In Bruges (Martin McDonagh, 2008)

[dx23]

Speaking of this film, it's good to see that Colin Farrell's excellent worked was recognized with a nomination for a Golden Globe. After many so-so films he's been part off the last couple of years, it was good to see him in something where his acting chops showed.

[Nothing]

Oh come on people, this film is diabolical. It is built on a flawed premise - the numbing cliche of 'honour amongst thieves', that Farrell's killing of the child would not only merit more than a shrug amongst criminals of this type, but that they would sacrifice their own lives to see 'justice done'. This dishonest sentimentality / flawed humanism is followed through to the film's conclusion. McDonagh's famed 'dialogue' is generally childish, a sub-Tarantino attempt to be 'off-beat'. As for the direction, it is entirely pedestrian, textbook American film school coverage that was probably suprvised by the DoP. There is one shot in the whole film that threatens to carry some visual clout, moving up behind the comedy duo as they look out from the church tower over Bruges at night in the snow - but the effect of even this one shot is ruined as McDonagh cuts roughly in, too early, into a bog standard two shot. This guy shouldn't be let near a camera. Conventional sub-Hollywood score smathers the whole thing, also. As for Farrell's acting chops, he's fine, but was far better in The New World and Miami Vice - watch these (again) instead.

[kaujot]

Oh come on people, this film is diabolical.

Is that really the adjective you were looking for?

[dx23]

As for Farrell's acting chops, he's fine, but was far better in The New World and Miami Vice - watch these (again) instead.

Miami Vice? Again? For real? I think that film showd the worst of everyone involved, including Farrell.

[John Cope]

As for Farrell's acting chops, he's fine, but was far better in The New World and Miami Vice - watch these (again) instead.

Miami Vice? Again? For real? I think that film showd the worst of everyone involved, including Farrell.

I think the opposite is true.

[Cde.]

I as well.

[jbeall]

I liked both Miami Vice and In Bruges, and think Farrell is okay in the former, quite good in the latter. And I can't stand the bloated pretentiousness of The New World.

Farrell's got great comic timing in In Bruges, and the film's absurdist streak was hilarious. I can't see why anybody would focus more on the cinema aesthetic than the darkly comic dialogue, but even so (and it's been about six months since I saw the film), I recall that it's visual aesthetic was fine. It's not a Renoir film, but then it doesn't pretend to be. This isn't Guy Ritchie selling crap as art-so-deep-you-plebs-can't-understand-it.

[Nothing]

I can't see why anybody would focus more on the cinema aesthetic than the darkly comic dialogue

Because it is a film, not a play / Elmore Leonard novel?

but even so (and it's been about six months since I saw the film), I recall that it's visual aesthetic was fine.

Define fine.

I can't stand the bloated pretentiousness of The New World.

Heaven forbid that a working director actually reach for something profound, as opposed to making slick, easily digestible, forgettable 'entertainment'.

[kaujot]

I can't see why anybody would focus more on the cinema aesthetic than the darkly comic dialogue

Because it is a film, not a play / Elmore Leonard novel?

Why does a film have to be strictly a visual thing? That's like saying that newspapers can't run profiles because they're not a news story.

[jbeall]

And as far as reaching for something profound, wasn't Guy Ritchie doing just that on Revolver? Consider how that turned out. The line between profundity and pretentiousness is very thin indeed.

I'm was being a tad unfair to Malick in my previous post, but I don't care much for his films. Beautiful imagery, but a three-hour lyric film-poem gets old for some of us. I much prefer the way the quasi-sentimental moments in In Bruges promptly get undermined by the characters' pathological nastiness, when the lyric is subverted by diabolical laughter. There are a couple of lovely visual moments, but the spell is broken as soon as the hitmen begin to speak.

[tavernier]

Here's John Simon's pan.

[Nothing]

Did I ever say 'strictly' visual? But visual form / aesthetics are a major consideration in cinema, of course.

