52 Films by Women Vol 4. 53. GOOD POSTURE (Director: Dolly Wells)
Dolly Wells is the
latest graduate of the Jamie Adams’ school of actresses turned director,
joining alumni Alice Lowe (Prevenge) and Jessica Hynes (The Fight). Her low budget debut as writer-director, Good Posture, was
shot in the now gentrified neighbourhood of Bedford Stuyvesant in the New York
borough of Brooklyn. As such, it may travel a lot further than Lowe and Hynes’
features – for starters it premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival. Jamie Adams
advocates a low-budget form of filmmaking. Movies are typically shot over
twelve days in a location close to where the moviemaker lives. Unlike Lowe and
Hynes, Wells opted to stay behind the camera. Her film focuses on the life of
troubled graduate, Lillian (Grace Van Patten) who, when we first meet her is
being driven to her new digs by her frustrated ex-boyfriend, Nate (Gary
Richardson). Nate hates that Lillian talks during movies, asking a million
questions. The opening gag is that he doesn’t have to drive her very far before
she arrives at her new lodgings. Nate is appalled that she is so nearby.
Lillian has a famous
dad who is in Paris with his new girlfriend. He has arranged for her to stay in
a guest bedroom of the house of noted novelist, Julia Price (Emily Mortimer); Dad
knows Julia’s husband, Don (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) who is a musician of sorts. In
the course of one night, in which Lillian says she would like to build a house
of her own and Don shows her the hut at the end of the garden that his retreat,
where he can play music subject to neighbours’ complaints, the young student
causes a fight. Don leaves – maybe he had to go anyway, he has a new album out.
Lillian uses Julia’s toothbrush and bathroom and starts receiving notes from
the retiring author, who, Miss Haversham-like, is shuttered in her room. In the
rest of the film, she makes friends with Julia’s dog walker, George (Timm
Sharp), who has issues of his own – an anecdote about being kicked in the head
that doesn’t put him in a good light. (Seriously, it is a conversation-ender.)
The film arrives at
a plot about half an hour in, when to prove herself to Nate, whom she meets in
the street with his new girlfriend, Lillian decides to make a documentary about
Julia. The joke: she hasn’t read any of her books.
What has this got to
do with the title? Erm, nothing. Good posture traditionally refers to ladies of
breeding carrying themselves with comportment. You know, back straight, head
raised, neck catching the light, bosom heaved. If I didn’t know any better, I
imagine that Wells had a title in one notebook and a script in the other and
brought them together regardless of the fit.
Both Wells and
Mortimer are the daughters of noted wordsmiths – John Wells of the satirical
magazine, Private Eye and John Mortimer who created Rumpole of the
Bailey. Noted wordsmiths Zadie Smith, Jonathan Ames and Martin Amis bulk
out of the cast and appear as interviewees. While Smith winces when Lillian’s
cameraman, Sol (John Early) gets close, and Ames performs a dance routine, it
is Amis who delivers the film’s best line: ‘happiness is whiteness on a page’.
No one wants to read about well-adjusted people. Readers are gripped by sadness
and regret - the messy stuff.
The plot is simply a
device to delay a confrontation between the reclusive author and her
houseguest, whom she tasks to act as a cook instead of paying rent and is
dismally disappointed by mac and cheese. Lillian fares better when she passes
George’s cooking as her own. There is an amusing scene in which George cooks
for the dog and Lillian scrapes the leavings from the pan; the dog eats better
than she does.
In the film’s best
section, Lillian auditions cinematographers who can barely express their
knowledge of the art of moviemaking. One of them is only interested in her;
Lillian ends up sleeping with him. Sol is the most enthusiastic. He changed his
name to create a new identity but has a hard time getting people to use it. He
arrives at the studio that Lillian’s father arranged claiming the space will
inspire people to dance; only Ames responds in this way. His enthusiasm leads
to the production’s tipping point.
If the film has a
through line, it is about a young woman who renounces her claim on sharing her
widowed father’s life and strikes out on her own. The love that Lillian’s
father (Norbert Leo Butz) felt for her inspired a passage in one of Julia’s
novels. Julia continues to write in Lillian’s notebook and gives her a copy of
said novel until they reach an impasse.
In a sense, Wells’
film is also about her stepping out from her father’s shadow to express her own
creativity. She is partially successful but has constructed a series of amusing
conceits than a fully satisfying story. Lillian never explains why she talks
during movies; Wells prefers a gag to creating a fully rounded character.
Nevertheless, Van Patten gives an appealing performance. We want her to learn
how to cook, to become independent.
In a film about
self-absorbed characters, Wells doesn’t consider that her characters are
interlopers, feeding on Bed-Stuy landlords’ desire to charge higher rents. Has
Lillian not heard of Spike Lee’s seminal student film, Joe’s Bed-Stuy Barbershop: We Cut Heads? Wells must know the history of the
neighbourhood. She must be aware that her characters are denying space. But
Wells does have something to say, debunking the myth of the author as a
transformer of reality. Julia takes as much as Lillian does and there is an
issue about the end-product. Wells doesn’t engage with the idea that great art
speaks about universal truths. In her movie, Lillian ends up behind the counter
in a coffee shop, serving George two coffees.
Reviewed at
National Film Theatre, Screen One, BFI South Bank, Waterloo, Central London,
Monday 23 September 2019, 20:40 screening with an introduction by Wells and
Mortimer
Comments
Post a Comment