Oscar 2013: Pacific Rim (spoilers)

Well, I've been absent for a while without warning.  Truth be told: my days at blogging regularly are over.  But, I will check in from time to time with random spoiler summaries, and, most definitely Oscah! predictions.  In the meantime, I had read the script to Pacific Rim several months back.  It's from the imaginations of Guillermo del Toro and screenwriter Travis Beacham.  I have to say, out of all the scripts I've read thus far, Pacific Rim is right up there with The Counselor when it comes to density (but for different reasons).  Spelling and grammar errors, as well as non-traditional screenplay style aside, The Counselor was full of thick narrative and its subject matter of drug smuggling was tricky to follow and full of developments that were implied rather than explained.

With Pacific Rim, Beacham's dialogue rolls along without much incidence, and the storytelling methods are pretty straight forward, subject matter aside (it's pretty out there).  And, I have to say, out of every script I've read so far, THE SPELLING WAS IMPECCABLE.  The presentation: unbelievably super clean.  So clean, you'd think it was a final draft--a real final draft (it wasn't).  The difficulties involved mostly being a very conceptual film ... with its own glossary!  At first, I felt like I needed computer science AND biology degrees.  There are several very unique terms which appear to have little relation to the English language, and more Asian-influence.  After a while, I grew accustomed.  I read an old version of the script, which has a major female character (a widow of the male protagonist's brother named Flick--I pictured Allison mack from Smallville for some reason), but, judging from the IMDb, she has totally been axed.  

The gist of the story (if I can remember correctly--but, I could totally be getting things wrong here, so don't shoot me!), is that it's set in the future and there's a war going on.  We live in global community, though a good part of the film takes place in the East Asian and Oceaniac regions.  By cosmic intervention, there are these monstrous, destructive creatures--called kaiju--emerging from underneath the Pacific Ocean, at least, physically, though, metaphysically, this "place" is another dimension.  They're attacking cities all over the world.  I seem to recall Peru, Korea, and Japan being three of their targets.  They're wreaking havoc everywhere.  I got a serious Godzilla vibe from all of the mayhem.  To combat and defeat them, soldiers, who work for a united coalition that involves most, if not all, countries on the planet, must operate these Jaegars (both these and the kaiju each have names that reminded me of race horses).  Each of these "vehicles"--which also gave me a Godzilla meets Starship Troopers (without the irony) vibe--seat two officers.  Their brains are somehow synced with each other, as well as their machine, and the only way for the Jaegars to function is cerebrally via the soldiers; everything is controlled by brain waves.  How effective they are at defeating the kaiju depends on how emotionally sound they are and connected with each other.  There's a love story between two of them.  There was also another love story between reporter Flick and a scientist trying to discern the source of the kaiju, but that seems to have been cut.  

The story was fun, inventive, and definitely original.  The film touches on battle fatigue, as well as damaged souls finding each other (think the Korean set-piece in Cloud Atlas).  While fascinating, my empathy for the characters was lacking.  I just couldn't get there emotionally (maybe I'm dead inside?).  Perhaps, I was burnt out from having just read Elysium.  Rim had a lot of action scenes, which may easily be brought to life, judging from the trailer.  And, while Elysium's conceit wasn't fully realized and rather oversimplified, Rim threw enough scientific jargon my way that I was less critical and more accepting of its more metaphysical elements. 

I can't really properly review it, though, as a non-science-fiction aficionado.  I really have to leave it to the experts.  I mean, this script was hard core science-fiction.  This is the kind of movie Sheldon and company from The Big Bang Theory would enjoy, though I imagine he would have more than his share of problems with technical details (that would actually make a good scene).  Like I said, there was a glossary and the script was very conceptual.  And, I was left wondering about its commercial prospects.  I had serious doubts that this script would draw a large audience, at least stateside, to make up its budget.  I imagine the adjustments dumbed a lot of the film down for the average filmgoer.  And, I hope, for the sake of the fans of del Toro, it wasn't too much.  This is his first film since Pan's Labyrinth that doesn't have Hellboy in his title.  Hopefully, it will be a hit.  I don't care if it's crap.  There are so many known properties being made into films repeatedly, we really need people paying money to watch more unique fare.  

Plot Summary (spoilers)

(Please note: This is based on an early version by Beacham and is, by far, not the version that will be released in theaters)

At his counselor’s office, Raleigh Antrobus (Charlie Hunnam) is plugged into a virtual incident he experienced a year before, but then disengages.  The counselor implores him to confront his past in order to work through it.  He leaves the office and there are monitors in the lobby showing Tokyo under attack.  Pilot Aki Seto died.  Cut to the actual scene, where Stacker Pentecost (Idris Elba) comforts the surviving copilot, the distraught Mako Mori (Rinko Kikuchi).  You have to understand that they were pilots of these massive robotic machines, which they operated with their minds working on the same plane. 

