Monday, 10 December 2012

Cosmopolis

The Book

I found Cosmopolis quite a difficult read. The story focuses on a wealthy young billionaire travelling in his high-tech limousine through a city in turmoil to have his hair cut at his old family barber. Other billionaires are murdered as the world's financial markets are in meltdown. Eric has played his part in this, through mismanaging the yen, and there are potential threats against his life.
The whole story is a bit of a dream world with bizarre incidences featuring rats, fleeting appearances by a range of individual advisors turning up in his car, and encounters on several occasions with women who may or may not be his wife. His actions seem irrational and those of someone who is bored of life and actually wants to experience death as the one thing he cannot afford or control.
Ultimately I didn't really feel any connection with the character and so didn't really care whether he lived or died.






Official Cosmopolis Film website




The Film

"I know this" I really didn't think I was going to enjoy the film, but it held a strange fascination for me. David Cronenberg's screenplay makes every sentence delivered seem heavy with meaning and undertones. The dialogue feels very staged but that adds to the whole unreality of the film - a surreal riff on capitalism, fame, information technology and finding a meaningful purpose in life in modern society. I especially enjoyed Samantha Morton's theorist, who didn't know a lot.
The calm and smooth ever onward movement of the stretch limo, where as much noise from the outside world as possible has been drowned out and where not even the riot and threat of being overturned phases the inhabitants, seems like a metaphor for the stock markets and bankers.
Its a film rich for film studies criticism and analysis and a classic in the Cronenberg canon.







If you enjoyed the book, try Tom Wolfe's Bonfire of the Vanities
If you enjoyed the film, try a David Lynch film such as Mulholland Drive





No comments:

Post a Comment

Feel free to add your own views and reviews here: