On Friday nights, IndieWire After Dark takes a feature-length beat to honor fringe cinema in the streaming age.
First, the spoiler-free pitch for one editor’s midnight movie pick — something weird and wonderful from any age of film that deserves our memorializing.
Then, the spoiler-filled aftermath as experienced by the unwitting editor attacked by this week’s recommendation.[Editor’s Note: After Dark is mutating! Check back September 6 for a new format. It’s the same juicy midnight movie bait…with a little extra bite.]
The Pitch: Do the Talking Limousines Know Something We Don’t?
When talking about the state of arthouse movies in the 2020s, I often think about something I call “The ‘Titane’ Phenomenon.” Julia Ducournau’s Palme d’Or winner is a wildly layered piece of art about trauma, gender, bodily autonomy, and revenge — yet to so many people, the extent of its cultural relevance is the fact that its star has sex with a Cadillac in it. Such is the life for challenging cinema in a saturated media climate. Arthouse films often need a shocking angle to have any hope at building something that resembles a mass audience, and cinema that stands the test of time is often initially marketed with campaigns that say little more than: “You won’t BELIEVE how WEIRD this is!!”
Leos Carax’s “Holy Motors” has endured a similar case of automobile-centric oversimplification. Released in 2012 to rapturous critical acclaim, the fantasy drama stars Denis Lavant as an actor who makes his living in the most surreal way imaginable: driving around in a limousine to various appointments, each of which requires him to put on an entirely new persona and then carry on with that persona’s day. Sometimes he’s an elderly woman begging on the streets. Other times he’s filming CGI sex scenes. At one point, he fakes his own death. The film has less to do with any specific act he performs than the mindset required to be a performer. As his day winds down, he begins to question whether waning interest in these abstract performances will eventually render his life’s work fruitless. It’s a richly nuanced piece of cinema, but to many, it will always be remembered for an iconic sequence in which limos take on human traits and begin to converse with each other.
While Carax’s film amounts to far more than its most bizarre scenes, there’s something fitting about it being remembered a little too often for its shock value. While cinephiles can argue about the puzzling details of each individual sequence, it’s not hard to interpret the film’s overarching message as a form of eulogy for cinema as we knew it. I’ve always felt that Carax was working through his own emotions about the almost delusional love that’s required to keep creating work in a medium whose business model has become increasingly unforgiving. The brilliant juxtaposition in our hero’s final acting sequence has always stuck with me as a reminder of the irrational sacrifices that artists put themselves through to keep working in the art form that fascinates so many of us.
Lavant’s Mr. Oscar doesn’t seem to be able to articulate why he keeps doing what he does, but he does it anyway because he can’t think of anything else. That’s why people make movies, and why people like us keep trying to preserve them. Yes, it’s easy to quibble over whether a film ought to be classified as a highbrow work of arthouse cinema or a transgressive midnight movie. But as long as we’re making progress at the increasingly task of getting people to see them, what difference does it really make? Market forces might create the illusion that challenging cinema is getting harder and harder to come by — but as long as people are guided by the same inexplicable drive as Mr. Oscar, I have no doubt that we have a chance. —CZ
Those brave enough to join the fun can stream “Holy Motors” for free on Tubi. IndieWire After Dark publishes midnight movie recommendations at 11:59 p.m. ET every Friday. Read more of our deranged suggestions…
- Kate Winslet Burns It Down in Australian Haute Couture Revenge Movie ‘The Dressmaker’
- Karate and Vomit Make ‘Little Manhattan’ a Midnight Movie for Kids — and Basically ‘Sex and the City’ for Boys
- ‘Sugar & Spice’ Is the Child of ‘Bring It On’ and ‘Usual Suspects’ You Never Knew You Needed
