"Weiner" is a difficult film. Really a documentary from Showtime, it
follows the strange Anthony Weiner in his efforts to win the nomination
for N.Y. Mayor on the Democrat ticket, a campaign launched less than two
years after the sexting scandal that forced his resignation from
Congress. After a brief stint at the top of the polls--he was doing
remarkably well-- the endeavor collapses under the fallout from a fresh
round of revelations that Weiner had returned to his old ways, using the
pseudonym “Carlos Danger.” It is certainly interesting, in a "I can't
look away" manner, as Weiner shows the obsessive and exhibitionist
cravings essential to politics and his perversity.
Somehow the documentary is haunted by American Politics, Hillary and her problems with Bill, forgiveness and bigotry, with just enough farce to prevent anyone in the audience from settling in. No one come out well, not even Huma who did approve of this and does gamely participate in the strangeness until the end. You walk away wondering how the system creates these people and how we can escape them.
It is not an enjoyable 90 minutes. But there is an enjoyable and entertaining speculative curiosity, one reminiscent of the obscene phone caller. He has a focal madness, a narrow perversion via the camera phone. Where does this perversion come from? We have ancient genes molded by ancient encounters and pressures. Those pressures did not include electronics. Electronics are a late circumstance for us; it never shaped us. So what genetic predisposition does Weiner's weirdness--or the obscene phone caller--tap into? It must be an extension of something ancient. What? Or is it some epigenetic creation, a screwy diversion of some genetic open-mindedness?
Somehow the documentary is haunted by American Politics, Hillary and her problems with Bill, forgiveness and bigotry, with just enough farce to prevent anyone in the audience from settling in. No one come out well, not even Huma who did approve of this and does gamely participate in the strangeness until the end. You walk away wondering how the system creates these people and how we can escape them.
It is not an enjoyable 90 minutes. But there is an enjoyable and entertaining speculative curiosity, one reminiscent of the obscene phone caller. He has a focal madness, a narrow perversion via the camera phone. Where does this perversion come from? We have ancient genes molded by ancient encounters and pressures. Those pressures did not include electronics. Electronics are a late circumstance for us; it never shaped us. So what genetic predisposition does Weiner's weirdness--or the obscene phone caller--tap into? It must be an extension of something ancient. What? Or is it some epigenetic creation, a screwy diversion of some genetic open-mindedness?
No comments:
Post a Comment