Article: Spending Time with Mr McMahon

This blog rarely talks about television. However, as a lapsed fan of sports entertainment, I took the time to binge-watch the recent release of Netflix’s limited series documentary Mr McMahon. This in-depth look at Vince McMahon, the former World Wrestling Entertainment owner, has coincided with the WWE merging with Zuffa, creating the new company TKO. The WWE’s flagship show, RAW, is also soon to be appearing on Netflix. However, during the 3-year filming of Chris Smith’s documentary, McMahon resigned from TKO after allegations of sexual assault and sex trafficking. Rather than throwing the series into disarray, the documentary is updated with details of the allegations. Most of the interviews that appear in the series are shown before the allegations with Vince’s final interviews never taking place.

The six-episode docuseries delivers an overview of his life. Detailing how he took the once territorial wrestling federation from his father, turning it into a global entertainment phenomenon. It also charts the creation of Mr McMahon; a wildly exaggerated television character of Vince who plays the main villain for the WWE. Mr McMahon asks whether there’s a difference between Vince the character and Vince the man. 

Considering the real-life allegations now attributed to Vince, the differences seem slight. Early on, Vince remarks that he doesn’t want to show anybody the real him. This is an unfortunate remark as Vince’s own self-aggrandising ego, toxic masculinity and unrepentant capitalist viewpoint underline his true nature at nearly every turn. While many of the film’s interviewees have an alliance with Vince, the documentary has done enough homework to highlight much of Vince’s questionable behaviour. And the term questionable is too light a word. When under the microscope Vince can be seen as a vicious Tyrant who rules over his bread and circus soap opera with an iron fist and engorged loins. No one is really spared from his oppressiveness, wiliness or lack of moral fibre. Huge musclebound Titans shed a tear for Vince at points. Granted that this takes place before the allegations and stepping down, it’s still hard not to see this as Stockholm Syndrome.

Like so many Netflix documentaries, Mr McMahon is hampered by how it is presented. It’s clear that many livelihoods have been lost or destroyed due to Vince’s actions, yet there isn’t a lot of breathing space for those who have suffered over Vince’s tyranny. Instead, the questionable antics are almost shrugged off with arguments over different values. Possibly because there’s so much dirt and there’s only so much time. This becomes tough to swallow during the midway point when the tragic story of Owen Hart comes to the forefront. The Hart family have suffered great turmoil under the WWE, with Owen’s death being the peak of their heartbreak. Listening to Bret speak about his dealings with Vince and the WWE is still as troubling as it was in the 90s. The fact that Owen dies on a live pay-per-view and Vince orders the show to continue speaks volumes. The images of distressed wrestlers continuing to fight over the only just dried blood stains of their dead friend are more haunting than any horror film. Yet that might even be the worst of it.  

But the difficulty here lies with the talking heads who still favour Vince. To many, Vince McMahon is still seen as a father figure who launched their careers. Countless people owe Vince for where they are today. Late on, Senior Vice President Bruce Pritchard takes offence to what he’s seen from the documentary, with a strong feeling that the only things the filmmakers are doing are showing Vince as a villain. Pritchard notes how Vince ensured the best care available for his wife who was diagnosed with cancer. The defence given feels like the moments in Peter Biskind’s Down and Dirty Pictures in which filmmakers who found success with disgraced producer Harvey Weinstein still gave him an amount of protection despite his bullying. With this, Mr McMahon has more of an element of balance than expected at times, because so many of the ex-wrestlers interviewed don’t hold a grudge against Vince, because why would they? 

For wrestling fans, Mr McMahon doesn’t tell you anything they already don’t know. Those who didn’t realise how much of a conceited megalomanic Vince McMahon is will be shocked at what they see. The film only drains half of the swampy waters. Some will be shocked at how guarded Vince is. Many more sordid details could easily be found on the many well-researched YouTube channels or by listening to the 4-episode deep dive of McMahon on the Behind the Bastards podcast. But those other outlets aren’t as slick. The backing that Netflix provides, softens matters because, as mentioned, the company now have a stake in the WWE. So, the documentary becomes a history highlight reel of Vince and the WWE for the uninitiated.

However, Vince’s corrupted story of the American dream plays out on a scale as large as films such as There Will Be Blood (2007) or Citizen Kane (1941). Honestly. Vincent Kennady McMahon’s story is that operatic. He is Daniel Plainview for the lovers of spandex. Nothing stands in his way. With pop culture influenced in ways many couldn’t even imagine. As a docu-series, with the interviewees that Smith manages to sign off and get time with, Mr McMahon is the most comprehensive, mainstream look at the WWE of recent times.

