Sometimes I Think About Dying (2023)

 

Sometimes I Think About Dying (2023)

Director: Rachel Lambert

Stars: Daisy Ridley, Dave Merheje, Parvesh Cheena, Marcia DeBonis

Short Review, no spoilers

Delightfully offbeat piece with some of the perceptive irony of Todd Solondz minus his searing cynicism. Quietly powerful, inspiring and cathartic, the performances are understated and well-drawn including an excellent demonstration of versatility from Daisy Ridley. Beautifully shot and scored, it’s a bleakly heart-wrenching but also very funny portrait of average desperation and loneliness.

Full Review (spoilers)

“Mediocrity never goes away – but neither, I hope, do those who are willing
to challenge it.” – Miloš Forman*

The 1975 classic One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, directed by Milos Forman, opens with a dreamy view of the mountains followed by shots of psychiatric inpatients emerging slowly in to their average day. In one shot we see a US flag, situating it in America but could it be anywhere? Czech New Wave directors like Forman understood the potential to make statements about oppression in society with stories about ordinary people filmed in melancholically humorous ways. Fellow New Waver Ivan Passer describes making a list with Milos Forman of ways to make films that could be released under Communist party rule, one of which was to make comedies.** Sometimes I Think About Dying similarly opens with delicate images of an early morning on sleepy streets as a deer tentatively emerges from a garden and apples are seen rotting in a road drain. There’s something about the wistful imagery here and throughout, along with an ironically playful, haunting music score, that resonates with One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. The latter was also made in Oregon with some scenes filmed in a similarly coastal region of Depoe Bay less than a 3-hour drive from Astoria. Differently however, Sometimes I Think About Dying is shot in a coolly muted light with the sense of off-peak seaside towns in England, while the coastal scenes in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest are grainy but more sunnily presented. Whereas in one film the environment and climate reflect our hero’s bleak state of mind, in the other it is one of many stages for optimistic rebellion led by the iconic character of R.P. McMurphy, played with furiously infectious energy by Jack Nicholson in one of his most outstanding performances.

In both films a European sensibility trickles through a distinctly American setting – in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, it is via the direction of Czech pioneer Forman. But in Sometimes I Think About Dying, the humorous banality resonates with a traditionally wry English dreariness. Monotony and petty grievances characterise the ‘events’ that take place in both institutions: a psychiatric hospital and office workplace respectively. And in both films, it takes the arrival of a newcomer to shake things up, although it’s the receptivity of the currently institutionalised residents/workers that also create actual change.

In Sometimes I Think About Dying, jolly retiree Carol – known mostly from heroine Fran’s point of view by the back of her head – is replaced by Robert, a sociable and easy-going guy who secretly confides to Fran that he’s never really had a job before. Via email (naturally, even though they are about a metre or so away from each other), Fran warns him to keep that to himself, one of several hints at office politics that lurk behind the apparently friendly unity of a workplace. Another is the phony camaraderie during Robert’s introduction to the team when we realise that the manager is young, doughnut loving Isobel in subtler but nevertheless classic David Brent character mode with probably deluded visions of themselves as a ‘chilled-out’ boss. There are two funny moments in this scene that signal how little any of them actually know each other despite Isobel’s presentation of familiarity. The team are momentarily embarrassed when colleague Garrett has to remind them that he’s a vegetarian (a ‘fact’ that he later reveals was ironically faked for his own amusement), and even more so when oddball Rich contradicts assumptions that he loves fishing based on a photograph seen of him holding a big fish. The awkwardness of these moments lay bare what it is to know people beyond basic signifiers, the status quo being disturbed by unexpected ‘honesty’. Funnily enough, there is a comparable moment in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest - the same kind of fish catching photo is noticed by McMurphy in the head psychiatrist’s office however, McMurphy provocatively questions the validity of this photo from the get-go.

