Drive-Away Dolls

Ethan Coen and Tricia Cooke

The directors on the set

Ethan Coen directing a scene

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DRIVE-AWAY DOLLS       B-                                                                                                    USA  (84 mi)  2024  d: Ethan Coen and Tricia Cooke

Love is a sleigh ride to hell.

Not to be confused with DOWN AND OUT WITH THE DOLLS (2001), the Portland all-girl band movie by Kurt Voss, Joel and Ethan Coen have not made a movie together since The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (2018), each going their own separate way, with the older Joel making the murky, heavily atmospheric Shakespearean drama with Denzel Washington and his wife Francis McDormand, 2022 Top Ten List #5 The Tragedy of Macbeth, while the younger Ethan, in collaboration with his openly lesbian wife Tricia Cooke (which is a story in itself, with clear autobiographical elements that she co-wrote, edited, and produced, both brothers working with their respective wives), made this screwball lesbian comedy that was largely inspired by Cooke’s queer youth in New York City’s dyke bars in the 80’s, which at that time were considered communal safe spaces for lesbian women (see Nan Goldin in the Laura Poitras film, 2023 Top Ten List #2 All the Beauty and the Bloodshed).  While there used to be two hundred lesbian bars in the U.S. during the 1980’s, those numbers have been steadily dwindling (There's 32 Lesbian Bars Left in America. Here's Where ...), so this may be a very deliberate love letter to lesbian bars, while also a satiric response to the current political wave of extreme Republican homophobia, especially in Florida.  Actually written back in the 90’s under the original title DRIVE-AWAY DYKES, which was deemed unsuitable by the studio and Motion Picture Association, concerned about negative connotations, they were unable to get financing at the time for anything that wasn’t deemed serious, so the project sat on the shelf for years.  They thought their West coast friend Allison Anders, who directed her own idiosyncratic road movies Border Radio (1987) and GAS FOOD LODGING (1992), would direct the film in 2007 with Selma Blair, Holly Hunter, Christina Applegate, and Chloë Sevigny on board, which sounds like a blast, actually, but it simply wasn’t to be, as there wasn’t a cultural acceptance of LGBTQ characters at the time.  The Covid pandemic gave them time to revisit the earlier work, where Cooke is actually a co-director, but since she’s not a member of the director’s guild, she is not credited.  Somewhat reminiscent of the zany comedy of the politically subversive spy thriller BURN AFTER READING (2008), made during a time when making fun of the bungling misadventures of the Bush government was commonplace, this retro take on the seemingly simpler times of 1999 offers a raunchy yet nostalgic glimpse of a lesbian subculture tucked away from a more conventionally mainstream America, which also happens to be the beginning of an era of stifling conservatism that still exists today, offering a wild ride of a road movie that none of us ever actually took, but who says it has to make sense, where the absurd nonsense of sex jokes and off-the-wall humor is an entertaining mess that has its moments, but is also hard to appreciate, feeling more like a discarded script by the Farrelly brothers.  Universally panned by critics, perhaps it never lives up to its ambitious stab at making lesbians likeable and easy to identify with.  And that may be the biggest flaw, as the exaggerated caricature is simply not for everyone, making it hard to like any of the characters, who are so over-the-top to the point of being ridiculous, but perhaps that’s the point.  Apparently all this really wants to do is have a few laughs, with some neo-noir crime elements, road trip comedy, raunchiness, and a bit of mystery surrounding this adventure that sounds like a wacky delight, with eclectic musical selections assembled by music supervisor Tiffany Anders, the daughter of Allison Anders, like Le Tigre - Eau D'Bedroom Dancing YouTube (2:55) or Lizzy Mercier Descloux - Fire YouTube (5:15), but it never really comes together, feeling anxiously chaotic and randomly stitched together in the editing.  Fueled by plenty of ideas, this tries to capture the sleazy energy from 60’s and 70’s B-movies, like Russ Meyer’s FASTER, PUSSYCAT! KILL! KILL! (1965), or an homage to the queen of underground sexploitation movies, Doris Wishman, where a clip from one of her films, Deadly Weapons (1974), was featured in the John Waters’ slasher film SERIAL MOM (1994), but it fails to find that excitement level, though this is reportedly the first of a planned “lesbian B-movie trilogy.”  

