The Virgin Suicides
USA 1999
Reviewed by Mark Olsen
Synopsis
Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.
A male narrator recounts how a group of five teenage sisters, the Lisbons, all committed suicide during his youth in a Michigan suburb 25 years ago.
After the youngest Lisbon, Cecilia, tries to slash her wrists, a psychiatrist recommends the sisters be allowed more interaction with boys. The Lisbons host a party during which Cecilia throws herself from a window, killing herself. The shock of her death causes the family to close in on itself, and the girls become a source of obsessive fascination for the boys. When the athletic Trip Fontaine courts Lux Lisbon, the girls seem within their grasp. Mr and Mrs Lisbon only allow Trip to take Lux to a dance if the girls all go. At the party, Trip and Lux are crowned homecoming king and queen. When Lux stays out all night, she brings on a parental crackdown.
The girls are taken out of school and kept at home. The boys attempt to communicate with them, and soon the girls secretly begin sending notes. Lured late one night to the Lisbon house, the boys believe it is to aid an escape. They discover the four sisters have all taken their own lives. The mysterious motivations of the Lisbon sisters haunt them into their adult years.
Review
Making her feature-film debut directing her own adaptation of Jeffrey Eugenides' novel The Virgin Suicides, Sofia Coppola has essentially given herself two main goals: to portray adolescence's delicate blend of whimsy and melancholy, while recreating the soft-rock and wood-panelled-basement side of American life in the 70s. Her take is probably more in line with the actual recollections of people who came of age in that era, when suburban living had reached its decadent peak, more so than the coked-up disco-pants and haircuts imagery so commonly used to establish the period.
Moreover, that era has long been the main cultural touchstone for the casually wealthy, ultra-hip media-darling demi-monde of which Coppola is very much a part. Before now she has dipped a toe into numerous endeavours, including photographer, actress and boutique owner. This diverse background makes her perfectly suited for the role of film director and perhaps the most impressive thing about her film is the way it's very much a total package. All of its elements - performance, cinematography, sound, art design - combine to illuminate not just a theme or singular idea, but to create a unified feeling and mood.
An oblong detective story of sorts, the film's unseen narrator recounts, 25 years on, one odd year in a suburb just outside Detroit. A group of five teenage sisters all kill themselves, leaving behind a group of boys whose odd fascination with the girls lingers into adulthood. Eugenides' novel and Coppola's film in turn are not concerned with explaining the exact details and motivations of the event. Tinged with a stately death-march pace that stems from the divulged outcome from the start, both film and novel are touched by a sad sympathy for the boys' obsession, while allowing the girls to remain inscrutably unknowable, inhabiting a world of rainbows and tampons where reality and fantasy intermingle. As Lux, the only sister allowed a singular personality, Kirsten Dunst brings a remarkably knowing air to her character, suggesting that oddly feline quality of young women. James Woods and Kathleen Turner as the girls' stilted and repressed parents both turn in remarkably restrained performances, cast against type. Woods in particular gives what may be the most sensitively nuanced performance of his career.
The film moves confidently through its opening sequences, establishing its characters and locale with energy and zest. Coppola frequently frames moments as if taking a still photograph, aiding the film's air of suffocating memory: a mother washing dishes, the assorted clutter of a young girl's bedroom, or a boy locked in the lonely late-night world inside his headphones. Explosions of energy - the dance, Trip's stoner-elegant swagger to the spacy wail of 'Magic Man', the dance - and a sly, off-balance sense of humour keep the film feeling brisk even as it delves deeper into a world of silent hysteria.
Having so deftly created this overall milieu and tone, it's disappointing when the film splutters towards its finale. Following the homecoming, as the boys watch dumbfounded while the girls begin the grim slide towards their demise, Coppola doesn't quite seem to know where to go and begins to rely on trickery - time-lapse photography or split-screen effects - that feels more like straw-grasping than skilful control. The central enigma regarding the girls' inexplicable motives becomes central too late. Similarly, the ludicrously unnecessary sequence near the end in which a fashionable debutante party is celebrated with an asphyxiation theme falls too far into grotesquerie. Altogether a mixed bag, The Virgin Suicides is nevertheless a noteworthy debut. Coppola proves herself a director of burgeoning talent, as well as a sensitive screenwriter. If her missteps hold the film back from achieving the full grandeur it aims for, there is no denying the way it conjures a magic-realist American suburbia, rarely before brought so convincingly to life.
