Single White Female (1992)

We've all had bad roommates. It's a part of growing up in the modern world – trying to find a place to live, coming up short on cash and having to move in with some psychopath who starts to imitate your every move.

Wait, what?

Director: Barbet Schroeder

Starring: Bridget Fonda, Jennifer Jason Leigh

IMDb

Co-written with Michelle.

Yes, this is one of those 1990s films which has since become a sort of punchline - “don't go Single White Female on me,” cries many a half-joking roommate, crossing their fingers and hoping they don't end up on the front page of the newspaper as the victim in a crime story. But back in 1992, it was just a movie. A weird, weird fucking movie.

The film begins with a woman named Allison (Bridget Fonda), in bed with her husband when her husband's ex-wife conveniently calls and leaves a message saying the two slept together. Wow. That's awfully contrived that she called RIGHT FUCKING NOW, like some silly stage play, isn't it? The husband feebly tries to save face, but really, it's all over. There is nothing to do anymore, and the relationship is dead in the water. Now, it's just time for crying alone on a bed:

"This is even worse than the time I was in Lake Placid!"

She goes through a bunch of potential roommates, most of whom are a little bit weird and say bizarre things, so they're all obviously terrible and not even worth considering. Like this girl:

Yes, it looks hopeless. Who will she ever find as a roommate? Who will spare her from these awful cretins who deserve to die?

But all is not lost – eventually, as she's sitting there crying in the kitchen, a random girl walks in without being invited, which doesn't raise any alarm bells for some reason. The girl, introducing herself as Hedy (Jennifer Jason Leigh), offers to make her tea, but when they try to turn on the sink, it showers them with water.

I wonder how they'll bond when the toilet gets clogged.

Let's recap that: She was crying in the corner, Hedy broke in without even knocking or anything, and the sink exploded on them. Seems like a match made in heaven to me!

So they're pretty much instant BFFs, trying on clothes together and they even get a dog, which they take pictures with and even sleep in the same bed with. It's all pretty candy coated.

I can feel my teeth rotting just watching these scenes!

And hell, Allison even promises Hedy that she'll never get back together with her old husband. Weeeeeellllllllll....

She's basically a big liar!

Yup, they get back together almost instantly, without any scenes of them talking or anything. I guess that's a blessing though, as the film is already close to two fucking hours long. Which honestly begs the question – why did they break up at all? Why not just make a film about a younger couple who weren't living together and the girl got a new roommate? Why have the breakup/marriage plot at all? I guess they really needed the extra 10 minutes tacked onto this already overlong film.

Anyway, Hedra doesn't take their getting back together well – there are even a couple of scenes where she sits around eating and watching TV! The horror!

You would think after The Hitcher, she would be able to take this a little bit better. But I guess not.

At least she has the dog, though – oh, wait, no she doesn't. The dog starts ignoring her too.

I guess the dog is just able to tell which person it should pay attention to because the movie's plot needs to move forward.

Which doesn't make any sense, because Hedy's the one who has been actually paying attention to and feeding the dog! Allison has mostly been ignoring it or not there. But in this movie's world, it wants Allison only, even though she never seems to do anything with it, over Hedy who does everything for it and is always there. But Hedy doesn't take THIS injustice lying down... she retaliates by throwing the dog out a window.

Ha! Take THAT, you dumb dog!!!

If seeing a dog die makes you uncomfortable, just pretend the dog was an advocate for the anti-vaccine movement.

My favorite part of this is how Allison believes the bullshit story Hedy feeds her - the dog jumped out of the window of its own volition. Like yeah, that's something a dog would just do at random, because dogs have no sense or intelligence at all and are just helpless dumb animals who commit suicide at any given moment. Does this movie understand dogs at all? Well, a better question would be, does the movie understand anything? I don't think it really does.

Things get even stranger, though, when Hedy gets a makeover and dyes her hair to look exactly like Allison. This is all extremely weird, but does Allison take any action about it beyond being a little annoyed? Nope! It's just kinda weird, is all. I dunno, if my best friend showed up wearing the same clothes as me with the same hairstyle, I'd stop being friends with them.

