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Greg Araki staked out his place in the film world with the advent of so-called New Queer Cinema, a crop of gay filmmakers who in the early 1990s rebelled against the idea of 'positive representation' and embraced a more confrontational, punky ethos. The movement was short-lived and never really made an impact on the mainstream, although its influence can be felt in films that are shown at venues like the London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival. The most prominent and intellectual film-maker to come out of New Queer Cinema was Todd Haynes, who was Oscar-nominated a couple of years ago for his superb Douglas Sirk-inspired Far From Heaven. Araki's trademark has been to channel queer teenage anger and sexual energy into a defined aesthetic, which nods to elements of pop culture such as MTV video-clips, B-Movies and other sub-cultural grammar. But, unlike Haynes, so far he never seems to have hit the nail on the head and his films have been plagued with a certain teenage petulance. Past films like The Living End and Doom Generation had a certain misplaced energy: though certainly nice-looking and 'cutting-edge', the films were not really intellectually satisfying. Araki's new film is based on Scott Heim's debut novel in which one of the heroes, the geeky Brian Lackey (Brady Corbet) believes he was abducted by aliens at the age of eight because of two blank-out moments which he can't account for. Running parallel to Corbet's story is the story of Neil McCormick (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), an indie type who hustles for a living and who may hold the solution to Lackey's childhood mystery. The film is quintessentially American in its sense of small-town weirdness, as is the look of the film, sometimes redolent of Cindy Sherman's 'film stills' with a nod to David Lynch. Mysterious Skin seems to signal that Araki is reaching maturity – and it is probably the film that will garner him some cross-over success: it has moments of beauty and genuine emotion, and the cinematography is beautifully composed, the antonym of the gritty documentary feel pursued by much independent cinema these days. Araki seems to have found a balanced way to cinematically portray the issue of paedophilia, which has become one of the big issues of our times, without succumbing to the medieval hysteria that usually stifles any mention of the topic (it's a good companion film to Todd Solondz's Palindromes in that respect). The young cast deliver good performances and those who nurture nostalgia for the 1980s look will be in for a visual treat.
Reviewed by Antonio Pasolini
Reader comments about Mysterious Skin
Dean Agius (deanagius@hotmail.com) writes:
This is superbly assured stuff from Araki. And remarkably rich - the film is beautifully shot, but has an ugly subject matter; the two leads are truly fantastic and despite the painful past that ties them together, they express themselves in utterly different, equally compelling ways.
This is distinctly Araki - aliens/ polysexuality - but he has reined this is to give the impression of heartbreaking honesty. Of course he was assisted by Scott Heim's extraordinary semi-autobiographical book on which this film is based. Even more encouragingly, Heim has gone on record as endorsing the film as movingly empathetic.
Mysterious Skin could have been a Todd Solondz film, the way it seeks to probe open wounds in a kind of picket-fence America. And though the film arguably generates a Solondzian guilty laugh on occasion, it could not be accused of being misanthropic in the way that Solondz's films so often are. It shows that there can be compassion in pain, and pain in compassion.
Mysterious Skin should not be missed.
MandyR (mandyjr62@hotmail.com) writes:
I came out of Mysterious Skin with a full blown anxiety attack..To be sure it was powerful material but as for being a mature reflection about paedophilia I seriously have to disagree. This and all Greg Araki's films ARE heavy on style and light on intellectual engagement. (And if anyone dares say that film is NOT an intellectual process they can sod off!) It was disturbing and created a cul de sac of emotion which in the end has nowhere to go. And god knows, as a survivor of paedophilia, I ask that Araki, and any other director who approaches such material, think about release for the audience. You have an obligation...yes an obligation, Greg, to give hope instead of your usual faux nihilism.
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