MAN TO MAN
A film review by Max Hoffmann
Copyright 1993 Max Hoffmann
US Premiere at San Francisco Film Festival Rating: 12 (on scale of 1->10) England, 1992, 72 minutes video (from 16mm) Director: John Maybury Producer: James Mackay Screenplay: Manfred Karge Camera: Dominique Le Rigoleur Editor: Maybury, Nigel Hadley Cast: Tilda Swinton Print: Basilisk Communications
IN A NUTSHELL: an extraordinary creation by Director John Maybury, with a towering performance by the unstoppable Tilda Swinton. Based on a true story of a woman who crossed the gender line and lived as a man in Nazi Germany. The film offers an entrancing world of composite images, the hypnotic canvas of Tilda Swinton's face, and an intense look into the best and worst of human survival.
Imagine that it's 1930, and you're the first amongst your friends to see THE BLUE ANGEL with Marlene Dietrich. Then you're told it may not be shown again! That's the unthinkable situation for this brilliant new offering from John Maybury. About 60 thousand pounds is needed to transfer the film from video to 35mm, and a distributor must be found. (Information on where to send your donations/inquiries at end of review.) I spoke with the Director, and there are currently no more scheduled viewings. If you want to see this film, dig, and dig deep. As Aimee Semple McPherson said when passing her collection plate, "I don't want to hear any of that metal sound; let's make it paper, please."
ABOUT THE FILM: my description will fall short of matching the film's genius, so keep an open mind. It is a tour d' force, one-woman show, based on the true story of a woman who assumed her dead husband's identity to avoid destitution. (This was not an isolated case, and in other festival showings, the director has encountered evidence of about a dozen similar cases.) From this vantage point comes a view of fear, power and regret that is only possible when gender is hidden. Rather than being a specific glimpse of Nazi Germany preserved in amber, the film rises to a higher level, and is universal in scope and relevance.
This film is a visceral portrayal of exactly what it's like to stifle who and what you really are. As such, the film's essence is immediately recognizable to any gay who's suffocated in the closet, to any woman who's hidden her talents to "get a man," or to any member of the status quo who has stayed silent in the presence of outspoken bigotry. It is a film that must be seen, and be seen by many.
The film is startlingly original. It neither sags nor looks stagey, which is often the case for one-actor-stage-shows attempted on film. Maybury (who's worked with the medium of video for thirteen years) supports Swinton's performance with brilliant composite images (drawn from newsreels of the time, contemporary footage of Berlin, and the most compelling image imaginable, Tilda Swinton's amazing face). Swinton portrays over a dozen characters, male and female, and with chameleon-like subtlety. Whoever did hair, costume and makeup is a genius.
The end result? The best of stage and screen art combined.
There are several soul-shattering, personal moments of revelation that you'd normally associate only with the highest peaks of world-class "live" theatre. It is when the film's acting/directing is so brilliantly intense that you are stripped of every barrier ... granted the vision to peer into the absolute essence of Swinton's character. Yet this film still has the best "fluid" aspects of cinema, and you never feel "trapped" in a filmed stage play.
Even if the camera work and directing were inept (which is far from the case) this film would warrant a rave review, just for the privilege of seeing Swinton's epic performance. There are moments, like the one when the unmoving camera stays fixed on Swinton's slanted face against a pillow that reach the summit of great film acting. It compares with Emil Jannings dropping to his knees in THE LAST LAUGH's washroom; Jean Louis-Berrault's achingly unrequited love for Arletty in CHILDREN OF PARADISE; and the brief scene in WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF when Elizabeth Taylor (viewed through a screen door) drops all her defenses and confesses her love and dependence for "George," ....
Director John Maybury has achieved the unthinkable by capturing every nuance of Swinton's performance, while exercising deft skill in either isolating her image in unforgettable black and white, or enhancing it with a kaleidoscope of color composite shots.
The film is uncompromising, and "takes no prisoners" in its relentless mission to stay true to intentions of the script. At times it is difficult to watch, and it occasionally takes concentration for an American audience to filter everything through Swinton's heavy working class accent. The director's approach is deliberately antagonistic, both sexually and politically. The choices made by Swinton's character will alternately draw you closer to her, or distance and repulse you. The ambiguity of gender is just one of many levels the film offers for interpretation.
HISTORY: Maybury was given 160,000 pounds and a ten day shooting schedule by the BBC. He had a minuscule three weeks to edit. This will stun you when you see the fine instincts that went into the composite shots, and the variety of ways Swinton is framed. Images are often painfully original. Swinton assumes the gaunt features of a concentration camp victim, while an inverted camera makes her appear to be clinging from the ceiling, bat-like. In another image, splashed with symbolic menstrual blood, she assumes the angular, almost pre-natal positions common in Weimar abstract art. The final close-up of her heavily socketed, aging face resembles the famous "optical trick" image of the Gibson girl in front of a large vanity mirror--from a distance it becomes a skull.
In the Q/A session, the director revealed that many of these "archetypal" images were subconscious. He drew from a vast library of techniques and images he's used before (enabling him to create a masterpiece, and not a "low-budget" offering in just ten days).
The script was derived from a one woman play (starring Swinton, of course) staged at the Edinburgh Festival in 1987. The original English translation from the German was "plain text." All movement and staging belongs to Maybury. This film was completed in 1992, before Swinton did ORLANDO.
Unfortunately, the BBC transferred the 16mm original (which has much more subtle lighting effects) to video, and televised it, essentially killing the film's chances for distribution in the UK. Hence the director is now in the unenviable position of seeking funding to make a 35mm print and get distribution elsewhere. He has a five- minute test of how luminous the film is, when transferred to 35mm.
My comparison to THE BLUE ANGEL is no exaggeration. This film, if it is distributed, is destined to achieve such enduring appeal.
Financial support or inquiries for obtaining a print can be directed to the producer: James Mackay BASILISK 31 Percy Street London W1 (071) 580-7222 voice (071) 631-0572 FAX
... be sure to tell them "Max sent me." (I want my name in the credits!)
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