 |
| Images courtesy of Cactus Jack Records |
What do you do when a controversial artist you have no
honest interest in, namely hip-hop rapper Travis Scott still reeling from the
Astroworld Festival crowd crush and recent assault allegations at the Nebula
nightclub, makes a promotional music video feature film hiring not one but four
directors you really, really like? Such
was the conundrum presented by Circus Maximus, a secret viral film
credited to Travis Scott as the chief creator but when you break it down it
actually consists of Gaspar Noé, Harmony Korine, Nicolas Winding Refn and Valdimar
Jóhannsson. A more-than-overqualified
lineup of great psychedelic outlaw cinema provocateurs, the question becomes does
this Murderer’s Row of hot directors justify seeing what is essentially an open
concert film promo of Travis Scott’s upcoming Utopia album? Overall, the answer would be no but out of
rabid salivating interest in anything new from this unlikely foursome of
renegade visual artists, I proceeded anyway.
Frankly joining the likes of such fare as Daft Punk’s
Electroma or The Weeknd’s Dawn FM Experience, Circus Maximus starts
out with a bang opening on a recurring series of interviews between producer
Rick Rubin and Travis Scott filmed by Harmony Korine in an oval shaped window
box that appears to have been shot separately, played off of a CRT television
to get that aliasing and interlacing onscreen, and then recorded again ala Julien
Donkey-Boy. Interspersed in between are
separate music videos by Jóhannsson in a cave being attacked by a giant
octopus, a riff on the car chases of Drive and neon lit skull imagery of
Too Old to Die Young by Refn with a crash test dummy and lastly a yellow-purplish
stroboscopic hyperkinetic freakout by Noé that feels like Climax and Lux Æterna sandwiched together.
From here the film settles into an outdoor concert film in
the chariot racing stadium in Rome without spectators, only cameramen, lighting
and speaker technicians present with many of the same tracks heard earlier in
the four directors’ contributions being performed again, all filmed in what
looks like Ultra Panavision 2.76:1. It
should be noted also the film freely switches ratios, usually filling the
screen at 1.85:1 but with portions that are pillar boxed in 1.33:1 as well as
Korine’s peculiar oval boxed image. Whether
you like any of this music or not depends on the listener, and by the second
half of the movie being performed outdoors I was pretty much over what this
expensive half-hearted Moonwalker film had to offer. It should be noted ticket prices neared the
cost of a pay per view event, asking a lot for a film that only runs seventy
film minutes.
Despite the technical bravura on display, including but not
limited to shooting much of it on 35mm film, cranes and ornate drone
photography, and even a sequence where a band of robots plays instruments
alongside Scott, this lark is difficult to recommend. Between the controversies surrounding the
artist himself, the ticket costs for such a short film that isn’t really about
anything and whether or not you’re actually a fan of the music in the first place,
Circus Maximus despite selling out at repeat showings after increased
demand for more than one screening is probably best awaited for arrival on streaming
platforms. Yes the Refn, Noé and Korine
segments were cool but not at the expense of nearly $30 and supporting an
artist with a dubious code of conduct in the court of public opinion. An interesting curiosity and bit of
fanservice involving film directors I like but overall pass.
--Andrew Kotwicki
