Review of Third Person (2014) by Octavian — 25 Jul 2014

Third Person is terrible. It's rare you find a film stuck so far up its own ass. It's downright infuriating. At the same time though, it's a film that was very much touched by human hands, a film with real ambition, and one that should definitely be seen, at least so that it can spark conversation. Director Paul Haggis, also serving as screenwriter, is no Hollywood hack. This Canadian rogue and Scientologist gets under people's skins for different reasons. Many still can't forgive him for his 2005 film Crash winning the Best Picture Oscar over Brokeback Mountain. Haggis is quite adept as a screenwriter too, having crafted scripts for Clint Eastwood's Million-Dollar Baby and Letters From Iwo Jima, and he has made some fine films in the form of 2007's In The Valley of Elah. But even Haggis' screenwriting can go from fantastic (his script for Casino Royale) to maddeningly dull (his other Bond script Quantum of Solace). His last writing and directing feature, 2010's The Next Three Days, was a veritable piece of shit. And his latest, Third Person?

It will drive you crazy. But its theme---creation, creativity and the struggles behind it-- is something worth grappling with. Haggis begins with Michael (Liam Neeson), a Pulitzer-prize winning novelist dealing with writer's block in a chic Paris hotel room. Michael doesn't need room service. He just sends for Anna (Olivia Wilde), a young writer he's been sleeping with since he left his wife, Elaine (Kim Basinger). Neeson imbues Michael with a terrific sense of carnal vitality and caged-animal heat, and Wilde stuns as the willful muse he exploits for sex and inspiration.

And then of course, Haggis piles on the sub-plots. In Rome we have Scott (Adrien Brody), who makes a living stealing ideas from fashion houses. But then he meets Monika (Moran Atias) and denounces his every instinct as a selfish cad to help her get her daughter back from Romanian kidnappers. Then in New York, we have Julia (Mila Kunis) who is working as a hotel maid trying to finance a custody battle with her ex-husband, Rick (James Franco), an artist who can't get past an incident of child neglect, despite the case from Julia's lawyer, Theresa (Maria Bello).

Neeson and Wilde are great, but the rest of the cast are trapped under plot overload. Do all these differing plots connect in any way? They sure do, in ways that strain credulity and are even rather demented. It all adds up to nothing all that worthy, which is the most frustrating part. Haggis has ambition to be admired, but it'd help if what's onscreen wasn't such a wandering mess. You get more pleasure out of analyzing and examining Third Person than you do in actually watching it and taking it in.