It’s March again and arguably it’s never stopped being March. Malkovich, Malkovich, Malkovich. Ever since the global COVID-19 pandemic hit the U.S. and then basically forced most of the country to shut down and self-isolate in March 2020, the idea of existential despair has been on our brains both consciously and unconsciously. First, of course, it was panic—see stores running out of food and toilet paper—and some were able to channel that anxious energy into a kind of manic hypercreativity or hysterical productivity in the first few months of uncertainty (Steven Soderbergh famously wrote three full screenplays in about the first two months of the pandemic, challenging the nervous energy of not knowing what to do with himself with so much “downtime”). Despair and worry were in there too, but they were disquieted by the aforementioned feelings.
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But after the first two or three months of quarantine went by, when it was clear that “we’ll reopen the country again in Easter,” was just a big f*cking flat-out hilarious lie that actually helped no one in the end, and it was obvious this pandemic and virus weren’t going to abate any time soon, the soul-crushing feelings of existential despair started to creep up into many people. Feelings of loneliness, isolation, despondency, desolation, crushing ennui, languorous inertia, and the dreadful hopelessness of feeling trapped in limbo. These are all essentially the flavors of the big ugly Existential Despair, a phenomenon common to pandemics and all kinds of cultural or personal great depressions, big or small in nature.
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This despondency was on the brain, and the way, the sense of dread, melancholy, and futility has been channeled by different filmmakers in many different manners over the years. Of course, the European filmmakers of the 1960s and 1970s—Bergman, Antonioni, Fellini to some extent—were the masters of capturing the feelings of existential despair, and made many of their masterpieces about this kind of disintegrating spiritual fulfillment (and were routinely mocked by Americans for years in comedy afterward).
Others approached it with comedy (Woody Allen, the Coen Brothers), and some made their own sincere paeans to the hollow feelings of despair and sadness (Allen again with “Interiors,” and Lars von Trier). Existential Despair, like depression and anxiety, comes in many insidious flavors and if you need help, you seek it out. It can be emotional despair, spiritual despair (Are you there, God? It’s me, The Playlist), financial despair, end of days despair, or as the Coen Brothers are so good at, that absurdist brand of cruel destined futility, mocking you for trying to foolishly think you can change your fate.
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But as a form of therapy and self-care, and because ugh, it’s March all over again, it’s been a year of this sh*t and nothing feels like it’s changed, we thought we’d take a quick examination through the Existential Despair Hall of Fame of cinema. – Rodrigo Perez
“Adaptation“
Charlie Kaufman is the clown prince of existential despair in the modern age. No one is able to touch the way his glass-half-full look at life, often cold, lugubrious, and austere, despairs about existence. Fortunately, in the days when Spike Jonze, was directing Kaufman’s scripts, they were much funnier, carefree, and glib in a good way (and/or Kaufman’s scripts have gotten increasingly darker). “Adaptation” was supposed to be an adaptation of Susan Orlean‘s acclaimed “The Orchid Thief” book. Instead, in a fit of anguish and despondency, Kaufman wrote about the despair or writer’s block and his inability to properly adapt the book, using the job as a self-therapy session to self-flagellate himself for being a terrible writer. He creates two IDs for himself in the story in the form or two screenwriters: the failure Charlie Kaufman, insecure, suffering from self-doubt and self-loathing (brilliantly played by Nicolas Cage), and his boorish twin brother Donald Kaufman (also Cage), an insufferably confident jackass, the untalented pair of the twins who are, of course, much more successful and happy. Somehow that gets to the story of Orlean (Meryl Streep) and an orchid thief (Chris Cooper), but ultimately a story about hope and a love for life. So it’s a much more hopeful, life-affirming film, in the end, but make no mistake, it’s 100% born from Kaufman’s own sense of self-hatred, self-recrimination, and despair. – RP
“Anomalisa”