An LGBTQ film like you’ve never seen, even featuring explicit girl-on-girl sex, this brings queer cinema into the mainstream, where a road movie with a queer storyline may have made waves back when it was initially written, but complex queer characters and queer sex have long since arrived in the mainstream, becoming a differently envisioned ode to freedom and happiness, like THELMA AND LOUISE (1991) as a queer couple on the run with a happier ending, where the bright, visual canvas is provided by Ari Wegner, the visionary force behind the camera of Jane Campion’s 2021 #1 Film of the Year The Power of the Dog.  According to Cooke in a Moviemaker article, “Being married to Ethan and being queer, there’s always a little disconnect sometimes,” yet this film champions female empowerment.  Maybe these aren’t the characters we’ve come to expect in movies, feeling more like the shallow world that we see routinely on television, but these days the line between movies and television is not that distinct, as it’s all blurred together into one hot mess, and this film reflects that amalgamation.  Most films benefit by being shown in theaters, as the screen is bigger and the sound is incredible, but in this film, not so much.  How it really improves, though, is being in a communal audience where you can hear and appreciate the spontaneous outbursts, which opens up new possibilities we may have missed, but honestly, that’s a stretch, as this film needs all the help it can get.  There’s probably a joke that starts with, “A girl walks into a lesbian bar,” which seems to be the premise for the film, then providing any number of multiple scenarios.  While it’s amusing in an oddly flat sort of way, it just never takes off, with a few diversions down memory lane that are less than memorable.  Perhaps the most obvious example is the nearly indecipherable Southern drawl from lead actress Margaret Qualley as the high maintenance yet free-spirited Jamie, who serves as a kind of insatiable alpha-lesbian from Texas, perhaps channeling Holly Hunter in RAISING ARIZONA  (1987).  And if you haven’t seen it, check her out in this wild dance video by Spike Jonze, Kenzo World - Spike Jonze YouTube (3:55), which ostensibly served as her audition, as she’s all over the place, exhibiting astonishing range.  This is the same actress used so effectively by Claire Denis, mired in the intellectually measured, clandestine political intrigue of Stars at Noon (2022), going completely bonkers here in an unhinged example of girl power, where she’s an unrestrained illustration of sexual liberation, unable to confine herself to a single partner, even bragging about it at an open mic lesbian bar.  That proves to be her ultimate undoing, as her partner Sukie (Beanie Feldstein), a local cop with aggression issues, kicks her out for her acknowledged serial cheating, but she quickly finds a comfortable landing spot with the more practical and sexually uptight office worker Marian (Geraldine Viswanathan, an Australian actress of Indian and Swiss descent), who of all things, is planning a road trip to Tallahassee, Florida to go birding with her aunt.  It’s Marian’s level-headedness that grounds the picture, offering intelligence and humor, while the more scatterbrained Jamie can go flying all over the place (in sync apparently with the editing), becoming a lesbian Odd Couple road movie.  Rather than just drive, they decide to utilize the drive-away car service of transporting someone’s car one-way, which lessens the cost considerably, but instead of plotting the quickest and safest route, Jamie decides to take detours to a bunch of lesbian bars along the way, because who knows when they’ll ever come this way again, which pits their diverse, starkly contrasting personalities in motion, with Jamie chasing casual hook-ups, constantly urging Marian to loosen up and get laid, since it’s been years (with a Ralph Nader staffer, nonetheless), but she prefers to read Henry James’ The Europeans, insisting that is fun.  While the film is brazenly proud about being lesbian forward, sending a message of queer female empowerment, the actual storyline is unrelated to the characters’ sexual orientations, which are instead explored through dialogue and heavily circuitous side plots.  The jarringly disconcerting opening sequence in the back alleys of Philadelphia haunts the entire picture, as a devious crime was committed that just happens to plague their jaunt across the country, though the events are seemingly unrelated.  When Jamie decides to pick up her stuff at Sukie’s apartment, there are drawbacks, yet this scene epitomizes the type of ribald humor used throughout, DRIVE-AWAY DOLLS - "That Was A Gift " Official Clip - Only In ... YouTube (56 seconds).  In a lesbian drama, the male penis, apparently, has hilarious ramifications, becoming the core aspect of male patriarchy that must be subverted.    

