The Place Beyond the Pines and the Tripartite Structure.

This is also a film I watched a fair while ago now, but haven't had the chance to blog about. I seem to be incapable of watching a film now without writing about it (an intrinsic side-effect of being an English Literature student, I guess). Anyway, continuing the positive theme, this was a film I absolutely adored, and not just because it starred my ultimate celebrity pin-up Ryan Gosling (in fact, perhaps in spite of this!). By the way, if you haven't watched the film, and want to be surprised when you do, do not read this write up: MASSIVE SPOILER ALERT. 

The film opens with motorbike stuntman Luke Glanton (Gosling), preparing to perform at a state fair (I'm hazily guessing it is now set in the late 80's, possibly early 90's). Glanton, like Gosling himself (sorry, I can't be impartial), is effortlessly cool, your typical 'bad boy' figure. After performing his stunt, Glanton finds an ex-lover Romina (Eva Mendes) waiting for him; he subsequently discovers he has fathered her child, Jason. Glanton decides to do the right thing, quit the fair and support his child; Romina, however, is less than encouraging, having moved on and 'in' with a new lover, Kofi. Glanton follows them to church, where we see Jason baptized, in the arms of Kofi: silent tears roll down Glanton's face as he is confronted with a physical emblem of his loss of fatherhood (a fatherhood he, paradoxically, never knew he had in order to lay claim to). 

The narrative now follows Glanton's attempts to involve himself in his son's life. He finds a job fixing cars and a home (a beat-up caravan) with similar down-'n'-out Robin. The pair soon embark on a series of bank robberies, in an attempt for Glanton to get more money to support his child. With this money, Glanton begins to win Romina's favour. She allows him to see Jason, and spends the night with him (although this fact is, refreshingly, as my friend pointed out, not dwelled upon: the real affection and concomitant drama is between father and son, not lovers). Glanton, inspired by this recent contact, visits Kofi's house to deliver Jason presents when Romina and Kofi are out: when they return, conflict erupts. In this scene, we can't help but feel sympathy for Glanton. Although his gestures are misguided and extravagant, he is simply attempting to do what he believes to be 'right' by his child. A battle of wills emerges between Kofi (who believes that as this is his house, and Jason is his adopted 'son', Glanton should leave), and Glanton, who feels a touchingly paternal - if obstinate - claim to Jason, as his biological son. Glanton hits Kofi with a pair of pliers and is arrested for assault.

Now, I'm not sure if this is the director (Derek Cianfrance)'s intention or no, but I couldn't help feeling a remarkable pathos for Glanton, and sense that the other characters in the narrative have overreacted to his imprisonment. Romina for one, point blank refuses to allow Glanton access to her, while Robin effectively eschews him and hacks his beloved bike to pieces. It is, perhaps, this 'unjust' overreaction to what was, in my view anyway, an act of non-life-threatening retaliation to Kofi, that prompts Glanton's next, fatally drastic series of movements. He displays a heretofore unseen menacing side when threatening Robin with a gun to the mouth, before seizing his share of the robbery money, and buying another bike. It would be easy to develop a distaste for Glanton here, as the other characters do, yet I feel that all the while his primary (if doggedly, recklessly, quasi-ignorantly) concern for Jason, his utter devotion to him motivates this violent action. The sincerity of this motivation prevents the audience from wholly rejecting Glanton. He is, throughout, attempting to achieve a moral end, irrelevant of whether the means to this end are immoral.  

