"Images for Promises Written in Water have yet to be made available." Lots of film-makers have given themselves the credit "Written, Directed and Produced by" over the years, from Orson Welles to Rob Zombie. But here in Venice, when it came up at the beginning of
Vincent Gallo's latest film,
Promises Written in Water, it was greeted with a huge, derisive laugh. And perhaps with some justification. His last film was 2004's critically savaged The Brown Bunny, infamous for its scene of unsimulated oral sex performed by Chloe Sevigny on the film-maker - not the first time Gallo has made a film as an act of self-gratification, but possibly the most literal. It also didn't help that this on-screen credit followed "Music by Vincent Gallo", which had already come after his billing as the lead. He clearly has shortage of admiration for his own talent. But worse than an arrogant big-head, is one who has reason to be an arrogant big-head, and behind the pretension is a very fine actor. He was remarkable, starring in another in competition film here,
Essential Killing. As if to rub it in, he has a third reason to be in Venice this week, also entering a short film called The Agent. So what of this in competition feature? The scene that best sums this modest and low-budget, black and white drama up, comes after about twenty minutes of silence and sees Gallo enter a cafe and sit opposite a young, blonde woman. "Did you call Colette?" she asks, getting no reply. After a long pause, Gallo replies, "what did you say?" and she repeats the question: "did you call Colette?" Another long pause follows, the entire scene taking place in an unbroken and completely still close-up on the star. Eventually he does reply, "Yes I did. I did call Colette." Then what feels like ten minutes goes by, in which the actor repeats the same story about the phone call, in a loop and probably about a dozen times. The reason I say this sums the film up is that for me it encapsulated the best and the worst aspects of it. Vincent Gallo is intense and you don't want to take your eyes off him, whilst with every repetition of the story his reading is different, yet always naturalistic. It somehow feels improvised even though you've heard it said ten times already, with subtle shifts in meaning. It is also a simple, yet elegant scene in terms of its execution, the static shot of Gallo only breached after the girl says she is vain, her head then coming into the periphery of the image as if to support her point. Yet it also sums up the worst of the movie, as the director perfectly lives up to every stereotype of what a little, arty festival film should look like: it is slowly paced with no real plot to speak of; it is lit in ultra lo-fi (almost grainy) black and white; and there are even extended and knowingly provocative shots of the lead actress's genitalia. It is the sort of film you expect from a director whose entry in the festival catalogue is the only one without a picture, as the synopsis reads: "This film is written, directed and produced by Vincent Gallo. No other information will be supplied" (with the "director's statement" section simply reading, "no comment"). "Oh Vincent! You're such an artist!" we cry. The rest of the film also follows the pattern of the scene I described, as each drawn-out section features similar repetition of lines. This is the film I thought Francis Ford Coppola's Tetro was, last year: self-indulgent and rather too proud of itself. Only now I see that Coppola's film had far more substance and explored themes verging on primal and operatic, which elevated its modest budget into something cinematic. By contrast it is banal and tedious. There is nothing cinematic here. Ever wilfully provocative, I suspect one of Gallo's aims is to alienate and polarise his audience and he would no doubt relish the site of people walking out (this is the only film I've seen here that received boos). But in the final analysis, there is nothing more pointless, false and bland than someone going out of their way to court controversy. Which is part of the reason this film receives my verdict of shrugging indifference. Gallo's pretensions and eccentricities can mask an excellent performer. But when he's the writer, director and producer, the level of unchecked onanism is hard to warm to.