Cold War

The style over content debate may get one of its strongest work outs with 2018's COLD WAR.  Here is a stunningly gorgeous film in which every damned shot is perfect.  Composed with a consideration for the most artistic view and to suit the unfolding drama.   I watch movies very closely and often think "If the DP had just panned two more inches the the left..." and so on.  With a contemporary film shot in black and white and set in the mid twentieth century, it's near impossible not to employ this approach.  Clearly director Pawel Pawlikowski invites this sort of analysis.  With cinematographer Lukasz Zal he has created one of the most beautiful looking recent films I've seen since, hmm, probably BLADE RUNNER 2049.

COLD WAR is a love story set from 1949 to 1964 as lovers Zula (Joanna Kulig) and Wiktor (Tomasz Kot) unite and separate several times across several countries.  They meet in Poland as Wiktor and his creative partner Irena (Agata Kulesza) hold auditions for a music ensemble.  Zula quickly asserts her talent (and herself) and the attraction is swift.  All goes well with the show until the inevitable request to include lyrics that praise Stalin.  This would open up the touring schedule to include Communist territories. Irena resigns.  Wiktor wants to escape to the West and bring Zula with him.  It does not work out.

Over the years, Zula becomes a star.  Wiktor settles in Paris with a new bedmate and works in a jazz band.  The lovers meet once again, still clearly enamored.  Or so the screenplay by Pawlikowski (writing with Janusz Glowacki and Piotr Borkowski) tells us.  I was not convinced, especially with Kot, who spends the movie merely reacting.  Kulig is striking and has definite presence, but her acting chops are only gradually revealed.  Scene after scene our pair hug and make love, but the chemistry wasn't there.  I never believed their passion, be it joyful or grief ridden.  Well, not until the last few moments, but by then it was too late.  That very last scene is quietly powerful, though.

COLD WAR also frustrates with its tendency to rush through the timeline.  With barely an hour and a half, it is impossible to give the story (and its post WWII backdrop) the proper treatment.  We needed more scenes with Wiktor and Zula.  And longer, more developed.  Improvisation with their dialogue may have revealed more.  I starred in a one act play based on Katharine Anne Porter's short story called "Rope" during my senior year in college.  During a rehearsal the director encouraged my co-star and me to speak extemporaneously.  It was a valuable exercise, and helped us understand our characters better, hopefully translating to more convincing performances, even if during the actual show we stuck to the script.

But this film looks amazing.  The music is fine too.  Technically, nothing can be faulted.  The relationship in COLD WAR just simply never involved me.  You can criticize the same year's A STAR IS BORN for numerous reasons, but the lovers there felt like the real deal.  I was even strangely reminded of Baz Lurhmann's ROMEO AND JULIET, an audacious update set in the 1990s but with Shakesepeare's dialogue intact.  Quite a spectacle.  But what made that one really fly was how invested Leo and Claire were in their roles.