Chekhov’s gun is the well-known writing adage that if you show a gun in the beginning of the story, it should be fired by the end. It is a plea to writing efficiency; don’t add unnecessary fluff. Efficiency though is not itself an ultimate virtue, as this mentality can be suffocating to the unique beauty that can emerge from sloppy writing, narrative cul-de-sacs, or the rule of cool. Strange and specific choices are interesting regardless of narrative significance. One corollary of Chekhov’s gun, which I find more useful, is that if you choose to have a gun – or perhaps an orbital laser – in Act I, might as make use of the opportunity to use it. Fire that laser. This film starts with a close up of the titular ‘better man’ – an anthropomorphized ultra-realistic Chimpanzee face. This Chekhov’s Chimpanzee hangs above the door throughout the entire film, yet he never fires a single bullet. Though at least he does decapitate someone with a sword.
Why is Robbie Williams a chimp? This question was like a monkey on my back throughout the film. *Pause for raucous laughter and applause*. A google search will reveal that reason given, is William’s feeling like a performing monkey. [Technically, chimpanzees are apes, not monkeys. This is a common misconception. The metaphor would be taxonomically inaccurate.] Which may be his truth, but it isn’t evident by the events of “Better Man”. Though his manager didn’t treat Robbie particularly well during his boyband days, it was never a coerced career. Unlike that of an actual performing ape, he was not bound by a leash. (And none of the other guys in Take That were portrayed as chimps). It was his choice to try out for the boy band. It was his choice to continue his solo career when he got kicked out. It was his own internal drive and desire to keep performing and performing, despite it wearing him out.
So, why is Robbie Williams a chimp? The choice seems only detrimental to the film. “Better Man” covers Robbie Williams’ rise to fame. Robbie Williams got famous quite young; chimpanzees have quite wrinkly faces. A-ha, a dilemma! Hard to see something so haggard looking (from a human perspective) seem young and youthful. The film tries its best to compensate, mostly via clothes and hair, but it is an uphill battle. Without going to Wikipedia, I would be hard-pressed to understand how much time has passed from his rise to fame in a boyband to the final concert at the end of the movie.
Maybe it was 20 years, maybe it was only three. All I know it was at least nine months, since there was a whole subplot of the ape wooing and impregnating a human woman. And not to shame furries, but there was a visceral discomfort whenever he went in for a kiss.
Why is Robbie Williams a chimp? He doesn’t do anything chimp-like. Amazingly there aren’t even many missed opportunities for monkey business. The one noteworthy m.o. is when Williams trashes his home. A classic scene in any movie about a downward spiral. You could have Chimp Williams swinging from the chandelier, climbing all over the place, screeching like a chimp. But no, he just trashes the house like any non-chimp human would… Boring!
Not only does the film not want to play up the lead’s zoological appearance, the script seems to be unaware of the lead characters atypical mode of being. Some oddities pop up in the word choices. Like the aforementioned human-woman calling Robbie “a fucking animal” in an argument. Given the appropriate cinematic weight such a phrase would be given in a lover’s quarrel. That is, if it were towards a human looking human that is. Now it instead catches your ear. “…But he is an animal though?” your subconscious can’t help but think. Does she actually know he’s a chimpanzee? Is this a racism allegory? Answers to both is, of course, no. But the audience shouldn’t be distracted by such pointless questions in an otherwise dramatic scene.
Similar questions arise when, during the beginning of Take That’s success. Robbie gets a handjob from a groupie. Who, somehow, has mistaken him, the only chimpanzee in the group, with another member of the band. An easy mistake to make!
During a particularly heartfelt and saccharine scene at rehab, the drug addict chimpanzee discusses his substance abuse and how fame impacted him. He brings up the saying that life freezes when you become famous. Now he is forever a fifteen-year-old. Though, he doesn’t put it like that. He says he is “unevolved”. He says this with full sincerity, tears in his eyes, in a scene which expects you to be as well. The choice of phrase takes me out of the moment. Use a different word!
Maybe I am being too harsh, perhaps this is just the thesis of the film. The elusive answer to the “why is he a chimp” question. If only, if only. The final scenes of the film show a mature Robbie. One who seems to have grown out of his destructive ways, drug-free, and mentally calm. It is a sappy happy ending. The movie indeed about growing up and changing. Afterall, the film wasn’t titles after Robbie William’s other famous songs – “Let Me Entertain You” would have been an obvious candidate for biopic title – choosing to title it “Better Man.” …Except he is still a chimpanzee at the end. So still unevolved then, I suppose, if the metaphor was supposed to be intentional. [As an aside: humans aren’t evolved from chimpanzees, rather we share a common ancestor. So, making the chimp being a metaphor for being unevolved is scientifically inaccurate]
The lack of awareness goes beyond word choice as well. The most distracting example is during his stay in rehab. We get a cliché, yet effective scene. One where a character looks at themselves in a mirror as they cut their hair. It a straight-forward way to visually represent internal transformation with an external one.
Taking this example from “The Royal Tenenbaums”, there is a significant shift of appearance to what the character looked like throughout the film previously and after the shaving. This mirrors (ha!) a change in the characters perspective and inner world. Now let’s look at the before and after in “Better Man.”
Transformative, isn’t it? The slightly scruffy ape person, is now slightly less scruffy. Why even have that scene?
So, again, why is Robbie a chimp? Besides making the insane climactic concert scene easier, using computers instead of stunts and physical people. it seems like the answer is perhaps it was purely a publicity stunt. Or, more charitably, because they thought it would be neat. But they did not seem to have put much thought beyond that. No thought seemed to be have given to how it impacted the narrative. Or impacted the viewing experience. It is just a photo filter applied to the lead character for the audiences’ sake and that’s it. What a wasted opportunity.
AWholeCroissant 