An Unfinished Film

 

Director Lou Ye

AN UNFINISHED FILM                 B-                                                                                 China  Singapore  Germany  USA  (107 mi)  2024  d: Lou Ye

A film crew was harshly gobsmacked
When the deadly Wuhan virus attacked
Forced to their rooms
And reliant on Zooms
They sat until they collectively cracked

—An Unfinished Film (一部未完成的电影) - The Steel Frog Blog

Returning to the scene of the crime, the outbreak of the Covid pandemic in China at the beginning of 2020, with masks and social distancing becoming a regular part of our daily life, yet told through an unusual angle, blurring the boundaries between fiction and documentary, as Lou Ye, one of the most uncompromising Sixth Generation voices of China’s film industry, a filmmaker known for his bold and often controversial approach, has made what can be described as a cellphone film, as it normalizes the use of cellphones, a reminder that social media surrounds us everywhere, which some find as commonplace as any other daily ritual, yet a major distraction for others, who aren’t yet ready to call vertical-screen cellphone videos an artform, but this film builds its case.  Initially shown out of competition at the Special Screenings section at Cannes, this is essentially a behind-the-scenes, documentary style glimpse of filmmaking, a movie about making a movie, which extends to the multitude of largely unseen personnel who collaborate in the creative process, as we watch them work collectively, led by director Xiaorui (Mao Xiaorui, an actual television director), trying to reconstruct a film out of the remnants of a project that started 10 years ago but abruptly stopped for lack of financing, using outtakes or unused footage from what appears to be a sequel to Lou’s own gay-themed film SPRING FEVER (2009), among the first Chinese Mainland films to graphically depict gay sex, which won the Best Screenplay award at Cannes in 2009, but did not endear himself to Chinese authorities, released as a French/Hong Kong production to circumvent his imposed 5-year ban from filmmaking after SUMMER PALACE (2006), which was set against the background of the Tiananmen Square massacre.  Breaking out all the old outdated computer equipment that has been in storage, they rediscover the original files, while Xiaorui has also secured the participation of the same lead actor Jiang Cheng (Qin Hao), who is now an in-demand star, though when he rejoins the cast he explicitly states, “Your film will never pass censorship.”  Nonetheless, defying authorities, he’s eager to work with the director again, though they are all significantly older, carrying with them new life experiences, as some have gotten married and have families, including Jiang whose wife has an expectant baby on the way.  Filming begins in Wuhan only after the baby is born, becoming a poetic ode to the courage and tenacity of independent artists who are willing to buck the government censors, risking their careers and even reputations for so little, as there was no guarantee anyone other than the participants themselves would ever see this film, with Jiang heard uttering at one point, “If nobody can see this film in theaters, then what’s the point?”  Yet they choose to do it anyway.  Written by the director in collaboration with his wife and longtime co-writer Ma Yingli, this project gives them the opportunity to look back at the past, as the director and crew are constantly examining what they filmed a decade ago, which becomes a catalyst for their own introspection, constantly challenging viewers to question what is real and what is staged. It’s never clear what role Jiang has in this production, yet all communication starts from him, where part of the persistent rhythm is devoted to video chats between Jiang and his wife Sang Qi (Qi Xi), where the actress was really at home in Beijing taking care of her one month old baby, so this reality was built into the film, as she is only seen on a cellphone screen, often shown on a split screen to show both of them speaking quietly to each other, in one tender moment even falling asleep together, each holding their cellphones next to their faces.  A commentary on the film process itself, with the actors playing a film version of themselves, what we see is not just a film about interruption, but a film that interrupts itself, as its incompleteness is the central thesis that speaks volumes through time gaps and silences.  

