Filth - Nerve-racking and chaotic, in the most emotional way (Spoiler’s Alert)

This movie is officially my new favorite comedy-drama. If a movie is adapted from a book, or another screenplay, I always had to finish reading the book before I can allow myself to purchase the CD. The nasty habit has been haunting me since I watched the old Wuthering Heights with my parents when I was nine, and even since that day I have read a book and say “no, this plot is unadaptable for a film”. Filth ended the inertia. Every page of the book is full of revolting drugs, abuses, bribery, addiction, masturbation, homophobia, eczema, manipulation, cheating and the thoughts of a tapeworm! “If a movie is capable of showing all these, I will vomit out every cell in my body within the first five minutes,” I thought to myself. Jon Baird did it – with all the above. I did not get emesis, instead I got lacrimation.

 Filth (2013) Retrieved from IMDb

The film was a masterpiece – the right director, the right plot, the right actor. This is the fourth movie that I am writing about and James McAvoy already appeared twice. This time his acting as Bruce Robertson, comparing to his impression in Inside, I’m Dancing, carried much more authenticity and subtle showmanship. Bruce Robertson is a manipulative and sociopathic Scottish Detective Sergeant; a misanthropic man who is the epitome of nastiness. He bullies, manipulates, does drugs, and fucks incessantly, with different women. 

The story starts with his goal to gain promotion and an investigation of a murder. At first, anything and everything seems to be under his control and schemes. His colleagues do his bidding for him, and their wives are under his indoctrination. At home there is a beautiful and seductive wife waiting for him. The life of a successful, hardened thug. But moving on we see him weakens, loses his grip on reality, and sees grotesque fevered imaginations. His psychiatrist (Jim Broadbent) was in his hallucination, which slowly leads to the reason of his depravity – He killed his brother out of jealousy and has been on medication of bipolar disorder. His wife has left him for another man, taken the custody of his daughter and triggers the deterioration. He hallucinates the existence of his wife and dresses in her clothes. He was unable to solving the murder case for fear of the disclosure of his fetishism because he was spotted by the murderers in his wife’s clothes. He is then taken by the murderers and is nearly killed, later found by his colleagues. The film ends with the footage of a tape of Robertson apologizing to a friend – who is framed by Robertson with sexually harassing his own wife, which was actually done by Roberson. Probably sick of his life and his pain, he chooses to hang himself, but is interrupted by Mary (He tried to save her husband’s life but he died nonetheless) and her son. He laughed and said his catchphrase “same rules apply”, seems to forsake the idea of killing himself. At the moment the chair under him snaps and hangs him. 

The whole story was intricately plotted into the 100 minutes’ time, tight and fit, without any redundancy. The most intricate part of the film is the switch between Robertson’s antagonistic personality and protagonistic personality. At 19:30, Mary appeared the first time with her dying husband and Robertson displayed the kind and righteous side of himself but quickly lapsed back into his evilness. 

At 31:34 after confronting one of the murderer, which might have triggered a little bit of his memory of his fetishism, he met Mary again when she was picking up the wreath for her husband’s funeral. This time he almost broke when Mary asked him if he has ever lost someone close. The tears in his eyes were at the threshold and he quickly left and went back to being a villain. 

At 51:20 - 58:30, Mary came to his work and thanked him for helping saving her husband. This time he showed tenderness by giving her his home address and number. You could tell from the actor’s eyes that he needed help and he wanted her to stay. Following that he went back and watched the old family video of his wife and daughter, weeping and helpless. 

After the tragic death of his brother kept coming back to him, at 71:15 he had his meltdown in front of his colleague, revealing the actual good side of himself and admitting that he cannot understand, or remember why he has two distinct personality. His vulnerability was pitiful and as the movie began to reveal to truth, his life inevitably was shattered into pieces. He was forced to have sex with a woman that he dominates. Late he collapsed to the floor entered his good and sane side of his personality, again revealed his vulnerability.

 At 86:10, after he got out of the hands of the murderers, Robertson saw his wife and his daughter when shopping. The scene brought tears to my eyes – in rugged clothes and almost in a trance, he called out his daughter’s name with tears in his eyes, but knowing what he might do or bring to his life, he did not say her name a second time, or chase after them. Mary startled him when he was staring as his wife left, he dropped the wine bottle that he was holding and lied to her about the scars on his face. When she was about to leave he could not hide his pain and distraught anymore and told her not to leave, which was perceived as a strange reaction for Mary and she left nonetheless. These five scenes are all ten to twenty minutes apart from each other, making believe that Robertson is a good person deep down inside and triggers immense compassion for Robertson. If told separately, or the scenes weren’t so evenly spread in the plot, the audience would have difficulty understanding his disorder and moreover, that would take the bloom off of the intense emotional response the director what to stir up among the audience. 

It is easy so see how Robertson’s life was torn apart by the disease by comparing the image of Robertson at the beginning of the film and after this scene.

The film was also highlighted by its soundtrack – the director chose Christmassy, jovial music to go with the most tear-jerking moments, the nuanced rhythm brings out the sadness in the scenes even more and resonates even after the scenes changed. The film will definitely leave a sense of heaviness in you, but it is not entirely tragic. The Scottish humor displayed throughout the movie will still bring out your laughter from time of time, before you sink back into the main character’s immense pain and mental disturbance. 

 Check out the full trailer of Filth (2013)