A group of inept mobsters led by Colman Domingo, along with C.J. Wilson and Joey Slotnick (both cast in Ethan’s off-Broadway theater production of A Play Is A Poem), strongly reminiscent of Steve Buscemi and Peter Stormare in Fargo (1996), under orders from an unseen crime boss heard on the phone, are on the lookout for the drive-away car, as it contains something they view as essential.  Yet somehow, someway, there was a mix-up by the car service giving to the girls what was intended to be their car, Drive-Away Dolls Movie Clip - Don’t Call Me Curlie (2024) YouTube (42 seconds), providing them access to a suitcase with questionable contents, becoming a comedy of errors, like some kind of ode to Robert Aldrich’s Kiss Me Deadly (1955), or the on-the-run-from-the-mob zaniness of Billy Wilder’s Some Like It Hot (1959).  So while there’s a breezy, lightweight comedy of lesbian thrill seekers, erupting into something along the lines of spring break, there’s also a band of gunmen trying to track them down, but are stymied by their inexplicable route digressions.  This adds a dark side to the jaunty fun that the girls seem to be having, but the most unexpected detours are recurring flashbacks to the psychedelic era of the 60’s, complete with period artwork that’s neither funny nor insightful, with cameo appearances from two unforeseen stars.  The first is a billboard advertisement for virtuous all-American Senator Gary Channel (Matt Damon) preaching family values, eventually finding himself in an uncompromising position, a clear shot at the current homophobia in Florida, and the other is an uncredited appearance by Miley Cyrus as hippie flower child Tiffany Plastercaster, aka visual artist Cynthia Plaster Caster (the film is dedicated to her), who gained fame from making dildos of the erect penises of various rock musicians and celebrities.  She appears in TV advertisements that resembles turn-of-the-century computer animation for a one-of-a kind “groovy” experience that is enveloped in free love and flower power psychedelics, uttering “Hey handsome, you want to get plastered?” with Eddie Hazel’s high wire guitar solos swirling around in the background, Funkadelic - Maggot Brain [HQ] YouTube (10:34), which may or may not have anything to do with this film.  Once more, the male penis, in this case the Senator’s (a nod apparently to his youthful transgressions in the 60’s), plays a prominent role in this lighthearted comedy, having a little fun at someone’s expense, which becomes the central focus of the drama, secretly meeting our girls in a lesbian bar where they attempt to extort what they have that belongs to him, DRIVE-AWAY DOLLS - "Democrats" Official Clip - Now ... YouTube (49 seconds), but he only ends up finding himself in an even more compromising situation.  But two smaller scenes really stand out for their sheer originality, one is when our protagonists crash a slumber party of teenage girls and end up making out with an entire soccer team to the music of Linda Ronstadt, though there was never a thought that Linda Ronstadt’s music could be considered lesbian music, but hey, it’s all in the mind of the beholder, and they appear to evoke powerful memories, though the two songs heard, "Long Long Time" by Linda Ronstadt from DRIVE-AWAY DOLLS YouTube (4:24) and Linda Ronstadt - Blue Bayou (Official Music Video) YouTube (4:18), are not from the 1976 record album shown on a coffee table, Hasten Down the Wind.  Nonetheless this scene certainly gets Marian’s juices flowing, tempting her in ways she can’t refuse, while the other is one of Marian’s flashbacks.  As a child, she loved jumping on her trampoline, and if she jumped high enough, she could see over the fence at her neighbor next door, discovering a bare-assed Savanna Ziegler (in her first role) sunbathing and swimming in the nude, a welcome sight for repressed sexual desires, which feels like an ultra-personal childhood memory that simply reeks of authenticity, mirroring a similar scene in A Serious Man (2009).  This oddball film stands in stark contrast to the overbloated, overproduced films that seem to dominate the awards season, where fantasy, sci-fi, and superhero movies have become an American cultural affectation.  Setting out to make an “unimportant film,” the knock on this may be the incessant juvenile antics on display, where it’s uneven, at best, exhibiting a heavy underutilization of supporting characters, where many just disappear without a word, feeling more along the lines of the underwhelming Hail, Caesar! (2016) than what we have come to expect from the superlative work of the Coens.

