CQ
dir. Roman Coppola
Opens Fri May 31 at the Metro.

The easy thing to say about music videos is that they are empty vessels designed to sell a product; to look good and signify as little as possible. And while a cursory glance at MTV and VH1 makes this popular idea seem almost irrefutable, shrewder minds are hip to the fact that the short, lowbrow form has been responsible for more artistic innovation (probably the wrong word; let's say "ambition") in filmmaking than the last 20 years of narrative features.

By necessity, videos are built on shorthand cues designed to evoke a feeling, time, or relationship, in fractions of a second. Much of this shorthand comes down to elaborate production design, or even imitation, and again, most of it lies in the service of nothing more than making a band or DJ seem cool by association. But the best video directors know the band is beside the point; videos offer the chance to discover just how much can be suggested by the way a thing looks. When the ambitions of a genuine music-video talent are extrapolated to feature-length and turned to more human subject matter, the results--as with Spike Jonze's Being John Malkovich--can be startling not just for their originality, but for their curious, almost backdoor resonance.

The easy thing to say about films made by music-video directors is that they are all style, no substance. CQ, the debut feature written and directed by Roman Coppola--master director of bizarre, beautiful, and hilarious clips for artists like Moby and Fatboy Slim--is a bold exception. It doesn't represent the triumph of style over substance. (We have Brian De Palma for that.) Rather, CQ heralds a transmutation of style into substance, a kind of alchemical reaction in which the film's incredible look--it's set in Paris, 1969, in a post-riots world of film sets, muted colors, and emotional ambivalence--becomes an indispensable guide to the characters' inner landscape.

CQ (even the title is shorthand!) is about Paul (Jeremy Davies), a young would-be filmmaker who is in Paris to edit Dragonfly, a trashy Euro sci-fi movie that's obviously modeled on Barbarella and The Tenth Victim. Meanwhile, he's making his own "brutally honest" black-and-white documentary of life (obviously modeled on the obscure vérité spoof David Holzman's Diary) with his beautiful French girlfriend (Elodie Bouchez), about whom he can't make up his mind. When Dragonfly's director (Gerard Depardieu) is fired, Paul gets the job, falls for his leading lady (Angela Lindvall), and finds himself thrown into endless conflict between art and commerce, desire and commitment, and ultimately, style and substance.

The film's setting is more than a contrivance; it's a crucial factor. CQ exists in a Paris, 1969 of the mind, a world in which glamour exists at arm's length from social tumult and confusion. The same can be said of Paul's predicament; his desire to make "serious art" runs aground not only of his abilities, but eventually, his beliefs.

The contradictions built in to the story are echoed in the filmmaking, and also in the dilemma between videos and movies. Coppola treats all this head-on, realizing that it fuels the story's emotional inquiry while satisfying his obvious jones (and skill) for design; the result is a film that not only looks, but is, beautiful.