As the action progresses, Glanton becomes increasingly desperate, and embarks on a bank robbery on his own. As he pulls up, he realises he has forgotten his sunglasses. In the course of the narrative, these glasses would have no real effect anyway (he is followed by cops almost as soon as he leaves the bank), but this omission subtly augurs and insures the negative outcome of the robbery; he is not together, he is not thinking correctly, he will not be successful. During the robbery itself, Gosling reflects his character's desperation exceedingly well; his actions are sporadic and twitchy, he becomes increasingly profane, and his voice reaches a pitch almost inhumanly high. As he exits the bank, his bike (not his usual bike, that was destroyed by Robin), refuses to start: he is quickly pursued by cops, and a tense, high-octane car/motorbike chase through cemeteries and suburban streets ensues. Glanton eventually falls off his bike, taking refuge in a house - initially he claims the occupants as hostages, but quickly releases them - holing himself in an upper bedroom. The door is not ostensibly locked, and he sits in an open windowsill calling Romina, telling her not to tell Jason about him. Here, the two narratives converge. Avery Cross (Bradley Cooper), a low-ranking officer, tentatively pursues Glanton through the house, kicking in the door, and shooting him (Glanton in turn shoots him in the foot, it is unclear who shot first). Glanton falls from the window, killed by the shot and/or fall. 

One would not be overly presumptive to assume that here, the film would terminate (I certainly believed so), but no, the screenplay (written by Cianfrance, Ben Coccio, and Darius Marder) continues, now following the fallout of the incident from Cross' perspective. Some people I have spoken to have criticised this aspect, claiming that the film's posters and trailers did not advertise this section of the film (from a glance at these, 'The Place Beyond the Pines' is ostensibly exclusively dedicated to Glanton's narrative, centering on a specifically domestic setting). However, I feel that this omission is not lax or unintentional but extremely skillful. We do not expect the narrative to continue beyond Glanton's death, but this continuation opens up the film in an entirely new, experimental way, preventing an either linear or sentimental reading. 'The Place Beyond the Pines' is, for all intents and purposes, an extremely intricate, complex interrogation of human relationships, individual consciousness, conscience, morality, justice and crime: leaving off at Glanton's death would not allow these discrete, particular, yet paradoxically interconnected themes to be developed - and 'The Place Beyond the Pines' would simply become 'another' trash movie, in which Ryan Gosling looks pretty for a bit and is eventually shortchanged, and we all cry sympathetic tears (see The Notebook, or Drive). 

Cross is treated as a hero after killing Glanton, receiving an honorary award, and congratulations from his co-workers. There is, however, inside him and with us, a niggling suspicion that his actions were not, in fact, just or warranted, or event preventative (Glanton had not stated an intent to hurt anyone, he set the 'hostages' free, and it is unclear whether the door was barred). He feels remorse about killing Glanton, especially when discovering he has an infant son like his own, information we learn when he visits a therapists office (hang on, I'm having flashbacks to Silver Lining's Playbook!). Cross is induced by corrupt officers to visit Romina's home and seize (robbed) money left to her by Glanton. This is an extremely interesting element of the film. Just as Glanton attempted to do what he thought was 'right' by his son, yet encountered several obstacles (i.e. poverty, Kofi, jail), Cross attempts to do what is 'right' by handing the dirty money to a senior officer, yet discovers a barrier that prevents and skews his own moral compass: the senior police, he discovers, are just as if not more corrupt than everyone else. In light of this barrier, however, Cross persistently perseveres, recording an attempted blackmail and reporting the situation to an external board, and thereby securing a position as district attorney (removing himself from the corrupted police force). He is again reported in the news as a 'hero' who has busted an internal web of corruption, drug-dealing and money-laundering within the force: a man of integrity. I find the way the media is involved throughout the film extremely interesting; at several points it praises Cross (and disregards Glanton), elevating him to a superhuman, hero-like status. This outside intrusion is likely to have some impact on his perceptions of himself, as well as the pressure exerted by his father, and perhaps is what spurs or causes him to seek higher, more ambitious positions (he will later run for public office). Cross as a character - intentionally I feel - like Glanton, leaves us torn. On one hand, one appreciates that his first act (killing Glanton), was in part motivated by naivety and fear, and that he did (respectfully) attempt to atone for his 'crime' by turning in his fellow officers after the robbery; however, did he turn them in because he felt bad about invading Romina's home, or because of their corruption? did he seek to leave the police, only to achieve a higher position? is attention his motivation? is the public sphere one he chose, or, as the saying goes, had thrust upon him? These questions remain open-ended, and throughout my attitude toward Cross remained ambivalent: he seems to me, at once, an abstraction of the exceptional public 'hero', and an embodiment of the inherently ambitious but essentially flawed everyman. 