Indeed, McMurphy questions everything in front of him, even as he is questionable himself. His being in the hospital in the first place is up for scrutiny throughout, however, after seeing Nurse Ratched in action for a while, he tells the evaluating shrinks in a review that Ratched ‘ain’t honest.’ They defend the long-standing, well respected matron of the ward but McMurphy sees the passive aggression behind her apparent care and professionalism. There’s no Nurse Ratched in Sometimes I Think About Dying but a less fascistic dishonesty is shared by all, preventing people knowing each other better and thus truly unifying as a result. The office workers are patronised as much as the psychiatric patients are infantilised. And the benign mask of Isobel isn’t a front for such devastating power as that held by Nurse Ratched however, the false familiarity does obscure Fran’s utter alienation in a team that she has apparently been a part of for some time.

Completely opposite to McMurphy - a rebel who immediately explodes in to the story as a charismatically disruptive outsider - Fran clearly engages in a well-established role by which she goes out of her way to sustain the most limited presence possible. Similarly to McMurphy however, people around our central character respond accordingly, with the patients in the asylum stirred by this electric new presence while Fran’s co-workers can’t see to make any effort in including the quiet young lady already in their midst. Those with impatience for shyness may struggle to understand, but the conflicting agonies in yearning to be acknowledged one moment and wishing to fade away in another is made exquisitely visual with brilliant perception and empathy by Ridley. It is both painful and endearingly funny, particularly when Fran literally squirms away from Robert’s casual friendliness, made poignant by the fact that he’s unaware of her non-status in the office so tries to get to know her like everybody else – the pure non-judgementalism from a group newbie. This is also a significant aspect of McMurphy’s arrival – not knowing the system, he treats the patients like men and not just like a bunch of ‘nuts’. (In another way, Fran is like Chief in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, in that she is virtually silent and dismissively ignored until the gregarious newcomer arrives and affords her opportunity for recognition).

It might seem strange to compare a 1970s mental institution with a modern-day office workplace, but they are after all two such places where disparate people are put together and from which weird group dynamics evolve as a result. However, the soul-scraping of Nurse Ratched’s group therapy creates a situation whereby all of the men are overbearingly aware of each other’s various gripes, whereas the phoney façade of office camaraderie in Sometimes I Think About Dying oppresses expression of any meaningful internal issues at all. This is thrown in to a light outside of Fran’s experience when she bumps in to jolly Carol sometime after her leaving the office. Sat in a coffee shop, she confesses to Fran that her husband was taken ill before they could take their much-anticipated retirement cruise leaving her alone and sad. She speaks of ‘doing the right thing’, as in working hard her whole life and waiting for her opportunity to relax and leisure with her husband, only to get there and it be too late. Thus, even one who works hard and is socially engaged in an acceptable way can end up with suffering and isolation. There is empathetic comfort to be found in one who also knows pain and loneliness though, as Fran listens quietly to a woman who no longer exists to the group she recently left - in spite of the cake and good wishes.

Of the soundtrack to Sometimes I Think About Dying, creator Dabney Morris says this:

"Early in the pre-production stage of the film, [director] Rachel Lambert approached me with an idea that we treat Astoria, OR, as though it had the same escapist allure as a Hawaiian getaway. This ultimately took us down the seemingly endless rabbit hole of the often-eye-rolled-at genres of exotica and lounge. Pulling inspiration from Martin Denny, Les Baxter, Arthur Lyman, Henry Mancini, and the dreary, dull Pacific Northwest coast, we were able to imagine a score that was at once lush and enticing, yet dark with a sort of romantic macabre." ***

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest features an equally haunting music score that combines the easy listening mind fuzz from the asylum ward record player with the plaintive, wayward and sometimes heart-wrenching notes of a musical saw. There’s also irony in the track title ‘Bus to Paradise’ when McMurphy hijacks the patient outing bus to take the men fishing, and even Hawaiian influence in another track titled ‘Aloha Los Pescadores’ which I believe translates as ‘Hello Fishermen’. The recurring theme of fishing suggests the freedom of the sea contrasted with being caught and trapped – hook, line and sinker. Carol’s big holiday and well-earned freedom is also linked to the sea, only to be robbed of it and trapped when she thought she had earned her release. The main musical theme in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest bears close resemblance to easy listening classic ‘Please Release Me’, alluding to the thin line between escapism and desperation.

