Once upon a time in Kansas

[chani]

I went to see Mysterious Skin today. I had planned to do it for a while but nobody wanted to go with me. Eventually I went by myself...

This movie intrigued me (an American NC-17 rated movie, go figure!) and of course I knew that Michelle Trachtenberg (our little Dawn from Buffy) was in it, so I had two good excuses to see it! 

This film is about the aftermath of pedophilia, but it has nothing to do with Almodovar's La Mala Educacion (which wasn't a bad movie btw, and whose main subject wasn't actually child abuse).

This is the story of two boys living in some small town in Kansas. Brian and Neil. First we are introduced to little Brian, the blonde kid, hidden behind his huge glasses. His nose is bleeding and Brian's voice (off) tells us that he lost 5 hours of his life that day...when he was 8. Then came Neil, the dark haired kid with his huge and beautiful blue eyes. There's a connection between both guys whose journeys we are going to follow. They played in the same baseball team when they were 8, and they shared the same coach.

This is a film to see if you want to think and to be moved at the same time.

This is a film to see if you want to know Neil...

One of the qualities of the film is its honesty. Neil's burgeoning sexuality is first mentioned. He's attracted to men. He masturbates and comes while spying on his mother and one of her boyfriends. He lusts after his coach the first time he sees him. Yes children do have a sexuality. Yet Neil is still an abused child as well as the innocent Brian who didn't have any desire towards the coach.

What would have Neil become if he hadn't been abused? We'll never know but the Summer he shared with the coach made him and damaged him to some point. He learnt at 8 that sex could provide him something (the love of his beloved coach, power and money). He's clever, incredibly beautiful and totally screwed-up. When he's 15, Neil faces the dirty side f life and starts selling his body to various men while Brian is growing-up behind his glasses in his childish bedroom while repressing his memories.

Both mothers are very different but both are completely clueless.

Neil quickly used what the coach taught him to control the others and to make money while Brian stayed a mamma's boy, uptight and sexless. Soon Brian persuades himself that he has been kidnapped by UFOs when he was a kid! Of course the aliens abduction is a perfect metaphor.

At the end of the day the film shows how people learn to deal with a painful past and the defenses they have built up to protect a secret. That secret, Neil yet shared it with his "soul mate" (as he says), played by Michelle Trachtenberg. It's actually a moving relationship, sexless since he's gay (and the fact that his soul mate is precisely someone with whom he'll never have sex, is significant), but quite romantic. And of course her name is...Wendy!

Neil/Peter Pan wanna fly (he enjoys sex, pot and alcohol...he wants to leave that "trou paumé")but he can't grow up. Basically he's still a child. Wendy tries to help him, to protect him but when she leaves we understand that Neil will be lost without her. He joins her in New York eventually and she takes him under her wing.

Meanwhile Brian is tracking him down to find out what happened to him when he was younger.

Neil gets really hurt one night (a very painful scene in which he's drugged, beaten and raped by one of his client) and when he goes back to his home-town, he meets up with Brian finally, 10 years later.

In that last scene they both face their truth. This is an emotionally charged scene but never tear-jerking. Brian is ready to hear what exactly happend and Neil is ready to explain. I think it's a  pivotal scene mostly for Neil, because first he recalls he was the favourite boy, the one whom the coach really loved, he's almost cruel then, taking a sort of revenge over the other boy (he had to share his beloved coach after all) but in the end he finds compassion in his so-said empty heart (a black hole as Wendy said to their friend Eric) and feels sorry for his own role in what happened to Brian. The audience is left to decide if there's hope or not for them.

So the film is dark and quite disturbing, but it has also a certain lightness (the music, the way it's shot and the aliens theory provide it for instance) and it's often poetic. Baudelaire-like I would say.

Certain characters are under-developed, like Wendy, Eric or even the freaky-girl who claims she has been kidnapped by aliens 20 times. But perhaps it's precisely the charm of this movie to suggest other journeys, just lighly touched on the screen. This contributes to its mysterious tone and its mysterious skin.

All the actors are good (the kids who play little Brian and little Neil are terrific) but Joseph Gordon-Levitt who played Neil is simply amazing. He's an angel of beauty, sexy, cocky and lso very lost but always very convincing!

Nodody's going to forget Neil...

 

 

Comments

[fishsanwitt]

Thank you for this wonderful review. I'm here through 'We Band...' and I really love Joseph Gordon-Levitt. I think he's an amazing talent. How did Michelle do?

[frenchani.livejournal.com]

Aww thank you.

Michelle was okay, but her role was too small to provide a great performance. I must confess that I've seen her doing better in Buffy though.

JGL is extremely talented indeed, and really beautiful in this movie. While watching it I was thinking that I quite understood the men who paid Neil for sex, honest!

Chani

[fishsanwitt]

I know there's a lot of 'Dawn' hate out there, but I always thought Michelle did an excellent job - I thought her work was pretty subtle.

[frenchani.livejournal.com]

I don't get hatred towards a character (so many Spike haters used to post on boards!)...It's beyond my understanding.

Michelle was often very good in BTVS indeed.

[fishsanwitt]

Well, I'm a Spike lover :)

I *do* understand why so many Spike haters were out there - because he *threatened* their 'one true pairing', whatever that was.

I still don't think it was right of them to be so vitriolic to Spike fans - but people usually aren't rational when they're hurting or when they're defensive.

I've been on *both* sides of the fence - loving the original 'ship and also loving the 'next' 'ship - it's a tough position to be in.

Fandom can be *vicious*.

[frenchani.livejournal.com]

Well I've never been a Bangel shipper, and I even kinda disliked the pairing when it was too sappy ("Amends" for instance!)...but I didn't hate Angel at all.

I understand your point, and yes Spike was a threat for Bangel people and Bander people, but we're talking fictional characters here! Well I guess that Spike haters actually ended up hating the writers and Spike fans.

Xander isn't my favourite character but I don't hate him. I became a true Spuffy shipper when seeing "Something Blue" but I've never hated Riley.
I'm quite a passionate person too and I do love Spike (the best tv character ever created IMO) but I didn't hate Buffy in season 6 for being "so mean" with him.

Fans can be scary.

[fishsanwitt]

When I first started watching 'Buffy', I liked B/A together. Same as you, when I saw 'Something Blue' and saw how *amazing* Spike and Buffy were together, I was a goner.

I'm a diehard S/B fan now - no other relationship will do :)

But I didn't hate Angel or Riley or any of the characters - and, like you - I didn't hate Buffy in Season 6. I tried (and still try) to understand where she was coming from - and I don't excuse her, as I don't excuse Spike.

Despite *everything*, they were and *are* the perfect match for each other.

And I agree - Spike is a unique character - brought to life by an amazing actor. James is *truly* gifted.

And here's where I part from those *scary* fans - I never hated the writers or even Joss or Marti (okay, I dislike Marti a lot - I can't lie about that), but I wouldn't send them hate mail or any weird stuff like that!