Shadowplay (Bebjak, 2022)
Prison is a kind of boxing ring, Michal opines to Jan (Milan Ondrík). All life is a boxing ring.
That sort of tell-don’t-show writing doesn’t necessarily disqualify a film from praise, but it often signals, at least in my experience, a writer more enthralled by an idea than capable of enthralling others with it. Shadowplay is no exception.
As the film opens, Jan is fighting with his wife over the phone. When she is murdered soon after, he is plagued by guilt for not answering her call for help. He works out his guilt at a local gym, convinces a friend in the prison system to get him inside so as to confront the murderer, befriends a young woman hanging around the gym, and generally vacillates between anguish and sadness. This plot summary doesn’t even include the police officer who is using the murderer as an informant, leading Jan to fear he may escape responsibility. In other words, there is a lot of plot here. But sometimes more is less. The circle keeps expanding, which doesn’t allow any one storyline to breathe and develop; consequently, they all remain on the most basic level. Something happens and a character verbalizes the conflict or emotion that the action evokes.
Initially, such a process can be welcome, especially if we are confused by a plot point or theme. On first viewing, I didn’t understand why Jan felt responsible for his wife’s death. That sort of random timing, the proximity of her murder to their breakup, understandably increases his anguish. But what would he have been able to do had he answered the phone? Director Peter Bebjak says in the Press Kit: “On a pragmatic level we will realize that this is pure nonsense.” So the film itself only partially conveyed its theme. I understood Jan felt guilty, but it wasn’t clear to me that the film was communicating that his guilt, while real, was irrational.
Similarly, the title Shadowplay is a tad too expository for me. Shadow boxing is the process of practicing moves against an imaginary opponent, going through the motions of fighting without an actual opponent. Films about internal struggles are welcome, and Ondrík has an undeniable presence that lends the story more gravitas than it earns precisely because that internal struggle must be explicitly and outwardly conveyed rather than being implied or even just subtly presented.
Writing is tough. As I get older, I sometimes wonder if it is the most difficult part of making a good movie. Certainly, it is the aspect that I find weakest in an otherwise endorsable film. The acting here is fine, and the direction is both confident and competent. I feel as though these artists are good storytellers. I just wish they had a story that was more focused and not quite so sprawling.
