TYOLD
The Year Of Living Dangerously – I watched this many years ago, but wanted to see it again since I now live in Singapore, so close to Indonesia. I wondered also if it would give me any insights into life there.
Lots of great narration by the asexual actress Linda Hunt, who is a caucasian woman playing the role of an Australian-Chinese man named Billy Kwan. “We add our own light to the sum of all light.” He also quotes Luke and Tolstoy. Great cinematography – shadow on window, sound of dripping water, the faces of old men in Jakarta. “The unseen is all around us, especially in Java.”
“That’s the great thing about being a dwarf – you can be wiser than anybody, but no one envies you.” Then, when talking to Mel Gibson’s Guy Hamilton character, some wicked humor/sarcasm: “We make a good team. We even look alike. People have noticed – same colour of eyes.” Then there’s the line “and so it begins,” which I’ve heard used in The Fantastic Mr Fox film, I wonder if Wes Anderson has that in there as a sort of homage. The Maurice Jarre electronic music is pretty funky, I like it. They run the roadblock like fools. Very sexy driving.
Mel Gibson and Sigourney Weaver have great chemistry, and their romance is interesting, but it’s still a film about Billy Kwan, who’s the only person in the film who really does anything at all. Gibson is a failed human being, someone who tries to make an impact, but who ultimately betrays his ideals, his friends and himself (making excuses the whole while). A complicated person, like Gibson himself. That’s why Billy tells Hamilton “I created you!” Maybe that’s why I like this film – it leaves you feeling uneasy because of the terrible things that happen. Hunt’s academy award for acting is richly deserved – just watch the fading glint in her eyes in Billy’s death scene.
Kwan’s apartment is full of great photographs, and lush life. He visits a poor young woman whose son is dying. The film is full of scenes of water – the source of life, but too often contaminated – and in the end the young boy who dies is prepared for burial with a sponge bath.