1/5
Five minutes into Tjokroaminoto (alternately titled The Hijra), I knew it wasn’t working, but I held steady. “Be patient,” my gracious mind advised, “Give it some time to unravel. It may get better.” Never has a purer act of human benevolence gone so utterly unrewarded. The kindest thing I can say about The Hijra is that it isn’t the worst film I’ve ever seen; the bad news, however, is that it is the most boring. It’s one thing for a film to be as lifeless and poorly realized as this one — clumsily directed, under-edited, and stiffly written — but what does it say when I walk away from a movie even less interested in its real-life subject than when it began? If the goal was to pay tribute to an influential figure, it may as well have never been made. I’d be saner for it.
Omar Said Tjokroaminoto, referred to in the film simply as Tjokro, was a critical figure in the formation of the Islamic Trade Union. So says my research, anyhow. The film attempts to dramatize this crucial period of his life and the political intrigue within, but I must confess: my eyes glazed over so early on that even the smallest details of this period were lost on me. I recall the story not in plot points or historical insights but rather as a series of muffled cries heard from within the cork-lined confines of an Orwellian re-education chamber. This raises the question: is it honest to review a film if the critic remembers nothing about it? Perhaps the answer is “no”. If so, allow me to describe the experience of watching the movie in place of the movie itself. Rest assured; that is a Joycean odyssey all its own.
As is usual for a festival (this was my third screening of the Tokyo International Film Festival), I walked into the film knowing only a title. I had no knowledge of the actors, the director, or even the story, perhaps making me its ideal target. Almost as soon as the lights went down, I knew something was wrong. Some sage advice: if the opening titles of a film evoke memories of your friend’s student films, that is your cue to tip your hat and discreetly make your exit. If only I’d been so wise. Indeed, scenes depicting the beginning of Tjokro’s life are, without any apparent discrimination, intercut with black and white photographs overlain with the names of cast and crew. This seems incidental at first, but it’s the first sign of a much bigger issue: despite its sprawling scope, this is a film without vision, and is therefore hardly a film at all.
Who exactly was Tjokroaminoto? As a walking set of political ideals, he is oppressively there, but as a man, he is absent. There is not one moment that allows him to express himself as a full-blooded personality. He is caged-in by a script that strips him down to a series of quotes and wise retorts. All the characters, in fact, exist only as vehicles for some the most tiresome diatribe to be written for the screen in any language. There is never speech, only speechifying. Nearly every scene in the movie adheres to the following template: 1) gather people into a small crowd filled with extras primed for nodding and murmuring, 2) have a character inexplicably begin shouting about Tjokro and socio-political conflict, and 3) if there is no room for 1 or 2, create a scene that exists only to feature a handful of plain folk exchanging remarks in a contrived “Did’ya hear?” manner to keep the audience aware of the brewings not discussed in every other occurrence of histrionic grandstanding. It’s about as subtle as an RKG to the face, and it leaves the film without the slightest sense of rhythm, coherence, humanity, or even intrigue.
About forty-five minutes into the film, I looked to the man next to me for some sign that it wasn’t just me. He was out like a light. “Phew,” I thought, “Of all the things that I am at this moment — bored, flabbergasted, fuming with anger — wrong is demonstrably not one of them. ” All that was left to do was to see the thing through. I reached into my press bag, unfolded my copy of the day’s screening schedule, and desperately squinted through the darkness to acquire some sense of how much of this torture was left to endure. I kid you not: the delirious cackle that escaped from my mouth upon reading of the movie’s one-hundred-sixty-one-minute runtime would have had me thrown out of the cinema if 80% of the audience hadn’t already been fast asleep.
I could hardly believe my eyes. How in god’s name could anyone have consciously allowed this film to leave the editing room at such an unforgivable length? The pain of sitting through it was considerable enough — for its entirety, I slumped, I fidgeted, I sighed with defeat — but as the film unfolded, I began to consider things more practically. How is a film this long to be marketed? Who is its proper audience? It is too lengthy to be aimed at the casual cinemagoer, and any cinephile worth their salt would be wise to avoid this like a wasp nest. If it is to have any life beyond the festival circuit, it needs to be cut by at least one hour. Yes, it would compromise the narrative, but to worry about that is to think that it has anything remotely resembling a narrative in the first place. To distributors: butcher the thing. If not for commerce, if not for art, it is to be done out of basic decency.
I often marvel at films that fail on so many levels, but only if the failures are fascinating in and of themselves. Ridley Scott’s The Counselor, a work that had every reason to be great, is a film manages to make Cameron Diaz having sex with the windshield of a Ferrari seem inert and bone-dry. After Last Season, a movie I’m proud to call the all-time worst, is so terrible that it transcends itself and begins to take on a perverse majesty. There is no such novelty in The Hijra. Its missteps are so elementary, so obvious from frame one, that they offer no surprise, no relish. One is simply left adrift in the movie’s nearly three-hour runtime, numb to even the slightest pleasures and paralyzed by unfathomable boredom. By the end, the only satisfaction mined was the privilege — the cosmic mercy — of finally leaving the cinema, a warm bath of sunlight welcoming my return like the tearful embrace of a loved one after years lost at sea.
Spencer Moleda is a freelance writer, script supervisor, and motion picture researcher residing in Los Angeles, California. His experience ranges from reviewing movies to providing creative guidance to fledgling film projects. You can reach him at: www.spencermoleda.com
Spencer Moleda is a freelance writer, script supervisor, and motion picture researcher residing in Los Angeles, California. His experience ranges from reviewing movies to providing creative guidance to fledgling film projects. You can reach him at: [email protected]