Gus Gazzler

What make a film a film? I just read an article about Gus Van Sant, the indie director whose list of films include: My Own Private Idaho, Even the Cowgirls Get the Blues, To Die For, Good Will Hunting, Finding Forrester, Gerry, and Elephant. Two of the films on this list are not typical Van Sant, Good Will Hunting and Finding Forrester.

An indie director often has a different take on what qualifies as entertainment. While it takes skill to make films that lots of people like, which directors like Zemeckis or Spielberg seem to excel, some directors also deny its audience the basic pleasures it gets from films, such as a hero to root for, a romance to care for, or a flat out comedy. How many people would declare Gerry genius? It has little to no dialogue. The dialogue is practically meaningless. There are lengthy scenes of two guys (Matt Damon and Casey Affleck) walking in some rocky, desert-like terrain, resembling a desolate version of Lawrence of Arabia, minus the entire epic story and characters. What does it mean? Do we get caught up in the here and now?

Somewhat more structured, yet similarly opaque, was Van Sant's Elephant. The title derives from two different stories. In one, an elephant in a living room is so obviously a problem that one can't ignore it. In the other, are the story of three blind men trying to describe an elephant. Since they touch the elephant in different parts, each comes up with a different story.

Elephant is a tale of several high school kids on the day a terrible shooting occurs. Van Sant often takes the camera just behind the head of one student and follows him or her around. We don't really get any great sense of who anyone is. There's nothing that predicts the atrocities that are going to occur, and even when the camera follows the two kids who are going to carry out the deed, we only get bits and pieces of their lives, not knowing why they do what they do, only that they do it. Absurd moments such as one character's dad's drunkenness of the bulimia of three girls add a peculiar touch to what is essentially a naturalistic exploration of life on a pivotal day. Van Sant refuses to invest drama or an emotional pack to what happens, asking us, the viewer to come that conclusion without his help.

It's not those movies I want to talk about, it's the one movie of his that I want to see next, and that is his shot-for-shot reproduction of Psycho. I'm sure, if you asked Van Sant, whether he thought he was as good a filmmaker as Alfred Hitchcock, he'd say, of course he wasn't. Van Sant isn't trying to make the same kinds of film that Hitchcock is.

Apparently, Van Sant had detailed notes on the production of Psycho. He wanted to make a shot-for-shot reproduction of the film. I presume he even used the same music. He had two make two concessions, of course. First, he had to have new actors. Anne Heche, for example, plays the role that Janet Leigh did. Vincent Vaughn plays Norman Bates, the role made famous by Anthony Perkins. Vincent Vaughan, interestingly enough, has gone on to do comic roles.

He also had to make the film in color, since black and white films simply do not do very well. Few films these days are done in black and white. Schindler's List is black and white (mostly), and many of Guy Maddin's films are black and white. Young Frankenstein is in black and white. Sin City comes close to black and white.

I believe Van Sant expected the experiment to fail, but he was curious. If you follow his directions exactly, why is it that you can't reproduce what Hitchcock produced? Many critics didn't realize that this was Van Sant's purpose. If he stumbled on a great reproduction of Psycho, then great. If he failed, then it wasn't because of the way the shot was set up. There was something more.

In the article I linked above, the author suggests that Hitchcock had what's known in the business as "directorial gaze". I read a review of School of Flesh by director Benoit Jacquot, in which the reciew says that Jacquot does this "male gaze" as well as anyone. The idea is basically camera as voyeur, trying to capture, women in moments of vulnerability as well sensuality. Hitchcock is well-known for his fascination for icy blondes, and the author of the article says he probably hated himself for it, and that both tendencies come across in the way women are captured in his films.

Van Sant, he argues, is a gay man, and would have far less sensibilities to such matters.

There's also the matter of originality in film. Some films become so beloved that people just don't want to see a remake. I have to wonder if this is how people think of some shows. Would you make a new Friends or Seinfeld with new actors playing the roles? After a while, we associate the people so much with the roles that they basically are the role they play. Much in the same way that we like one person instead of another, it no longer becomes the quality of acting, but the familiarity of that person in that role. We want no one else.

For some reason, many other forms of entertainment does not suffer from the need for originality. We can listen to many different people play the Goldberg Variations. We can prefer one over another, but there's nothing wrong with performers playing it. Same with Broadway plays. New cast and crew replace old ones. This doesn't seem to detract from the enjoyment.

The only thing close, I suppose, is pop music. While there are plenty of remakes, often, it's the original that people remember. Only when the original singer is suitably obscure does a more famous remake take its place. Many of Elvis's songs were not his own, and yet, he was so famous, that his renditions are the one we remember.

Why do different forms of entertainment have differing views toward the acceptability of remakes? Right now, Hollywood is remaking many films that weren't so great to begin with. Summer 2005 has really brought on quite a spate. From Herbie Fully Loaded (not exactly a remake), to Bewitched, to The Longest Yard, to The Dukes of Hazzard. Batman and Superman films have either come out or are expected out soon. Those weren't the classic that Psycho was and furthermore they're not the same faithful adaptation.

Bewitched for example is about a film about the remake of Bewitched. Will Farrell plays a down-on-his-luck actor who hopes this show will resuscitate his career. Nicole Kidman plays a real-life witch who gets cast to play the Elizabeth Montgomery role. A remake often twists the original in a way that makes it more acceptable for a modern audience.

It's my hope to watch Van Sant's Psycho first, then Hitchcock's later on, as most people almost invariably watch Hitchcock's first, at least, if they care to watch either version. I want to see if the act of watching Van Sant's version first is enough to make it more resonant. Unlike Roger Ebert, I haven't done shot-by-shot analysis of a film like Psycho, which may prejudice him by making him so closely attuned to the original, that he can't see any other remake with a disinterested eye.

It's too bad more directors don't try this out. I'd love to see what happens with other faithful reproductions of other classics. I know most critics would find it a travesty, and a waste of film and talent. Yet, it's the very question of talent and directorial intangibles that such an experiment attempts to explore, and while we see entertainment as entertaining, I find the thought of entertainment as analysis on what defines greatness a fascinating one.