Another Kind of Fable
No Such Thing Spins Fairy Tale

Each and every day, the media tells us what is happening in the world, how it affects us, and what we should think about it. In such a world, what would we believe if the media brought a monster -- a real, fire-breathing monster -- to our television screens? In the offbeat satirical film No Such Thing, writer/director Hal Hartley examines humanity through the eyes of a monster in a distorted fairy tale.

No Such Thing
Beatrice (Sarah Polley) tries to comfort the Monster (Robert John Burke) in the satirical No Such Thing. (MGM, 2001)
Directed by: Hal Hartley
Written by: Hal Hartley
Starring: Sarah Polley, Robert John Burke, Helen Mirren, and Julie Christie

Rated R (for for language and brief violence)
Running time: 102 min.

FilmGuru's Rating : 8 out of 10.

Beatrice (Sarah Polley) works for a media outlet that has lost a crew sent to a remote Icelandic area in search of a local legend. Because her fiancé was one of the crew that is now missing (and believed to be killed by the monster), she asks for permission to go to Iceland and follow up on the story.

On the way, Beatrice's plane goes down in the North Atlantic, but she miraculously survives. After an experimental operation and months of therapy, she can walk again. She becomes a modern day miracle to the locals in Iceland, and her physician, Dr. Anna (Julie Christie), seemingly adopts her as a daughter.

Finally, Beatrice sets off to finish her quest. She makes it to the village where the crew was last seen. Surprisingly, the locals turn on her. She is drugged and dropped at the lair of the beast as a sacrifice. But the Monster (Robert John Burke) doesn't kill her. Instead, the Monster strikes a bargain with Beatrice that will change both their lives.

The world Beatrice inhabits is a horrible place, filled with domestic and international terrorism that everyone seems to take for granted. People live in fear, afraid to help others. Humanity seems to be falling apart, and The Monster sits in judgment of it. His hatred for humanity is based in our lack of accomplishment. After all we've been through, he expects more of us. Like an unpleased god, he eats those whom he finds unworthy.

Beatrice, however, is an enigma. Her role changes throughout the film. She begins as an innocent, looking for her lost love. She becomes a representation of the miraculous by surviving the crash. When she confronts the Monster, she has an inner strength and shows no fear. Then we see her smoke, drink, have sex, and eventually become obsessed with the trappings of fame. Nevertheless, Polley manages throughout to keep Beatrice innocent. Like a child experiencing things for the first time, she's bound to get burned before she learns her lesson.

Burke's performance as the Monster is witty and interesting. He comes across as more of a grouchy neighbor than an immortal, fire-breathing monster. But there are flashes of cruelty, too, as when he roots through a pile of human bones to find the remains of Beatrice's fiancé.

Helen Mirren gives a wonderful turn as Beatrice's boss. With her hard-hitting management style, she will stop at nothing to get the next big thing on the news. Her willingness to exploit Beatrice's tragedy, the Monster, and even her own misfortune is an indictment of the media's manipulation of events.

No Such Thing is not a mainstream picture. It's almost an art house film. It has the feel of a dream, with long, silent scenes emphasizing the broad vistas of the Icelandic landscape. While the pacing of the film is a bit slow, that too adds to the dreamlike quality of the film.

This is not an adaptation of Beauty and the Beast (or any other fairy tale I can recognize). Nonetheless, it is a fairy tale. Like many fairy tales, it has a quest motif. Beatrice is told repeatedly that her plane, her car, her horse, etc. "will get you only so far." She has a hard road ahead of her. She collects friends along the way, like Dr. Anna, the nurse, and the scientist Artaud (Baltasar Kormákur), who all come back to help her in the end.

The mythic quality it possesses lends itself to allegory, allowing us to examine No Such Thing at more than face value. Those who dismissed this picture as falling below Hartley's previous works should give it another try.