[Archive]: The Plagiarists (2019)

One project I had considered writing for this month was ranking all the films and ephemera I saw in March 2020. This was doomed due to how long it was taking and that with some exceptions I want to move away from lists. They take too long and, unless it's the yearly reviews, lazy and not fun to complete due to how long they gestate. One piece of the writing I wanted to salvage is this, which is a barebones fragment which does not completely deal with this lo-fi oddity, but is a hint of it that hopefully will tantalise.

Also, even if this is a negative review, if I had the chance to see the film again I would gladly revisit and possibly cover The Plagiarists, as it was a real curiosity worthy for covering.

I never thought I would see a film with a black screen at the end showing all the books and materials references in a little reference section, but hey, The Plagiarists was an odd misfire. The structure, a mumblecore drama shot on videotape about a pretentious white heterosexual couple whose car breaks down and meets an older man, is compelling if you are open minded, reverberating onwards in the downfall of their relationship when the girlfriend is perturbed by the older man quoting a Scandinavian author off the top of his head and without quoting the reference.

Even shooting this film in Betamax has an unexpected aura that adds to experience, the rival of VHS being a very idiosyncratic choice in itself, which was said to have a higher picture quality and existed more commonly after its mainstream failure in industries like news broadcasts, befitting a film where one of the couple is an advertisement director who has higher inspirations. The problem is that this film decides to be vague in what it actually wants to talk about. Eventually its theme, alongside the breakup of a relationship, is the notion of legitimacy which I honestly have completely forgotten entirely, aside from The Hunger Games being quoted as an example for the argument and that it became nasal gazing over tranquil video fuzzed images of a beach.

I cannot help but think of Hal Hartley's Henry Fool (1997), which managed to ask of these subjects by having a garbage man character write scatological, crude poetry and make it funny. The Plagiarists at times looks like it is going to be subversive, especially as the older man accused of theft of intellectual rights is a working class African American man, only to wander off into something less.