.: Victor Soho :.

The mumblecore has become a disaster drawer where it was first grouped with friends who enjoyed working together, then films with certain common stylistic features associated with the Sundance festival, to end up becoming a label to define any film about human relationships. made with little budget in the United States from 2005 to 2015. The reality is that mumblecore has never existed, has always been a straw man more interested in forcing movements for the conception of a history of cinema than a genuine collective commitment that the same type of cinema existed. That's why I prefer to reject the mumblecore label and focus on comparisons and distinctions between specific filmmakers rather than a desire to imagine a collective aesthetic that never existed. The problems of the mumblecore label are still a representation of some of the problems that Swanberg has had throughout his career, that is, that no one has done a genuine exercise in analyzing his cinema, as his fans tend to be groups of hipsters who are not fond of the worst behaviors of cultural criticism. This tendency to group in different movements creative individuals is still a completely outdated tool, a crude attempt by film historians to approach a view of art history that has become obsolete to the current form of creation. This series of attempts is still problematic approaches to the present from the perspectives used in the past. I'm not saying that Mumblecore is a word to erase from our texts, it can certainly be very useful for easy jokes in groups of Discord and tweets written quickly that have little theoretical vocation; but when stricter analyzes appear its validity is ridiculous. "Goodbye, mumblecore, the indie movement that was never more than a flurry of festival hype and blogosphere branding." [Goodbye mumblecore, the indie movement that was never anything more than a confusing burst of festival hype and blogging atmosphere], as Amy Taulbin begins in her famous article for FilmComment.

In general, I have no interest in grouping different individuals under the name of a "generation." Mumblecore does not seem to be acceptable as the shared characteristics of different filmmakers, whose interests and styles are so different from each other. I don't want to define mumblecore, but I do want to approach the group of filmmakers that Swanberg is often surrounded by - especially Andrew Bujalski, Frank V. Ross, Ry Russo-Young, Greta Gerwig, Amy Seimetz and Kent Osborne. Ultimately, if anything could unite them are the similar criticisms of which they are accused: their bourgeois style or lack of political background, their lack of firm narrative structures, their endless chatter, their tendency to self-fiction, their dirty language or the link with the hated urban tribe called hipsters. This resides not only in his fellow filmmakers, but in those who share similarities in age such as the so-called Alt-Lit. Aware of the difficulty of defending the union of so many voices, the poet Berta García Faet in her introduction to the anthology "All the noises: anthology of poetry Alt-lit", draws up a list of those points that could unite such different poets as was the case with Mira Gonzalez, Tao Lin, Megan Boyle or Steve Roggenbuck. This list of mainly biographical features - so important in works of autofiction - offers at the same time general descriptions (which allows a kaleidoscopic look of the group, not enclosing the different individualities), as concrete in its definition (which allows the label make sense to use): They are authors of middle or upper-middle class, hijxs of a capitalism where they do not feel comfortable, but without any revolutionary interest; a generation that began linking through Messenger, Yahoo, Terra or Facebook; doing so in real life in malls, moving away from highcult to show up as cultured individuals in early millennium pop - British Spears, Backstreet Boys or the Spice Girls - as well as spraying a unified or regulatory language -they use different media, emojis, abbreviations or careless spelling-, are consciously anti-metaphorical and are products of the decadent capitalism of the first decade of our century, with the first blow being 9/11 and the second with the terrible economic crisis of 2008.

Swanberg's cinema encapsulates all these generational feelings, both as an artist and in his own characters. His films are about how the characters interact with their environment, not so much about personal explorations. He is not an author who is often read in historical terms, but his film is a great example of the youth devastated by the economic crisis, of the hopes of a broken future and the feeling of drifting without a way to settle down; of a home cinema, independent and lacking in budget. He is youthful, but sad; formally radical, but politically conservative and in those contradictory proposals encapsulates different generational characteristics.

