A sweet title - not a sweet movie. Take a good, hard look at this movie still, and you might notice two things: the amazing cinematography and the main actress, Amy Adams. This is Tom Ford's long awaited 2nd film after the fabulous "A Single Man" which came out 7 years ago. This time the cinematography is by Seamus McGarvey and it is beyond flawless. Mc Garvey's captivating cinematography will make anything look beautiful, even a weird curtain hanging in a Texan hut with a fly on it. So that part of the movie is stunning. Unfortunately the plot however isn't, Ford chose to adapt the book of Austin Wright called Tony and Susan and it's a story within a story.Susan hasn't spoken to her estranged ex husband in 19 years, which can happen, and one day she receives a book dedicated to her. When she opens it, the packaged paper gives her a paper cut and you'll know this is going to be a strange movie. But there is good strange, in an intriguing way and bad strange, in a more what the hell is gonna happen now, way. This movie tends to cling to the idea of the latter. What starts as a semi-intriguing, somewhat exciting idea, quickly becomes very bizarre and very misogynist indeed. A road trip gone very wrong meets a relationship which has also gone pretty wrong. And a main male character, played by Jake Gyllenhaal, who has got serious issues. The issue of him being too romantic and too weak for Susan seems to be a big deal in this film, but I couldn't exactly detect much romanticism in this particular character. I do however, shockingly so, detect serious issues of the director with his female characters and full-on misogyny, as well as victim blaming.
Susan could be a pretty strong woman and Amy Adams is doing her best to embody her, but the plot lets her believe that she's nothing without a man on her side. The stuff that happens to her is full on, the book variation is just downright painful to watch and Ford torments his audience and juggles the story between massive drama and creepy art house horror. But perhaps we have gotten used to a lot of casual misogyny around us, so we don't even notice this anymore? None of the early reviews were even the slightest bothered by this. Ford's other female figures are brief, bizarre and grotesque and it's not very satisfying to get a few scenes with actual well written dialogue, only to have them snatched away and being fed more art house horror madness. Fact is: not enough background story, not enough good dialogue and certainly not enough character development. This could have been a lot better! I expected much more from a film maker I so fell in love with 9 years ago.
So what remains of watching this movie is a deep disappointment of the story in itself and the fact that the director succumbed to the bizarre temptation to have to maybe cater to a wider audience with a greater appetite for casual horror. A story that could have been very interesting but the other story kept interfering and tried to complicate things in an unnecessary and annoying way. Needless to say the actresses and actors are doing their best. Very interesting beginning, a pretty strange middle part and a very, very weak ending. Not your average thriller I guess but not incredibly memorable either. So Mr. Ford, it's a shame that you seem to have an issue with Modern Art, but you don't hesitate to use it to a very obvious point, and with women who seem to be too complex and kaleidoscopic for you to truly be able to show all their interesting facets and colours. But you did prove one obvious point: we really need more stories written by women and films directed by women. Case closed.
