The Immigrant

At some point, we’re going to collectively recognize that just because Joaquin Phoenix is in a film, doesn’t make it quality. Doesn’t necessarily make it bad, either – Her was among my very favorite films of 2013. There is, however, a thought pattern suggesting since Joaquin eschews standard Hollywood tripe, his projects must necessarily have value. Not so. And for Exhibit A, I present The Immigrant, where Joaquin plays a pimp in an era when pimps didn’t wear bling and probably got beat up regularly – by the girls.

Bruno (Phoenix) is scoping Ellis Island in 1921 when Ewa (Marion Cotillard) and sister show up, “fresh” off the boat. I was immediately reminded of grilled James Franco checkin’ out the literal jail bait in Spring Breakers. That memory proved apt as when Ewa is immediately shuffled to the “get the f*** out of America!” line, Bruno “saves” her from deportation. Gotta break in here – Ewa gets put in the bad egg line because of reports of misbehavior on the ride over. There’s something I never considered before: they care about what you did on the boat?!– Before you know it, Ewa is Bruno’s prize pet and she becomes part of his cheap burlesque foreplay. Eventually, she has to figure out these women are prostitutes, right? Eventually.

It took more than half the film to realize that Marion Cotillard was supposed to be playing the kind of woman men kill for. Now I know standards have changed over the years, but I wish to know in what world the woman of maximum desire dresses like she’s lost in a Russian winter, never smiles, and behaves like a cornered rat. She has reason for the cornered rat routine – her sister has been quarantined for TB and her aunt and uncle abandoned her on the island. When she finally tracks them down, they reject her because of the boat behavior. Geez, was there a published report? Is this what you did in the 1920s?  You went down to Ellis Island to collect your huddled mass, but hey! Check that boat report first! We have no need for the poor, hungry and tired with demerits.

For that matter, your niece sails the ocean to a foreign land where she knows exactly you and you deny her based on a second-hand source. No matter what way you slice this, it’s not a good plot point. Speaking of which, Ewa, without means, friends, or a single entrepreneurial idea, eventually concedes, “well, better get to the whorin’, then.” Don’t get me wrong – I feel for Ewa, but only to a point. What exactly did she expect would happen in the United States, anyway? No job, no money, no friends, no clue and, quite clearly, a tenuous relationship at best with her kin. Tell me there was something you had in mind when you got on the boat, woman. But hey, she’s pretty, right? Under the 18 layers of clothing, the scowl and the grand aloof, I’m sure the 37-year-old who sleeps holding a knife is Aphrodite among the flapper crowd.

The Immigrant constantly begs the question, “why did you come here?” It wants to be sympathetic to this tremendous miscasting, but until we figure what’s so much better about this life vs. her last, it’s hard to take her pain seriously. You want to be something that’s not a cheap whore? Leave. Or for God’s sake, at least smile or something. Give me a reason to believe men would kill for you.

The American dream more shady than keen
Choices that would make a “beauty” careen
This life I spurn
It’s time to return
Hooking? No, I want to lose Joaquin.

Rated R, 120 Minutes
D: James Gray
W: James Gray, Ric Menello
Genre: Historical pimpin’
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: You know those people who are sold into modern indentured servitude and forced to labor in sweat shops in the United States for their lives to pay off their debt? Probably not them.
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: Problem solvers