The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
Wednesday, January 17, 2018 — 5A
“Marie Antoinette” is Sofia
Coppola’s
masterpiece.
“The
Virgin Suicides” is the cult classic
of the “Donnie Darko” crowd,
“Lost in Translation” gets all the
critical attention, but it’s “Marie
Antoinette” that best showcases
the ineffability of her visual wit. It’s
a lush, pastel coming-of-age story
that sees one of the most infamous
figures in Western history as a
person — not wholly good or bad,
but young and unprepared. It’s
about glut and greed, but it’s also
about the loneliness of teenage
years. All that and the soundtrack
slaps.
Coppola crafts — by pairing
the dying days of the French
monarchy with the restless sounds
of post-punk and new wave — a
tension between sound and image
that perfectly mirrors the inner
turmoil of adolescence. Marie
Antoinette the person stands
in the face of everything these
music movements are. “Marie
Antoinette” the movie puts them
in tandem, pairing the material
excess of Versailles with the sonic
exactitude of The Strokes and New
Order.
We can draw a distinction
between the character and her
historical
counterpart
because
Coppola isn’t making a factual
biopic, she’s making an emotional
one.
In
“Marie
Antoinette,”
she builds a Versailles that is
at once suffocatingly full and
excruciatingly lonely, and then
sits in it. For two hours, she tracks
her protagonist (a tour de force
performance from Kirsten Dunst)
as she roams the grounds, pushing
the boundaries of what the Queen
of France can do and be.
This unlikely union is most
in sync at the heart of the film in
which Marie suggests she and
her entourage sneak away from
Versailles to attend a masked ball
in Paris. As she enters the ball —
looking decadently goth in an all-
black ensemble — strings pluck
softly. You think, “Wait I know
this … is this …?” And it is. A string
intro to “Hong Kong Garden” by
Siouxsie and the Banshees that
explodes into its original form as
Marie enters the swirling mass of
dancers. For a second, as bodies
whirl around each other, it looks
like a pit.
The restless joy of the night
mirrors the song Coppola chooses
to score it. “Hong Kong Garden”
has been called the most important
early post-punk hit. The song was
born out Siouxsie Sioux and John
McKay’s love of a restaurant — the
Hong Kong Garden — and hatred
for the “skinheads” who populated
it. Marie finds herself at the
crossroads of the same emotional
extremes in this scene. She loves
being at the ball, but hates being
there with her husband and the
boring company he keeps.
This is, perhaps, why Marie
emerges as sympathetic despite
her wasteful and careless lifestyle.
She is lonely and her yearning is
palpable. She wants what everyone
wants: to understand and be
understood. Late in the film, she
drifts through a quiet boring
party. Tired of feigning interest,
she excuses herself and bursts into
the cold, endless halls of Versailles.
The opening chords of “What Ever
Happened?” burst with her.
The opening track on The
Strokes’s sophomore (and best)
album Room on Fire, the song
begins with the declaration: “I
want to be forgotten.” Which
she does, at this moment. Marie
longs — like all good teens — to be
outside her life. For the Queen of
France, that means to disappear
from the public consciousness, to
be freed by anonymity. The tension
between wanting to be forgotten
and admired, to be free but also
seen are exemplified by the song.
This party is presented in
contrast to Marie’s birthday, a few
scenes earlier. This party —scored
by New Order’s “Ceremony” — is
characteristically youthful and
bursting at the seams with energy
and joy.
The soundtrack is the perfect
representation
of
Marie’s
subjectivity. Her emotional core
is made manifest in the music
Coppola uses to score her. To
pick songs that can be loosely
tied by this nondescript label
of post-punk is genius. Part of
what made this thing I’m calling
post-punk
different
from
the
punk that preceded it is a self-
aware recognition of the joy that
can come out of anger. It’s the
thrill of being young and mad
and confused. The frustration of
pushing against the boundaries of
a world that can feel terribly small,
and the rush of excitement that
comes from pushing.
“Marie Antoinette” is Coppola’s
masterpiece because she manages
to operate in two eras at once, a feat
that is more complex than pairing
incongruent music and images.
Coppola imagines Marie as a
teenage girl in 2006 with an early
generation iPod. She feels trapped
by the suburban life her parents
chose for her. She hates them, but
she gravitates towards the music
they grew up on (New Order, The
Cure) and artists who take after
them (The Strokes). She’s a roiling,
volatile, confused teenage girl who
can’t understand why she was born
into the body she’s in. Teenage
emotions, Coppola discovers, exist
even within the hedge mazes and
Baroque ballrooms of Versailles.
