Promised Land (2012)

The Promise of Matt Damon

Matt Damon is one of those rare species that manages to pick appropriate material to showcase his talent. Sean Penn is a better actor than his body of work; the opposite might be said of Damon. His films give him a broader range than one might imagine. His matinee idol quality (Bourne Identity series/Bagger Vance/Saving Private Ryan) fails to obscure his gravitas (Syriana/ The Green Zone/ The Departed/The Good Shepard).  Off screen Damon maintains a solidly progressive political track record culminating in being the voice over for the documentary “Inside Job” which chronicled the 2008 financial debacle . Even if you’re a reactionary; it’s hard not to like the guy. His comity glows whether he is fiercely debating a reporter over teacher’s pay or signing autographs to exuberant fans.   He has a self-depreciating “everyman” quality that belies a dogged determination.  It has been over a decade and a half since he broke onto the scene with “Good Will Hunting” and yet he has remained “on top”.  That doesn’t happen by accident. Mr. Damon has now decided to reprise working with the director, Gus Van Sant, who guided his breakthrough project. It is an interesting combo as they both share the same social concerns and have chosen to base this feature around a contentious political issue: oil shale fracking.

Van Sant has a jaundiced view of the wholesome American dream.   “To Die For” is based around a woman who seduces teenagers to murder her husband who is blocking her dreams of stardom. “Last Days” is a fictional account of the suicide of a rock star based on Kurt Kobain’s final week. “Elephant” is a meditation on the Columbine massacre. Van Sant also had the courage to tell the story of the gay political pioneer Harvey Milk who was assassinated by a deluded blue collar hero.  The edgy subject matter never matches the filmmaking. “Milk” was milquetoast (my review: http://thebettertruth.blogspot.com/2009/01/milktoast-heroes-my-grandmother-was.html). “My Own Private Idaho” and “Drugstore Cowboy”, once again dark heartland tales, established a meandering, listless conventional story-telling that permeates his work. Stripping away the daring subject matter, one is left with forgettable conventional features.  The idea of Van Sant teaming up with Damon on a hot button topic conjured up the prospect of an uninspired preachy rant - however much one may agree with the perils of Natural Gas Drilling.  In the end “Promised Land” surprises. Damon manages to pull Van Sant from his gloominess and delivers a solid romantic comedy. Who woulda thought?

The key to the success of “Promised Land” is channeling the “off screen” amiability of Matt Damon. Here is an example of the spirit of the man. Most movie stars cringe at being accused of being gay.  It has been viewed, even in this day, as potential box office poison. Here is Damon’s response to accusations that he was romantically involved with Ben Affleck:

“I never denied those rumors because I was offended and didn’t want to offend my friends who were gay, as if being gay were some kind of f--king disease. It put me in a weird position in that sense.”

That response deserves an academy award for magnanimity given the fact that most stars choose to curse the reporter posing the question. Van Sant and Damon’s very open political and environmental beliefs one might have expected “Promised Land” to be a screed against BIG ENERGY. It does deliver that message - but it also surprises and draws the audience in with the acknowledgment that the dividing line between good and evil is more of a circle.

The central character in this Dave Egger’s story is a disillusioned Iowa farm boy turned huckster of big gas fracking. (Note: Damon and another star John Krasinski wrote the screenplay) The backstory is critical as the protagonist’s embrace of corporate power is rooted in a bitter acknowledgment the inevitable reach of modern corporations. One such company destroyed his beloved hometown by closing down a manufacturing facility. Matt Damon’s character isn’t a true believer but someone who lives his life in a Freudian reaction formation. To quote wikipedia:

In psychoanalytic theory, reaction formation is a defensive process (defense mechanism) in which anxiety-producing or unacceptable emotions and impulses are mastered by exaggeration (hypertrophy) of the directly opposing tendency

