December 7, 2010: 127 Hours
I wrote recently about the odd career path of Danny Boyle, when I reviewed Millions (2004). For his first feature since his Oscar win a couple of years ago for Slumdog Millionaire, Boyle brings us 127 Hours. A recent standout on the festival circuit, this film interprets the true-life story of Aron Ralston, who became trapped by a boulder during a weekend trip into the canyons of Utah, and ultimately was forced to remove his arm in order to escape.
So how do you spice up a movie about a guy standing in the same place for several days, unable to move? Well, Boyle’s your man. He lives for strange POV effects shots, extreme close-up zooming, split-screens, and eliciting sympathy for unsympathetic characters. Hey, wait a second! Of course those first three points are all relevant, but what of my classification of Ralston as unsympathetic? Isn’t this a guy who got trapped and needed help and was essentially doomed through no fault of his own? Well, not quite, and Boyle’s sensitive portrayal of the character and the circumstances helps the viewer to put the whole situation into perspective, accepting our protagonist’s strengths and weaknesses alike. You see, Ralston goes on a Saturday day-trip, leaves behind a few important pieces of equipment because they are not close at hand, recklessly rides his mountain bike down steep hills, even falling and nearly getting shredded by a prickly bush in the desert before he even gets to the caves. So, he’s unprepared and he’s not careful, but does that make him a bad person? Does it make him deserve his fate? Of course not, but to paint him as an entirely innocent victim would not be true to the story.
Ralston’s strength of character really begins to shine through after his arm becomes stuck due to a freak accident in which an apparently immovable boulder is dislodged (he does check it for stability before he steps on it). Once trapped, he goes through the understandable initial panic, but quickly settles down and thinks clearly, saving his water and prioritizing his strategies for escape. It occurred to me that he was probably going through the 5 stages of grief (denial/anger/bargaining/depression/acceptance), coming to the conclusion fairly quickly that he’s doomed unless he is miraculously rescued. He has occasional angry screaming breakdowns, but who wouldn’t if they were forced to stand in place for several days with barely any food or water and knowing that their chances of survival are miniscule?
Long, slow scenes put the audience in touch with Ralston’s love of the landscape, which is the reason he comes out to this rugged area. Soaring overhead shots contrast with those of his new microcosm deep in a crevasse, and he appreciates the sun and the wildlife and the geological formations even as they torment him. The tedium of the days is broken by his daily videos, which he records for posterity, humbly admitting to his mother that he wishes he’d picked up the phone when she called that first morning before he left, and told her or someone else where he was going that day. His manic energy comes out in these videos, and they incidentally provide some good narrative material so that the film’s trailers make sense.
James Franco is on centre stage throughout the film. He’s an actor who has shown promising range, from his supporting role as a villain’s son in the Spider-Man films (2002, 2004, 2007), to brilliant comedic turns in the likes of Pineapple Express (2008) and Date Night (2010), to his dramatic turn as Sean Penn’s sometime lover in Milk (2008). He was a significant player in Judd Apatow’s teen angst comedy/drama TV show Freaks and Geeks back in 1999-2000 as a lanky heartthrob. He’s totally up to the task here, with a face which can go from looking haunted one moment to delighted the next.
Much has been made in the press of the inevitable and ostensibly pivotal scene in which Ralston finally cuts off his arm in order to escape. Boyle knows where to push the buttons but also where to back off in order to keep his audience on the edge of their seat but also grounded in reality, so he keeps the gore to a minimum but throws in a few particularly jarring moments (I’m sure we’ve all thought about the process of cutting off an arm, but it didn’t even occur to me that the worst part of it would be having to cut through a nerve bundle). I’m typically not squeamish when watching this sort of thing in movies, and for the most part it was not an issue, but it really did effectively drive home the agony of the process as well as the courage required to go ahead with it. The youths a couple of rows back and across the theatre who were chattering through the entire film didn’t fare so well during this scene, and I was hoping at least one of them would puke on the others, but no such luck. The sequence is well handled, but be warned that it’s there.
127 Hours was certainly a viewing event at the time I saw it, but I find it fading in my memory aside from a few memorable moments. I’m glad to have those moments with me, but I might not make an effort to see the film again soon. There’s Oscar potential for James Franco’s performance, and I’d be perfectly happy with him taking home the prize.
A real filmmaker tackles real life.
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