tried to explore is the validity of the distinction between art film and non-art film and my analysis points to a success formula which is a perfect blend of art traditions and classic Hollywood traditions in film making. I have scrutinized this aspect by text-reading the film, The goddess of 1967 to find out how much of art tradition goes into its make and how much classical Hollywood tradition. The film, The goddess of 1967 (Law, 2000) has a duration of 118 minutes in which the viewer is invited to traverse a beautiful physical landscape that parallels a bizarre and melancholy emotional landscape. Before immigrating to Australia, Clara Law, the director of this film, had made a number of films in Hon Kong which won good reception also (Phillips, 2001). This particular film had earned entry into prestigious film festivals like Venice and Toronto film festival (Phillips, 2001). The theme of the film is a journey undertaken by two strangers- a man and a woman- under odd circumstances, and the recollections they make of their lives through which they heal themselves as well. On surface, it is for the sake of a car, the whole journey is undertaken, but deep inside it is a journey through one’s own self for the protagonists. This was a movie that perplexed its viewers so that they were divided into its fans and foes (Coyle, 2005, p.67). Only two things that are seemingly perfect in this film are 1) the car, which is a much coveted Citroen DS, and 2) the natural beauty that encompasses the visual narrative of the film. Everything else is flawed- the minds of the characters, the life situations and the memories. Yet the beauty of the car is paralleled by the beauty of the landscape in each frame in which they appear together. And the film, like many other travel films, shows how the emotional wounds are healed by mutual understanding and companionship, by revisiting the past with a retrospective calmness. What the director tries to explain This film is about a lot many things including the mechanical life that one encounters in a city, the helplessness of human existence, loneliness, crime and the baser elements of human mind. Chaudhuri (2007) has called this film based on “themes of exile” wherein the male protagonist is a temporary migrant in Australia and the female protagonist is alienated from her society and family in her own land and hence living a life of exile (p.122). Fung Cheu (2007) on the other hand has opined that the theme of this film is “cultural dislocation” (p.129). From a direct view point, this film has been also called the story of an abused woman (Fung Cheu, 2007, p.141) By making a car the major presence in this film, a car with a history, a car venerated as perfect and elegant in all times, the film contrasts the perfection of a machine with the liveliness of even a flawed human existence. A machine cannot sin against its design and it is built to behave, but a human being is prone to vices but still retains a hand full of godly moments in his/her life. In a feminist interpretation of the presence of this car in this film, some critics (Senzani and Florida Atlantic University, 2008) have said that the car represented a channel of “escape… for the abused women”, and even a “mobile home” (p.431). It is also a depiction of how circumstances make and carve human characters. The film is made in such a way that this conclusion can be arrived at either with pessimism or optimism. The beauty of the film is in that it never advises the viewer to make either of this choice. The director herself has called this film “an attempt to portray the dysfunctional character of contemporary life and personal relations” (as cited by Phillips, 2001). The isolation that comes inevitably with urbanization, the bizarre ways in which humans try to relate, even by trying to love reptiles and strangers, and the visible absence of a community around human lives, are some aspects that gets subtly discussed in this film. Synopsis The story of the film revolves around a protagonist who lives in Tokyo, who rears snakes as pets and is a computer hacker as well (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). As he makes a deal with a man in Australia to buy a 1967 model Citroen DS car, the drama of the film starts unfolding (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). For J.M., the car “offers the possibility of escape through the fantasy of space travel”, and also will “complete his identification with Alain Delon’s character Jef Costello, in Le Samourai (Mayer and Beattie, 2007, p.196). J.M., the protagonist travels to Australia only to find out that the man with him he struck a deal had killed his wife and committed suicide (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). He is left with the only option of travelling along with the dead man’s blind and emotionally unpredictable niece, B.G., to a place that can be reached by driving 5 days so that he can find the relative of the dead man who will now sell the car to him (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). It is revealed that the owner of the car is B.G.’s grandfather. And as they travel along, they start learning about each other’s past (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). It turns out that J.M. had stolen a huge some on internet so that he has the money to buy the car (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). And it is also revealed by B.G. has a horrible past in which she saw and experienced rape, violence, incest and what not (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). B.G.’s mother adds to her agonies by being