I guess Allison does start to get worried about her though, after she finds a box under Hedy's bed containing a bunch of letters and stuff that prove she was lying about her past. Allison confides in her best friend, a gay guy upstairs, who tells her they should definitely call a therapist and get her institutionalized. That seems like the obvious thing to do, but then, I live in real life, and not a strange fantasy land like these characters.

But Hedy takes care of him well enough, so whatever, you know?

If a scene where Hedy sleeps with Allison's husband while pretending to be her sounds like a fucking Dr. Phil episode, well, I wouldn't blame you for thinking so. But I'll give the movie one concession – most Dr. Phil episodes don't end with the woman killing the man with a high heel to the head. Though, that would give me more incentive to watch fucking Dr. Phil.

Not all deaths are equal. Some deaths are cool, like dying valiantly saving a friend from an assassin's bullet. Other deaths are not cool, and this is one of those.

So Allison finds out Hedy killed her husband, and that immediately flips Hedy's evil switch. Like, boom, it's fucking instant – she's suddenly just Saturday-morning-cartoon-character evil. Now, she holds Allison hostage at gunpoint, forcing her to buy plane tickets so they can escape. Hedy leaves for a while and Allison, tied to a chair, tries to escape by turning up the volume on the TV to try and get someone's attention to come save her. Which is exactly the way my father survived his own kidnapping in 1993, so I have an emotional attachment to this scene.

Hedy gets back and is about to finally kill Allison, when Allison decides to kiss her on the mouth, which stops Hedy from doing anything. The least they could have done at this point was add in some hot lesbian action, but no, all they do is kiss and then she rests her head on Allison's lap.

This is just her favorite kind of foreplay.

Well, that's one way to stop from getting killed. Though I doubt it would work in every situation...like, a fucking Mafia hitman probably wouldn't be swayed by that.

So let's run down a checklist of what this movie considers mentally ill people to be: they're super clingy and can turn into serial killers at the drop of a hat for almost no reason. Just remember, people with mental health problems: this could be you! Make sure to feel completely ashamed and feel awful about yourself. This movie's got you figured out.

Oh, and the gay best friend guy survived. How? Did he just hide out in his house pretending to be dead for several days? Why not go to the cops and tell them what's happening? Maybe he's just attracted to the fucking danger of all of it. He does give it his best shot at beating Hedy up, but he can't even do that right, as this isn't the real climax!

You get a B minus for effort though.

The real climax involves Allison escaping and running around in the basement air vents like a fucking Die Hard action scene – I'll give the movie a few points for that, as I honestly didn't think THAT would be in the movie. But mostly that's because it's a complete non-sequitur with where the movie was going.

She's like the John McClane of privileged white girls in NYC.

Eventually, though, all things must come to an end, via a stab in the back:

Et tu, roommate I kidnapped?

What did we learn from this movie? Mental health problems means you're crazy and have always been crazy. There's no hope for you, and you'll probably die by being stabbed in the back.

Seriously, this is a pretty silly flick. It's not that good, with little character or story development – it's all strictly shallow and surface-level stuff, existing only as an excuse for the cheap thrills. To be fair though, the thrills can be kinda fun in a dumb way, and the movie was never outright bad. Jennifer Jason Leigh's acting is actually really good, and the other actors aren't bad either.

Talking about it afterwards, Michelle and I both concluded that this was a product of its time, a relic that seems dated now, but also kind of innocent in a way. Like, they didn't know any better. This was made in a time when the world didn't have the Internet giving everyone a voice, including people with mental health problems who would have said 'hey, this is insensitive as fuck.' The people making the movie were living in a much simpler world, without the societal context to know what they were doing was inaccurate and silly. They just wanted to make a scary, fun movie.

It really is interesting in that way, to watch Single White Female in the context of today's super aware world. Social media did a wonderful thing by allowing minority voices to come out and express their feelings and make the complexities of life more visible – that way, they're not as confusing, and the average person can understand the plight of the mentally ill better now without, you know, having to go to school and learn that shit in books and stuff.

But hey, at least we make great and insightful movies now, that only show mental illness in realistic ways!

... On second thought, I'll show myself out.

Images copyright of their original owners. We own none of them.

Melancholia (2011)

Today we are taking a look at a movie that I'm sure would never make it onto your school's mental health wellness study week. Oh who am I kidding? Your school doesn't do that shit anyway and lets mental health fall to the wayside in favor of more standardized testing, so I guess it's moot. 

