IT'S ALL ABOUT LOVE
Denmark, 2003, 104 minutes, Colour.
Joaquin Phoenix, Claire Danes, Sean Penn, Douglas Henshall, Margo Martindale, Alun Armstrong, Mark Strong.
Directed by Thomas Vinterberg.
Thomas Vinterberg directed one of the most effective films under the 'Dogme 95' banner, Festen. It probed under the surface of Danish family respectability. It is not quite clear what he is doing with It's all about Love.
The films looks very good (no Dogme minimalism here). The setting is the 2020s in a world where temperatures have become colder rather than global warming, a world where people are self-preoccupied and don't notice the dead bodies lying around the city streets, that kind of world.
The focus is on a young Polish man, Joaquin Phoenix, who visits an American city to sign divorce papers. His wife, Claire Danes, is a champion figure skater. She wants to retire. It seems a company are making clones of her to continue her career. This does not work out, the couple flee and end up in the snow and... who knows? (and one is tempted to ask: who cares?)
To give the plot some solemnity (not that it needs it), Sean Penn appears as a man afraid of flight who has overcome his fears, telephones his brother and keeps flying because there is too much ice and snow on tarmacs to land.
1. A strange film, complex plot, futuristic issues? Audiences being divided? Hostile or being absorbed by the atmosphere?
2. The career of the director, the influence of Dogme, this film as the opposite in style, lavish visuals? The musical score?
3. The title, the relationship between John and Elena? The separation, alienation, meeting to sign divorce papers, the threats to Elena, the decision to flee and be together?
4. The director working in English, the mixture of strange accents? The international cast?
5. The locations, New York City, the plains, the interiors?
6. John and his Polish background, relationship with Elena, the break, the desire for the divorce? Meeting her again? Her strange situation? The decision to leave? The hopes for rediscovering love?
7. Elena, ice skating, champion? Her career? Her marriage, separation from John? New York City, the decision to sign divorce papers? The threats to her, the clones or the doppelgängers, the sinister people behind the plot? Getting rid of her and substituting the doppelgängers? To what purpose? Her meeting John, whether to sign the papers on not, the decision to flee, to discover their love for one another?
8. Themes of the weather, the increasing cold, snow in July in New York? The upsetting of the seasons? The suggestion that this was all symbolic of the cold in human hearts and the need for love?
9. The conspiracy, those behind it, the clones, the doppelgängers, targeting Elena?
10. John’s brother, his observations of people, a guide, philosophical, his attitude towards flight, continually flying around the world?
11. The Ugandans, tied, the African background, their flight in the plane, to what purpose?
12. The continuity of the plot, lack of continuity? Episodes seeming absurd? Or simply images for the audience to surrender to, to experience them and to feel rather than to think?