Again, one now expects the film to conclude, yet Cianfrance thrills in thwarting his audience's epistemophilia, and we quickly discover that the film is not in fact bipartite, but tripartite (big spoilers coming). It is fifteen years later (wow, Bradley Cooper hasn't aged one bit!), and we learn at Cross' fathers funeral that his son AJ (Avery Junior, played by Emory Cohen), is getting into trouble and wants to come and live with him. AJ comes to live with his father and transfers to a new high school where he meets a lithe boy sat alone (anyone with even rudimentary perceptive skills will work out who this is), named Jason (Dane Dehaan). In a deft twist of dramatic irony, neither boy (and why would they) knows who each other is: Jason does not know he is sharing a splif with his father's killer, nor does AJ know he's sharing one with the son of the man his father killed. We quickly discover that Aj is, in fact, a rather nasty piece of work, who induces Jason to 'score' some drugs for him. The pair are caught and arrested: AJ is set free, and - because of Cross' influence - Jason's charge is dropped to a misdemeanor. It is interesting to note here, that, in his position of power and influence (a privilege Glanton crucially lacked), Cross can make virtually 'anything' happen: the corruption he once eschewed appears to have regrown and metamorphosed, in a paradoxically similar, yet different mutation. Avery orders his son to stay away from Jason. 

Following his arrest, Jason begins to think about his 'real' father, and manages to convince Kofi (who insists that he is his 'real' dad), to give him Glanton's name. This piece of information sets the film's final action in motion, hurtling towards a disturbing denouement. Jason 'googles' his father, and discovers the information about him and his death that the audience is already party to, and goes to visit Robin. He learns about his father, his superior motorbiking skills, how much he loved him, and finds his bright green glasses (a nice touch, Glanton placed them on Jason as a baby, and more sadly, their 'loss' was the omen of his entire undoing). AJ invites (or bullies) Jason into stealing drugs for a house-party he holds at his father's house. Jason gets drunk, and spots a photo of his father's killer (AJ's father) Avery Cross, this horrible recognition prompting him to attack the unknowing AJ, who in turn beats him to a pulp. Watching this, I wonder here whether, if AJ knew why Jason was beating him, he'd understand or even sympathise. I'd hazard a guess at no. Both 'children' adopt and exaggerate their father's characteristics. Jason looks and acts like even more of an outsider, 'loner', or outcast than his father: with all the melancholy and none of the skill, fame, or attractiveness. AJ meanwhile, is an abstraction and amplification of the pig-headed, ambitious, popular, corrupt, self-important aspects that only glimmered in his father's character (however, through his public office campaign seem to have been developed). The two appear as polar opposites, and clash as opposites (despite the fact that some of their qualities intersect or intertwine). 

Jason leaves hospital, and his mother, and arrives at the Cross' house while AJ is in the shower - with a gun. We are not aware whether he has killed AJ or not as he kidnaps Avery senior, and makes him drive into the woods (in a scene that hauntingly echoes that when Cross is forced to drive into the woods by a corrupt officer), holding him at gunpoint and preparing, we are led to believe, to execute him. Jason, like his father before him, is displaying all the signs of a desperate man (or boy), attempting to do what is 'right' (for Jason, Hamlet-esque, revenging his father is the moral course). His conviction to kill Cross is blighted by Cross' affectionate concern for his own son, and admission of his regret and atonement for killing Jason's father (Cross displays his early integrity once more). Jason takes his jacket and wallet, finding the photograph of himself and his mother and father Cross took from Glanton's backpack in the evidence room. As Jason drives away, leaving Cross alive, there is a sense of circularity; he has the picture of his family (a token of their once ephemeral existence), and, we learn, he has 'spared' Cross and his son in a way that his father was not spared. Jason finds a new justice, one that does not end in death (but maybe a bit of crime). 

