SURVIVING DESIRE

US, 1991, 86 minutes, Colour.
Martin Donovan, Matt Molloy.
Directed by Hal Hartley.

Surviving Desire is a short television movie made for American Playhouse by writer-director Hal Hartley. Hartley made a big impact with his quirky and offbeat films The Unbelievable Truth and Trust. He continues in this vein with Surviving Desire. However, he moves from suburbia to academia, focusing on a tortured literature professor, overeducated, boring his students who literally pelt him with books, obsessed with a passage from Dostoyevsky about the meaning of life, thinking of himself as an atheist but undergoing a crisis of conscience as well as being attracted to one of the students. The professor is played by Martin Donovan, who had the central role in Trust.

The film is literate and witty, entertaining with its ideas as well as its characterisations. The portraits of the professor, the student who works part-time in a bookshop and writes short stories, the theological student friend of the professor who is sent from the university, gets a job in the bookshop but can't make anything of his life, the street vagrant who proposes to everybody who passes by.

The film's dialogue is strong, humorous and offbeat, deadpan and intelligent. The film focuses on knowledge and experience, paradoxes of modern love, guilt and uncertainty. There are some delightful moments - as when the hero suddenly bursts into West Side Story dancing in a courtyard.

Short, but very effective in achieving its intentions and one of Hartley's solid and successful works.

1. The cinema skills of Hal Hartley, writing, characterisations, direction? Offbeat and droll?

2. The film made for television, quick delineation of characters and situations, establishing of moods, the strong verbal screenplay, comment on contemporary American life?

3. The interiors: the classroom, restaurants, poolroom, apartment, the scenes in the street, the service station? The musical score?

4. The title and its application to Jude, Sophie, Henry, Kate - and the meaning and meaninglessness of life?

5. The plainness of the cinema style, camera takes, close-ups? Adapted for TV? Yet the editing, the pace?

6. The importance of the verbal aspects of the screenplay, the wit, the droll and deadpan comments? The unexpected? Character interactions, philosophical reflections about the meaning of life? Literature? Dostoyevsky? Ironic and deadpan?

7. The paragraph from Dostoyevsky which was read and reread? Literary and philosophical authorities and their influence on people? Meaning and meaninglessness - as dramatised? The bar attendant and his comments about literature, life and the penchant for American tragedy?

8. The portrait of Jude - and the reference to Hardy's Jude the Obscure? Reading out the paragraph, his intense interest in it, the class, the students' angry reaction, throwing books at him? The young student and the accusations about the questions and no answers? His teaching method and self-deprecation, lack of confidence? His attentiveness to Sophie? Her listening to his questions? The discussion with Henry, their friendship, openness? Henry's comment on his academic style? Wary about his relationships and the infatuation with Sophie? Jude as intelligent, his comment about being an atheist? His crisis of intelligence? Action and passion? Intimacy and his listing of verbs? Giving Henry the lift? Going to the bookshop, spending hours reading but not buying? Sophie approaching him, his reaction to her, talk about intimacy? The date, meeting with Sophie, her thinking that she might be seen to be getting a better grade by her liaison with him? The lie on the phone to her roommate? The kissing, her speaking the truth? His questioning the truth - and answering with "Perhaps"? The encounters with Katie, on the street, her mental condition, her proposals? His reaction? Buying her the coffee and muffin? Meeting Sophie, their discussions, her second lie on the phone? Going home together, her direct approach? The aftermath of the affair? His reaction to her denying knowing him to Henry? Henry's arrival, comments, her fragrance and his getting the toast smoke around the room? Going back to class, the reading of the paragraph, the pandemonium - his giving the facts and figures about Dostoyevsky? Writing "Knowing is not enough"? Meeting Katie, his reaction to her engagement with Henry's ring? Her explanation that she wanted to be asked? His lying in the gutter, trying to come to his senses, get some meaning - and photographed upside down? Somebody asking him to direct them - and his getting up and pointing out the real way? (And the happy interlude of his relationship with Sophie and his doing the West Side Story dance?)

7. Sophie, her attentiveness in class, attention to Jude? Her reaction to his questions, her explanation of how helpful his classes were? Chatting with her girlfriend, analysing her motives? At work, offering to help people - but just talking vainly and vaguely into the air? Seeing Jude, her relationship with him, her story, writing a short story "Him"? Her diary? The evening with Jude, telling a lie to her roommate? The books, the shop? The beer with Jude? The night, her direct approach? Waking up in the morning, snooping in his apartment? Denying knowing him to Henry? Back to class, her disappearing from the class and from Jude? Her wondering about his surviving? Her surviving and questions?

8. Henry, theological student, ousted from the university, talking with Jude, a sounding board for him? His astuteness, religious background? His drinking? Working in the shop and getting sacked? Helping Jude, talking with Sophie - and her denying knowing Jude? The encounter with Katie, the talk, sympathetic, the engagement, giving his university ring?

9. Katie, on the street, obsessed with being married, offering herself to everybody passing by - and the variety of reactions? Henry's chat with her, drunk? Sympathy, engagement, giving her the ring? Her explaining to Jude that she just wanted to be asked?

10. Sophie's roommate, chatter, study? Her more mundane concerns, magazines and dresses?

11. The angry student in the classroom, his philosophy of education and being told answers?

12. The world of academia, reality and unreality? Knowing and experiencing? Intimacy, passion and desire? The contrast with the world of academia and the real world?