Originally conceived as a film consisting of old footage of Jiang playing various roles, reflecting the changes in China over the past decade or so, but yet another unforeseen circumstance happens while they are shooting in the town of Wuhan, as they’re also grappling with this huge, unprecedented global pandemic unfolding all around them, taking us back to the very earliest stages of the Covid pandemic when it was just beginning, shifting the entire perspective of the film, becoming an hour-by-hour update on the changing focus of containing the outbreak, which suddenly becomes part of what they’re filming.  Despite television news reports of blocked roads alongside a very public military presence, at first no one paid it any mind when a hairdresser from Wuhan is sent home, or a production assistant faints in the corridor, thinking those affected were simply random illnesses, as the production would still move forward, AN UNFINISHED FILM Clip | TIFF 2024 YouTube (1:53).  What they envisioned in making this film never comes to fruition, instead they are continually interrupted with public health updates, which is mirrored by security enforcing a contamination zone, not letting anyone in or out of the hotel, which literally happens overnight and is completely inconceivable for some, who just assumed they would be home by the Lunar New Year to celebrate with their families, as travel plans had already been arranged.  But that comes to an abrupt halt when they are forcibly locked inside their rooms, while people in full-body hamzat suits bring their food or other essentials to their door, yet none of this eruptive chaos ever feels like it is staged, but remains viscerally raw, as cinematographer Zeng Jian’s handheld shots move between observation and confusion, mimicking the anxiety and disorientation people must have felt in the early days of the pandemic, where the emotional power lies in restraint.  The euphoric mood of the opening, hoping to create something entirely new, quickly turns into panic mode, initially met with anger and indignation, forcibly trying to make their way through security, followed by resignation and despair, with the realization that they would be stuck there for quite a while under quarantine, literally cut off from their families and the rest of the world, yet unlike those who voluntarily chose to stay at home and shelter-in-place, these individuals were really forced to lock down, where the entire crew must remain inside their respective hotel rooms, unable to leave until this is over, separated by circumstance and/or arbitrary health rules enforced by the military.  Blending actual footage of those early lockdown days with staged scenes, not everyone viewing this film wants to re-live these experiences again, as it may be too soon, still traumatized by what happened, with astronomical death rates that had never happened before during our lifetimes, yet at the very beginning, no one knew that it would lead to a worldwide pandemic, thinking only about its effect in the immediate vicinity, as the majority of the first reported cases of coronavirus are in China.  What happens at the hotel is a mini-version of what’s happening in the entire city, as the whole population of 14 million people are under a lockdown enforced by authorities, leaving the streets eerily empty, like a post-apocalyptic view of how the world might look after a nuclear war, so in essence the film is a time capsule of a historic period in our lives, and while the film was censored in China, completed only with financing from Singapore and Germany, it has been embraced around the world, largely for its critical thinking.  What this film thoughtfully captures is the fear, the isolation, and that longing for connection, things we can all universally relate to and understand, while also questioning the role of art during times of crisis. 

A film about creative inspiration quickly becomes a Covid documentary, a reflection of the chaos and confusion of the times, and a social and political crisis that played out differently in different places around the world, with cellphones documenting what the cast sees in the hallways, courtyards, or out their windows, where a constant stream of ambulances are seen arriving and departing, with disinfectant being sprayed everywhere, completely changing the fluid pace and hopeful outlook of the beginning, which is reduced to a crawl when the entire crew is left alone in their hotel rooms under lockdown.  With phones and televisions becoming their only window into the outside world, viewers are suddenly privy to personal messaging back and forth, sharing the latest updates while attempting to keep their spirits high, reaching an apex when they all gather together on a group video call and count down the seconds to the Chinese New Year (January 25th in 2020), then exploding in celebration, each alone in their rooms, breaking out into music and dance onscreen, where it’s all captured by cellphones.  Overly rambunctious in their joyous celebration, they spontaneously break out into the hallways and comingle, violating all health protocols, which is immediately shut down by security who orders them all back into their rooms.  It’s a brief moment of elation, lasting only a few minutes, but it captures the essence of what they’re all feeling, just wanting to feel alive again in a world where all the emphasis has shifted to the pandemic.  In just the first few months, a main focus of all the news reports is an inexplicable public health phenomenon that spreads rapidly, with no known cure, becoming more and more contagious, offering a rare glimpse into the Chinese experience of the pandemic, where some of the few surprises includes actual clips of news footage, CCTV surveillance footage, and TikTok-style children’s covers of songs that went viral on the Chinese internet, creating this kaleidoscopic effect, showing how individual experiences are intertwined with surrounding events, bringing us right into the middle of all the chaos and uncertainty.  With little advance warning, authorities completely stifle the population from coming into contact with one another, shutting down the city of Wuhan and the surrounding regions to contain the virus, though six Wuhan hospital doctors died in just the first six months, including infamous whistleblower Dr. Li Wenliang, who warned his colleagues about the virus before succumbing to it himself, and is remembered on TV clips.  Speeding through a collage of conspicuous events over the next several years, including footage of the riots that followed the 2022 Ürümqi fire that sparked nationwide protests against the government’s Zero-COVID policy, which was irrefutably unpopular and controversial, yet the number of infections spiked drastically when the policy was dropped, leading to a massive amount of infections and a staggering death count, which are conspicuously missing from the film, though the magnitude of the loss is profound, feeling more like an elegiac memoriam by the end.  While mostly contained to just a few months immediately after the outbreak, this is a highly personalized, insular view of what transpired, a calm before the storm, as over 7 million people worldwide eventually died.  The film seems to challenge our collective memories, asking if the world has changed significantly since then, are we any different, did we learn anything, and has this situation changed us?  Personal phone calls between Jiang and his wife give way to random videos posted online (click here to watch the video, 4:35), with an imprinted date stamp indicating how long after the outbreak, all poetically capturing the mood and feel of living under lockdown and slowly coming out of hibernation, as if released from captivity, where the joy of simply walking unimpeded down a city street feels like a precious moment of unleashed freedom.    