Let's get together and talk about the modern age

All of our friends were gathered there

With their pets, just talking shit

About how we're all so upset

About the disappearing ground

As we watch it melt… -

The Good That Wont Come Out , Rilo Kiley

Within this existential boredom is where Swanberg does not seek to captivate with games of language, elaborate thematic contradictions or images with great captivating force; but with its essential basis, the anecdotes. It frees its images from symbolic codes, large arches and complex narrative structures; its filming is objective and direct, it is the facts themselves and their cumulative abilities that give that greater weight to the whole. This attitude places Swanberg in a privileged place to portray scenes of genuine intimacy. His characters have pathetic, half-embarrassed or cheesy attitudes that only develop in moments of intimacy and trust with each other. Kent Osborne's penis burger at Uncle Kent - where he wraps his penis around his penis as a joke for his partner - is one of the most obvious and fun examples of this. He forgets metaphors and pretensions, serious conflicts between characters and focuses on a sincere stupidity that is only visible in the most absolute privacy, a state that can only be freed from pretension, not wanting to impress, or be anything other than oneself. Joe Swanberg is unique in capturing the funny indecency of what happens in confidence, how embarrassing it may seem from the outside, and how liberating it is from within.

I mean I'm sick of meaning, I just wanna hold you… -

Bodys, Car Seat Headrest

It does not portray anything that has nothing to do with the experiential. In Swanberg's work, the vivid and the filmed are separated by a thin glass that breaks easily, something that is conceived as a symptom of life on the Internet. Swanberg goes on to say in an interview with the Austin Chronicle, "I tell the story of a group of guys in Chicago who have adopted technology in such a way that it is indivisible when it begins and ends in real life." It is not a reflection on the image of the twentieth century, the dichotomy between fictionalized self-representation and the most imminent material reality derives from his interest in social media. LOL (2006) is a clear example. It starts with a porn website and a girl getting naked; a montage sequence between dozens of men watching her and masturbating. None is the protagonist, none will be relevant; but they are all part of a social group and common behaviors. The Internet in this case, along with the film, will be the only possibility for these similar and unknown people to meet in some way - Internet cinema and porn are the only point of convergence between two seemingly parallel lives. His unfocused narrative tends to be driven by the definition of an urban group or tribe. It forces you to enter. Without welcome and with a cut begin their films, that of the mediocre people of the suburbs of America.

Although it seems that Swanberg wanted to ignore that label about generationality, he is a person committed to relating to his friends to make his films. In an interview he goes so far as to point out that he would not be interested in working with great performers, because his filming mechanism is to call and ask if his actors / actresses are free to record a couple of sequences. In a filmmaker whose key feature is the distortion between reality and art, it is not surprising that the confusion is reproduced in not knowing how to distinguish labor relations from personal ones - although that may have changed in recent years. Let's say there is no link that can be strictly working, so if there is no friendship there is no cinema. Staying and meeting seems like a process and an interest prior to filming the film. In The Zone (2011), his film more focused on the tense relationships between ethics and aesthetics, tells the process of stopping a shoot for the consequences it may have on the emotional relationship they have in reality. A trio is filmed in the film, but two of the actors are a couple and fight during the filming of a scene. His montage mixes fiction recordings with excerpts where Swanberg shows the film to his team and talks about the problems caused in filming. It is a technique similar to that of a filmmaker who has received several comparisons with Swanberg, Joanna Arnow, who in i hate myself :) (2013) showed her parents and her partner the documentary she recorded about the abuse she received in this relationship, hoping to capture their reactions and reflect on the material filmed with some of the protagonists themselves. This is not only linked to the selection of actors / actresses, but also to their own connection with other directors. When Kent Osborne acted in his films, he tended to write them with him - being one of the best screenwriters in Adventure Time -, co-directing two films: Autoerotic (2011) with Adam Wingard and Nights and Weekends (2008) with Greta Gerwig. There are other cases where some colleagues like the director Frank V. Ross are in charge of the sound, Adam Wingard has been the director of photography of several of his films or he himself lends himself to work as an actor in the films of the rest. It eliminates any hierarchical system, it is disinterested in the image of genius-creator forming a community where to make cinema and to enjoy the company.

