Another marvelous experience from Marco Berger. I became very much more aware of many of his cinematic traits while watching this film – perhaps because I have relatively recently seen two other works by him and his visual language is still fresh in my mind. #
The opening was characteristic with an animated conversation between two people – the two main characters Bruno and Pablo with the female Laura soon introduced into the mix. – but which we only saw and could only hear the musical soundtrack. I think in this case we are put in the position of an observer who knows nothing about the situation and characters being shown but which nevertheless draws us in to their story, as here the conversation looked urgent and passionate. I think this helps draw us in to the story as we can see that the interaction is important to the characters even though we are not privy to what it is about. I think another technique that he uses is lingering on a character’s face for longer than is strictly necessary which also, for me at least, helps me to begin to identify with that character and share his/her moods and emotions at that time – even if, as with the opening sequence, we do not know anything about them or the interactions that we are observing.
The film is regularly punctuated with establishing shots of buildings and locations that have a very formal and geometric quality about them – and again, the length of shot is just a little bit longer than one would expect.
c.28 minutes in, the two central characters meeting up is depicted in a very romantic way with long pauses before they see and react to each other – and again, no dialogue. And here, as in much of the early part of the film, the subtle moves that Bruno makes on Pablo are very elegantly effective.
Like perhaps all of his films, this film deals with male intimacy and male friendship and the connections and links between them in a sensitive, often erotic but not luridly blatant way. The intimacy is casual – much of the time and Berger manages to suggest that something sexual could happen but this is again done subtly and plausibly – and very cinematically. He does not rely on dialogue and in this way demonstrate=s that he is a master in communicating in a cinematic (i.e. visual) way. His way of filming interactions between men is marvelously sexual and often erotic – and yet very subtle with the possibility of ‘action’ or not always being very ambiguous and uncertain. In a way NOT having a sexual scene becomes very sexual in itself. He also makes use of what is apparently almost a signature shot – the Berger shot with the camera at crotch level (there was a LOT of this in Taekwondo) which I see as the gay male gaze and the equivalent of the ‘male gaze’ idea of Laura Mulvey and how women are, and almost always have been, the object of sexual male viewing.
By 40 minutes in, the likelihood of greater intimacy is much stronger – a casual arm thrown over Pablo when they share a bed for example. And at about the same time in the film, the close-up shots of Bruno, with their lingering quality marvelously convey the mixture of his feelings. I recall, about here in the film, that shot of them embracing with the camera lingering on Bruno’s face as they embrace…it managed to convey both guilt and desire and uncertainty. And all this was helped by the fact that the camera just remained on his face so that we, the viewer, could more fully empathize with him at that moment.
The value and power of NOT knowing was very powerfully shown in the scene where Pablo opens the gift received (hello, Hawaii!) and reads the letter. We do not know what the letter says but by this stage, I think we are well able to get a strong sense of what it does say. It was also noticeable that the colour of the photo displayer matches that of the lamp beside Pablo’s bed. And earlier on, Bruno was wearing a shirt with red on. But just after this when we saw him – no red on him at all which was a marvelously subtle way of indicating that he realizes that he must end what it was that was between and connects them.
As the film approaches the climax and resolution, there was, at 1. 10 a wonderfully powerful scene of Pablo lying on his bed, again silence, and thinking of the letter and one tear runs down his cheek with he quickly and somewhat aggressively brushes away. It sounds like a cliché but it was wonderfully powerful.
Their meeting again after the ‘break-up’ at the gym (where they first met) was marvelously awkward – and very traditionally masculine in their mutual inarticulacy – in sharp contrast to the emotional freedom they had been showing to each other – but not really through words.
And the ending was superbly satisfying with the fact that we remained outside the bedroom being one of the best aspects of the scene.
So, another marvelous piece of work.