Director: Mike Nichols Movie Review Sample

Film: Closer (2004)

1. What is the true subject or theme of the film, and what kind of statement, if any, does the film make about the subject? Which elements and which scenes contribute most to addressing the theme of the film?
Closer is a tragic romantic drama about four people trapped in a game of love, seduction and deception. The characters seems to be in ‘true’ relationships at first, however as the film rolls, it’s becoming more evident that the only truth in the whole film is their desire to sleep with one another. All the four characters are sharp, articulate and even sincere in conjuring up their own lies and in confessing them just to cause pain. As the character Alice tells Dr. Larry, “Lying is the most fun a girl can have without taking her clothes off, but its better if you do.”
The film is portrayed by four great actors, Julia Roberts (Anna), Natalie Portman (Alice and Jane Jones), Jude Law (Dan) and Clive Owen (Dr. Larry). The character’s lives interconnect through a series of meet cutes scenes in places with great significance in the whole film. Dan the obituary writer meets Alice the American stripper in a love at first sight scene as they were walking the streets of London. As they were eyeing and flirting with each other, distracted Alice is struck by a taxicab. As she opens her eyes, she sees Dan and smiles, “Hello, stranger.” They became a couple, enough time for Dan to make a novel of based on their relationship with Alice. To do the photo shoot for his book jacket, he hires American photographer, Anna who he instantly desires and leaves Alice for. Time flies and Dan out of curiosity, impersonates as Anna on-line and sets up a date with stranger Dr. Larry in the real Anna’s favorite place, the aquarium. Dr. Larry turned up as planned and accidentally met the real Anna there and then starts their affair. Alice, who works a stripper, meets Dr. Larry in the bar and they also hitched.
Scenes that really describe the film’s depiction of deceit are too many to mention. In the early part of the film, there’s one scene when Anna says, “I'm not a thief, Alice,” but the next scenes wherein Dan and Anna became lovers, proves she really is. Dan cheats on Anna by having internet sex with Dr. Larry who thinks he is Anna. Dr. Larry tells Dan that Alice didn’t had sex with him, however, Alice reveals later on in a confrontation with Dan that they really did. Alice on the very beginning is lying, because her real name is Jane Jones, as revealed in the end. She adapted Alice Ayres based on a name of a hero imprinted in a monument.
2. How do all of the separate elements of the film relate to and contribute to the theme, central purpose, or total effect?
a. Narrative – Director Nichols detached the story from the usual chronological narrative in which the cut from one scene to the next leaps across months or years. The movie keeps us guessing how much time until the next scene wherein they switched partners has passed. Everything is revealed through their lines and conversations.
It focuses more on talk, delivering lines wherein the actors did a very good job at. Unlike other movies on sex, Closer doesn’t focus on the graphic sexual intercourse. Rather, verbal intercourse dominates every scene as evident in their flirtations, backlashes, arguments and confessions. For example in confessing the truth to Dan, Alice tells him, “Here’s the truth, so now you can hate me. Larry fucked me all night. I enjoyed it. I came.” This proves how words are simply enough to prove a point.
b. Acting – As great actors, Law, Roberts, Portman and Owen doesn’t need any supporting acts to narrate the whole story. Since the movie is an adapted play of the same name, they gave justice to it. The most powerful act in the movie was when Dan shouts at Alice, “Who are you!” She replied “I’m no one”, and spits in his face.
Roberts acting is far off from her usual smiling characters in the past. As Anna in the movie, she is very serious and morose but still able to attract the guys in the film. Owen’s powerful macho aura is disarmed when he delivered the sad lines with Alice in the strip club after being heartbroken from Anna’s deceit.
c. Cinematography – The angles of the movie are noteworthy. The first scene where in Alice was struck by a taxi and she saw Dan from a ant’s point of view and the film cuts to her close-up saying “hello stranger”. Even only in that scene, we can see what the whole movie is all about - that every character until the very end, are all strangers to one another.
The scene in the strip club is also interesting with shots of Dr. Larry and Alice’s flirtations and awkward stripper poses captured in weird camera angles such as a zooming in to extreme close up of Dr. Larry eye’s from under Alice’s legs and a sudden bird’s eye view when he shouted “What do you have to do to get a little bit of intimacy around here!”
d. Editing – The film didn’t use any special effects or transitions nor did it use any type of filters. It’s just plain, linear story editing.
e. Art Direction and Design- Since most of the location is in of London, the streets, museums, tourist spots, parks and galleries were used like in the scene of Anna’s photo exhibition and in the reveal of Alice’s true name. Creative set used is the strip club’s private room wherein the motif is sparkling blue and red.
The costumes for all characters are plain London fashion except with Alice, as a stripper, she was donned in sexy outfits and wigs of pink and orange and even her black hair seems fake
3. What scenes in the film show the director’s style and how do they show it?
In his past works, Nichols was known for his direction in the raw and needy emotions expressed in two of “Who’s afraid of Virginia Wolf and “Carnal Knowledge. His style of addressing sexuality is discreet and truthful. In Closer he used this style to show less and say more. Although one of the characters is a stripper, the movie was directed in a way that the focus would be the conversation rather than the skin, as opposed to countless of movies on sex. We can see this style in the strip club scene where in Natalie Portman’s nudity didn’t take the glory away from fully-clothed Clive Owen’s raw self-exposure.
4. What were your personal reactions to the film? What are your personal reasons for liking or disliking the film?
In my opinion, Closer is a very unique love story fit for this generation wherein insincerity in relationships is rampant. The characters do not understand each other even themselves. They only know what they want and how to get it but not take responsibility for it. All they care is experiencing their own pleasure not considering who they hurt. In the end, they are all lost and really not destined to be with each other. True love is absent in the story as the characters definition of love is lust. For me, the movie ended in a happy one as each of the character doesn’t deserve to be together and they did not.