Independent Visions: Why Soffia Coppola Could Totally Kick Spielberg's Ass

I finally saw Sofia Coppola's "Marie Antoinette."  It's glorious.  But rather than bore you with a general review, here are a few specific ideas about the film and the genre in general.

What makes this film so wonderful is that Coppola's approach is utterly, unabashedly, and courageously unique.  I am so bored of historical, factual, biographical, etc. cookie-cutter films, no matter how well executed they may be.  

What do I mean?  Consider the following.

I also just rewatched "Saving Private Ryan."  While I was absolutely engrossed and moved, I also hated it.  My reaction is summed up best by the following review (from Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader).

"Steven Spielberg's 1998 exercise in Oscar-mongering is a compilation of effects and impressions from all the war movies he's ever seen, decked out with precise instructions about what to think in Robert Rodat's script and how to feel in John Williams's hokey music. There's something here for everybody--war is hell (Sam Fuller), war is father figures (Oliver Stone), war is absurd (David Lean, Stanley Kubrick), war is necessary (John Ford), war is surreal (Francis Coppola), war is exciting (Robert Aldrich), war is upsetting (all of the preceding and Lewis Milestone), war is uplifting (ditto)--and nothing that suggests an independent vision, unless you count seeing more limbs blown off than usual (the visceral opening sequence, showing Omaha Beach on June 6, 1944) or someone getting graphically shot underwater."

This is such a perfect response to each and every one of the well-executed historical, biographical, factual, etc. films I've ever seen.  

Yes, they work.

Yes, they're well made.

Yes, they make you cry.  

But they're all the exact same movie.  There's no "independent vision."  It's all so very safe and strategic.

In Coppola's "Antoinette," however, everything feels new and fresh.  What does she do that's so different?  As usual, Ebert put it best:

"Coppola has been criticized in some circles for her use of a contemporary pop overlay -- hit songs, incongruous dialogue, jarring intrusions of the Now upon the Then. But no one ever lives as Then; it is always Now. Many characters in historical films seem somehow aware that they are living in the past. Marie seems to think she is a teenager living in the present, which of course she is -- and the contemporary pop references invite the audience to share her present with ours. Forman's "Amadeus" had a little of that, with its purple wigs."

Her attempt is far more ambitious, subjective and personal than Spielberg's.  She asks you define meaning on your own, where as Spielberg, I would argue, tells you how to feel.  Coppola's music doesn't cheat.  The characters don't say exactly what they should say to bring about the correct emotional response.  There's no finale, no "third act" even.  The movie is a series of scenes which build to nothing in particular, at least not until you've had time to really think about them.  She isn't a strategic filmmaker, Spielberg is (in fact, Spielberg is probably the best strategic filmmaker alive, which I mean as both a compliment and a critique).

Of course, I'm a fool, because films like "Ryan" appeal to far more people than "Antoinette," chiefly because you have to work a little on your own to make sense of the latter.  "Ryan" conveniently delivers your emotions to you in a nice little box, which is what most people want.  And there's nothing wrong with this, I just wish there was more of an appreciation for people like Coppola who attacked stories from this angle.