Cross goes on to win the public office election, AJ at his side. If the pattern is to repeat itself, Cross' success would be matched by 'a' Glanton (Jason's) failure. However, as Jason buys a bike and drives off into the distance, there is ambiguity. On one hand, this can be seen as a direct signal that - if it is not happening immediately - Jason will eventually follow in his father's footsteps, towards a life of crime and premature death; however, on the other hand, and more strongly, I feel that there is a profound sense of hope that Jason will move away from what is a largely corrupt and unhealthy setting, toward a new life. He sends the picture back to his mother; he will not, like his father, cling hopelessly to the vain, idealistic belief in the (I'll call it) 'Glanton family' - but remember it as a momentary, halcyon snapshot. This is not to say that Jason's faith in 'family' as a concept is altogether destroyed, but that, unlike his father, he will not allow a passionate, but misplaced familial fervour dis-rail his life entirely. As he leaves he is alone, but that aloneness itself becomes a good thing: cathartic, redemptive. Adopting his fathers positive traits (motorbiking skills), yet eschewing his bad ones (violence, attack), Jason, in fact, does Glanton proud. 

I loved 'The Place Beyond the Pines's three-parts. Although the film was incredibly long, I found myself engaged the entire way through, and even thought loosely of Aristotle and his three-part structure (protasis, epistasis, and catastrophe) while watching the film. The 'Glanton' section, rather than being the 'main' part of the film, is merely the protasis, or introductory element of the film, feeding the rest of the action. The 'Cross' section, is the epistasis, the main action - following 'Cross' the character whom links the two sandwich or 'bread' sections of the film together. And finally, the 'AJ and Jason' section is the catastrophe, where the climax of the film occurs: the characters confront each other, revenge is almost enacted, and the narrative is finally resolved. I do not believe this comparison is an overstatement. Cianfrance does something at once surprising, original, but ancient in origin: uncanny, at once familiar and unfamiliar, comforting in its linearity yet refreshing and exciting in its perspective (and, paradoxical, circularity). Five stars for the film that didn't focus on its actors' attractiveness, that created a surprising narrative, fresh yet indebted to ancient drama, that not only goes beyond expectations but obliterates them.   

*****

Django Unchained: the interlocking of fact and fiction.

Hi all, its been a while! I watched Django Unchained a couple of weeks ago, but haven't had a chance to blog about it yet, and realise I'm well behind the times! Now, my parents watched Django before me, and gave it a mixed review (too much gore, apparently), so I was skeptical. However, going against my parents judgement, I unequivocally loved it. 

I've recently been completing a module on American Literature, and the course has included some slave narratives, i.e. The Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglass (an amazing, disturbing, fascinating read). I was amazed to see how Django was both a departure from, and remarkably accurate homage to such narratives. The film begins with a troop of slaves being lead through the dark, nearly-naked, chained before Dr. King Schultz (Christopher Waltz) bursts onto the scene, selecting Django (Jamie Foxx) for - as-yet unknown purposes - and murdering one typically repugnant, white slave driver brother, and leaving the other to be ripped to shreds by the remaining slaves. This first scene perfectly blends the fundamental elements of Tarantino's film: violence, historical accuracy, drama, and spectacle. These elements will be drawn out, massaged and elaborated as the film develops. 

