Exotica

Super Marcey's Exotica Review

4/5

I had been wanting to see this for the longest time, and I finally managed to find a copy. My second voyage with an Atom Egoyan film, and I must say I like what I see, and I will certainly be seeking more of his films out. Exotica is not an easy film to describe (featured in Episode 27 of Super Podcast), so I will try my best to give it a shot and give you a basic idea of what this is about. Exotica is the name of a night club (strip club), where the DJ Eric (Elias Koteas) watches/obsesses over his ex-girlfriend Christina (Mia Kirshner), who dances in a school girl costume, for Francis (Bruce Greenwood), who then in turn is auditing a Pet Store owner Thomas (Don McKellar) which takes some interesting turns.

Basically these are the four main characters, Eric, Christina, Francis and Thomas. They are all entwined some how and as the film progresses you see that. Each character has their secrets and demons, which is slowly revealed as well. You are thrown into things, and you just sit back and watch as things unfold, and put the pieces together. Egoyan is an interesting film maker, the story itself in the end is actually quite sad and his use of sets and colours really set the mood, the sound track as well is excellent.

Performance wise, everyone is spot on, I really felt they understood their characters and it shows in their performances. Elias Koteas is an actor that can do no wrong, no matter what he is in, he always delivers. He is a charismatic actor, and here as Eric everything is just perfect. You can really feel that jealousy he feels, his wanting and needing Christina. In turn Mia Kirshner looks gorgeous and she is mysterious as Christina, you can feel a strange bond between her and Francis, you know there is something there but you can't quite place it. Bruce Geenwood has a tough role to play, you know he is suffering something harsh and you can feel that in the scenes at the Exotica. He suspects Thomas, but he some how feels sympathy for him as well.  Don McKellar plays Thomas as awkward as they come, he does strange things and it feels like he is a man that isn't happy with himself. Just the way he portrays him, you really get to feel for the character. In other hands, I don't think we'd feel much of anything for these characters and I think it wouldn't have left a lasting impression.

Exotica is a haunting and strange film, unlike anything I have seen before, it is strange and it draws you in. This isn't a fast film, it is a slow burn film, which slowly reveals itself. You are given some pieces and you can sort the puzzle out for yourself. I like films which do not hand feed you everything, and they make you think. This certainly does that, and it sure stayed with me after I watched it. This is something I do want to watch again, I am sure I will get even more out of it. This is a film I would recommend, a lesser known and seen film, certainly worthy of attention.

(Written on 12 April 2010, first published at SuperMarcey.com)

Recommendations: Moon (Duncan Jones, 2009), Milk, Hurt Locker, The (Kathryn Bigelow, 2009)

Movies 365: Day 7 – Exotica

I’m still not sure how much I liked Exotica. I watched it almost eight hours ago, and I’m just not sure how I feel about it. Parts of it work very well, others not so much. I suppose the main problem with the film is that it feels about twenty minutes too long. Normally I’m not one to complain about the length of a film, but with Exotica, it’s a bit different. I suppose I should begin summarizing some of the plot so that I can get to the point where the problem occurs.

The movie opens with Thomas (Don McKellar) smuggling eggs into the country, meanwhile at Exotica, a strip club, Eric (Elias Koteas) calls Christina (Mia Kirshner) to the stage. As she dances her routine to Leonard Cohen’s “Everybody Knows,” Francis (Bruce Greenwood) watches on, then buys several lap dances from her. Thomas goes to the ballet, giving his extra ticket to another gentleman, instead of watching the ballet, Thomas merely gazes at the lap of the man whom he gave the ticket to. Francis drops a young girl off, paying her as he does, the next day, he comes to Thomas’ exotic pet store to perform an audit.

What little story there is progresses from there, all the while flashing back to an earlier time when Eric first met Christina whilst walking through a field on a group hike. Their first meeting is interspersed throughout the film, and every once in a while we get some grainy home video footage of a woman and child. Who are they? What is the point of it all? These are questions that the film answers to varying degrees of satisfaction during it’s last ten minutes.

Part of the problem with Exotica is the fact that all of it’s characters are trapped in boring, routine lives, as such, each night passes in almost the same way. Ballet, strip club, ballet, strip club etc….it seems to go on for quite a while before anything of consequence begins to happen, and so the movie feels overlong though clocking in at an hour and forty-five minutes, not much could be cut in order for the films payoffs to work in the end.

As a big fan of Egoyan’s 2005 film Where the Truth Lies I was sadly disappointed in Exotica. Unfortunately not much happens, and the payoffs at the end don’t seem to justify the preceding hour and a half, at the very least, the biggest problem is that they don’t necessarily make the story more interesting. Or, I should say, it doesn’t make the story as a whole interesting, it does provide a lot of context for a couple of the relationships in the film, unfortunately, it proves that some parts of the film could have easily been done without. Though not a bad movie by any means, Exotica is unfortunately not a terribly good one either.

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Last updated: 2010-03-05 07:29:59 by user05