Phocus Insights - thoughts from Rodney Collins

Certified Copy: a review

Life really is what we make it.  Literally.  The mind edits – speech, smell, images and memory – with lightning speed and with little trace of the spliced edge.  Life is edited to perfection to enact a world which represents how we feel at a particular moment in time.  Who hasn’t had the experience of encountering an object that is a lot smaller as an adult than we remembered as a child or of the stunningly beautiful or handsome first date who disappointingly begins to look incredibly ordinary the second time around?

In ‘Certified Copy’ Juliet Binoche pairs up with renowned baritone-turned-actor William Shimmel on a day’s excursion through a small Tuscan village.  Shimmel plays somewhat successful English author, James Miller, who is in Tuscany shopping his latest book on the underappreciated value of copies of great works of art.  Reasonably, he argues that reproductions are pieces of art unto themselves and that their status as ‘copies’ is no different from the manner in which ‘the original’ copies the image of its subject – be it a pretty woman or a bowl of fruit. 

Binoche’s character is a fan of his. Well, actually she’s an enamoured fan who arranges to meet up with and to spend the day with Miller following his book talk.  He signs several books for her to keep and to give to friends and family.  The two go off on a drive to nowhere in particular.  In fact, their journey serves as a metaphor for the aimless journey that the film seems to be taking.  But patience, as they say, is a virtue.  Iranian director,  Abbas Kiarostami, has little tolerance for the cinemagoer who is unable to take a few breaths and to ease into things. 

Binoche is a woman in conflict.  She begins the film in conflict with her son and through a clever juxtaposition of harmless pretense and mild psychosis is soon in raw and spirited conflict with the author, Miller, a man she barely knows.  He agrees to go along with Binoche in bringing to life a seemingly harmless mistake a café owner makes in assuming that the couple is man and wife.  Binoche makes the most of it by taking us on a journey showing what it would be like if Miller were really her husband.  Or is it that Binoche shows us what would happen if her character’s actual husband were there?  I’m not quite sure.  Kiarostami leaves the cinemagoer marvellously questioning what’s fantasy and what’s real.  Has Binoche’s character made a certified copy of her husband through psychological projection?

In leaving us guessing, the director does us a favour.  Kiarostami allows us to see that we can inhabit the same space as others and not see them at all.  We use them. We shape them. We love them.   But in the process, we lose the dividing line between reality and fantasy.  In fact, Kiarostami questions whether there is such a dividing line.  As I write this, I’ve reached the conclusion that I don’t even think Binoche’s character had a name.  The character is someone specific yet everyone at the same time.  As another example of borderline psychosis, the film dialogue moves seamlessly between Italian, English, and French in fantasied but paradoxically real expression of the ability of individuals to communicate efficiently with others who don’t share important aspects of the their world, like language. 

I know this is all very confusing, but I think it’s supposed to be.  ‘Certified Copy’ is boring yet engaging, concise yet full-length, full of meaning yet about nothing at all.  In short, the film is life itself.  Go see it.

'Up in the Air'

What can I say? If George Clooney is in the film, I make sure to give it a go.  And after his performance in 'Up in the Air', I'll be certain to continue going to see him.  In the film, Clooney plays a character so isolated and rife with contradiction that he encapsulates well the dilemmas of the life of the present day travelling professional, and by extension, many of us in the 21st century.

Clooney's character, Bingham, is a hatchet man for hire who's responsible for making personnel redundant at any one of his various corporate clients.  He's an outsider who sweeps in, delivers a questionably sincere 'goodbye and thank you for your services' message and flies off to his next assignment with little time for reflection.  The film is powerful, not so much because of the view we get of corporate firings, but because of the insight we get into the price Bingham pays for severing his ties to other people so that he may do his work with so little discomfort.  But, to be honest, when we see Bingham within the context of his sibling relationships, it is clear that his isolated approach to life pre-dated his job.  Bingham chooses a career that allows him to rely on few, have 'romantic' relationships by diary in cities across the country, and spend as little time as possible in the office with others because it suits who he is.

It's a funny thing though.  It all begins to unravel when Bingham chooses to re-engage with his siblings for his sister's wedding.  In the process, he ironically saves the day with his professionally-honed counsel when the groom gets the obligatory cold feet.  Bingham also gets a glimpse into what he has been missing in life as he witnesses their heart-rending reconciliation.

We can run, but we can't avoid connections with other human beings.  The randomness of life - weddings, deaths, accidents, job losses - ensures that our perfectly constructed defences against intimacy and the risks it imposes will crack at some point.  And the pain that follows when the defences fail is a boon, as well as an uncomfortable consequence.  Pain's upside is the alert we receive that change on some level is necessary.  A job loss means immediate financial worries, but it also invites an opportunity to change career paths or upgrade to a better position.  The marriage of someone close reminds us of our solitude, but the event also affirms that our presence has meaning to others and should not be taken for granted.

Bingham's life falls apart in just about every way from the moment he takes a step back into the world of the emotionally alive. But, the beauty is that as the artificial structures he built over the years begin to fall away, he is left with a base that is badly battered but real and able to serve as a platform for a new life with relationships that are uncertain and unpredictable, yet meaningful and rewarding.  

Again, it all started with risking the pain of emotion.  For if we want the joy of life, we have to be willing to risk the pain.