Smithereens

This is a cult classic no wave New York slice of life kinda film. If you like early Jarmusch you'll did this. Siedleman directs this no-budget flick between the excellent Decline of Western Civilization punk documentary and just before the mainstream Desperately Seeking Susan. Wren is proto-"Susan", if you want a glimpse of the world the Madonna character came from you'll get a good idea here. If you want a look at the run down abandoned New York City of the early 80's you'll get a good idea here.

A lot of the reviewers focus on the waning punk scene of the Village in the early 80s, but this is really irrelevant to the movie. Wren, our heroine, is just one of thousands since the 1920s looking for "the dream" of success while living in a trash can or other men's pants. Susan Seidelman did an outstanding job of capturing the desperation, the hopelessness, the lies, the dirt, and the total narcissism required of pursuing "the dream". Aptly, in one scene we see anti-hero Eric's room mate reading a comic called "Despair". While I myself was once a musician in NY (but an hour north of the city), being awake for days going from work to practice to gigs and back to work again, I had long ago disabused myself the idea of "the dream" - I had decided I enjoyed eating and sleeping in my own home more important. Playing music was for fun. But I played with people exactly like this, including a female lead singer who had once led exactly a Wren-ful life of sleeping in the street or some guy's van just to survive. I even had my own situation as a skull full of mush where I found myself dragging a suitcase and a portable TV down a street 1500 miles from home with exactly enough money for a ticket back - leaving me with a dollar to last me three days, with which is more than Wren ended up. That final shot encapsulates the nightmare masquerading as a dream perfectly. "Smithereens" is nothing new - there are scores of movies since the silent era-days exactly like this. But capturing that mood so perfectly is pure art. BTW - did anyone catch Chris Noth (of "Law and Order" fame) in the van?

Wren (Susan Berman) is a restless young woman trying to break into the music scene in NY of the early 1980s. A young, handsome and trusting man named Paul (Brad Rijn) falls for her--but she just uses him and tries to hook up with self-centered Eric (Richard Hell) who says he has contacts to get a career going.

This was a very impressive directorial debut by Susan Seidelman. It was made on a very low-budget and had mostly nonprofessional actors. It was surprisingly a favorite with critics and a success with art house college audiences of 1982. However it's pretty much disappeared since then. It's easy to see why. The clothes, music and attitudes are all clearly from the early 1980s. Most college kids today wouldn't know what to make of this. Still it's a good movie and, as a college kid from that era, I can honestly say this caught the look and feel of that time expertly. Purportedly this is also a pretty accurate portrayal about how the Village was way back then--hard to believe it was 25 years ago.

The film itself is gritty and negative and looks cheap--but that's because it was and it actually helps the movie. Seidelman's direction was actually pretty assured considering it was her first feature movie. Also, for the most part, the acting is good--Rijn in particular stands out. The only negatives I can think of is that is a depressing movie and Berman is miscast. She's a good actress but seems far too intelligent for the character she's playing.

Worth catching--especially for men and women who were in college in the early 1980s. It will really take you back! I give it an 8.

We know people like this: rootless, aimless, self-absorbed, and using. This is a realistic portrait of such a young woman who, when everything smashes to "smithereens," may or may not have an epiphany, in an ending reminiscent of the last frame in 400 Blows. Great directorial debut.

There's something about black and white checkered miniskirts in 1982 that sums up an entire era.

"Smithereens" documents a brief history of an archetype that many are familiar with: the Hip Urban Street Punk on a Path to Nowhere.

What makes this film superb is that it treats the subject with a frank honesty rarely seen in such a genre. No happy endings, convoluted plot points or moral judgments are imposed upon Wren as she bumbles about New York trying to make her way.

She is neither likable nor despicable. Belonging to no demographic, she creates her own. She has vague desires, but no goals. And as such an aimless character, the film's closing shot is quite perfect.

"Smithereens" is an engaging, refreshingly stark 'documentary' that does not gloss over its themes with the glitz and glitter otherwise prevalent in the early 80's. It successfully encapsulates a time and a lifestyle rarely portrayed correctly, except maybe in "Sid & Nancy".