Do you remember some years back when clever cart-upsetters recut classic movie trailers to give the pic a different feel? The best one was “Shining,” a re-imagining of The Shining which ended up resembling some sort of Vince Vaughn-ish family comedy. This, I believe, is what happened to Enemy – a film cut to seem menacing when it should have been nothing of the sort.
Let’s talk about tone for a minute, shall we? Tone is what makes The Shining parody work. When you show Jack Nicholson frustrated with a typewriter, cut away fast and add a wacky soundtrack, you can change the tone of the clip to something lighthearted. Enemy decided the mood was bleak and foreboding no matter what the film actually showed us. Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal) is a political history prof at “UGT” [read: University of Toronto]. He’s single, but has a steady girlfriend (Mélanie Laurent) he can’t satisfy. Poor Mélanie, she must bed Jake Gyllenhaal half a dozen times in this film without a happy ending. In fact, the opening feels a lot like a dour Groundhog Day – mopey, hunched, defeated Adam teaching, coming home, pissing Mary (Laurent) off, teaching, coming home, pissing Mary off … and always with a soundtrack suggesting imminent doom.
Adam watches a movie on a colleague’s recommendation and discovers that one of the bit players is his exact double. Curious, he tracks “Anthony” (also Jake Gyllenhaal) down. Wouldn’t you know it? The guy is a local, go figure. After a series of odd conversations and more tragic soundtrack, the two decide to meet in a remote hotel room (??). It shouldn’t have, but for me this meeting begged the question, “if you have sex with your clone, is that technically masturbation?” And Anthony is an exact clone of Adam. Wait. This is the same guy, right? This is a Fight Club or an Angel Heart thing going on, yes? “No?” We’re going to pretend this is two different guys, who look exactly alike … down to the same … scar?! These are two different people. Really?
Now what would you do if you discovered your doppelgänger? Would you question? Would you scream? Would you scheme? Or instead would flee like little bitch because, I dunno, this means there’s impending evil afoot? Yeah, that happened.
So this is a film with a mystery. A mystery that won’t get resolved; you’ve been warned.
Enemy wants a deeper meaning, one that justifies the “uh oh” soundtrack and Adam’s need to look over his shoulder constantly. Is this meaning hidden in the
spiders that keep showing up? Is it hidden in his lectures about totalitarianism? Is it hidden in the fact that there are two of the same guy runnin’ around? I’ll tell you one big thing I didn’t get is how Anthony lives better than Adam … one guy is an unemployed actor with a pregnant wife and three non-speaking roles to his credit, the other is a single university professor … who do you think lives better?
Jake Gyllenhaal got some praise here for dual roles – the timid and frumpy Adam v. the more extroverted and polished Anthony. For me, this does little other than show, ok, you’re an actor. You have successfully demonstrated you can play two distinct characters in one film … now show me why I should care about either of them. See, that’s the real trick. And like so many facets of Enemy, there’s a faint hint of something magical in the Gyllenhaal bifurcation, but nothing worth the retelling. The roots of a better film were here. This one left me empty.
There was a dude from lake ON
Who found there were two of him, mon
He met his twin
Let the games begin
Or at least try to stifle that yawn
Rated R, 91 Minutes
D: Denis Villeneuve
W: Javier Guillón
Genre: The attempted mindscrew
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: The naturally paranoid
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: People who need a payoff
