Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Simple Film, Difficult Reality, Complex Redemption

I wish there were more films like Rachel Getting Married.

Those who have seen this film, can surely attest that Rachel Getting Married is hardly your big Hollywood mega-production. It's hand-held camera style, and it's clear resolute to be unconventional is clearly intentional. This film could not be told so well with Hollywood finesse.

In fact, I think that many films that want to deal with interpersonal drama and situations are better told "small." Some how, by being small makes the film seem more real.

Another small film that has this appeal to me is the film Pieces of April or Frozen River. Perhaps you can think of other films like this as well.

This fly-on-the-wall-production-light style has great appeal in connecting you to these people as three dimensional characters. Neither Rachel (Rosemarie DeWitt) or Kym (Anne Hathaway), the two sisters in this film, are all victim or all victor, instead there a mixed bag of person that represents how people really are...complex.

And seeing Kym and Rachel and everyone else have low and high points also gives the film viewer to see how in real life there is opportunity for redemption, but it's not all fairies and rainbows.

There's complex redemption. Redemption that doesn't wipe away the past, redemption that doesn't offer future guarantees, but redemption that has hope. And this complex and true redemption is beautiful.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

There is a special quality that this movie has, perhaps that it is told in a small way, that made me feel uncomfortable, like I was there, experiencing the harsh realities of their lives. I really appreciated that realness.

Notas Sobre Creación Cultural e Imaginarios Sociales said...

I agree, sometimes it gets so intimate you feel like you shouldn't even be there.
Brilliant performance by DeWitt!

RC said...

@ ehome & Jose --- I was wondering what parts I felt most akward about --- surely the scene with Kym and her Mom, but more so for me was the akwardness at the rehersal dinner --- I appreciated Kym for trying, but could understand how Rachel could be so hurt and bothered by Kym's toast on so many levels.

Courtney Small said...

The dinner rehearsal was a fascinating, and cringe inducing, scene. There is a certain level of emotional rawness that flows in this scene and several others. I also loved the dishwasher scene with the father and son-in-law. It seemlessly moves from a joyus event that brings the family together, to a heart wrenching moment that rips them further apart within a matter of minutes. Great film all around.