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21 Grams is a jarring, scrambled cinematic work of mathematical
metaphor, mixing modern philosophical explorations of grief, retribution, and redemption
into a disjointed narrative.
The movie revolves around three strangers:
Christina Peck (Naomi Watts), a
recovering drug addict turned suburban mother and
wife, Paul Rivers (Sean
Penn), a mathematics professor whose heart and marriage are
both failing, and
Jack Jordan (Benicio Del Toro), an ex-con who has become a born
again
Christian. On the surface, the plot centers around a tragic accident that
brings their lives together, but beneath that, the film is a psychological meditation on
life’s chaotic traumas and the way people struggle to cope: through addiction, through
religion, or through science.
These stories are delivered in a
non-sequential disorder reminiscent of
Christopher Nolan’s Memento. After
the film, my girlfriend and I wondered if the impact would have been as strong if it was
told “normally”. Reconstructing the story in a linear pattern, it seemed to be more than
just a genre shift from “Drama” to “Artistic Drama”—it seemed to lose all meaning. Here,
writer/director Alejandro González Iñárritu provides narrative vignettes, scattered
throughout time, acting as a metaphor to the whole theme of the movie—each giving its own
intense emotional texture. It symbolizes the philosophy of phenomenological memory/time
(that memory is connected through emotional theme rather than a longitudinal structure)
and the poetry of fractal images that reveal patterns within chaos.
21
Grams however, is defined by its stellar performances. Naomi Watts, who attended
support group meetings to capture the essence of her character, uses every facial
expression to demonstrate Christina’s underlying weakness
and the depths of her
pain. Sean Penn, who was brilliant in the otherwise mediocre Mystic River,
is not quite convincing as a mathematician. Penn
renders a performance of existential
agony that draws you into the
character’s complexities but somehow doesn’t quite
follow through as a
poetic professor of the quantum (a bad ass well read on math,
maybe, but a
professor, not really). Benicio Del Toro steals the show: his grief
palpable, his agony stomach turning, and his performance painfully
real.
The film’s only fault is that its eagerness to keep to the metaphor
sometimes comes at the expense of plot. At points, its stylish unfolding is so
over-stretched that it becomes a burden, but overall the experimental motif and
exceptional performances make it a work of art.
