Suicide is Painless
"No one could understand how Mrs. Lisbon and Mr. Lisbon, our math teacher, could produce such beautiful creatures"
Every one I know doesn't like The Virgin Suicides "its boring" "its crap" "I don't like Kirsten Dunst" "oh yeh I saw it but I didn't like it" but I like it so....
Heres the trailer:
Plot
The film opens in the sunny suburbs of Grosse Point, Michigan, Cecilia Lisbon is floating face up in her bath having slit her wrists open, shes survives and when her doctor tells her shes doesn't know how hard life gets she responds with a cracker of a line "Obviously doctor, you've never been a 13 year old girl" Cue opening titles
We spend the rest of the film seeing the Lisbon family through the eyes of a group of neighbour hood boys, the film is narrated by one of them and his obsession remains to this day. The Lisbon family are Cecilia (Hanna Hall) -the kooky youngest one who always wears a shorn wedding dress, Lux (Kirsten Dunst) - the sexy one, Bonnie (Chelse Swain) - the sour faced one, Mary (AJ Cook) - the elegent one, Therese (Leslie Hayman) -the brainy one, the mother, Mrs Sara Lisbon (Kathleen Turner) and father Mr Ronald Lisbon (James Woods).
On Cecilias return from hospital her parents throw her a party in her basement where the neighbourhood boys are invited (one of the rare moments in the film where "our boys" get to mingle with the girls) the party is going kind of well (considering its kinda crap) though Cecilia doesn't really seem to be enjoying herself the rest of the girls chat away, when the downs syndrome boy comes round Cecilia seems to lighten up, he then sings to Cecilia....... she promptly leaves the room, flings herself from her bedroom window on to a spiked fence and any chance the downs syndrome boy had as a party entertainer has been shot to sh*t.
From here on the Mrs Lisbon starts to very slowly tighten her grip on her remaining girls, and like the boys we stay at a distance, thats is till "school hunk" Trip Fontaine (Josh Hartnet) enters the fray on his quest to snare Lux (to f**k her basically) Lux couldn't care less which turns her into an obsession for Trip, he eventually manages to take her to the dance, along with arranging dates for the other girls. For the first (and last) time the girls have loads of fun, especially Lux who gets voted Prom Queen (just what the world needs, another dead Prom Queen) and she gets f**ked by Trip on the football field, he decides to leave her there (older Trip can't explain why he did this) this leads to Lux missing curfew by a few hours, which leads to Mrs Lisbon going insane by taking the girls out of school and locking them away in the house -so when you think about it Lux got f**ked by Trip twice that night.
After watching Lux f**k random men on the roof (bit of a slut is Lux) the boys are finally contacted by the girls who invite them to come rescue them, so off they go to the Lisbon house in the middle of the night.......and guess what they find. THE END
The film is based on the book by Jeffrey Eugenides and, like Jackie Brown, it is a faithful adaptation, what Sofia Coppola manges to capture is the haunting presence of the girls, everything you ever find out about them is from other people you are never "with them" and aside from the odd scene the film keeps to this. Both the film and the book have this hazy dream like state, with its beige tones even the suicides themselves seem sickly sweet. Its that "sicky sweet" atmoshpere that reminds me of the film Picnic at Hanging Rock, the spopky Australian film about the school girls who go missing on a day out, I feel the films are distant cousins.
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| Picnic At Hanging Rock |
Heres the trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08e9QqQP7sY
If you do like The Virgin Suicides then checkout The Ice Storm, it makes a nice counterpart, heres the trailer (the trailer is crap and say nothing about the film)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_6p-QlHQLE
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| Mr Lisbon |
Coppola choose well when casting the roles, in the book the girls are beautiful yet ordinary, it is the fact that they are so elusive that gets the boys, they have the "it" factor. Lux is the most attractive and Kirsten Dunst fits the role well, though never stunning as some one like Scarlett Johanson, Dunst had that "girl next door" look nailed, there is something untouchable yet homely about her. Aside from Cecilia the focus stays on Lux and the other girls don't get much chance to shine which is a shame as it would have been nice to know more about them, AJ Cook especially stands out as Mary. Kathleen Turner gives a stellar performance as Mrs Lisbon and having read the book shes quite an odd choice yet she pulls it off. Being a mad God lover she could have easily have played that up but instead she is very subtle, shes makes Mrs Libson a human being who really loves her daughters. James Woods as her husband, the teacher Mr Lisbon also gives a stellar performance, once again he keeps on the right side of crazy, he reminds me so much of my mad teachers at school, for Woods its all in the eyes, you can feel Mr Lisbon pushing all his madness and grief inside himself. The one thing I don't get is Josh Hartnet, as Trip he is the stud of the school, I personally think he looks like a camel in a bad wig, it must be a girl thing.
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| Mrs Lisbon |
The soundtrack by Air, was tailor made for the film and has such an effect that it would be hard to imagine the film without it, the melancholy sounds make the film even more haunting.
Have a listen if you like, the music video is great, I love the sad little gum:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mQ4reLS8Lo
Standout day Player
Dominic Palazzolo is the immigrant kid whos love for older girl Diana Porter leads him to standing at the open window, mouthing to God "I love her" and then throwing himself out the window...into a bush, having made his point he then struts off down the street in his sunglasses and flares. Genius.
To Sum Up
You may not like this film, some may think its to girly, but you need to realise its as much about the boys as it is about the girls, since this film was made all of its stars have gone off the radar a little, they'll probably be back but I feel this was a peak in their careers, they may have been in money making popular films but Turner has never been so deep, Woods has never been so calmly unsettling and Dunst has never been so ethereal, even Hartnets performance is pretty solid. Sofia Coppola made some brave choices with the film, it could have so easily been a different film when you think about it, 5 goodlooking blonde teens, the school stud, bible bashing parents, the 70s Detroit setting, she could have gone for a dramatic teen flick with a rocking retro soundtrack, instead she kept to the book making the audience choose between immersing themselves in the film or just walking away. I think thoughts of suicide all cross our minds at some point in ours live yet suicide is the loneliness act to contemplate, I know during those sleepless nights I've thought about it alot, but the film doesn't glamorize it but nor does it make it dark & shocking, instead suicide becomes inevitable for the girls, something they were born to do. But why watch it at 2am? Well actually don't, watch it at 2.30am during the summer months, when it ends dawn will just be breaking and I feel in your tired, dream like state you may just feel those long dead girls calling to you.