Again! If there’s one writer in modern cinema that’s cornered the market on existential despair, it’s without a doubt Charlie Kaufman (see the most recent cry for help, “I’m Thinking Of Ending Things” too). From his Spike Jonze collaborations, “Being John Malkovich” and “Adaptation” to his recent directorial efforts, Kaufman has managed the seemingly impossible feat of translating his own narcissism and neuroses into ambitious, genre-defying films that speak to the most universal of emotions. For his second time behind the camera, Kaufman and co-director Duke Johnson, used eerily life-like stop motion animation to brilliantly illustrate a world of mundane encounters and a soul-crushing monotony surrounding his latest surrogate, miserable motivational speaker Michael Stone (voiced by David Thewlis). Once again tapping into our most innate fears and insecurities, Kaufman adapts his cynical yet strangely hopeful worldview to animation, in an attempt to understand what makes us human and more importantly, what makes us unique. In a brilliant and effective decision, every character Stone encounters in the film is voiced by Tom Noonan, until he meets Lisa (in one of the best modern voice performances by Jennifer Jason Leigh) who serves as a reawakening for Stone. Those who might have found his directorial debut “Synecdoche, New York” to be punishingly bleak, can rejoice in the fact that “Anomalisa” is much funnier and more hopeful and humanistic in its depiction of the struggle to understand our place in the world, even if the film is ultimately sobering in its purposefully anti-climactic ending. Particularly now, Kaufman’s films can serve as a bittersweet reminder that our desires and fears are often the same, and for better or worse, we’re all in this together. – Max Roux
“The Brown Bunny”
Vincent Gallo’s directorial debut “Buffalo ‘66” might have put him on the map and led to a cult-like success, but his 2003 follow-up “The Brown Bunny” is perhaps more known for its disastrous Cannes premiere and climactic blowjob scene than anything else. Seventeen years removed, “The Brown Bunny” deserves a second chance at cinematic redemption. Colossally indulgent and slow-paced, Gallo’s sophomore feature has also revealed itself to be one of the most searing indictments of masculinity ever put on celluloid. Once again casting himself as the lead, Gallo plays a motorcycle racer haunted by the death of his one and only true love, Daisy (Chloe Sevigny). “The Brown Bunny” can be a tough sit, but if you’re able to get on its wavelength, it’s an emotionally rewarding journey. Gallo’s long takes and wide frames become hypnotic, even transfixing, as you come away from it having experienced a solipsistic ghost story that will resonate long after its unforgettable finale. – MR
“Dancer in the Dark”
It’s perhaps an understatement to say that Lars von Trier doesn’t traffic in cinematic comfort food. His Dogme ’95 drama “Dancer in the Dark” is a visceral, often grueling watch that’s impossible to shake off. Von Trier’s deconstruction of the archetypal musical uses a 1960s Americana backdrop to explore hope in the face of misery. Icelandic goddess Björk gives a spectacular (and rare) lead performance as a Czech immigrant who loses her vision. On paper, the plot sounds like a parody of the most miserable film one could possibly imagine. Von Trier and Björk admittedly punish their characters, but they do not punish the audience. The musical sequences are exhilarating, shot in a naturalistic digital hue that acts as a stark contrast to the artifice of vintage Hollywood musicals. As we attempt to distract ourselves with the newest binge-able series, “Dancer in the Dark” might not qualify as escapism or comfort food during this trying time, but it remains a harrowing masterpiece, and one of Von Trier’s most compassionate films. – MR
“Diary of a Country Priest”
Robert Bresson was a master of austere minimalist cinema, responsible for classics of the form such as “Pickpocket,” “Mouchette,” and “Au Hasard Balthazar.” In terms of Bresson films that are explicitly about existential despair, one has to go with “Diary of a Country Priest,” the director’s exquisite, disquieting masterwork about the cost of maintaining hope in an uncaring world. Claude Laydu offers a wrenching lead turn as a morally unwavering man of the cloth who arrives at a parish in northern France, where he’s taken to task over his rigorously myopic commitment to his faith. Bresson understands the considerable burden shouldered by those who are devoted to a cause, religious or otherwise, and the resulting film – which is shot and framed with Bresson’s signature precision and stark lack of fuss – is one that indisputably belongs in the pantheon. – Nicholas Laskin
