Gossip
Directed by Davis Guggenheim.
Starring James Marsden, Lena Headey, Norman Reedus, Kate Hudson and
Joshua Jackson.
Prior to seeing Gossip I had the impression of either an American college drama or conspiracy-theory. A few facts do not fill one with confidence: the prior experience of the actors, the director and the production team is almost entirely confined to television police dramas and soap-operas. However, I found the film, its ideas, production and acting intense and impressive. The premise is that three students at an East Coast university decide to start a rumour about the sex-life of another student as an experiment in how gossip propagates and develops. They find the initial results hilarious but then the rumour takes a sinister turn, becomes an allegation of date-rape which even the victim in fact starts believing. Then, it seems that all this has happened before…
The ideas that this film explores — that hearsay can take on the status of fact in people’s minds, that popular belief can alter the perceptions even of those with personal experience — are hardly profound. However, they and their effects on the characters are cleverly handled. One particularly interesting side-light is the photographic collage which one of the students creates to represent the rumour’s development and effects. There is a palpable sense of something potentially destructive running out-of-control; more than that, something that no-one apart from the perpetrators understands.
The first part of the film is a bit unreal and tedious with the students doing their obligatory tour of hip nightclubs and super-funky parties, drinking vast quantities of expensive cocktails, and living in a spacious bohemian apartment decorated with original artwork. Apparently, the director did this deliberately to suggest that the students’ perceptions were hyper-real, giving them a sense of superiority and invulnerability. If so, it’s overstated. The other jarring feature is the ending: the latter parts of the film seem to get rather out-of-control and the climax — though certainly a real twist — is improbable and silly. However, Gossip is mostly well put together and quite gripping in places. It’s not perfect — perhaps it tries too hard — but certainly worth watching.
Guy O.
