Arizona Dream (1992) - Emir Kusturica

Fourth feature from the remarkable Bosnian filmmaker Emir Kusturica, a piece of work in which more of a novelty we will appreciate, though certainly not all the news will be as positive as one would have wished. Kusturica, to begin this exercise, set what would be with this, his first and to-that-date only work outside his native Sarajevo, out of Yugoslavia, or more accurately, Bosnia. The cause comes to be the civil war that broke out in the Balkan country, an event that became untenable the fact of continuing producing films in a country of already turbulent and complex nature. Kusturica travels to the United States, to Hollywood to shoot his work, although French production would be responsible of the film. It represents a unique story, as always in the director, a young man who makes his living by linking with ichthyological business, suddenly receives the call of his beloved uncle to be best man at his wedding; accepting reluctantly, he moves to where his uncle lives, founding in his way, an Arizona trip, a unique woman and her daughter, women who will provide peculiar experiences. A film that feels from the outset, actually different from what until then had produced the bad boy from Balkans, markedly different, and in all aspects, perhaps the cause of the picture being detected as the weakest and less concise to that point. However, the film must be assessed or appreciated starting from the context, from the circumstances, some of which were mentioned above.

                  

The film begins with a dedication by the director to his father, after which we are presented with the first image of the film, men who are around an igloo, and then appreciate the difficult existence in icy lands, an individual has problems in the fragile ice with his sled of wolf dogs. A pink balloon then takes us from the ice to the city, from the city to the protagonist, Axel Blackmar (Johnny Depp). You can feel all that is different in this film to all prior to Kusturica from the beginning, when we appreciate the obvious credits in English, but also with music, feeling it distant from his previous openings, an obvious difference considering that in his previous three films, the music was almost always intimately close to the land where everything is taking place. And so, as stated, albeit rather obvious, the film immediately reflects its distinction to the previous works of the director, its essence is perceived completely alien to those works, we feel Kusturica is not in his natural habitat anymore, we can feel that all resources and guidelines present before, have lost their strength, their effectiveness. The filmmaker has been removed, has lost its roots, the fish is out of water, strength and power of his portraits, among other things, have been attenuated, embodied this in the fact that it is not only his first picture shot out of Bosnia, but also the first one located outside the Balkans, in the Mediterranean world. Now, torn from its roots, the music for his film feels as well close to another culture, the United States, besides the early nod to one of its icons, Arnold Schwarzenegger; it is completely evident that this is another culture, another essence, and seems Kusturica does not even think to hide or disguise it in any way.

The tribute to the United States will continue almost uninterruptedly, paying tribute the aspiring actor, Paul Leger (Vincent Gallo), constantly to older acting luminaries in America, such as Al Pacino, the titan Marlon Brando, Robert DeNiro as well, with that singular sequence honoring Raging Bull, and even a tribute to North by Northwest, of the american stage from prodigious master Alfred Hitchcock, or a nice nod to the classic giant masterpiece The Godfather II; the picture imbues thus completely in the American acting firmament, a detail that has Kusturica for his eventual hosts. It feels, however, that the film is in fact more innocuous than at other times, it has lost its corrosive power -for good or bad, depending how you look-; although the present comedy is not childish, much less, we notice the decrease in mordacity, as if his figures and what they represent would have lost some sharpness, even his strength as a creator of images, which of course does not go away completely at all, feels it stopped, did not continue with that spectacular progression observed particularly intensely in Time of the Gypsies (1988). It feels like a poet content, bounded, circumscribed and limited by the unfortunate external circumstances of internal, civil war, a war that broke out in Bosnia and made impossible to maintain a normal film production. You must understand first of all that circumstance as one of the capital causes of this film and its peculiarities.

We feel warm hints of expertise and mastery in handling the camera that Kusturica had reached with tracking shots crossing certain scenarios, like the cousins having dinner with their host women, with lens  subtly sliding by location, showing its ease; but again, being nothing more than a warm halo of what had been achieved so far by the director. And very unfortunately, once envisioned the first half hour of the film, it is not difficult to realize that, compared with all the strength and goodness of the previous pictures of the Bosnian -especially of Time of the Gypsies, with which so many summits were achieved-, this work feels like a terrible jam, like a quagmire. Kusturica, outside their natural environment, is inevitably perceived stagnant in his actions, in his language, in conveying his visual language; civil war in his homeland expelled him from there, it is therefore this vicissitude in American lands an unnatural event in his growth, in his art-training, is something forced, not voluntary, not his genuine evolutionary path, so that the film should not be torned by the viewer; it is indeed a shame what happened, but this should help you understand why many things are present on the picture. Despite the ballast mentioned, his constants, his seals, are still there, kept the estrangement, the relative madness, typical of his visions, and the aforementioned sequence dinner for four is an example, madness, debauchery and absurdity are raised and displayed by Kusturica with his usual closeness and simplicity, is that the master director could not be turned off completely, much less, to a possible pitfall.

