'Arbitrage' and Iconoclasm. Or 'How to read (too much into) a movie poster.'

At first, this poster for the upcoming film Arbitrage is quite striking, if standard. It’s Richard Gere, and he isn’t grinning or sharing poster-space with a brunette, so we can safely assume this isn’t a rom-com. He’s playing it serious.

This top image is separated from the lower half of the poster (depicting the aftermath of a car-crash, which, we can presume, is both actual and metaphorical) by what seems to be a whited-out silhouette of a cityscape. That most famous and iconic (at least in the Western World) of cityscapes – New York.

Even without having heard about the film, or seeing a handy summary or trailer, we can guess that this is either going to involve lawyers or stockbrokers/bankers. That is, shady dealings. Gere is in a tux in the top half, and the car he’s totalled in the lower half looks as though it was pretty expensive. He is certainly not of the 99%.  

So far, so topical.

Decent, but still pretty standard-looking.

Then, we notice something else about that dividing section. It triggers a memory of something. Well, two things.

The first is a Simpsons episode, ‘Lisa the Iconoclast’, involving the fraudulent past of Jebediah Springfield, founder of the town in which the show is set.

The second is one of the cultural artefacts that inspired that. The unfinished portrait of one of America’s ‘Founding Fathers’, George Washington. One of the first, and still most notable, of America’s ‘elite’.

Suddenly, this poster begins to ask questions, rather than simply doling out answers and telling us how we should see this film because it’s totally awesome and there’s probably some cool stuff in it and also Richard Gere doesn’t do any smiling. It makes us wonder why it has chosen to make this reference.

Is Gere’s character powerful enough to hold near-Presidential levels of influence?

Is he unfinished?

Is he coming apart?

Is his city?

Or, in repurposing the unfinished original into this very clearly structured, polished reproduction/homage, is the suggestion that this is how, in the time since the country’s official post-revolution formation, that blank space has been filled in?

Leaving a rich [white] man – practically a Marley-esque spectre – carefully, though precariously, removed from the wreckage he surveys?

Notice how the dividing line appears to be retreating upwards.

Notice how much more you can get out of a thoughtfully-constructed poster than you can from a trailer that seeks to condense ninety minutes into just two and a half.

 

Somebody has to steady that ladder you're climbing: On 'Brave' and 'La Luna'

I’ve long been of the opinion that a good film, much like a good story or a good song, should keep its audience hooked right until the very end. I once, for instance, became pretty pissed with my two brothers when they started joking around near the close of Gladiator. If anything, this attitude has only strengthened since I began to take my own writing seriously, as a potential livelihood. The feeling being, in that case, that I would very much like for a given reader to pay full attention to my work throughout its entire course, and to feel rewarded in some way at the end of that experience. Therefore, it would be hypocritical, not to mention a little rude, for me not to pay full attention to the work of other artists.

So, I didn’t exactly anticipate spending the last ten minutes of Brave only part-watching. Part looking up from my nearly front-row seat [got there late], and part looking down at my notepad, sketching out ideas for what has turned out to be this article.

It isn’t that I was bored, though, or that I was so disappointed in the film that I felt the need to jot down my negative responses before it had even ground to a halt. On the contrary, I was entertained throughout. And I did follow the ending, even whilst I was writing. I still wanted to see how it all tied together. It was good, charming, and put a smile on my face.

But it is the fact that I could be so sure of exactly what was going on even when I wasn’t looking up that leads me into the point of this piece.

I don’t intend that to sound like too harsh a criticism. After all, if I were to take that tone, to lambast Brave for being ‘too predictable’, then I would be met with an all-too-obvious and all-too-deserved reposte – that being that it is principally a kids’ film. It’s not attempting to be Inception. It is a film with a clear point – a moral, even – that it wants to convey, and it would have scuppered that point entirely had the ending been different.

It is no sin for a film to seek simply to tell its tale and entertain, forsaking any major surprises. It is certainly far better to do that, and do it as well as Brave does, than it is to shoehorn ridiculous and implausible twists into a storyline and bugger it up.

On the other hand, if a film sets out to communicate a message, then, once that message is clear, it doesn’t perhaps require the viewer’s full attention. Brave laid its cards on the table well before the end, and, as such, the first half of the film was more entertaining, and arguably more essential watching. Its joys lie in its sharp, fairly fresh takes on old character types, and in the animation, art design, and soundtrack. Which combine to give the film a sense of both spectacle and intimacy. The balance between the showier scenes and the more introspective moments is well-struck. In addition, there are good laughs to be had throughout.

The second half, surprises more or less revealed, is more obviously formulaic, and, whilst entertaining, never really leaves its conclusion in doubt (unlike the far more daring and exceptional Toy Story 3).

But that’s OK.

Because Pixar made up for that before the main feature even started.

