January
1997
Big
Screen Bugs
By Cathleen and Colleen McGuire
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Microcosmos. Directed by Claude Nuridsany
and Marie Perennou (1995). 77 minutes.
Angels and Insects. Directed by Philip Haas. Mark
Rylance, Patsy Kensit, Kristen Scott Thomas (1995). 117 minutes.
Microcosmos is an eloquent documentary devoted to a single task: observing
insects. Using unique, specially designed cameras, the film was shot
at bug-eye level by French biologists Claude Nuridsany and Marie Perennou.
The two spent over three years studying the denizens of a vast, fascinating
universe ignored by most humans. Beginning with a sweeping pan of an
immense sky, the camera slowly inches closer and closer to earth -
through trees and bushes, past flowers and shrubs, finally focusing
on blades of grass. There we encounter a cast of thousands worthy of
a Cecil B. deMille production. In this common meadow in France on a
single summer day from dawn to dusk, the documentary randomly tracks
a day in the life of bugs.
Almost devoid of human commentary, the film bears silent
witness to the comings and goings of a micro-metropolis of
tiny creatures who
cohabit this planet with us. A highly creative musical score - a device
probably necessary to sustain general audience appeal - encourages
anthropomorphic interpretations. Accompanied by a swelling operatic
crescendo, we are enthralled by the prolonged climax of two snails
kissing like some Gone With the Wind poster. Staccato drumbeats "narrate" the
bustling of worker ants as if on a factory production line. Dramatic
violins play as an overwhelmed little beetle pushes and prods Sisyphus-like
a pellet of sheep dung with Herculean effort. Noisy horns underscore
two stag beetles in combat, resembling a senseless macho confrontation
between teenage boys. The exquisite cinematography likewise obviates
the intrusion of spoken word. A close-up of one insect's coat of armor
brings to mind an exotic Mardi Gras costume. Deep in the folds of a
luscious flower, we watch a bee drunkenly suck nectar. The time lapse
recorded birth of a water bug evolving from larva to the splendor of
evanescent wings evokes the sacredness of life's passages.
While not a single human enters the filmic frame, at one point an enormous
shadow hovers over a throng of ants. It is an average crow, yet from
the camera/ants' perspective it appears as a beast of Himalayan proportions.
While the bird pecks and eats its scurrying brunch, the ants continue
apace, making no effort to flee or organize a defensive strategy. One
is tempted to dismiss them as mindless automata. Yet, the viewer senses
that incredible sense of cooperation is evident when we observe residents
inside an ant hole neatly stacking their hoard with the meticulousness
of housekeepers. The two scenes pose a paradox: seemingly purposeless
meandering juxtaposed with actions of calculated precision. The viewer
is left pondering the interplay between instinct and consciousness.
While the music and cinematography of Microcosmos beckons its audience
to humanize the insects' behavior, one is also struck by how much we're
like them.
Segue to Angels and Insects. Director Philip Haas has created a mini-Microcosmos
in his portrayal of a 19th century English household.
Entomologist William Adamson (Mark Rylance) has just returned
from 10 years of study in the Amazon rainforest. He now seeks
patronage
from a wealthy vicar, Sir Harold Alabaster (Jeremy Kemp), an amateur
naturalist, who hires him to organize his insect collection and tutor
his younger children. He soon falls in love with Eugenia (Patsy Kensit),
the vicar's stunning, blonde, neurasthenic older daughter. He admires
her beauty as lovingly as the ethereal butterflies he carefully impales
for her father. Despite his "vulgar blood' and working class origins,
they marry, and Adamson settles deeper into the baronial Alabaster
manor and the dark secrets that lie within.
A brief opening scene presents Adamson in the Amazon surrounded
by indigenous people engaged in a phantasmagoric midnight
dance. The contrast
between Adamson's (Adam's son?) wanderings in the "primitive jungle" could
not be more sharply drawn than by his catapult via the Alabasters (the
ultimate WASP surname) into upper class British society. Stiff dinner
conversation is enlivened by new Darwinian theories of nature, while
Victorian notions on race, class, gender and, sexual repression, hover
as subtext.
The film's pacing is as slow as watching a glassed-in ant farm. Numerous
close-ups of ant colonies and other insects serve as metaphors for
human behavior. The household is like a hive, with worker-drones scurrying
about the halls in the service of the vicar's family, especially his
portly queen bee of a wife. A funeral procession resembles a column
of ants. Colorful ball gowns mirror butterfly wings. When shocking
secrets unfold, the entire mansion buzzes with the servants' hushed
whispers, akin to a low beehive hum.
Some critics scoffed at the film's "politically correct" observations
on culture and nature. The Alabasters represent the pinnacle of "civilized
man": decorous, obsessed with lineage, comfortable with all manner
of supremacism. Nature, newly colonized peoples, and weak, submissive
women bluntly stand for the subdued Other. The dualistic themes may
be obvious, but an intelligent examination of the intersection of imperialism,
class, gender and species is still a rare treat, given most popular
culture fare.
Class issues abound in the form of obscene wealth, domestics avoiding
eye contact with masters, and the vicar's snooty son's disdain for
Adamson, whose father was a butcher. As a flawless period piece, the
film vividly depicts the stark sexism of Victorian England where upper
class women are corseted and silent, reduced to vessels for birthing
heirs. Rape plays a primary role throughout this film. Feminist relief
comes in the form of Matty, the Alabasters' poor relation and quasi
governess, crisply portrayed by Kristin Scott Thomas (who, coincidentally,
supplied the lone human voice in Microcosmos). Matty masterminds a
collaboration with Adamson to write a popular book based on their ant
colony studies. Her erudite, self-assured presence is a respite from
the other subservient, marginalized women.
The presentation of gender and class is strong, but Angels
and Insects doesn't quite accomplish a deeper understanding
of speciesism. Corollaries
between "man" and insects (nature) are provocative, but conveyed at
a distance, as if the director were observing the Alabaster household
through an entomologist's magnifying glass. The audience is left wanting
more insights on the connections between culture and nature, not just
a mise-en-scene. For mere observation of species behavior, Microcosmos
-without words and staged drama - more indelibly captures the wondrous
peculiarity and mystery of nature's beings in all their complexity.
Cathleen and Colleen McGuire are
twin sisters who, through the vicissitudes of genetics, have
had endless opportunities to study the nature/culture question.
They live in New York City.