‘Marie Antoinette’ has
the perfect soundtrack
DAILY FILM COLUMN
MADELEINE
GAUDIN
‘Search Party’ & ‘The End’ convey despair via music
I spent a good half of this past
weekend
binge-watching
the
latest season of TBS’s “Search
Party”
and
Netflix’s
newest
series “The End of the F***ing
World.” The former is a witty
murder
mystery
about
four
Manhattan 20-somethings, led
by the anxiety-riddled Dory (Alia
Shawkat, “Transparent”), who
struggle to cope after having
accidentally killed an innocent
private investigator in search of
their missing friend. The latter
is a twisted British comedy that
follows two teenagers — one a
self-identified psychopath (Alex
Lawther, “Black Mirror”) and
the other a coarse misanthrope
(Jessica Barden, “The Lobster”)
— who decide to embark on a
road trip to escape their boring
hometown.
Having
engrossed
myself
in both shows in such a short
span of time, I couldn’t help but
notice that “Search Party” and
“The End of the F***ing World”
share more than just a sick sense
of humor and young, conflicted
protagonists fed up with life’s
mediocrity. Like any good TV
soundtrack, the music curated
on each show plays a hugely
influential role in informing
us about the inner turmoil of
the
characters,
articulating
the motivations behind their
actions and the emotions buried
underneath. More specifically,
the particular type of music used
in “Search Party” and “The End
of the F***ing World” illuminates
the humanity of the ostensibly
irredeemable protagonists, each
of whom are, coincidentally,
guilty of committing murder.
For a program like “The End of
the F***ing World,” you’d expect
the soundtrack to be filled with
venomous punk rock in the style
of The White Stripes, The Clash
or even Green Day to match the
rebellious angst of its central
couple, James (Lawther) and
Alyssa
(Barden).
Surprisingly,
however, the show takes a much
more unconventional approach in
regards to music genre. Over the
course of the first season, each
episode is peppered with a diverse
musical palette — sweeping doo-
wop ballads, romantic acoustic
rock and dreamy French pop.
It’s a bit jarring, especially
for a show where the two main
characters are criminally insane,
dangerous
and
frequently
insufferable — think “Moonrise
Kingdom” meets “Natural Born
Killers.” But underneath the
surface of the show’s cynicism,
the
light-hearted
soundtrack
benefits
James
and
Alyssa’s
cause for acting out. “The End of
the F***ing World” establishes
this right from the start: In the
first episode, James explains
his psychopathy as Bernadette
Carroll’s
“Laughing
on
the
Outside” plays in the background,
and later, Alyssa explains her
misanthropy over the sorrowful
tune “Where is the Love” by the
Monzas. Both songs sonically and
lyrically ache with such forlorn
tenderness that it’s impossible not
to feel sympathy for these two and
how they grew to be so alienated
from the world around them.
The music offers a more tangible
understanding of James and
Alyssa’s shared suffering — absent
parents,
loneliness,
childhood
trauma — that would otherwise
seem dull or trite if the music was
edgier and more on-the-nose.
Other
important
scenes
are made only more poignant,
romantic and clever with the
undercurrent
of
music
cues.
When James and Alyssa break and
enter into a stranger’s mansion in
episode three, they dance to Hank
Williams’s “Settin’ the Woods on
Fire,” having just blown up their
car in the previous episode. Later
on, James stabs the stranger, who
attempts to strangle Alyssa after
catching her in his bed, while
singer Brenda Lee croons her
1960 single “I’m Sorry.” The two
frame the murder in the next
SAM ROSENBERG
Senior Arts Editor
NETFLIX
episode to the tune of Timi Yuro’s
cover of Charlie Chaplin’s “Smile.”
Perhaps these jingles are only
meant to soften the blow of the
show’s disturbing, grisly violence.
I’d argue it serves a greater
emotional purpose: The music
not only literalizes the shock
and despair James and Alyssa
experience in these situations, but
it also excavates the innocence
concealed beneath the darkness
of their actions. Their love for one
another intensifies, even as they
stray further away from sanity.
This idea continues onto episode
four,
where
James’s
woeful
monologue about the loudness of
silence feels all the more potent
with the sound of Ricky Nelson’s
“Lonesome Town.” The scene
marks the first time James and
Alyssa are separated, and we can
actually start to feel heartbreak
for both characters as Nelson
sings, “There’s a place where
lovers go / To cry their troubles
away / And they call it lonesome
town
/
Where
the
broken
hearts stay.” Being a confused,
frustrated teenager often does
feel like the end of the world, but
the soundtrack for this off-kilter
coming-of-age story offers hope
and guidance for lost souls like
James and Alyssa.
As for “Search Party,” the music
choices are a bit more subtle,
but still just as effective. Like
“The End of the F***ing World,”
one would guess that “Search
Party” would incorporate a more
indie rock-based soundtrack to
reflect the stylings of its hipster-
millennial characters. Instead,
the show opts for a more ambient
electronica sound, using songs
by obscure chillwave musicians
Boga, Tender, Little Ashes and
Roosevelt. Sometimes, the music
is used as a tool for comedic
irony — Beat Club’s “Something
Better” provokes an impromptu
dance party in the season two
opener, as Dory and her friends
mask the guilt and shame of
killing the private investigator
Keith Powell (Ron Livingston,
“Loudermilk”) just hours before.
