Joaquin Phoenix and the truth
Suckers. He was faking it all along. The monosyllabic, bearded, totally spaced-out Joaquin Phoenix has been exposed as a fraud by his brother-in-law and co-conspirator Casey Affleck.
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The change of persona from responsible Phoenix to far-out Phoenix was first presented to the public . Although , the performance succeeded in fooling most - including, it seems, Letterman.
This was followed by the documentary being shown at this year's Venice and Toronto film festivals before going on general release. It is directed by Affleck and records the absurd life and ambition of Phoenix as he attempts a career change from accomplished actor to wannabe hip hop star.
Affleck had insisted at all the press junkets that the film was for real, a true account of a man in crisis/hippy heaven. But , and that the film is in fact a mockumentary in the spirit of previous spoofs which sit on a spectrum between Spinal Tap and Sacha Baron Cohen's Borat.
(On which subjects - that is, music films, character observation and Baron Cohen - the man who became Ali G, Borat and Bruno is now to become Freddie Mercury in a new biopic of the Queen frontman currently being written by Peter Morgan, he of Last King of Scotland and Frost/Nixon.)
In all of these cases - fake Phoenix, for-real Ali G, flamboyant Freddie biopic - the central conceit is for the performer to convince others that the human being they are watching really does or has existed. They are not presented as a fictional person within a story, but as genuine inhabitants of our world.
Their currency is truth. Borat and Ali G worked because Baron Cohen was able to convince the real people in the real world with whom he was interacting that he too was real. And a bio-pic relies on the audience believing that what it is being told is true.
They are, broadly speaking, documentaries: chronicles of life. And yet they are all made up, false, pretence. But then does any documentary, in whatever form, ever tell the whole truth? The hour or 90 minutes you see is of course an edited version of events, constructed in such a way as to tell the story the director wishes to tell. It is necessarily subjective.
Joaquin Phoenix and Sacha Baron Cohen have, in their way, both been probing and questioning the truth of documentary - as I will be doing in greater detail next week.
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Comment number 1.
At 17th Sep 2010, MayorElohim wrote:Exit Through The Gift Shop explores some of the same ideas also.
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Comment number 2.
At 17th Sep 2010, Graphis wrote:Surely it defeats the whole point to reveal that it was a hoax BEFORE the film goes on general release, and only a handful of people have seen it?
It would have had a far greater impact if it remained what it purported to be until after everyone saw it. Now it's just another spoof we can all safely ignore, instead of a (potentially) fascinating peek into someone's real-life crisis... however, I suspect that the film (and I haven't seen it), isn't really that interesting (rich, famous actor has personality crisis... yawn: doesn't this sort of thing happen weekly in the wacky world of "real" celebrity anyway?) and the makers have been forced to reveal the truth in an effort to drum up some bums on seats.
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Comment number 3.
At 17th Sep 2010, jr4412 wrote:Will Gompertz.
"Joaquin Phoenix and the truth"
luvvies, eh? the things they do to get attention, who would have thought?
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Comment number 4.
At 18th Sep 2010, dratomic wrote:Doesn't this go back to "Take The Money and Run", Woody Allen?
By the Joaquin was really bad at least in my opinion.
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