Forward and Back

[May 4th, 2005] Todd Solondz is not an easy filmmaker to connect with. His dry, somber-faced films are meticulous character studies of eccentrics and societal misfits who are as likely to disturb or offend as to endear and entertain. Erratically woven tapestries that contain patterns of brilliance, Solondz's works can be equally pretentious and tedious. Films like Welcome to the Dollhouse and Happiness are clearly crafted to make you feel something, and quite often that's discomfort. Strained laughter is often the only response you can muster for moments that act as a powerful magnetic force against your moral compass.

Palindromes, Solondz's latest, finds the director traveling down the same path he has maneuvered in his previous works. Serving as a pseudo-sequel to Welcome to the Dollhouse, Palindromes begins at the funeral of Dawn Wiener, the put-upon heroine of Dollhouse. The death of his most memorable character could be perceived as the filmmaker's attempt to show he's ready to move in a new direction, and that it's time to bury his cinematic past. But that perception would be wrong, for the director seems content to frolic-or perhaps wallow-in the same melancholic, often septic, playground of his past films.

Dawn Wiener serves as a cautionary lesson in Palindromes-the sort of person parents warn their little girls not to be like. In Solondz's universe, the worst thing a young girl can be is a misfit like Dawn; at least that's the perception of young Aviva, the movie's central character. When she begins her quest to have children of her own-at the ripe age of 13-her shocked mother (Ellen Barkin) forces the teenager to have an abortion. Distraught, Aviva runs away from home, embarking on a Homeric odyssey through a world of born-again Christians, pedophilic vigilantes and other lost souls.

In a stunt that will work to engage some viewers while alienating and confusing others, Solondz employs eight different actors to portray Aviva. Four of the actors are white teenage girls, while the character is also portrayed by a boy, a 6-year-old black girl, an overweight black woman (Sharon Wilkins) and Jennifer Jason Leigh. Solondz's creative casting seems to be a statement that surface appearances have no impact on who we are inside. He paints a portrait of Aviva as a personality and soul who comes in many shapes, sizes and colors. Like a palindrome itself-a word that remains the same spelled backwards or forwards-Solodnz attempts to show that you can change how something is presented but not what it is. It's a nice trick that works most of the time, especially with Wilkins, who is more convincing as the emotionally tortured spirit we have come to know as Aviva than the other actresses who look more the part. But at the same time, Solondz's gimmick only works when his script is firing on all cylinders-and that's only some of the time.

The burning question throughout Palindromes is whom this film is for. The answer would be the fans of Solondz's work, who are most often cool, detached hipsters. Yet the problem is that those viewers aren't necessarily getting the films for what they are. There will no doubt be laughs in the audience when Aviva seeks refuge in the home of Mama Sunshine (Debra Monk), a devout Christian who runs a home for physically and mentally challenged children. Her adoptive children-a brood that includes a blind albino, an armless girl and a boy with Down syndrome-perform in the Sunshine Singers, an upbeat Christian-pop band. Most will probably laugh at the bizarre, straight-faced musical numbers, which evoke memories of Tod Browning's Freaks and Werner Herzog's Even Dwarves Started Small. But somehow that doesn't seem to be Solondz's desired result.

Palindromes, like his other work, doesn't seem to be a film that's meant for enjoyment. Indeed, from the start of his career, Solondz has appeared to show little regard for the sensibilities of his audiences. The medium of film is merely a tool to push buttons, to make viewers laugh or cringe or, more simply, be repulsed. And it's this desire to eschew traditional ideologies and paradigms that makes Solondz's films so engaging and, at the same time, so difficult to watch.