In other words Matt is an effective salesman because he believes this is the ONLY way that small farmers can embrace the future. In his mind there is NO choice but to join the winning side - so he does - WITH GUSTO. His dressing in costume and practicing his “down homeness” matches his scoring points with the home office by low-balling the “marks”. It is all an embrace of the mirror image of the values of the heartland: he’s an honest, hardworking bullshit-artist.... and you like him. Ditto for his partner (Francis McDormand), a beleaguered single mother wistfully watching her son grow up on Skype while she struggles to bring home the bacon.  She is less convinced of “the mission” but all she has to do is look across the table at the desperate farmers to know that it’s better to be a hammer than a nail.  Interestingly Damon, in order to suppress his pity, erupts with rage against those trying to ignore the onslaught of big business.  All the characters who have post-highschool education are finely drawn:  John Krasinski is wonderful as the Bendict Arnold environmentalist as is Hal Holbrook as the retired engineer/science teacher.  In the end you get what makes them tick delivered in crisp credible dialogue and gesture.  The local yokels fail to inspire. They are incarnations of how college people view the rural underclass.  Their words might inspire but the quality of expression is devoid of the taciturn, hard worn brevity of many farmers. Can anyone imagine the farmer in Grant Wood’s American Gothic giving a speech? All you have to know is the clenched pitchfork - direct all questions to his spouse. Note: Mr. Wood changed her role to “daughter” after depression era audiences were uncomfortable with husband having a wife half his age. The old man in the painting is remaining silent.

In the end it is the faceless company playing games with Damon’s integrity forces our anti-hero to be the real deal. He’ll play the game... to a point.  Krasinki and Mcdormand are bewildered.  We’re all getting paid in the end and we win.... so who cares?  But the beauty of this set-piece is that Damon does.  The closing scene shows him channeling the shame of John Proctor in the Crucible. The dialogue fails to match Arthur Miller’s words of the farmer from Salem MA; but one can feel Damon channeling the pathos of the American Classic:  “How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul; leave me my name!”  In a sense this film fails to be about Natural Gas as much as the hopelessness of good people forced to do bad for all the good/wrong reasons. Matt gives us the unvarnished truth about fracking: You might get paid; but the cost could be your land and heritage.  The movie cleverly recognizes that even good people on both sides of a sale will make the wrong decision; but it’s THEIR career or land and, more importantly, THEIR choice. We are in a soapbox-free zone.

As a coda I would like to mention an article I saw in the Daily Mail.  It is strange that I should quote a newspaper dedicated to tearing apart the subject’s integrity but that makes the headline all the more poignant:

Friday, Jan 11 2013

'I couldn't leave them': Matt Damon clasps daughter tight... as he reveals he gave up director role to be with his four children

I believe him. Maybe I’m a fool and this is an elaborate PR campaign to boost the “goodness” of the film - but I don’t think so. Boxoffice fails to rule in this case. Damon will jump at the chance to be in the blockbusters.... but it seems merely a platform for quieter, more important work.  That is a promise well worth keeping.

Added in early 2018 - as a coda to the coda. The sexual abuse scandals have rocked the business and entertainment world.  Maybe I saw too much in Damon in that his failure to call out Harvey Weinstein coupled with a less than robust response to the "me too" movement has certainly tarnished his standing as an unblemished "good guy." There are no reports of his being directly involved in abuse, but there is a certainly the impression that he could have done more to stand up for vulnerable women.

Harvey Milk (2009)

Milktoast Heroes

My grandmother was born when women were forbidden to vote. I was born when African Americans were legally segregated and exploited. I was a seven years old when the gay community put its foot down at Stonewall. As a middle-aged American I can say, borrowing the tag line from the first smokes broadly marketed to young women: “You’ve come a long way, baby”. Harvey Milk is a name most likely remembered by the same people who can recall “Virginia Slims” cigarettes. It’s unfortunate that Mr. Milk has fallen into obscurity. My theory is that the timing of his assassination unfortunately coincided with one of the most disquieting events in 20th Century American history. Milk was murdered on Nov. 27th 1978. Jim Jones orchestrated the Jonestown massacre on Nov. 18 the same year. To give you an idea the impact the mass suicide had on the news cycle I would note that the Dec. 4 issue of Newsweek featured a cover “special report” on “the cult of death”. Harvey was being pushed out of history before his ashes were scattered.

There is much carping about matching the struggle of the gay rights movement with the battles of the mainstream civil rights advocates. A cursory viewing of the actual black and white film footage of police raids on gay bars, which appears during the opening credits of the feature film “MILK” should put to rest any notion that this movement lacked legitimacy. The pathos of these images is strong enough that only the most hardened bigot would fail to see the inhumanity. There is no doubt that Mr. Milk should be placed alongside Malcolm X and other easily recognizable martyrs for human rights. Mr. Van Sant made the film to correct the record and give Harvey is rightful place in the mainstream collective consciousness of good men fighting for a good cause. Unfortunately the film shares the fate of Spike Lee’s bio-pic “X” in that strong performances cannot overcome poor direction and bad writing.

