Hidden Truth/Hidden Truth.iso/data/xfiles/x-files3/duanebarry.rvw

Text File | 1996-09-22 | 5.7 KB | 102 lines

            Where, Oh Where Has My Little Girl Gone?

                        by Sarah Stegall

     I've started and scrapped this review three times.  "Duane
Barry"/"Ascension" is a very difficult arc to get a handle on.
While there are problems with pacing, direction, and content,
there are moments--defining moments--in this two-part series that
characterize "The X-Files" more sharply than anything else that
has appeared in the series so far.
     Someone needs to remind Chris Carter that when you begin,
literally, with a scream, it's hard to go anywhere but down.
You've shot your load before the opening credits, and the rest of
the evening is a long, slow slide into numbness.  "Duane Barry"
opens on a screech, jumps to a quiet, tense interview, rebounds
to a hostage standoff, and never really gets its feet under it.
"Ascension" opens with bewilderment and goes nowhere at all. The
uneven pacing of this story may have something to do with the
fact that it had different writers and directors for both
episodes, but some overall conception should have prevailed.
     I was never convinced of Duane Barry's bona fides.  He
struck me as a deranged man, whose story was wholly
untrustworthy.  When dealing with someone so divorced from
reality as a brain damaged psychotic, even direct evidence in the
form of scars and assorted implants does not "prove" his story.
We still have to rely on his testimony, and what he thought he
saw may not have been what was really happening.
     Steve Railsback is a good actor, but if not reined in he
tends to spit his lines through clenched teeth.  He had some good
moments:  during a couple of brief scenes, he showed a shy
geniality and an almost childlike bafflement, but he needs a
firmer hand from a director than he got.  I kept contrasting his
performance with  William Sanderson's beautifully restrained,
superbly paced spin-out-of-control in "Blood".
     I am very reluctant to criticize David Duchovny's
performance in these two episodes; he is carrying a hell of a
load in Gillian Anderson's virtual absence.  In "Little Green
Men" and "Ice", he has shown us that Mulder can show strong
emotion believably. Parts of "Duane Barry" show his intensity,
his command of nuance and implication, his sharp grasp of
understatement and control. Having said all that, however, I have
to say he disappointed me in this story.  I know Fox Mulder is
not given to hysterics, but there comes a point when you have to
pull out some stops.  Like Sam Spade says in "The Maltese
Falcon":
       "When  a man's partner has been killed, he's supposed
  to  do something about it.  It doesn't make any difference
  what  you  thought  of him, he's your partner  and  you're
  supposed to do something about it."
     When Mulder found Scully's necklace, when Duane Barry (the
only witness to her whereabouts) died, I needed to see some
reaction from him.  Consider the resonances of this story for Fox
Mulder:  the only person in the world whom he trusts has been
snatched away from him, while he is powerless to do anything
about it--just like his sister.  A normal man would be driven
half mad with guilt and anger and fear.  Mulder either looks
sleepy or puzzled. Duchovny neither raises nor lowers the
temperature, right up to the last scene.  Is he looking for Dana
Scully in the stars, or figuring his income tax?  From his face,
you could never tell.  I sincerely hope that when he is finally
reunited with Dana Scully, he does more than simply nod at her.
I don't mean a clinch, but we will need emotional closure of some
kind on this subject, or else I will have to conclude that Mulder
is just going through the motions out of a sense of duty.
     Mulder's furious attack on the recalcitrant Duane Barry, in
which he may well have killed a bound and helpless suspect (or at
least contributed materially to his death), is too little, too
late and way out of character. Furthermore, I think that putting
David Duchovny in extended scenes against Steve Railsback was a
mistake.  The difference in acting styles between the two men are
exaggerated:   Railsback roars and Duchovny whispers. It's a
risky move that, frankly, didn't pay off.
     I suppose I must say something about the swimsuit scene in
Act One of "Duane Barry".  Very well:  David Duchovny looks
wonderful.  He moves with the lithe and sinewy grace of a
stalking cheetah.  As a woman, I was deeply appreciative;  as a
critic and reviewer, it added nothing to the story. Let's move
on.
     I cheered when Deputy Director Skinner re-opened the X-
Files.  I am glad we can get back to "normal"; I miss the slide
shows.  How typical that he did it in a fit of pique, rather than
as an administrator who saw, finally, the value of those extreme
possibilities.  I must give writer Paul Brown credit, however,
for not making Walter Skinner a hopelessly evil bad guy.  This
scene was one of the best of the entire story, showing Skinner as
a frustrated, hard-nosed cop who cannot seem to get a grip either
on the slippery characters he's up against or the obsessed agent
before him.  In fact, this time around he was more human than
Mulder.
     Sam Spade could at least track down the Fat Man and
miscellaneous shady characters:  Mulder has nothing and no one to
go on. There are no clues left to investigate.  There is no
action he can take. Scully and Krychek are both missing, the
Senator cannot help, and Plot Device -- excuse me -- his
mysterious informant is again speaking in Zen koans. Chris Carter
has led Mulder and us into a dead end. Even in as cerebral a show
as "The X-Files", it's mighty risky putting your lead character
in a position where he merely waits on events.
     I give this two-part series three sunflower seeds out of
five:  two for the story and one for the Speedo scene.
                           --LOGOFF--