Noirish Project Blog: “Rouzbeh Rashidi Responds To Noirish Project”
Rouzbeh Rashidi is a filmmaker and founder of Experimental Film Society. He recently completed the Arts Council backed feature film, There Is No Escape From The Terrors Of The Mind.
Noirish Project, the debut feature film by James Devereaux is a heist movie at first glance but it only lasts for five minutes and then becomes an abstract, minimal, atmospheric, absurd, neorealist science-fiction. The “abstract, minimal, atmospheric, absurd, neorealist” is in the visuals and the “science-fiction” is in the audio. The narrative-line taps into a very simple story reminiscent of 40’s film noir. Billy steals his family’s precious pearls and hands them over to Jimmy, who in turn takes them to a fence. But when the pearls turn out to be fake, they set out on an adventure to take the pearls back. Perhaps this much information about the story is enough simply because there is nothing more to be said within the linguistic form of expression. Noirish Project really works like a labyrinth, the more you go into it, the more lost your situation becomes. If you want to draw a mental map of this labyrinth or structure of the film it will be like this: Neorealist urban space, then poetic-atmospheric wild landscapes and finally back to the city but this time it’s extremely nightmarish and delusion- like. The film very quickly reveals its intention story-wise and we don’t have any confusion right through to the end but is it that easy? Absolutely not, Noirish Project, is furiously an existentialist portrait of both characters. They are lost within this grotesque universe and fail to communicate with one another right from the start till the very end. The film occasionally benefits from intentionally misguiding humour that helps to keep the motor running and other times it projects the sheer harshness of its virtual reality. The humming, drone and ambient of the background really hypnotises and the fantastic post-apocalyptic location choices transport you to Red Desert type of imagery, but here it is in black & white …
The two characters are played by James Devereaux himself and Alfie Black. The acting is possibly the film’s strongest attribute, which Devereaux has managed to extract using his rigid formula. The actors are constantly battling with being sympathetic and utterly alienated at the same time. As soon as any sort of understanding is established, Devereaux destroys it by introducing a hidden dimension of the character which wasn’t known till then. This formula really adds much mystery to the film.
The traces of Becket, Kaurismaki, Jarmusch, Serra and Anotnioni are very obvious but Devereaux finds his very personal voice easily and masterfully. As these characters are drifting through streets, bars, stations, trains, woods and ponds, the heaviness of their existence becomes stronger and stronger til it reaches its mad cacophony at the end. The goal is achieved, the pearls are retrieved and Billy has to shoot off. The last few minutes really remind us of L’Eclisse but in a very different system of thought and usage. This weight of the film is just too much and Jimmy is completely lost deep down. He wanders in his internal landscape and waits for his coffee to be brought to him. THE END!
