★★★★★
12 January 2016
A movie review of A BIGGER SPLASH. |
“I can’t believe the clock can run out on a woman like that,” Harry Hawkes (Ralph Fiennes)
A snake entering the grounds of an Italian villa idyll, early on, is an apt metaphor for what has just occurred. Rock star Marianne Lane (Tilda Swinton – of course a total fit) and boyfriend Paul De Smedt (Matthias Schoenaerts) are sojourning at the former’s secluded holiday home while she recovers from throat surgery. Lounging sans apparels is how we meet them, further growing the Garden of Eden analogy. Out of the blue, Harry (Fiennes) telephones to say he has just arrived on their Mediterranean island, Pantelleria. In tow is newly acquainted daughter, Penelope Lanier (Dakota Johnson), effusing sulky distance. Back to that snake, Paul unceremoniously chucks it from the property. Oh, and a sand storm is coming.
A snake entering the grounds of an Italian villa idyll, early on, is an apt metaphor for what has just occurred. Rock star Marianne Lane (Tilda Swinton – of course a total fit) and boyfriend Paul De Smedt (Matthias Schoenaerts) are sojourning at the former’s secluded holiday home while she recovers from throat surgery. Lounging sans apparels is how we meet them, further growing the Garden of Eden analogy. Out of the blue, Harry (Fiennes) telephones to say he has just arrived on their Mediterranean island, Pantelleria. In tow is newly acquainted daughter, Penelope Lanier (Dakota Johnson), effusing sulky distance. Back to that snake, Paul unceremoniously chucks it from the property. Oh, and a sand storm is coming.
Quietude, prior to the father-daughter interlopers, suggests contentment for the couple (perhaps an idea reaching out to all relationships devoid of outside influence and isolated from modern technology) or more interestingly, and what the film plays on, that this is a fragile happiness – a mask waiting for the tiniest of breezes to crack. No puff of air arrives; Harry is a whirlwind. Hilarious motormouth, a natural raconteur, he is the life of any party.
While a narrative welcomes Harry’s dramatic catalyst, Marianne and Paul do not; in particular the latter who spends the entire film coiled pensively. Insecurity runs through him. A struggling documentarian, he can’t compete career-wise with successful music producer Harry, who is also his belle’s ex. Complicating matters further, Harry introduced them after they split - as a result of his wandering eye. Regret brims over amidst Harry’s energetic dervish behaviour. Wait till you get a load of Fiennes dancing (you won’t look at Voldemort in the same way). His spirited performance wows and delights, reminding of another of Fiennes’ Harrys, in IN BRUGES, here though shorn of the sweary menace.
Having to rest her voice post-operation, Marianne would be blank if not for the abundant skill of Swinton making emotion and intellect swim across her face. One cannot help wonder, as do the competing men for her affections, whether she is satisfied.
All four players have barely restrained amorousness oozing from every pore. Similarly aged Marianne and Harry, in their fifties, have charisma and confidence, while 30-something Paul and the younger still Penelope, at 22, have youthful vigour. Aging command of a room verses Greek mythology beauty. No one has the full package, and the film suggests human ennui will set in when we have our fill of each, perpetually desiring the other trait. Grass is greener on the other side anxiety. Summer holiday heats up the frisson to palpable levels. Sex and violence as release are the undercurrents lapping below the surface.