Credits
- Director
- Sofia Coppola
- Producers
- Francis Ford Coppola
- Julie Costanzo
- Chris Hanley
- Dan Halsted
- Screenplay
- Sofia Coppola
- Based on the novel by
- Jeffrey Eugenides
- Director of Photography
- Edward Lachman
- Editors
- James Lyons
- Melissa Kent
- Production Designer
- Jasna Stefanovic
- Music
- Air
- ©Virgin Suicides, LLC
- Production Companies
- American Zoetrope presents a Muse production in association with Eternity Pictures
- Executive Producers
- Fred Fuchs
- Willi Baer
- Co-producers
- Fred Roos
- Gary Marcus
- Line Producer
- Suzanne Colvin
- Associate Producer
- Jordan Gertner
- Muse Production Executive
- Timothy Peternel
- Production Services, Toronto
- Dufferin Gate Productions
- Production Co-ordinator
- Keitha Redmond
- Production Managers
- Suzanne Colvin
- 2nd Unit LA:
- Livia Perez-Borrero
- Location Manager
- Michael Blecher
- Locations Consultant
- 2nd Unit LA:
- Mike Fantasia
- Post-production Supervisors
- James R. Rosenthal
- Toronto:
- David Bailey
- 2nd Unit Director
- Roman Coppola
- Assistant Directors
- Tom Quinn
- Chris Binney
- Al Buchok
- 2nd Unit Toronto:
- David MacDonald
- Stewart Young
- Script Supervisors
- Winnifred Jong
- 2nd Unit Toronto:
- Stephanie Miller
- 2nd Unit LA:
- Haley McLane
- Casting
- John Buchan
- Linda Phillips-Palo
- Robert McGee
- Additional:
- Roz Music
- Hayley Marcus
- Plaster Casting
- Stuart Howard Associates
- Jane Alderman Casting
- 2nd Unit Toronto Director of Photography
- Paul van der Linden
- Vacation Photo Montage
- Johannes Gamble
- Diary Montage
- Fantasy II Film Effects
- Special Effects Co-ordinators
- Jordan Craig
- John Laforet
- Graphics
- Nigel Churcher
- Diary Montage Editor
- Haines Hall
- Art Directors
- Jon Goulding
- 2nd Unit LA:
- Linda Spheeris
- Set Decorators
- Megan Less
- 2nd Unit Toronto:
- Tom Thompson
- 2nd Unit LA:
- Linda Spheeris
- Storyboard Artist
- Victor Renaldi
- Costume Designer
- Nancy Steiner
- Costume Co-ordinator
- Judith England
- Key Make-up Artist
- Kathleen Graham
- Make-up/Hair Stylist
- 2nd Unit LA:
- Roz Music
- Key Hairstylist
- G.E. 'Freddie' Godden
- Title Design
- Geoff McFetridge
- Champion Graphics
- Titles/Opticals
- Title House
- Optical Line-up
- Dennis Dorney
- Additional Music Composition
- Richard Beggs
- Music Supervisor
- Brian Reitzell
- Music Editor
- Richard Beggs
- Soundtrack
- "On the Horizon", "How Many Times", "End It Peacefully", "Everything" "You've Done Wrong", "The Good in Everyone" by Sloan; "The Air That I Breathe" by The Hollies; "Magic Man", "Crazy on You" by Heart; "Strange Magic" by ELO; "Come Sail Away" by Styx; "Alone Again (Naturally)" by Gilbert O'Sullivan; "So Far Away" by Carole King; "A Dream Goes on Forever", "Hello It's Me" by Todd Rundgren; "Ce matin là" by Air; "How Can You Mend a Broken Heart" by Al Green; "I'm Not in Love" by 10cc; "Run to Me" by Bee Gees