Other
times,
“Search
Party”
relies on the glum, melancholy
synths of its soundtrack to evoke
the fear stirring within the four
friends as they suppress the truth.
In the last shot of episode two,
Dory and her friends contemplate
the repercussions of lying about
murdering Keith, sitting solemnly
in the car as Fear of Men’s “Sane”
lingers in the background. The
title of the song pretty much says
it all.
These music choices affect
Dory in particular, who, since
season one, has experienced a
quarter-life crisis of listlessness
and anhedonia, heightened even
more by the trauma of killing
Keith and subsequently burying
him with her friends to cover
up their tracks. The dirty regret
bubbling inside Dory culminates
into an all-time low in the seventh
episode
when
she
envisions
jumping off a rooftop to Tender’s
“Belong” — a song that mirrors
her terror of being found out,
especially with lyrics like, “No
I don’t belong, to anyone / But I
wish I did / Then maybe I won’t
feel the shame.”
Strangely enough, the music
in “Search Party” and “The
End
of
the
F***ing
World”
ruminates on very similar ideas
about how scared people in this
generation are to confront their
own existence. Dory, James and
Alyssa repress not only the truth
about the mistakes they made,
but also who they are as people.
None of them feel like they can
live up to societal expectations,
and instead of reckoning with
the issue upfront, they do their
best to bottle everything up as
much as possible, often leading to
disastrous consequences. But the
soundtracks in both shows do their
best to validate the remorse these
characters face. Music itself can
often be a cushion for characters
like these, just as it can be a source
of solace for people who feel just
as lost, angry, misunderstood
and burdened with a need to do
everything right.
TBS
TV NOTEBOOK
‘Post’ is a timely thrill
Steven Spielberg (“Bridge of
Lies”) is the de facto storyteller
for inspirational American tales,
ranging from the life of Abraham
Lincoln to the European invasion
of World War II. “The Post,” his
recent recount of the publishing
of The Pentagon Papers, is no
different. With a star-studded
cast, larger-than-life characters
and the typical Spielberg-esque
flair, “The Post” recaptures the
bravery necessary to confront a
corrupt government and expose its
shameful secrets.
Richard
Nixon’s
tenure
as
president is only increasingly
relevant today as we trudge
through the daily drudgery of a
Donald Trump presidency loaded
with bigotry, lies and distrust of
the media. History repeats itself,
and Spielberg’s efforts to retell past
dilemmas to teach us about the
present are not fruitless. Someone
of such influence and talent —
Spielberg, that is — is the perfect
person to educate those born
before the early ’70s about such
paranoia and hatred toward a free
press.
Beyond the movie’s timeliness, it
boasts a thrilling yet slow-burning
story that, despite a rather dull
beginning, displays the virtues
of doing what is right rather than
what is easy. After The New York
Times publishes an article exposing
government cover-ups and lies
regarding the Vietnam War, The
Washington Post rushes to match
their competitor’s content. Ben
Bradlee (Tom Hanks, “Bridge of
Spies”), editor-in-chief for The
Post, fights to publish government
documents revealing a reluctance
to withdraw from Vietnam despite
clear signs of imminent failure.
Alongside Bradlee is the paper’s
new publisher Kay Graham (Meryl
Streep, “Florence Foster Jenkins”)
— the first woman to hold such a
position — who refuses to appease
her disobedient board filled with
multiple men breathing down her
neck.
Liz Hannah and Josh Singer’s
(“Spotlight”) screenplay is the
ideal
match
for
Spielberg’s
grand directorial style. It avoids
complexity in favor of a more
straightforward
storytelling
approach. The script’s good versus
evil trope is different from the
more typical “America is good”
and others are “bad” approach
some of the director’s other films
follow. Here, the government is the
antagonist, while the reporters are
the protagonists. Regardless, “The
Post” is as pro-American as a movie
could possibly be, highlighting the
fundamental role the press plays in
preserving democracy.
“The Post” would not be as
strong of a movie without standout
performances from Streep and
Sarah Paulson (“American Crime
Story”), who, in limited screen
time, takes over in some of the
movie’s essential moments. Bob
Odenkirk (“Better Call Saul”)
comes alive as Ben Bagdikian, a
reporter who played an integral
role in receiving and publishing
The
Pentagon
Papers.
As
a
movie that heavily relies on the
performances rather than large-
scale CGI and special effects, all
actors do their part in ensuring
success. Even Hanks, who I don’t
always find to be that talented, does
his job with passion and ease. He
portrays Bradlee as the cowboy of
the beltway — the journalist with a
growling voice eager to go against
the establishment.
For a movie that everyone
already knows the ending to, “The
Post” manages to fully engulf
us into the world of early ’70s
journalism. Despite a somewhat
unnecessary final moment, we feel
comfort in knowing that corrupt
administrations filled with secrets
will finally be brought down. To
me, that’s reassuring for our future.
WILL STEWART
Daily Arts Writer
20th Century Fox
“The Post”
20th Century Fox
Michigan Theater,
Quality 16, Rave
FILM REVIEW