Nine Lives Review
by [email protected] (dnb AT dca DOT net)November 12th, 2005
NINE LIVES
A film review by David N. Butterworth
Copyright 2005 David N. Butterworth
***1/2 (out of ****)
"We are all connected to everyone and everything on this planet."-- Aidan Quinn in "Nine Lives."
Rodrigo García's splendid ensemble drama considers these connections, this continuity, in its depiction of nine disparate women at some emotional crossroads, nine separate yet occasionally linked stories with an intensely strong female character at their center. Stories such as an incarcerated felon in the L.A. County lock-up, encouraged to swap information for privileges; or a highly-strung nurse struggling to come to terms with her abusive past; or a mother picnicking with her eerily distant daughter.
These and another half dozen equally powerful vignettes, each running less than fifteen minutes on average, share several strong
commonalities:
1. They're all shot in a single, beautifully choreographed take. No breaks or interruptions help concentrate the focus of each segment, a technique that proves essential given the limited amount of time allocated each episode. It also forces the performers to be more "on" when hitting their marks and/or delivering their dialogue, like stage players;
2. The stories end abruptly, ambiguously, yet on just the right note, a high or low point fading furtively to black; and
3. Each story features superlative performances from its intelligent cast, of men as well as women, but mostly women--especially those playing the nine in question--coupled with skilled writing (never once overwritten) and solid direction, these last two courtesy writer/director García (who attempted something similar with 2000's "Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her").
Former lovers Damian (Jason Isaacs) and Diana (Robin Wright Penn) bump supermarket trolleys in a trendy California neighborhood store. In the ensuing ten years or so each has married and Diana is heavily pregnant. Damian makes the mistake of telling Diana he still thinks about her--often--causing her much confusion and consternation.
Lorna ("Judging Amy"'s Amy Brenneman) attends her ex-husband's wife's funeral against her better judgment and, amid the expected hostility, finds her repressed feelings unexpectedly reciprocated by the hearing- impaired Andrew (William Fichtner).
Rather than heading off to college as planned, Samantha (Amanda Seyfried) has chosen to remain at home to care for her paraplegic father (Ian McShane) while her mother (Sissy Spacek) contemplates a motel tryst with another man (an initially unrecognizable Aidan Quinn).
Despite the potential, the film as a whole doesn't come across as a gimmicky exercise. Not one bit. Some of the characters do overlap-- García didn't want it that way; the studio did and won--but they overlap minimally, reflecting more life's strange little coincidences than the contrived mechanics of the plot (as was the case with this year's "Crash," another ensemble drama with interrelated, free-flowing characters). Unlike other similarly-structured films that either improve--or weaken--the further you get into them, "Nine Lives" remains constant throughout, with each life as potent and exhilarating as the next, each installment offering something a little bit different, a little bit special.
"Nine Lives" might not be entirely different a motion picture but it *is* special, at once memorable and moving, volatile and surprisingly resonant, much like its rich and principled principals.
--
David N. Butterworth
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