Wrestling journalist Dave Meltzer, who is often a voice of reason through the series, delivers a throwaway comment which rings true not only about Vince and wrestling fans but also the complicated relationship that many have with celebrity idols: “People will support an entertainment product and not care about the moral fibre of the guy running the product.” It’s not a profound statement, but an incredibly accurate judgment on where many are with modern celebrity culture. An unexpected moment in a series full of expected moments for wrestling fans.

Mr McMahon is streaming on Netflix

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Article: Sleaze on the streets - A first viewing of Cop

 A grim neo-noir which is as blunt as its name. Cop (1988) is a morbid curiosity which only matches its bloody violence with absurdity. Roger Ebert’s review of the movie notes the film becomes an essay on the “Cop” genre; with its final shots slamming the book shut. Cop which certainly borrows from the likes of Dirty Harry (1971), certainly feels like a full stop on a certain type of cop drama. While of course, films like Cop have never stopped being made, its release coincides with the final Dirty Harry entry: The Dead Pool (1988). A film which had the cracks more than starting to show with the series. Cop also comes out the same year as Die Hard. Kathryn Bigelow’s Blue Steel appeared soon after in 1989. Looking back at this moment, it feels like subconsciously there’s a crossing of the guards. It might be harder to get away with films like this in the future.  Once Silence of the Lambs and Seven appeared in the '90s, it felt like the book Ebert talks about had been rewritten. Cop now feels even more like a relic. That doesn’t stop it from being an entertaining watch though.

The cop of the film’s title is deliriously played by James Woods, who portrays the role with the intensity and odious sleaze that only an actor like him can provide. Woods plays Lloyd Hopkins, an unorthodox police detective who, like Dirty Harry, doesn’t play by the rules, but damn sure gets results. However, while Harry Callahan's dubious morals are built towards a black-and-white view of justice, Woods Hopkins is a grubbier prospect. He is happy to rely on graphic stories of the scumbags he arrests/murders to his eight-year-old daughter, while his wife pleads with him to go to therapy for his troubled mind. The issues Hopkins has become quite apparent when he takes on a murder case of a young woman. He believes the murder is one out of a string of similar killings which have been occurring for almost two decades. Hopkins is a good detective, but his evidence in this case is flimsy. Therefore, Hopkins executes all the tricks of his playbook. Take note early one, Hopkins blows away a criminal suspect in a shower of bullets before making the moves on the dead man’s date before the split blood has even cooled. Lloyd Hopkins is a particular kind of asshole.

This is what makes Cop a fascinating watch. Hopkins’ talent as a detective is formidable. Shown early in the film’s second scene in which he shows a greener cop the ropes of what to pick up on when a call comes through. Yet why he’s a Cop seems to be for the sport, with little care for upholding the law. He puts on a front that he’s part of the thin blue line stopping L.A. from being overrun. Hopkins displays his little bedtime story to his daughter as something to prepare her for the scum she may have to deal with in her life. All the while, Hopkins’ objectification of women is as dubious as the hypothetical crims he claims that he is preparing his daughter for. Another litmus test for his values is his behaviour when canvassing a feminist bookstore for leads. Here he meets the owner, Kathleen; a woman who may hold the key to finding the culprit of the case. Here Hopkins pulls out his inner James Bond, putting on all his sleazy moves to seduce her. This is also while being wholeheartedly dismissive of her as a survivor of sexual assault. Seeing her as merely another object that can hurtle him towards his goal.

Woods’ ability to sink into Hopkins’ grubby nature makes the endeavour immensely watchable. There's a swiftness in how he fornicates with a sex worker witness. A brazenness to the obnoxious tone in his exchanges with his boss. Hopkins is, for lack of a better word, a sleazy prick. However, the amount of concern he gives to this case, along with the fact his hunches keep him on track of the killer, only makes him more compelling. This is Bad Lieutenant (1992) before Bad Lieutenant. The way the film cannily keeps focus away from the killer helps suggest that you don’t need villains around when you have cops like this. In an updated reference, Hopkins is no better than the killer he’s chasing. Seeing people, particularly women, as disposable. He would be a reason to choose the bear.

