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By
WAYNE KLEIN
Immature adults lying,
cheating and being unusually cruel to each other
has they dance around commitment drive the drama
"Closer." Alice (Natalie Portman) a stripper fresh
from New York gets his by a taxi on her first day
in London. Her knight in shining armor Dan (Jude
Law) an aspiring novelist who writes obituaries by
day ironically becomes her savoir whisking her off
to the hospital for treatment. The two fall in
love despite their differences and the obstacles
of an inability to commit to anyone. Anna (Julia
Roberts) takes pictures for a living of complete
strangers. It seems like the perfect occupation
for someone who can't commit and can't share her
inner life; all she sees are surfaces. Larry seems
perfect for Anna only they've never met. He's a
dermatologist who likes to surf porn sites on the
net looking for cheap thrills. When he meets
"Anna" on a porn site he is inadvertently set up
on a blind date to pain and suffering when he
falls in love with Anna. These four do a square
dance of deceit, pain and humiliation in search of
love never realizing that they're looking in all
the wrong places with all the wrong people at all
the wrong times.
Driven by a series of strong performances, it's
clear that "Closer" has roots in a stage play; the
language and communication come across as
declarative statements or nasty barbs aimed for
the amusement of an audience. If cinema is the
ultimate voyeur's tool, then this film allows the
viewer to dig in for adventure with four of the
most hurtful, deceitful and plain immature adults
in the dating world. The sad thing is they
probably represent what's out there currently.
Although the directing is a bit stogy, Nichols
film resonates with the power of the four
performances although Natalie Portman and Clive
Owen shine the brightest (and both deservedly got
Academy Award nominations for their performances).
A glimpse into the strange dance of dating and
commitment, "Closer" skirts too close to the edge
of sadism to come up with any meaningful insights
although the powerful performances and Nichols'
solid direction makes the film seem to have more
substance than it really does.
A brilliant, beautiful transfer with mild digital
imperfections, "Closer" has a crystal clear image,
robust and vibrant colors and accurate flesh
tones. The high definition transfer looks terrific
and, while the 5.1 sound mix isn't all that
active, there are subtle sound effects dispersed
around the set. The DTS track has slightly better
depth than the 5.1 but beyond that they are
incredibly close.
Surprisingly light on extras, we get the
theatrical trailer, Damien Rice's music video for
the song "The Blower's Daughter" and preview
trailers. That's it. There's no commentary track
although this film could have benefited from it.
Nichols directs with a sure hand but the passage
of time is never clearly communicated until a
character states, "we've been together for a year"
or something to that effect.
A brilliant looking transfer and a quartet of
strong performances anchor Mike Nichols films.
There's surprisingly nothing in the way of extras
to fill out this set. Definitely a rental unless
you like digging into other people's misery for a
two hour stretch on a regular basis. |