The paradigm American hero is George Washington, a man very, very aware of his place in history. I doubt there are any schoolchildren familiar with the red haired founding father who had no biological children and owed his wealth and standing to marrying a widow. This does not detract from Washington’s accomplishments but it does give a human touch to a personage who coolly gazes up from the one dollar bills (maybe it was the laudanum – you didn’t know?). Young America, still somewhat awed by European aristocracy, adopted the notion that national heroes need to be heroic beyond their recognized accomplishments. “The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin” is chock-a-block with advice on frugality, humility, hard work, honesty… even tips on bathing… Is it any wonder that a century and half latter two young American boys from immigrant families would create the culmination of the George Washington ideal: SUPERMAN. It is unfortunate that Truth, Justice and the American Way gives us little humanity in our pantheon of national heroes. MLK has become tepid… no room for his attitudes regarding economic egalitarianism, his family difficulties or his short-comings as a scholar…. Once again the truth of MLK’s doesn’t detract from his greatness – in fact I would argue the opposite. Just as the lies Samuel L. Jackson repeated in the pre-inauguration ceremony about Rosa Park’s ordinariness take away from this daring activists role as the spark that ignited the conscious of a nation. She certainly did get on the bus to get arrested AND I SAY BRAVO!

Who was Harvey Milk? I’m sure of few things in life but one of them is that he wasn’t the selfless, affable, earnest, edgeless do-gooder depicted in Mr. Van Sant’s work; despite Sean Penn’s efforts. How could he be? The last person I saw who resembled that person was the leading character in the original production of Godspell. There are hints of something more human in the storyline: the failed relationships, the lover’s suicide, the unbridled ambition and, most interestingly, the taped recording “to be played if I am assassinated”. Now here is someone who possesses our Founding Father’s sense of scripting a place in history. His ability to swap a pony-tale for a three piece suit also gave a hint at something darker – it is difficult in the early 21st century to convey the significance of trimming the locks (see David Crosby’s song “Almost Cut My Hair”). It raises an interesting question about degree of compromising involved in winning. The other aspect, glossed over in the film, was Milk’s war on “being closeted”. I don’t know if Harvey actually “outed” someone without their permission but once again the significance of his stance was pummeled over in the TV movie sensibility of keeping our hero on his journey to martyrdom.

In terms of the writing and direction the closing scene post Harvey’s demise sums up the effort: two of his close aids arrive at a city hall remembrance ceremony soon after the assassinations. It is in the foyer of the solemn marble building and it is sparsely attended - one turns to the other "Doesn't anyone care?" - they leave in disgust..... They walk outside and "discover” a candle-lit parade of 30,000 crying mourners. Guess they missed everyone on the way in? Didn’t hear about the march? I don’t remember the scenes where these two aides were cut out of the loop; ditto from them suffering from severe visual or audio impairment. But I guess that’s “artistic license” – just like the stop action of Harvey locking eyes with the poster of Verde Opera woman as he falls (it was soon over after the fat lady sang). The mainstream stereotype of the gay community is a group obsessed with fashion and style. Mainstream television shamelessly plays on this notion in “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy”. It is weird and ironic that “Milk” is so, well, “straight”. This is blandest most mainstream production of an alternative lifestyle you will ever experience (actually there is the movie “Philiadephia”). It is as if the Walt Disney company created a theme park called Queerworld. In short the film was too “straight”.

Aside of the artistic camp there was a more insidious side to the Milk show. The producers decided that they didn’t want to associate the film with the Prop 8 anti-Gay marriage proposal that was circulating in CA at the time of the film’s scheduled release. This was a conscious decision and had nothing to do with production issues. The irony here is that, if one is to believe the film (a dubious choice) the crowning achievement of Milk’s career was his leading the DEFEAT of the anti-Gay workplace proposition brought forth by Anita Byrant. The director noted in an interview “Harvey would have opened it in October”. Well we can hope the producers had some sort of strategy in mind that didn’t involved soft-peddling the very principles of the principle. Maybe they figured if Prop 8 won the film would garner an even larger stage – Sean Penn will win best actor and I’ve no doubt that the film will garner more statues than the competition. It looks like the plan, if that’s what it was, is working. Maybe it’s a tribute to Harvey’s pragmatic side – let’s not consider the alternative.