Joel Edgerton and Sigourney Weaver lead the cast of Paul Schrader’s new film, a story that begins calmly and gradually reaches its climax.
“Please don’t step on the flowers.”sang Palito Ortega in the half-hippie times of peace, love and flower power. Now, in these times, two drones step on the flowers, use the chainsaw and make a mess all over a large garden. That’s how it goes. The gardener knows how to use more than just the rake and the trowel. He makes, in his words, “subtle adjustments to the disorder where that is effective.” And where it is not effective he can make less subtle adjustments.
These moments, quite brief, the scene of a previous threat, very commendable, an argument at lunch, also brief, and the conversation with a police officer, are the most attractive parts of Paul Schrader’s new film, “Master Gardener”here deceptively renamed “The garden of desire.” The truth is, what the character initially wants is to be left alone.
The boss, for her part, wants to show off and win money at an upcoming flower fair. She is a lady from Louisiana, on staff she has a gardener to take care of the plants and other services, and unfortunately for her she also has a grandniece who is already grown up and has no job. A pretty girl, mulatto, which for the lady is another misfortune even if she hides it. And there will be something else that will satisfy your patience. Because who does the niece want?
That is one of the conflicts of the story. The other has to do with the gardener’s past. The director takes almost an hour to reveal this past to us. At the beginning it is a slow, minimalist, half-muted work. Only the man with the knowledge of botany and floriculture, his assistants and apprentices, and the lady, distant, vigilant. Everything is calm, except for the background music that anticipates the existence of something bad among those people.
Little by little the story becomes more entertaining. And it will not end in an act of redemption, like other Schrader, but in a kind of unstable but happy labor reform. A novelty in this author, which has been repeated without lowering his level, but also without reaching the height of his first, distant films, “Blue Collar”, “American Gigolo” and “Hardcore”, which here was called “Where is my daughter?”
In the distribution, Joel Edgertonwho talks like a listless drunk, Sigourney Weaverthe pretty Quintessa Swindell and Esai Morales like the police officer with the feminist t-shirt and straw hat. Texts, taken from the book of Dame Penelope Margaret Lively “Life in the garden”.
“The garden of desire” (Master Gardener, USA, 2023). Dir.: Paul Schrader; Int.: Joel Edgerton, Sigourney Weaver, Quintessa Swindell, Esai Morales.
Source: Ambito
I am an author and journalist who has worked in the entertainment industry for over a decade. I currently work as a news editor at a major news website, and my focus is on covering the latest trends in entertainment. I also write occasional pieces for other outlets, and have authored two books about the entertainment industry.
