On Saturday, my wife and I went to see the new George Clooney movie, The American. We liked it! But, were then stunned to learn from one of the ushers, that they’ve had more walk-outs on this movie than any other in recent memory. I immediately asked if it’s because of some offensive scene - and he says, “No, they just think it’s too slow and boring.”
Wow. I was not prepared for that.
So, in case any of you were thinking of seeing this movie, here’s a fair warning so that your expectations aren’t too far off the reality.
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First, this is not a spy movie like Bourne Identity or 007 or Salt. If anything, the movie reminded me of the Matt Damon vehicle, The Good Shepherd. In The Good Shepherd, Matt’s character has very, very few lines - even though he’s the protagonist. His inner life and motivation are revealed through his actions and his nuanced facial expressions. That’s what I saw in The American.
Clooney plays an assassin named “Jack” or possibly “Edward” but probably neither. We learn almost nothing of Jack/Edward. We don’t know who he’s working for, or who he’s killed in the past, or how long he’s been doing this, or why. We do find out that someone means to kill him and is sending assassins to do it. We also learn that he has a weakness for women. Now, here’s the first major bifurcation from 007. Jack/Edward isn’t a womanizer and we see no evidence that he has a weakness for “women” plural … we just see him form an attachment on one specific woman and make a connection with her. This is dangerous, to both himself and the woman, because he’s an international assassin who’s being hunted.
Hiding from both his hunters and his handler, he ends up in a small Italian town, built along the sides of a mountain. The name is something like “Castle on the Mountain” (in Italian, of course) and there are many beautiful shots of this town. The only two “friends” Jack/Edward makes in the town is the priest and a local prostitute named Clara. This isn’t an accident. Ironically the church is at the very top of the mountain and, apparently, a brothel is somewhere near the bottom. Jack/Edward, of course, lives somewhere between the two.
Are you catching the symbolism?
Without spoiling everything, I’ll just add that the prostitute is not a simple cartoon of a woman, sexy but blank or a “whore with a heart of gold.” Instead, she’s a complex enigma in her own right and she has both us (the audience) as well as Jack/Edward guessing. Is she what she seems to be? Is she in on the hunt, reporting his where-abouts to his hunters? Does she work for his handler? Further, the priest is no simple supporting character, either. Again, no cartoons here. He has a secret that makes him fallible, but in the frailty of human nature way - not in the comic book villain sort of way.
Like a recurring motif, running through the movie is this special, collapsible weapon that Jack/Edward has been tasked with making. We never know who it’s for or who it’s meant to be used on - though we begin to get a hint as the movie progresses. We see him order the parts, build a simple machine shop in his hotel room, and work on the gun like an artisan working on a sculpture. In fact, it’s not too far fetched to imagine a parallel between the work he’s putting into this gun, day after day, and the decisions he’s made in his life. This thing that he’s meticulously built has landed him, now, in this place. No wife or children or future (that we know of) and nothing but his secrets and his skills.
Another recurring motif is the butterfly. Though we can assume that Jack/Edward has some sort of military background, from both his specialized skills and from a military looking tattoo on one shoulder, we never learn what that background is. Nor can I make out the origin of the tattoo. Interestingly enough, he has another tattoo between his shoulder blades of a butterfly. We also see him biding his time by reading a large book which turns out to be about butterfly’s. Why is this? What does this mean? Could it be references to butterfly’s as symbol’s of death and rebirth? Or some subtle clue about the future he had wished for himself but not the reality he actually lives.
Finally, the movie is a slow and steadily paced meditation. It’s movements are not ponderous, but deliberate. Each scene is carefully composed and quite artist. The women are beautiful to look at and it’s hard not to admire their beauty and grace in a way that no “beach bunny” film ever achieves. The setting is Italy and those shots and backgrounds just filled us (my wife and I) with an even greater desire to go and see these places for ourselves. So, while the action was subdued, there was always something fascinating, on screen, to hold our attention. There was some symmetry, beauty (in face or place), and some nuanced emotional subtext to puzzle over.
It is not a popcorn and beer movie. It is probably not a “take your date and impress her” movie. It’s certainly not a “sit passively and wait for the characters to explain everything to you in ham-fisted monologue’s” movie, either. Instead, it’s a movie to fall into. To experience to the exclusion of all distractions around you and to ponder for days, weeks, or months later as you piece together the clues and the signs and significance of what you’ve seen.
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I hope this helps others know whether or not to go see The American and maybe spare someone the time and money of being disappointed and walking out.