In her car parked in a driveway of a bar and grill in Port Hueneme, California, reporter Felicity “Flick” Kincaid (character axed from script?) discusses the location of a source with Jim, which turns out to be outside of Lima, Peru.  She decides to fly there.  She gets out of her car after spotting Raleigh, the brother of her dead ex-fiancée Yance, and questions him about monsters (or kaiju, one of those huge robots from the trailer) coming out of the Pacific Ocean.  When she brings up The Interstice, which happens to be a region five miles underneath the ocean that separates the universe from the anteverse, Raleigh goes cold. Raleigh and Yance were copilots in a jaeger, a virtual vehicle of sorts, which means they shared each others' most intimate thoughts, which included those of Flick.  

At his home, Lt. Commander Roscoe Calhoun enlists Raleigh to man another jaeger in Tokyo with Mako.  Flick falls asleep while looking at a framed Vanity Fair cover sporting the Antrobus brothers, for which she wrote the article.   She has a nightmare about Yance, surrounded by pools of blood, involving a kaiju spreading wildfire. 

At central command in Tokyo, on a man-made island connected by causeway, Pentecost greets Raleigh.  In the locker room, Mako shares some words with pilot Kaori Jessop.  Pentecost prepares Raleigh.  He introduces him to Kaori and her husband Duc, shows him his Mark-1 jaeger, called Gipsy Danger, and introduces him to Mako.   They begin a series of exercises to train for their time in the jaeger together. 

A driver takes Flick up to the Calixto Particle Observatory near Lima, Peru, to meet Dr. Newt Gottlieb (Charlie Day or Burn Gorman?).  He consults with his colleague Myron Toynbee.  They share data with her that on the day of the attack on Osaka, a parallel universe opened up in the Pacific Ocean with aliens putting out signals.  A scientist Ivo Czerny was working on it and was close to a breakthrough, but got transferred to the Australian outback.  Flick believes the alien life forms are going to start a war.  Newt invites himself along to Flick’s journey to Australia.  Before they leave, an alarm goes off in the city and an “unholy fusion of tarantula and dragon” called Dengue attacks.  A fleet of copters drop a Mark-2 jaeger Puma Real.  Newt gives up his scooter to a desperate man.  The two giants square off in battle.  Newt and Flick hide with others in a drainage pipe.  Dengue, along with the city of Lima are, destroyed. Newt waits at the airport with Flick, as she contacts Raleigh about what she has found out. 

Raleigh is sent on a mission.  We enter his virtual world of operating Gipsy Danger, along with Mako (Pentecost translates), while they do battle with enemy Slattern.  Mako experiences a drift—a memory of hers that Raleigh will also witness as if it’s his own—to the day she lost her partner Aki.  She drifts again to her childhood in Osaka when her father dies in the wake of the first kaiju, Trespasser.  Raleigh aborts their mission, which turns out to be a simulation. 

At an international meeting, a panel of countries interrogate Sci-Division General Takada on the frequency of attacks, as well as the plan to stop them.  In private, Pentecost requests that Takada graduates a cadet pair early.  Raleigh shoots hoops with Duc and confides in him about Mako’s past.  Pentecost has Raleigh and Mako slow dance with each other.  There is a montage of ghost drifts including Yance, Mako as a young girl dealing with her father’s death, Raleigh processing his brother’s death, Mako discovering Aki dead, Tortuga battling Coyote Tango, etc.  Raleigh and Mako begin to see each other for all of what they are.  In another ghost drift, Raleigh and Mako meet, and find themselves dancing naked in a grove of cherry blossoms, kissing.  They both wake up and almost leave their rooms to meet each other. 

Cut to Flick and Yance on the Santa Monica pier at sunset, as Tortuga and Coyote Tango battle.  She then realizes the pier is deserted, but it’s a dream.  Newt tends to Flick’s wounds and she accuses him of having feelings for her.  They travel to the Eschaton Institute in Australia to visit Czerny.  Meanwhile, South Korea is the latest attack and battle site between a jaegar and kaiju, draining the country of its power.  Duc and Raleigh watch on TV as the kaiju gives birth mid-attack in Busan.  An alarm sounds summoning Raleigh and Mako to action.  They’re loaded into their jaeger Gipsy Danger.  Takada presides over their activity, as they struggle to sync with each other.  Copters transport Gipsy Danger to Busan.  While they battle Invidia, they both drift, before finally connecting with each other and overpowering their opponent.  They drift again, before they’re able to neutralize Invidia.  Everyone celebrates in a bar afterwards.  Duc sings the karaoke version of Alphaville’s “Forever Young.”  Raleigh and Mako go back to their living quarters and make love.

Czerny explains to Flick that the monsters are from the anteverse located in the Pacific Ocean beyond the interstice which divides them from the human world, of which they created.  Newt is more concerned with stopping the signals being carried out in the universe, but Czerny is fascinated about exploring the anteverse.  Later, Czerny busts Flick who is snooping around. He takes her to a backroom where he holds a kaiju’s brain.  While doing snooping of his own, Newt finds a pair of reading glasses which allow him to see holographics invisible to the naked eye.  Czerny secures Flick and proceeds to connect her to the brain.  Thumbing through holographic files, he is able to examine the interstice.  Flick gets a taste of the ugly anteverse.  Czerny busts Newt.  When Newt tries to stop Czerny from pulling out a bomb, he pushes him out of the way.  They continue to scuffle.  Despite getting stabbed with a letter opener, Newt breaks free and saves Flick, narrowly escaping the detonating bomb.  After he performs CPR on her, she wakes only to wish to die having seen the anteverse and the imminent doom which lie ahead. 

