Gerry (2002)
Directed by Gus Van Sant
Written by Gus Van Sant
Starring Matt Damon, Casey Affleck
Release Date February 14th, 2003
Published February 8th, 2004
There has always been a hunger for films that challenge traditional cinematic form. Films that break with convention and deliver something that is diametrically opposed to Hollywood filmmaking. For the most part these challenging films came from Europe where the avant-garde arose as an artistic movement and a reaction to the encroachment of Hollywood formalism into European film markets. These challenging films are still being made but the hunger for them has died down, beaten back by the invention of the blockbuster and the big business that is Hollywood.
These films, however rare, are out there and Gerry from director Gus Van Sant is one of the most fascinating.
The film begins without credits. We simply open with light classical score and a long shot of a car on a lonely highway. This shot lasts for three or four minutes before switching to a shot of our two protagonists played by Casey Affleck and Matt Damon as they continue to drive. No words are spoken. Finally, they reach their unspecified destination, a hiking trail through the desert. Still no words are spoken.
It isn't until the 8-minute mark that a line of dialogue is spoken but it's not very enlightening except as a minor sign of things to come. A sign that says this is not a film where dialogue is going to explain, enlighten or entertain. As the two friends continue their journey, they bail on the hiking trail for a supposed shortcut before finally becoming lost in the desert. All of the film’s dialogue act as conversations that have already started before we met the two characters. There is a joking conversation about Wheel Of Fortune, some odd conversation about what I think was a video game, but not anything that is going to lead to a conventional plot.
The lost in the desert situation is no Blair Witch exciting fight for survival or wacky slice of life ala some ridiculous sitcom. It simply is what it is, two guys lost in the desert looking for a way out. The two characters never react the way you would expect from a conventional plot. There is very little whining or carrying on. Indeed neither character seems all that concerned about surviving or dying. If they are concerned they keep it to themselves, it's up to us in the audience to fill in the blanks.
In it's minimalism of one handheld camera, sparse dialogue and characters, Gerry is a direct challenge and reaction to the typical explain-it-all-style of the Jerry Bruckheimer era. No obvious explanatory dialogue that leads the audience to obvious conclusions, no quips and no filler before the next explosion of bullets. Gerry has none of those elements and goes to the very opposite extreme. For that I was willing to stick with and feel rewarded at the end. Challenged to create much of the movie in my own mind I was mesmerized by the film and it's techniques.
The films title is odd and not just in it's spelling of the oft-used name. In the film, both characters refer to one another as Gerry but one suspects that it is neither of their real names. In fact, Gerry is an in joke amongst Damon and Affleck's circle of friends. A “Gerry” is a fuck-up, someone who constantly screws up. A fitting title for two guys who manage to get lost in the desert in this day and age when everyone everywhere has a cellphone, pager, blackberry, and any myriad number of other electronic leashes to the outside world.
In that sense, what if the whole film is one big in-joke? What if Damon, Affleck and Van Sant simply went to the desert, film absolutely random shit and called it a movie? They put it together professionally with technical prowess in editing, shooting and scoring to make it look legitimate. Then released the film so that people like myself could rhapsodize about it's minimalist genius and it's influences garnered from Bela Tarr and Fassbinder and other people only snobs have ever heard of.
Whether or not we have been made a fool of, we will never know. I for one don't care if I have been duped. I enjoyed the opportunity to so actively watch the film. To take my mind in odd directions in order to fill in the empty passages that are filled with shots of the two actors walking and the sound of rock under foot. Gerry is a form of film meditation and I dug that about it.
