Ari Folman (Waltz with Bashir) has been working on The Congress for the better part of five years now, with the first footage of the film appearing online almost three years ago exactly. Now, the final product has premiered at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival. Inspired by Stanislaw Lem’s short story “The Futurological Congress“, the film uses the idea that in the future hallucinogenic drugs will be used to replace reality, and Folman takes this thought to make a commentary on cinema and its potential demise at the hands of Hollywood overlords seeking new ways to remain stuck in the past rather than move forward into the future.
In many ways The Congress creates a complicated, well worn circle where advancements in technology are being used to maintain a hold on the past rather than propel us into the future. Utilizing both live-action and animation, the film begins with Robin Wright playing herself as an aging actress who’s “not even 45” being offered the last role she’ll ever be offered in Hollywood.
Danny Huston plays a Hollywood overlord working at the not so subtly titled Miramount studio where he offers Wright the opportunity to be hermetically scanned onto the studio’s servers where her likeness will reside in a perpetual state of youth. The studio will own all rights to Robin Wright the actress, meaning she can never act again in any capacity as they will use her digital self to continue making movies in which she’s the star.
Initially against the idea and more concerned for her ill son (Kodi-Smit McPhee), Wright is eventually convinced to accept the studio’s terms, a big payday and a 20 year contract that will see “her” starring in films such as RRR (aka Rebel Robot Robin).
Wright gives herself over to the role, which is not entirely forgiving. The success of The Princess Bride is thrown in her face when compared to the promising career she is told she through away with nothing but bad choices following Forrest Gump. Having Wright as the lead actress for such a role is somewhat ironic considering the surge her career has seen as of late with roles in films such as Rampart, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and her powerful contributions to “House of Cards”, but it’s a point well taken when considering the way Hollywood treats its aging female stars.
The first 45-50 minutes are entirely live-action and they make up the strongest portion of the film and actually conclude with a powerful scene in which Wright is being scanned into the system and her life-long agent (a noteworthy performance from Harvey Keitel) recounts the story of how he became an agent and what Wright means to him. It’s touching in that both recognize that what she’s doing means for their future in the careers they’ve come to love. When faced with the inevitable, Wright has chosen a last ditch effort at self-preservation in an ultimate method of retirement.
Shortly thereafter the movie shifts into full-on, psychedelic animation and it’s where Lem’s story plays a much larger role as we jump 20 years into the future, Wright’s contract is up and she’s headed to the Futurlogical Congress at the Miramount Hotel, located in a “restricted animation zone.”
The final two acts of the film are told in this ugly, animated style that’s more of an eyesore than anything beautiful. The shift is so jarring and the style in which it’s presented, as far as I can tell, adds nothing of visual significance to the film.
Wright is meant to speak at the Congress where new advancements in digital scanning are set to be unveiled, one of which includes the ability to “drink” (I wasn’t sure if this was meant to be taken literally) your favorite celebrities, an idea that was tackled in a far more interesting way in Brandon Cronenberg‘s Antiviral.
The message in these last two acts gets muddled with ideas from the film’s commentary on cinema and celebrity worship to its real world association. The Congress gets so lost in its floral, animated acid trip that the themes begin to disappear and I can only assume Folman lost his handle on the material and that’s one of the main reasons it has taken this long to come to the surface.
The live action sequences, and there’s a second one toward the end of the film, are all quite good and meaningful. The animated moments, however, only take away from the film. Considering the amount of time we spend watching Robin Wright stumble around with a digital Jon Hamm (a character that never really finds his footing) in a world she describes as being designed by a “genius designer on an acid trip”, it all can’t help but fall apart. I’m only happy Folman didn’t decide to further complicate his commentary with 3-D. I’m not sure my eyes could have handled anymore.
The Congress is smart and challenging, but almost too much for its own good. Folman seems to have lost control of his film and just couldn’t find a way to reign it in. He definitely challenged himself and that’s something I think we want to see from all of today’s talented directors, but as much as I can respect the effort I can’t say I enjoyed the film.