Swanberg does not poetize or over-embellish ordinary life; but it gives him a courage to live it. A critic talking about Kissing on the Mouth (2005) commented on how boring and uninteresting Swanberg's friends were and how they did not deserve to star in a film. Noah Cicero offers this thought in his interview in The Nervous Breakdown, following the Alt-Lit: “Being / being means feeling that you talk too much bottomless, weird, lonely and depressed about not having your organic bread sandwich, look to an amazing tree, touch it and feel it [...] Our lives are generally boring, for most young people. [...] Ninety percent of humans who live boring lives are not even considered human. Well, we're human and we want to live too, and we want to talk about our shitty version of life. ” This need to seek a reality without apparent intervention - or with the least possible - is very evident in the crosscutting of Alexander the Last (2009), the practices of a play with a sex scene are contrasted with the real sex of the actor and his partner. In one they are forced, receiving constant indications and being interrupted; so it feels inorganic, heavy and unerotic. In the other, the actress enjoys sex normally. Already in his first film he says he has learned "that if a group of people trust each other and believe in what they are doing, it is possible to make a film that everyone is proud of." Swanberg understands his cinema as a process where his own fears are "overcome." "We lowered our guard, took off our clothes and tried to represent the problems of youth in the most accurate way" is the statement of his first film, which not only shows his ambition, but his desperate search for sincere intimacy.

Swanberg never gives up the interest of his films to their pictorial value. He ignores it because he is not interested in light, compositions or colors; he is an artist of gesture and the relationship between people. His camera seeks precision in offering that gesture free of apparatuses or metaphors; nothing means anything else you see. Swanberg's films are full of what is offered as involuntary and reflects our personality in the process of relating to another person. In Hannah Takes the Stairs (2007), shortly after the film begins, Gerwig, Duplass and Bujalski talk in a kitchen. Regardless of the content of the conversation, it's hot; Gerwig approaches the beer bottle to his head, hoping to cool off; Duplass listens intently to Bujalski, but stops at times to wipe the sweat from his forehead. Another moment from a previous movie: "Nice Camera" says the protagonist of Kissing on the Mouth, while a friend prepares his analog camera to take a picture. This scene serves as a statement of intent and a satire, very common in the rebellion of prime operas. While a friend prepares the tripod, he cleans the camera, places each piece to form the body, then the lens and other mechanisms; Swanberg moves freely and savagely, letting him record every little detail that interests him (like the grass that stains the soles of the photographer's feet). The more recreation, the more loss of reality. "I prepared each scene with the maximum possibility of error, knowing that I could only make an interesting and true film if it was full of errors," Swanberg said in his statement for the film. The analog fetishist takes twenty minutes to prepare his camera, while Swanberg records instantly so that life is not interrupted. In his thriller Privacy Setting, a stalker who records clueless girls naked or in sexual situations meets an exhibitionist who lends himself to being recorded. The conflict arises when she is aware of the presence of the camera, begins to control her body, to pretend the gestures and, progressively, to lose the interest of the stalker who does not find there the naturalness of the robbers.

Especially worth dwelling on sex scenes. Swanberg is more than a generational director, he is a director focused on the tensions and frictions of a group of individuals. "If Andrew Bujalski's work was on the stony path to self-knowledge, Swanberg explores the insurmountable gap between the individual and the other," says Dave McDougall in his critique of Mubi on Nights and Weekends. Swanberg's film spectrum explores the social and the zeitgeist by natural impulse, while relationships are what is explored by interest. It is noticeable that this is what genuinely interests him, which is why most of his films portray relationships or groups of friends. Within these relationships of individuals part of their strong point resides in the sexual scenes - that occupy a small but important percentage of their films. Unlike in the movies of Joanna Arnow or Lena Dunham - whose sex scenes are full of dialogue - when people have sex in Swanberg's films they are silent, silent and completely disillusioned with passions. In a cinema so full of words, a kiss or sex is not so much silence but the final annulment of reason. There is no intelligence or logic that mediates between two bodies moving by the maxim of being excited (once again, Car Seat Headrest's phrase: "I'm sick of meaning, I just want to hold you"). When these moments came, Swanberg tended to get closer than ever, to be so close to them that the tension between bodies was unstoppable. As he progresses in his filmography, Swanberg prefers to observe from a distance, to respect the personal space of his own characters, and creates a more distant code on a physical, not an emotional level. This breaks down in Hannah Take the Stairs, at the lowest point of the film. There is no affection, no love, only an emotional lack that seeks to be filled in any way. That kiss where he returns to his original style is a punctual break that with the context of the film makes him the most painful kiss of his career. This change of language in codes of medium or distant planes, giving freedom of movement to its characters to break it in a plane very close to the faces.

