"A film should have a beginning, a middle and an end, but not necessarily in that order," cracked French filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard ("Breathless," "Alphaville") who famously reinvigorated movie narrative with fractures and jump-cut flash-forwards.
I thought of Godard's crack during "Duplicity," Tony Gilroy's sleek spy-versus-spy story that pits American agent Julia Roberts against her British counterpart Clive Owen. Through a series of flashbacks-within-flash-forwards, Gilroy (whose "Michael Clayton" likewise scrambled its chronology) makes the viewer wonder whether Roberts and Owen are in conflict or cahoots. Though I thoroughly enjoyed the film's erotic byplay and was warmed by its considerable starpower, by the fifth flashback I lost hold of the (very tangled) narrative thread. Has this happened to you in films such as "Memento," "Synechdoche, NY" and "Adaptation"?
It's hardly a new trend,.Preston Sturges used it in his very complex screenplay for "The Power and the Glory" (1933), itself a huge influence on the fractured narrative of "Citizen Kane" (1941). But in certain films, this flashback-and-forth is exhausting. Thoughts?
Perhaps it was because they were released at a time when I was so impressionable that I recall two 1972 films: George Roy Hill's rendition of "Slaughterhouse-Five" that was praised by Kurt Vonnegut, and Luis Buñuel's "Le charme discret de la bourgeoisie," which, upon reflection, perhaps owes a bit to "Rashomon." I came away from both films trying to tie the story lines together yet delighted at having been challenged to do so.— californiafan- Ordinarily I'm up to the challenge -- as with the exceptional "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind." But sometimes the plots are so labyrinthine that the thread snaps.— carrierickey
- A snapping plot thread can be the starting gun for a good snooze.— rbwhitehill
- Carrie-- I have very fonde memories of being played with by Claude Lelouch's "The Crook" ("Le Voyou"), whose narrative also scrambled (as opposed to simply unchronological). It confused the daylights out of me but I loved every minute of, validating somewhat Godard's loose dictum about movies going every which way. Loved "Duplicity," by the way, and for that very reason.— Pash
- Carrie-- I have very fond memories of being played with by Claude Lelouch's "The Crook" ("Le Voyou"), whose narrative is also scrambled (as opposed to simply unchronological). It confused the daylights out of me but I loved every minute of, validating somewhat Godard's loose dictum about movies going every which way. Loved "Duplicity," by the way, and for that very reason.— Pash
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