| Overall Grade: |
A |
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| Story: |
A+ |
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| Acting: |
A |
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| Direction: |
A |
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| Visuals: |
A |
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A Visual Journey to the Spiritual World
by Dan (movies profile)
Mar 29, 2005
"That gun will replace your tongue. You will learn to speak through it. And your poetry will be written in blood."
**** - #12
I was nervous watching this film. I thought it would be a woven fog of mysteriousness that would reveal nothing when it parted. This is a love or hate film, some may not see anything in this; some may or may not care. The journey is the most important part of this film. The film stars Johnny Depp as William Blake. This protagonist goes through a journey in this film that will change him. He is not on the route for redemption, as many cliché film plots say these days. He is on the route to the next stage of life.
William Blake is an accountant whose parents have recently died. He spent nearly all of his money to go to the town of Machine from Cleveland, being guaranteed a job. He discovers he is too late, and has been replaced. He meets a former prostitute named Thel. He goes with her to her house and they get in bed. Soon enough her ex-lover comes in to surprise her with a gift. He shoots her, and the bullet goes through into Blake near his heart. He shoots the man and escapes out the window. He awakes the next morning being operated on by a mysterious Indian named Nobody. Nobody thinks Blake is the same William Blake, the poet who died decades before the film’s setting. They travel while a trio of hired gunfighters try to find Blake, because the man he killed was the man he almost worked for in the town.
This is a very different take on a western. The film is like a dream mainly due to the editing. Director Jim Jarmusch simply fades out in between scenes like many old films would and uses the film score to amplify those moments among others in the film. In the opening scene on the train we get a dose of it as Blake dozes on and off through the long ride, with the score briefly sounding between dozes. At the beginning of the film Blake is a nervous young man who is easily startled. His journey with Nobody will bring him towards both violence and compassion. In one poignant scene Blake rests next to a killed baby deer and touches its blood. Nobody seems to be preparing Blake. Could it be mental nirvana? Is he preparing him for death? Or the next stage in spiritual existence? Blake becomes more comfortable with violence as opposed to his jumpy self when the men shoot at buffalo on the train. In one scene where he kills two men, he appears almost completely apathetic.
Johnny Depp is definitely the most versatile actor of today. He’s definitely a different kind of western character, almost Burton-ish in the later scenes. This is one of his best performances and it shows just how different he can be. When you see his roles like Edward Scissorhands, Jack Sparrow, Raoul Duke, Donnie Brasco, you could see that he can play anyone to a T. Gary Farmer is very convincing as Nobody, who seems to be a very unconventional Indian. He is a loner, alienated from his tribe. There are several delightful cameos from Robert Mitchum as the Dickinson, who hires the bounty hunters to Gabriel Byrne as Thel’s lover.
One of the things that support this film very well is the musical score by Neil Young, which is a combination of acoustic and electric guitar that’s used throughout the film in bursts, which adds to the effect. It creates a pulsating feeling of melancholy that goes perfectly with the film. It almost reminds me of the way Ennio Morricone’s score helped Leone’s westerns. The cinematography is haunting in the black and white photography. Many mountain and forest landscapes are given more of a feeling. This film would be very different in color. To me, this is definitely one of the ten best films of the 90’s and one of the greatest westerns ever, even if it’s completely against type as far as westerns go. As many have said and I agree with, poetry on film. |
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