Miranda
Fall’s latest exhibition is so creepy, it is hailed as a work of genius by the
art press. Basically, when she found a poor schmuck’s phone, she proceeded to spy
on him and utterly invade his personal space. Naturally, she is rather taken
aback when the exposed Arthur Anderton reacts with outrage. Doesn’t he
understand privacy is out of fashion? Fall finds the shoe is on the other foot
when a mystery man starts stalking her, but the situation really gets
complicated when she stalks him right back in Camille Thoman’s Never Here (trailer here), which opens tomorrow in New York.
Her
opening was an unalloyed triumph for Fall, except for Anderton’s grouchiness.
Then the chaos starts. While spending the night in her flat, Fall’s married
gallerist lover Paul Stark sees an assault from her window. When he refuses to
call the police, she does so in his place, much like Steve Guttenberg in Curtis
Hanson’s Bedroom Window. Predictably,
Fall soon finds herself floundering through line-ups, relying on Stark’s vague
description. Of course, she cannot risk fingering the wrong person, but she
gets serious vibes from one of the suspects, so she starts following him. Maybe
he is following her too, or perhaps it is Anderton or maybe even someone else.
In
the small world department, it turns out the cop assigned to the case is a
former college boyfriend and the victim is the journalist who just wrote up a
fawning profile of Fall. Both start to doubt her slippery account of that
fateful evening. We might have our doubts too. Fall definitely has the
potential to turn out to be one of those “unreliable narrator” types.
Thoman
is obviously deeply steeped in Antonioni’s Blow-Up:
an ostensive mystery set in the hipster art world that becomes increasingly ambiguous
and hallucinatory. Regrettably, but probably predictably, Thoman falls short of
that lofty target. Too often, Never Here feels
like it is being obscure for obscurity’s sake, rather than as part of a grand
vision. There is the possibility Fall is nuts, or maybe it is just us, but the
movie itself isn’t crazy enough. Fearing commitment, it never stops playing the
is-she-or-isn’t-she game, without ever over-extending itself in either
direction.
Still,
Mireille Enos has an intriguing screen presence that mostly works in the
context of the film. However, the most memorable turn comes from the late Sam
Shepard as Stark, whose surprising complexities and human messiness will be
revealed over time. Nina Arianda also has some interesting moments as the unfortunate
journalist.
Cinematographer
Sebastian Winterø gives the film an ominously beautiful look that suits its
Lynchian and Hitchcockian influences. Nonetheless, we cannot help wondering
what the film could have been like if it had been helmed by producer Pang Ho-cheung,
especially given the madness of his HK slasher Dream Home (there is a film that had no problems committing). Frustrating
and ultimately disappointing, Never Here is
only for hardcore fans of Robbe-Grillet novels and sinister-looking art films,
when it opens tomorrow (10/20) in New York, at the Cinema Village.