a fanatically repressive Catholic (Coyle, 2005, p.67). The relationship between the two protagonists stays more or less the same as when they started their journey, with no conventionally expected progression seen in the story line. In many situations, the protagonist seem to be a little eccentric, like when he breaks down crying when sitting inside the car and switching it to start for the first time. The ecstasy that he shows even after being bitten by a reptile when he tries to catch it is another instance (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). Even as there is no visible bonding between the two in a conventional manner, there is a kind of trust felt between the two and this is a consensus emerging between two desperate people rather than mutual love and understanding. In this way, this film is a statement that in a world where real love and understanding is no more a possibility, at least people can find relief in sharing loneliness. The supporting actors like Nicholas Hope as B.G.’s grandfather and Elise McCredie as B.G.’s mother, have added great diversity of flavor to the film. B.G.’s past is elaborately shown through flashbacks but J.M. has only disoriented memories and his daily life is shown spent mostly eating noodles (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). If it is the tragic twists and turns of life that haunted B.G., it is on the other hand the monotony of city life that has made J.M.’s life a distinct one. Eventually, B.G. stands face to face with her grandfather who had raped her as a child and by that time she becomes healed of her emotional wound and decides that she would not her kill her grandfather as she had intended (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). And the film ends when J.M. and B.G. returns, their loneliness compensated by the presence of each other and looking forward to a life of more meaning and understanding. The Director Goddess of 1967 (Law, 2000) is the second film by Clara Law after she stationed herself in Australia. A graduate from London’s National Film and Television School, her film repertoire include films, The Reincarnation of Golden Lotus (Law, 1989) Farewell China (Law, 1990), Fruit Punch (Law, 1992), Autumn Moon (Law, 1992), Temptation of a Monk Law, 1993) and Floating Life (Law, 1996). Floating Life, had been “selected as the official Australian entry in the Best Foreign Film category of the 1997 Oscars” (Phillips, 2001). This film focuses “the difficulties confronting an elderly Hong Kong couple who migrate to Australia and the modern suburban home of their ambitious and highly-strung daughter” (Phillips, 2001). Compared to films like Floating Life, the film, Goddess of 1967 has been criticized as “confused, pretentious and essentially coldhearted work” (Phillips, 2001). The director has more or less followed to the narrative tradition of classic Hollywood films in this movie but it also reflects certain elements from the stylized Japanese film tradition and French art film tradition that revolved around existential problems (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). The experimentation with time, by way of flashbacks starts when the film is almost half way through when the protagonist along with Diedre are on the way to see the relative who can sell the car to him (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). Again, when a reference is made by J.M. to a French film that portrays the same car, a single shot from the film in black and white, is inserted into the conversation (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). These two instances are typical examples of the French film making style evolved by the likes of Godard (Breathless, 1960). But as the narrative returns to the melodramatic main theme, where a confrontation between the hunter and the hunted is expected, such experimentations often turn into intellectual gimmicks. When B.G. asks J.M. what the Tokyo city is like, the mental image rather than the real images of Tokyo city is shown in a blurred and fast moving sequence of the subways and roads of the city (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). It is as if J.M. is caught in a mirage which represents the very reflection of his own lonely existence (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). The main female protagonist, B.G., is depicted with cold precision and subtle understatement by the actress, Rose Byrne, and her emotional remoteness is justified by her dehumanizing past experiences narrated by the film (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). Her hollowness is comparable with the elegance and perfection of the car, which is reminded through a documentary-like narration within the film on the history and technical specialties of this car, nicknamed ‘goddess’, in French. In this sequence, there is a visible influence of the Godardian French film Genre (Breathless, 1960). The Citroen DS car is depicted as ‘goddess’, and the “car for the future” while contrastingly, B.G. is a woman of the past and a mortal who has to experience all the harrowing experiences of that existence (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). Art versus Mainstream This film cannot be completely called as an art film as it is emotional to the core and also influenced by the mainstream narrative in its style of narration. The deep psychological scars that B.G. has upon her are not simply existential but having a background of abuse, helplessness and violence. The treatment of the film lingers more on the emotional aspect of all this rather than moving into an