EXOTICA (1994) A Film Review by Ted Prigge Copyright 1998 Ted Prigge
Writer/Director: Atom Egoyan Starring: Bruce Greenwood, Elias Kosteas, Mia Kirshner, Don McKellar, Arsinée Khanjian, Sarrah Polley, David Hemblen, Peter Krantz, Victor Garber, Maury Chaykin
Every other night, he comes in to the "Exotica" club and gets the same girl to do an erotic dance for him, and, after a couple hours of this, leaves. And every time he does, the "DJ" of the club observes from above, and sometimes from a tinted window, observing everything that goes on. The man doesn't really seem to get a lot of enjoyment from it, but instead seems to feel cleansed by the act of the particular girl dancing for him. For him, it's not just some easy woman showing off her body, but instead it's something deeper.
Canadian director Atom Egoyan's films always deal with a group of people who have bizarre connections to one another, and the films usually examine their relationships, giving us information as it goes on and allowing us to put it all together. The same goes for "Exotica," which dives right into its narrative without so much as an exposition, and forces us to pay complete attention, and remember everything we see. He gives us characters who seem unnecessary at first, but eventually come into the narrative more clearly, and presents situations and scenes which appear to have no relevance or meaning, but then blossom as other scenes make more sense out of them.
Take for instance a scene between two of the characters in the film who are talking while walking in a field with a bunch of other people. They mention that they "joined up" with the event, and that they're "looking for something," but what they're doing there isn't even mentioned until the second to the last scene in the film. It's the kind of film you watch once to see everything, then watch a second time so that it all makes sense.
Egoyan introduces several characters and slowly allows us to get to know them better throughout the film by not only seeing what they're doing in the present day, but also bits from their past which are often tossed in looking like scenes from either the present or the near future. Character-wise, there's: Francis (Bruce Greenwood), an IRS man who is the guy who goes to the club every other night; Eric (Elias Kosteas), the DJ at the club; Christina (Mia Kirshner), the stripper at the club who dances for Francis; Thomas (Don McKellar), a gay pet store owner who's been checked out by Francis; and Zoe (Egoyan's wife, Arsinée Khanjian), the owner of the club who is probably the most disjointed person in the film.
One would think that people like an IRS man, a DJ, a stripper, a pet store owner, and a club owner would never fully amount to a film, but they all have connections to one another in some way. Although Thomas seems to be just a mere subplot that has nothing to do with any other part of the film, Egoyan eventually gets him into the narrative and also gives his character some depth.
Watching the film is like watching layers and layers and layers being peeled back; as the film goes on and we piece things together, the film's emotional core is exposed, and instead of just a really fun and kinky film, like some of Egoyan's films ("The Adjuster" is the least emotionally attached film that I've seen of his; "The Sweet Hereafter," the most), it shows that it's about people who become more and more realized as the film goes on, and by the last scene, our heart is crushed because we know everything. We get to witness what happens to every character, and piece by piece, we see what they're doing and why. In the beginning, we have no clue why Francis goes to the club every other night, and we think that his behavior is just a tad off kilter. But by the end, we know what has happened to him to make him do this, and we feel all the more for him.
It doesn't hurt that Egoyan has created some extremely interesting characters who you can care about, and the actors are extremely good in developing their characters, most of whom are Egoyan regulars. It seems that he can only get the same group of actors for each film, save a couple extras, probably because his characters do such weird things. Egoyan regulars in this film are: Bruce Greenwood, who expertly shows a man who is at the end of his rope; Elias Kosteas, who plays yet another weird character, and well; Don McKellar, who's performance is wonderfully subtle; Arsinée Khanjian, who is slightly pathetic once again; a small role from "The Sweet Hereafter"'s Sarrah Polley; and cameos from David Hemblen as an inspector in the first scene, and Maury Chaykin as an "Exotica" patron. Egoyan newcomer Mia Kirshner is wonderfully sympathetic in what would normally just be a seductive role, and look for Victor Garber, who recently played the sympathetic desinger of the ship in "Titanic," as Polley's wheelchair bound father.
The brilliance of "Exotica" is that it grows on your emotions as you watch the story unfold. What starts out as just another bizarro Egoyan film blossoms into one of the most emotionally profound films of the 90s, as well as one of the most fascinating. Of course, this is no shock coming from Egoyan, who, with this and "The Sweet Hereafter," is now not only one of the most fascinating directors working, but also one of the best.
MY RATING (out of 4): ****
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