Dec. 02, 2009 - Issue #737: Climate Crossroads

DVD Detective

MUMBLECORE

What'd you say?

American independent cinema, especially in these days of relatively cheap digital means, is too varied and disparate a thing to ever have an overarching trend, but one strong movement that's emerged of late has been mumblecore, a poorly named but nevertheless important reaction to some of Hollywood's excesses. Few filmmakers willingly call them as such, and it's really more of a style or feel than a philosophy of filmmaking, but there's nevertheless a group of films that share the aesthetic and general themes: there's the natural, improvised dialogue that gives it its name, but also a preoccupation with very specific interpersonal relationships, a handheld, documentary-style camera and a general lack of artifice to the whole proceedings.

Lynn Shelton made one of the standouts of the genre with Humpday, about two heterosexual male friends who set out to make a gay porn, a witty and very down-to-earth film that deconstructed male friendships in the funniest, breeziest way possible (and which also had a criminally short run in Edmonton). Thanks to the popularity of that particular film, one of her earlier works, My Effortless Brilliance, is now out, and it's an interesting study in just the kind of tightrope this style demands walking.

My Effortless Brilliance is the story of a somewhat pompous writer, Eric (Sean Nelson), and his frayed relationship with an old friend, Dylan (Basil Harris). It's quite similar territory to Humpday, at least thematically—though its rustic setting also recalls another better minimal film about male relationships made by a female director, Kelly Reichardt's Old Joy—and though Brilliance isn't nearly as deep and successful, Shelton still puts together a very naturalistic exploration of friendship.

The main problem is that only one half of our equation is fleshed out. Eric is a ridiculous man, obviously with some level of talent, but who has mostly used it to get away with acting like an ass to those close to him: the first scene is Dylan telling him as much, an abrupt brush-off that comes after a day of Eric mostly just looking at various writing utensils and conducting fake interviews with himself. A few years later, Eric is in the neighbourhood of Dylan's new, rustic digs, and decides to look him up and try to reconnect. Once that starts, there are some choice moments, including a brief discussion between Dylan and his neighbour about the desire to hit someone with an axe, but it suffers for the fact that we really don't know much of anything about Dylan. Eric seems an ass, sure, but Dylan is nothing, and so we're left waiting for Eric to act so we can get Dylan's reaction, which hurts both its natural feel and a sense of momentum or depth.

Shelton would correct that entirely in Humpday, and I have to wonder if Medicine for Melancholy, also out recently, isn't Barry Jenkins' My Effortless Brilliance, a first step towards a natural and evocative style of filmmaking that nevertheless doesn't quite get enough right to totally work. In this case, Jenkins' main stumbling block is how caught up he is in trying to make a larger point: this is a story of two young, black San Franciscans spending a day together after a one-night stand—Micah (The Daily Show's Wyatt Cenac) and 'Jo (Tracey Heggins)—though it's also a film about being a minority in a gentrifying city, and too often the latter overwhelms the former.

It's not that there's anything wrong with making a larger point—if anything, that seems to be the natural evolution of mumblecore, from fully realized, personal films to fully realized, personal films that also manage to say something deeper, like Humpday—it's just that the point is constantly budding into the naturalism, and there are times when it feels like we're listening to pointedly crafted arguments more than the honest chit-chat of two people who barely know each other. Especially that time Micah and Jo rather conveniently happen to walk by a community meeting on gentrification.

Again, though, there are moments: a carefree spin on a carousel, the goofy way Micah checks his face in a mirror, the quiet walking or bike riding. And it needs to be said that it's about time this style got brought of its basically entirely white spectrum. But Jenkins is so obsessed with his points that those quickly give way to more arguments, and it's hard to work up a lot of emotional attachment to the characters, something that's basically essential when everything else is so minimal. If he can find a way to imbue those arguments a bit more realistically into his characters, make it feel more like a natural topic than the big idea, Jenkins could well be onto something special. V

New comments for this entry have been turned off and any existing ones are hidden. We apologize for any inconvenience.