- Sound Design
- Richard Beggs
- Sound Recordist
- Henry Embry
- Sound Mixer
- 2nd Unit LA:
- Felipe Borrero
- Re-recording Mixers
- Richard Beggs
- Kent Sparling
- Recording Supervisors
- Robert Knox
- Brian Sarvis
- Recordists
- Ethan Derner
- Pete Horner
- Supervising Sound Editor
- Galen Walker
- Dialogue Editors
- Keith Burhans
- Erik Blank
- Jesse Pomeroy
- Laura Laird
- Roy Wes Otis
- Additional Sound Effects Editor
- Jussi Tegelman
- ADR
- Supervisor:
- Jesse Pomeroy
- Loop Group:
- Sounds Great
- Recordists:
- Robert Serda
- Doug Andorka
- Editors:
- Keith Burhans
- Erik Blank
- Jesse Pomeroy
- Laura Laird
- Roy Wes Otis
- Foley
- Artists:
- Gretchen Thoma
- Sanaa Cannella
- Recordist:
- Sean Keegan
- Cast
- James Woods
- Ronald A. Lisbon
- Kathleen Turner
- Mrs Lisbon
- Kirsten Dunst
- Lux Lisbon
- Josh Hartnett
- Trip Fontaine
- A.J. Cook
- Mary Lisbon
- Hanna Hall
- Cecilia Lisbon
- Leslie Hayman
- Therese Lisbon
- Chelse Swain
- Bonnie Lisbon
- Anthony DeSimone
- Chase Buell
- Lee Kagan
- David Barker
- Robert Schwartzman
- Paul Baldino
- Noah Shebib
- Parkie Denton
- Jonathan Tucker
- Tim Weiner
- Michael Paré
- adult Trip Fontaine
- Scott Glenn
- Father Moody
- Danny DeVito
- Doctor E.M. Horniker
- Joe Roncetti
- Kevin Head
- Hayden Christensen
- Jake Hill Conley
- Chris Hale
- Peter Sisten
- Joe Dinicol
- Dominic Palazzolo
- Dan Belley
- Dominic's stunt double
- Suki Kaiser
- Lydia Perl, TV reporter
- Dawn Greenhalgh
- Mrs Scheer
- Allen Stewart-Coates
- Mr Scheer
- Sherry Miller
- Mrs Buell
- Jonathan Whittaker
- Mr Buell
- Michèle Duquet
- Mrs Denton
- Murray McRae
- Mr Denton
- Roberta Hanley
- Mrs Weiner
- Paul Sybersma
- Joe Larson
- Susan Sybersma
- Mrs Larson
- Peter Snider
- Trip's dad
- Gary Brennan
- Donald
- Charles Boyland
- Curt Van Osdol
- Dustin Ladd
- Chip Willard
- Kirsten Fairlie
- Amy Schraff
- Melody Johnson
- Julie
- Sheyla Molho
- Danielle
- Ashley Ainsworth
- Sheila Davis
- Courtney Hawkrigg
- Grace
- François Klanfer
- doctor
- MacKenzie Lawrenz
- Jim Czeslawski
- Tim Hall
- Kurt Siles
- Amos Crawley
- John
- Andrew Gillies
- Principal Woodhouse
- Mairlyn Smith
- Mrs Woodhouse
- Sally Cahill
- Mrs Hedlie
- Tracey Ferencz
- nurse
- Scott Denton
- Mr O'Conner
- Catherine Swing
- Mrs O'Conner
- Tim Adams
- Buzz Romano
- Michael Miglessi
- parks department foreman
- Sarah Minhas
- Wanda Brown
- Megan Kennedy
- cheerleader
- Sandi Stahlbrand
- Meredith Thompson, TV reporter
- Neil Girvan
- drunk man in pool
- Jaya Karsemeyer
- Gloria
- Leah Straatsma
- Rannie
- Mark Polley
- Kirk Gonnsen
- cemetery workers
- Marianne Maroney
- teacher
- Ann Wessels
- woman in chiffon
- Giovanni Ribisi
- narrator
- Certificate
- 15
- Distributor
- Pathé Distribution
- 8,722 feet
- 96 minutes 55 seconds
- Dolby Digital
- Colour by
- CFI