The Tragedy of the Underrated Film: Cameron Crowe's "Elizabethtown," six years down the road

Elizabethtown

Directed by Cameron Crowe

Fall 2005

I could, quite easily I think, call Cameron Crowe my favorite director of all time. Sure, Tarantino's blown my mind wide open countless times, the Coen Brothers have never made a film I didn't like, David Fincher just gets better and better, and Peter Jackson probably gets himself into the conversation based on my love for The Lord of the Rings alone. Then there are greats like Spielberg and Scorsese, who have made so many great movies (and so many different kinds of great movies), that I still haven't explored either entirely, but if I had to pick one director's collection of films as my "desert island film list," Crowe would have to be the winner. His films are so personal, so infectiously moving and memorable, and so full of replay value that I can't imagine getting tired of them. Like great songs or great albums, Crowe's films don't always necessarily become my favorites on the initial viewing, but they really stick with me. Perhaps it's due to Crowe's fantastic use of music in his films, but every single one of them has one or two moments of pure magic, and those moments infect my mind and stay there until I am dying to see the film again. We Bought a Zoo wasn't my favorite film of last year, but it was one I found viscerally moving and very memorable. There were a few moments in that film where Crowe's music choices and Matt Damon's performance juxtaposed so perfectly that they transcended the film's simple narrative and became a part of me, and for that reason alone, I'm dying to see the film again.

I can't figure out for the life of me why I wrote off Elizabethtown for so long. The 2005 film, for the longest time, has been one that I sort of lumped in with Vanilla Sky as a part of Crowe's "dry period," but looking back, I recall quite enjoying it on my first viewing (which was, I suppose, 6 years ago). After reading through an excellent countdown of the greatest music moments in Crowe's films (read it here) and seeing the abundance of Elizabethtown tunes on there, I decided to give the film another chance, and I fell in love.

I think there is something deeply wrong in the way we gauge the quality of films in this day and age. So much relies on what wins awards or what scores a high percentage on Rotten Tomatoes, but really, what do those things mean? As much as I follow the Oscars, as much as I love seeing all the films and deciding for myself what I think should or should not win, at the end of the day, it's just an Award, just a statistic (though one that will, admittedly, immortalize that particular film amongst a highly regarded tradition), but unless my own personal favorite films are being validated by those prizes, does it really make a difference to me what wins? And what about those Rotten Tomatoes scores, which have probably caused people to write off countless numbers of films that I love due to mixed critical reaction: there are things inside these films that simply cannot be condensed down into a number, and in trying to do so, I think we have lost something from modern cinema.

Crowe's films and Elizabethtown in particular got me thinking about this, as they've never been big awards players, and Elizabethtown holds a disgusting 28% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which is pretty much enough for me to write the site off for the remaining stretch of my existence. There is no arguing that the film is flawed: Orlando Bloom is a deeply likable actor, and he tries terribly hard in this role, but the performance never quite works the way it should. There are strange snatches of awkwardness and even a few scenes (towards the beginning), where something really does feel very, very off. But he does his best. Much like Woody Allen's films, which all seem to present a different version of the director, the Cameron Crowe hero has always had bits and pieces that felt friendly and familiar. Matt Damon, Tom Cruise, John Cusack and Patrick Fugit have all done splendidly in different takes on a similar role, each in wildly different settings, but all playing through some similar thematic issues, and although Bloom doesn't quite hit that mark, I still kind of liked his performance for what it was. More on that later.

Elizabethtown follows the story of a shoe designer named Drew Baylor (Bloom), who has just been fired after designing a product that cost his company a billion dollars. Well, not quite a billion dollars, but as Alec Baldwin states in his brief appearance as Drew's boss, the number is close enough that they might as well round up. And so Drew's story begins, fired, dumped (by Jessica Biel, with so little to do in this movie that you wonder why they even bothered) and at the end of his rope. It's not so far from the set-up of Jerry Maguire, except for instead of resolving to start his own company and come back from his crushing failure, Drew goes home, tosses his belongings in the trash, and prepares to kill himself. It's then that the phone rings and changes everything: Drew's father has died, and Drew has to go to Elizabethtown, his father's old hometown and where he was visiting when he died, to make funeral arrangements. And then he meets Claire (Kirsten Dunst, as a bubbly flight-attendant), and the film really gains its feet.

