USA
4*
Director:
David Gordon Green
Screenwriter:
Paul Logan
Director of Photography:
Tim Orr
Running time: 95 minutes
Angelo J. Manglehorn is a locksmith and a miserable wretch of a man. He lives alone, but not quite. His own real connection to another living, breathing creature is his relationship with his cat, Fanny. But even Fanny seems to have given up on this life, as she refuses to eat and seemingly prepares to shuffle off her mortal coil. Manglehorn himself is not much better, although an early interaction with a woman who accidentally locked her baby in the car makes us realise he is capable of caring, even though his social skills leave much to be desired.
But then come the voice-overs, and the first voice-over is so beautiful I was literally on the verge of tears.
There are few directors in this world whom I want to give a hug to just because I feel so elated that they are contributing to the cinematic art form, but David Gordon Green is certainly one of those. Green’s first two features, George Washington and All the Real Girls, which he made in his 20s, received near-universal critical acclaim. But it was his third film, Undertow, that moved me viscerally through its action yet spoke to me through its unconventionally poetical approach to its story. That film also had some of the most amazing bits of voice-over I had ever heard, and while the comparison to Terrence Malick is easy to make, Green is usually far less sentimental.
Manglehorn is certainly not for everyone. Little of note ever happens, and when it does, we are left puzzled by the meaning of what we just saw. Two scenes everyone will be bound to discuss are the graphical presentation of the operation on Fanny, which easily could have come from an episode of Nip/Tuck, and the multi-car pile-up in which we see not blood but smashed watermelons on the steaming wreckage, which we see Manglehorn pass thanks to the smooth Godard-inspired lateral shot. What do they mean? Nothing obvious, and they don’t look like anything else in the film. And yet, thanks to Green’s capacity to both present naturalistic events in a way that is entirely unrushed and simultaneously astound us with their simple humanity, even these moments don’t feel out of place.
The surprising thing is that Manglehorn is played by Al Pacino, the king of loud-mouth recklessness, and his performance here is utterly compelling despite his character’s absolutely cringe-worthy behaviour towards those who might be his friends if he gave them half a chance or half a sincere smile.
He has the rarest of interaction with his son, a wealthy commodities trader living the high life, but also doing so alone, and much of the second half of the film is devoted to the budding relationship with Dawn (Holly Hunter), the bank teller he sees once a week and whom he has decided to ask for what she presumes is a date. She is also lonely, but they are not on the same wavelength, and the romantic idea of love they witness at the bank, when a man comes in to serenade a woman, is as beautiful as it is the exact opposite of what she is in for with Manglehorn.
The story with his son, competently played, though without a great deal of texture, by Chris Messina, is short but turbulent, and while there is no clear-cut resolution or happy ending, the development is absolutely satisfying from the points of view of both drama and realism.
And finally, there is the infuriatingly garrulous Gary who for all the money in the world would not stop talking. Harmony Korine shows redoubtable virtuosity in his portrayal of this simple man who thinks he has made it big by opening a massage parlour (read, “brothel”) in town, but whose bullying of Manglehorn’s son immediately defines him as a loser.
The metaphor of the locksmith and the big secret he keeps is obvious, but the presentation of the material makes even the mundane rise to the level of the extraordinary. There is a scene with a mime that is comparable to the end of Antonioni’s Blow-Up, and this kind of comparison firmly underlines the magnificent talent of David Gordon Green. The voice-overs do become burdensome, but the film never becomes predictable, and the score by David Wingo and Explosions in the Sky, who also worked on Green’s winning Prince Avalanche, is wholly infectious.
Manglehorn is a challenge, but it is one that is worth taking on, as the experience provides a glimpse of humanity and conveys the feelings of some unusual people, even when they themselves are not even sure what they are.