Gerry
Directed by: Gus Van Sant Written by: Gus Van Sant, Casey Affleck, and Matt Damon Starring: Casey Affleck and Matt Damon
It's not often that an R-rated movie appears on the scene about two 20-something jerk-offs that isn't about sex, drugs, or Rock and Roll. But in a youth culture that prioritizes the crude, often hilarious, but predictable exploits of the sexually malnourished male, asking whether making a different kind of movie is possible, should be the most logical next step.
For indie filmmakers today, swapping storyline and action for the sake of experimentation and originality is a step that even directors of seemingly mainstream movies are willing to take. However, Van Sant, whose directorial credits include Good Will Hunting and the edgy Drugstore Cowboy, could hardly be categorized in the same column as Jerry Bruckheimer apprenticed cheese-graders and other hardwired mainstream corporate puppet-masters.
Gerry, Van Sants's latest effort, is a storyless, lifeless, visually breathtaking and mentally exasperating experience, which even for buffs and Damon and Vant Sant faithful may require an unknown amount of patience to uncover its sandblasted genius.
A film without heroes; just two stoned-confidant "Gerrys" with nothing better to do than take a daytrip scatabout into nowhere. Both are casually dressed for either a day in the desert or a night on the town, and aware of nothing if not that because they have the world by the balls they're invincible.
It's a film where the story isn't what it's about as much as it becomes a mirror held-up to viewers to show them what they've been expecting from movies today. Made to reform and revitalize the trade's compendium of cinematic techniques, while educating today's viewers.
Playing with our desire for a straightforward narration and stable sense of connection with the characters, who are virtually as ordinary as anyone, smoking the occasional grit, talking about video games, and building obscure phrases like "shirt basket" and "dirt mattress," the camera's and by extension Van Sant's viewpoint shifts from omniscient detachment to co-partner of their fading hopes of survival.
For Gerry and Gerry their drama is a simple search for water and the highway home while recognizing that after days of walking without either in sight, or the strength to continue the search, this might be the end.
Charting their estrangement from the civilized order, their clothing gradually bears the battle marks of dirt and sand and as days walk by. The look of hunger, thirst and exhaustion shows more and more on their faces. The film drags you kicking and screaming through a stunning landscape: a dry, barren deathtrap of jagged mountains, endless, serpentine sand dunes and miles of craggy vegetation.
Shot close to real time, the camera moves with them and paces their actions with wide angle panning shots and odd-angle close-ups showing the young men's mounting frustration as they get further and further from where they started. Pitting the eerie landscape with Arvo Part's hypnotic score, the creative team of Van Sant, Damon and Affleck is filled with promise to be matched with the likes of best. But it will definitely require more than what two hapless Gerry's can deliver to consider these comparisons.
Matthew Czarnik is a graduate of UW, where he was an arts and entertainment editor. Matt works a day job to support his writing habit.
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