domestic distress triggers the hallucinatory
presence of Slater (Dennis Leary), a former
patient who has issues with Dave’s dental
work. Slater verbalizes all the nasty things
Dave thinks but doesn’t say. At least, up to a
point. Performances by Scott and Davis are
faultless and pitch-perfect. When Leary
invokes the presence of Scott’s alter ego (or
is it alter id?) right at the dinner table, the pre-
scient tiny toddler picks up on him as well.
7. THE SECRET LIVES OF DENTISTS
Alan Rudolph directs one of the year’s
finest domestic comedies about two den-
tists, Dave Hurst (Campbell Scott) and his
wife, Dana (Hope Davis), who share their
practice. Parents of three little girls, Dave
and Dana, like the parents in Mystic River
and In America, are devoted to the their chil-
dren. But they may have reached the point
in their marriage where things left untended
are breaking down. We never learn if the
problem is a sexual one, but we can infer
from Dave and Dana’s behavior that intima-
cy of some kind is lacking in the relation-
ship.
I love the children in this film, because
they know something is off-kilter between
the parents, as real children always do. The
toddler, especially, responds to the emotional
balance in the household like a Richter scale
8. AMERICAN SPLENDOR: 2003
Looking at this film a second time, I saw
the artistry the writer, director team of Shari
Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini
brought to bear on their story of Harvey
Pekar, author of autobiographical comics
titled
American
Splendor. I recognize
the film’s post-modern
artistic
concerns.
Berman and Pulcini
understand
Pekar’s
humanity that’s hidden
behind the depressed
everyman persona he
shows the world. They
find his poetic side the
same
way
Pekar
expresses it in his
work, by turning to a
comic-book
style.
Some scenes have a
comic-strip look, while
the rest of the film looks relatively realistic.
But it’s the relationship between Pekar and
Joyce, his wife, that I love. I’m talking about
the roles played by Paul Giamatti and Hope
Davis as well as the real couple, who are
included in the film. The interconnections
between the film characters and the actual
Pekars is a form of self-reference the film
investigates in a documentary manner.
The value of human connections and the
isolation that comes from a lack of commu-
nication with others underlies the entire
film. Pekar is a prickly man, who makes it
difficult for others to be close to him. But
he shows his good heart in the way he
relates to his co-workers at the Cleveland
VA Hospital, where he works as a clerk
until his retirement.
Joyce, however, cannot live without rela-
tionship, and she finds her commitment in the
bond with a child they foster-parent. Harvey
comes to love the girl as well, and the Pekars
adopt her. By the end of the film, they are
family.
MANHATTAN PICTURES, 2003.
D O C U M E N TA R I E S
Spellbound
Winged Migration
Fog of War
Rivers and Tides
Capturing the Friedmans
moves into the undisciplined Catholic
household of the painter, his wife, her
mother and a band of children. The girl
hears shocking stories about the licentious
behavior of the painter and his patron with
the painter’s models.
But when it comes to Vermeer (Colin
Firth) and Griet (Scarlett Johansson), their
relationship is based on mutual respect for
the work. Griet helps Vermeer mix paints.
Griet takes a great risk when she moves a
chair the artist has set up for a scene he is
painting. But apparently he agrees with her
decision, because he removes the chair
from the painting. But when the mother-in-
law, who owns the house, orders Griet to
model for Vermeer, the sexual tension
between the painter and the girl charges the
atmosphere.
Like the lovers in Lost in Translation,
Griet and Vermeer express their longing
through facial expression, which is the story’s
conceit and the film’s vibrant centerpiece.
The face of the Girl with the Pearl Earring
has drawn viewers to her over for centuries.
What is she saying? we ask. At whom is she
looking? In one of the most erotic scenes in
recent films, Vermeer first pierces Griet’s ears
and then hangs the exquisite pearl earrings in
the vulnerable lobes.
10. 21 GRAMS: 2003 Academy Award
nominations: Best Actress, Naomi Watts;
Supporting Actor, Benicio Del Toro.
In Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s haunt-
ing, fragmented film, several characters are
brought together through tragedy. Their
relationships are colored by the accident
that kills Cristina's (Naomi Watts) husband
and two daughters. The husband’s heart
saves the life of Paul (Sean Penn), but the
driver of the car that hits the family, Jack
(Benicio Del Toro), loses his faith in God
and his confidence as a husband and father
after the accident.
Like the role of fate in Mystic River,
these characters are bonded by time and cir-
cumstance to one another. Paul leaves his
wife, who wants to have his child, for
Cristina, who has lost her family. Cristina is
unaware that Paul knows he owes his life to
her late husband, and he does not tell her
immediately. After they become lovers,
Paul and Cristina bond in vengeance as
well as love.
The fractured, non-chronological narra-
tive of Inarrritu’s film challenges the desire
to understand the connections between
characters, but the result of the director’s
choice is a textured, layered film that
echoes in the viewer’s mind.
films
TO CATC H O N V I D EO
Barbarian Invasions
House of Sand and Fog
In This World
Pieces of April
9. GIRL WITH THE
PEARL EARRING: 2003
Academy Award nominations:
Best
Art
Direction;
Cinematography; Costumes.
Peter Webber’s film,
based on Tracy Chevalier’s
novel, is a work of fiction
about the unknown young
woman who modeled for
Vermeer’s famous portrait.
Set in the Dutch city of Delft
in the mid-1600s, the movie
chronicles the experiences
of the daughter of a crafts-
man, who must earn a living
as a servant in the household
of the painter. The girl
comes from a Protestant
family
for
whom
respectability and order are
important values. She
21 Grams
FEBRUARY 26, 2004 13
FOCUS FEATURES, 2003.
don't miss
HBO FILMS, FINE LINE, 2003.
that measures marital felicity. When tension
between Dave and Dana increases, she
becomes correspondingly needier and reject-
ing of Dana. By the time the whole family is
leveled by a five-day bout of flu, this small
one will not permit Dave to put her down. He
wears her around his neck for days. She is the
only person in the family getting what all the
others need — security and comfort — and
she isn’t about to give it up.
Dave’s conflict centers on a real or imag-
ined affair he thinks Dana is having. His
LIONS GATE FILMS, 2003.
Academy Award nominations: Best Adapted
Screenplay, Robert Pulcini, Shari Springer
Berman.
The Secret Lives of Dentists
American Splendor
Girl with the Pearl Earring