Despite this, the film applies a certain level of absurdity to the proceedings. Leslie Ann Warren, a feminist book owner comes across as a fierce activist for women’s rights. However, it’s surprisingly troubling how easily Hopkins puts the moves on her; and how swiftly she indulges him. It’s a dynamic that would be more interesting if Hopkins needed to chip away at her defences. However, the weakness within this character and her belief in white knights and happy endings feel underwritten. Although it does bring forth a dark humour to the situation. Albeit one that would perhaps get the stink-eye from folk today. Also, while Hopkins's cop credentials are established well early on, it’s a narrative in which Hopkins rarely seems to struggle in his investigative work. Hopkins is allowed to have some fiery exchanges with his head of department when he’s deprived of resources for the case. However, his hunches are unwavering, a small piece of detective is uncanny, and the conflict within the film never gets as hostile as Hopkins himself.

However, the brutally abrupt finale to Cop is such a ballsy slap in the face, that it’s lingered in my mind for a few days since my viewing. It’s not that the last moments are shocking in any grotesque way. But the film’s ending is so sudden that it forced me to think about the film, as well as parts of the subgenre. It’s commendable that the film's unromanticised finish ensures a sense of nihilism all the way up until the end. Cop starts and ends with a Detective on the edge; who’s so enraptured by sleaze that he’s become addicted to it. He talks a good game about wanting to solve the case, but the disillusionment and emptiness can be seen from the start to the final three shotgun blasts. Copagander this ain’t.  

Cop can be found on various streaming platforms.

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Article: "It's a good scream" - A view on Blow Out (1981)

Spoilers abound in this piece

The way Brian De Palma tacitly Became one of my favourite directors was quite surprising. It was a seduction that occurred with a quiet subtlety. Many years ago, I watched his 1981 film Blow Out as a chance to cross off a blind spot in my long list of movies I’ve not seen. Then over the years since then, I own or at least have seen a huge chunk of his filmography. They’re not all brilliant. Many of De Palma’s works in the latter half of his career don’t shine as brightly as his iconic films of the 70s and 80s. However, De Palma’s filmmaking is so distinctive that even many of his failures have been somewhat interesting. In an age of cinema by committee where filmmaking takes less risks now more than ever, watching something by a director like Brian De Palma still elicits a thrill. You are watching something directed. Not middle-managed. 

Now over 40 years old, the themes of Blow Out still cause provocation. One element is the likes of social media allowing people to lounge within some of the more sinister sides of their interiors. The ending of Blow Out is disturbing for a few reasons. One of them being a woman’s blood-curdling last moments becoming the ADR backdrop for a glib sequence of gaudy horror. In an era where almost everyone’s phones allow one to “broadcast themselves”, it’s of no shock that many people can turn their trauma into “content”. Although De Palma’s film suggests there is a personal toll for doing this, even despite the flashy filmmaking. 

With further inspection, Blow Out is De Palma having a ball with the Conspiracy Theory thriller. A sub-genre that had its heyday in the 70s. Once the rise of Donald Trump solidified the premise of “fake news”, that and the all-encompassing force of social media helped ensure that almost all current affairs can be believed to be underhanded. Trump himself had an assassination attempt not even months ago at the time of writing this. Yet the fracturing of media now has made the idea that the man was ever shot a difficult one. The same manipulation of the medium expressed in Blow Out now feels commonplace for a larger group of people. Misinformation is now a part of the furniture.  

 Blow Out starts with a quintessential De Palma fake-out; opening with an unknown assailant leering outside a rambunctious sorority house. The killer breathes heavily while they peer through the windows of female dorm rooms. Mimicking the likes of Halloween (1979), the shot is taken from the killer's perspective. By seeing what he sees the viewer becomes a participant in what may be about to take place. Soon the killer is inside; stalking the halls of the co-ed’s living quarters. He scans the bedrooms of the young, scantily clad women. Nearly all of them seem to be indulging in some sexual activity. He spies upon a solitary blonde in a shower. She is unaware of the killer advancing upon her until the last moment. Her eyes widen and she lets out…a rather ridiculous scream. The film cuts away and we discover that this is a film. It's a scene of a movie playing within a movie. This gratuitous slasher flick is being checked out by sound engineer Jack Terry (a career-best John Travolta) who is then instructed to find more ambient sound for the movie. He’s also charged with finding a better scream for the soon-to-be murder victim in the film.

