Episode 41: The Player
Justin:
I should’ve loved THE PLAYER. But I did not.
Now, since I don’t adhere to the idea that so many on the internets believe in that you must only love or hate movies, I can confidently say that I did in fact like it and enjoyed many aspects of it.
But the thing that’s got me curious is why I didn’t love it. Because by all accounts, I should have. I usually love movies that are about the Hollywood system. As someone who would very much like to be a part of that world, I definitely get a kick out of seeing all sides of the creative process. And that’s certainly on display here. I also tend to enjoy movies that are self-aware and I’m by no means turned off by meta moments as long as I can fully grasp their point or just find it entertaining (see: Bill Murray’s suggestion that his life’s regrets include making GARFIELD when he’s shot and dying in ZOMBIELAND).
Now, from what I can gather, and I’m generalizing to be sure, Robert Altman was a big deal in the 70s and then kinda got black-balled a bit in the 80s, causing him to satirize the industry with this particular picture. A former insider but now-outsider, as it were, showing us all what it’s like behind the scenes. To have lots of the celebrities popping up as themselves makes a lot of sense to ground the film in reality, while not necessarily suggesting the actors are in on this satirization of the entertainment industry. So whether that’s Burt Reynolds frankly acknowledging Griffin is an asshole or Angelica Huston and John Cusack glad-handing with Griffin and pretending to know who he is, it all felt very real and something that will always be true about that world.
But on the other hand, he also got some actors to perform as themselves, but within the constraints of a movie-within-the-movie that is clearly a send-up of the exact type of thing that has made those people who they are. By acting to be acting in “Habeas Corpus,” a clearly terrible dramatic tear-jerker, are Bruce Willis and Julia Roberts mocking Hollywood? Are they suggesting they know they make drivel but as long as the focus group from Canoga Park likes it, then it’s all good?
Then, the film ends with it’s most self-referential moment: Griffin, clearly about to green-light a movie called “The Player” based on the exact story we just watched, recites the same bad dialogue Willis and Roberts just spoke in the aforementioned movie-within-the-movie to his now-pregnant partner June, who we know as the former girlfriend of the writer that Griffin got away with murdering. And roll credits.
So maybe I’m not smart enough to see it (even after two viewings) but what exactly is the point here? I’m most confused by those final few moments, where Altman decides to end his movie “up” as Griffin would say, signaling that this is the type of movie that the masses want to see. But since so much up to that point has been tongue-in-cheek, you can still feel that it’s mocking the system that it has certainly benefited from. Am I crazy, then, for thinking if Altman knows this storybook ending is schlocky, why do the exact same thing? Is it that much more clever to do the thing you just said is bad? And am I wrong for thinking that’s… bad?
Now of course I’m not saying it’s a bad movie by any stretch. I liked it a lot! But between all these questions and the romance side of the story that I wasn’t fond of either, it’s just not a movie I loved. Instead, I’ll live in the rarely spoken-of world of “like” with this one. Gray area FTW!
