The Virgin Suicides (film)

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The Virgin Suicides

Theatrical release poster
Directed by Sofia Coppola
Produced by Francis Ford Coppola
Julie Costanzo
Dan Halsted
Chris Hanley
Written by Sofia Coppola
Based on The Virgin Suicides 
by Jeffrey Eugenides
Narrated by Giovanni Ribisi
Starring James Woods
Kathleen Turner
Kirsten Dunst
Josh Hartnett
A. J. Cook
Music by Air
Cinematography Edward Lachman
Editing by Melissa Kent
James Lyons
Studio American Zoetrope
Distributed by Paramount Classics (US)
Pathé (UK)
Release dates Cannes Film Festival:
May 19, 1999
United States:
May 12, 2000
United Kingdom:
May 19, 2000
Running time 97 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Budget $6 million
Box office $10,409,377[1]

The Virgin Suicides is a 1999 American drama written and directed by Sofia Coppola,[2] produced by her father Francis Ford Coppola,[2] starring James Woods, Kathleen Turner, Kirsten Dunst, Josh Hartnett, and A. J. Cook.[2]

Based on the novel of the same name by Jeffrey Eugenides, the film tells of the events surrounding the lives of five sisters in an upper-middle class suburb of Detroit during the 1970s. After the youngest sister makes an initial attempt at suicide, the sisters are put under close scrutiny by their parents, eventually being put into near-confinement, which leads to increasingly depressive and isolated behaviour.

Plot

The story takes place in Grosse Pointe, Michigan, in 1974, as four neighborhood boys reflect on their neighbors, the five Lisbon sisters. Strictly unattainable due to their overprotective, authoritarian parents, Ronald (James Woods) and Sara (Kathleen Turner), the girls — Therese (Leslie Hayman), Mary (A. J. Cook), Bonnie (Chelse Swain), Lux (Kirsten Dunst), and Cecilia (Hanna R. Hall) — are the enigma that fill the boys' conversations and dreams.

The film begins with the suicide attempt of the youngest sister, Cecilia, as she slits her wrist in a bath. After her parents throw a chaperoned party intended to make her feel better, Cecilia excuses herself and jumps out her bedroom window, dying when she impales herself on an iron fence. In the wake of her act, the Lisbon parents begin to watch over their daughters even more closely, further isolating the family from the community and heightening the air of mystery about them.

At the beginning of the new school year in the fall, Lux forms a secret relationship with Trip Fontaine (Josh Hartnett), the school heartthrob. Trip comes over one night to the Lisbon residence to watch television and persuades Mr. Lisbon to allow him to take Lux to the Homecoming Dance by promising to provide dates for the other sisters, to go as a group. After being crowned Homecoming Queen and King, Lux and Trip copulate on the football field. Lux falls asleep, and Trip abandons her immediately. Lux wakes up alone and has to take a taxi home.

Having broken curfew, Lux and her sisters are punished by a furious Mrs. Lisbon by being taken out of school and sequestered in their house. Unable to leave the house, the sisters contact the boys across the street by using light signals and sharing songs over the phone as a means of sharing their feelings.

During this time, Lux begins to have anonymous sexual encounters on the roof of the house late at night; the boys watch from across the street. Finally, after months of confinement, the sisters leave a note for the boys, presumably asking for help to escape. When the boys arrive that night, they find Lux alone in the living room, smoking a cigarette. She invites them to wait for her sisters, while she goes to wait in the car. The boys briefly imagine the group of them driving blissfully away on a sun-soaked country road.

The boys wander into the basement and discover Bonnie's body hanging from the ceiling. Terrified, they rush upstairs only to stumble across the bodies of the remaining sisters. They had all killed themselves in an apparent suicide pact moments before: Therese took an overdose of sleeping pills; Mary stuck her head in the gas oven; and Lux left the car engine running in the sealed garage.

Devastated by the suicides of all their children, Mr. and Mrs. Lisbon quietly flee the neighborhood, never to return. Mr. Lisbon had a friend sell off the family belongings, especially those belonging to the girls, in a yard sale; whatever didn't sell was put in the trash, including the family photos, which the neighborhood boys kept as mementos of the mysterious girls. Soon after, a young couple from Boston purchases the Lisbon's house. Seemingly unsure how to react, the adults in the community go about their lives as if nothing important happened. The dead girls forever remain a source of mystery and grief for the boys, who cannot forget them. The film ends with one of the boys acknowledging in voiceover that they will spend the rest of their lives trying to put together the unsolvable mystery of the Lisbon sisters.

Cast

Reception

The film was generally well received by critics; it has a 76 % Metacritic rating and a 76% Rotten Tomatoes rating.[3] The New York Post heaped praise on the film; "It's hard to remember a film that mixes disparate, delicate ingredients with the subtlety and virtuosity of Sofia Coppola's brilliant The Virgin Suicides."[3] The Philadelphia Inquirer outlined its attributes: "There's a melancholy sweetness here, a gentle humor that speaks to the angst and awkwardness of girls turning into women, and the awe of boys watching the transformation from afar."[3]

Score

Main article: The Virgin Suicides (score)

Soundtrack

In addition to original score composed for the film by Air, the film features songs by 1970s-era performers and five tracks from the 1990s by Sloan. A separate soundtrack album was released featuring music from Todd Rundgren, Steely Dan, Heart, Sloan, The Hollies, Al Green, Gilbert O'Sullivan, 10cc, Styx, and two tracks by Air (one previously recorded; one composed for the film).

Mentioned in the credits (chronologically):

Cultural references

  • A passage from the narration and a ticking clock sound are sampled at the end of the song "Doors Closing Slowly" from the album Journal for Plague Lovers by Manic Street Preachers. The quoted passage is "In the end we had pieces of the puzzle but no matter how we put them together gaps remained; oddly shaped emptiness mapped by what surrounded them, like countries we couldn't name".

References

  1. ↑ The Virgin Suicides (2000). Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2011-03-11.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Scott, A. O. (April 21, 2000). "The Virgin Suicides (1999) FILM REVIEW; Evanescent Trees and Sisters In an Enchanted 1970's Suburb". The New York Times. 
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 The Virgin Suicides Reviews, Ratings, Credits. Metacritic. Retrieved 2011-03-11.

External links

Films directed by Sofia Coppola
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