ROCK-STYLE LA BOHÈME IN AIDS-RAVAGED EAST VILLAGE

RENT
Directed by Chris Columbus; written by Stephen Chbosky, based on the book and lyrics by Jonathan Larson; cinematography by Stephen Goldblatt; edited by Richard Pearson; music by Jonathan Larson; production design by Howard Cummings; art direction by Steve Carter, Keith P. Cunningham, and Nanci Noblett; set decoration by Barbara Munch; costume design by Aggie Guerard Rodgers
With: Anthony Rapp, Adam Pascal, Rosario Dawson, Jesse L. Martin, Wilson Jermaine Heredia, Idina Menzel, Tracie Thoms, and Taye Diggs. Rated PG-13 for mature thematic material involving drugs and sexuality, and for some strong language. Running time: 135 minutes




Reviewed by Joel Johnson

Rent is the film adaptation of Jonathan Larson’s Pulitzer Prize–and Tony Award–winning rock opera, based on Puccini’s La Bohème, that tells the story of a group of bohemians struggling with love, loss, AIDS, and modern-day life in New York’s East Village over the course of one year. Or as they keep reminding us—the 525,600 minutes that make up a year.

As you might guess from this description, it has an episodic structure providing different slices from the principal characters’ lives. The narrative thread in the film is quite loose. For example, we may see fairly dramatic events that would seem to profoundly affect a relationship, either ending it or advancing it. However, a later scene may indicate that an earlier scene retains only a negligible effect.

There is a dark shadow that hangs over the film since it deals with AIDS, drug addiction, loss (especially through death from AIDS), and a deep antipathy to the exploitative capitalism perceived to be endemic in American society during what many describe as the “postmodern” period. These are difficult issues that, although Rent is set between Christmas Day 1989 and Christmas Day 1990, continue to plague us. Drugs have allowed AIDS to be successfully controlled in individual patients that maintain their treatment regimen. But there is no cure, and the AIDS drugs are not readily available in many parts of the world so that the disease is making deadly sweeps through many countries. Drug addiction is a scourge on individual lives and imposes a heavy societal cost even before its role in furthering HIV infection is factored in. There is much gnashing of teeth over “selling out,” allowing one’s creativity to be subsumed in an amoral pursuit of profit. The idealism of Rent’s characters may seem too extreme, as they seem nearly paranoiac about any enterprise that aims for a profit, but the excesses of major corporations make one hesitant to dismiss outright the characters’ discomfiture with American business.

The musical is set in the avant-garde section of one of the world’s most cosmopolitan cities—New York City. While idealistic aspiring artists, social misfits, lesbians, strippers, the HIV-infected, drug addicts, homosexuals, and transvestites may not be unknown outside such places, the film centers on this eclectic collection of individuals who are often marginalized in our wider society. In this film, they represent the norm and not the margin. Will this skewing of the typical social reality play well in Anytown, USA? That remains to be seen.

Regardless of how one feels about the issues on which the film touches and the characters with whom we are asked to identify, one can not fault Jonathan Larson’s invigorating music and lyrics. The entire cast sings and dances quite well and has to. There are no talk-through songs for nonsingers and no walk-through dance sequences for the dance-challenged. Amazingly, the original Broadway cast—except for Rosario Dawson stepping in for Daphne Rubin-Vega—has been reassembled ten years after the show’s debut in 1995. It boasts numerous production numbers that just pulsate with energy that leaves the audience breathless. Much of the film’s dialogue is delivered in operatic—that is rock opera—musical dialogue. While the mean alleys and squalid tenements give a vivid sense of the harsh realities of the characters’ world, the musical form is the most unreal. Singing and dancing sequences that flouted cinema’s ability to create vivid realism fell into disfavor for several decades. Since musicals seem to be experiencing something of a renaissance on the screen, it will be interesting to see how this film, which makes no effort to place its music in a realistic context (e.g., setting the film in a nightclub where entertainers singing and dancing would be expected), is received.

There’s a lot to admire about this film. It is highly entertaining but also unrelenting in keeping the audience focusing on the dark issues that it wants to address. There’s a constant leavening process as contrasting elements are played off against each other. There are several things about the film that may be off-putting, but it raises several issues that still resonate very deeply. I write this on World AIDS Day. For much of the world, the effects of AIDS have only gotten more deadly over the last ten years. 

 

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