Review: The Burning Plain

Theron goes for Oscar gold. 

Charlize Theron, Kim Basinger, Jennifer Lawrence, José María Yazpik, Joaquim de Almeida, Tessa Ia, Diego J. Torres, J.D. Pardo, Danny Pino, John Corbett, Robin Tunney
SCR/DIR: Guillermo Arriaga
R / 1:46 / RELEASE: 9/18/09
www.burningplainmovie.com

The Burning Plain is a handsomely-shot, beautifully-performed multi-generational story of love, loss and guilt. So how come it’s so unfocused and frustrating? 

The problem lies in a twofold decision made by writer-director Guillermo Arriaga.  The most obvious gaffe is to present the story in a non-linear timeline, which is generally a wonderful way to unfold a mystery, peeling back layers of story to reach one undeniable truth.

That’s the second problem.  This isn’t a mystery.  There is nothing to solve.  The Burning Plain is the stuff of high drama with flawed characters attempting to understand a traumatic incident from the past, one that everybody knows about from the first few seconds of the movie.  And with no mystery to solve, the fractured narrative calls attention to itself and asks us to look for clues to something that will never come.

Minor spoilers ahead:

Middle-aged New Mexico mom Gina (Kim Basinger) is having an affair with Nick (Joaquim de Almeida), a married man.  They meet regularly in a shabby trailer in the middle of the desert.  Her daughter Mariana (Jennifer Lawrence) becomes suspicious and grows remote, but no more so than your garden variety snotty teenager.

It’s not spoiling anything to tell you the love trailer explodes in a big fireball.  It’s the very first thing that happens in the movie.  We immediately jump into the aftermath: Gina and Nick have died in the freak explosion, exposing their indiscretions to their families.  Daughter Mariana eventually strikes up her own connection with Santiago, the son of the deceased adulterer, going so far to recreate aspects of their parents’ affair.

In another timeline, Mariana (now played by Charlize Theron, also a producer) has assumed the name Sylvia and has relocated to Portland.  She manages a high-end restaurant and has random sex with just about anyone.  She also broods a lot and occasionally cuts herself.  Mariana/Sylvia sure seems like she’s carrying a lot of guilt.  

Suddenly, a sullen Mexican man shows up with a little girl.  It doesn’t take a Power Point presentation to figure out where this is all going.

Basinger and Almeida in The Burning Plain

If I’m snarky, it’s because what unfolds within the frame is quite good.  Theron is as restrained as she is powerful, with her striking dark eyes conveying a world of pain.  Basinger is also solid in a complex role (hers is the only secret worth keeping).  Alas, the rest of the cast does what they can with the material, despite lazy casting: nobody even slightly resembles their younger or older counterparts.

The music is sparse, but the atmosphere is thick.  Expertly shot by two cinematographers (Robert Elswit captured the rainy blues of Portland while John Toll conveys the dry, dusty heat of New Mexico), any sampling of footage would convince anyone this is some quality Oscar bait.  And there are some very strong award-friendly moments, especially from Theron.

But story strands are introduced and go nowhere.  Capable actors like John Corbet and Robin Tunney are reduced to standing around.  And worse, the symbolism is so heavy-handed, you can craft a drinking game around it. 

Here is where it’s important to call out Guillermo Arriaga, who co-wrote director Alejandro González Iñárritu's films Amores perros (2000), 21 Grams (2003), and Babel (2006).  He wrote this film for himself to direct, and his ability to get it made was likely based on his previous films.

But let’s go back to that structure.  Told chronologically, Theron’s nude entrance as a seriously damaged adult would have been more powerful.  It also would have placed the focus squarely on the shoulders of her character, which is where it belongs.  But if Arriaga really needed to structure this film out of sequence, then he should have practiced some restraint.  

The movie’s fatal flaw is showing us that explosion in the opening frames and following it up with a scene in which teenage boys are climbing through the charred wreckage. 

Charlize Theron in The Burning Plain.

If Arriaga had held back showing the explosion until the moment we find out exactly who and what caused it, then The Burning Plain would have had an element of mystery to it.  We would have wondered the entire time how these two middle-aged lovers died.  The moment of the explosion would have been as stunning to us as it was to the other character in the scene when it occurs. 

But to reveal it upfront strips all the mystery out of it.  Now that we know exactly “what” happened, the “how” part becomes an afterthought, allowing us to focus on other things, like how little Jennifer Lawrence resembles Charlize Theron.

Did the distributor think we needed a huge explosion to open the film or was this a decision made by the filmmaker?

That’s a very important question.  One is a commercial decision that undermines delicate storytelling.  The other one reveals a certain flavor of hackery.  I’m hoping one day Guillermo Arriaga opens up about how he was forced by the studio to change his film, but I fear that will never happen.

The Burning Plain is positioned as an Oscar contender but squanders the power of its own performances by allowing its framework to overwhelm the sum of its parts.