Director Mike Leigh
CAREER GIRLS B-
Great Britain
France (87 mi) 1997
d: Mike Leigh
Less cynical than the usual Mike Leigh working class
miserablism, but about as uncomfortable an experience as one can have at the
movies, a character study of two flat-mates in college who meet again in London
six years later, where repeated flashbacks are interwoven into the mix
contrasting the past and present, but the physical and mental imperfections and
peculiarities are on overdrive here, accentuating the grotesque with rashes and
tics and signs of mental distress, this film puts viewers through the ringer,
coming out the worse for wear, exhausted and likely disappointed, as this is a
weirdly incomprehensible film about next to nothing. Following the success of SECRETS AND LIES
(1996), the Palme d’Or winning film from Cannes, having won Best Director
earlier for NAKED (1993), both huge landmarks in the director’s career, but
this couldn’t be a more deflating follow-up, receiving some of the worst
reviews of his career, which is unfortunate, as it stars Katrin Cartlidge, such
an appealing actress who regrettably died five years later at the age of 41,
never achieving the success she deserved.
So the film is significant for that reason alone, and she offers a
quirky performance, spilling out some terrific one-liners that get lost in the
shuffle, but it can’t overcome the downward thrust of dysfunction that defines
this film, filled with too many overly troubled characters who simply can’t
express what they’re trying to say. In
this myriad of confusion, a friendship develops between the outrageous
extrovert and overly sarcastic Hannah (Katrin Cartlidge) and the much shyer
Annie (Lynda Steadman) in her high-pitched voice, where the film is largely
seen through Annie’s viewpoint, opening when she is perceived as damaged goods
among the walking wounded, but becomes more resilient over time. The flashbacks to their earlier college days
are troubling in their exaggerated attempts to prove emotional separation, shot
in a bluish tint, where the earlier immaturity has a rougher edge, with the
acting drawing attention to itself, perhaps flaunting its own artifice, making
it difficult to be in the same room with them, as Annie has a skin condition on
her face that she describes as dermatitis, never looking anyone in the eyes,
looking down out of habit, as if to protect herself, but she’s subject to cruel
jokes about her face, even from Hannah, making the quip, “You look like you
just did a tango with a cheese grater,” leaving Annie in tears hiding in the
bathroom afterwards. Unfortunately, much
of the rapidly spoken dialogue is drowned out and lost, where British films
with thick accents often need subtitling.
Initially there are three roommates, including Claire (Kate Byers), but
she’s pushed out the next year, yet there’s little viewer evidence that Hannah
and Annie are closer friends. Instead
what we see are people coming and going with regularity, including the stuttering
and mentally challenged Ricky Burton (Mark Benton), kicked out of his old
residence, where it’s highly improbable he would be welcomed into the apartment
with open arms, who says things like “I’m not an idiot. I’m like an idiot savant, I just haven’t
found my savant yet.” One drunken
evening, however, he blurts out his love for Annie, who spurns his advances,
sending him reeling out the door in rejection and never returns, like a spurned
lover in a romance novel.
The film is a departure from the social realism of Leigh’s
other films, using a jazzy score written by Tony Remy and Marianne
Jean-Baptiste, the gifted black actress from SECRETS AND LIES, which simply
doesn’t fit the often gloomy trajectory of the film, which is an indicator of the
film overall, as the more socially awkward and emotionally immature scenes of
the past aren’t particularly reflective of student behavior, as there’s little
interaction with other students and no mention of class assignments, instead
there’s an overreliance on the youthful music of The Cure, which is never
played loud, as students are inclined to do, but is instead used as background
music. There’s simply no explanation for
why Hannah and Annie are such good friends now, as there wasn’t much of an
emotional connection earlier, yet suddenly they’re more vulnerable and open
with each other, free to discuss the intimate details of their lives. None of this feels organically real, but
feels forced together by the director, which is not representative of his other
films. Opening on a train and closing on
the railway platform at King’s Cross Station, the film is a seemingly connected
series of ephemeral moments, perhaps revealing the transitory nature of our
lives and the intrinsic power of these seemingly random moments that shape our
lives. While their youth was spent
drinking, smoking, and experimenting with sex, experiences filled with jagged
edges, the present allows them to speak in more measured tones, becoming a picture
of restraint and even a touch of conservatism, not so flippantly detached as
before. We learn both come from painful
childhoods with absent Dads who left the family around the age of 8, but their
responses are decidedly different, as Annie was left in tears, no longer
remembering anything that came before, yet retains an empathy for others, even
as she tends to remain in the background.
