Manic (MGM)
Picture:
B Sound: B Extras: B Film: B+
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) was a masterpiece precisely because it
worked from perhaps Ken Kesey’s original premise that Nurse Ratched was the
craziest of them all -- the cuckoo that got away. This invariably led to one of the greatest screen characters of
all time, Jack Nicholson’s Randall P. McMurphy who was played so brilliantly by
Nicholson that even today, twenty-nine years later, whether or not McMurphy
knew completely what he was doing and had absolute control of his faculties
throughout the film is still debatable.
If he was smarter than Ratched, how did he end up losing to her through
being lobotomized? But if instead he
was fed up with the craziness of the world – then maybe he, in fact, did find a
way to escape by bending to her will in a Christ-like move of submission,
ultimately inspiring Chief toward freedom.
We all know the moment – the window is open and McMurphy decides to hang
back, falling asleep with escape only inches away. Did he really want to escape the real world? Milos Foreman’s film begs all these
questions, and in my opinion still must be the film by which all movies about
mental illness are judged.
But what is interesting
about Jordan Melamed’s Manic is that
I’m not quite sure this film, if I can call it that since it was shot in its
entirety on a Sony PD-150 Mini-DV camera, is even about mental illness. This is not necessarily a new thing – other
films have been shot entirely on DV prior to Manic, and contrary to mainstream history, Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones was not the first film
with a theatrical released shot entirely digitally, though that was in High
Definition. Yet, like this film and
perhaps the subsequent 28 Days Later,
this disc as a feature-length film shot on mini-DV is a landmark in the digital
revolution, and probably more cleverly directed than all the digital videos
I’ve seen released at approximately that same time with the exception of
perhaps Spike Lee’s Bamboozled and
Soderbergh’s Full Frontal. Yet, the eventual transfer to film leaves
the image on the disc with a grain that while probably intended, does lend to a
certain low-budget feel. But this
low-budget feel is an asset to the film’s aesthetic of roughness, and being a
filmmaker myself, I must applaud any attempts at innovation as far as picture
quality goes. However, the star power
of Cheadle ought to distract most from what otherwise might be perceived as bad
picture quality. Cheadle introduces
himself to Lyle as a psychologist in a compelling opening credit sequence that
crosscuts between Lyle’s own disorientation at the psychiatric hospital and the
audio of a violent exchange over black minus tiny white credits. Cinematically, this sequence enables us to
get oriented to the grit and style of Melamed’s direction of Nick Hay’s
deliberately shaky camera-work and grainy images as the cnematographer, albeit
electronic. This may take some getting
used to. I don’t think the picture
grain, resulting obviously and deliberately from the video transfer to film is
a bad thing – I actually think it adds to the grit and authenticity of the
movie’s mise en scene. But even for
those unconvinced by the image quality, the acting here is so good, in no small
part due to Melamed’s directing and Michael Bacall and Blayne Weaver’s
screenplay, that most disc viewers undoubtedly within the first ten minutes
will soon forget about the image, and become fully engaged with the film’s
characters. I don’t exaggerate when I
say that Manic presents some of the
best acting by a relatively unknown, or at least non-star, cast that I have
seen in a single movie in a long time.
With little exception, each performance is so noteworthy, it is almost
futile to attempt in a single review to name those who stood out. Melamed’s direction of both the actors and
editing indicates a strong command of what the uninitiated viewer would call realism; however, Melamed’s frequent
cuts, edits, and usage of both montage and non-diegetic sound make this more a
formalistic affair than a realistic one in every sense of the word.
Watching Manic I don’t think the core issue is
sanity – well, perhaps it is sanity in the legal sense of being a threat to
yourself or others – but certainly not sanity in the colloquial sense of what
society calls “crazy”. Halfway through
this film, and certainly by the end, I thought Mad would be a better title for the movie because “mania”-- in both
the clinical and the Greek sense -- from where the word derives, are hardly a
central focus here. No, this film is
not about mania – that delusional euphoria that defies reality. This film is about pure, unadulterated rage
and all of its various manifestations as its protagonist and supporting
characters grapple with the problem of displaced, unexpressed, unrequited, and
misunderstood emotion. Now, granted,
psychology teaches us that depression is anger turned inward – but most of the
characters in this film are so outward with their rage, it is fairly difficult
to tell who is depressed, and who, on the other hand, is just plain pissed off
at the world.
With a title like Manic, you would think that Jordan
Melamed’s cinematic portrait of the psychological anguish that teenagers
experience at the beginning of the 21st century would be an
insightful depiction of the trials and tribulations of a protagonist grappling
with bipolar disorder, otherwise known as manic depression. But that is not exactly what you get. In fact, I don’t think we are ever meant to
be certain what Lyle, played with earnest by Joseph Gordon-Levitt is ever
suffering from, aside from inexplicable bursts of anger. Now in a normal world this may in fact be a
reason for psychological treatment, but in our age of road rage and melees at
NBA basketball games it is difficult to fully imagine what the consequences
would be if anger were treated indiscriminately as a mental illness. After all, aren’t we all mad about
something? Certainly, everyone in this
film is. Now granted, in the opening
sequence Lyle is not wrestled down by two large orderlies and given a shot in
his butt simply because he is angry, or so we are supposed to believe. But I’m not buying it.