2021 #1 Film of the Year The Power of the Dog

 

Director Jane Campion

Cinematographer Ari Wegner (left) with Campion

Campion checks with Kodi Smit-McPhee and Kristen Dunst

Campion checks the camera on the set

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE POWER OF THE DOG                        A                                                                        USA  Great Britain  Australia  Canada  New Zealand  (126 mi)  2021  ‘Scope  d: Jane Campion                                                                                                                                                                                                        Deliver my soul from the sword, my darling from the power of the dog.                                         —Psalm 22:20, King James Bible

Beware the unseen power of a scorpion bite, as that insidious poison infects the overall storyline of what we see, as there’s an underlying sting of macho dread and horror that underlies every frame of the film, haunting some, if not all, where a noxious male influence spreads untouched, like a Biblical plague that pervades throughout the land, wreaking havoc, destroying lives, literally running roughshod over the women, yet the story is beautifully told with a carefully calculated and complex mastery, producing a surprising outcome, imbued with such an understated discretion that it may leave viewers perplexed.  Her first feature film since Bright Star (2009), and her first male-led picture, Campion immerses her audience into a very specific time and place, the vastly underpopulated Montana in 1925, though sumptuously shot in ‘Scope in the Otago region of the South Island of New Zealand by Ari Wegner, capturing the breathtaking beauty of the surrounding landscape, whose enormity is captured in ways not seen since William Wyler’s THE BIG COUNTRY (1958), speaking a language all its own, literally dwarfing the human presence to solitary figures of near insignificance.  Adapting the Thomas Savage novel of 1967, Savage is an American author who described the conditions of the American West, while Campion’s film celebrates the rampant masculinity of the Western genre, but turns it on its ear, subverting the topic through a feminist lens, but couldn’t be more subtle, expressing a rare mastery of the Western landscape that exerts its own mysterious power, as the sheer look of the film is simply extraordinary, yet more than any other Campion film feels indebted to The Piano (1993), exposing the human flaws of the people attempting to tame the land, revealing a carefully calibrated characterization that typifies stories of the Old West.  We are introduced to two brothers who couldn’t be less alike, wealthy ranchers Phil Burbank (Benedict Cumberland in the role of a lifetime), a lone wolf, malicious and homophobic, college educated at Yale yet used to working with his hands, displaying all the standard markers of Western manhood, grace in the saddle, wit in the saloon, and an apparently unlimited tolerance for pain and discomfort, and his more generous brother George (Jesse Plemons) who manages the business, remaining steady and decent, honest and simple, but wears a suit in the saddle, constantly referred to as “Fatso,” with Phil bullying his brother, apparently, simply because he can, where an openly displayed derision is built into the dynamics of their relationship, despite sleeping in the same bed for nearly forty years.  Together they manage the day‑to-day running of their huge cattle farm, evoking some of the more spectacular scenery in the vast and open range as they herd their cattle back into familiar pens when the weather turns cold.  When George marries Rose (Kristen Dunst, his real-life partner), a kind, yet sad and overly anxious widow with an effeminate teenage son Peter, Kodi Smit-McPhee, grown up from the 10-year old kid following Viggo Mortensen around in John Hillcoat’s version of Cormac McCarthy’s apocalyptic The Road (2009), also Slow West (2015), Phil is appalled and explodes with a virulent anger, tormenting Rose and her “sissy” son with cruel mockery, emotional cruelty, and threats of violence, pitting a cold, Machiavelli-like superiority complex against what he perceives as weakly and undeserving intruders, turning Rose into a closet alcoholic as her own protection from a man she views as a beast.  A vicious, yet spectacularly filmed movie, this overblown toxic masculinity that Phil represents influences every scene of the film, literally carrying the picture with its own infectious energy, providing the nuance and rhythm of the film, yet subverted by a feminist touch, extremely rare to see, especially done as well as this.  Premiering at the Venice Film Festival, it won a Silver Lion for Best Director, and may be the most important film Campion has ever made.    