Hannah learned never to cry, to grow independent from an early age and
take care of herself, using humor as a means to protect her inner sanctum,
which is completely off limits to anyone else.
In college Hannah is sexually voracious while Annie is virginal, yet
their friendship seems to thrive on eccentricities, such as being seduced by
the same guy, Adrian (Joe Tucker), a self-centered stoner with a love for the
ladies, but gets an attitude when somebody mentions commitment or
responsibility, scornfully claiming, “Vagina.
Nice place. Wouldn’t wanna live
there.” When recalling this experience
in the present, Hannah confesses that she’s always admired Annie’s innocence,
that the period in her life when they first met was the absolute worst for her,
knowing she was on the edge and about to go under, closing herself off to
others out of self-protection, but admired Annie’s ability to trust people, to
remain open and still fall in love.
Annie, on the other hand, has always admired Hannah’s independent
streak, viewing it as a strength, thinking she was too trusting, herself,
growing sick and tired of people walking all over her and using her as a
doormat.
Though Hannah is living in a beautiful apartment with giant
windows overlooking a park (“Welcome to my humble abode”), Annie is duly
impressed, her skin condition all cleared up, now able to look people in the
eye, discovering Hannah is looking into real estate options, thinking it’s time
to buy something of her own. With that
in mind, the two decide to visit a few high-end places together, getting some
idea on how the other half lives, yet their playful style is comically
revealing, where viewers aren’t sure if they’re serious or going through the
motions, as they’re not really interested in buying, perhaps inventing a way to
pass the time away, all in good fun, inheriting new personas where they are
each playing caricatures of themselves.
In the first, a large apartment overlooking the river, shown to them by
a flirtatious Andy Serkis in a robe, continually offering them drinks, as if
trying to seduce them, where Hannah’s hilarious reaction is to suggest, “I
suppose on a clear day you can see the class struggle from here,”
eventually running out the door giggling for joy, leaving the poor sucker
gasping for more. This kind of inspired
writing is easily overlooked in the film due to the theatrics of the characters
involved, many of them suffering through ailments or abnormalities. Their next home visit comes as a surprise, as
the agent showing the house is a cleaned-up Adrian from their student days,
dressed suspiciously conservative in wire rim glasses and a sport jacket,
remembering only Annie, not Hannah, though a flashback shows them in bed
together, eventually wandering into Annie’s room, obviously playing the field
(with Hannah chiding him with derision, “This isn’t a bordello you know, you
can’t just walk into any boudoir and choose a different bint!”), now
revealingly with a wife and child. These
memories fade into the woodworks, their lives considerably different from what
they imagined at the time. Again, purely
by chance, as they walk through a park a female runner jogs by, and it’s
Claire, earplugs in, completely oblivious that they are standing there gaping
at her, but not really liking her enough to even say hello, laughing about it
afterwards. Wondering what happened to
Ricky, they find him sitting outside their old flat, as if he’s been there all
along, now boarded up and condemned, along with the Chinese restaurant below,
saying hello to him, as if waking him from a dream, but he’s boisterously rude
and ill-mannered, more dysfunctional than ever, drowning in his own sorrows,
screaming profanities at them, as if they’ve done him some terrible wrong that
he’ll never forget, yelling at them to leave him alone, both powerless to help
him, seen scrambling away afterwards and returning Annie to the train back
home. While these unexpected coincidental
meetings feel strange and surreal, the film ultimately paints a portrait of two
friends, both survivors of rough experiences, a couple of working girls for
better or for worse, seen in the opening playing Ouija board word games with
“Ms. Brontë, Ms. Brontë,” asking a mandatory question about their future,
usually involving sex, while Hannah does a magic spell gesture above the book Wuthering Heights, turning to a page at
random and mysteriously finding the answer, offering a copy of the book to
Annie as a present when she leaves. In
our eyes, however, the film solidly provides a foundation where they will
always be the combative and acid-tongued Hannah and the achingly vulnerable Annie.
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