The innocuous task of finding some movie sounds kick starts a chain of events which alter Jack’s life in a way he could never imagine. While capturing sounds of wind, owls, and toads, Jack hears a tire burst and sees a car fly into the nearby lake where he’s capturing sounds. In a moment of heroism, he rescues Sally (Nancy Allen) who was trapped in the vehicle but finds out later in the hospital that the other person in the vehicle, a famous senator, drowned in the car. Questions arise about why that young girl was with a politician on the brink of an election win. She isn’t his wife. She’s substantially younger than the man she was in the car with. But a more taxing riddle is burning on Jack’s mind. He thinks he heard a gunshot before the wheel blew out. If it had merely blown out, then it’s an unfortunate accident. If there was a gunshot, then this was an assassination attempt. 

Ostensibly a political conspiracy thriller which relates more to the decade just gone, Blow Out is also an incredible movie about filmmaking and how our media distorts the truth. So much of the film is De Palma using his bag of tricks to illustrate the illusiveness of fact, and how easily an audience can be toyed with. That opening sequence starts from the killer’s perspective. We’re then told that the movie we were watching, which was at first through another person’s eyes, is not the film we will be watching. The third scene that plays while the opening credits appear utilises more De Palma favoured techniques. The scene has Travolta’s Jack working on his film while a television relays the evening news. Using the split dioptre and split screens, the film not only builds Jack’s character on one side of the screen, but it also constructs the narrative bones of much of the movie on the other. It also provides fictional information. I’m sure many people know that “Liberty Day” doesn’t exist as a holiday in America but, Blow Out shows you this information like Philadelphia has been celebrating the day for years. 

The way the camera is used to inform people of the story is beguiling. The cinematography is used in a manner that heaps layers of meaning upon each image. Midway through the film, Jack is searching for a piece of audio evidence that has gone missing. As he frantically searches the room, the camera rotates in a slow 360 pan. The move not only highlights the slowly increasing paranoid energy of the protagonist, but it also mocks Jack’s occupation as a soundman, spooling around like a reel of tape.  Split screens are used to highlight victims and murder weapons at the same time. 

Meanwhile, legendary cinematographer  Vilmos Zsigmond and the design team build multitudes of shots with Red, White and Blue to capture the film's mood. Desaturating the colour where they can. Using the colours of the American flag as the palette of the film only seems to heighten the cynicism of the film’s central conspiracy. Zsigmond in an interview on the Arrow Blu-ray, spoke about how much he dislikes movies in which the dialogue tells the story over the visuals. One wonders how he would cope with the cinematic landscape now, where some movies are mere fodder for internet meme culture.  

Brian De Palma has fared less well in his later decades. His recent efforts have faltered below the level of his earlier works, perhaps due to the changing attitudes and approaches to cinema and filmmaking. This is a shame because, with films like Blow Out, the filmmaker has things to say in abundance. First off, the film’s title and plot are a riff on Michelangelo Antonioni's Blow Up (1966) and more than a small nod to the world cinema that De Palma devoured during his early career. The film also feels like a response to The Conversation (1974), directed by De Palma’s friend Francis Ford Coppola. The references to Alfred Hitchcock's movies undoubtedly make an appearance as expected. However, the most notable aspect of Blow Out is how much De Palma wants to communicate the filmmaking process.  Blow Out is so fun because intermingled with all the paranoid thrills of it all, De Palma is gleefully inducting us into how the sausage is made. The fun with so many of Brian De Palma’s thrillers is how they both deconstruct their absurdity while sweeping you up within it. There are many films which love to tout the “power of cinema” yet De Palma, at this point in his career, was so adept at filmmaking, that he managed to do so by having John Travolta illustrate the potency of the moving image with a flicker book. It’s not like people haven’t done things like this before. It’s just that they haven’t done it like De Palma. Almost every scene highlights the artifice of cinema, while the same visual language is used to enthral the viewer.

In addition to this De Palma has never been afraid of pushing buttons and having his films revel in their baser urges. When combined with his technical skill Blow Out, along with the likes of Dressed to Kill (1980) and Body Double (1984), allows the filmmaker to make films that are operatic yet trashy. Lusciously crafted, but lurid in theme. While Body Double and Dressed to Kill are possibly more direct with their explicit nature, Blow Out still indulges in provocations. The death of the Governor is founded upon his fondness for escorts. The thuggish Burke, played frighteningly by John Lithgow, is killing women who look like Sally. One of them is also a sex worker (Deborah Everton). The interplay between Lithgow and Everton before her violent demise is comical, but also based on the idea of hooking up in a public station for a sex act. 