A rich and challenging psychodrama broken into chapter headings, offering brilliant character development, the film is a picture of restraint, yet thrives in its own brooding intensity, where Cumberland mirrors the misanthropic amorality of Daniel Day-Lewis’s Daniel Plainview, offering an early capitalist counterpoint to the enthrall of Paul Thomas Anderson’s There Will Be Blood (2007) set in the same time period, similarly scored by Jonny Greenwood with an unsettling musical soundtrack that captures the essence of the underlying tension with simple guitar strums, expanded to a more abstract musical accompaniment that accentuates the emotional strains below the surface, turning this into a quietly sustained horror movie, filled with an underlying dread.  Yet the film’s first lines (differing from the book, omitting the first third of the novel) come from Peter in an unseen voiceover during the opening title sequence, pondering “When my father passed, I wanted nothing more than my mother’s happiness.  For what kind of man would I be if I did not help my mother?  If I did not save her?”  This quotation stands alone, never referred to again, and is seemingly forgotten over time, in stark contrast to the daily scenes of cattle ranchers leading a hardscrabble life out under the hot sun, roping, fencing, branding, pitching hay, and castrating cattle, which Phil proudly performs without wearing gloves, the only one who scorns that practice.  So their calloused hands are used to getting blisters, cuts, and splinters, making this the brother’s twenty-fifth year together driving cattle from the southwest Montana plains.  Yet Campion adds an alternative female gaze perspective, showing the men stark naked while bathing in the creek, then lounging on the rocks afterwards, sunning themselves in nothing but their birthday suits, with their hats carefully placed over their privates.  It’s the kind of scene never shown in earlier Westerns, which would instead accentuate the male bonding experience, where spending time out in the open range allows men time to think and ponder their existential situations.  Yet there’s very little of that here, as the men are indistinctive, becoming a Greek chorus of conformity, led by Phil as their leader, following his every move.  Phil takes great care to acknowledge his predecessor, Bronco Henry, recalling the glory days of his dead mentor, the original leader of the pack, where a shrine in his honor rests out in the barn, along with his saddle that Phil fastidiously keeps polished and clean, unlike his own body that he rarely ever bathes, perhaps once a month in the creek, never bathing at all in winter.  Rose runs a boarding house in nearby Beech, a small town where her husband used to practice medicine, serving patients who often couldn’t pay, yet his late descent into alcoholism and depression is a disturbing revelation, where his early demise has left Rose to raise her son alone, where Peter is seen displaying extraordinary patience and a skilled artistry in creating paper flowers from cut paper that are extremely lifelike, with Rose proudly placing them on the tables for her customers.  Yet when Phil brings his ranch hands into town, Peter quickly becomes the object of Phil’s derision, mocking his voice, his hand towel, and for painstakingly crafting the delicate flowers, using one to light his everpresent cigarette, dumping it in a used glass, while his men join in offering more scorn, with Rose scurrying to collect the table arrangements before more are destroyed.  Peter storms out the back, trying to ignore what happened, leaving Rose weeping in the kitchen, comforted by George, who remains in the background for the most part, yet is forced to apologize for his brother’s open cruelty.     