In Pudong, Shanghai, Gipsy Danger prevails over Oolong in simulation.  Pentecost gives Mako his approval for having relations with Raleigh.  Raleigh and Mako make more love.  They ghost drift to the battle between Tortugo and Coyote Tango operated by Raleigh and Yance and process his brother’s death. 

Nearing Mt. Fuji, Newt hatches a plan to destroy the interstice.  Flick kisses him.  Duc and Kaori prepare for battle.  A kaiju Komodo descends upon Yokohama and takes on Tacit Ronin.  The jaeger ends up killing Komodo, only to have to deal with Fulcrum.  As Duc and Kaori prepare for death, Gipsy Danger saves them.  The two jaegers tag-team the kaiju, freezing Fulcrum, before he falls and shatters into pieces.  Flick shows up, as the mess is hauled away.  Raleigh implores Pentecost to listen to Newt.  He gives a presentation for the soldiers, as well as Pentecost and Takada, for closing the interstice.  He wants to use a bomb, but the commanders school him on there not being enough uranium to power the explosion.  Raleigh disagrees, suggesting using a jaeger as a bomb.  Pentecost and Takada deliberate over sending Raleigh and Mako on a suicide mission.  Takada confirms that Czerny found a way to through the interstice.  Raleigh and Mako discuss sacrificing themselves for the greater good. 

Techs prepare Gipsy Danger for the mission, crossing the eject buttons.  Flick says goodbye to Raleigh.  Everyone salutes Raleigh and Mako as they load in for their final mission.  Takada explains the plan to the press.  Report comes that dozens of kaiju are bursting out of Midway—the epicenter of the interstice.  Cities across the world prepare their jaegers.  On their way to Midway, a kaiju narrowly misses attacking Gipsy Danger.   Copters drop the jaeger into the ocean towards Midway.  In Odaiba, Tacit Ronin is surrounded by kaiju Tengu, Pharoah, and Scunner.  Gipsy Danger enters the throat of the interstice and battles kaiju on its way down.  Tacit Ronin loses an arm.  After destroying two of the kaiju, and depleting its coolant reservoirs, Tactit Ronin must take care of Scunner.   Kaori is severely injured.  Mako drifts.  Kaori recovers, and Tacit Ronin is victorious over the final kaiju.  Mako drifts again.  She embraces in a kiss with Raleigh and they engage the self-destruct function, as well as eject.  The bomb goes off and the interstice collapses.  Raleigh and Mako both make it to safety.  The End.

Box Office/Oscar Prospects

I have no idea if this will be a hit or a miss.  My instinct is that it will be too much for mainstream audiences to swallow, even if the revisions dumb everything down (or especially so).  That being said, I hope it's a massive hit!  As far as Oscar chances, I'll say the predictable thing and go with: Visual Effects, Sound Effects Editing, and Sound Mixing.  Perhaps an outside shot at Cinematography end Editing.

Previous Editions:

American Hustle     August: Osage County     The Counselor     Elysium      Foxcatcher     Fruitvale Station     Grace of Monaco     Gravity     Labor Day     Out of the Furnace     Pacific Rim      Prisoners     Rush     Saving Mr. Banks     The Secret Life of Walter Mitty   

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Movie Spoiler: Fatal Attraction

Fatal Attraction was landmark horror-thriller that dealt with marital infidelity involving a publishing lawyer and book editor.  The R-rated movie earned its scarlet letter mostly from sexually explicit scenes between Michael Douglas and Glenn Close, that were especially controversial during the height of the AIDS crisis.  Despite the graphic nature, the film went on to be one of the highest grossing R-rated films in history, earning six AMPAS nominations (the unrecognized Douglas was nominated and won for Wall Street that same year) including Best Picture.  As, well, stars Douglas and Close went on to land the cover of Time.  Close gave a balls-out-amazing performance--the kind that win awards.  However, the elderly straight white male demographic might have found her bat-shit crazy sexy villainess too intimidating and voted for Cher instead.  Her role didn't go over well either with some feminists, as the movie itself suggests women have to choose between career and family.  

1. Opening Credits

The film opens with a tracking shot of the New York City.  At the time, I pretended it was Seattle, so I could imagine that I lived so close to the center of the universe.  

Sherry Lansing produced, who was notable for being one of the first female studio presidents.  Additionally, she was inexplicably known for being pro-life, a rarity in Hollywood.  I suppose that pissed feminists off too.

There was minor controversy over the film’s title, because it copied a movie from 1980. 

Moose's arch rival Lisa must have had something to do with this.

