Movie Review: Under the Silver Lake (2018)
You know you are watching something extra special when looking at house numbers, or a turd in the toilet as something that could feature important secret clues in a quest you’re not even sure why you’d regard as such. But you keep watching it because you hope to figure out at some point what is really going on there.
Everything that’s not important in an average thriller is important in Under the Silver Lake, and vice versa – things that would be important in a normal thriller are of little importance here. Let’s take a thing called plot device as an example. Normally a kidnapped person or, for instance, a weapon of fairly exclusive effectiveness would drive the story forward. Not Under the Silver Lake. In this movie the lead character Sam, played by the contemporary Spider-Man Andrew Garfield, seems to find plot devices where no one else would imagine looking for any – Sam is creating his quest as he goes while unpaid rent and some other missed payments bother him less and less each new day because, you know, small things have got big meaning, one thing leads to another, and all that is terribly important.
I first watched Under the Silver Lake back in January 2019. I thought I’d probably create a blog post about it, so I made some notes in my diary, but the post never happened. One reason for it not happening was the understanding that I had mistakenly watched it as a dumb comedy. The thing with Under the Silver Lake is that somewhere in the third act one might realise the film is really not that dumb.
Then, when you watch it for the second time, you realise that the relative abundance of breasts and half naked women in the first 10 to 15 pages of the screenplay might have been a deliberate trick to mislead you about the film’s true purpose. I think Under the Silver Lake’s true purpose could only really be comprehended if you happen to be a 90’s kid. The references to that decade the film features, and which I can remember from the top of my head are: the poster of Kurt Cobain, some radio hit singles, Super Mario video game.
To emphasize the degree at which I was wrong about Under the Silver Lake when first watching it, here's an excerpt from the Wikipedia article about the movie:
"While not initially a box-office success with audiences, Under the Silver Lake has garnered a cult following who are convinced that there are hidden meta-clues, codes and ciphers sprinkled throughout the film waiting to be discovered. These include references to the mystery surrounding the identity of the dog killer, various different cyphers or codes, geocoding systems, and even analysis of fireworks in the film, connecting the sound pattern they emit to Morse code. In certain scenes in the film there is graffiti that can be seen in the toilets and on a wall and which are coded with the Copiale cipher. The film's cryptography consultant was computer scientist Kevin Knight, who in 2011 co-created a program to translate the Copiale cipher."
Grace Van Patten as Baloon Girl in Under the Silver Lake. Source
Looking at the seemingly never ending list of executive producers, I had come up with my own conspiracy theory about how all those people had a casual LA BBQ party, and decided they needed a movie with a sentimental value, which showcases life in LA entertainment circles and covers their youth, with the tricks and jokes included their generation would understand – for instance, turning Da Vinci Code’s Langdon into someone who’s figuring out subliminal messages in lyrics of rock songs while writing those down on a pizza box because that plays part in a mystery with Lost Highway vibe where a girl originally from Mulholland Drive might, or might not be missing. At the same time, the aesthetics and signature creative works of earlier decades really play out like a tribute to that generation’s idols and venerated “influencers”. (Think Marilyn Monroe and Alejandro Jodorowsky level of "influencers".) In this the movie’s development team has succeeded beyond expectations; the creative side regarding cinematography and direction in this film is indeed exquisite – each frame captures people and their surroundings with stunning precision, and everything fits in the bigger picture flawlessly. The visual brilliance is further complemented with things like costumes, colors and props at parties, for example, where one can see a band called Jesus & the Brides of Dracula performing.
Andrew Garfield as Sam, Sydney Sweeney as "Shooting Star No. 2", Grace Van Patten, and Bobbi Salvör Menuez as "Shooting Star No. 1" in Under the Silver Lake. Source
Out of the cast of 80 people in Under the Silver Lake there are only about six characters that have got actual first names, one of those being Allen, played by Westworld series’ star Jimmi Simpson, who for the most of his screen time seems to be there to say hi to Sam. Apart from odd moments like that, people in this film simply don’t have names. Instead there are characters such as Actress, Blue Miniskirt, Songwriter or Homeless King. The latter has got a special meaning in this movie since Sam’s quest has got something to do with hobos. This is one of those particularly well crafted things, which I understood as a reference to people who’d despite everything they’ve got feel like they don’t belong anywhere. It seems that only people like that end up going on quests. In this sense I think Under the Silver Lake can serve as a decent test for your inner hobo; see if you vibe with Sam’s passion and reasoning.
Peer Ynt
My review of Deadwax series that deal with a different and more deadly quest can be read here
