More than any other name brand director Steven Soderbergh switches his style and filmic vocabulary to suit the story at hand that he wants to tell. In no film is this more evident than in his overlooked 2002 film Full Frontal. Filmed on a shoe string between his larger budgeted remakes of Ocean's 11 and Solaris, this film was almost universally panned by critics. No, it's not one of the greatest films ever made, but it's certainly not as bad a film as panned, nor a bad film at all.
This film revolves around the lives of some low level movie types who are all invited to a party for a film producer who ends up dead in his motel room due to his kinky perversions. There's a married couple, Lee and Carl (Catherine Keener and David Hyde Pierce), on the rocks- he's a depressed screenwriter who's just been canned and she's an adulteress who's getting banged by the star of the film Carl wrote. That star, Calvin (Blair Underwood), is having problems both in his real and reel lives. Calvin with juggling his many lovers, including Lee, and his character Nicholas, from the film in the film called Rendezvous, who struggles through life as an actor, until he gets a break in a Brad Pitt cop film (which is a film in the film in the film) directed by real life director David Fincher. Soderbergh, himself, also appears X-ed out as himself. In the mere film in the film, Rendezvous, Nicholas is being interviewed and pursued by Catherine, who is played by Francesca in the actual film (Julia Roberts in real life). Francesca and Calvin end up at the party for Gus the producer, along with Lee and her sister Linda (Mary McCormack), the hotel masseuse who earlier in the day gave Gus (David Duchovny) a blowjob for $500. Having felt guilty over her prostitution- as well as stealing an extra $500 from Gus- it is Linda who discovers the body . Yet, one can only help but admire Soderbergh's willingness to adeptly go back and forth between the mainstream and his indie roots, especially since his critical and financial dufecta of Erin Brockovich and Traffic has allowed him to abandon the small film if he wanted. While there is truth to criticisms that Soderbergh has made too many remakes in recent years (and I, personally prefer the smaller, personal feel of The Limey and Full Frontal) I doubt that it's due to laze, merely a restiveness and desire to see how he can veer from already tried conventions. The DVD's features are worth checking out, even if the film is not what most viewers expect. Soderbergh is, along with Francis Ford Coppola, one of the few film directors adept at discussing both film and art in general, as well the making of the film under commentary. His explication of scenes, along with the screenwriter, is top notch, as is a feature that has the characters in the film being interviewed by Soderbergh 'in character'. I guess it's a testament to the vapidity and impatience of the American public that such a gem of a little film was lost in the harsh glare of criticism, but my gut tells me that this is a film like Orson Welles' The Stranger, Alfred Hitchcock's The Lodger, or Coppola's The Conversation, that will only grow in stature in his canon through the years. Given its premature burial, in fact, that's really the only thing it can do.
This film revolves around the lives of some low level movie types who are all invited to a party for a film producer who ends up dead in his motel room due to his kinky perversions. There's a married couple, Lee and Carl (Catherine Keener and David Hyde Pierce), on the rocks- he's a depressed screenwriter who's just been canned and she's an adulteress who's getting banged by the star of the film Carl wrote. That star, Calvin (Blair Underwood), is having problems both in his real and reel lives. Calvin with juggling his many lovers, including Lee, and his character Nicholas, from the film in the film called Rendezvous, who struggles through life as an actor, until he gets a break in a Brad Pitt cop film (which is a film in the film in the film) directed by real life director David Fincher. Soderbergh, himself, also appears X-ed out as himself. In the mere film in the film, Rendezvous, Nicholas is being interviewed and pursued by Catherine, who is played by Francesca in the actual film (Julia Roberts in real life). Francesca and Calvin end up at the party for Gus the producer, along with Lee and her sister Linda (Mary McCormack), the hotel masseuse who earlier in the day gave Gus (David Duchovny) a blowjob for $500. Having felt guilty over her prostitution- as well as stealing an extra $500 from Gus- it is Linda who discovers the body . Yet, one can only help but admire Soderbergh's willingness to adeptly go back and forth between the mainstream and his indie roots, especially since his critical and financial dufecta of Erin Brockovich and Traffic has allowed him to abandon the small film if he wanted. While there is truth to criticisms that Soderbergh has made too many remakes in recent years (and I, personally prefer the smaller, personal feel of The Limey and Full Frontal) I doubt that it's due to laze, merely a restiveness and desire to see how he can veer from already tried conventions. The DVD's features are worth checking out, even if the film is not what most viewers expect. Soderbergh is, along with Francis Ford Coppola, one of the few film directors adept at discussing both film and art in general, as well the making of the film under commentary. His explication of scenes, along with the screenwriter, is top notch, as is a feature that has the characters in the film being interviewed by Soderbergh 'in character'. I guess it's a testament to the vapidity and impatience of the American public that such a gem of a little film was lost in the harsh glare of criticism, but my gut tells me that this is a film like Orson Welles' The Stranger, Alfred Hitchcock's The Lodger, or Coppola's The Conversation, that will only grow in stature in his canon through the years. Given its premature burial, in fact, that's really the only thing it can do.