When you think of “Carmen,” you most likely think of opera. But this version of “Carmen” inhabits a dancer’s world.
With Benjamin Millepied at the helm, it makes total sense. The dancer choreographed for and performed in 2010’s “Black Swan,” and in his directorial feature debut – a complete reimagining of Georges Bizet’s 1875 opera – dance is the primary mode of expression. “Carmen” opens with a rousing performance from flamenco artist Marina Tamayo, dancing on a wooden platform outside her home in the middle of the desolate Chihuahuan Desert.
The wind whips around Tamayo as she moves, her feet pounding against the boards below her. The stomp of her feet underscores the growling engine of an approaching car, effectively building dread as two men exit the vehicle and approach her. We learn that the men are looking for someone, but beyond that there’s little dialogue or explanation in the scene. Tamayo’s rhythmic steps and sharp, strong movements tell us all we need to know. Her physical presence embodies strength in the face of a threat.
This opening scene best exemplifies what it is that the arts of opera and dance have in common. In Bizet’s work, based on the novel of the same name, the words do not have to be understood for the emotion to be felt. Although Millepied’s version of the opera has essentially nothing to do with its original plot (the setting, story, and music are all different, besides some lyrics from the opera’s original libretto), what it shares with Bizet’s work is that operatic quality, the intangible magic that can thrill and entrance you without the need for a direct translation. When the film abandons magical realism and dance, it falters. But when Millepied lives within his wheelhouse, “Carmen” is at its most powerful.
“Carmen” the opera takes place in Spain and centers around a temptress who seduces an upstanding, but naive soldier and causes his downfall. “Carmen” the film, however, revolves around a different sort of doomed romance. Carmen (Melissa Barrera) is a Mexican woman on the run from the men who killed her mother (Marina Tamayo). During an attempt to cross the Mexican/U.S. border, she’s apprehended by two volunteer border agents, including ex-marine Aiden (Paul Mescal). When the other agent attacks Carmen, Aiden kills him, and the two end up on the run to Los Angeles.
Millepied does not seem to be particularly interested in examining the murky dynamics of a romance between an immigrant woman and the volunteer border agent who saves her life, and beyond light set up of their circumstances beforehand, there’s no real deeper examination of the politics at play in Aiden and Carmen’s meeting. That decision, however, works in the film’s favor. “Carmen” thrives on extravagant emotion over real life complications. The strongest aspects of the film, unsurprisingly, are its long, beautifully shot dance sequences. Whether they take place in the real world, a fantastical realm, or on some plane in between, every dance conveys to us the connections between different characters – and more importantly, the reason characters make the decisions that they do – more clearly than any words spoken in the film.
This strength is showcased early on in the film, as Carmen and Aiden make a pitstop at an abandoned theme park on their way out west. Carmen runs through a fog of flame and smoke, Aiden following her into the unknown as Nicholas Britell’s stirring score plays on. Carmen finds a group of dancers and joins them. The dancers and the camera swirl around Carmen as she finds her place among the group, and Aiden watches from a distance. The sequence sets up their dynamic perfectly – a young woman desperate to find a place in the world, and a young man watching and protecting from a distance.
But in the few moments of “Carmen” with straight dialogue, when the film shifts from that exhilarating mix of color, light, and passionate movement to something more grounded in reality, the film’s operatic quality is flattened. These scenes are a bit stilted in their presentation, as if Millepied isn’t near as comfortable cinematically capturing that type of reality. As the direction falters, so do the performances. But, outside of those moments, Barrera and Mescal have such a physical presence, both together and apart, it’s easy to get swept away. Barrera, who shoulders the film’s emotional weight, is not a trained dancer, but has an awareness of her body’s position to both her partner and the camera that comes with that particular training. Barrera is mesmerizing when she dances, that almost hypnotic draw helping to translate Carmen and Aiden’s unspoken magnetism.
While the choreography and those moments outside of the real whisk you away so thoroughly, it’s difficult for “Carmen” to keep the magic up when reality is waiting on the sidelines to drag it down. The director and the actors have a difficult time with the switch, and only one performer seems to grasp the connection between the two worlds.
Rossy de Palma – who frequents the work of Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar, and therefore is no stranger to magical realism – plays Masilda, an old friend of Carmen’s mother who takes the pair in at her dance club. In one scene, she stands behind Carmen in the empty club, dancing with and comforting her as the ghost of her mother looks on. Coming from de Palma’s lips, words that might otherwise feel trite are laden with purpose. She infuses the real world with mysticism, bringing the two together instead of treating them as separate entities, more confident in her ability to do so than the film seems to be in itself.