The final moments of Dennis Franz’s Manny are wryly shot with the character lying as if crucified, while the camera hovers over him a la God’s eye view. The scene's main purpose is to provide more detail into the film’s inciting incident. And it ends with Manny losing a headbutt battle with a bottle of whiskey.  His last moments are a desperate attempt to get his end away with an unwilling Sally. Bathed in red light, the death of this low-rent Jake Gittes wannabe is shown with a beauty the character doesn’t deserve. Of course, that’s the fun of it. The film loves to jump over the line between sex and death. De Palma loves to do this with panache. 

My love for Brian De Palma, particularly his more personal genre pieces, is that he knows that the audience likes to watch.  While a polarizing filmmaker, he’s also a seductive one, using the power of his technical to lull a viewer into corruption. His films wouldn’t be challenged so much if they weren’t so cinematically proficient. At his peak, the films of De Palma became fascinating because of how well they manufactured distance between a viewer while coaxing them into the heightened drama. Blow Out starts with a cheesy wannabe Halloween-style opening. Something that feels manufactured, but once Lithgow’s Burke begins to execute murders of women who share a familiarity with Sally, suddenly the film's tactics, still self-contentedly winking at the audience, operate on a different level. The cheese has gone. It is now replaced with anxiety. 

De Palma’s command of film language comes from the filmmaker he cribs from the most, Alfred Hitchcock. De Palma's filmmaking journey stems from the impression Hitchcock’s Vertigo made in 1958. The portly Brit’s ability to utilise cinematic language burrowed deep into the psyche of a then-young De Palma. In a 2020 interview with the Associated Press, De Palma details:

“As I’ve gotten older and made a lot of films, I can see there’s always lessons to be learned from Hitchcock the way he sets up certain sequences. And “Vertigo” is the whole idea of creating an illusion and getting the audience to fall in love with it and then tossing it off the tower twice. Very, very good idea.”

It's such a good idea that De Palma borrows from Hitchcock liberally for many of his films. Sometimes it was the theme, like Body Double, where the voyeurism of Rear Window (1954) plays a huge part of the narrative. Dressed to Kill is an updated reinterpretation of Psycho. In Blow Out, however, while De Palma makes his riffs to Hitch, what punctuates the matter is De Palma’s setting the film up as an example of Hitchcock’s “Bomb Analogy”:

 “Let us suppose that there is a bomb underneath this table between us. Nothing happens, and then all of a sudden, “Boom!” There is an explosion. The public is surprised, but prior to this surprise, it has seen an absolutely ordinary scene, of no special consequence. Now, let us take a suspense situation. The bomb is underneath the table and the public knows it…In these conditions, this same innocuous conversation becomes fascinating because the public is participating in the secret.”

Blow Up is possibly De Palma performing this exercise in its purest form. From the split screen news report early on that layers and primes the audience to information the lead character seems only half aware of, to the introduction of Burke, whose underhanded tasks throughout the film, which like the cheesy slasher film from the start hands the audience the perspective of the killer. De Palma goads the audience with the information. He seems to say: “Are you watching this? You’ve been given this information. Don’t you think it might hurt somebody?” De Palma constantly provides the audience with knowledge the characters are unaware of. The viewer becomes a participant. 

De Palma, despite his love of Hitchcock, isn’t fond of the idea that he imitates the master of suspense. On an episode of Dick Cavett's 1978 talk show, De Palma told Cavett that he had evolved the cinematic grammar that Hitchcock had put in place. This is true. De Palma uses Hitchcock as the basis, but there’s always as much of De Palma in his films as there is Hitchcock. Quentin Tarantino sums this up well in an interview where he gives his opinion on why he vibes with Brian De Palma over Hitchcock. In an interview, he notes that De Palma not only being able to explore the artistic minutiae of the violence in his set pieces due to the changing attitudes of the eras that each filmmaker operated in but also mentions that De Palma is a stronger social satirist throughout his body of work. It’s fascinating to hear Tarantino mention this, as I suddenly felt the director try and provide similar within his work, to mixed results.  

Both De Palma and Tarantino are similar to hip-hop producers, who have repurposed the language of the medium that they love in surprising ways. Injecting what has come before with their personality infused. It’s hardly any surprise that both directors often make commentaries about filmmaking itself within their movies. They are also directors who at the peak, were looking to see what buttons they could push from a societal standpoint. This is perhaps why Blow Out endures. In a recent interview for Vulture, De Palma claims his films have lasted out because they are cinematic in a way that modern films do not approach. It’s hard to disagree. A Guardian retrospective on the film notes how the film is broken down into visual and audio, in a way that you don’t see in modern filmmaking, despite the improvement of tech. 

