Review: Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil

John Cusack stars as a New York reporter hired by a magazine to cover a swank Christmas party in Savannah, Georgia, hosted by rich Southern gentleman Kevin Spacey (insinuating, charismatic, and slightly elusive). It is there that Cusack is introduced to various colourful locals. After the party concludes, Cusack goes home. However, his slumber doesn’t last long because he hears a lot of commotion from Spacey’s place across the street from where Cusack is residing. It turns out that Spacey has shot and killed a young man played by Jude Law, who had earlier been making drunken threats to Spacey (an antiques dealer, by the way), and who was Spacey’s lover. Now what was going to be a disposable puff piece about a swank party, has turned into a murder trial story involving one of Savannah’s most prominent (and ‘in the closet’) citizens. He even manages to get the exclusive coverage by agreeing to help Spacey (who claims self-defence) and his attorney (Jack Thompson) in the investigation of the case. Meanwhile, Cusack encounters two feminine inhabitants of Savannah, the alluring Mandy (Alison Eastwood), and The Lady Chablis (played by one and the same), who isn’t your traditional girl, she is in fact a transsexual. The Lady Chablis apparently knew the deceased well. Bob Gunton plays the prosecuting attorney, Irma P. Hall is the local voodoo priestess, Geoffrey Lewis is a local weirdo who may be concocting deadly poisons, Anne Haney plays Spacey’s mother, and Kim Hunter is another local who aids Cusack.

Forging a mid 70s-early 80s niche as the star of several reactionary, rather right-wing urban actioners, Clint Eastwood has had a much more varied and unusual career as a director after making his directorial debut with the excellent “Play Misty For Me” in 1971. Beginning with this 1997 adaptation of a John Berendt book (mostly non-fiction), Eastwood was making films that touched on topics you wouldn’t immediately associate with the guy who recently and most notoriously mocked President Obama by talking to an empty chair. The star of such homophobic and right-wing endeavours as “Sudden Impact” was quite possibly evolving. Here was a story that touched on homosexuality and also featured prominent gay and transsexual characters, and it doesn’t exactly demonise or even ridicule them. In fact, perhaps the worst sin committed here by Eastwood and writer John Lee Hancock (director of the overrated “The Blind Side”, writer of Eastwood’s not bad “A Perfect World”) is that the main character played by John Cusack and apparently based on Berendt himself, has been changed from a gay man to a straight man. This is regrettable, but anyone who accuses Eastwood of homophobia here is misguided. For starters, I don’t think Mr. Eastwood agrees with the disgusted sentiment of the local townsfolk upon learning of Spacey’s private affairs. It seems as though he’s condemning them for their intolerance. Why would a homophobe do such a thing? He wouldn’t. And try as Eastwood and screenwriter Hancock might (if you believe this is what their agenda is), the Cusack character still feels as though he was meant to be seen as gay anyway, at least in the early stages of the film, and there’s plenty of swish going on around him anyway and that’s before the drag queen even turns up (KD Lang is even on the soundtrack!). Kevin Spacey (whose character is a grown man with a cat, which tells you a lot), for instance, seems to be trying to suggest an attraction between his character and Cusack’s (and it’s interesting that after Spacey disappoints Cusack at one point, Cusack almost immediately seeks out Ms. Eastwood to kiss her. Frustrated much, Mr. Cusack?). I also think making Cusack straight allows him to function as the surrogate for the viewer to the colourful surroundings. Sure, there are plenty of gay viewers out there, but it’s not such a terrible idea in that sense to give someone for the majority of the audience to latch onto.

But there’s no doubt that the change is a problem, because it feels tacked-on when Cusack mentions that he’s straight. It may not be homophobic, but it doesn’t feel authentic or organic to the story, either, with everything else I’ve mentioned. Was it tacked-on after bad test screenings? It feels that way to me, rather than simply laying the blame at Mr. Eastwood or even the screenwriter. So I condemn the execution more than the idea itself here. Anyway, I just needed to get that out of the way before discussing perhaps more relevant aspects of the film.

