MUSEUM HOURS B+
USA Austria (106 mi)
2013 d: Jem Cohen museumhoursfilm.com
Jem Cohen is an American independent filmmaker from New York
most known for making short experimental films, Super 8 film essays, shooting a
Polaroid diary of New York, newsreels of the occupy Wall Street movement, and
music documentaries, often blending video with Super 8 and 16mm. Here he shoots a film entirely in Austria,
using a completely different style than the contemporary Austrian filmmakers
whose precise detail and sterile cleanliness show Austria as a nation that
prides itself in picking up their own garbage leaving the streets immaculately
clean. Cohen, on the other hand, shows
graffiti on the walls, littered beer cans, cigarette stubs, and a host of other
lost items just laying on the streets.
Shot during the Christmas season, the city of Vienna is shrouded in a
relentless gray color, often battered by either rain or snow, giving it a less
than accommodating feel throughout, especially to strangers who don’t know
their way around. The film, however, written,
directed, produced, co-shot (with Peter Roehsler), and co-edited by Cohen, shooting
exteriors on 16mm and interiors on two types of digital cameras, begins in an
art museum, where one of the guards narrates his thoughts about what it’s like
to be a museum guard at the prestigious Kunsthistorisches Art Museum,
backtracking a bit about his own life, a lifelong lover of heavy metal, where
he used to manage punk bands and be something of a rebel. However, after experiencing all that “noise”
early in his life, it’s only appropriate that now in his later years he
balances it with “quiet.” While he may
be about age 60, we see him walk between the rooms of the museum, pointing out
various habits of many that visit the art museum, as often people return,
intrigued by certain works, which perks up his interest in his job, as he feels
a connection to his surroundings. He
notices one woman return, where she also seems to be lost studying a map, where
he helps offer her directions in English and even future assistance, if need
be, should language present a problem.
She takes him up on his offer, and the two develop an ongoing
friendship.
She is Anne, Mary Margaret O’Hara (1980’s singer and sister
to Canadian actress Catherine O’Hara), a vistor from Montreal, while the museum
guard is Johann, Bobby Sommer, a nonprofessional who works for the Vienna
International Film Festival, who actually has a past in the music
business. The two share naturalistic
scenes that alternate with Johann’s thoughtful voiceovers. She is there to visit her cousin, who she
hasn’t seen in years, now lying in a coma in a nearby Vienna hospital. Johann, who initially thinks she’s Austrian
by the green color of her coat, apparently quite prevalent in his country, helps
her obtain a museum pass and helpfully calls the doctor from time to time to
get the latest health updates, and at least on one occasion he accompanies her
to the hospital. It’s a poignant moment,
as anyone who’s visited a coma patient realizes how challenging it is, because
you’re not sure if they actually comprehend anything you say, making no
response, yet doctors encourage communication.
Anne asks Johann to describe some paintings in the museum, which he does
brilliantly, where Cohen shows interspersed images of paintings and various
works of art throughout the film. The intimate
knowledge he shares about various works of art actually has a healing power
that can be felt even by the viewers, as such personal insight is rarely
revealed, offering a glimpse into multiple worlds, where art history becomes
personalized and associated with such a depth of humanity. Described to a coma patient, this is simply a
chilling moment, but it solidifies their friendship, as this is an
unforgettable shared experience. They
spend more time together on the streets of Vienna, where he shows her the
sights, actually reacquainting himself with much of what he’s always admired
about the city. Each are also shown
separately, as Johann always returns to his job at the museum, while Anne
rummages through open air flea markets on the downtown streets, while also
making daily visits to the hospital.
The film takes the viewer somewhat by surprise, as the
stream of gorgeous images of artworks is stunning and hypnotically mesmerizing,
requiring a certain amount of contemplation, where the director actually
engages in an ongoing conversation with the audience, using a flow of still
images, often evoking a sense of wonder, mixed with conversations describing
various feelings about the artworks, but also hauntingly beautiful outdoor
landscape images, capturing the emptiness of the trees, while the two characters
themselves are engaged in their own conversations. It’s an extremely slow but reflective style
of filmmaking, where Cohen takes us into the Pieter Bruegel (the elder) room,
the most popular destination in the museum and the site of more of this artist’s
works than any other museum, where we interestingly share a visiting art
professor’s tour of the paintings. Like
Johann earlier, to hear one’s personal reflections elucidated so clearly and
eloquently is an extraordinary experience, and one that contrasts with the
droning commentary that patrons are forced to listen to on the earphones
provided, which simply don’t capture the immediacy of the moment. The guest lecturer, Ela Piplits, brings the
works to life, pointing out often overlooked details about the subversive
nature of his works, a 16th century Dutch artist where even painting ordinary
peasant behavior was frowned upon during his lifetime, as paintings belonged
exclusively to the rich. As there were
no museums, which originated with the Louvre in Paris during the French
Revolution (1789 – 1799), establishing the first collection of artworks
open to the public, Bruegel had a tendency to rub the noses of the wealthy
aristocracy in graphic unpleasantries, which often shared religious
compositions, but he was also one of the first to originate landscape
paintings. According to the professor,
Bruegel’s paintings “are not sentimental, nor do they judge.” Also of interest, Cohen is one of the few
directors to set his cameras inside nearby pubs, showing life in the beerhalls
of Vienna, a slice of everyday life that is extremely lively and
decorative. Again, this offers quite a contrast
to the moments of solitude in the hospital when Anne is alone with her cousin,
quietly breaking out into song at one point, expressing infinite sorrow and
tenderness. The film is a modernist,
free form meditation on how art and the human spirit coincide, concerned with
language, images, and history, vividly expressed through an endless stream of
art images that challenge our way of looking at the world around us.
