Salon.com > Somewhere

8. “Somewhere”

Thu, 30 Dec 2010 14:05:00 +0000

"Somewhere," about a divorced, bored, spoiled action film star (Stephen Dorff) who becomes more alive and alert when his daughter (Elle Fanning) comes to visit, is a stylistic departure for its writer-director, Sofia Coppola. Her previous movies ("The Virgin Suicides," "Lost in Translation" and "Marie Antoinette") were built around montages and music, and parts of the films were so dissociated and dreamy -- chock-full of dissolves and slow fades -- that they recalled the films of Hong Kong sensualist Wong Kar-wai ("In the Mood for Love").

"Somewhere" is much more austere. With a "we'll get there when we get there" feeling reminiscent of the '70s cinema the director adores, Coppola takes her sweet time and only goes places that interest her. The movie is less of a story than an experience, a mood, a set of situations -- something you look at and listen to and either engage with or don't; perhaps more like an album of aloof yet mysterious pop songs than a typical American narrative film.

Sofia Coppola: Not just for girls

Thu, 23 Dec 2010 18:01:00 +0000

It's fitting that Sofia Coppola's new movie is called "Somewhere," an apt title for a filmmaker whose works are grounded in a sense of place and yet feel as if they're taking place in their own hermetically sealed world. The same qualities that got "Lost in Translation" lauded for its dreamy atmosphere prompted attacks on "Marie Antoinette" for being cosseted and self-indulgent, which had more to do with critics' sympathies toward the former's melancholy May-December romance and their hostility to the feminine frippery of the latter than any profound shift between the two. (Anthony Lane's New Yorker review of "Marie Antoinette" remains one of the most sexist pieces of criticism I've ever read.) A few of the same brickbats have been lobbed at "Somewhere," but in the main the story of divorced action-movie star Johnny Marco (Stephen Dorff) bottoming out at the Chateau Marmont has met with a warmer reception, winning the top prize at the Venice Film Festival.

“Somewhere”: Sofia Coppola’s smart, stylish celebrity takedown

Tue, 21 Dec 2010 02:02:00 +0000

In creating drama, the most basic question is that of how much information to give the viewer and how much to withhold; Hollywood movies are largely based on the premise that every question we may have about the characters and situation will be answered. Four films into an intriguing directing career and approaching age 40, Sofia Coppola is all about withholding more than she surrenders, and never more so than in her new "Somewhere," which is roughly one part critique of celebrity to seven parts opaque art film. That's a pretty good ratio as far as I'm concerned, but the world at large may disagree.

I can tell you the story of "Somewhere" in a single phrase -- an A-list movie star named Johnny Marco (Stephen Dorff) gets a visit from his 11-year-old daughter (Elle Fanning), which forces him to face the emptiness of his existence -- but that conveys very little, perhaps less than nothing, about what the movie's really like. Coppola and her ace cinematographer, Harris Savides, have constructed the film as a series of attention-challenging extended shots, often 45 seconds or longer, that force us to go right through the visible subject and out the other side, Buddhist-meditation style. I don't use that analogy idly; if there's a subject to "Somewhere," it's the impermanence and insubstantiality of the things we think are real.