Frederick Douglass

We quickly learn that Shultz is a German bounty-hunter, and Django is a slave separated from his beloved wife Broomhilda (Kerry Washington), and the quest that follows fulfills both their aims: Shultz's desire for his bounty, and Django's for his wife. The pair travel the south, collecting bounty's, and on one occasion return to a sprawling, white plantation where Django kills the brother's who whipped Broomhilda when they attempted to escape together. This scene is highly evocative, and highly accurate. In his narrative, Douglass describes the brutal, bloody whippings white slave-owners would perform upon his helpless aunts, or other slaves. Each crack of the white man's whip is a sickening reminder of the atrocities, truly, enacted in American slave plantations. I particularly like how Tarantino makes use of flashbacks to highlight the direct, corollary link between initial crime, and retribution: throughout the film, Django is not sporadically, senselessly killing white men, but selectively pinpointing the perpetrators who have caused him or his wife harm - or those intimately connected to those perpetrators. In this sense, Django Unchained is not merely a gratuitous, frivolous blood-bath, but a revenge tragedy - like Hamlet, or The Spanish Tragedy - that just happens to enact, and repeat revenge in the same gory forms that the initial wrongdoing took. The idea that events are circular, and that revenge accords to crime is perfectly encapsulated in Django's inversion of the white man's 'I like the way you beg, boy', to 'I like the way you die, boy' as he kills him: Django not only wrests the physical, violent power from the driver, but also his vocal power - appropriating action an language, he is the ultimate victor. 

The duo now travel to Mississippi, where Schultz discovers that Broomhilda's owner is the notorious Mr. Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio). The pair first meet Candie when he is watching a 'Mandingo fight', where two black men are pitted to fight until death, in a disconcertingly sumptuous apartment. Mr. Candie is a francophile, yet Schultz is informed not to speak to him in French, as he does not know any, and it will embarrass/ anger him. This subtle fact embodies the hypocrisy, contradiction - nay madness - of the Southern plantation owner: they are wealthy yet deal in the unsellable (flesh), they have luxurious furnishings in which to watch blood-fights, they are extremely courteous, formal, charming even yet spit racist vitriol at their 'possessions' (the list is endless). Tarantino gives us a simultaneously stomach-churningly graphic and aesthetically-tuned view of the fight - two glistening black bodies writhing and slamming by a fire - which is extremely uncomfortable to watch. Yet, it is completely necessary - highlighting how 'bodies' were, quite literally, employed for sport, exploring the blurring of the boundaries between human and plaything that occurred in decadently-lit salons across America: and, most importantly of all, giving us a insight into Candie's simultaneous delectation for entertainment, and blood. Another of Candie's passions is cold hard cash, and the pair devise a plan to make a 'ridiculous offer' for a Mandingo (with Broomhilda thrown into the bargain) that Candie just cannot refuse. 

Candie is, of course, instantly attracted by this offer, 'you had my curiosity, gentlemen, now you have my attention' he drawls in a simultaneously honey-smooth and sinister Southern twang. Off they travel to the seat of 'Django's' action - Candyland. The dynamic between Django and the other men on the ride to Candyland is extremely interesting. As a 'free' slave (Schultz purchased his freedom when he appropriated him from the Schleck brothers), he feels superior to the Mandingos, and unlike them, rides a horse; as a man with integrity, he also feels superior to the repulsive, poor white slave owners - yet, he is however, not. This complex highlights the liminality felt by freed slaves (which Douglass, in his narrative, eventually is): they obviously enjoy greater liberty that their 'brothers in bonds', yet are not - and will not be for at least two centuries - equal to white men. In this situation, Django alienates himself from the black men, and the white: to some extent, he emerges almost race-less - or, at least, estranged from both races - and we are given the sense that he is a man on a sole mission, unlike any other, exempt, outside, ostracised from the slave world, but not yet immersed in another, freer one. This implacability is again highlighted when they reach Candyland and are met by Stephen (Samuel L. Jackson), Candie's fiercely loyal, senior house slave. Stephen is a complex character, and Jackson portrays him perfectly; he is obstinate, petulant, almost sycophantic in his praise of his master, and - strangely - seems to believe he is white. He, more so that Candie or anyone else, is outraged that Django rides a horse (this was banned by law), and (rather comically) informs him so. He persistently refers to Django as nigger, and almost refuses to allow him in the house, to sleep on a bed. Stephen has become so completely, immovably indoctrinated in a lifetime of service, that he has absorbed the prejudices of Candie and others, and seems to forget his own 'heritage', or alliance to his race: with him, there is no such thing as brothers in bonds. I really admire the way that Tarantino does not specify the root of Stephen's behaviour/prejudice; does he think himself superior because he is a house slave? has he forgotten that he is 'owned' by Candie? does his hatred for Django come from a love of white people (see the old insult Uncle Tom), does he detest the thought of freedom, or merely the way Django acts when free? These questions about as we watch the film.

