SHORT CUTS
A film review by Scott Renshaw
Copyright 1993 Scott Renshaw
Starring: Andie MacDowell, Bruce Davison, Lily Tomlin, Tom Waits, Anne Archer, Fred Ward, Tim Robbins, Madeleine Stowe, Julianne Moore, Matthew Modine. Screenplay: Robert Altman and Frank Barhydt. Director: Robert Altman.
Point #1: Raymond Carver purists might be extremely disappointed in what Robert Altman has done to some of the best short stories written in the English language. The interlocking story structure of SHORT CUTS does not serve those stories well, and the small pathos of Carver's Pacific Northwest isn't the same in Altman's Los Angeles.
Point #2: SHORT CUTS stands independently as a splendid film achievement, a brutally funny collection of fragments from broken lives crafted by a director with renewed vitality. Only an abiding cynicism and the uneven appeal of the nine main stories mar this dynamic, poetic work.
SHORT CUTS follows 22 characters through four days in contemporary Los Angeles. Howard and Ann Finnigan (Bruce Davison, Andie MacDowell) are an upscale couple whose young son is hit by a car driven by Doreen Piggot (Lily Tomlin). Doreen is a waitress with a drunken husband (Tom Waits) and a disaffected daughter, Honey (Lili Taylor). Honey is married to Hollywood make-up artist Bill (Robert Downey Jr.), and best friends with Jerry and Lois (Chris Penn, Jennifer Jason Leigh). Howard and Ann's son is cared for by Dr. Ralph Wyman (Matthew Modine), who is married to aspiring artist Marion (Julianne Moore). Marion's sister Sherri (Madeleine Stowe) is married to philandering cop Gene (Tim Robbins), who's having an affair with Betty (Frances McDormand), much to the dismay of Betty's estranged husband Stormy (Peter Gallagher). Also in the milieu are the Finnigans' next door neighbors, a night club singer (Annie Ross) and her cellist daughter (Lori Singer), and Claire and Stuart Kane (Anne Archer, Fred Ward), a clown and her unemployed husband.
SHORT CUTS is about those moments when individuals are at their most basic, naked and vulnerable. Indeed, nakedness and scatology play a key role in the film, perhaps more than some viewers might find palatable. Characters in SHORT CUTS pop zits, break wind, urinate into streams, talk bluntly about sexuality and wander around in various states of undress, but none of these elements ever seem gratuitous. These are the hidden moments when men and women reveal themselves, full of insecurity, guilt and fear, and SHORT CUTS captures them with a stunning grace. In one of the film's most memorable moments, Julianne Moore stands before husband Matthew Modine making a painful confession, with evidence that she is a natural redhead in full view. In another scene, Bruce Davison squirms while his father (marvelously played by Jack Lemmon) describes the tryst that led to his estrangement from his family thirty years before. This is a film loaded with individual moments that slam home with the intensity of reality recognized, and frequently inspire nervous laughter.
In my estimation, however, Altman erred in the decision to interlock his stories. While the structure serves a purpose in emphasizing a great tapestry of lives, the impact of Carver's individual stories is largely lost. "Neighbors," in which a couple begins living vicariously through the apartment they are taking care of, is reduce to a couple of white trash folk messing up a nice place; "Collectors" becomes a single scene with a door-to-door vacuum cleaner salesman. It's true that I'm criticizing the film SHORT CUTS is not rather than the film it is, but it just seems a shame that such rich source material is given such a cursory treatment. Altman never seems to identify with his own characters the way Carver did, and as a result it seems he's laughing at them and not with them.
Opinions will vary as to which stories worked best. I cast my lot for the most faithful of the adaptations, "So Much Water So Close to Home," in which Fred Ward, Buck Henry and Huey Lewis discover a dead body while on a fishing trip. "A Small Good Thing" also scores big point from the fine performances of Andie MacDowell as the nervous mother, Jack Lemmon in the previously noted turn as Bruce Davison's father, and Lyle Lovett in a quirky appearance as a baker with a mean streak. The two big losers are "Neighbors" and the one story created wholly by Altman, the relationship between a boozy singer and her daughter which tries to fit in but always seems obviously out of place. The valleys, however, are few, and the peaks are massive. At over three hours, SHORT CUTS is anything but boring. It's a sharp, clever, perceptive look at life in the big city that goes for the jugular rather than the heartstrings. These SHORT CUTS are somewhat cold cuts, but they're mighty tasty.
On the Renshaw scale of 0 to 10 short cuts: 8.
-- Scott Renshaw Stanford University Office of the General Counsel
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