2. Family Affair

We first see the child of married couple Dan (Michael Douglas) and Beth Gallagher (Anne Archer) watching TV.  I could immediately identify with little Ellen (Ellen Hamilton Latzen), as she was totally androgynous (Shiloh Jolie-Pitt of her time) and was watching Christine aka “Moose” get slimed on Nickelodeon’s You Can’t Do That on Television (a favorite of mine as a kid).  As the couple gets ready for a book publishing party, Ellen manages to smear lipstick all over her face, as well as practice a curse word. 

Her babysitter shows up, played by theatrical actress Jane Krakowski a good decade before Ally McBeal.  Her voice sounds like a teenager, because she was one at the time.  It was her second film after another classic from the 1980’s, Vacation.  Her third film would star Liza Minnelli.  She had a good agent, that one.  She looks like a blonde Carol Kane in this movie.  She gives Ellen a present, but the little girl isn’t that impressed. 

At the shindig, the couple mingle with their friends Jimmy (Stuart Pankin) and Hildy (Ellen Foley, who looks like a blonde Minnelli), as well as work associate Bob Drimmer (Mike Nussbaum).  Sushi is one the menu.  The guys make fun of Japanese culture, which was big in the US circa 1980s. 

Jimmy checks out a woman--Alex Forrest (Glenn Close)--and she’s not having any of it.  Pankin was a jarring casting choice for someone well-tuned in pop culture of the mid-80s, as he was the lead newscaster for HBO comedy show Not Necessarily the News.  It’s always strange to watch someone known for clowning around to all of a sudden be in serious fare.  He plays a tool, though, so it kind of works.  

Forrest is dressed in a shimmering black-gold dress with deep eye shadow and her long blond curls set away from her face.  She shoots Jimmy the look of death and shortly thereafter moves in on someone more her type, the less forward and more handsome Dan.  She finds him affable and charming.  She’s an editor at Robbins & Hart.  He handles legal matters at Miller Goodman Hurst. 

And, like any well-tuned wife regardless of how unassuming she may appear on the outside, Beth's radar goes off, she spots her husband, and signals him it’s time to leave.  He tries to mask how perturbed he is at having to bid such hot snatch adieu and leaves Alex to ruminate over either “how the good guys are all taken or gay” or, more likely, how many different ways she’s going to fuck him until Tuesday after she tracks down his personal information and stalks him. 

Not tonight, honey.  You're going to have to blue-ball it.

At home, all hot and bothered, Dan is ready to roll in the hay, but he must first attend to the potty needs of their golden retriever Quincy (also the name of a popular television doctor character in the 1970s) who is much too big to have his own indoor piddle pad.  Dan walks back into the bedroom with a swagger ready to be rewarded and cash in his primal urges, when he sees that little rebel-rouser Ellen is having nightmares and is going to sleep with them “just for tonight honey.”  Sexual gratification deferred. 

So, mommy and child take a trip out of town to check out new homes without daddy, as he had a mandatory meeting to attend.  He sends her off with a very subtle look of fuck you for leaving me with a huge erection and ventures to work at 10 East 53, where the name of Forrest’s firm looks like it was stenciled guerrilla-style with spray paint next to the entrance of the building.  It just so happens that Alex will be in attendance by chance due to one Henry’s absence.  We never meet Henry, so we can assume when she used the excuse of getting a file for being late, that she was really busy slicing him up and stuffing him in a Chinese meat locker, which I’m sure is time-consuming, especially when hair and makeup don’t do themselves.  Dan makes a crack about Bob’s neck. 

If you're horny and you know it, touch your nose

They discuss a book their house wants to publish that deals with a philandering type who a real-life congressperson insists is based on him and has filed an injunction against its publication.  As the lawyer, Dan needs to know if the story is based on any truth (I could have sworn a TV show taught me that lawyers don’t want to know the truth if you’re guilty, but anyway …).  As the author’s editor, Alex fesses up and basically says that the injunction has no basis, because the writer is a whore and has slept with an assortment of politicians--the character could have been based on just about anyone on Capital Hill.  Dan and Alex have a meet-cute moment across the room from each other when she indicates that he got some crème cheese on his nose while eating his bagel.  (Alex probably made sure of the limited breakfast cuisine, as donuts would have never provided her such an opportunity.)

You have no idea what you're getting into, do you?

3. Are You Discreet?

After getting off the phone with Mother Nature to discuss the weather, she finds Dan in the street struggling with a shitty Taiwanese umbrella in the rain.  She must have also paid off a lot of cabbies to pass them by, because she’s white, sexy and a female, and none of them stop for her.  She breaks the first physical barrier by grabbing his hand and running to the bar with him when he suggests drinks.  Over red wine, he shares a humorous (to them) personal anecdote about his parent’s divorce.  She lights up, because it’s New York and it’s not the 21^stcentury, yet, and you can smoke in restaurants.  With her cigarette dangling between her fingers, she turns the subject to discretion.  She knows he’s horny and plays him like she’s interested in something on the down-low (a trick she learned from past experience of not showing her desperation too early in the game).  She references a phone call we never saw her make about standing up her date for Dan to boost his ego, as well as play down her neediness.  We all know that phone-call she made was Alex canceling her appointment with her psychiatrist and informing him/her that she's better now and going off her meds.  He plays coy and puts all of the responsibility of the affair on her (like the movie’s reshot ending does).  She continues to play her hand smoothly and seduces him to the point where he can barely spit out his request for the check. 