Fran’s escapism stops at the sea, instead manifesting itself in fantasies about dying either on a beach or in a forest. I was reminded of a controversial character’s similarly nihilistic visions in Todd Solondz’s Happiness. No one depicts irony – and of the darkest kind – much better than Solondz, who similarly played out images of human death in the normally soothing context of nature and relaxation in Happiness. The character involved is far more provocative to audience identification however, Fran’s inward-leaning preoccupation with death will still seem uncomfortably morbid to some. The irony at play though is that it is sometimes the embrace of death that can more profoundly bring a sense of life and living in to one’s existence. To Fran, death is a potentially liberating feeling of escaping her life. Not that she wants to die necessarily, as proven by the manner in which she seizes on her opportunity to make a relationship with Robert (whether she knows what to do with it once she has it or not). But, as Chief feels for McMurphy, to Fran, dying appeals more than living life lifelessly. Even the game that she finds herself engaging in at a party involves pretend murder, but again Fran finds it to be a successful way to be imaginative and part of a social gathering. Of course, when pretending to die is the challenge, no one is more spontaneously creative than Fran, showing that even being good at imagining death can be a positive. Her fellow partygoers are surprised and delighted and Fran feels the enjoyment of human interaction.

At the end, Fran finally breaks down her personal boundaries and also the modern societal rule of confessing face to face rather than through some sort of platform. When she tells Robert that sometimes she thinks about dying, he pauses and then, non-judgementally, without saying a word, hugs her, and then we see the forest floor from Fran’s death fantasy appear around them – now Fran is feeling through the understanding from another person rather than through the release of death.

The tragedy in Sometimes I Think About Dying trickles gently throughout but ultimately ends life-affirmingly, whereas One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest ends in tragedy after a spirited challenge to the misery of accepted routine and the endurance of societally ordained micro aggressions. Both explore the importance of taking risks - McMurphy’s actions are always inspiringly informed by throwing caution to the wind while Fran’s are by cautiously containing herself entirely - until that is, she seizes her opportunity to break down her own asylum walls. The arrival of Robert is that opportunity, but Fran has to make it happen before he maybe joins the rest of her colleagues in barely acknowledging her existence. In the world of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, an inspirational leader is crucial to positive disruption, and that disruption has clearer, wider societal implications. In Sometimes I Think About Dying, there are no inspirational leaders and, in a world increasingly focused on the individual, Fran’s microcosmic problem is one she has to take on herself.

Through alternative voices, we see that oppression can be present in any society at any time, but also that there is hope where it can be broken down, even in the most subtle ways. McMurphy is appalled when he finds out that most of the inpatients are voluntary, that individuals may choose to escape in to a prison because they can’t cope with what an apparently free society demands. In Sometimes I Think About Dying, Fran retreats in to herself and in to fantasy, while others are only loosely connected by the convenience of working together. Seemingly forever alienated until Robert arrives, Fran exists on the fringes of society. It might not seem like a world-beater, but if resistance to an assigned role begins with the individual, then this is perhaps one place to start.

 

*https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/notable-deaths-in-2018/100/

** The filmmaker said, “I believe that the Party was worried when they saw ordinary people, with all their weaknesses and strengths, depicted on screen. I think they also preferred to be attacked directly rather than to be ignored completely.” https://www.filmcomment.com/blog/still-free-interview-ivan-passer/#:~:text=Before%20the%20clampdown%2C%20Milos%20and,were%20more%20tolerant%20with%20comedies.

***https://cinemacy.com/exclusive-dabney-morris-debuts-track-from-sometimes-i-think-about-dying/