Is it possible for a contemporary America drama dealing with grief not be referred to using the “post-9/11” prefix? Louder Than Bombs charts the emotional complexities of a middle-class New York family as a retrospective article about their deceased war photographer mother/wife is published in the New York Times, resurfacing their most base fragilities.
There is nothing in the film that remotely refers back to that harrowing event in American history, yet for many audiences it’s embedded in the subtext – New Yorkers who are confused how to react after this unexpected turbulent event in their lives.
A European reflection on America
Norwegian director Joachim Trier, the infinitely more subtle of the European arthouse auteurs with that name, marks his English language debut with this film; an outsider’s perspective on a distinctively American trauma, dealt with more nuance than his American filmmaking counterparts due to geographical distance.
Which isn’t to say this film is by any means subtle; not grasping English as a first language means that both Trier and regular co-writer Eskil Vogt produce dialogue so heavy-handed in addressing its themes it hits you over the head like a sledgehammer. But this blunt dialogue, twinned with an icy European detachment, makes this multi-stranded drama feel distinctive, possessing a bizarre emotional honesty that sets it a league apart from the similarly dreary Paul Haggis films it narratively resembles.
The film is anchored by three central performances, portraying a father and two sons desperately trying to find meaning in other women in ways a less intelligent film would pass off as a mere oedipal complex brought on by grief. Gabriel Byrne portrays the family patriarch in a believable way; he has been afforded the time to come to terms with his wife’s (Isabelle Huppert) passing, with a less than stable marriage not hindering the feelings of hurt clearly plastered over his face.
With the New York Times article about to be published, he has to come to terms with telling his youngest son Conrad (Devin Druid) that her death was self-inflicted; each new revelation about her life he discovers has little emotional repercussions on him. He’s settled his peace with the past just as his sons are about to feel disquiet and angst towards it.
Conrad is likely to be the most divisive character, as angst-ridden teenage boys in melodramatic ensemble pieces tend to be. Trier and Vogt try to find an honest truth in the character, but struggle. It is only Druid’s assured performance that rescues it from the verge of being insufferable. He refuses to speak to his dad, at one point suffocating himself with a carrier bag in front of him; a scene the film’s detractors can rightfully use against it, trying to make sincere a Harold and Maude–style skit. The character is presumably conceived in order to rebut preconceived character archetypes, but frequently becomes full-blown parody.
That Druid is still a magnetically watchable presence throughout the most nonsensical moments is the highest praise imaginable. Best known to audiences for playing a young Louis C.K in the terrific fourth season Louie episode Into the Woods, he is likely going to become typecast as a socially-awkward teenager by any casting agents who have seen this movie. It’s a shame, as here he takes on the most challenging (and embarrassing) role and returns unscathed.
Not liking these characters is the point
Jesse Eisenberg completes the trifecta of central roles as the eldest son Jonah, visiting his father in town shortly after the birth of his son. Leaving wife and baby at home, he chooses to reconnect with an old flame he tells that his wife has contracted a terminal illness, balancing that with trying to maintain a stable influence in his younger brother’s life. It is Eisenberg’s character arc that is all but screaming for criticism for representing middle class white guy problems the majority of the audience won’t even care about, let alone empathise with.
Of course, Trier’s film has more interesting things on its mind than making its protagonists likeable, but focusing on distinctively privileged, caucasian grief and how it causes its characters to react distastefully is intuitively going to test the patience of many audiences before a single frame has been seen.
Trier has a track record of making films about privileged people suffering from personal problems. His previous film Oslo, August 31st, was an empathetic masterpiece, fully putting us in the shoes of an unlikeable recovering drug addict with a finger permanently on the self-destruct button. Louder than Bombs is a more difficult proposition; grief naturally results in empathy, but Trier is uninterested in gouging a single iota.
Instead, it feels more like an exploration of how a family’s rampant narcissism has been stunted following severe revelations after the passing of a loved one. Viewed in this regard, the writing and the performances are pitched perfectly. The movie may appear to be asking for us to engage with them, but Trier maintains a steady detachment throughout, ensuring each emotional breakthrough is instantly mockable, only helping to accumulate their own levels of self-interest.
It is more engrossing than countless numbers of similarly themed dramas about white people problems due to putting them directly under microcosm and holding them up to scrutiny. Louder Than Bombs is a film that wouldn’t register as satirical towards an entire sub-genre instead of just a part of it, were it not for the two European minds putting the pen to paper.
Conclusion
Louder than Bombs is a work of a director subverting preconceptions so slyly, many audiences and critics will be easily forgiven for thinking it is nothing more than a work of morose egotism. The film is emotionally hollow, and that is why it represents the emotional truth. Characters in stasis, trying to sort out their own problems whilst firmly in the grip of a past long since irrelevant, yet still being used as an excuse to not mature out of their emotional immaturity.
This is certainly a film that will prove divisive, a character study following characters the director wants to keep as far away from as humanly possible.
What do you think about European directors making films about American trauma?
Louder than Bombs is released in the US on April 8 and in the UK on April 22. All international release dates are here.
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