> I much prefer the way the quasi-sentimental moments in In Bruges promptly get undermined by the characters' pathological nastiness

Except they aren't pathologically nasty, they are gangsters 'with a heart', with a 'code of honour', it's hoary old bullshit.

In any case, the point at which Terrence Malick gets compared to Guy Ritchie is also probably the point at which I should probably bow out of this thread...

[kaujot]

You implied that because it's a film, people should be watching for and focusing on the film's visuals, not its dialog, which I find to be a very totalitarian statement.

I wouldn't give a shit about House of Games if Mantegna said something like "Oh, this is too big of a risk. I'll pass on your idea," instead of "Oh, you're a bad pony. And I'm not gonna bet on you." The visuals of that film are in its art direction, not the actual direction. But it's the dialog that makes it come alive. That hardly makes it less of a film. Similar to In Bruges, though I would add that the film had some excellent visual moments.

[Mr Sausage]

Except they aren't pathologically nasty, they are gangsters 'with a heart', with a 'code of honour', it's hoary old bullshit.

It's not "hoary old bullshit" so much as a convention of the form. Such conventions can be tired, but In Bruges has a lot of fun playing slightly with them. I especially like how the gangster-with-a-code convention gets taken to its brutally logical conclusion, twice. The first is that grimly hilarious scene where Ralph Fiennes finds he can no longer kill Gleeson, and his exasperation at his own code is hysterical. Then of course when he's actually held to his, at first dubious, claim that he'd shoot himself if he found he killed a kid, his whole code is revealed to be as pathological as the rest of him (Farrell's suicide attempt is out of genuine human emotion, but Finnes' suicide at the same contains none of this and is totally unrelatable--his code is so inhuman, like a robot) and not the result of laudable ethics, which is how movies usually present it.

There's other stuff, but I suddenly find myself too groggy to write about it.

[Nothing]

It's not "hoary old bullshit" so much as a convention of the form.

This would be the convention adhered to by Goodfellas, Godfather Pt2, Gomorrah...? But, wait, this is a British film... British films must at all times pander to the audience and subscribe to faux humanism in place of psychological/social reality if they want to have any chance of breaking the US market, so I guess this is okay afterall.

You implied that because it's a film, people should be watching for and focusing on the film's visuals, not its dialog, which I find to be a very totalitarian statement.

In fact, you are correct - by following a tired and tested list of shooting/editing conventions and techniques, it is possible (and desirable) to sublimate mise-en-scene beneath the far more important 'content' of a film, this being narrative, character, dialogue and performance. This is what one might term 'real filmmaking', as opposed to the 'artsy-fartsy bollocks' that French people and communists tend to indulge in from time to time.

[Mr Sausage]

It's not "hoary old bullshit" so much as a convention of the form.

This would be the convention adhered to by Goodfellas, Godfather Pt2, Gomorrah...? But, wait, this is a British film... British films must at all times pander to the audience and subscribe to faux humanism in place of psychological/social reality if they want to have any chance of breaking the US market, so I guess this is okay afterall.

Doesn't matter where your film is made, genre convention is genre convention, and the gangster with a moral code is a genre convention. I would also like to know what you think humanism is, just so I can figure out what faux-humanism means. I've gathered you think humanism is antithetical to "psychological/social reality" (or at least faux-humanism...?), but I just have to ask: whose reality are we talking about? A ganster's reality is never going to be your reality anyway, so won't a movie seem more real if it apes a realistic movie style, not if it actually tries to be 'real'? (In Bruges is fantasy anyway, so it's kind of a tangential question, I know).

[kaujot]

In fact, you are correct - by following a tired and tested list of shooting/editing conventions and techniques, it is possible (and desirable) to sublimate mise-en-scene beneath the far more important 'content' of a film, this being narrative, character, dialogue and performance. This is what one might term 'real filmmaking', as opposed to the 'artsy-fartsy bollocks' that French people and communists tend to indulge in from time to time.

