Strict Machines

For year-end consideration, a couple of films that are built to do a particular job, and do it quite well. They are not especially resonant, in part because their subtext is installed right into the film's hardware. There is not a great deal of speculation as to what these films "mean," since they are extremely forward, not to say aggressive, in letting the viewer know precisely what they mean. In order to extract surplus meaning from these films, one would need to work very hard to brush them against the grain, and for now I will leave that to the inevitable deconstructions and auteur studies in years to come.

Uncut Gems (Josh and Benny Safdie, 2019)

I'm not at all certain that I like the Safdies' films. They are definitely defined by an unmistakable style, tightly wound and organized to produce maximum anxiety from any given situation. Bring Me Some Rosemary involved a deadbeat day who might have accidentally poisoned his children. Heaven Knows What takes us right inside the frantic existence of a disheveled junkie. And most recently, Good Time gave us a robbery gone wrong and the violent aftermath of said event. In each case, the main characters are faced with moment-to-moment choices and almost inevitably take the wrong path, thereby insuring that more mayhem ensues. The jagged editing and propulsive soundtracks serve to heighten the maddening atmosphere, resulting in around 90 minutes of "don't go in there."

Uncut Gems is their most accomplished work to date. If I'm ambivalent about it, that doesn't change the fact that it masterfully achieves exactly what it sets out to do. Howard Ratner (Adam Sandler) is a high-ticket jeweler leveraged up to his neck and seriously in debt to bookies and gangsters. He has a connection, Demany (LaKeith Stanfield), who brings him wealthy black clients, mostly athletes and rappers. When Kevin Garnett comes in and takes a literal shine to a rare uncut opal, Howard sees a chance for a big score. He then spends two hours fucking it up.

Good Time had some strange racial overtones in the sense that Robert Pattinson's character kept getting away with things because there were African-Americans for him to set up or exploit. It seemed like a critique, but it was never entirely clear. In Gems, the Safdies are obviously working on some sort of dialectical relationship between African-Americans and Jews, with Ethiopian Jews serving as a mostly unseen point of connection. But the opening sequence goes from the dangerous mines of Africa, into the infinite sparkle of the gemstone, and then right up Ratner's ass. This tells us right away that there will be no social consciousness, at least not for this character. He is in it for himself.

And this is where the odd racial business comes in. There is some black comedy in Howard's continual failure, but there is also a discomfiting emphasis on his Jewishness that seems connected to his downfall. He is part schlemiel, part Shylock, trying to "win" by making deal after deal until he has destroyed almost every relationship. It felt vaguely stereotypical, but I'm not sure I'm qualified to press this point. I think Sandler and the Safdies know what they are doing, and Uncut Gems seems to be widely embraced among critics, Jews and gentiles alike. So this depiction could be part of a particular tradition I'm just not aware of. And of course, as with Good Time, the blatant questions of race on display only add to the discomfort, and discomfort seems to be the Safdies' weapon of choice.

UPDATE: The Safdies address the issue of Judaism in this very interesting interview for the Times of Israel. 

Knives Out (Rian Johnson, 2019)

Agatha Christie by way of Clue(do), Knives Out is a beautifully structured object. This is particularly the case because most of us know what to expect from Whodunnits, and when Johnson departs from that basic formula, it appears at first as if he is letting his film go slack, giving the game away early in an attempt to offer us a postmodern anti-mystery. But the additional twists are there, which only adds to the fun. Based on his oeuvre thus far, Johnson seems to have these genres in his DNA to such a degree that he can riff on them like a jazz musician, taking them in new directions while maintaining the recognizable melody.

At the same time, there's an overdirective literary quality to Knives Out that keeps it from becoming something truly transcendent. It operates based on character tropes rather than actual people, and one of the key plot premises -- that innocent nurse Marta (Ana de Armas) becomes nauseous when she tries to lie -- is a bit too precious. Johnson's decision to use a classical format as a delivery system for contemporary political commentary is also a bit awkward, since it seems to either assert itself forcefully (the immigrant conversation) or disappear entirely. What could have been subtext is instead broadcast with a cinematic equivalent of an LRAD.

But there's not much point in quibbling with Knives Out. It's witty and urbane and a lot of fun, and it does score points against all the appropriate targets. Calling out the hypocrisy of Meg (Katherine Langford), the rich college liberal, was particularly astute. When privilege is under attack, the wealthy white folks always circle the wagons.