Review of Oleanna (1994) by Miss J — 09 Feb 2010

Political correctness has become increasingly over-saturated in modern society, reaching a fine peak of debate in the 1990's - not that the reserving of onesself toward public representation of somewhat stereotypical or offensive thoughts and ideas is a bad thing - in fact, it's rightfully protective at times, but it's undoubtedly blown out of proportion in most respects to the point of bastardized communication.

This is one of the prevalant themes of David Mamet's play-turned-film 'Oleanna' from 1994. Adapting into the big screen, he still only uses two characters - John (William H. Macy), a college professor just a step away from career tenure and the purchase of a new home in celebration of his job security who hides behind big words and his male-dominance; and Carol (Debra Eisenstadt), a confused student who proves to be a threat to John's career.

Carol writes a letter to the university's Tenure Committee, inciting how John's teaching is far from comprehensible for her, as he carelessly strolls through lessons without expanding what there is to learn.

Carol is obviously bright, though the film doesn't exactly penetrate her true intelligence - is she really smart, but purposely undermining herself out of hateful spite for the professor? or is she autistic - being actually smart, though incapable of catching on to large words and literary paradigms being taught.

Created in the tradition of slow-boiling, uni-setting, dialogue-driven films like Alfred Hithcock's 'Rope' and Sydney Lumet's '12 Angry Men', 'Oleanna' takes place 90% of the time inside of John's office - in pulsatingly interruptive and argumentive verbal exchange between John and Carol.

Carol cuts John down to size by claiming him to be a sham of a teacher - a teacher obsessed with power over education, as he clearly monologues his comfort and security he's worked 20 years for. After politically-incorrect inviting words and a light touch to the shoulder, Carol escalates her claim to a sexual harrassment dispute - raising the tension level to blood red.

David Mamet has a brilliant mind for career-based story-telling, as he has tackled the real estate business ('Glengarry Glen Ross'), the life of a psychiatrist ('House of Games'), the corrupt innerworkings of law ('Homicide'), the cutthroat nature of political news and journalism ('Wag the Dog'), and the film industry ('State and Main').

This brilliance is achieved in 'Oleanna' through ornamentally hidden, yet abrasive, opinions of the modern school system and the teachers who revolve around it. Mamet also details the deterioration of social masculinity, which in turn correlates to the themes of political correctness prevailing over common human gestures.

Juggling these thoughts and themes, he continues his trademark of an indeniably rhythmic flow to his on-screen rhetoric, setting him far apart from other screen verbivores, though this time he strays from his usual coining of punchy poetry of the profane.

Where the film may slightly be crutched is its character delivery standing too close to that of live theater - both Debra Eisenstadt and William H. Macy declare their lines all too audible, so loudly as if they were performing to an audience instead of just each other.

This corrupted the film's intimacy, yet, this isn't such a distracting flaw, as David Mamet gives William H. Macy to have some serious gonads to his character, reciting his lines with piercing dignity, unlike his characters through the great films of the Coen Brothers and Paul Thomas Anderson.

David Mamet already proved his craftsmanship of heated suspense encased in limited setting with 'Glengarry Glen Ross', but with 'Oleanna', he lets the walls close in even further.