I'll be honest. I have no idea what you're talking about it.

[Nothing]

Doesn't matter where your film is made, genre convention is genre convention, and the gangster with a moral code is a genre convention.

Perhaps I didn't make my point clearly enough - the characters in the three films I listed certainly do not adhere to this convention. They are out for themselves, out for the money. Woe-betide anyone who gets in the way. They are gangsters, in other words - still romanticised, perhaps, but depictions that are close enough to bone to be worthwhile. One need only investigate the source material to know this to be the case (at least in the case of Goodfellas & Gomorrah).

Renoir is a genuine humanist, he can stare unblinkered into the heart of man - our greed, our selfishness, our violence, depravity and indifference - and still find a great deal of value. Malick also. Faux humanism, as practiced by McDonagh, is the refusal to accept / engage with the darker aspects of human nature because to do so is too 'troubling', too 'disturbing' for the mainly bourgeois audience that you are trying to flatter, satiate, pander to and, ultimately, exploit financially.

I'm perhaps being too unkind to the British - Sexy Beast and Gangster No:1 had at least something to recommend them.

[NABOB OF NOWHERE]

Fed up with being urged to see this by friends I bought the dvd only to stop it after 20 mins to list it on e-bay. Reluctantly I returned to see it out and went to bed furious at once again being fooled by word of mouth desperate hype- this time by witless smug derivative and tedious paddy banter gangstering. (Before I get picked up by the PC police, I am as Irish as the director). The only thing keeping me going was wondering whether Farrell's endless Groucho style eyebrow acting would atrophy before the credirs.

[Mr Sausage]

Doesn't matter where your film is made, genre convention is genre convention, and the gangster with a moral code is a genre convention.

Perhaps I didn't make my point clearly enough - the characters in the three films I listed certainly do not adhere to this convention. They are out for themselves, out for the money. Woe-betide anyone who gets in the way. They are gangsters, in other words - still romanticised, perhaps, but depictions that are close enough to bone to be worthwhile. One need only investigate the source material to know this to be the case (at least in the case of Goodfellas & Gomorrah).

Out of curiosity, when Don Corleone refuses Salozzo's offer to go into the drug business because it's a "dirty" business, would you not consider that a code of honour, especially next the cold honourlessness of his son?

But I still don't get your point. What is it you're trying to say about genre convention? Are you devaluing genres that adhere to a convention of their form? And why do you insist on comparing In Bruges, a fantasy, to movies like Goodfellas? It's a bit like comparing Psycho to Evil Dead in terms of their believeability.

Renoir is a genuine humanist, he can stare unblinkered into the heart of man - our greed, our selfishness, our violence, depravity and indifference - and still find a great deal of value. Malick also. Faux humanism, as practiced by McDonagh, is the refusal to accept / engage with the darker aspects of human nature because to do so is too 'troubling', too 'disturbing' for the mainly bourgeois audience that you are trying to flatter, satiate, pander to and, ultimately, exploit financially.

Except engaging "with the darker aspects of human nature" has nothing to do with humanism. Humanism, historically, is an affirmation of the dignity and worth of man and the importance of the present life against the doom-and-gloom of mediaevel thought. Whether you arrive at it through hard examination of human faults, or from a hard examination of human virtues (or from whatever it is In Bruges is doing to become humanist, or 'faux' humanist), doesn't much matter. You've invented this distinction yourself. No doubt it is more appealing to a modern person, since people today seem more willing to believe the worst of humanity than the best, or at least to treat depictions of a suffering life as reality and depictions of an easy, non-suffering life as sentimental fantasy. But it hasn't much to do with humanism.

I'd be more interested, actually, in whether you think the mediaeval elements (purgatorial structure, mediaeval feel of the setting, vague grotesquerie) means the movie is not dealing with humanism at all, 'faux' or real.