La Luna, another in their growing line of justly-celebrated short films, is a genuine gem. Delightful, on both a visual and thematic level, it is perhaps only retrospectively that its true brilliance – and the way in which that brilliance is augmented through its pairing with Brave – can be understood. [Which explains, hopefully, why it took me nearly the full length of the longer film to write anything down about the shorter one.]

When it becomes clear that the two films share the same basic intent/moral, the difference between the two forms (short and feature films), and the relative merits of each, are thrown into bright and rather wonderful relief.

That moral is, simply, that the younger generation should first pay attention to, respect, and learn from the previous generation, before they can successfully strike out on their own. It is a timeless, and perhaps rather obvious, even trite message. But it is one that both films seem convinced of.

However, whereas Brave makes this clear well before the credits, La Luna – constructed, as is common for Pixar’s standalone shorts, almost in the form of a single-reel silent movie, only with gestures and grunts instead of title cards serving as stand-ins for speech – manages to keep its theme subtly present throughout, and then still enchant and surprise with its conclusive, summative shot. The notion that the best results are only achieved through working together and learning from others certainly sounds trite when worded like that, but is conveyed in La Luna with a cinematic eloquence that circumvents the cynicism some viewers might otherwise feel.

Indeed, just as there are many writers who believe that the short story is the best and most direct form of prose fiction, there is certainly an argument to be made for short films doing the same thing within the context of cinematic fiction. In such shorts, there is no need, nor any room, for the tiresome exposition/statements by protagonists about the things they’ve learnt, which, understandably, grate with some viewers. Neither is there space for nonsensical subplots, which plague so many longer films (though not, it should be noted, Brave) and come across simply as filler.

Following this, there is a further argument to be made for more studios to throw money at short films and release them not simply for free on YouTube, but as valued works in their own right (albeit probably not at the cinema). This would be, in some ways, similar to the shift the music industry saw, as regards the focus being placed more on the downloading of individual songs rather than the purchasing of whole albums, with the corollary being that many albums ceased to display concern with functioning as cohesive entities, content instead to exist as collections of singles.

There are, of course, film-makers doing this already, and there are also kinks in this approach which probably mean it is not ‘commercially viable’ on any grand scale, at least not on its own. There’s no need for it to be, though. The argument is simply for more credence and consideration to be given to short films, not for them to supplant full-length feautures. There are things short fiction is better equipped to handle than longer variants, is all. Things it can tackle more immediately, and more effectively. Moral tales are a great example of this, as suggested by the longevity of Aesop’s Fables, amongst other works. Moreover, short forms that don't rely upon dialogue often allow the viewer to reach the story's moral/revelation in their own way, in their own words. It becomes something for the audience to discover, rather than something they must be told/have lectured to them.

On the other hand, longer-form fiction can deliver such lectures. It allows for a much more in-depth, and therefore theoretically more roundly satisfying, consideration of its chosen themes. It can also give the audience more of a good thing. If all that existed of, say, Raiders of the Lost Ark was the opening scene, it would make for a fantastic short film, and would still give a good sense of the character. However, at full length, it becomes a masterclass in adventure storytelling, and cinematic entertainment in general.

Yet, there is no need for film-makers to choose one form at the expense and exclusion of the other, as Pixar continue to prove. Indeed, perhaps it is even better if a way can be found, as the studio has with La Luna and Brave to link the forms together in some way. A great single can, after all, be improved even further through inclusion on an album of other, likeminded songs.

A more useful way, beyond this music-selling metaphor, to consider what Pixar have done here might be to look at both the short film and the main feature as being parts of an essay on the same ideas, the same central theme. The short film is the abstract – it introduces the issue, in an attention-grabbing fashion, and at least hints at what the essay’s overall conclusion will be. It’s not strictly necessary to read on to guess with some accuracy what the rest of the essay will argue, but if the abstract has done its job right, you will.

The main feature is the essay’s body – it provides examples which interrogate and demonstrate the underlying argument. These examples should, where possible, be original, entertaining, and above all else interesting. If that part of the essay has done its job right (as Brave did), then you’ll probably have reached the full conclusion before you actually read it.

As I did, enabling me to start off on this ramble in the first place.

Only, there’s one more crucial detail that I might have missed, had I still been writing at the time, and not heading for the door. A dedication to Steve Jobs. Something which was, I guess, to be expected at the end of the first original Pixar film to be made after his death, but which also suggests that Brave had to be that film. And that it had to be coupled with La Luna.

Whatever your opinion of Jobs on either a personal or professional level (or of Apple and its assorted products), it is inarguable that Pixar would not be where they are today without his early input. These two films serve as an acknowledgment and show of thanks for that, even as they demonstrate just how far the company aspires to move forwards without that input.

I’ll admit, though, that it did take the onscreen dedication to actually make me reflect upon that, and thereby to deepen a little further my appreciation of both films. Which shows that it really does pay to watch a good film all the way through to the finish. And, in Pixar’s case, that it pays to make people want to do so, whether they end up writing in notepads at the same time or not.