Saturday Night At The Movies

Thursday’s child is Sunday’s clown

By Dennis Hartley

(Please note: This week’s review is based solely on the “extended” director’s cut of the film that appears on the DVD; I have not screened the original theatrical version.)

One of the more fascinating trends to emerge in simpatico with the ever-narrowing window between the moment a first-run film leaves the multiplex and its appearance on DVD is what I like to refer to as the “auto repair cut” of box-office flops (“Okay, I think I’ve found the problem -try starting it now...”)

One recent example is George Hickenlooper’s extended cut of “Factory Girl”, which is his biopic about the pin-up girl of the 1960s underground, Andy Warhol “discovery” Edie Sedgwick. The film, plagued with production problems and prematurely rushed into theaters late last year, did marginal box office at best, and was even less enthusiastically received by some of the surviving real-life participants in the Warhol Factory scene (More sordid details here).

Edie Sedgwick was the Paris Hilton of the 1960s; a trust fund babe imbued with no real discernible native talent aside from the ability to attract the paparazzi by associating with just the right people in just the right places at just the right juncture of the pop culture zeitgeist. Despite growing up as a child of privilege, Sedgwick’s childhood was less than idyllic (two of her brothers committed suicide and her mother was institutionalized). She arrived in New York City in the mid 60s and was drawn to the downtown art scene, where she was subsequently spotted by Andy Warhol, who immediately became platonically smitten with her wide-eyed, waif-like beauty and vowed to make her a “superstar”. Warhol featured her in a number of his experimental films, and she became the iconic symbol of the “Factory”, a warehouse space where Warhol worked on his multi-media projects and played host to a revolving door co-op of avant-garde artists, musicians, actors and hangers-on. Sedgwick fell from grace with Warhol when she became strung out on various substances and was cut off financially by her family. She eventually sought treatment and cleaned up, only to tragically die of a drug overdose at the age of 28.

This is a pretty rich vein from which to mine a juicy biopic. The director is no stranger to this territory; his outstanding 2003 documentary about L.A. DJ/rock impresario Rodney Bingenheimer, “The Mayor of the Sunset Strip” basically deals with the same theme (see my review here from 5/5/07). So, is Hickenlooper up to the task? Well, yes and no.

Hickenlooper’s affection for the subject at hand is evidenced in his canny visual replication of the 1960s underground art scene; he alternates grainy, b&w film footage with highly saturated 16mm color stock and utilizes a lot of hand-held cinema verite style shots, cleverly aping the look of Warhol’s own experimental films. The fashion, the music, and the overall vibe of the era is pretty much captured in a bottle here.

Okay, so the film has a great look, but what about the narrative? Ay, there’s the rub. The director’s pastiche approach plays like the Cliff’s Notes version of Warhol and Sedgwick’s partnership. A lot of things are left unexplained; peripheral characters come and go without much exposition (it wasn’t until the credits rolled that I learned tidbits like “Oh. THAT character was supposed to be Moe Tucker from the Velvet Underground. Coulda fooled me…”). In a fictional story, you can get away with creating bit parts like “Man #2 with suitcase” or “Crazy bag lady in subway”, but when you are dramatizing a true story…well, I think you see my point. (Ironically, the 30 minute documentary extra on the DVD, featuring recollections from friends and family. serves up much more insight into what made Sedgwick tick than the full length feature does).

One cannot fault the actors. Sienna Miller gives her all in the lead role and does an admirable job portraying the full arc of Edie’s transition from an innocent pixie, fresh from her parent’s pastoral country estate, to a haggard junkie, encamped in a dingy room at the Chelsea Hotel (eerily, the very same place where, a scant decade later, a strung-out Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen would write their final chapters). The always excellent Guy Pearce completely disappears into a spooky evocation of Warhol. It’s not as easy as one might think to inhabit Warhol’s deadpan persona; several actors have made valiant efforts (David Bowie, Jared Harris and Crispin Glover) but generally end up doing little more than donning a white wig, affecting a blank stare and tossing out the rote catch phrases (“Umm, yeah. That’s great.” “Yeah, hi.”). If you’ve seen footage of the real McCoy, Warhol was, in actuality, quite the wiseacre (in his own slyly ironic fashion). Pearce perfectly captures Warhol’s calculatingly detached, bemused demeanor. Even the usually wooden Hayden Christensen registers a pulse and gets with the program, doing a passable impression of Bob Dylan. Oh, I’m sorry-did I say ‘Bob Dylan’? I meant to say, ‘Billy Quinn’ (as in “The Mighty Quinn”-get it?), referred to in the film only as a “folk singer” (even on the DVD commentary track, Hickenlooper goes to great pains to avoid invoking Dylan by name- Bob’s lawyers must be some scary motherfuckers.)

All in all, “Factory Girl” is perhaps not quite as dismal as many have led you to believe, but it is still not as good as one might have hoped (I guess we can call this a ‘mixed review’, no?) Worth a peek on a slow night; it actually might be a more enhanced experience if you pair it up with one of my recommendations below. Ciao!

Andy’s Chest: Ciao Manhattan, Andy Warhol: A Documentary Film (originally shown on PBS as a two part “American Experience” presentation-highly recommended!), The Life & Times of Andy Warhol - Superstar, I Shot Andy Warhol, Basquiat, The Doors (only mentioned here because of Crispin Glover’s cameo).


.