[HerrSchreck]

Out of curiosity, when Don Corleone refuses Salozzo's offer to go into the drug business because it's a "dirty" business, would you not consider that a code of honour, especially next the cold honourlessness of his son?.

Just a head's up-- Don Corleone is a stand-in for Carlo Gambino, and the no-drugs policy had less to do with morality (Corleone: "It makes no difference to me what you do for a living understand,") than pragmatism, via the agreement that was ultimately reached at Apalachin NY. Drugs for the most part were avoided (this is of course a myth anyhow, and even in the movie Corleone submits to dumping them into minority nabes "theyre animals anyhow.. let them lose their souls") because they represented a threat not only to the health of the individual members via addiction/financial-deterioration, but because of the stiff prison sentences threatening to turn members into informants. The business was too hi-risk, too violent, too riddled with informants and unknown quantities. It was strictly a business decision to protect the organization from the threat the drug business posed-- in the film as well as in real life.

The Mafia doesn't give a dang about "civilians" who exist exclusively for the exploitation. Any patter about morality from a group that, after all, grew its legs on bootlegging bathtub gutrot, gambling, hookers, murder-for-hire, etc (that we can presume Corleone is a part of for his bread and butter), is and should be suspect. They have qualms about nothing, unless it threatens their own survival.

[Mr Sausage]

Out of curiosity, when Don Corleone refuses Salozzo's offer to go into the drug business because it's a "dirty" business, would you not consider that a code of honour, especially next the cold honourlessness of his son?.

Just a head's up-- Don Corleone is a stand-in for Carlo Gambino, and the no-drugs policy had less to do with morality (Corleone: "It makes no difference to me what you do for a living understand,") than pragmatism, via the agreement that was ultimately reached at Apalachin NY. Drugs for the most part were avoided (this is of course a myth anyhow, and even in the movie Corleone submits to dumping them into minority nabes "theyre animals anyhow.. let them lose their souls") because they represented a threat not only to the health of the individual members via addiction/financial-deterioration, but because of the stiff prison sentences threatening to turn members into informants. The business was too hi-risk, too violent, too riddled with informants and unknown quantities. It was strictly a business decision to protect the organization from the threat the drug business posed-- in the film as well as in real life.

The Mafia doesn't give a dang about "civilians" who exist exclusively for the exploitation. Any patter about morality from a group that, after all, grew its legs on bootlegging bathtub gutrot, gambling, hookers, murder-for-hire, etc (that we can presume Corleone is a part of for his bread and butter), is and should be suspect. They have qualms about nothing, unless it threatens their own survival.

Good points. My question was definitely off-base. But surely I'm not off base in finding some sort of code of honour in Don Corleone--in family, in business, or what have you--that Michael lacks, leading to the emptiness of that final image in part II?

[Ishmael]

But surely I'm not off base in finding some sort of code of honour in Don Corleone--in family, in business, or what have you--that Michael lacks, leading to the emptiness of that final image in part II?

There’s certainly a moral code—almost a sophistication, a sense of old-world charm that's honest within its brutal limits—that Don Corleone represents. The Don has a certain way of conducting business; it involves murder and theft, but it also has rules. If you play his game, he’ll play yours. That’s the point of the opening scene of Part I: the Don won’t murder the guys who raped the undertaker’s daughter because they didn’t kill her. He will, however, make them suffer, as long as the undertaker pledges his friendship. It’s not about money, since twice he refuses Bonasera’s offer of financial assistance. It’s about respect and honor. This code begins to degenerate as soon as he goes into the hospital in Part 1: “Pop never used to talk about business at the table.” The clearest example, though, of how far Michael’s sense of honor has fallen is what he does to Fredo. That pretty much represents the abandonment of any moral code, and it leads directly to the final image you reference.