"I'm tired of being compared to movies like 9 Songs or Ken Park. It's very significant of the state of cinema when three very different films are constantly being compared, simply because they all have some real sex scenes, ”is Swanberg's position in a Chicago Reader interview about his first film. Seeing other films with that degree of real sex like those of Lars Von Trier or Gaspar Noé or even Serra - which may be the only one that starts from really interesting aspects - Swanberg's cinema is never provocative. It never overcomes the barriers of general morality - except in Autoerotic, a film more like the film of its co-director Adam Wingard in an outdated tribute to filmmaker Lloyd Kaufman or in his only two thrillers 24 Exposures and Privacy Setting. It is not recreated in the vision of sex as something pure or something that scandalizes, but understands it as a natural process of social relations. It is not always comfortable to see, the sexual relations of his stage of 2011 - that year where he was able to direct six films - are sad, very lacking in romanticism and yes of affection and understanding. They are uncomfortable to see because sex ceases to be an act of pleasure to become a desperate attempt to no longer sink into misery and reconnect with the world. Nights and Weekends is a film about a breakup of a long-distance relationship. It starts with a sex scene after days without seeing each other, but the act is not exciting. They are clumsy bodies, tired from a trip, poorly coordinated and with an unfavorable space; but while the sexual act is awkward the scene is tender and affectionate. The onset of LOL, so focused on pornography and the way individuals relate to it, could indicate a lewd look centered on dangerous power systems; but Swanberg is anything but pornographic, because his sex is tender or sad, it's exciting for the characters and not for the viewer. Much is said about its similarities to Echoes of Silence (Peter Emmanuel Goldman, 1967), Cassavetes cinema or other similar cinema of the 60s and 70s as influences close to Swanberg's style. I feel that these similarities are superficial and that his approach is so realistic and comic, that it is casual and not very tragic, something sad and that does not tend to the transcendental brings it closer to the cinema of Albert Brooks. The specialist in standing out in front of the camera and portraying himself in the ridiculous without being self-compassionate. In short, in the sex of his work there is no vocation to break taboos, or to bother in a search for cruelty; it is a similar process from which fiction does not differentiate from what is lived: if sex exists in one it must exist in the other.

"I just want people to feel less alone and see something good in the world." In the midst of The Zone's creative crisis, Swanberg utters these words in complete uncertainty about his position as creator. It could be a comment provoked by the nerves of the moment, but it does not stop fitting with what I have written before: that its cinema speaks of relations. They are often more abstract than the relationship between art and life, others are as simple as that of their friends and partners; but there is also a link with the viewer. A tendency to look for reflection and identification, to find in the problems of his characters the mirror of his life and that of more people. Swanberg shot much of his films in the neighborhoods he knew as a young man on the outskirts of Chicago; from a middle class away from the big city and great experiences. It escapes the particular and the eccentric, it does not look for figures that the spectator wants to be, they are not fantasies; but representations and individuals whose widespread criticism is that they should not star in a film. Let's go back to Noah Cicero's words: "We want to talk about our shitty vision of life." A boring one, not very revolutionary in political terms, very far from the social centers where history will be written; but that Swanberg's cinema has been responsible for preserving. That just as it deserves to be lived, it deserves to be filmed. Perhaps that is Swanberg's greatest value, being able to portray what we did while we were alive. Beyond history, beyond the fabulous; life as it overwhelmed us in our youth.