Divergent

A few small thoughts on Neil Burger's Divergent.

Neil Burger previously directed the terrible film The Illusionist (which, incidentally, does have a beautiful score by Philip Glass).

But Divergent is very good, and the more I think about it the more I like it.

Comparisons with The Hunger Games are inevitable – girl-power, dystopias, vaguely anti-Fascistic politics, highly structured class systems, color-coding, young-adult-novel-as-source – but Divergent is way way way better than The Hunger Games. For one, the young woman at the center of Divergent's narrative does a lot of choosing, seems to have a purchase on the decisions that she makes, and basically becomes a total badass on her own.

Divergent also lacks the intense sentimentality of HG, opting instead for a character who favors rational decision-making, an understanding of power structures combined with a savvy ability to work within them, and a political knowledge more complex than a notion of "good guys" and "bad guys".

As a film, Divergent also gives us plenty of time to take in the beauty of the world in which it is situated. The central character (her name is Tris – rhymes with Katniss – and she is similarly saddled with a less-cartoonish but still vaguely symbolic last name; hers is Prior) enjoys the world in which she lives, finds parts of it beautiful, and treats it with respect and affection. And it isn't just the film's protagonist who enjoys her world, the filmmaker, too, takes a great pleasure in the world that surrounds Tris.

Unlike the heroine of HG, Tris, who (like Katniss) is, of course, forced to respond to the military power and governmental violence that are brought to bear upon her, but Tris responds actively, dominating her surroundings, leading the other people in her life, and enjoying the victories that she wins. Divergent is not a film with a series of bad choices, wherein the heroine must opt for the lesser of a series of evils. Divergent resounds with a hopefulness for a future where the world might be better. If, finally, we are given no image of what that world might look like, we are given an image of a young woman who is prepared to work hard to make a world in which she would like to live.

Divergence, as an idea, is a happy metaphor for queerness, for the idea of a person who doesn't fit in who feels alone and then finds a community of others who diverge similarly. It may be that I liked the film for this reason most of all, and then am tacking on my other ideas as the result of this identificatory process. Or it may be that the lovely Shailene Woodley simply smiles a good deal more than the for-some-reason-always-serious Jennifer Lawrence.

In any case, sequels are scheduled, and I will definitely be seeing the second one of these.

Vibrating Homosexuality and the Pacino Popper Freakouts

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Don Jon

I have to say that I am sort of irritated by how, well, not good Joseph Gordon-Levitt's first feature is.

I don't even think I have a lot to say about this film except that it is basically Ted except for instead of an amusing (well, not that amusing) talking bear, JGL's version of the man-child who doesn't want to grow up has a laptop and some pornography to keep him company.

One thing that Ted has on Don Jon, too, is that Ted has a woman at its center who is actually correct about how to improve the man in her life. Don Jon's version of that is a shallow, idiotic rich girl who literally doesn't approve of speaking out loud about purchasing cleaning products in Target in case someone hears you. I mean this film hates its central female character.

Don Jon isn't without its merits. JGL is hard to dislike. How could anyone? He is clearly a lovely performer, and the picture is decently made – it is his first, and its a lot better than, well, other actors' first features.

And the film makes some really good points, too. Carl's Jr. ads really are pornographic, and this film calls them out on it. Romantic comedies, too, get some women off in the same way that pornographic films get some men off. It is a pleasing comparison: one that basically erases the history of oppression and misogyny to which women have been subjected through the dehumanization of pornographic imagery, but not incorrect.

Here's the deal: this is a film with the tagline There's more to life than a happy ending. A pornographic pun, to be sure. And the film promises to be irreverent, to be relatively sexy/pornographic, and then to end without a happy ending: something at the very least non-normative. But it doesn't know how to do that.

There is not more to life than a happy ending in this film. It is a film with a very earnest message that made me want to throw something. It purports to know how to have sex correctly – the true way to enjoy sex with someone (in case you weren't aware) is really to see someone else, to share something, to make love. I mean, look, I'm glad that is good for some people, and I am not saying that that's, like, a bad way to have sex or anything, but to behave as though the way that you like to have sex is somehow the correct way to do it, seems... well, I'll be generous and say: a bit short sighted.

And Don Jon is totally invested in its main character learning exactly this lesson. In fact, like other recent comedies about grown men turning into adults and leaving their childhoods behind (Knocked Up, The Forty-Year-Old Virgin, Ted), Don Jon links growing up or "becoming a man" to something very specific that the film argues is "what adults do". In the case of Don Jon, "what adults do" is watch less porn than they did when they were teens/kids/whatever. And they make love with the women with whom they have sex: they don't simply engage in "one-sided" sex.

This is all fine, I suppose. I jut don't relate to this kind of thing in any way.

Maybe I need to grow up and start having sex the "right" way. Paging Dr. Freud.