Director: Lars von Trier

Starring: Kirsten Dunst, Charlotte Gainsbourg

IMDb

Co-written with Michelle.

Melancholia is one of the more recent films by Lars von Trier, who is famous for making provocative, artistic films. Now, given the fact that this is a very abstract, strange movie, I don't think it would be right to review this in the same way I would review Species 2 or something. In fact I debated whether to review this at all...but then I went nah, it's cool, I can do this. I did preparations Rocky-style by running up and down a flight of stairs this afternoon.

If you don't know, this is the movie starring Kirsten Dunst about a bride going through depression and also the world is ending. I listed those two plot points in that order because I understand priorities!

We start off with a slow-moving apocalypse scene with the world going to hell and a woman played by Kirsten Dunst and her family running around on a golf course with horses. It's very interesting and evocative imagery, only the problem is that von Trier played it so slow that I thought my computer was lagging – which kind of lessened the effect when I had to check my Internet speed instead of getting sucked into the atmosphere. I mean, that shit does happen all the time on Netflix when you're like me and have a computer you bought for $300 at Office Max.

The aftermath to Evil Dead?

But never fear, for then we get a scene of Dunst at her wedding day with her husband Michael. They're trying to do a three-point turn in a limousine and get to, you know, the wedding party itself. The driver can't hack it, so Michael gets in the seat and tries. Then he can't do it, so Dunst has to try. At what point do you just give up and rent a Subaru instead? So far this is probably the worst wedding I've ever seen, and I've seen a lot.

I sure hope they didn't pay that driver too much for having to get him out of the limo and do it themselves...

They finally get to her sister's humongous mansion, complete with a giant-ass golf course that nobody seems to use, and Dunst pauses the whole thing to go say hello to her real lover... 

Ohhhhhh yeah.

Inside at the party, we see that things aren't quite as idyllic as they appeared – including a whole table of women named Betty and a mother played by Charlotte Rampling that constantly stresses how much she doesn't like weddings, and for some reason came anyway. Also, the sister played by Charlotte Gainesbourge constantly has a scowl on her face at the wedding and constantly says she hates Dunst's character Justine over and over. The whole mood is very uncomfortable and goes on for a long time. So, like a real wedding, then. 

"Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll have 17,000 more glasses of wine. Clearly I haven't had enough yet."

The best wedding gift is soul-crushing depression to the point where you can't get out of bed.

The problem is just that we don't really get much of a story here. Yeah, the mood is tangible, and very well done for a little while, but it drags on for over an hour and there isn't much to really latch onto after a while. We get scraps of this story about how depressed Justine is and how she's had problems in the past, and you think, oh, it'll be revealed more later. Only it isn't. It's like a date with a person who speaks a different language, and you think, oh, we'll connect more when we spend more time together. It can't be that hard. But then you just end up at home alone anyway and more confused.

And don't get me wrong here – I'm not one of those assholes who just thinks all film has to be straightforward and anything that isn't an explosion-filled action fest just sucks by default. No, I didn't go into this expecting a Michael Bay action fest – thank you IMDb commenters. In fact that whole argument is just kinda bullshit to begin with; just because someone doesn't like something doesn't mean they were expecting some ridiculous polar opposite that you made up just to be condescending. Same shit in the other direction, too - “oh, you didn't like Transformers 5: Return of the Giant Phallic CGI Effects? YOU MUST HAVE JUST BEEN EXPECTING KING LEAR!!!”

No.

Even so though, Melancholia just tends to drag on too long without enough real character or drama, so much as just the ghostly suggestions of those things. Instead of actual conflict, we get the implication of it, sort of tantalizingly waved in front of the audience's face like a slab of wet meat in front of a salivating dog. The atmosphere is still there, but where I wanted to hear some good, soul-searching dialogue that explored what was going on between them, I just got this: 

CLAIRE: It's not about the cost. It's just, I thought you really wanted this.

JUSTINE: But I do.

CLAIRE: Michael has tried to get through to you all evening, with no avail.

JUSTINE: That's not true. I smile, and I smile, and I smile.

CLAIRE: You lied to all of us.