We understand during this moment
that prior to this his temper tantrum, he was involved in an altercation where
he committed criminal assault. But how
Lyle, a white teenager on the verge of turning eighteen, winds up confined to a
psychiatric unit for “bashing a kid’s head in with a baseball bat” –- (note:
these are the words of Don Cheadle’s Dr. David Monroe in an early scene, and
not Lyle’s) -- and not in jail awaiting an attempted murder trial is an
interesting but all too true reflection of our own culture where certain
populations receive treatment for criminal assault, while others receive jail
time. But it is not clear whether this
is a racial point Melamed wants to make since Monroe, played by Don Cheadle is
a complex and intelligent black man who genuinely cares about his patients, but
in my opinion, is a bit too unprofessional in his approach. I think Monroe is flawed in that in his
desire to relate to his teenage patients, he makes it difficult for me as an
audience member to determine how he can really help them. The emotionally frustrated needing a friend
and a sounding board is one thing, but those guilty of criminality using
treatment as an escape from prison is yet another issue – especially when
Monroe as a black man ought to realize that none of his patients are
black. Is this really about helping the
emotionally disturbed, or is this a systematic way of letting certain people
off the hook for their behavior? It is
indeed a mad, mad world. But this is
not Cheadle’s fault, nor a fault of the director.
Cheadle is one the best actors
working today, and probably equally one of the most underrated. He’s good in everything he does, and he’s
good here. Maybe for the sake of
character likeability it is good that his Monroe comes off more as a big
brother than a professional with all the answers, but his own angry outbursts
at key moments on the disc reveal perhaps a man who has only masked his own
inner demons with a Ph.D. in psychology, which incidentally would preclude him
from being able to prescribe medicine – and yet throughout the film it appears
that the drugs are administered on “his watch”. A discrepancy, to me, that only hurts the film’s believability
and Monroe’s characterization even more.
While
the cast is diverse – Lyle’s roommate looks Latino or perhaps Native American –
it is worth noting, as I have already hinted at, that the only
African-Americans in this institution are those in authority, obviously
employed either for their brawn – or in the case of Cheadle’s Monroe, for their
brains. But various crises in the film
betray this since Monroe time and time again resorts to bursts of anger, rage,
and profanity to work out his own issues.
While the role is compelling, it is not compelling enough, since
African-American men are almost always cast for their ability to be angry. Just think of all the cop dramas and
comedies where the chief of police is a black man chewing the heads off of the
protagonists, or those hood flicks throughout the nineties. But this isn’t surprising. Nobody in this film can control their tongue
or their temper. The patients exclaim
four letter words as easily as they can spout facts about the possibilities of
Batman beating up Superman, which makes this disc an unlikely source for any
real solutions as to how to deal with anger in any public sense. This is not a place for answers or a
prescription, but merely a diagnosis.
Accordingly, the orderlies, as they do in real life, commonly use their
size and numbers to violently subdue unruly teens, whether they are boys or
girls. And prescription drugs are
dished out, literally, on the threat of violence. It is an upside-down world that Lyle inhabits in this film, but
this topsy-turviness does lend itself to an interesting moment in the last act
of the film between Cheadle and one of his nurses, another black man – as they
lament over the tragedy of that particular day’s event. This moment is interesting because it
punctuates this realm that Melamed has drawn where a black man -- and his black
right-hand man -- can have charge over troubled suburban youth. For this reason alone, this disc is worth
viewing in its presentation of a black male whose authority and influence over
white suburban youth is not validated by hip hop or sports. Some of this is undercut though by frequent
scenes of basketball games played by patients on low hoops, presumably so
frequent cuts of actors dunking can be edited within these sequences – or maybe
the hospital has intentional lowered the hoops so that the patients can have an
outlet for their frustrations. But
since these sequences always end in fights, if the latter were the case, it
seems they should revise this policy.
Stylistically, Melamed
wants us to believe that he just lets the camera run and had the actors ad-lib,
but there is definitely a method behind this madness that is as controlled as
Hitchcock on the set of Rope. There are no accidents here. Melamed is in control of the feel of his
frame every step of the way. He just
wants you to think this is a documentary.
Quite persuasively, I might add.
This is brilliant directing of a good, but not great story. It is the acting, the cinematography, and
the editing that stand out here. The
disc itself is good, but not great. All
in all, it is worthwhile with a 10 minute behind-the-scenes featurette that is
too much movie, and not enough behind-the-scenes. But there are deleted scenes and an interesting enough
commentary. But since this is Melamed’s
first feature, I’m anxiously looking forward to what he will do in the
future. He and his producers have
certainly proven that you can indeed make good movies, and subsequently good
discs, with the very affordable Mini-DV format.
- Gregory Allen
Gregory
Allen -- filmmaker, scholar, and critic -- is an assistant Professor in the
Cinema and Digital Arts Department at Point Park University, and is currently
pursuing his Ph.D. at the University of Pittsburgh. He also oversees the student film production organization The
Sprocket Guild www.sprocketguild.org and
can be contacted at info@sprocketguild.org.