But the best films of De Palma are also dream vessels for the themes they inhabit. Body Double is now revised as one of De Palma’s crowning achievements from film fans. It’s easier to see this now. Because the world we live in has become inhabited by the allure of voyeurism. We are now constantly snooping around the publicly private lives of everyone else. Blow Out is a blow-for-blow account of how the moving image helps play with objective truth and how easily we lose ourselves because of it. De Palma guides the viewer through this; the fake-outs, the split screens, the homages to cinema language. The audience is being directed every step of the way.  Blow Out’s tragic ending becomes an exclamation point on how truth is lost. The screams Sally emits before her actual death are taken, repurposed and reshaped into the shoddy horror film that Jack’s been making. Real pain into a fake entertainment. Jack finds his killer scream to finish his movie. It’s a good scream. His producer loves it. But the sound is driving him mad. And you know where it came from too. Yet if he told anyone where those cries came from no one would believe him.

Blow Out is on YouTube and Prime Video at the time of writing. There are also two exceptional Blu-ray packages floating around.

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Article: Venice in Peril - Looking back at Don't Look Now.

In the years since I last watched Don’t Look Now, I had lost two children in a short space of time. Rewatching the film in 2024, with the dark shadow of grief clouded over my face, I must admit, the film hits a little differently. The horror films I love most are often tinged with a little sadness. Horror works better when a particular line of sorrow runs through it. But one of the reasons Nicholas Roeg’s film still strikes a chord, 50 years after its release, is just how well it hits the pain points of grief. Watching Don't Look Now this time around, I found myself stricken by its opening scenes. When John Baxter (Donald Sutherland) pulls his daughter’s body out of the cold muddy water, he emits an ungodly howl. His sobs come from the pit of his stomach. I’m stuck by this because I know those sounds. The resonance with that anguish is all too clear now. 

Family turbulence always goes a long way in horror films. The open wounds of a family broken by a traumatic incident are the perfect breeding ground for the supernatural to fester. Much like Roeg’s sophomore feature Walkabout (1971), Don’t Look Now has a family member's death as the catalyst for the story. When their young daughter drowns in the river near their home in England, John and Laura Baxter travel to Venice where John has accepted a commission to restore an ancient church. Saddled with the remorse and grief felt by their negligence that played a part in the tragic accident, Laura’s feelings soon take a turn with a chance meeting involving two elderly sisters. One of the siblings believes she is psychic and claims to have had contact with the Baxter’s daughter from beyond the grave. The readings give Laura hope, however, John stubborn with guilt and wary of a spate of murders occurring in the city, grows frustrated with his wife’s insistence of Christine’s happiness in the afterlife. That said, John also appears touched by the gift of premonition and is soon struck with visions of a small figure dressed in the same outfit Christine wore at the time of her death: A Red Hooded Mack.

For all the talk of visions and apparitions, so much of Don’t Look Now deals with the very human drama of a couple finding each other after a traumatic event. Where Walkabout used its guilt-riddled incident to approach themes of lost innocence and irrevocable change, Don’t Look Now’s tragedy leads towards how grief influences intimacy and romantic connection. Innocence is lost here too. However, Roeg frames this as two flawed human beings who still have a deep love for each other and, importantly, still look for ways to reconnect despite their differing views on tackling their loss.

One can say that travelling to Venice to get over their daughter's drowning is perhaps not the best way to go about overcoming their despair. Moving to a literal floating city surrounded by water ensures that the Baxters cannot get past their trauma. In the original short story by Daphne du Maurier, the death of Christine is caused by meningitis. Roeg and his screenwriters alter this in the film to drowning, a masterstroke. With that substance being the element that took their daughter away, the so-called city of water becomes a haunting presence for both the audience and the Baxters. A crumbling, sinking crypt masquerading as a place of escape. Full of labyrinthine alleyways and dead ends. At one point The Baxter’s find themselves lost in the city. Their disorientation metaphorically highlights the couple's struggle to find a way out of their pain. It becomes important to note that Laura leaves Venice at one point and does so after obtaining clarity from the clairvoyant sisters. For John, who never leaves Italy once the film’s action moves there, the location becomes a catacomb of grief. 

