Based on the 1978 novel of the same name by Ian McEwan, Andrew Birkin's' screen adaptation of
The Cement Garden is about masculine and social decay, and the power of female sexuality against the fragmentation of masculine dominance. Contained within the backdrop of a crumbling concrete landscape on the outskirts of town, a family home, block-like, grey and characterless seems to erupt from the ground which only sees plant life protruding from small cracks in the manufactured ground. In the opening the father (Hanns Zischler) of the isolated family is concreting over what plant life exists in their garden, but his evident ill-health (represented as a spluttering pipe-smoker) causes a heart attack, killing him. During this scene the film cuts from the impending heart attack to the increased masturbatory climax of eldest son, Jack (Andrew Robertson), a 16 year old who is clearly sexually frustrated, and is detached from the rest of the family. Just weeks later the mother (Sinead Cusack) dies of a mysterious illness, but on her death bed she speaks of orphanage's and fragmentation of the four children to her eldest, Jack and Julie (Charlotte Gainsbourg).
Not wanting to comply with the social structures of adoption and social services, Jack and Julie decide to bury the mother themselves in a block of cement in the basement. The eldest two vie for control over the siblings, acting as surrogate parents, but Julie, also at the stage of teenage-era where she is learning to use her sexuality to control and influence men. She plays against Jack's frustration by teasing him, sexually luring him to gain female dominance over the family. This idea of female sexual dominance is presented in the cross dressing whims of youngest child, Tom (Ned Birkin), who plays at being Julie with his friend (who consequently play-acts as Jack. Tom wears his mothers dress and a blond wig. After the death of the parents, the only adult presence is a slimy, business-dress, convertible sports car driving, Derek (Jochen Horst). A friend of Julie's, Derek is another masculine object that Julie is attempting to break down with her sexual teasing, but he becomes increasingly suspicious of the smell coming from the basement. After a confrontation, where Jack step up to become the man of the household, Derek is sent away, and Julie has her brother where she wants him.
The Cement Garden goes into some incredibly dark places, touching on incest and young sexual control. The film is also self-contained in its setting, and this isolation, and the very man made environment give the film substance and depth. This backdrop also juxtaposes the characters ideas of what natural is. Nature in this place is absent, so Julie and Jack's own perception of nature is skewed. Outside and inside the house everything external to their emotions are falling apart and rotten, and inevitably this decomposition (also of the mothers dead body) influences their ideas of natural acts - culminating in incestuous activities. The acting is superb, with Gainbourg's sexually promiscuous, flirting character she is seduction incarnate, and Robertson's detached, wanking teenager, is rife with sweaty, greasy complexion and brooding, on-the-edge-of-explosion sexual charge. It is not a beautiful film, but the culmination of all these elements creates a daring and alarming drama that highlights the symbiosis of place and human nature.
Directed by:
Andrew Birkin
Starring:
Andrew Robertson,
Charlotte Gainsbourg,
Alice Coulthard,
Sinéad Cusack
Country: France/Germany/UK
Rating: ****
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