The sorrowful sight of abandoned relics of Hollywood’s heyday adorn the inital minutes of The Canyons, lingering husks of long-gone glitz and glamour left to fester as the entertainment world moves on. Cynicism drips from every image, both by design, and in the audience’s likely reaction; though director Paul Schrader (Adam Resurrected) and writer Bret Easton Ellis (The Informers) are far from subtle in their intended statement about the death of cinema and civilisation, the immediate visual manifestation of their message instantly recalls the cast and crew’s own wavering fortunes.
Long before it neared screens, The Canyons became one of the most talked about and anticipated releases of the year – but for all the wrong reasons. The weight of infamy is unavoidable in the end result, every barely-clad appearance of leading lady Lindsay Lohan (Scary Movie 5), smouldering glare from her co-star James Deen (better known for his adult film career), and stilted exchange of less-than-clever dialogue seemingly poised to prove preconceptions predicated upon highly-publicised production troubles. And yet, in a feature caught in the wash of its reputation, there are scant traces of insight in its combination of performers and scenario. Similarly, there’s an evident acceptance of exactly what it is that the film wants to be.
Delving into the darkness that surrounds Lohan’s Tara and Deen’s Christian, The Canyons doesn’t aim for grandeur, but for the distress that comes with its all-too-often unattainable pursuit. Both protagonists epitomise the inability to achieve their desires, despite concerted efforts to ensure appearances indicate the contrary. A failed actress turned neglected arm candy, Tara has traded one source of turbulence for another, preferring material stablity over emotional ease. A producer only by virtue of his trust fund, Christian talks big and acts bigger, yet is only comfortable when his outbursts of machismo and misogny have witnesses.
In an unashamedly stylish soap opera marked by its penchant for Ellis’ usual proclivities – the melodramatic maneouverings of Los Angelenos among them – the ill-at-ease couple’s dysfunctional relationship unravels over a combined project. Christian finances a low-budget slasher at the behest of his former assistant, Gina (TV’s General Hospital); Tara assists with casting, including securing Gina’s boyfriend Ryan (Nolan Funk, Riddick) a starring role. A dinner shared by the quartet is intended as a celebration of their collaboration, but instead sparks a spiral of sex and sleaze, a display of degradation and deception, and a mess of malevolence and manipulation.
There’s nary a sliver of hope in Ellis’ calculating script, nor in Schrader’s cold realisation of the troubling tale, as the recurrence of the opening imagery underscores. The repetitive emptiness of long-lost cinemas is mirrored in the moral desolation that fuels the narrative, with bleakness the only mode of operation. The heaviest of hands hammers home the connection, one heightened by Lohan’s involvement and Deen’s background. That both acquit themselves of any misgivings lurks among the film’s surprises, with their impressive presence perhaps the ultimate evidence of the feature’s thematic intentions. Indeed, who better to truly demonstrate the askew values of modern movie-making than a former child star constantly felled by scandal and a veteran of more than 1,000 pornographic works?
Alas, such astuteness can’t conceal the uncomfortable nature of much of the material and execution, from the exploitative use of Lohan’s form (accompanied by the requisite full frontal shot of Deen, to be fair) and notoriety, to the devolution of story and phrasing to abysmal levels. Again, perhaps there’s method in the feature’s descent into derivation whilst packaged as something more seductive. For Schrader and Ellis, the shadow of their biggest successes (scripting Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver, Raging Bull and The Last Temptation of Christ, and writing novels Less than Zero and American Psycho, respectively) affords The Canyons a legitimacy actively eschewed by its content.
Rating: 2 ½ stars out of 5
The Canyons
Director: Paul Schrader
USA, 2013, 99 mins
Sydney Underground Film Festival
suff.com.au
5 – 8 September
Melbourne Underground Film Festival
http://muff.com.au/
6 – 14 September
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