REVIEW - COSMOPOLIS

Watching a David Cronenberg film can be like looking down a long, dark tunnel - you see nothing but what's in the tunnel, be that a lot or very little. This 'tunnel vision' applies to Cosmopolis, although the experience is different - this time, there's nothing happening in the tunnel, just a lot happening at the far end. It's a distancing experience, which I suppose was the intention, but also a tedious one, and if that too was Cronenberg's intention, this may be his most immature film to date. The thick, elaborate dialogue, barely comprehensible, the portentous evocation of threat, and every last supporting character are all rendered insignificant eventually, not because of what occurs nor what has occurred, but because they were insignificant all along too. At least with previous Cronenberg films, if you felt you didn't understand the characters once you left the theatre, you had still learnt something about them along the way, or were able to glean that their remoteness was profound, or had purpose. The people in Cosmopolis exist to be there, their words exist to be heard and forgotten, not understood. Their remoteness is a construct, designed to tease and frustrate us; this film is so self-aware. Nothing happens that could possibly relate to more than two other moments in the film, it's all for our appreciation. It's as though Cronenberg knew precisely what he wanted us to think and feel, and his filmmaking is arrogant in its presumptuousness. Occasionally, he exerts his directorial style on the material (things spring into life at the opening 'snip-snip' of the barber scene, somehow this scene feels more alert and comfortable than the others), at other times, it feels like he's inventing wholly new styles (the intensely focused sound mix is mesmeric), but too often it feels like he's a slave to his source material and the product ends up lacking in energy. Robert Pattinson is equally accountable - he acts as though someone switches him off when he's finished a line, then on when he has another one, and not even every time. The other cast members are generally more capable, but I felt nothing but sorrow when Samantha Morton appeared, and I remembered that she was in this, and thought she deserved so much more.