Something Wild
directed by Jonathan Demme
There are numerous challenges to writing effectively about a film over a quarter of a century old, and Lord knows, I'm not the one to transcend them. Belonging to a later generation, It's tempting to fall back on established critical consensus while only topically discussing its intrinsic links to social and political movements. Fortunately, the core ideals of Jonathan Demme's film have not yet lost their potency.
One week removed from my final Spring exams, the summer full-time work season has just begun. After a week of long, grueling hours in the blistering sun, hauling land-surveying equipment and hammering wooden stakes into the West Texas desert soil, it is evident my body has not yet adjusted the demands of the job. Leaving me both physically exhausted and filled with ennui. Thus, revisiting Jonathan Demme's mid-1980's masterwork after a routine work day, I found a degree of commonality with the gawky, soft spoken hero, Charles Driggs (Jeff Daniels). Though, I am not a paper pushing banker, his nervous temperament in the initial sequences where his seemingly ordinary existence is derailed by a free thinking, bohemian "belle noiseuse," (played by the very likeable Melanie Griffith) was instantly recognizable as pure wish-fullfillment. Charlie has little in the way of intrusive mannerisms or dangerous streaks as an early retort,"I channel my rebellion into the mainstream," lands with a comic thud.
After some very herky-jerky driving, the couple stop at a motel, she quickly seduces and hand-cuffs him to the bed-railng, enabling Lulu to force on him a telephone conversation with his boss. He has evidently never been late to work and now must tell his boss that he will not be coming in. Afterwards, the couple dine at an expensive restaurant. Lulu initiates a "dine-and-dash" leaving Charlie distraught and pierced by the judging eyes of the customers and employees. The cumulative effect of these scenes suggest a farce like Planes, Trains and Automobiles. We suspect Lulu (mirroring John Candy) will eventually loosen the tight grip she has on her wacky facade and reveal the damaged individual inside, but no, Johnathan Demme respects the integrity of his characters too much as he circumvents the expected romantic comedy tropes and fulfills the promise of the bold title. After buying a new blue suit, Lulu symbolically unlocks the handcuffs Charlie has been wearing since the motel: "I'm setting you free."
It is soon revealed that Lulu has "kidnapped" Charlie to serve as her date to the ten year class of '76 reunion. Amidst all the bicentennial bric-a-brack, hats, American Flags & red, white and blue balloons, Demme suggests a vision of suburban life just as far reaching, but never quite as nihilistic as the one shown in David Lynch's Blue Velvet. Though there is a direct similarity in that both films feature a psychotic antagonist that our awakened hero struggles against, tonally, they are very different films. David Lynch film unearths the the corrosive underbelly of everyday suburban existence from the American psyche, while Demme comfortably underplays it, choosing to highlight the details of the ordinariness of Lulu's classmates. The fact that they are so anonymous, well-mannered & harmless manages to be more frightening than the presence of Frank Booth's deranged cronies.
One of the many small miracles of Something Wild is that it manages to be a bold, socially conscious film without shoving it in our faces like the similarly themed films about awakening, the pre-millennial Fight Club and American Beauuty being key examples. Not unlike the best of Demme's films, a reliable emotional hook is favored over topical speechifying and histrionics. The same way his 1998 film, Beloved (a radically different film in tone), is more about the human experience of slavery as opposed to it's politics, Something Wild is more about coloring Charlie's transformation into a more relaxed individual than speechifying about the lecherous Wall Street world which he occupies.
Something Wild is a film of simple closeups, two-shots and establishing shots, it is quite assured. In an underplayed stroke of visual mastery, the late scenes where Charlie is observing Ray and Lulu, waiting for the opportunity to rescue her, we see Charlie finally comfortable in his skin. These scenes effectively mirror the earlier ones of his social discomfort in the upscale restaurant. When he changes his bloodied shirt at a convenience store in from of other customers and casually converses with the cashier, we sense a changed person.
Furthermore, the bold use of colors do not constitute an affectless quirk (a la Wes Anderson), but rather reveal the film's modus operandi. Taj Fujimoto's cinematography is deceptively traditional- establishing shots, two-shots and close-ups-, but when paired with bold use of color, it provides a perfect counterpoint to the personal narrative of a square guy tapping into the danger within: bright colors trapped within a simple frame. Only in the later scenes of triumph, the contrast between Charlie's plainness and his swirling surroundings is finally subdued. The violent bathroom showdown between Charlie and Ray, constitutes another deceptively subtle employment of color as the national colors are on full display. The tight camera work rarely allows all three colors to coexist in the same image, but Craig McKay's rapid fire editing unites them through montage that recalls Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho. Red & White: the blood stains on Charlie and Ray's white tee shirts, Charlie's white shorts and the plain walls. Blue: Ray's blue Jeans, the blue towels, the wave patterns on the wall and Lulu's light blue shirt.
Something Wild gives the appearance of a document of a bygone era, but unlike another film that dared to cover much of the same ground, Oliver Stone's Wall Street (which was released one year later), it manages to carve its own trans-temporal identity apart from the topical social musings. Sure, the soundtrack is comprised of distinctly 1980's artists: Talking Head's frontman David Byrne; experimental artists, John Cale and Laurie Anderson; New Wave and Post-Punk artists, The Feelies, UB40, Fine Young Cannibals and New Order; but, the film eschews easy categorization: it is more than just an effective genre-hopping excursion into 1986. The film has thematic weight and a clear moral conscience as it notes the tight grip corporate America has on our necks and the necessity for companionship in increasingly impersonal times. As Charlie asides, "it's better to be a live dog than a dead lion."
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