Affliction (1997)
4/11/2019
4/11/2019
Affliction, directed by Paul Schrader, is about a troubled, tempered cop named Wade Whitehouse (Nick Nolte) who becomes obsessed solving a fatal hunting death, all while certain events causes him to become crazed and unstable.
When Josh Zeman held an interview with Schrader, Schrader states and confirms that when it comes to the structures of his movies, he tends to "use a genre to disguise your real business". Even in another interview with David Konow, Schrader says "Genre is a very, very useful tool, because it sets in motion a certain set of expectations that you can use and that you need to respect if you are going to use them. There is a little bit of the mystery genre in Affliction... I use it (mystery) to get the audience to a place so that I can drop what has seemed to be the plot and reveal it to be irrelevant, so what had seemed to be the subplot can take its place". The mystery-thriller comes from Wade's belief and obsession that Jack Hewitt (Jim True-Frost) killed Evan Twombley (Sean McCann).
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The subtext (or subgenre) of drama comes from Wade's abuse as a child from his father Glen (James Coburn) and the lasting effect it has on himself and his relationships with his jobs, daughter, ex-wife, and (ex)girlfriend. His attempt to be a better man than his father as well as his attempt to be a better father than his is fails. As his behavior becomes erratic and his emotions all over the place, he manages to scare off and disappoint his daughter and girlfriend. The man he despises so much growing up is now the man he became. Wade is aware of that and can be seen in the film that he is disgusted by it, so when his father goes up to him to say that he has finally become a man and loves him after pushing and hurting his daughter and his ex-gf noticing, he wants nothing to do with his father anymore. As Wade's brother Rolfe (Willem Dafoe) puts it "our stories, Wade's and mine, describe the lives of the boys and men for thousands of years: boys who were beaten by their fathers, whose capacity for love and trust was crippled almost at birth, men whose best hope for connection with other human beings lay in detachment... as if life were over." Upon hearing what Rolfe says, it leaves the audience showing pity and understanding of Wade's demise.
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Overall, I found this movie saddening based on the character's past and his inability to have his emotional scars healed up entirely, but I also did appreciate the effort and work Schrader put into screenwriting this movie from the novel. I also did like seeing the comparisons between this film and Schrader's other film we watched: Hardcore.
Thanks for reading my FILM talk!
Transformation in Art: The Films of Paul Schrader
Josh Zeman talks to Paul Schrader about his new film Affliction
Transformation in Art: The Films of Paul Schrader
Josh Zeman talks to Paul Schrader about his new film Affliction