Jeremy Davies does well with these socially awkward, and sexually timid yet still intriguing young men characters. I’d just recently seen his lovely and strange performance in David O. Russell’s Spanking the Monkey and was pleased to see him in CQ (2002, Roman Coppola) as well. Unfortunately, his pleasant presence and the over the top stylishness of this movie cannot save the film from its lack of a compelling core. There’s something about movies, which depict self-indulgent young artists questioning their own existences, that leads to annoying levels of self-aggrandizing in the film proper. Coppola falls into this trap in his directorial debut and never climbs out. Who cares about this guy’s existential despair over the hotness of Angela Lindvall and his artistic pretensions and his French girlfriend who just doesn’t understand? These movies always make me surmise that if I had a penis, I might, but I presume probably even then, I still wouldn’t. Also, someone should speak to Sophia Coppola and remind her that behind the camera, good, in front of the camera, like a stick figure from hell. She turns in the most consistently bad walk on performances in Hollywood. Her cousin, Jason Schwartzman, on the other hand, is completely adorable. I fear for his musical and “artistic” pretensions (see his recent release, Spun, a drug film directed by a music video director) but his blustering short man bravado charms me every time. In summary, Roman knows his way around a camera and gets the intriguing juxtapositions available to the director thoughtful about film history, but needs to get someone more adept at screenwriting on board next time.
Posted by karen at April 4, 2003 3:29 PM