intellectual kind of analysis. The scene in which the desperate and helpless child being sexually abused by her own father embraces a tree and tries to prevent her mother from disentangling that embrace is a scene where even the boundary line between the art film and non-art melodrama gets blurred (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). The mother cleansing fiercely using soap and water, the child raped by her father is another scene which blends the emotional into the existential. But in totality, the film is caught in the quagmire of story- telling and fails to go beyond it into the realm of visual meaning making. The heightened element of melodrama in the film is visible in the atrocities that happen one by one in the life of B.G. And it is these two factors of melodrama and direct story telling that has prevented this film from falling into the art film category. The film somehow reminds one of a film by Godard, Breathless (1960). In Godard’s film also, a man and a woman are seen travelling by road and exploring each other’s emotional and psychological landscapes (Breathless, Godard, 1960). But Breathless depicts a hero and heroine who are parties in crime and who are fleeing the crime scene (Breathless, Godard, 1960). There are many elements of a documentary in this film but the beauty of this film is in that the viewer never feels a jerk in the transition from fiction to documentary and the reverse. Also the film never has an emotional moment but still conveys the inhumanity of a contemporary existence. Compared to this, Goddess of 1967 is just a childish attempt at going beyond the conventional characterization and plotting. Cinematic style The story line has a linear basic structure which branches out at occasions into non-liner experimentations. But such attempts remain sheer experimentations as they are not smoothly blended into the main narrative. It is rather as if the director wants to work out this film as a stepping stone towards her future ventures than as a work of art itself. There are sparks of creativity sprinkled throughout the film though the film as a whole cannot be said to have a cohesive overall structure. The dancing scene in the film is one instance where the mundane rises to the sublime (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). The body expressions of a blind girl are depicted with its natural rawness and the soulfulness of the scene is highly touching. In a sequence like this and in many others, the film reflects classical French film genre where the narrative oscillates between the mundane and the philosophical planes with great ease. Similarly, the scene with B.G. as a child with her mother fleeing a dust storm suddenly flares alive when her mother opens the glasses of the car so that her daughter can experience the dust storm and understand it (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). The way the dance scene takes B.G. by hand into a memory that has no connection whatsoever, and the way yet the physical experience of dancing connects well with the experience of a childhood secure in the presence of a lively mother, is a memorable editing instance. From rhythmic music to the silence at the face of a gathering dust storm is beautifully timed. In another scene, when J.M. and B.G. returns to the car from a green wide angle shot of a hill side, suddenly the music mounts as if reaching out to the expansive sky seen in the visual. But the next moment, when the scene cuts to the inside of the moving car, the music returns to the mundane- it is just a music being played on the radio!. The nomadic childhood that B.G. had had a Christmas song as its nostalgic backdrop but the next moment, it turns into a nightmare of incest (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). The way the car is used to connect the past with the present is a unique aspect of treatment in this film. But the viewer might also feel that such a device is too obvious to be considered as a tool belonging to a work of art. More so as the vehicle is presented just as a silent witness to the lives of the people involved. In the incidents unfolding from the memories of B.G., no emotional connection between the vehicle and the people sitting inside it time and then is established. The only thing is that the vehicle happened to be there when all horrible things happened. A vintage car has historical value but it becomes invaluable only when it has some emotional historical connections like that is narrated in the documentary sequence about the history of the car- how French President De Gaulle escaped an assassination attempt while travelling in this car (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). This kind of a highly emotional incident directly related to the vehicle is depicted nowhere in the film. This could be counted as a weakness in the scripting of the film. The car and the people do not share a real common destiny in this film. It is like they exist parallel to each other never noticing the presence of the other anywhere around. The indoor lighting of the film is dark and sinister just like the emotional interiors of the key characters but the outdoor lighting often is pleasant and warm. This contrast is maintained throughout the film so that there is an inside and outside dimension to the whole presentation. The film is mainly shot outdoors and a major portion of the viewers’ time dedicated to this film is spent watching the journey on road (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). The beauty of Australian country side unfolds as the narrative moves ahead and the special