As the group sit down for dinner, we may verge on believing that Stephen has merely been indoctrinated in his beliefs, as he parrots everything Candie says. However, the embittered way he treats Broomhilda and other slaves, and, more-so, the calculated, clever manner by which he works out Schultz and Django's plan shows that he is not just a simple, unthinking old slave: he is sensitive, perceptive, and has far more cunning and sense that his supposedly 'superior' owners. He is however, completely dedicated to them, and informs Candie of the plan. I find this aspect of the film hard to process (but that is not a bad thing). Candie seems to think he has the answer to the question of slaves loyalty (i.e. why his father's barber did not seise the opportunity to slit his neck), using some hazy, obviously non-medical and unfounded phrenological argument which posits an excess of a 'servile' quality, ignorance, trust etc. That however, as we can appreciate, isn't quite it. Stephen is not 'built', or inherently constituted to serve Candie: Django isn't the exception, Stephen is. I believe here Tarantino makes us torn between hating Stephen, and pitying him; on one hand he frustrates us because he thwarts Django's plan and chooses to remain loyal to the repugnant Candie, yet on the other hand, what actual choice does he have? He has been brought up this way, fed into it, seeing no way out and - arguably - if you must obey him, it is better to love your master than hate him, isn't it?! Loyalty is a respectable quality, is it not? In a way, Tarantino uses Stephen as an embodiment of the many complex, conflicting questions that surround and constitute the slave trade. To go into them all now is beyond my capacity (and word length), but I hope to have set the spark alight for some of them. 

Now, on to DiCaprio. People have said he deserves his long awaited oscar for this performance, and I hate to follow the crowd but I can't help but agree! This isn't his usually attractive role. Candie is slightly podgy, (ironically) with rotting teeth, and a quasi-incestuous relationship with his sister Miss Lara. He is his most charming when his most menacing, consistently blending barbarism with Southern eloquence and etiquette: and this paradoxical combination makes for a simultaneously captivating and horrifying character. In this respect, as well, Tarantino plays upon real-live accounts of plantation owners. The white men that fill Douglass's pages are brutal and vindictive, barely concealing their inhumanity - or perhaps accentuating it - through an external layer of compliments, charm, convolution, elongated words and drawling lyric sentences. In the dinner-table scene where Candie reveals his knowledge of the plan (handily given to him by Stephen), DiCaprio is intense, captivating and forceful. There is a rumour bandying around the internet that DiCaprio was not actually supposed to cut his hand in this scene, yet carried on regardless. Whether pre-orchestrated or spontaneous, this move is extremely effective, Candie exerting his dominance and ownership in the ultimate act of possession: smearing blood on Broomhilda's shaking, terrified face (or should I say Washington: if this move was sporadic the blood would be as shocking for her as for her character). Here, DiCaprio is in his element.

Following the dinner-scene, there is the 'agreement' scene, and here, the Southern etiquette which I have alluded to costs Candie his life. I love how the hypocrisy we first witnessed in Candie's character reemerges in this scene. I felt genuine pathos for Schultz, as he attempts to reconcile the beautiful, melodious arias of Beethoven with the despicable violence of the parlour, that plays on his mind through flashbacks: how can a monster such as Candie enjoy or even deserve to hear Beethoven's beautiful music? Schultz again cannot digest the injustice of Candie's desire to shake hands - in a gentlemanly fashion - in regards to the sale of flesh. Here, Candie and Schultz begin to transcend their lineal characterisations, Candie representing an abstraction of false-hospitality, the south, evil, and Shultz representing honesty, transparency, the north, morality. We have witnessed wars of the flesh in Django Unchained, but this is a war of the mind. Although we may be frustrated with Schultz for refusing to concede to a simple handshake (his concession could have instantly resolved the situation, and Django would have walked free with Broomhilda), we appreciate that it is, again, not just a handshake but an emblem, a symbol of morality falling to the overarching power of evil, goodness lapsing to necessity, difficulty giving way to ease: in terms of the film's structure and message, Schultz cannot shake hands with Candie, and he does not.

