All My Stars (18)

By: Joanne McNeil
May 6, 2016

One in a weekly series in which Joanne McNeil recommends books, films, exhibitions, and more. You can also subscribe to the All My Stars newsletter here.

One of many things I really like about J.G. Ballard is, while his characters act oddly and perversely, he really puts his time into writing their triggers; their motivations are clear to us, even when their behaviors seem unlikely. But in Ben Wheatley’s High-Rise adaptation, all the triggers are gone. We never see why the trash piles up in the halls, or what happens after the first time the lights go out. The book is novella-length but its focus is the systems breaking down. The filmmaker however is so eager to get to what happens after the systems collapse, it never earns the chaos it depicts.

But it is a slick-looking film and I was delighted to see the characters come to life. Plus, it stars Tom Hiddleston, who is, as they say over there, fit. Also how we mean that here: there he is doing push-ups, then again at the rowing machine, and playing squash. He’s chilly and strange and perfectly cast. Part of it too, is Hiddleston has a perfectly gentle voice like he has never been exasperated for a second of his life. Like he’s reading a bedtime story to a bunny rabbit. Like he’s there to provide you Dewey Decimal System guidance at the card catalog. I could take or leave the sunbathing scenes, but could listen to his librarian voice for hours, so when I say the film could have used more narration, don’t listen to me. I loved his Laing. But Laing isn’t supposed to be the star of High-Rise — the building is; and that I can hardly remember the actual high rise — in comparison, I can still easily mentally navigate my way through the house in Karyn Kusama’s The Invitation, though I saw it a few weeks ago — says it all. There was very little intentional use of space in a film that is about space.

I meant to write a long piece, a much labored-over consideration of the film and the text, but there wasn’t enough there to inspire me. It’s… not bad. Misses the mark, but a nice try. The director made safe decisions and is left with a conventional rather than transgressive film. I had a good time watching High-Rise like I enjoyed watching the other movie I saw last week — a Keira Knightly movie on Netflix where she plays a singer who records an album in various locations around the city. Actually, Begin Again made better use of sets and scenery than High-Rise did.

I just got the sense Ben Wheatley has never thought particularly hard about how architecture affects behaviors and communities. Or maybe I’m particularly sensitive to it because lately I think about it all the time. Everytime I go to the gym. Pretty much the reason I go to the gym! That’s my trick to sticking to a routine — going to a physical location that fascinates me and makes me wonder how such a small space operates efficiently and is able to accommodate every possible demographic. It’s just a no-frills Y. It’s multigenerational, multicultural, but — in a city where people regularly hold jousting matches with umbrellas when it rains and shove their way out of subways — people respect each other’s space.

Just the other evening I was idly foam rolling out my it band and looked up to see the mayor text-messaging on a yoga mat beside me. And then looked up again to see his secret service at both corners behind the treadmills. Yes, De Blasio travels all the way down from Gracie Mansion just to work out there. This is how well the space works: there is a sloped balcony above the gymnasium for running laps. Once I arrived without headphones and went for a run while a group of kids began a gymanastics class on the floor below. The soundtrack for the class was Kidz Bop versions of songs I don’t particularly like whether or not it’s sung by a chorus of nine year olds. But I didn’t even mind! In certain environments running laps to Kidz Bop’s “Safe and Sound” would be my idea of a nightmare. I realize I’m failing to explain how it is this building works and why people aren’t bickering at each other in the locker rooms or that sort of thing. I don’t know that I have the language for it. I’m not J.G. Ballard, who was uniquely sensitive to the ways that people assemble in elevators, or lose their patience in a power outage or their minds trying to exit a building. He really was one of kind. Maybe it’s just too much to expect his sensitivity in any film adaptation.

One thing I really did love this week: I read Lily Hoang’s A Bestiary and was enchanted by it. It’s honest and haunting. Not the first time Michele Filgate has handed me a book and I finished it within twenty-four hours. From the Maggie Nelson blurb: “This book would be impressive enough as a collection of finely-forged fragments, but as it weaves itself into an even more impressive whole, my hat came off. Lily Hoang writes like she has nothing to lose and everything at stake.”

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All My Stars (18)

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