Doubtlessly, this film is flawed: actors or characters make brief appearances and then disappear without a trace, others seem strangely underdeveloped, and some scenes feel disjointed and out of place. And yet despite all of this, as the film finished out tonight, after years spent writing it off, I immediately thought I may have found a new favorite. Why? How can a film with so many obvious flaws and such a weak opening end up being so sublime, so weirdly, quirkily, unexpectedly brilliant? The answer is that, despite strange casting and scripting flaws (and a serious snafu in the film editing department), this is still a Cameron Crowe film, and it still has his trademark magic: the magic of the all-night phone conversation Drew and Claire share together, with Ryan Adams' "Come Pick Me Up" serving as soundtrack; the bizarre comedy of Drew's drunk encounter with a groom at the hotel he's staying at as he tries to steal a few beers; the wistful warmth of Drew and Claire driving to meet each other at dawn, just to sit and watch the sunset together, staying on the phone until they're face to face; the weirdly emotional power of the scene where Susan Sarandon (as Drew's mother) tap dances to "Moon River," her late husband's favorite song, at his memorial. It's the kind of magic you feel as Drew's cousin reunites his band to play "Freebird" at the memorial, lighting the place on fire, but continuing on through the entire guitar solo, even as the sprinklers drench the place and the audience runs for the exits. It's the sheer perfection of the film's closing sequence, where Drew takes a long road trip home, perfectly laid out and soundtracked by Claire (in the most flawless tribute to the mixtape that film has ever seen), and it's the satisfaction of watching them search for each other in a busy crowd, the connection of their eyes, the sprint towards each other, the collision, the embrace and the long, drawn out kiss. It's old fashioned romance, but Crowe has always had a way of making that seem fresh, and he does it perfectly here.

But perhaps the thing that hits the hardest in this film is the music that Crowe selects to soundtrack it: the crushing tragedy of losing a parent that sets in on Drew as Helen Stellar's "This Time Around" plays and he finds himself looking back; the melancholic strains of Tom Petty's "It'll All Work Out" that so expertly foreshadow the fated collision of these two people and the love they will find together; the welcome arrival of any of the three Ryan Adams songs, at key points in the score, framing the film almost as much as Elton John's opus "My Father's Gun" does; or the way the music washes over the road trip scene and brings the film to a truly fantastic conclusion, from the splendid American vistas that pass by as EastMountainSouth's gorgeously harmonized cover of Stephen Foster's "Hard Times" plays, to the bittersweet melody of Wheat's "Don't I Hold You," which will put a smile on the face of any audience member who has ever fallen in love with a song on a thoughtful late night drive. The list of examples could fill paragraphs, but suffice to say that, of all of Crowe's films, Elizabethtown is perhaps the most fully realized in terms of its soundtrack, and that's saying something. Maybe that's why I love this film so much: the script is certainly flawed, the casting imperfect, but when it comes to perfect collisions of music and film, it's hard to think of another example that blends my two favorite mediums of entertainment and art together so well.

Aside from Vanilla Sky (which I hardly even count as a Cameron Crowe film), Elizabethtown is probably Crowe's weakest screenplay. It's weak in that there are plot and character inconsistencies and that, at times, it feels like there is something missing. But in its concept? In its central story and character ideas? In those areas, the script about as far from weak as you can get. I read a blog post once (read it here) that explained it more perfectly than I can:

"If Jerry Maguire and Almost Famous are both a solid 9 out of 10, then Elizabethtown is a solid 4 out of 10 yet also a solid 12 out of 10. It's everything and nothing, it's great and terrible, terrible and great."

That is to say, there are failures in this film, but when Crowe succeeds, like on that perfect road trip sequence, or the euphoric up-all-night phone call scene, it's hard for me to think of moments in his other films that I love more. I honestly think he could have made his best movie here, had a few things gone differently; he misses that mark, but it's still worth an awful lot that I can't get the movie out of my head. Maybe it's the music geek in me: maybe it's Drew visiting the scene of Martin Luther King's assassination as U2's "Pride (In the Name of Love)" plays like an anthem in the background; maybe it's him stopping by Sun Studios and grabbing a drink in a bar nearby, where the bartender tells him stories of all kinds of music legends (Elvis included) who have walked through his door; maybe it's the chilling mention of Jeff Buckley's final resting place as Drew drives over the Mississippi; or maybe it's just the idea of a guy who suffers a crushing tragedy and a demoralizing defeat at the same time, and then finds himself in the aftermath: in a crazy extended family, in music, and in love. I love that plot and I love the way the film reminds me of moments out of my own life. I think Drew is a really great character, one that I can see myself in a lot, and the fact that Bloom doesn't quite hit the bullseye doesn't take away from how genuine and good-natured his performance is. And his chemistry with Dunst just works: one viewing of that phone call scene makes that statement undeniable.

Elizabethtown, unlike Almost Famous, is not a perfect movie, but it bears its scars proudly, and it rises above them to become a truly great film, even if I didn't realize that fact for six years. There's a tragedy in films sitting underrated for more than half a decade like this one has: the tragedy of missing out on years of these songs and scenes to remember fondly; the tragedy of thinking my favorite director lost his golden touch. But there's also something truly splendid about the underrated film: it's getting to rediscover it years after the first viewing and cherishing it all the more for that reason; it's having the film come back into my life at the perfect time and truly resonating with me like I know it never could have when I was younger; and its the thrill of reclaiming a film that critics and popular consensus kept from me for far too long. In that way, I suppose it's more of a triumph than a tragedy.