The Last Days of Disco
with Chloe Sevigny, Kate Beckinsale, Chris Eigeman, Mackinzie Astin
Written and directed by Whit Stillman
by Scott Hefflon
The Last Days of Disco, for those who didn’t recognize it as such, is the latest movie by Whit Stillman (Metropolitan, Barcelona). I kept confusing 54 (which sucked), A Night at The Roxbury (which I’ve successfully avoided seeing thus far), and The Last Days of Disco (not realizing it was by Whit Stillman because there’s more than one word in the title). But it took mere moments of the film to recognize the inimitable style of Stillman, not to mention the regular characters who, for the most part, have yet to appear in any other significant movie and are probably in danger of being forever typecast. Much like Jason Lee, the crass wildman in Kevin Smith’s Chasing Amy and, more notably, Mallrats, Chris Eigeman (as Des) is a joy to watch, even though it’s roughly the same spoiled, bored, elite-class wiseass he’s played every other time. And like Kevin Smith, yet on a completely different social scale, Stillman’s movies show characters you either know, or come to know, having outlandishly “deep” discussions about simple human interaction, movies, and the overall compartmentalization of life. Both writer/directors have the uncanny ability to take simple, automatic responses and turn them into debates requiring clarification in order for the world to continue revolving. A favorite I have of Smith’s is “what is vs. what is not the food court of the mall.” You just don’t hear lines like “Eateries that operate within the designated square downstairs qualify as food court. Anything outside of said designated square is considered an autonomous unit for mid-mall snacking” in many movies. Stillman is harder to peg. While multiple clever observations and phrases litter his movies, often building over the course of many scenes so quoting a punchline would take paragraphs of explanation, his true genius shines in elaborate, Ivy League-schooled dissections of such crucial social events as the release of Bambi and its impact on culture, or how all male-female relationships’ success rates can be predetermined by which dog the male is in The Lady and the Tramp. And as we discover, it’s not which dog you see yourself as, but the panel of judges, your drinking cohorts, your peers, who make the call. Again, Stillman’s humor cannot be easily summarized, but it’s a sly smile and a knowing nod as opposed to the slapstick, hit-in-the-nuts humor most common in comedies.
Many viewers may not find The Last Days of Disco very exciting. They can fuck off. The Last Days of Disco is conversation-oriented, and you learn about the characters mostly through how they interact with each other, what they admit without realizing it and what it’s obvious they’re trying not to say. Because, honestly, they don’t really do a helluva lot. They do what most people do: they rent apartments, they go places with their friends, they always have the nagging suspicion someone somewhere else is having more fun, they gab with friends because there’s really not a lot else to do, and they get together and break up for pretty much the same reasons. There are many situations here that will seem painfully familiar. And there are plenty of angry, unretractible statements, strong emotions, and varying betrayals of loyalty and friendship that will ring true. Sad in a way, yet ultimately fulfilling because it lets you know even pampered, well-educated, sooner-or-later-upwardly-mobile twentysomethings feel just as lost, just as misplaced, and just as confused as the rest of us. They have no easy answers, and neither do we. But they were admitted to the club.
