Movie Review: Carnage
There is always a mild sense of controversy in admitting that you’re a fan of Roman Polanski, especially considering his conviction for the statutory rape of a 13 year old girl, which caused him to flee the United States were he had at the time begun the founding of a promising career on the back of Horror classic “Rosemary’s Baby” as well as the equally classic “Chinatown”. Due to this he frequently remains a director both admired for his directorial skills, but also approached with caution, especially when expressing any kind of admiration for his work and because of his current fugitive status, which has meant that he has not returned to the United States since 1978, despite an attempt by U.S. Authorities to extradite him back to the states in 2010, which eventually saw him being released by the Swiss after they rejected the U.S. request.
Still as a director I will admit I do list several of his films including “The Pianist” amongst my favourites and as such try to keep the man’s talent and person life separate, which is the stance that I carry across into this review as well.
Set in the aftermath of a dispute between two young boys Ethan and Zachary, which ended with one hitting the other in the face with a stick. Believing the issue can be resolved without the lawyers getting involved, the boys parents decide to hold a meeting to try and resolve the issue themselves. In this spirit of co-operation Zachary’s parents Alan and Nancy Cowan (Christoph Waltz & Kate Winslet) visit the home of Ethan’s parents Michael and Penelope Longstreet (John C. Reilly & Jodie Foster), but soon things start to go astray as personality differences come to a head and the meeting slowly degenerates.
Based on play “God of Carnage” by Yasmina Reza for which she won both the Olivier and Tony award for and despite the closest I have come to seeing being via a Wikipedia breakdown, it’s still clear that the framework has essentially been retained here, despite the names of the two mothers baffling being changed. Still Polanski has seemingly set out to shoot the film from essentially the same view point as if the audience was watch it as a play, which still allowing himself the freedom of close ups and multiple angles, rather than restraining himself by shooting from a fixed stand point and it feels like great care has been taken with each of the shots, to find those exact angles in which to shoot, while the backgrounds are so packed with interesting items and intricate details it frequently makes you want to crawl inside the film so that you might get to look around the Longstreet’s apartment better, while the claustrophobic setting perfectly cranks up the pressure as the tensions between them grow.
Despite being set in Brooklyn, New York, it’s actually Paris were the film was shot thanks to Polanski’s aforementioned status, not that it really matters as the film unfolds in a grand total of four sets, as the action moves between the Longstreet’s Living Room, Kitchen, Hallway and Bathroom with only the ending and opening shot as exterior shots, which Polanski shows the original incident happening, yet teasingly doesn’t allow us to hear what causes the fight in the first place, something which is frustratingly never really explored with the boys behaviour discussed really in snippets of conversation, while the main focus is put on finding a resolution, a topic which soon also gets lost in the upheaval of personal opinions and loosening of tongues thanks to the lashing of scotch later consumed, leading to levels of unexpected carnage from when we first meet the couple exchanging polite conversation over espresso and homemade cobbler.
The two couples differences are set to consume them and eventually each other essentially from the start, with the Cowan’s being decidedly upper class, with Nancy being an investment banker, while her husband is an investment banker, whose continuous breaks from the discussion to answer his mobile and discuss his current case were he is defending a questionable Pharmaceutical company facing a class action. Meanwhile the Longstreet’s are less grand in their pursuits with Michael working as a salesman of kitchen ware and sanitary equipment, while his wife Penelope seems almost mismatched to him in comparison, especially with her stance as the concerned liberal and writer of books about Africa’s problems, while extending her desire for chance to her husband, who she is constantly trying to improve. Still she is very much the kind of woman who wears her heart on her sleeve and displays her cultural side on the coffee table, in what would seem to be many of her attempts to social climb and escape the current preconceptions of her current position.
Polanski here has assembled here a truly fantastic cast with Three Oscar winners in his cast and his sole non winner (yet still nominated) Reilly certainly looking like a much stronger contender for one after this one, as he adds yet another great performance to his resume, especially as it’s a performance which emphasis’s his natural warmth and humour, rather than his more forced attempts at comedy he has largely now become associated with thanks to the likes of “Step Brothers” and “Walk Hard: The Dewy Cox Story” which thankfully this is a hundred miles away from. Waltz meanwhile is on his usual top form, with the script perfectly suiting his ability of elevating even the simplest of monologues into a treat for the ears, as he plays and teases out each of the words with the utmost ease. Foster once again gives us her usual sniper esq style of projection, largely being softly spoken throughout and proving truly devastation the further she is pushed as the afternoon rolls on and each attempt to end the meeting fails as the couple return to the living room once more. Winslet is the more emotional of the foursome and produces many of the surprise moments throughout including a vomit sequence which seemingly comes from nowhere and producing a similar level of shock to that of the chest burster in “Alien”.
“Carnage” is the sort of film that will appeal largely to fans of “Lost In Translation” who don’t need frequent scene changes, gratuitous nudity and expensive looking explosions to make their moving going experience a fun one, more so with the action here being a largely dialogue driven look at what happens when the manners start to fade and people let their true side show and while hardly the easiest of sells, it’s one which is certainly worth giving a look and made all the more enjoyable by it’s capable cast who share some real chemisty, helped further by a fantastic script co-written by original playwright Reza and ensuring that it perfectly transfers from the stage to the screen.
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