Following this mental victory (resulting in the physical death of both Candie and Schultz), we are shown a sustained, gory war of the flesh once more (shot and orchestrated with great skill). It would be easy to say that the gore here is unneeded (and it does occasionally veer that way), but I see what Tarantino is attempting to do. It would not be enough for Candie to die, Django has to kill those related with him, the white men who pour to the house, who loyally walk into their own death for him: simultaneously obliterating every shade of 'Candie', and making Django's crime graver and graver, blacker and more heinous (whilst also showing off his excellent gun skills. Tarantino deals in extremes: Django has to commit the worst crime, in order to receive the worst punishment, in order to escape that worst punishment and be the ultimate victor. There is a chain, there is succession, and there is logic in Tarantino's design (despite superficial appearances). As Django is chained (again), upside-down and naked, he is taunted by a white man (Crash) who he had a previous clash with, who threatens to chop off his member. Although Django is clearly afraid here (who wouldn't be), this is not the most frightening interaction he has. The true psychological difficulty coincides with Stephen's reappearance. Candie is now dead, but Stephen's loyalty isn't (it was not, then, a circumstantial, situational affection): if this is a case of Stockholm syndrome, it is one that continues after death. Here, again, Stephen seems to show his intellectual (or at least sadistic) superiority over the white men, claiming that the have devised a series of physical torments for Django, where as it is he who comes up with the psychological torment: Django will be sent to a mine, where he will hammer rocks repetitively, will have no name no freedom no right to speak, and be tossed in a pit when he's dead like an old, broken tool. If Stephen hates Django for behaving like a white man, than he is going to remind him exactly what he is: a black slave, with no rights and no voice. As Stephen passes his judgement, however, I can't help but think that he embodies the very thing he claims to hate: Candie dead, he fills his place, more white and more hate-filled that him, able to execute the role better, perhaps, because of his close observation of it. 

After this scene, I feel that the film loses pace slightly. There is a lot of comedy in Django's gulling of the Australian slave drivers (with Tarantino in one of the roles), comedy which mirrors the Klu Klux Klan scene (which I'll talk about in a moment) where white men are revealed to be stupid and greedy; additionally, there is pathos and beauty as Broomhilda and Django are reunited. The film only springs into its own again, however, in the last few shots. Django returns to the house (while the family and slaves are at Candie's funeral), and enacts the perfect moment of transgression and re-appropriation: dressing himself in Candie's clothes. This act is not just actually, but symbolically and ideologically subversive: as he reclaimed the words used against him (see above 'I like the way you beg, boy') he reclaims and refashions the garments of studied hypocrisy, of fine brutality, of respectable injustice, and on them they lose those connotations - they look new, they look handsome, majestic even. When they return, he (literally) occupies the highest plain. I believe that here, who he allows to live, and who is deigned to die is particularly interesting. The white men are killed yet the two black women are allowed  to go. In this respect, one might argue that Django works by binary opposites - killing because they are male, and white, releasing because black, and women. However, his shooting of Miss Lara complicates matters. We begin to realise that, as I argued earlier, to some extent, Django sees through race, he also sees through gender. The black women are saved not because they are black and female, but because they are blameless: Miss Lara's gender doesn't save her - she is evil or does evil actions, so in Django's mind, deserved to die (how complicit she is is contestable, as I am aware that indoctrination is also colourblind). We also learn that race is not a saviour: Stephen is Django's final victim, and to the last, he remains pejorative to Django and loyal to Candie. Although I respect that in this cinematic sphere this is justice - Stephen, like Miss Lara is a bad person regardless of race or gender and should die. But, as I did with her, I question his complicitness. I feel that the questions I raised earlier complicate the sense of 'victory' in this killing: there is neatness, circularity (crime answering crime etc), but his death did not make me happy. There is the great sense as the film concludes that, although one Stephen is dead, there were (are) many Stephen's - complicated, hard to judge characters - still out there. It is a bittersweet justice, a justice you half-want and half-eschew (ah Tarantino you do confuse me so expertly).

