Tanner on Tanner

I watched this last night on Sundance. Altman must be the most hit or miss director of note ever. This show, despite its "star power" is utterly non-compelling, and its political insights--which I as a proud liberal in no way disagree with--are shallow and clunky, and seem ripped from the headlines of USA Today, despite the fact it's coming out of the mouth of someone as esteemed as Mario Cuomo. The drama, as such, is not very dramatic, and the comedy is not funny. The only points of interest, really, are seeing how New Yorkers live their lives, and the loyalty of a cast and crew to reassemble a show that keeps insisting has some cult following from 1988. Sometimes it seems like Altman's sole contribution to cinema has been the art of having all your actors talk at once, the effect of which is one feels depressingly like they're a stranger at a wedding.

It was a joy to discover 8 hours of Robert Altman's best work that I had not previously seen or even heard of. In the last week in the UK the BBC has screened the series Tanner 88 on its late night cultural ghetto channel BBC Four, followed by the recent update, Tanner on Tanner filmed largely during the 2004 democratic convention. This work has a breadth that has not been seen since Nashville, and, with a screenplay by Garry Trudeau, it also has a rare depth.

It is, of course, difficult for me to judge how well Tanner on Tanner would stand up as a film on its own. Much of the pleasure of the film is in seeing how the characters have matured over the 16 years since the original series, notably Alex Tanner played by the 22 year-old Cynthia Nixon in 1988. As a British viewer I learned a lot about the American political system from watching these films, although Tanner on Tanner is as much a satire about film-makers as it is a film about politicians.

It was clear from the beginning that the successful project would not be Alex Tanner's film about her father but her student's study of Alex, which we see at the end as Diary of a Mad Filmmaker. However, the anticipation of the irony did not detract from the pleasure. To my mind, the best scene in the film is where Alex Tanner and Alexandra Kerry find themselves double-booked to film an interview with Ron Reagan. They alternate Kerry's serious questions about stem-cell research with Tanner's ditzy questions about what it's like to have a celebrity father. I don't know what the future may hold for her father ( this is written 2 days before the election) but Alexandra Kerry would certainly seem to have a future as a comedy actress.

I admit it: I watched Tanner on Tanner for Cynthia Nixon. I'm male and an independent, right-leaning voter, but Tanner on Tanner was Nixon's series all along.

Politically, it had all the Demo-speak and the flashes of Garry Trudeau. Jack Tanner seemed a combination between deer-in-the-headlights and Clinton clone; TJ transformed from hard-working campaign manager to hardcore bitch in a short amount of time (bitter?) and the misadventures of Salim culminated in his vegetable curry being violated by a hard drive.

But every time Nixon's eyes teared up or her chin quivered, you knew that Trudeau and Robert Altman didn't play everything for laughs. The scene that struck me the most was Alex's admission that her Guatemalan husband was missing, and the tear trailing down her left cheek showed that even through all the bashing, glad-handling, and backstabbing, people still have deep emotions.

I don't agree with Trudeau's politics, but I enjoyed this series. Cynthia Nixon did a superb job in portraying Alex Tanner, and Trudeau should definitely consider taking Alex worldwide.

Altman considered Tanner '88 has his most creative work. It isn't surprising that the miniseries is the only work to spawn an Altman directed sequel. Tanner on Tanner is a pretty good coda to the original miniseries; it has the same bone dry humor of the original. It has the sharp barbs at both politics and documentary filmmaking. (Tanner on Tanner is more a media satire than a political one) And it was nice seeing the characters 16 years later.

However, Alex Tanner is more of an object of derision than Jack Tanner was in the original. At no point in the original did it come across as if Jack Tanner was the butt of the joke-instead the absurd process of electing the president was what Altman and company was kicking. *Here* it feels much more targeted at Alex as a character. Of note there is a painfully awkward scene in which two women filmmakers are having to compete for a man's time because of a scheduling mix-up. The scene *in theory* is a very funny but as it plays out it is painful to watch because of the social coding and performances. It is a very sour scene. So sour in fact it feels like it belongs in a different series.

I don't think this is worthwhile to watch on its own; it's really an extension of Tanner '88 and while good in that context it depends on the first series for its vital spark.

This follow-up to Robert Altman's "Tanner '88" (1988) originally aired as a four-part TV-series on HBO. Michael Murphy and Cynthia Nixon reprise their roles as Jack Tanner and Alex Tanner, with the former presidential candidate now teaching at Michigan State, while his daughter is a Manhattan-based documentary filmmaker who also teaches at the New School.

Basically, there's only one real character in this film and that's daughter Alex Tanner. It's hardly a person one can sympathize with, since she is a self-indulgent howler with seemingly only one goal, rehabilitating her father, Jack Tanner, whom she adores unconditionally.

According to Altman the film is primarily a spoof on the new documentary film-making, which he didn't intended as such, he admitted in an interview. The question is, what was the original idea for the film?

Well, the writing suggests a much more dramatic approach, but on that level it doesn't work. But with Altman, you already know this is gonna be a loosely constructed stew, highly dependent on high-profile cameos, but the irony is that this film essentially has become what Altman claims his own film ended up to be, a spoof about film-making itself, and documentary film-making in particular. "Tanner on Tanner" is about nothing. Of course it's not a documentary, but filmed as one and looks like one, shot in verité style. It's not drama. It's no allegory on politics. It's - if anything - a self-indulgent look at the very process of film-making.

At one point, in the last part of the series, the student of Alex who is making a film about her film, proclaims: 'Look at Michael Moore. Old-fashioned documentary film-making is dead.'

In many ways this seems true, at least if you aspire your documentary to get any attention at festivals. Facts are for television, and it's only recently that the documentary has become an accepted cinematic approach. For a long time, there was only one form. The factual, the journalistic approach. Now there are many, but more so than ever, the documentary has become a political pamphlet, a very powerful piece of propaganda. This makes it much easier for us to judge them on their cinematic qualities, instead of their qualities as objective journalism or an authentic portrait of a certain subject or person.

Camera Obscura --- 6/10