The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed

 

Writer/director Joanna Arnow

THE FEELING THAT THE TIME FOR DOING SOMETHING HAS PASSED     C                     USA  (87 mi)  2023  d: Joanna Arnow

Do you think people can change?        —Ann (Joanna Arnow)

Mumblecore has come a long way since the minimalist realism of Andrew Bujalski’s FUNNY HA HA (2003), Mark Duplass’ THE PUFFY CHAIR (2005), Joe Swanberg’s HANNAH TAKES THE STAIRS (2007), Lynn Shelton’s HUMPDAY (2009), Lena Dunham’s TINY FURNITURE (2010), Noah Baumbach’s Frances Ha (2012), and Charlie McDowell’s The One I Love (2014), movies about the tedium of modern life, featuring meandering almost nonexistent plots that are very dialogue/character focused.  This feels like a post-Mumblecore movie, the modern day answer to the contemporary confusion from dead-end jobs, having to deal with a soulless corporate culture that not only feels dehumanizing, but exhausting, having to ping-pong back and forth from a series of one awkward moment after the next, with people languishing in their own ineptitude and banal existence, using deadpan, self-deprecating humor to exaggerate the absurdity of the moment, where the operative word in all this is distanced.  While the featured Mumblecore protagonists were mostly white, middle-class, and college educated, they are also indecisive and completely apolitical, alienated from their own lives, people who can’t ever make up their minds, who exist totally in a world of ambivalence.  These small budget D.I.Y. indie projects were ultimately a small phenomenon, very personal films made by twentysomethings and their friends, exploring the malaise at the core of our lives, often made on smartphones or home computers, receiving bare-bones theatrical runs, distributed instead on the internet befitting the general lack of industry financing, and never fully entered the mainstream until the concept was embraced by television, like Lena Dunham’s HBO series Girls (2012) or Joe Swanberg’s Netflix series Easy (2017).  Bored with what work entails, people could instead laugh at the absurdities they find themselves in, where the dysfunction plays out in interpersonal relationships, leading to a series of small, confessional sitcoms that have become the new cinematic cultural vanguard embraced by the nation with shows like Curb Your Enthusiasm, Arrested Development, The Office, 30 Rock, and Parks and Recreation.  Suddenly awkwardness and social discomfort was the norm, feeling disconnected with life, bored with the surrounding world and what it has to offer, even going so far as to make fun of meaningless family rituals that are the bane of one’s existence, or so it seems.  Mumblecore embraced the internet but was firmly influenced by cinema, while now the internet has fully integrated itself into real life, and social media has become its own influence.  While there’s an expressionless perception of coldness, reminiscent of similar films by Todd Solondz and Yorgos Lanthimos, spiritual depravity apparently hounds this new generation, having no role models or any confidence in the rapidly changing technological advancements, where new training sessions are continually replacing outdated work models, where pointless work is sustained at the expense of a disposable workforce, instilling a lack of trust in authority and the ill-effects of inequitable power dynamics, apparently espousing the views of David Graebner’s Bullshit Jobs - Wikipedia, who contends that more than half of available work today is meaningless, having a psychologically destructive impact on the workforce, who inevitably feel useless.  Whether it’s work, love, or family, they are all intertwined, yet this will likely appeal more to the attention deficit challenged social media generation of Millennials, making it all too easy to mock others and cast blame when things don’t go well, where it’s always someone else’s fault, as there’s little to no existential soul-searching, which was all the rage for the socially conscious Baby Boomers. 

