SIMPLE MEN

DISCOVERY:
Found this one in the recent acquisitions section of video store. I was, at the time of my selection, unaware that this was by the same man who made Surviving Desire. I knew it was he by mid-film.

OPENING SCENE:
"Don't move!" We're thrust into the middle of a hold-up. The Hispanic security guard is blind-folded and his hands tied behind his back, a nickel-plated .45 held point-blank to his face.

The way Simple Men began, I thought the camera was going to pull back to reveal a stage play. The acting was wooden, the lines glib, terse. But no such thing happened. Instead, this drama gained speed and momentum up to the last scene.

PLOT:
The sons of a Marxist ex-baseball player, on the lam from the Feds, venture outside the Big Apple. Denis seeks dad. Bill, suffering a broken heart and laying low after a botched heist, seeks a blonde. Between them they have less than $20.00.

CINEMATIC SIMILARITIES:
It has the charm of a Jim Jarmusch film, without the loneliness and heavy-handiness. It's not a slap-stick knee-slapper, but it has some very funny scenes and lines. It has the road movie element, the fish-out-of-water element, and the boy-meets-girl motif.

In my initial viewing of Simple Men I was reminded of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead (1990), a Tom Stoppard play I once tried  to watch. Rapid-fire clever dialogue is what they have in common. Why I was turned-off by Stoppard's play, and turned-on by Hartley's work, is difficult to say. The premise of Stoppard's play was clever, yet pretentious: two minor characters drawn from Hamlet, carry on. Hartley's work is warmer, more honest with Sam Shepherdesque tones of people who care about one another, yet are somehow alienated. Hartley's work contains the poetry of Wim Wender's (à la Wings of Desire) work and the quirkiness of a David Lynch troupe of characters. I am also reminded of the work of Robert Altman, another prolific American in-dependent film maker, who's movies are dialogue-heavy with a Gilbert and Sullivan patter to them. Truth, honesty and integrity are the underlying themes in Simple Men, which remind me of Steven Soderbergh's sex, lies and videotape.

The sheriff is straight from David Lynch's "Twin Peaks" as he kicks back and reels off platitudes about life. Despite the sheriff's quirkiness, he is still a believable character. The pump jockey, Mike, plays a mean ax, and learns French in order to pick up the delicatessen girl. The Catholic school nun smokes when no one's looking. Ned, who reminds me of Tracy Walters (Repo Man), beats up his motor-bike because it won't work.

OVER-ALL ANALYSIS:
Women portrayed in submissive, victim roles. Men portrayed as sensitive, intelligent and bumbling. There are no children, one non-white, and no homosexual characters.

Do characters grow? I think not.

FINALE:
"Don't Move."  The movie which was plausible and realistic gives way to stage acting theatrics again.

Burke, Löwensohn, Sage, Sillas, and Donovan

Credits: 105:00 min.   USA   1992   English

Directed by: Hal Hartley 
Writen by: Hal Hartley

Hartley shuffles the deck—the cast of characters, the story lines, the story elements. The location is often the same. Sound familiar? Woody Allen is another independent film-maker who recycles his players as well as extrapolates from his personal experience, drawing from events of his life, to create characters, and plays.

Martin Scorsese and Stanley Kubrick had their regulars, too. Seeing the same players is exciting. Sometimes Hartley reuses them in parallel roles. Other times you do not recognize an actor, not because of makeovers, but because the talented actor projects a different persona.  

"There is only trouble and desire. And the funny thing is, once you desire something, you're immediately in trouble. And when you're in trouble, you don't desire anything at all."  

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