Then Claire leaves, that's basically the end of that, and Justine goes and talks to Charlotte Rampling, because I really needed more scenes of Rampling telling her not to get married and that nobody wants to be here, so it's good the movie's got my back. I can see what von Trier wanted to do with these scenes, showing the futility of it all, but again - it's just bits and scraps of a real story; you don't actually get very much.

Oh, except for close-ups so invasive that you could pick the eye-boogers out of every character's head.

This whole wedding thing goes on for way too long, and culminates in Justine leaving her husband in the middle of wedding night sex and instead fucking some idiot who works with her on the golf course sand pit. 

"Hmmm...something isn't right here..."

"Ah, yes, this is better."

Oh, and then like a few scenes later, she calls out her boss and quits her job, despite having been given a promotion earlier in the wedding. Awesome. That's just amazing to me. Most of these wedding scenes seem to always come back to one central point – no one likes each other, no one wants to be at the wedding and yet they came anyway.

It's just that so much of this relies on interpretation – you're supposed to glean your own meaning of what this exactly is trying to say. So many of these types of movies just end up bullshitty when you get down to it. Yeah, there is some genuine artistic inspiration behind it, that much is clear, but it just doesn't make it a good movie alone. If I have to interpret things to the degree that I'm just filling in the crater-sized gaps in the movie's plot with my own imagination, I might as well just go make my own movie instead.

Oh, sure, von Trier was definitely trying to make a movie about depression, and the film has certain very interesting glimpses at what that feels like – there's one scene later on where Justine is staying at her sister's mansion and comes down to try and eat something, taking one bite and bursting into tears, exclaiming “It tastes like ashes!” It's honestly a good scene and is very evocative as to what it feels like to be depressed. 

That's just one scene though, and the whole movie is filled up with tons more vast stretches of silence and other vague scenes that sort of, kind of hint at the story, but the story you're waiting for never really comes to fruition. I don't want this to be too much more straightforward than it is – I like the weirdness and vagueness of a lot of the imagery and scenes here, but I'm a literature guy at heart; I want to see more of a glimpse into their characters and motivations and desires. Here, all I end up getting is more scenes of people scowling at one another, and none of the characters really get fully fleshed out.

Oh, but we do get Kirsten Dunst beating up a horse. Can't forget that! 

I never saw a "no horses were filmed in the making of this movie" disclaimer!

This whole movie is kind of like going on a road trip to somewhere and seeing vast, beautiful sights and scenery – and then ending up turning around and going home without doing anything or learning anything. I mean, look at some of the rest of these scenes in the last part of the movie. I'm tempted to think, with how glacial the pacing is, the actors could all just die on set and von Trier would never notice. 

"Sir, I think they've stopped breathing!"
"Keep filming! We need to get this right!"

The ending has some good scenes of Justine monologuing about the world ending, and also another one where they hide in a tent made of sticks against the fiery comet-death of the Universe. 

I guess soul-crushing hopelessness is one way to deal with it, and child's cowboys and Indians games are another. It would admittedly be funny if it worked, though, and the smoke cleared and they were fine underneath those sticks – which really are the only defense against fiery comets bigger than the Earth hurtling towards the whimpering, cowering planet, when you think about it. 

They could still be OK.

Too much of this whole movie is just what you bring to the table from your own subjective life experience – so much so that there's really nothing there in the movie by itself. Some people will probably watch this and see a very evocative, beautiful and haunting portrait of depression and how depressed people see the world. Others, like my friend who helps me do these reviews, will absolutely hate this and find it pointless and dull beyond belief. Personally I thought it was weak with little character development and even less of a real story.

Movies as a whole are like that. Melancholia is an extreme example, and really takes the “subjective experience” thing to a whole new level, being almost entirely reliant on it for the viewer to get something out of it at all, or else they'll just hate it. But the answer, no matter where you stand, is never just strawmanning it up and painting the opposite opinion as somehow hysterically wrong. Going either “you just want every movie to be a big dumb action movie if you hate this” or “you clearly only like butt-sniffingly pretentious arthouse crap and are obsessed with your own intelligence if you like this” is just too far. How about just not being a jackass about it?

I'd also like to take the time to point out that this movie was actually a prequel to a timeless classic released about 25 years before. The events that come after that comet hits the Earth are truly terrifying...

Indeed.

Images copyright of their original owners; I own none of them.