My previous statements do not mitigate my appreciation of Django's ending. The house is blown up, effectively answering and silencing Stephen's claim that 'can't no n***** destroy Candyland' (they can, he just did), and Django walks away, master of spectacle, master of events, the master. In the final seconds of the film, I felt a respect for Django (Foxx's performance is consistent, sustained, sometimes unbelievable, but often witty, funny, likable, admirable), yet also a fear that correlates with my statement about the 'many Stephen's' still out there. Broomhilda and Django, two slaves on the run, still in the south, face the same danger and prejudice that Douglass and his new wife experienced when he was newly escaped. Tarantino effectively juxtaposes fantasy and reality in these final moments; fantasy in the massive explosion, like the fallacy and fictionality of this select story, and reality in the touching human tenderness of husband and wife, like the reality of those impossible - almost unbelievable - yet true stories like that of Frederick Douglass. I guess a pictorial representation is never fully accurate, but Tarantino's - in its blend of accuracy and inaccuracy, fiction and reality - actually, paradoxically, perfectly encapsulates the life of the escaping slave: your slave-life is one of a real pain that is almost fictional in its brutality, your escape involves true danger, but must be fantastical in order to succeed.  

Douglass in old age

Other notable parts of the film which I may have missed in this chronological review are:

1. The scene where Southern Klu Klux Klan members storm Schultz' dentist wagon. I was, at first, truly terrified by the scene - men charging towards the tiny, vulnerable wagon on horseback with flames and, by now, well-known costumes, with hooves clashing, disturbing whooping sound etc. - fearing that Django and Schultz truly were in danger. However, Tarantino creates a wonderful bathos, when their discussion of tactics descends into a petty, childish squabble over the inadequacy of their costumes. I love how Tarantino highlights the dual aspects of the KKK; these men were noxious and terrifying, they murdered black people across America for centuries (and this is, largely, how they are remembered in history books), however, they were also acutely stupid, uninformed, ignorant, poverty-stricken men - more often than not - with nothing better to do that make the lives of others a hell akin unto their own. Tarantino obliterates the abstract, quasi-mystical, fictionalised picture of a Klu Klux Klan member: they were not inhuman killing machines (although their actions were inhuman), but human, fallible - cheat-able, conquerable - mortals, who gained power not through true superiority or strength or cunning, but through the circumstantial historic climate, money (if not much of it), and the sheer mass of them. Pit 10 white men against 1 black man and its obvious that the minority will often be the losing party. This paradoxically light, and rich, scene is perhaps one of my favourites of the film. 
2. The reunification scene between Broomhilda and Django. There is all sorts of dramatic irony going on here. Miss Lara, and Broomhilda believe Schultz has sent for her to have sex, and her fear and frustration are evident. The fact that the scene is spoken in German heightens both the sense of danger, and tension. As Schultz talks he dresses - rather than undresses, figuring the opposite of the process which Broomhilda is used to (she is used for sex by Mandingos and others). We cannot help but admire Django's love of 'spectacle' (he is, so often, the object of other's entertainment, you can't blame him for wanting to re-appropriate glamour, and orchestrate a drama of his own), but the tension is near-distressing. The door opens, Broomhilda faints: it is, in its own way, the perfect reunification.
3. I love the slow shot of the blood splatter on cotton. It seems apt in so many ways.

JEM.