The dishes are going to have to wait.

4. One Night Stand

They get down to business in her apartment and screw in the kitchen sink without taking off too many articles of clothing.  She sits on some dishes that look like all they needed was rinsing and now will definitely have to be washed.  But, she’s kind of freaky, so she would probably get some perverse thrill out of eating off plates with her ass-print.  She could reminisce about sex with Dan during one of her many meals alone.  She cools them off with some water and he slobbers over one of her tits.  He does this comical bit mid-fuck where he moves their activities over to the bedroom area of her studio apartment while he tries to remove his pants with his feet. I imagine Beth wouldn't be laughing.  

We get some unintentional foreshadowing with the percolating tea kettle that fits in nicely with the reshot ending.  They take a post-coital breather before going salsa dancing.  They walk through the meat-packing district to her apartment.  He’s ready to leave, but, like the Aerosmith song that would come out a few years later, she wants to have love in an elevator.  

And not just any kind of lift, but one that’s old, huge and exposed, save the wrought-iron gate around its parameters.  

The elevator is shot to look really cool, but it looks like it’s a piece of shit.  

She stops the elevator and blows him as a gentleman walks by.  

At the entrance of her apartment the look on his face suggests he has no desire to catch a cab home.  But after three or so rounds, he’s finally fucked himself dry.

5. The Morning After

Poor Quentin, the family dog, who has been left home alone through the night is rewarded for his faithfulness and sorrows by Dan opening up the door right into him.  He rhetorically asks him how he’s doing knowing full well that even if Quentin could talk and dial the phone, he suffers from Stockholm Syndrome and wouldn’t ever dare consider calling the Humane Society on Dan.  However, it wouldn’t be beneath Quentin to blackmail him for some Milk Bones over his owner’s dirty little secret. 

Back when cell phones weren’t a reality, Dan listens to a message from another faithful member of his troop: his wife.  He calls her at his in-law's New England home and she shares that their little handful wants a rabbit (will become important later).  Dan, who has just thumbed his nose at the sanctity of his marital vows, reacts caustically to the idea that somehow wanting a bunny ranks lower on the totem pole of humanity than cheating on your wife.  The self-entitled husband and father then makes a crack about how their home is becoming Noah’s Ark, which is a direct dig at faithful Quentin, resting right beneath his feet.  (At this point, the Golden Retriever is thinking about adding Snausages to his list of demands). 

Beth informs him that their return will be delayed and makes an off-handed remark about the importance of kindergarten, which probably wouldn’t fly today amongst most upwardly mobile New York City parents.  Dan considers a revisit to Alex' place.  "She’s five years old.  What she gonna miss, trigonometry?"

Twenty-five minutes into the movie, Alex shows her first sign of crazy by 1) Calling Dan at his home and 2) Calling him within only a few hours of his departure.  All that desperation she repressed so coolly up until now is poking out from a few strands of her hair.  But, she’s also working on a timeline here, as the wife is due back soon. He must have given her his number, because he doesn’t ask her how she got it.  Instead, he references “the note” he left her thanking her for a good time, but let’s just be friends.  For the audience’s sake, she pretends that she never saw it and acts surprised, when, really, she read it thirty times before she called him imagining all the different ways he may have intended to use the word “friend.”  After neglecting, physically assaulting and verbally abusing his dog, he plays the Quentin card as one of the reasons he can’t get together with her. 

6. A Walk in the Park

She insists on prolonging their affair and manages to convince him and they end up in the park with Quentin in tow, who is giddy at not only the prospect of getting out of that cramped fucking apartment, but all the new dish he’ll be able to nail Dan with when it’s time to pay up.  They run around and Alex releases that bat-shit crazy laugh of hers that hints at the Hell he has entered when he popped her vagina without even realizing it.  Glenn Close shows off the baseball skills she learned on The Natural and Dan fakes collapsing scaring Alex.  She gets back at him by sharing her father died of a heart attack when she was seven years old and then laughs saying she made it up.  This is the moment he realizes that their sense of humors might be a little mismatched. 

At her apartment, she plays Madame Butterfly while cooking spaghetti.  He reminisces about his limited relationship with his father, while she thinks about how grandiose her suicide will be if he never leaves his wife.  They dine while she grills him for personal information.  He tells her twice that they can never be together because he’s married.  When she responds, “just my luck,” she means that she’s annoyed he’s putting her through the whole trouble of bunny boiling, sabotage and kidnapping.  We get another shot of Douglas in only a dress shirt grazing his ass cheeks as he explains to her that, no, this time I’m really serious when I wrote what I did in that note I left you.  She’s convinced that he doesn’t understand his own definition of “friend” and goes bananas. 

