A Potpourri of Vestiges Review
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Our Rating: 7.0
Featured in IMDb Critic Reviews
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IMDb Ratings: 4.8
Genre: Horror | Thriller
Cast: Val Kilmer, Bruce Dern and Elle Fanning
Country: USA
Language: English
Runtime: 88 min
Color: Color
Twixt
is 2011 horror thriller film written and directed by legendary American
filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola that premiered at the Toronto International Film
Festival in September 2011. The movie stars Val Kilmer in the lead role of Hall
Baltimore—an alcoholic writer on the verge of a creative breakdown. Set in an
unknown small town, Twixt’s narrative begins with the mention of a heptahedron clock
tower with seven clocks, all of which show different times at any given point. Some kind
of devilish influence is accounted for this strange phenomenon—of which the
tower itself is said to be the centre—by the town residents. Hall Baltimore,
who is on a visit to the town as part of his book tour, inexplicably gets involved in a
series of bizarre incidents involving a mysterious young girl called V . The event eventually helps him
overcome his creative void and hence ward off an incipient marital turmoil.
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| Twixt (2011): Hall Baltimore meets V |
There
was a time when Francis Ford Coppola’s name was synonymous with American Cinema.
His movies epitomized the 20th century America. H is eccentric, cynical,
larger-than-life characters came across to the whole world as an embodiment of the modern American men: be it Harry Caul [The Conversation, 1974], Colonel Walter
E. Kurtz [Apocalypse Now, 1979], or Don Vito Corleone [The Godfather, 1972]. With
as many as five Oscars (not including the esteemed Irving G. Thalberg Memorial
Award that he received in 2010), two Palme d’Or and countless other prestigious
awards under his belt, Francis Ford Coppola arguably is the most celebrated
filmmaker of our time. 1970s saw Coppola go from strength to strength as he
delivered one blockbuster after another. 80s turned out to be mixed affair for
Coppola. But, his great reputation helped him endure the decade. However, 90s posed unprecedented
challenges for Coppola as success became more far-fetched than ever.
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| Hall Baltimore and Sheriff LaGrange inspect a corpse |
After
directing Rainmaker in the year 1997, Coppola decided to take a break from
active filmmaking so as to solely experiment with motifs that appealed to his
deepest creative urges. The first product of Coppola’s self-indulgence was the
enigmatic Youth Without Youth (2007)—a story of a timid professor metamorphosed
by a cataclysmic event. Coppola backed it up with yet another ambitious venture:
Tetro (2009). While these movies may not be significant from the entertainment
point of view, their academic significance cannot be overlooked. The movies
serve to be classic examples of unrestraint creativity in cinema—a formidable
overture to the limitless scope of cinema. Twixt is no different in this regard.
It’s essentially an experimental film with surrealistic undertones that
concocts several motifs and transcends genres in a haphazard, unrefined manner.
Twixt is a horror thriller with a self-contradictory, unaccountable comical
touch that one generally associates with the works of Franz Kafka. In fact, it
wouldn’t be unfair to treat the movie as an exercise in pretence—something that
even Coppola wouldn’t be reluctant to acknowledge.
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| A Still from Twixt (2011) |
Twixt
can as well be looked upon as Coppola’s biographical attempt inasmuch as it
tries to capture the story of a writer doing through a difficult phase in his
life. While Hall Baltimore’s plight starts with the accidental death of his
daughter during a boating adventure, Coppola’s decline as a filmmaker started
with the death of his eldest son, back in 1987. In Twixt, Hall Baltimore leverages
on the bizarre events and his own wild fantasies—in which he often seeks advice
and guidance from his idol, the American literally genius, Edgar Allan Poe—to
come out of his literary void. Similarly, Coppola’s decision to disassociate
himself from commercial filmmaking can be interpreted as a deliberate attempt
on his part to escape the expectations of his ever so demanding producers. Coppola’s
hermitic descent into self-indulgence is characteristic of a perturbed artist
desperately on the lookout for some divine source of inspiration.
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| Ben Chaplin as Edgar Allan Poe (Right) in Twixt (2011) |
Overall,
Twixt is as an attempt of a lost artist, in great dilemma over the question of
his own genius, desperate to demonstrate his mastery over his art to the whole world.
Twixt is a bizarre, beautiful, visually stunning, and deeply convoluted work of
cinema that owing to a deliberate attempt on the maker's part gets lost in
translation. But, it’s this nebulosity that separates art from exact science,
and that’s precisely where Coppola succeeds. Another factor that makes Twixt
memorable is Val Kilmer’s portrayal of Hall Baltimore. Kilmer's pressing performance—undoubtedly his best in years—is highly reminiscent of the remarkable performances he delivered during the 90s, right from his mesmerizing portrayal of Jim Morrison in The Doors (1991) to his nigh flawless portrayal of Doc Holliday in Tombstone (1993). Kilmer is well supported up by the rest of the cast with special mention of Bruce Dern and Ben
Chaplin. In fact, the latter's portrayal of Edgar Allan Poe remains a major high point of the movie. Twixt by no means is in the
same league as Coppola’s greatest works and in many ways is even inferior to
Youth Without Youth and Tetro, but nonetheless it is an honest attempt on the
part of an artist to discover his lost self. While the conventional film
enthusiasts can afford to give the film a miss, it’s a must watch for hardcore
Coppola fans.
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Interesting review!!! Well, I agree with you that it's one strange movie that comes across as some kind of a nightmare to an average movie goer.
ReplyDeleteWell, I can't really differ with you on that one. Twixt is indeed not meant for the average viewer who is not accostomed to deciphering an artist lost in self-indulgence :-)
ReplyDelete