The small moment of respite the Baxters obtain in the film is also Don’t Look Now’s controversial sequence. Midway through the film, John and Laura enjoy a moment of passionate lovemaking. The scene is executed in such a way, that the gossipy whisperings that the actors had full sex on film remain to this day. For a British film, the last thing you’d expect to find is sexuality being so unbridled when the culture is often so chaste. So much emphasis is placed on the scene due to the will they, won’t they factor. What becomes more apparent, however, is when we consider how the scene is intercut with the couple getting ready afterwards. There’s a strong emphasis on the normality of it all. For the Baxters it is a small piece of levitation and true pleasure the couple has after the tragedy that’s befallen them. This makes Don’t Look Now one of the only films which observes sexuality in a mature and adult way. The scene seems more erotic because of this. The awkward gait and angles of their body movement give the scene a realism that has not been seen much of before or since.  Roeg's assembly of the sequence feels like the shower sequence in Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960). You are led to believe you saw more than you actually did.  

But this moment of intimacy doesn’t wash away the deep-seated pain that looms over the couple. The sex hints at the connection of love the Baxter’s once had. But their feelings on how to approach grief now show a vast rift between them. And that the disconnect is affecting. Anyone who has experienced anything similar knows how fleeting the feeling of normalcy is. So much of their location is used as a destabilising effect. The spate of murders lingers in the background. The priest John is working with seems blasé about the work taking place, and even the God he proclaims to believe in. Midway through the film, a detective is introduced to investigate the spate of murders occurring in the background. Roeg purposely casts an Italian actor whose command of English isn’t as strong as others. Pushing the isolation the couple feel even further. But the key ingredient to much of Don’t Look Now is the mosaic-like editing. 50 years on, Don’t Look Now is put together in a way that feels fresher than films released 6 months ago. So many films of the modern era appear incapable of utilising the language of cinema in such an expressive way. With so many elements of composition and editing being viewed as more of a means to an end. Roeg’s powerful use of cutting ensures the Baxters are unstuck in time. Reliving their pain in both past, present and future. Essentially experiencing grief as a Mobius strip. An unbreakable loop of anguish. 

At one point a character describes Venice as “A city in aspic, left over from a dinner party, and all the guests are dead and gone.”  When you think about it, you wonder: Why bring your trauma to such a place?  It is a city which leaves its characters unmoored in many ways. John tries to throw himself into work, but either appears unfocused or in peril. Heather’s unstableness is displayed in just how easily susceptible she is to these strange sisters who claim to see into the beyond. For many the scariest thing in the world is our fragile mortality. The death of Christine becomes a huge metaphor for this. Her passing disturbs John and Laura in all three tenses. Leaving them unprepared and uncertain. For Laura (impeccably played by Julie Christie), the sisters help her regain some emotional footing but leave her vulnerable. For the sceptic John, his reluctance only ramps up his anxiety and fear of the unknown. When you lose a child, even if you have the good fortune to have another, or the child has a sibling, that small piece of the puzzle of a person’s life will forever be missing. It becomes difficult to feel like the complete picture again. It becomes obvious to see what the Baxters are doing to try and break the loop. 

Don’t Look Now isn’t one for typical scare tactics. Save for one moment, the gore is scarce. The type of Lewton Bus scares which litter many horror films are also omitted. But what makes Don’t Look Now so unsettling is its sense of existential dread hanging around the edges of the frame. Noticeable in the symbolic decaying city of Venice but also in how the film hops across its fractured timeline almost at a whim. Having the audience occupy the same frame of mind as its protagonists. John suffers from the curse of premonition early. Experiencing moments of foreshadowing that could change the fate of characters if they could just understand what’s happening to them. It’s a disorientating and unsettling effect. Being led to see more of the future than one can comprehend. Through their grief, the senses of the Baxters are now heightened in a way that others are not due to their perception being dulled.  Roeg encapsulates a profound anxiety: a fear of the known unknown.  

