A Potpourri of Vestiges Review
Our Rating: 9.0
IMDb Ratings: 5.5
Genre: Drama
Cast: Robert Pattinson, Juliette Binoche, Sarah Gadon
Country: France | Canada | Portugal | Italy
Language: English
Runtime: 109 min
Color: Color
Cosmopolis,
an adaptation of a 2003 novel of the same name by Don DeLillo, is a 2012 drama
film directed by Canadian filmmaker David Cronenberg. A nominee for the prestigious
Palme d'Or Award, Cosmopolis premiered at the 65th annual Cannes
Film Festival in May, 2012. Cosmopolis stars English actor Robert Pattinson in
the lead role of Eric Packer—an emotionally detached 28-year-old multi-billionaire
asset manager. Cosmopolis is an attempt to capture the abject hollowness
associated with our materialistic existence through the microcosmic world of Eric
Packer—a hyperrealistic manifestation of the modern man—confined to the
boundaries of a stretch limousine riding across Manhattan. In other words, Cosmpolis is a
tale of human decadence presented in form of a nightmarish rendezvous with the hyperreal—a glimpse of what awaits us.
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| Robert Pattinson as Eric Packer in David Cronenberg's Cosmopolis |
In a
worldly sense, Eric Packer epitomizes success. At a young age of 28, he has
everything that a man can dream of possessing: be it wealth, fame, power, good
looks, or intelligence. His high-end clients solely rely on his business acumen
to invest their billions. He has a billionaire for a wife; a penthouse for lodging
that he seldom visits; an uber-luxurious, high-tech limousine for an office that
he more or less treats like a home. Packer, a connoisseur by taste and a
perfectionist by behavior, does everything with absolute precision. And so even
on a day that’s marked by heavy traffic jams, augmented by the President’s visit
to the city and the funeral of a renowned musician, Packer is keen on getting a
haircut from his preferred barber. En route, Packer sees his chief-of-finance,
art-advisor (Juliette Binoche), chief-of-theory, doctor, and his reclusive wife
who for some reason seems averse to the idea of having sex with him. And then there
is Packer’s chief-of-security who from time to time makes his presence felt on
what pans out to be a day of utter chaos. Each of these meetings, most of which take
place inside Packer’s limo, helps us get an insight into Packer’s opulent yet
empty life.
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| Eric Packer with his Billionaire Wife |
Eric
replenishes the void created by his wife’s disinterest in him by fornicating
with his female employees. During the course of the day, while encountering
several anti-capitalist protestors, Packer learns from his chief-of-security
that his life is under serious threat. Things gradually go from bad to worse as
Packer makes terrible miscalculations. Consequently, his clients lose heaps of money
mostly deployed in form of ‘cybercapital’—the electronic money generated
through future market speculations that has become the greatest paradox of our
time, for even though it doesn’t actually contribute to the productivity of the business cycles it drastically impacts the overall liquidity of the economy. Shattered by the totality of his failure,
Packer loses his composure and ends up killing his own chief-of-security. He jeopardizes
his security further by choosing to visit the house his potential killer, André
Petrescu aka The Pastry Assassin—one of Packer’s ex-employees whose sole purpose
in life is to kill Packer.
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| A Still from Cosmopolis |
Packer’s
sudden descent has a kind of a ritualistic feel to it that’s strongly suggestive
of a man condemned to be his own instrument of destruction, something that insinuates
to the self-destructive propensity of the entire human race. Cronenberg uses a
wide array of characters to evoke a sense of pathos for this self-inflicted plight of humanity.
While Packer’s detachment revolves around an overwhelming sense of superficiality
that he encounters day in and day out, The Pastry Assassin’s alienation is a
product of his spiteful disposition. In the same manner the reclusion that one
sees in Packer’s wife has something to do with her inherent sense of apathy for
the world that surrounds her. Cronenberg is a master at using sex and gore as
effective tools to stimulate a sense of revulsion in the hearts of his audience,
but in Cosmopolis he uses sex and gore to propagate a sense of apocalyptic fear
in the minds of his viewers. In fact, the fear is all pervasive and the
uncertainty associated with the movie's last act only augments it further. Cosmopolis has
an element of crudity that one generally associates with art—the state of being
open to interpretation.
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| Juliette Binoche as Didi Fancher in Cosmopolis |
In Cosmpolis, Cronenberg’s
meticulous direction is brilliantly backed up by some fine acting and brilliant
cinematography. Robert Pattinson is a revelation as Eric Packer. And while it
would be remiss of me to downplay his previous works, I think it would be safe
to regard Cosmopolis as his best work yet. Pattinson portrays the part with a
sense of realism that is a trademark of a seasoned actor. But, without taking
anything away from him, I just can’t help but wonder what role did
Cronenberg have in Pattinson's remarkable transformation as an actor? Mathieu Amalric as The Pastry Assassin is
equally brilliant in a portrayal that seems to perfectly contrast Pattinson’s. Sarah
Gadon is consistently glacial as Packer’s reclusive wife and the air of haughtiness that she seems to exude is in perfect harmony with her caricature. Another performance
that’s worth mentioning is a cameo by Juliette Binoche. If her performance in
The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1988) was an embodiment of nymphean
innocence then probably her playful portrayal in Cosmopolis is its exact antithesis. The movie’s use of dialogue is quite elaborate, but for the
most part it may seem hollow with little or no meaning. In fact, Cosmopolis
encourages the viewers to try and read between the lines in order develop their
own understanding.
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| Cosmopolis (2012): The Pastry Assassin |
Overall,
Cosmopolis is a complex work of cinema, with several interweaved layers, which
requires multiple viewings for an enhanced understanding. The movie’s somber,
menacing, nigh surrealistic feel makes it quite challenging for the average
viewer. It is probably for this reason that the movie opened to mixed reactions
from critics worldwide. In Cosmopolis, Cronenberg succeeds in creating a world of his own
as he had so seamlessly done in his Sci-Fi extravaganza eXistenZ (1999). Robbie
Collin of The Telegraph writes of Cosmopolis, “It's a smart inversion of
Cronenberg’s 1999 film eXistenZ: rather than being umbilically connected to a
virtual world, Packer is hermetically sealed off from the real one.” Cosmopolis
takes a paradigm shift from the traditional style of filmmaking and transcends
the viewer into the nightmarish world of the hyperreal where the characters must
confront the hollowness of their existence in the manner typical of a
Kafkaesque setting. Cosmopolis is a must for intelligent viewers who understand
and value high quality, thought-provoking cinema.
Readers, please feel free to share your opinion by leaving your comments. As always your feedback is highly appreciated!
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Posts
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Sounds great. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteMy pleasure!
ReplyDeleteGood work Murtaza. There are so many people who hate this movie, so it's nice to see someone defend it so well.
ReplyDeleteThanks Bonjour... I am really glad to hear that from you :-)
ReplyDelete