When gazing at the night sky, the thing that stands out for people are stars due to their heightened visibility. The same can be said of film.
As film has developed as an art form, the actors featured in the film have become more important than those who worked to get the story from an idea to the finished product. The actor, once solely required to give life to the pages provided by the writers, is now also responsible for promoting the film, and can even be the only reason a film is produced just by showing enough interest to put their name to it.
Films are now fading into the background as incidental to the actor. The public is now more interested in filling in the canvas behind the beautiful face being projected onto the screen; leading to their names filling page-after-page of gossip magazines. The behind-the-scenes gossip has even led to films being made about such events, including ‘Hitchcock’ and the recent Elizabeth Taylor biopic starring Lindsay Lohan – although, the latter piqued interest more so due to its Russian Doll of a troubled star playing another troubled star.
The coupling of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt has been the most featured in tabloids; filling whole issues with articles about the pair, some imagined and some real. Their pairing was something paparazzi could only dream of: two giant stars meeting on the set of a film (‘Mr & Mrs Smith’) and having secret rendezvous away from their respected partners. The Pitts have now reawakened tabloid interest in the pair after collaborating for the first time since the film which brought them together on a feature written and directed by Angelina Jolie Pitt, ‘By The Sea’.
Angelina and Brad play Vanessa and Roland, respectively. Roland is a writer struggling for inspiration for new material. In an attempt to rejuvenate himself, the bohemian couple take a sabbatical to an unnamed coastal town in France. There is a lot of tension between the pair. Vanessa is cold towards Roland, popping handfuls of pills; and Roland is spending most of his time drinking excessively in a bar close to their residence. They soon begin to bond upon discovering a hole which allows them to spy on the newlywed French couple who are living next door (Melanie Laurent and Melvil Poupaud). Soon the couples begin to become a part of each other’s lives, but the manipulation of Vanessa may lead to more than just the frustration experienced by Roland at his wife’s actions.
'By The Sea' is Jolie Pitt’s third time in the director’s chair, after her 2011 debut ‘In The Land Of Blood And Honey’ and it’s 2014 follow-up ‘Unbroken’. Her talent as a director is beginning to flourish with her latest film. Jolie Pitt shows a talent with capturing some extraordinary shots, filled with colourful visuals provided by the seaside location. The warmth of the blues and whites of the ocean and sand brighten the scenery.
Ange also shows an attention to detail by placing audiences in the '70s French time period with beautiful costumes, and a soundtrack filled with Serge Gainsbourg songs that amplify the film as being, to borrow the title of a French music compilation, ‘So Frenchy, So Chic’. The performances Jolie Pitt gets out of her actors are also on-point, including her own as the conniving Vanessa. Brad and Angelina provide a believable and tense portrait of an unhappy marriage, showing a great chemistry on screen despite the bickering between the pair. Along with directing the film, Jolie Pitt has written the screenplay, which is one of the biggest failures of the film.
The film’s narrative is barely existent. The film is filled with long periods of dead space, with the briefest hint of an underdeveloped story appearing during its tiring run-time. After a long and boring first act of minimal speech and maximum posing, the introduction of the voyeurism plot gives some hope of an interesting story finally making an appearance. However, Jolie Pitt seems more focused on creating something to be taken somewhat seriously rather than a silly genre film like the thrillers where spying on neighbours is often used, for example ‘Rear Window’. But, Jolie Pitts attempt to avoid indulging in the tropes of genre films leads to a film that has the feel of self-indulgence.
Along with the stagnant story, Jolie Pitt also provides her actors with some cringe-inducing dialogue. After a brilliantly crafted opening sequence of the couple driving along the coast of France, the couple stop at their destination right next to the sea, with Angelina emitting the first words to be spoken, “It smells like fish here”. Although words are barely spoken throughout, those that do appear share the same lack of appeal as that opening line.
While the acting itself should be applauded, the characters themselves are less-than-desirable. The characters of Vanessa and Roland bear similarities to the caricatures tabloid journalists have created of the Pitts: Angelina’s Vanessa is cold, cruel and manipulative, going from vitriolic attacks to the doe-eyed innocence of a naughty little girl when accusations are thrown her way; while Brad’s Roland is an artist and party boy who suffers through his wife’s behaviour. Not much is revealed about the characters backgrounds beyond Roland being a writer and Vanessa was once a dancer. The two lack depth and any form of development, coming across as two-dimensional as the tabloids make the Pitts out to be. There are attempts at making Vanessa appear to be just troubled, with her reasoning used as a twist towards the end, but using it as a twist feels odd and doesn’t warrant it being used as such a twist – if anything, it should have been placed at the beginning of the film as a way of introducing the character.
{youtube}WvCwtQPBhDA{/youtube}
‘By The Sea’ seems to have ambitions to harken back to the art films from the French New Wave of the 60s. The films of that time were not only stylish, but they were innovative in their use of story and film-making techniques. ‘By The Sea’ tries to align itself with these films with symbolisms which come out completely empty. There appears to be a message about the intrusiveness of voyeurism, something Angelina Jolie Pitt should know with her dealings with the paparazzi; but this message is overshadowed by pretension. Angelina Jolie Pitt has proven herself as a director, but now she needs to work harder at writing or find a co-writer to bring form to her ideas. While visually stunning, ‘By The Sea’ does commit the sin of showing what mainstream audiences believe art house cinema is: long, pretentious and boring.
Two out of five snooty French stereotypes.
'By The Sea' is in cinemas now.
