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| He
can’t play dumb: Clooney in The Good German. |
A
Bad Director
By
Laura Leon
The
Good German
Directed
by Steven Soderbergh
In
making The Good German, dir ector Steven Soderbergh
has indicated in numerous interviews that he sought to pay
homage to the great mid-’40s films. In particular, he referred
to those from Warner Bros., which dealt in the vagaries and
mysteries of human behavior, all painted in velvety whites,
blacks and the all-important grays. In watching The Good
German, one can see the direct influence of, say, Casablanca,
but that’s only because Soderbergh blatantly riffs off famous
scenes, notably the airstrip finale, complete with a shot
of a vintage plane’s propellers whirring into action. That
said, the relationship is murky at best; Soderbergh may try
to mimic the look of certain scenes, but if anything, The
Good German suggests that he has no clue how to re-create
the emotional mood and, more importantly, the economy of storytelling
that marked the very best films of that glorious era.
Based on the book by Joseph Kanon, and adapted for screen
by Paul Attanasio, The Good German is basically The
Third Man redux, albeit without a compelling Harry Lime
or even a convincing patsy like Holly Martins. George Clooney
plays war correspondent Jake Geismer, who returns to postwar
Berlin not so much in hopes for a big story as in finding
ex-lover Lena Brandt (a raven-haired, dark-eyed Cate Blanchett).
What he finds is way more than he bargained for: Berlin is
a cesspool of depravity, suffering and political intrigue,
as the Russians and Americans scurry to co-opt former Nazi
scientists in preparation for the Cold War. Questions abound
as to whom to trust and who is working for whom; and Geismer
is consistently a day late and a dollar short when it comes
to figuring it all out.
A huge problem with The Good German is that Clooney,
an actor who can’t help but ooze intelligence and ability,
has to be so clueless, even inert. He actually gets the crap
kicked out of him by his driver and competitor for Lena’s
attentions, the wily Patrick Tully (Tobey Maguire), who runs
secret and successful black-market schemes on the side. Whereas
Kanon’s book carefully developed Tully into a force of evil,
Attanasio and Soderbergh seem content with the visual shock
value of having Spiderman do nasty things to Lena. Not helping
is the dialogue, particularly when it comes to Tully’s Jekyll/Hyde
personality. Maguire enthusing about his gal back home’s apple
pie doesn’t sound right, and it isn’t, because we soon realize
that Tully is a bad guy. The problem is that nobody talks
like this anymore, and if they ever did, this dialogue certainly
sounded more legit coming from the mouths of, say, Arthur
Kennedy or Robert Ryan.
Throughout The Good German, one has the queasy feeling
of watching somebody—namely Soderbergh—get off. Making it
worse is the fact that Soderbergh clearly enjoys the act of
being watched, like a child supremely proud of the mess he’s
made of Mom’s vegetable garden. He apparently has no concern
that his movie is all about copying angles and shots, not
about creating and sustaining a viable plotline, or examining
the depths of his characters’ souls. His uninterest in anything
“real” is most evident in his lackadaisical direction of Blanchett,
who, once you get past the idea that she’s playing a German
Jew, actually conveys the idea, in her detachment and self-hate,
of a Germany laid bare by years of heady supremacy and base
venality. Hers is a performance that begs to be supported
by so much more in way of vision and script and direction,
but it’s left to prop itself up on its own, a lone stick figure
of interest and depth in a landscape devoid of anything save
the director’s self-importance.
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