Meryl, Sigourney, and Jessica, eat your hearts out

“You run away after every time we make love,” she says like they’ve been carrying on an affair for years. 

That foot is bi-polar; one second she's caressing you with it
and the next moment she's karate kicking you the Hell out of her room.

She explains to him that when she initially used the word discretion in the restaurant, she wasn’t using it in regards to a triste, but the manner in which they were going to dispose Beth’s body after they kill her.  He tells her sex is just sex unless the church is involved and she sidekicks him out the bedroom.   On his way out, she mocks his suggestion of being platonic from here on out.  

Get ready for a surprise

“Why don’t you come over and say goodbye nicely?  Let’s be friends.”  He falls for the trap and realizes she slit her wrists during a bloody passionate bloody kiss.  As the soundtrack thumps with urgency, he runs cold water over her wounds next to the washed dishes and wraps her up in bandages.  He continues to lose time comforting her, while it rains outside.  Quentin lays low while Dan checks in with his wife and Alex pretends to be asleep.  She promises to see a doctor for her mental instability and emotional derangement and he pretends to believe her, before foolishly kissing her goodbye. 

Pressed for time, at home, Dan messes up the bed sheets (because God forbid a man would ever do the laundry and/or make bed) and feeds Quentin Alex’s leftovers.  At the office, he orders around his frumpy middle-aged secretary Martha (Lois Smith, who has been acting since the 1950’s--Suki’s grandmother in True Blood, Dr. Hineman in Minority Report, various daytime soap operas—looks like she could deliver her own brand of crazy), but she ain’t gonna do shit for him until he tells her “good morning.”  Way to stand your ground Martha!

7. Welcome Home

At home, little Ellen greets him and prattles on about a rabbit.  Mommy and Daddy kiss, so she skedaddles.  

Ellen plays amateur magician during dinner-time and goes on about rabbits again.

The next weekend, they check out the new house together.  The real estate agent (Justine Johnston) insists that it’s a great area for kids, but doesn’t mention anything about rabbits.  They check out the attic. 

Back in the city, Beth drops her husband off at work.  At his office, he finds Alex waiting for him.  They walk by Jimmy, but this time, Alex doesn’t shoot him nearly as deadly of a look (but she does brush him off).  

Are you sure you want to be left alone with that crazy bitch?

She acts all level-headed and apologizes to Dan for her behavior.  She casually offers him two tickets to Madame Butterfly, but he turns her down. 

“I’ll see you around sometime.”  This time, she waits for him to take the lead.  She goes in for a handshake and he thrills her with an embrace and peck on the cheek. 

In one of the creepier scenes of the movie, she listens to her favorite opera while sitting in her nightgown turning a lamp on and off in a somnambulist state.  Next to her stereo are two unused tickets to see Madame Butterfly in orchestra seats on Halloween 1986.  Dan and Beth bowl with Jimmy and Hildy at their local alley, back when rolling a heavy ball down a lane and knocking down pins was more popular.  A tear rolls down Alex’s face as she contemplates just how much tougher her job has gotten to make Dan realize that he must be a part of her life. 

In the next scene, Fred Munster, I mean, Arthur (Fred Gwynne) discusses a legal case with Dan.  The subject turns to the relocation from trendy city types to suburban life, as Dan cannot handle how fast and needy single ladies are these days.  When he finds Alex pestering Martha over the phone, he starts to lose his cool. 

Anne Archer or her body-double Tracy Keehn-Dashnaw?

Dan admires Beth as she beautifies herself for the evening, you know the kind of admiration only a man could feel who has just cheated on his wife recently.  They have Jimmy and Hildy over for some drunken good times.  They entertain each other in ways that only upper class white people would find funny.  Beth picks up the phone and no one answers.  She really can’t take a hint, because she waits a good ten seconds and five hellos before she hangs up (this should have been her Oscar clip). 

8. You Play Fair, I’ll Play Fair

The phone rings again at 2:13 AM while they sleep.  Dan pretends it’s “Richard” and does a pretty swell job covering, but it’s Alex.  He agrees to meet her the next day so Alex can try to explain her needs to him in a different way and he can tell her she’s crazy. 

“I’m not trying to hurt you, Dan.  I love you.”   And then she lets him know that she did see a doctor, but it wasn’t a shrink.  It was her gynecologist.  She’s preggers (or so she says).  Like a man who doesn’t like to take responsibility, he wonders out loud why she wouldn’t think to take birth control, because condoms ruin his sexual pleasure.  He throws the slut card at her, but she shoots him down with her mental obsession being purely monogamous.  He then throws his arm around her and plays the abortion card.  He’s actually stupid enough to believe that if she really was pregnant, her derangement would allow her to destroy the little Dan growing inside of her.  When she refuses, he actually is surprised that she won’t follow his simple demand (that he could have prevented with a condom).  He calls her out on her shit, but she’s able to continue the bluff, because he’s not exactly a rocket scientist. 

9. Breaking and Entering

The scene ends ambiguously and cut to the happy family at home that night.

