After watching this movie, I left the cinema convinced more than ever that biopics are bad idea. What purpose do they serve except giving a completely twisted, distorted and simplified version of person's lives - often filtered trough director's perspective and more attention has been focused on a crazy camera angles, sound and lighting than to a simple fact is this actually at least close to the truth. Take Shirley Jackson - a brilliant but now forgotten American novelist who is remembered for her two quintessential horror masterpieces "The Haunting of Hill House" and "We Have Always Lived in the Castle". (A friend of mine claims she is not forgotten and is very well known - besides me, this is the only person I ever heard mentioning Jackson) Jackson died more than 50 years ago, her children are now old people and grandparents themselves. Almost nothing is know about her - writers are notoriously private creatures - but if carefully looking over the old photographs and her writings, we can get impression of a witty person with a wicked sense of humour who was also carrying a burden of family, motherhood (she was raising four children) and writing career. Probably spread too thin on various sides, Jackson was a wife during 1950s when bread winners were husbands - it was socially accepted that women will stay at home with the family and act the part. By all accounts, Jackson didn't really fit into this Stepford mentality and not only that she was actually earning more money & publicity than her husband, she was very probably ostracised as author of disturbing fiction - not your typical white gloves Sunday Tea lady - and as a result of too much smoking, drinking and everything, she died at the age of 48. Had she lived longer, she would see the emergence of feminism and might have been celebrated as ice breaking author, unfortunately it seems life was not fair to her.
Now, how to make a movie about somebody half-forgotten as Shirley Jackson? Director Josephine Decker goes for book "Shirley" by Susan Scarf Merrell, which is a interesting but completely fictional story that uses names of real people (Jackson and her husband) and than goes into wild speculation what went on behind closed doors. Inspired by Jackson's writing, the book imagines that she might have half-mad herself and waves a plot not unlike "Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf?" where older couple sadistically manipulates younger for the sheer sake of gleeful fun. As biopic, movie could go to completely different direction and perhaps go for a unconventional woman who was trying to keep her head above the water in conservative 1950s society - instead, we get a complete fiction with hallucinatory and disorienting scenes, where half of the movie feels like a nightmare. As malevolent couple, both Elisabeth Moss and Michael Stuhlbarg are excellent, but I couldn't help thinking how this is a very good showcase for acting skills - there is lot of head shaking, twitching, falling on the floor, yelling and everything one would expect from a complete lunatic who happens to also be a famous writer. Artistic creativity is explained as possession, where Jackson furiously writes (and throws discarded pages on the floor) and has to be forced to dress up for dinner downstairs. Husband is evil manipulator who guides her for the sake of financial success but is very probably a philanderer. For the sake of the story, there is a young couple invited as a live-in help (fictional Rose and Fred) who are helpless victims of older couple's mind games - sometimes you even wonder are they real or just a clever reflection of Shirley and her husband - what bothered me is that there was not a single positive character in the whole movie, all four of them are like Chess figures, all of them have their own agenda and secret reasons - when Jackson and her husband finally got tired of young couple, they just dump them.
OK so this is a completely fictional account of something that never happened. Its a psychological drama that simply uses names of the people who actually lived. You could simply use names like Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, Alfred Hitler and Eva Braun, Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers - it does not matter because its fictional and used simply for the sake of entertainment. But its presented as a biopic. And this is what upset me. I am a reader and have my own opinion of Shirley Jackson - she was a genius, very, very talented lady who lived in different times. I even like the way she looked, obviously interesting and unconventional person who didn't fit into white glove expectations of ladies who lunch. the movie portrays her as a madwoman from the attic, manipulated by evil husband and there is absolutely no reason why these two people even live together - in the movie they are childless, he simply needs a live-in help to cope with a wife who don't want to get up from the bed. In reality Shirley Jackson raised four children. I mean, hey, what is going on in here? Why even using these names? Thousand of people will leave the cinema believing Shirley Jackson was some epileptic who was constantly rolling on the floor and hallucinating. Please, if you create a biopic, at least approach it with respect and do not make Twin Peaks out of someone's life. It really makes me question the whole idea of biopics and the entertainment value of "artistic vision" that convinces audience that Sharon Tate lived happily ever after and Shirley Jackson was in fact a madwoman.
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