Review: Only Lovers Left Alive

13th February 2014

By Marc Swadel.

If your like me, and are sick of the cheesy advent of ‘Twilight’ type films, reducing the dark sexiness of the Vampire do the level of Los Angles teen scenester appeal, then you will applaud Jim Jarmusch’s new film ‘Only Lovers Left Alive’ which offers something less crappy and more laidback, and rock n roll. Consider this a reclaimation of things Vampiric to the cool side.

In a very good way, Jarmusch has made vampire films more human.

He has a perfectly balanced and selected cast – the deeply in love, and quite traditional pairing of Adam and Eve, played by Tom Hiddleston and Tilda Swinton, Eves younger and troublesome sister Eva, played by Mia wazikowska, the older and wiser Marlowe played by John Hurt

The film creates a wonderfully relaxed and laidback atmosphere, and addresses some quite realistic issues if you were someone intellectual/creative who lived for centuries – you would need to engage with your human counterparts, and would want to express your creative juices, but of course, could be seen – being on radar is not the thing a vampire wants to be – attention would bring disaster and death, but its as if they were there almost guiding the development of creative endeavour, but not being able to fully take credit themselves.

Another issue – food! As they say in the film – sucking necks is so 15^th century 🙂

Being intelligent, enlightened vampires, it is about getting a feed without killing people and drawing attention – so supply of good clean blood is a key thing.

Hiddlestons Adam, is a reclusive musician and gear collector, and Swintons Eve, is the more romantic, living a nocturnal life in Algiers, surrounded by her beloved books. The film unfolds at a languid pace, and the direction of the fine cast is both assured and not over wrought. Jarmusch has made a fine, understated comedy, which all in all is a celebration of life, death, and love, and the inescapable fact you can’t choose your family. Even Vampires have relatives that drop by unannounced (Mia Wazakowza’s character Eva) who quickly meddles in the finely tuned lives of the loving couple.

On screen cameos by soundtrack bands White Hills, Jasmine Hamdan, and Jarmusch’s SQÜRL band mate Carter Logan add to the feel of the vampires being on the edges of what is happening.

And what a soundtrack!! Winner of Best Soundtrack Award at Cannes last year (the film itself was nominated for Palme D’or), it fair sizzles with fantastic, understated intensity, especially the atmospheric work of Jozef Van Wissem, which adds a timeless, very ethereal feel to the images.

The cinematography, of French shooter Yorick Le Saux, is, considering the limitations of being only able to shoot at night (obviously!) lush and colourful, with a fantastic tonality.

The art direction has us feel each of the vampires homes are more of a womb, and incubator, not just of the vampires, but their creative and expressive urges.

All in All – a very satisfying, assured, and low pretense film. A great example of when a good story, good actors and good direction just coexist beautifully without any need to exert undue pressure from any angle of the production.

8/10

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