The next day, he breaks into her apartment after watching her leave.  He finds an EPT plus test kit to remind him of his situation.  He finds her father’s obituary.  Not really sure what he was looking for.

He confesses everything to Jimmy who listens intently and ponders the bullet he dodged when she shot him that look of death at the beginning of the movie.  Dan confirms her pregnancy.  It all circles around to “family law,” a field which Dan refused to go into per earlier in the film, which is why he’s seeking Jimmy’s help.  “It ain’t good,” Jimmy shares about his prospects. 

A healthy diet and exercise are not going to make me sane

Alex sits on her bed dialing Dan’s number.  Meanwhile, Ed Koch is on the TV talking about tasers.  Next to her is a pint of Haggen-Dasz, a glass of white wine, a family-size package of Oreos and Doritos.  Junk food certainly isn’t going to help Alex get Dan back or achieve mental stability.  When the operator won’t give Alex the new number, a loud, “Well, fuck you!” is all she can muster to thank them for their time. 

Walking home, a dazed Dan almost gets run over on a not so busy street.  He’s greeted with overhearing Beth talking to Alex.  They’re having a delightful tea.  They shake hands and she reminds him of the first time they met.  Beth has already shared with her that they’re moving.  Alex has passed herself off as a pregnant woman looking to move into their apartment.  Beth gives her their new unlisted number.  After Alex leaves, Beth offhandedly makes a remark about her relationship status. 

That night, Dan confronts Alex at her apartment after she greets him in her negligee.  She reminds him of her pregnancy and his duties as a sperm donor who happened to be married to someone else.  “I’m not going to be ignored, Dan."  When he refuses her advances she gives him another option, “If you can’t fuck me, then just hit me.”  “I’m going to be the mother of your child.  I want a little respect.”  She threatens to tell his wife and he assaults her.  She dials the new number, Beth answers and she chickens out.

Dan and Beth move into their new home.  The phone rings.  Dan worries it might be Alex and insists on answering it.  It’s Martha!  Beth’s father—no dummy—can smell something’s up.  While Beth is busy preparing the new home and enduring a problem with the plumber, Dan informs her that he’s relenting to Ellen’s desire to create “Noah’s Ark.” 

10. Car Trouble

At the parking garage, Dan discovers his car has been vandalized, as Alex relishes the moment from afar.  


The vehicle looks like the bitch from Alienstried to impregnate it.  You’d think Ripley would show her face, but she has bigger problems than defending an upper-class Caucasian philanderer.  


Over the phone, he lies to his wife about the origins of the damage.

11. Play Me

Thanks to Avis car rentals, he cuts off a couple of pedestrians on his way home.  He discovers a tape aptly entitled “PLAY ME – Alex.”  How she was able to slip it into his rental is beyond me, but in her years of fostering her psychotic nature, she also must have read up on the art of moving like a ghost.  But, then, if that were the case, what was the point of damaging his car?  But, she’s full of so many kinks, why question her on this matter.  She follows him all the way to his new abode, without him realizing it.  Though, if she had managed to leave a cassette tape … in the car he just rented … I imagine that a normally intelligent person might consider that their stalker is nearby and just *might* be following them.  Anyway, Alex has good reason to assume that since his brain is in his cock, she would have no problem getting him to inadvertently reveal his home address. 

Even though Alex has already gone off on the deep-end, she tops herself.  “You know what you are, Dan?  You’re cock-sucking son-of-bitch.  I hate you.  I bet you don’t even like girls, do you?  Hah!  [You] flaming, fucking faggot.”  Now, even if he was gay (or bisexual at the most, as his behaviors indicated), I would have him been pegged as a butch, corporate type.  As someone who lives in a trendy area and listens to Madame Butterfly, I would have thought she could tell the difference.  But, then, she hates herself, so it makes sense for her to feminize the insults she directs against him. 

Alex runs to the side of the house to look for the stove, but first takes a gander at the happy family to help her bring up that day’s meal, because she was tired of using her finger to induce her bulimia. 

He goes upstairs to finish the tape where his wife startles him. 

The next day, he visits his local precinct to report a problem “his friend” is having with a woman.  He plays his skin color and tax bracket as some sort of self-entitlement by showing up, but it doesn’t work.  

Can I stay here instead of go home with that asshole Dan?

Leaving the bunny to fend for herself at home, the happy family visits the in-laws, where Beth has Ellen dressed up in an awful outfit and recite a marriage proposal for a play or some shit. 

12. The Rabbit

When they arrive back home, there is dramatic cross-cutting between Ellen discovering the rabbit is out of its cage and Beth finding the bunny boiled.  

Alex, ever the thoughtful lady, prepared that night’s stew for them.

Later, Beth comforts Ellen. 

Anne Archer's Oscar moment

13. It’s over

It rains and we learn that it takes a boiled bunny for a man to admit his infidelities.  The scene gives Archer the Oscar nomination.  She has a melt-down after she realizes her husband has gotten the blonde pregnant while Ellen watches comforting her stuffed bunny (not the one that just died, because there wasn’t a taxidermist available, but a toy one).  Dan calls Alex, who has been waiting by the phone next to her exercise bike.  She gets a surprise when Beth gets on the line and threatens to one-up her on the crazy scale and mop the floor with her frizzy haircut. 

