Over the weekend I rewatched Danny Boyle‘s The Beach (2000) starring Leonardo DiCaprio who, at the time of shooting, must have been around 24-years-old or so. Immediately I started thinking, either people are aging much faster nowadays or DiCaprio has even more of a baby face than my mind previously attributed to him because Damn does he look young!
This was the first time I’d watched The Beach since it was released 13 years ago and the only thing I could remember about that first viewing was DiCaprio as Richard having sex with Sal (Tilda Swinton), the beach leader, during a trip back to the mainland for supplies. That moment starnds out because it was the moment my interest in the film dramatically declined. Watching it again 13 years later I have the same issue with the exact same moment.
The Beach, to me, is very similar to Fight Club except instead of unplugging from the real world and fighting back, the members of the beach are unplugging and attempting to remove themselves entirely, building a utilitarian society where a dependence on modern technology and a slavery to commercialism is presumably abolished. Of course, I think it adequately displays the inability of humans to completely unplug and the trip Sal and Richard take to the mainland is evidence of this, but the sexual encounter between Sal and Richard serves a different purpose, muddying up the thematic waters a little too much.
Prior to the trip to the mainland, Richard takes everyone’s orders, everything from batteries to tampons are on the list, immediately making it clear that while this community is able to survive, there are wants that can’t be satisfied.
Now you might be saying, “But the sexual encounter between Sal and Richard was an example of human needs and wants. Sal wanted Richard and Richard saw it as a necessity to keep the secret about the map he gave the two drunken tourists a secret. He did it out of a need for survival.”
Yes, you’re right, however, he shouldn’t have felt that need at all. The beach community has already proven very forgiving to the point where Étienne (Guillaume Canet) unselfishly steps aside when Françoise (Virginie Ledoyen) cheats on him with Richard and the community merely accepts the situation as over and done with. A secret was being hidden, but the truth was finally out in the open, was dealt with and the community moved on. After all, what’s the alternative?
In order to keep a secret island community a secret you can’t kick anyone off and while they may be perfectly fine sending someone off to the jungle to die, it doesn’t seem there’s an interest in killing anyone. So why would Richard feel the need to keep the map a secret? He was already a beneficiary of the beach community’s forgiving and understanding nature.
Leading up to Sal and Richard’s sexual encounter, I felt the film accomplished a lot, but the steam it lost ruins what could have otherwise been a much better movie.
The third act could have almost played out just as it does, leading to a moment where Sal pulls the trigger on a gun aimed at Richard’s head only to realize it isn’t loaded. However, instead of the beach community running away and abandoning their life on the island, I would have found it far more interesting had they finally risen up and decided to execute Sal and welcome Richard back into the fold.
It wouldn’t be wise to just kick Sal off the island as it would be far too risky and I’m not sure the “farmers” would have allowed it anyway. Her execution, however, would prove a turning point in the community’s lifestyle and politics. By resorting to a tactic utilized and debated across the globe, sentencing Sal to a death sentence to preserve their secret way of life would have said far more than virtually any other moment in this film.
That said, the ultimate ending doesn’t ring true to me at all. Richard sits down at a computer, opens an email attachment from Françoise and smiles, remembering the time on the beach fondly. No! The Beach is an ugly movie, looking at the ugliness of society, end it on a truly ugly note.
I would prefer the final images to be of a secret beach community, playing volleyball on the white sands of a secluded island cove despite the knowledge their happiness comes at the price of taking the life of one of their own. Game, set, match.
EXTRA: Here are a few shots from the film I personally liked. Darius Khondji (Se7en, Midnight in Paris) served as the film’s cinematographer.
