He is just the picture

I finally saw Martha Marcy May Marlene which is indeed as good a film as the critics said – I wish I had the time to re-watch it and write a proper review in which I could elaborate on the ambiguity the film is based on,  and all the wonderful little details it provides to tell the story of a shattered personality and of an identity meltdown, through mirror plays, memory tricks, merging timelines and madness, and how it manages to create the right atmosphere doing so, but instead here's a link to a spoilerish review from The New Yorker –, and yes Elizabeth Olsen is quite terrific in it, playing a Martha trapped in her broken self, perfectly conveying confusion and conflicting drives, with her paranoia hiding the secret desire to be found, to fit in again...but it's John Hawkes who blew my mind once more. As usual, his performance was powerful but subtle. To me, he is just the picture.

There was nothing cartoonish about the pastoralist sect guru he played, and yet he was totally credible in the role of a community leader; hypersexualized "father" of nubile followers, exuding charisma, virility and menace, but also sweetness (John's smile always makes me melt!) and perversion; appearing both charming and terrifying, caring and creepy. And all of that, without overacting.

No, the part wasn't at all the same as the one he played in Winter's Bone the year before. Uncle Teardrop was a badass and a threatening presence, a hillbilly lone-wolf addicted to meth who inspired fear around him, but he turned out to be someone a girl could count on, especially if they are family. Patrick is quite the opposite, he appears much nicer, almost "normal", a family man watching over his people, but he is much more dangerous; he's a sorcerer who puts on a seduction act and pulls the strings of his admirers; he is bad news for little girls. A true big bad wolf.

John Hawkes doesn't have a lot of screen time but owns any scene he is in (even the orgy scene...he doesn't partake but the picture that stays with you is Patrick watching from the stairs while his puppets are having sex), and the character haunts the film, just like he haunts the girl who is named Martha/Marcy-May/Marlene. His invisible presence is palpable thanks to the mise-en-scène and Olsen's performance.

And of course there's the beautiful, and disturbing, scene in which Patrick plays the guitar and sings "Marcy's Song" (picture above) and the actress on the screen seems to become the girl in the song. It's very well done. John Hawkes looks like a mix of a troubadour, a magus and a predator. The scene also reminded me a little bit of the one from Maria's Lovers, when Keith Carradine serenaded Nastassja Kinski with "Maria's eyes". I think that John has a solo album to be released soon, I hope his cover of Jackson Frank's song will be in it.

 Martha Marcy May Marlene isn't flawless, some of the dialogues could have been better for instance, but for a debut movie it's really really good. I'm glad that one of my favourite actors chose it. Because thanks to his Oscar nomination for Winter's Bone, John Hawkes can choose now, and so far he didn't make many mistakes (okay Contagion wasn't a masterpiece but he had such a small part in it...).

By the way, apparently he has turned down a part in The Walking Dead. Good for him! He's very busy with movies (I'm so looking forward to seeing The Surrogate that some say it gave his career's best role *) and The Walking Dead, whose writing sucks most of the time, doesn't deserve his talent.

Anyway, if John should come back to television, I demand that it would be on Justified !!!!! They keep hiring Deadwood actors, so I'm sure they'd love to have him...and seeing Sol Star (the kindest character on Deadwood and John played him to perfection) and Seth Bullock reunited on screen would make my heart sing.

*PS:  Just read an interview in which John mentioned that his "Deadwood pals"– Earl Brown, who plays Dan Dority, and Robin Weigert, who was Calamity Jane– got small parts in The Surrogate! Some day I should write a blog on why Deadwood was one of the best tv shows ever, perhaps even the best...