This Must Be the Place (2011)

 

 Originally published in The Daily Nebraskan, 4-1-14

Home
is where I want to be
but I guess I’m already there
I come home
she lifted up her wings
I guess that this must be the place

These are lyrics from The Talking Heads’ song “This Must Be the Place.” They have been playing over and over in my head since I watched Paolo Sorrentino’s “This Must Be the Place” during spring break. The film takes its title from the song, which plays several times throughout the movie in different forms and renditions.

This film is so good, I don't know why I didn’t hear about it sooner. Sean Penn is Cheyenne, an aging rock star who still does his stage makeup every single day. His hair is a ragged paintbrush of black hair – he’s always blowing away that one strand that won’t stay put. Cheyenne speaks everything in a gentle murmur, always barely above a whisper. His walking is more like shuffling. On his bad days, he may be mistaken for an old woman.

Simply seeing Sean Penn made up in this way is enough to fuel plenty of silent giggles. He looks like a cross between Ozzy Osbourne and Bono’s grandmother, with just a sprinkling of Robert Smith for some edge.

Cheyenne has a mostly quiet life. He lives in Dublin with his wife (Frances McDormand) and visits with a fan (Eve Hewson) on occasion, but he’s haunted by the memory of two young boys who killed themselves because of his music. He tries to visit their graves but is turned away by the boys’ parents and told he’s not welcome. One day, Cheyenne hears his father is dying. He goes to visit his father at his deathbed but arrives too late. Cheyenne tries to appease his guilt by seeking out a Nazi officer who tormented his father during the Holocaust. What follows is Cheyenne’s journey to the United States to find the Nazi, and he meets many curious characters in his travels.

Sorrentino’s most recent film, “The Great Beauty,” won an Academy Award and was praised for its rich visual style. Looking at “This Must Be the Place,” one can see hints of the visual splendor to come in Sorrentino’s work. This cinematography in “This Must Be the Place” is spotless. Dolly shots and long takes are used to great effect. The camera swoops gracefully over an idle neighborhood to reveal several characters. We dolly between two characters and gaze down a huge chasm as their conversation grows more distant. Graceful, engaging shots bloom left and right, highlighting Cheyenne’s struggle and the sheltered world he inhabits.

A scene about halfway through the film is shot as one long take. It’s a long, gradual dolly back over a David Byrne concert, and it starts as a shot of a woman sitting in a ’50s style living room, thumbing through a magazine and tapping her foot to the opening strings of “This Must Be the Place.” It’s a bit disconcerting at first, until we realize that this is part of a musical performance. The camera keeps slowly pulling back, revealing the players on the stage and then David Byrne himself, who starts to sing the song that resonates throughout the rest of the film.

Gradually, the living room set behind the performers tilts vertically, hanging above the stage. The camera has stopped moving backwards. The living room set now moves slowly over the performers and towards the camera, now hanging sideways, with the woman still somehow sitting in the chair and reading the magazine. It comes to fill up half the screen, then the camera turns to face the crowd, slowly moving towards Cheyenne, the only still figure in the crowd, with a forlorn expression on his face. David Byrne’s rendition of “This Must Be the Place” works perfectly with the scene.

That shot goes on for three minutes, and it’s just one of many beautiful visions in “This Must Be the Place.” It’s a nuanced visual construction that utilizes all the tools of cinema at once. It’s one of those shots that opens and closes repeatedly in your memory, calling you to watch it again. The whole film and all of its images leave this impression on me. It does what many of the best films do, which is capture a state of mind in images and music. Penn is at the core of this film. At the tail end of the aforementioned scene, staring into the camera with eyes that tell us all we need to know, and yet nothing.

No easy words came when trying to write about this film. It’s not a film that wears its heart on its sleeve. In this way, “This Must Be the Place” is much like its central character. It’s curious, dryly funny, subtle, puzzling and a delight to watch. Like Cheyenne, this movie may also be genius. I have only seen it once, but I have no doubt that my appreciation of “This Must Be the Place” will grow with time. Whenever I see a great film that can surprise, delight and puzzle me, I feel like I’m home. I guess this must be the place.