Regarding the Don’s desire not to move into drugs, he’s pretty explicit that he’s afraid his political friends would “not be friendly very long if they found out our business was drugs instead of gambling, which they regard as harmless vices.” I’m not sure that’s a moral code; it sounds more like a matter of practicality. His political allies are his power. Salazzo and the other enemies of the Corleones take his reluctance to get into drugs as a sign that the Don’s influence is slipping, which is something Moe Green says explicitly to Michael later in Vegas. The fact that Michael brings the family back to the top by sacrificing all its ideals is tragic, but it also represents, for me, a general comment about the whitewashing of codes of honor, individuality, and integrity in the amoral business ethic that has increasingly defined power in American life.

[HerrSchreck]

Again, it's all practicality and brains, pretty much, in not turning yourself into too big a target. Whether the Don was slipping had more to do with pushing off a big deal backed by other families-- refusing his assets-- and walking around unguarded like a tired old man.

On the drug decision-- It's brains that the younger generations of mob guys lost, as they wanted to move at ninety miles an hour, make all the money in the world all at once, flash their wealth publicly, want too much too fast and at any cost. It's just bad business. Move too fast and too crazy, too recklessly, then the veneer of public normalcy falls apart, as does graft arrangements with politicians who can't maintain "front", yadda.

I really didn't want to insert myself into the discussion here w Mr_sausage & Nothing, which I was enjoying (I haven't seen the film in question, which I'd like to signal here).

[Nothing]

Out of curiosity, when Don Corleone refuses Salozzo's offer to go into the drug business because it's a "dirty" business, would you not consider that a code of honour, especially next the cold honourlessness of his son? But I still don't get your point. What is it you're trying to say about genre convention? Are you devaluing genres that adhere to a convention of their form? And why do you insist on comparing In Bruges, a fantasy, to movies like Goodfellas? It's a bit like comparing Psycho to Evil Dead in terms of their believeability.

Certainly, a debate can be had on why the early Sicilian mafia avoided narcotics (and also, in some cases, prostitution) - good business or morality? Personally, I'd incline towards a little of both - these were old school guys from rough peasant backgrounds where the word community still held some meaning. Undoubtably, there was a lot of hypocrisy in their 'code' - separating the 'good' and 'bad' criminal activities in their minds, a way of justifying their own actions and self-interest to themselves. Ultimately, people still died.

Where I don't see any debate is that these "mafia ethics" are a thing of the distant past - and I believe the gangster movie has moved on with the times. The Godfather Part I bookended the chapter on 'old-school ethics', to be exploded only two years later in The Godfather Part II. Films such as Goodfellas and Gomorrah take this amorality towards it's logical conclusion and, in such a context, In Bruges is a soft anachronism. It injects an early 20th century convention into a 21st century criminal mileu for no other purpose than to molly-coddle it's intended bourgeois audience, the Saturday night crowd, who don't take it kindly when too much reality is served up with their chips. It is indeed a 'fantasy' - a dishonest one.

Except engaging "with the darker aspects of human nature" has nothing to do with humanism. Humanism, historically, is an affirmation of the dignity and worth of man and the importance of the present life against the doom-and-gloom of mediaevel thought. Whether you arrive at it through hard examination of human faults, or from a hard examination of human virtues (or from whatever it is In Bruges is doing to become humanist, or 'faux' humanist), doesn't much matter. You've invented this distinction yourself.

Yes, it is my distinction. I believe that, for humanism to be convincing, it must first acknowledge the darker aspects of human nature.

La Regle de Jeu is perhaps the perfect humanist film in that, for all its light and life, for all its joy, it is a film that cannot be fully understood outside the context of the looming Nazi scourge - and in this is not an ounce of contradiction. One might think, also, of the climax of Polanski's The Pianist. The great human capacity to overcome suffering, to reach joy through pain, the acceptance that one cannot exist without the other.

In Bruges, on the other hand, denies and softens reality to make it's points, to turn Farrell and company into likable, 'decent' human beings (gothic setting or no). Thus, faux humanism.