attention imparted to each frame is so concentrated that sometimes the narrative takes the toll of it (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). The camera angles and frames are just amazing but one criticism cannot be avoided- many a times, the beauty of the landscape destroys the mood created by the emotional landscape of the characters. For example, the scene between B.G.’s mother and her grandfather who is also her father, is set in such a picturesque backdrop that the cruelty of the situation gets diluted with the beauty of nature. The film is also criticized for the “use of bleach bypass and other non-naturalistic visual effects, such as pixilation for the Tokyo sequences” (Coyle, 2005, p.67). The film is also written off by many as a cliche in thematic content (as cited by Coyle, 2005, p.67). Jen Anderson’s music imparts the film, a profound sense of loneliness which blends well with the total mood of the film. The minimal use of music is yet another feature of this film, a factor that takes this film closer to the art genre and away from the classical Hollywood tradition (The goddess of 1967, Law, 2000). The music used in the film is “a mixture of Celtic and quasi-Japanese elements, with a Vietnamese dan tranh (16 string zither similar to the Chinese Zheng) standing in for a koto, along with some wordless Romany style vocalizations” (Coyle, 2005, p.68). The music in the film in totality, is a typical urban mix of all music cultures and traditions and thus complements the message of the film as well (Coyle, 2005, p.70). The sounds belonging to the natural ambience like the sounds of birds and the sound of a break being applied are selectively used to create maximum impact. The distinct music that is used to depict the urban life also stands apart in the film. The back projection used in the film while the car is moving and people are shown in close ups sitting inside, is in a way surreal, but lack cinematic credibility. It is easily noticeable that the car is not moving but only there is some movement in the background screen. This creates an awkward jerk in the viewing experience. The bleach out processing technique used by the director has been lauded by critics (Senzani and Florida Atlantic University,2008) as a story-telling tool of creating “modern alienation” (p.432) There are very silly moments in the film as well that do not fit well with the emotional complexity that the director is trying to visualize. For example, the traffic accident death of the friend of J.M. is depicted as the reason why he became lonely and eventually decided to buy a Citroen DS car. This proposition borders the ridiculous. Similarly why the ownership of the car rests with the grandfather is another logical question that is not answered. With all these shortcomings, Goddess of 1967 is still a film which has relevance and quality. It can be seen as a film that reflects the urban middle class confusions and concerns about life. Conclusion The film as a whole has its dragging moments as well as engaging ones. It has an ability to haunt the viewer with its understatement of the present and the overstatement of the past. The present is cold and non-sentimental while the past is filled with emotions like hatred, violence and pain. The meeting of two people from two cultures who have suffered in distinctly different ways but find it redeeming to discover each other in a totally strange landscape of life, is a theme that has been told many times. But Law (2000) has succeeded in telling this story from a different perspective. The non-judgmental approach of this film is what elevates it from the cliched themes that it is dealing with. While the slow pace and distinctive treatment that the film has adopted put it into the art film genre, the emotional tensions and the enchanting picture post card frames tend to classify it into the mainstream films category. But the best way to describe this film will be to discard such water tight compartmentalization and instead call it a film from a genuine effort to surpass such boundaries. This is the need of the hour because this kind of films reminds us that the categorization of art and non-art is too old to reflect the cinematic culture of contemporary society. The film production equations are changing and joint ventures like Goddess of 1967 have now the potential exist as alternative space to mainstream cinema and even share common platforms with it. References Barendrecht, W. (Producer). Law, Clara (Director). (2000). The goddess of 1967 [Motion Picture] . (Available from Fandango, Baltimore, MD 21227, United States). Chaudhuri, S. (2007) Contemporary world cinema: Europe, the Middle East, East Asia and South Asia, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Coyle, R. (2005) Reel tracks: Australian feature film music and cultural identities, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Fung Cheu, H. (2007) Cinematic howling: women's films, women's film theories, Vancouver B.C.: UBC Press. Georges.D. Beauregard. (Producer). Godard, Jean-Luc (Director). (1960). Breathless [Motion Picture] . (Available from Films Around the World, Inc. France). Mayer, G. and Beattie, K. (2007) The cinema of Australia and New Zealand, London: Wallflowers Press. Phillips, R. (30 April 2001). Confused and coldhearted: The Goddess of 1967, directed by Clara Law, Retrieved from http://www.wsws.org/articles/2001/apr2001/godd-a30.shtml Senzani, A. and Florida Atlantic University (2008) Women, film, and oceans a/part: The critical humor of Tracey Moffatt, Monica Pellizzari, and Clara Law, Michigan: ProQuest. Read More