Cutie and the Boxer (Zachary Heinzerling, 2013, 82 min.)
UW-Cinematheque Fri Jan 17, 7PM»
Painters often fight their blank canvases, but instead of a brush as his chosen weapon, Ushio Shinohara uses boxing gloves.
Zachary Heinzerling’s directorial debut, Cutie and the Boxer, tells the story of Ushio and Noriko Shinohara, a starving artist couple residing in New York. Married for four decades, the film explores their marriage and their art, which are sometimes peaceful, sometimes volatile, and always inexorably intertwined.
As the titles roll, we see Ushio wearing gloves fitted with foam add-ons soaked in black paint. While he jabs and hooks his way across the canvas, punching paint wildly, we catch intermittent flashes of light in the frame. The flashes are from Noriko’s camera as, off-screen, she photographs Ushio’s latest work. She is initially marginalized here, a mere chronicler of her husband’s process. As she begins to move slowly into the frame, however, our focus shifts to her—an approach the film will eventually take as well.
Cutie does an outstanding job of covering a lot of territory in a short space of time. Combining modern-day footage with documentary clips from the 1970s, the film takes us through Ushio’s long career and concentrates on the urgency for him to sell new work to keep their family financially afloat. As its title implies, the film also spotlights Noriko, who has struggled to keep the family emotionally stable, all while pursuing her own artistic creation: an autobiographical comic relating the tale of a young aspiring art student (“Cutie,” an analogue for Noriko) and her turbulent life with an older, established, but less-than-responsible artist (“Bullie”, Ushio’s analogue). Both the comic and the movie itself give Noriko a chance to shine in her own right. Ushio’s pieces are undeniably captivating, but it is Noriko’s gorgeous art that feels more triumphant, as we are left with a picture of two people who, with all of their strengths and flaws, simply cannot live without each other.
While the struggle between the artistic and the practical is not new terrain, Cutie and the Boxer deals with it in a way that is calm, charming, and ultimately very enjoyable. This enjoyment owes to the tone of the film, and the beauty with which it is shot. As a director, Heinzerling shapes a story that is sweet without being saccharine, touching without being precious. As a cinematographer, he complements that balanced tone by pairing austere portraits of the Shinoharas’ home life with unequivocally gorgeous shots of Ushio’s artistic works. The motorcycle sculptures and boxing paintings burst with color and vitality. Less effective are the animated segments where Noriko’s comic is brought to life, since her art is powerful enough on its own without having to be set in motion, but this is a small complaint for an otherwise lovely looking film.
Thanks to the UW-Madison Cinematheque, Cutie and the Boxer will get a theatrical screening this Friday, January 17. Kicking off the 2014 Cinematheque schedule, Cutie is part of its Premiere Showcase, which provides local filmgoers the opportunity to see films for free on the big screen that ordinarily might not get a theatrical release in the area. Because of the Shinoharas’ art, and the beauty with which it is shot, Cutie is a film that demands to be seen in a theater.
Attend the screening if you can, stream it if you must, but don’t miss it. In a cinematic marketplace that continues to set its sights upon teenage audiences, Cutie and the Boxer is a film about adults, for adults.