Dan calls the family from a hotel room while they play Moonlight Sonata. 

14. Rollercoaster

Beth drives to school to pick Ellen up, but crafty Alex had slapped on a brunette wig and sprayed on some self-tanner and beat her to the punch.  In some of the best kid acting, little Alicia pops her head up while tying her shoelaces and casually informs Beth, “She’s gone.”

Ellen didn’t have any qualms, because she was going to go to an amusement park, where perhaps she can perform some of her magic tricks.  Though, the only magic trick being played that day was her disappearance, which Alex even gets a peck on the cheek for.  In another intense cross-cutting scene, we watch Ellen and her new friend (who took off all the mommy makeup) ride on the roller coaster as frantic Beth collides into a car and sends herself to the hospital. 

15. Revenge

With a little noirish homage, we watch Dan sneak into Alex’s apartment.  After running after her, he catches her and starts to strangle her to death.  He stops, because either he thinks she can suddenly be reasoned with or he figures she’s not worth going to jail for.  She splashes some cold water on her face in the same sink she used to cool off that one night they had sex.  Since Alex doesn’t care where she’s going, she tries to stab him dead with a butcher knife.  

The shot that bears no relevance thanks to test screening audiences

He stops her and in a pivotal moment that the film’s new ending renders insignificant, we watch him very carefully set the weapon down on the counter. 

So, no makeup sex?

You'll be back, even if I have to follow you home

At the police station, the sergeant takes Dan’s situation a little more seriously, considering Alex is guilty of kidnapping.  Though, I don’t think you’re going to hear any complaints from Ellen.  Dan leaves the precinct wondering why his tax dollars aren’t harder at work, when his mistake was a moral (and legal) one. 

Oh, God, what has my husband done NOW?

*****Original Ending*****

Dan rakes leaves in the backyard while the family watches on.  The police arrive investigating Alex’s homicide.  He has a flashback to the previous night and realizes that he left his fingerprints on the knife Alex committed suicide with.  Beth runs along holding the police car as her and Dan mouth “I love you” back and fourth to each other. 

While calling Arthur, Beth finds Alex’s tape and plays it.  She listens to Alex implicating herself in her suicide.  “Thank God,” Beth says and relishes that she has saved her family.  Flashback to Alex slicing her head off to the strains of Madame Butterfly.  

I've been waiting to cut all of this kinky hair off the entire movie

Oh, shit, what if we have to reshoot the ending?

And scene. 

*****Reshot Ending*****

16. Bath Time

He puts Ellen to bed. 

The beleaguered Beth prepares her bath upstairs, as Dan talks on the phone.  We see that the happy family has now cashed in on their second amendment rights.  Dan is now a little more smug, because crazy Alex has united husband and wife.  ”Just holler if you need anything else, alright.”  She asks for a cup of tea, so when the kettle ends up whistling and masking her screams, it’s partly her fault.  He locks the backdoor thinking he’s keeping them safe, but that ghost Alex is already in the house with a butcher knife.

This bathroom doesn't have enough white

Dan choked me yesterday; how much does he love you?

While it’s hard to discern a change of appearance in Close, the scene was shot months after the initial filming concluded due to negative test audience reaction.  Alex nibbles away at her leg with the knife as she schools Beth on how Dan is going to leave her to be with a nut-job.

If my fucking owner Dan would only just fill my God-damn water dish for once

She starts slicing away at Beth as the bath starts to overflow.  Beth gets in a good shot, but Alex grabs her leg and starts chopping away.  Enter good old Dan, who shoves her head into the vanity mirror and kicks her across the exceptionally large bathroom (payback for the scene when she kicks him out of the room their last day of sex together).  There is also some EXCELLENT sound effects going on, particularly when Alex takes a wide swipe at Dan with the knife and you can hear the “WHOOSH!”  It’s actually pretty awesome.  While the scene is masterfully directed and a testament to Adrian Lyne’s skills, it must be said that it was written almost as a retread of the previous scene of Dan strangling Alex in her apartment. 

Contractually obligated to pretend I'm in character

Then, Dan starts drowning her.  Now, we know he stopped short of chocking her to death at her apartment.  Are we supposed to believe that he was actually going to finish the job the second time? 

He doesn’t.  She plays dead underneath the water for a good thirty seconds, before she resurfaces ala Jason from Friday the 13^th.  

Beth the cuckold cleaning up after her husband

Beth shoots her dead.  Dan actually shakes the officer’s hand as they cart her body away when Beth did his job for him.  But, Michael Douglas would play Detective Nick Curran a few years later, and was on the TV show The Streets of San Francisco, so he’s gotten paid for plenty of fake police detective work. 

Well, this is as happy of an ending as you're going to get

17. End Credits

He walks inside their home and Beth embraces him.  They leave the foray and the camera zooms in on a picture of the happy couple with their gender-ambiguous six year old.  Roll credits.  

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