The film takes too long to get to where it’s going (and is far too long overall), and to be honest, it gets sidetracked with the character of The Lady Chablis instead of focusing on whether Kevin Spacey is guilty or innocent. Meanwhile, in a case of nepotism gone wrong, Alison Eastwood is completely out of her depth as the love interest of the Cusack character, perhaps shoe-horned into the story to offset any residual ‘gayness’ (she’s essentially a ‘beard’), but more likely just so Clint could attempt to kick-start his daughter’s career. She simply hasn’t got the chops for the part (playing a florist who moonlights as a torch-singing noirish siren!), and although not unattractive, she hasn’t quite got the body for it, either to be (brutally) honest. She’s not Sofia Coppola levels of ineptitude (and apparently her casting in a film directed by her dad was actually incidental- yeah, I believe that), but the actress is nonetheless a really phony element in an otherwise convincing, wonderfully colourful and atmospheric depiction of Savannah, Georgia. It’s the best thing about the entire film. Whatever the film’s flaws, a lack of atmosphere ain’t one of ‘em because this oozes Southern Gothic atmosphere from moment one with wonderful locations. Eastwood successful makes Savannah feel like an outwardly ‘respectable’ town almost bursting at the seams, barely concealing its secrets and sinister intentions.

Unfortunately, while all this atmosphere and conspiratorial goings on give us a fascinating set-up, it’s these very same things that end up looking awfully foolish when one realises that the central mystery isn’t worth it. Either Spacey killed in cold blood or he did it for another reason. Either way, we know he did it, so the build-up, police incompetence and so forth seems unwarranted for what is a fairly uninteresting crime. When one gets to the conclusion, yes it’s a tad more complicated, but only a tad, and certainly not anything much of a moral dilemma. You could even argue that Eastwood has populated the film with well-known and interesting names and faces to cover for a story that is lacking. So the film ends up being a disappointing fizzer at the end of the day, despite some very commendable elements.

Chief among these positives are the performances by Cusack, Aussie legend Jack Thompson (who steals any scene Kevin Spacey isn’t in), Jude Law, and Kevin Spacey in one of his very best performances (and that’s saying something). John Cusack is a sturdy presence in the lead, but there’s no doubt that some of the people around him act him off the screen at times. Aside from some seriously distracting brown contact lenses that make him look like one of those aliens from “The X-Files”, Spacey’s in particularly fine form here. He acts like he’s the only one in the film who knows how all this ends. He looks typically amused with himself throughout and it’s a fun performance that has you changing your mind constantly whether this guy is merely a cold-blooded murderer or something more complex. Jack Thompson adopts one of his better yank accents in a choice role here. His performance sits somewhere in the vicinity of Burl Ives without tipping over into latter day, overly indulgent Orson Welles. If you’re going to see this film, it should be for Spacey and our Jack, both seemingly having a great time, too. Jude Law doesn’t get much screen time, but with short shrift given to him, he nonetheless makes for an instantly worrying presence.

Look out for fine work by Kim Hunter, Bob Gunton (perfect casting as the dispassionate prosecutor), Leon Rippy, and Irma P. Hall (the latter almost single-handedly supplying the voodoo flavour) in too-small but memorable roles. Poor Anne Haney misses out as Spacey’s mother, seemingly waiting around to be written into the film, and as for Eastwood regular Geoffrey Lewis’ character, all I can do is throw my hands up in the air. I have no clue what the hell that was all about. And then there is non-actor The Lady Chablis, playing herself (most of the characters are based on real people, even if some of the names have been changed) like I imagine no other could. The Lady Chablis is certainly no actor, but so what? Who better to play The Lady Chablis than The Lady Chablis? It’s perfect casting, no matter the quality of the performance. I must say, though, that I found it absolutely bizarre that seemingly no one in the film could tell that The Lady Chablis was not, in fact, a lady. It’s obvious, isn’t it?

Look, this is in some ways an interesting failure from Eastwood, but interesting not so much in terms of being an entertaining film, more in terms of thinking about how it sits with the earlier persona Eastwood had forged and his well-established Republican/Libertarian allegiance. The film itself starts off interestingly and full of flavour, but is too slow and ultimately one realises the central mystery has no real juice to it. Still, it’s almost worth watching just to see Spacey and Thompson at work (both should’ve been Oscar-nominated if you ask me), and to see Eastwood seemingly maturing and evolving through his cinematic work. This ain’t no reactionary, right-wing vigilante cop movie.

Rating: C