There’s an unsettling nature to the depiction of male masculinity as being intentionally cruel and hurtful, which only escalates when George decides to marry Rose, viewing her with an affectionate tenderness Phil would never understand, railing against her with all his will, refusing to welcome her to the family, calling her “a cheap schemer,” certain that she’s after their money, becoming a menacing force, particularly when they all move into a huge, cavernous ranch house with two servants, Geneviève Lemon from Sweetie (1989) and Thomasin McKenzie from 2018 Top Ten List #5 Leave No Trace, turning into a chamber drama, much of it shot through doors or windows, reminiscent of John Ford’s THE SEARCHERS (1956), where the floor creaks and every door and window can fly open any second, feeling a bit haunted to Rose, particularly when her bedroom is located right next to Phil, who can hear every sound, seething with anger in what has been his own personal domain, master of his own house, now infested by a women he perceives to be an interloper and gold-digger.  When Peter comes home from medical school and joins them, Phil immediately identifies him as “Little Lord Fauntleroy,” mocking his slight lisp, with the Greek chorus joining in with the catcalls, calling him “Nancy Boy,” instantly thought of as soft, a young man smothered by his mother’s affections, labeled a gay blade.  Decorated to the hilt with slim jeans, a white shirt and an oversized white cowboy hat, the kid fits the part, yet he has a secret life unknown to the others, as he’s studying to be a doctor, catching rabbits only to dissect them for practice, something Rose forbids in the house, as it can be viewed as a gruesome hobby.  George proudly delivers a baby grand piano for Rose, who once played in the pits for Silent movies, continually prodded into playing by her husband, as if turning her into a spectacle that she has little interest in becoming.  Nonetheless, she awkwardly practices the Radetzky March, Johann Strauss Sr.: Radetzky March piano - YouTube (2:55), continually playing the wrong notes, a metaphor for her excruciating struggles, yet what’s worse, Phil is sitting in his room playing the same tune on the banjo, only playing it better, always having the upper hand, whistling the tune when he sees her, where his psychological campaign of terror leaves her exhausted and emotionally depleted, continually feeling diminished and weak, driving her to drink, shrinking back to being a little girl, living in a delusionary world of her own, losing all grasp of reality.  Yet Rose is the key component, as neither George nor Peter appreciate the way Phil treats her, literally manhandling her, keeping her under his thumb, scoffing at her acute weakness and lingering depression.  Still, no one stands up to him, as he remains top dog of the manor, and what he says goes.  The brother’s split their profits 50/50, as they always have, yet it’s clear who actually runs things, though Rose has mysteriously come between them, becoming a thorn in his hide.  Taking a different tact, Phil decides to befriend her son Peter, help turn him into a man by teaching him how to ride, going on extended trips together up into the mountains, offering extensive hands-on experience that he would otherwise never receive, becoming the mentor Bronco Henry was to Phil.  While Rose is in alcoholic distress, Campion curiously weaves Brokeback Mountain (2005) homoerotic overtones into Phil’s own repressed sexuality, seen alone bathing himself in his own private spot by the creek, sensually caressing himself with an old handkerchief that once belonged to Bronco Henry, with Peter finding his hidden stash of magazines that showcase the naked male physique, offering a window into his suffering soul of always having to fend off any pain, never allowing anything to affect him, always living up to a mythical façade of Bronco Henry, who was impervious to pain or weakness.  So it comes as a bit of a surprise that a mysteriously reconciled Phil and Peter have their own tender moments together, particularly a quietly extended scene in the barn that coolly observes cracks in the armor, sharing a cigarette, hearing anecdotes about Bronco Henry, solidifying their relationship, with Phil, against all odds, hoping to turn him into a man.  The calculated twist at the end comes as a huge surprise, with Campion cleverly inverting nearly everything that has come before, where tragedy takes on a dramatically different face, using the same subtlety and restraint that has pervaded throughout the entire film, telling a significantly different story than the one we imagined.