Clean

Saw Clean today at the 2004 Toronto International Film Festival, starring Maggie Cheung and Nick Nolte. Cheung and director/screenwriter Olivier Assayas were present to introduce the movie and showed up afterwards for a Q&A session. Clean stars Cheung as the drug-addicted wife of a once-good rock musician who, after a tragedy, must clean herself up and set her life back on track to regain custody of her son from his grandparents (played by Nick Nolte and Martha Henry). Don McKellar also makes an appearance early in the film as a business associate of Cheung's husband. The movie moves between Hamilton (!), Vancouver, Paris, and London as Cheung struggles to redefine her life. Clean was a great movie, and it's easy to see how Maggie Cheung picked up the best actress award at Cannes this year. And Assayas even made a dingy, industrial shoreline in Hamilton appear as a beautiful backdrop to one scene of Cheung taking drugs to escape the conflict in her life.

Some tidbits from the Q&A:

• The script was written for Maggie Cheung by the director, Olivier Assayas. The two had worked together previously on Irma Vep, and Assayas wanted to find a story that would fit Cheung, but it took several years.

• Cheung's character in the movie is much like her real-life self, in that it is a character between cultures, with roots in many countries.

• Maggie Cheung likes singing, which influenced the storyline.

• Nick Nolte was not the first choice to play the grandfather; another actor had been selected, but shortly before shooting, his doctor called to say that he was ill and could not participate in the movie, and in fact died not long afterwards. When recasting, Assayas told his casting director that he wanted someone like Nick Nolte for the role, and it was suggested that he just contact Nolte, who quickly accepted.

• Assayas couldn't believe that Nolte was actually in the movie until he saw him in front of the camera.

• When casting in Canada, the first set of tapes sent to Assayas for each of the characters were all wrong, with the exception of the one for the grandmother, which was Martha Henry. Assayas said she was the ideal choice for the role.

• Many people who make appearances in the movie are real-life musicians, which lends an air of verisimilitude to the movie. Included are Tricky and David Roback. Cheung's husband in the movie is also a musician, and is currently working with Nick Cave.

• When casting Cheung's son in the movie, Assayas said that he must have seen every Eurasian child in North America. :-) He eventually picked a boy with no previous acting experience, because he felt child actors are generally spoiled and lack spontaneity.

• When asked about her realistic portrayal of a recovering drug addict, Cheung mentioned that it is not based on her own experiences, but both she and Assayas have had friends in various stages of recovery, some entering it, some in it, and some coming out of it.

• Assayas said he didn't want to sentimentalize the problem, and that he wanted to be more balanced and not have anyone purely good or purely bad.

• He was a bit nervous showing the movie in Toronto since much of it was shot here or in the area, and that the audience could easily compare it to the real-life version (in fact, one shot that is supposedly in Hamilton is actually on Bathurst Street in Toronto).

• For the festival, he is staying in the same hotel in which he stayed while filming the movie, which he found weird. :-)

Wonderful characters and beautiful images, on a plot that supports them well, without grabbing too much attention. Assayas shows great skill in timing and in choosing when to pursue and when to cut off a scene, delivering the smoothest storytelling and the most delicate way to bring characters to life. Balibar, Dalle and Tricky provide a rich, clever, contrasting universe where Cheung's brilliant performance and Notle's strong presence can shine. If a bit over-dramatic at times, the use of music is rather moving: no formal perfection, no bland, formatted entertainment, but the sound of real people pouring their life in their songs. Subtlety, sensitivity and humanity in filming life's meanderings make this movie a real treat. 9/10

Assayas wrote this hyperactive and over-ambitious film expressly for his ex-wife, Hong Kong mega-star Maggie Cheung. She plays Emily, a "rock widow." That's what she becomes in the opening scene when her musician main squeeze (James Johnson) OD's near a Canadian steel mill. Emily's reaction is to get high on the same drugs and sit all night in an old American car staring at the ruined landscape while we listen to big sweeping passages from Brian Eno.

Six months later Emily gets out of prison for possession and seeks out her in-laws in Vancouver, who've been raising a little boy she had with the late rock star. The grandpa is Nick Nolte. Chastened by her boyfriend's death and a jail term, she now wants to start a new life and be allowed to take over the care of her son. In a painful effort to recreate herself, she opts for Paris because London has "too many memories." Only it's "trop de souvenirs" now, because the multilingual Cheung has switched necessarily to French. 'Clean' is in a mixture of French and English like Assayas' previous film 'demonlover'. This time a dash of Cantonese Chinese is added in when Emily waitresses in a big restaurant for a while in Paris before an interview with the Printemps chain, as a result of which -- somewhat improbably -- she is hired as the manager of a new store "for active women." Eventually she gets to see Nolte and little Jay (James Dennis), who both come over to Paris from London where they've gone from Vancouver (no shortage of travel in 'Clean') to get tests and treatments for grandma (Martha Henry).

During the movie's most touching scene, in the Vincennes Zoo with the boy -- who's long ago been turned against her by the grandma -- Emily manages a heart-to-heart chat that convinces her son she's not why his dad died -- and might deserve to be his full-time mom. As the movie ends she's gathered the courage to return to North America and record a song in a San Francisco studio (one last move in the director's endless locale-shifting game). Several brief scenes between Nolte and Cheung that show mutual empathy ("I believe in forgiveness," he tells her) also have some emotional authenticity.

