There is a scene about half way through Closer that just about sums up the characters and, this being an intricate, intimate character study, the film itself. It's a stupendous scene, probably the best in the film-- two break-ups, juxtaposed against each other for maximum effect. Dan (Jude Law), a mopey, selfish man-child obsessed with love more as an idea than an occupation tells Alice (Natalie Portman), his girl friend of several years that he is leaving her for another woman. Alice, young and seemingly truly in love, begs and pleads and cries. "But I'm supposed to leave you." And she does, finally, fleeing the apartment in angst the moment Dan leaves the room.
Across town, Larry (Clive Owen) chooses to confess a one night stand to his wife Anna (Julia Roberts). Anna doesn't get too upset-- she's Dan's mistress and was probably about to leave Larry anyway. Unlike their peers, these two opt out of the weeping and whining-- the gloves come off and they go for the jugular "Don't say I'm too good for you," Larry roars, reaffirming himself against the middle class upstart angst that's probably plagued him since before he became a successful doctor, "I am, but don't say it." Later, backed into a corner, Anna comes out swinging-- "He tastes like you, but sweeter."
So, yes-- Closer, as directed by the incomparable Mike Nichols and written by Patrick Marber (based on his late-90s play of the same name) is a film about two adults and two children playing love as a game. That these characters are performed by four attractive, talented people (Law, Portman, Roberts and Owen, in order of appearance) acting at the top of their game would, by itself, make the film a must-see. That the film is insightful, accurate, vicious and able to make your skin crawl, makes it a classic.
I said the film was about two adults and two children, and judging by that cast list, there isn't a minor amongst them. True, physically, but on an emotional level Law and Portman are younger than Natalie was when she made her debut (in The Professional, at 14). Their Dan and Alice make eye contact across a busy London street just moments before she is knocked cold by a taxi-- he rushes her to the hospital, and love ensues. A year or so later, he meets Anna (Roberts), and again it is love at first sight. However, the results of a cruel practical joke Dan plays brings Larry (Owen) into Anna's life and they eventually wed. Not, however, before Dan and Anna begin the afore-mentioned affair that will eventually ruin both of them.
Jude Law plays Dan as a man incapable of compromise, incapable of selflessness and by the end of the film his is the one character who most deserves exactly what comes to him-- which is absolutely nothing. On the opposite end of the spectrum is Julia Robert's Anna, a mature woman who has been through all these games before and finds them exhausting. Natalie Portman plays Alice first as a weepy little girl, then as an enigmatic woman, and both times keeps the impression of a child trying on different hats to find the one she likes the best. By the end of the film, she's the only character who has surprised us because, as the youngest, here innate nature is still evolving. She doesn't know who she is...how can we?
That brings me to Clive Owen, who, in the film's best performance smolders, blazes and sets the screen on fire. Here is a man who, without any silly romantic notions, understands the rules of the game and plays them to maximum effect. He gets what he wants whilst systematically destroying his opponents. And yet, while he does some shady, underhanded things, by the end of the film I felt a little justified that he wound up with Anna-- heaven's knows that's the only relationship in the movie that ever had a chance of lasting.
The film was directed by Mike Nichols, and this is his best theatrical effort in years, possibly since his Carnal Knowledge in 1971 (he also brought Tony Kushner's Angels in America to HBO in 2003, and that is, perhaps, the greatest thing ever done anywhere by anyone, but, for sake of argument we'll contain our hyperbole to the silver screen). Here, some of his staging feels a bit, well, stagy-- the theatrical roots of the production remain fairly evident, but the intimacy he brings to the production could only be achieved through film and helps to make the painful things that occur on the screen hurt even more. He uses beautiful sets and classical music to accentuate the ugly things the characters do, and Nichol's has always had a way with dialogue (see Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf or The Graduate)-- here, Patrick Marber's razor sharp script give him plenty to work with.
I think it's an accurate depiction of love in the first decade of the new century, where selfishness and stunted development and a 'win at all costs' mentality has permeated society and has turned dating into a war zone. And with words as daggers and sex as bombs, these four know bloody well there are no rules.
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