Paranoid Park

Synopsis: Alex (Gabe Nevins) is a skater boy who, when involved in the accidental death of a security guard, decides to say nothing. Trapped with feelings he can’t understand or manage, he writes a confession to try and comprehend his own feelings.

An elliptical meditation on guilt, confusion and teen alienation, Paranoid Park, based on the novel by Blake Nelson, is the latest in a string of films by Gus Van Sant demonstrating his fierce determination to never be remembered as “the Good Will Hunting guy” (a reputation he lampooned brilliantly in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back).

Paranoid Park is about as arty a film as you’re likely to find, but Van Sant is a masterful filmmaker, and whilst the story is slight, the dialogue deliberately vague, the soundtrack persistently incongruous, and the editing and framing constantly obscure, it’s nonetheless a thoroughly engaging and entertaining film. This is a mood piece, the story is told in episodes, sometimes repeated, as Alex struggles to remember everything that happened to him and, in some cases, why it happened. The disjointed nature of the film teases us with a mystery but the reveals aren’t so much shocking or revelatory as they are shading in the edges of something we’ve already glimpsed. It’s a portrait of a young guy who doesn’t know how to experience all the emotions he suddenly finds welling up in himself.

The cinematography is uniformly excellent, dreamy and full of beauty. One would expect nothing less from Christopher Doyle. Van Sant himself edits and structures his film with long broken pauses of skateboarding footage that are arresting for reasons I can’t quite put my finger on.

Paranoid Park is a frustrating film in some ways because whilst it’s a thing of beauty it is also very good in drawing you into the confusion of Alex. Yet despite being left with those unresolved feelings one can only say that the film is an experience that sits with you, without being able to really explain why. Well worth the time.

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