Watching Don’t Look Now this time after experiencing a similar tragedy, the core relationship between the Baxters hits harder now than previously. From the quiet moments of intimacy to the unsaid things which lie amongst the small talk, all creeps under the skin. At the same time, the film’s infamous climax is just as heart-wrenching as it is unsettling. Perhaps because after experiencing something so painful, it’s easy to see oneself fall into the same trappings as John. Wary of a hesitant future, all the while being too stubborn to see what may be in front of you. The loss of innocence does indeed bring about existential dread. It also pulls intimacy into sharp focus. One of the scariest things for me in rewatching Don’t Look Now is how tragedy can alter one’s sense of perception. Even now, when watching the film again, a small part of me still cries out for its ending to differ. For John to regain some of his innocence.  For him to absorb a little more of that intimacy over his grief. Something to have him refrain from stumbling around dilapidated alleys. Sleepwalking towards more misfortune. 

In the time it took for me to collate some thoughts on this film, Donald Sutherland had died. His son Kiefer announced on Twitter that his father’s life was well lived. Be it M*A*S*H, Klute, or Six Degrees of Separation. Sutherland’s ability to bring pathos to whatever role he played was astonishing. I feel that John Baxter is amongst his best performances. A father whose grave trauma has rocked his foundations to the core. In a piece celebrating the film for Inverse magazine, Kayleigh Donaldson remarks: “It’s not simply that you cannot escape death; it’s that it’s everywhere, quietly reminding you of its arrival in your life.” In rewatching his performance here, I found a strange amount of solace within my two losses. A salve through observing grief on a Moebius strip. I was rewatching Death on a loop. In real life. On celluloid. Melded together in the same mosaic way Nicolas Roeg constructs his film. Yet despite the film’s melancholy, through Donald’s performance now comes his son’s words. We may not be able to escape death, but we can live life well before its arrival. I look forward. With an attempt to live well for my wife and son. The two of us looking for where we can rebuild our bonds and provide a new piece of the puzzle to reframe ourselves.

Review: Bleeding Love

Year: 2023

Director: Emma Westenberg

Screenplay: Ruby Caster, Clara McGregor and Vera Bulder

Starring: Clara McGregor, Ewan McGregor

Synopsis is here

 

Bleeding Love opens with something that’s become a familiar pattern in today’s fractured media landscape. Like many independent features of its kind, the film begins with a multitude of different film production idents. Most of them are unheard of. Such openings have become a clear example of how difficult it is to get certain movies off the ground. It certainly makes this production feel more determined.

Ironically, the dogged nature of the barrage of production labels feels correct for Bleeding Love. It is a film about drug addiction and estranged family ties. To gain a solid footing on such themes in real life tenacity is often a key component. For lead actress Clara McGregor, who also has producer, story and singer credits on the film, it’s clear that she's dying to say something in this film. And is looking for as many ways to express that.

It possibly helps that having a famous father helps. Clara co-stars alongside her dad Ewan in this good-natured and well-intentioned tale of a father who is covertly taking his daughter to rehab hours after she’s overdosed. Their fractious relationship gets quickly established in the film's opening scene where Clara’s daughter character asks her dad to pull over on the roadside so she can relive herself. It’s an excuse to flee as the girl sprints off with her father struggling to keep the pace. It’s a funny moment. Bleeding Love effectively sets up the relationship between the couple and the tone finds its footing quickly.

There’s some intriguing stuff to chew on here. Ewan McGregor is well known for his breakthrough role as Scottish heroin addict Renton in the 90s’ phenomenon Trainspotting (1996). There is a dry sense of humour in seeing McGregor come full circle. His features are now only slightly gone to seed. He finds himself in the role of a father who feels he knows better. In Bleeding Love, his role as dad comes with a keen knowledge of where substance abuse can take you. In this story, it soon becomes apparent that this parental figure has had his share of demons but is trying his best to steer that around. This road trip with his daughter becomes a chance for him to bury some of his skeletons while keeping his daughter from creating her own.

Clara McGregor as the unnamed daughter has some entertaining moments throughout the film. Her substance-addicted character is not too overzealous. However, she is perhaps too fresh-faced and striking to seem as in trouble as the film suggests. The chemistry between father and daughter is solid enough. They bounce off each other as one would expect from real-life family members.

But while both McGregors are appealing to watch, the film never gains the emotional tug that would alleviate it above anything seen before. Director Emma Westenberg is confident in terms of form. Her use of wide-angle lenses to portray flashback scenes and drug use is well utilised, and the pop aesthetic and moments of humour are enjoyable. It’s also welcoming that many women occupy roles behind the camera to produce a film that appears different from what could have been expected.  But despite Bleeding Love’s focus on its father-daughter relationship and small flights of fancy, the film is often too safe to linger in the mind for very long.  

Bleeding Love is available on Digital Platforms from 22nd July 2024

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