Screened at Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes, there is an ambitious desire to make this matter to audiences, using a long shot, long take style of Tsai Ming-liang, also his quietness, but there’s nothing to lure them in, no character to identify with, and no actual humor to speak of, though some find the bone-dry delivery ridiculously funny, accentuating the pathetic awkwardness of uncomfortable situations.  However, this is not Roy Andersson, who offers a surreal and deeply philosophical Nordic take on the absurdities of modern existence, while also lacking the focus and originality of Radha Blank’s autobiographical insights that humorously explore the black experience in 2020 Top Ten List #9 The 40-Year Old Version.  This is instead largely an empty exercise in futility, a piece of autofiction with an exaggerated sense of detachment (like texting someone who is literally standing ten feet away), as if technology has completely shut down our ability to socialize or be human, where it’s too late to turn back now.  The title says it all, though it can also infer that the time for finding something meaningful in this film has also passed.  Mileage will vary depending on the individual viewer, but it’s hard to comprehend just who the audience is for this film, as it seems to target those who appreciate quirky comic sitcoms that resort to caricature, so watching this on television makes more sense than viewing it in theaters.   Made up of short, concise vignettes, capturing the frustrated feeling of early adulthood where you’re mechanically going through the motions, this is a collection of small moments in the life of an educated young woman in her 30’s, Ann, played by the writer/director herself, where there are stark moments of nudity splintered throughout the film, told in chapter headings that focus on the men in her life, as she plays a submissive in a comically absurd long-term BDSM relationship with an older man, Allen (Scott Cohen), which itself feels like a parody in its ordinariness, as he’s always fully clothed while she is completely naked for nearly half the film, which is not something you see today, yet this is so unglamorously unsexy, where the brunt of their relationship seems designed around sadomasochistic humiliation.  There’s nothing remotely fulfilling about the sex, as he doesn’t give a damn about her needs, or the details of her life, where she reminds herself “It’s like I don’t even exist,” so she apparently takes some comfort in not having to take responsibility for her thoughts or feelings, as if giving up control is a safe space, but it also prevents her from developing any longterm friendships or relationships, a bone of contention with her quarrelsome and suffocating Jewish family, particularly her real-life mother (Barbara Weiserbs), while her standoffish real-life father (David Arnow) is too busy ignoring her, having already given up on her.  The dysfunctional root of her existence appears to be in finding value in her life, as her parents don’t value her choices, while her employer feels the same way, viewing her as a small, low-level cog in a larger organization, where an irritated boss reminds her, “You didn’t become obsolete like you promised when I hired you,” leaving her all alone to fend for herself, finding little satisfaction to speak of.  Unfortunately, that same dissatisfaction is transferred to viewers, who are more than a little uncomfortable with what we’re seeing onscreen, while it’s also hard to understand the documentary advantage of using her own family.

While Arnow also writes fiction and draws comics (which this resembles), she is also the editor of her first feature film, which feels very choppy, some scenes lasting for just a few seconds, trying to do the most with the least, subverting conventional story structure in favor of a character progression, with her life changing with the passing seasons, yet there’s no unifying sense of cohesion other than things are continually happening to the same lead protagonist, who feels anesthetized throughout the film, as the absurdity and discomfort of that opening sequence pretty much defines the rest of the film.  Even around the office, subject to long meetings that go nowhere, Ann does not easily make friends or socialize with anyone, where it’s hard not to feel she’s created her own self-inflicted purgatory, never branching out, imprisoned by her own choices, none of which give her the power to explore the wide array of humanity, with the film exploring the monotony of lives trapped in routines.  Feeling a bit like Sartre’s No Exit, always stuck in the same rut, with a vast feeling of emptiness, which only feeds into a lack of self-worth and a sense of stagnation, where “I hate myself” seems to be the recurring mantra, which, coincidentally, is the title of an earlier short film, I HATE MYSELF :) (2013).  Perhaps, as a result, she decides to go on a dating app to meet someone, discovering an affable yet more conventionally acceptable Chris (Babak Tafti), and while their disjointed connection does feel authentic, fueled by a similar middle class intelligence, it’s more about the trials and travails of trying to make it work, though Chris seems more eager in that regard, as he’s openly optimistic, The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed ... YouTube (59 seconds), yet she’s continually pulled back down into the mud of her own anxieties and lack of ambition, where she just doesn’t believe in anything.  As a result, nothing ever happens for her, with no aspirations for anything better, so she continually falls back on what she knows, at one point breaking out into a Les Misérables-style show tune that appears to have been personally written by Arnow to avoid paying copyright fees, while she has just about memorized the entire repertoire of Andrew Lloyd Webber, a throwback to Debra Winger in TERMS OF ENDEARMENT (1983).  Similarly, her introverted father at one point breaks out into a guitar-accompanied rendition of Solidarity Forever, with his wife joining in, yet what it ridiculously exposes is the giant rift in the family’s lack of solidarity, leaving her left adrift on an island with no chance of rescue.  While the essence of the film is a pervasive sense of hopeless depression, which is never really taken seriously, by the way, preferring to mock or make fun, there are infused moments of humor peppered throughout, yet they don’t lift the spirits of either this character or the audience wondering where all this is leading, where the title comes from a conversation near the end of the film.  Shot with a handheld camera and muted color palette by Barton Cortright, the film hopes to convey the subjective experience of the way time passes, playing out like a cringeworthy TV show, but it’s hard to find joy in such abject despondency, or the plight of other people’s emotional and psychological doldrums, leaving viewers just as stranded as she is, where it’s hard to find reasons to care about someone who has all the advantages handed to them through education and opportunities, but then squanders those opportunities, doing as little with them as is humanly possible.