There is something in Kusturica that escapes any external agent, to any circumstance or situation beyond his creative elan, and that is his powerful capacity as creator of images, as audiovisual poet, and yes, much of that we will appreciate in the picture. Grace (Lili Taylor), the mature female beast that devours young fellows, wants to fly, demonstrating the absurd attempts of the lovers with various primitive contraptions to take off, in the style of Leonardo, with apologies to the Renaissance genius. Also, the fish will be one of the elements, one of the symbols, the most powerful of all in the film, having been presented soon by Axel almost like an alter ego of his, we know he carries out at the very singular occupation to monitor the fish, he even applies them minimal electric shock, and he tells us how, seeing the fish's eyes, he looks almost to himself; singular parallel that makes us then surreally see a fish "swimming" in the air, the skies to stroll casually by more than one location of the film. He has an intimate bond with the fish, he, like the fish, cuts through all that we see, is the protagonist, the vehicle through which we will travel through the story. The fish, like him, travels and roams this strange universe, around sky in the snow, around the sunset of a desert, between cactus and sand, around the city, around the vehicles-sale business, across the night sky when Elaine dies. It is certainly an allegory of Axel and his own experiences, it is displayed whenever a significant event occurs, something happens to permanently change Axel, to change him, the one who feels a strange bond with the fish, and those aquatic eyes, that would not arouse greater feelings in a common person. At the same time, it is a unique variation of the animal element, always present and loaded with true meaning in the Bosnian films.

We will see our protagonists with a turtle, eating at the table, the filmmaker does not lose, of course, all his ability to create some of his figures, some of the images printed in the screen, and thus we see the tortoise walking down the table, between the candles and food. Also a sketch of alienation, with Faye Dunaway playing the accordion while Axel walks peculiarly demented imitating a hen; necessarily an aura is perceived which indicates that, regardless of everything, this is a film of Emir Kusturica. This accordion is one of the few physical elements that have survived the severe split of this creation over previous works; and thais is because, of course, some of his bizarre style remains, some of his mystique, and oddly it may sound, the feature is strange, but not strange in the manner of Kusturica, but strange to be an unusual and rare blend of their perennial seals and guidelines, but now adapting those to an environment, culture and essence completely new to the creator. Normal is it gives, there are elements that have stayed in his land, along with part of the force that Kusturica is capable of printing to picture, a story set in the land where he grew up, the land he breathes. Now, gone that environment, also are gone their powerful human portraits, portraits of an entire generation, of an entire country; all the strength that emanated from the conciseness of these constructs, is now, predictably and normal, absent, or at least very considerably reduced.

The dream like, surreal element will be present again in Kusturica's films, readily observing the dream of Axel, in the desert, a long and endless line of vehicles placed at high altitude; while we know that an ancestor of his had the dream of "stack" the cars and thereby get to the moon. A warm symbolism of this dream, now almost imposed to the descendant, whom is slightly less than required and immersed in that situation, becoming a car seller. Something to take into account, considering that this is the story of a young man who was disillusioned of someone of his childhood, who does not want to follow his steps, however he will, and on the way will discover some of his own feelings. In the dream like, magic field, we also have the image of the ambulance, the ambulance that magically fly with uncle Leo's body to reach the moon, and his dream; a nice image and metaphor, which, however, languishes at his relative solitude in the middle of a picture in which the many limitations and restrictions must have felt Kusturica are perceived. Elaine levites, naturally floats sitting in a chair; surrealism does not disappear completely, that would be unthinkable in Emir, who speaks again with greater force through these dream sequences where his genius can spring freely, unfettered by conventions. And, despite all of the above, Kusturica always seems to get away with his goal; his label, his personal imprint, still are there despite everything mentioned, and that is remarkable, is what ultimately ends up imposing on the film.

The cohesion of both worlds, the real, concrete world, and the dreamlike, surreal world, although correctly set, will not work as effectively or as powerfully as before, and I don`t find the performances particularly laudable, except perhaps a Faye Dunaway that brings some freshness as the daughter of the young devouring mother, and Jerry Lewis, uncle Leo, who with his experience builds a relatively attractive character. Many of the hitherto unshakable constants is Emir Kusturica will be broken. No longer we observe a child or adolescent being the protagonist, this time as a young man, a young adult who is the protagonist; now we are no longer presented a genuine and close portrait of his land or his people in their native environment; now the romance is bifurcated to materialize in a mother and daughter, are dissimilar from one another, but both presents in the path of Axel. The characters have also weakened, not so sharply delineated as before, without the roots -in largely due to the natural Balkan environment- that previously made them so effective portraits of a whole nation; all presented with a musical accompaniment that also seemed divided between two worlds that reconciles. The film ends with the initial figure, that pink balloon that is floating and transports us, as we see similar to the initial image, men on the ice with his wolves. In addition, as said, it is a feature that breaks with the dynamic that led Kusturica; some say that to understand a genius we need sometimes to look at his weakest, not his masterpieces works. And there we have him, expelled from his native Bosnia, far from Sarajevo, dam of circumstances, making films in Hollywood, the worst that can happen to a filmmaker who makes true art; and there you see him, resisting, imposing his seal, naturally influenced, stained by circumstances, but resisting, because the film never stops feeling, however, a work of the author. Singular tape from Kusturica, to be looked with due care.