The Canadian opening has a kind of gritty trashiness. The conflicts between Emily and her husband and music people are confusing and disturbing; they're not exposition. But then they are: they show a lifestyle about to implode. Brian Eno's music provides a desolate background for the already bluntly metaphorical dark satanic mills (Assayas may mean the stark steel foundry to stand for the music industry) and for the ugly quarrel between Emily and her husband. The shot of the car at dawn is a memorable and poetic image of the end of a lifestyle. The director has talent: he just needs to channel it better.

As a depiction of the recovery process this is all smoke and mirrors. Most of what goes on in rebuilding a life is interior and that's hard to show in a film. "Fake it till you make it" is an important recovery slogan describing the early 12-step process: but if an actress accurately reproduces the effect of "faking it" the result is necessarily going to look chilly and artificial. Finally Maggie Cheung may be, at least in this her European/western persona, too composed and self-possessed a person to illustrate the sufferings of drug rehabilitation, though the absence of heavy histrionics is a plus. Another traditional rule of recovery is not to make any major changes in the first year -- a rule Emily frantically violates. Obviously, one abstains. But she is depicted going through methadone to illegally acquired painkillers to marijuana to being drug-free. The sense of fits and starts is valid, but the implication of such a progression's being part of successful recovery is a questionable one. Even advocates of the film admit that the interwoven scenes of Emily with crypto-lesbian bohemian characters and the unruly behavior of these women among themselves are nothing but a confusing distraction. Self-restraint seems a quality unknown to this director.

Emily has but one purpose: to remake herself -- to become "clean" -- so that she may have her little boy back. That is so simple, and it's all that keeps her going. But although this film deals with more down-to-earth material than 'demonlover', it handles it in too fragmented and detached a manner. Assayas seems to like chaos. Perhaps he's a little too distracted by the complexities in the life of a woman who after all has become very focused. Though this may not be the great performance some think, Cheung deserves credit for keeping at least some sense of consistency through the dizzying background shifts.

'Clean' was warmly received in France with prizes at Cannes and critical acclaim afterward in 2004, though the whole process may owe more to Assayas' and Cheung's enthusiastic fan base than to ultimate merit. 'demonlover' did well with fans too (though not so well with critics in France or the US) despite the fact that it self-destructs halfway through. American aficionados have been panting to see 'Clean' but Variety's David Rooney had predicted that only "a marginal release" for 'Clean' was likely. The movie opened in New York April 28, 2006, 18 months after the Paris opening.

So what does it take to win at the Cannes Film Festival? Well, Maggie Cheung pulled out all the stops for her win in 2004 in a moving film directed by her ex-husband Olivier Assayas.

Emily Wang (Maggie Cheung), a junkie ex-VJ, struggles in life after her husband, a famed yet ageing rocker whose career is in decline, dies after a heroin overdose on the drugs she had bought him. After serving six months in jail for possession, she finds her son, Jay (James Dennis) is put into the care of her parents in law, Albrecht (Nick Nolte) and Rosemary (Martha Henry). Knowing that the only way to see her son again is to clean herself up, Emily moves to Paris to rebuild her life, seeking help from long forgotten contacts. Meanwhile Albrecht begins to have a change in heart when he realises that Rosemary is dying.

Maggie Cheung's performance isn't easy to match with superlatives. Mastering dialogue in Cantonese, English and French, as well as singing the title track - she, unlike many HK actors, hasn't launched a singing career - it feels as much an honest, raw portrayal of Emily's character and her struggles to deal with the twists presented to her. Whilst Cheung and Assayas may have split amicably years before, I can't help but feel that their own history must have played a part in the making of this film, and if so, they used it well for the benefit of the film. Which is just as well, as I felt the overall script wasn't as impactful as it could be, particularly given Cheung's performance.

Nick Nolte's role is fairly limited. It's strange seeing him now as a grandfather, but he does it well - will we see a change in direction from him? This is a good film, and we will look back on it one day in an awards ceremony and say this is the one movie that exemplifies all of Maggie Cheung's achievements in one film.

To get the full, globe-trotting flavor of "Clean," one need simply note that Emily Wang is a Chinese immigrant living in Paris with her British rock star boyfriend, and that their child is being raised by the young man's parents in Vancouver, Canada. All I can say is that "Babel" clearly has nothing on this film when it comes to international story lines spanning widely varying cultures and time zones.

Though a French film, "Clean" actually begins in the English-speaking section of Canada where Emily and her husband, Lee Hauser, both heroin addicts, are desperately attempting to jumpstart Hauser's fading music career. The couple seems to be patterned somewhat after John Lennon and Yoko Ono, since everyone around them seems to think that Emily's undue influence on him is bringing him down both personally and professionally. When Hauser dies of a drug overdose, Emily - who earned some renown of her own as a music show hostess on an MTV-style interview show on French TV a decade or so back - is arrested for heroin possession and sentenced to six months in prison. Upon her release, she returns to Paris, agreeing not to have any contact with her son until she can kick her drug habit and make a decent life for herself.

As a cautionary tale about drug addiction in the music business, "Clean" doesn't show us anything we haven't already seen in countless films (and VH-1 specials) on this very same subject before. Yet, although the movie is a bit too scattered in its focus at times, when it is zeroing in on the things that really matter - Emily's attempts at overcoming her addiction and her efforts at forging a meaningful relationship with her young son - it is poignant, profound and deeply touching. The movie is blessed with a pair of outstanding performances by Maggie Cheung as Emily and Nick Nolte as Hauser's father, a kindhearted soul who believes in forgiveness and who offers a helping hand to a woman whose life, despite all her best efforts, is constantly teetering on the edge of disaster. Their scenes together, as the two characters reveal their fears, insecurities and even tentative hopes to one another, are both spellbinding and breathtaking, and show us what fine movie acting is really all about.