dirty pretty things ~ audrey tautou breaks out ~ a review

If you are not an immigrant and want to know what the immigrant experience is or wer ever curious, then see <b>Dirty Pretty Things</b> directed by Stephen Frears and starring Audrey Tautou, the dark-haired beauty and incredibly gifted French actress from “Amelie,” though don’t expect to see the same light –hearted, albeit melancholic girl, because Tautou is far too talented for that. She is changeable, the sort of actress directors dream of. a dream before camera;’ you can hear the words, “The lens loves her,” and indeed it does; those eyes! that mouth! Note too that this is Tautou’s first English-speaking film and she is exceptional in her language in this way and her Turkish Mulsim accent.

In Dirty Pretty Things, Tautou plays a sort of legal Muslim girl who is in the process of trying to become legal. She is a true Muslim and disciplined, though she will slowly become disillusioned even with this at one point saying “My God does not speak to me anymore.”

She is, as she should be as a young Muslim woman, a virgin – so clean, so pure, so innocent and naïve in some ways, yet in other ways incredibly wise and world wary. She knows the deal and when INS comes a knockin’ at her door and suspect her of working, as she is, at The Baltic Hotel, which she should not be doing under her current status, she is forced into a sweat shop where she works for a corrupt and greasy fat man who, once he knows of her immigrant status, uses this to force her into sexual slavery to favor him. He tells her, I don’t want to take your virginity…I just want you to help me relax.” threatening that “he could get into trouble’ because of her. It is blackmail and for a time, she goes alone with the deal, the ritual in the hidden coat racks during the lunch bell or after hours, opening that beautiful mouth for him to his taste.

How beautiful then the day when instead of sucking, she tells her friend and furtive roommate from Africa , Okwe, that she “bit instead of sucking.” How thrilled we are to see her as she bites down hard on this perverse and lacking in principles barely a man but a best to see him get his. The ritual at last over.

As it will turn out, The Baltic is not what it seems. It is for one, trafficking in human organs and Okwe, a former doctor in his country now reduced to driving taxi cabs and being a gopher at The Baltic, is faced with his boss, Senor Jose, who wants him to help perform illegal kidney removals. The deal is this: the person sells their kidney either rfor cash or for a passport or legal papers that Senor Jose can fake so well that they pass. The still healthy kidney is then picked up by the recipient in the underground garage of the hotel.

Okwe refuses to get involved but when his friend (Tautou) turns to Senor Jose feeling she has no choice if she wants to ever escape her situation, Okwe is highly conflicted and agrees to the operation. As expected, when Senay arrives at the hotel room, Senior Jose is waiting and expects more than just a kidney but wants to “cut the ribbon” as he says, to take her virginity as well ~ and so it is that we become by turns Dirty Pretty Things ~ perhaps in our own eyes, or even those of own culture. Regardless, she has little choice and agrees so long as it is from behind and he does not see her face.

Okwe confronts Senay and tells her, “For you, there is only survival. It is time you woke up from your stupid dream.” The stupid dream: to get an Italian citizenship and passport under a false name and go to New York where there “lights in the trees at Christmastime and you can skate on ponds and policemen on white horses, or some of them anyway…” Will she get there? It seems virtually impossible for this girl to escape London and you’ll have to watch the film to see, though expect many surprises from the plot and the actors involved as they turn in and out on themselves always morphing and changing, but always with the dreams held out before them and with a steady eye on them.

It’s a sad and touching scene and one that angered this reviewer. You want Senor Juan to get his and wonder if his comeuppance will ever come. So this stuff does really happen and is not an urban myth after all, if we are to believe this film.

Okwe has a friend who is a coroner or works in a coroners office and offers to help when he hears of his friends condition. If she must sell her kidney or insists on doing it himself. At the end, whether he likes it or not. This of course is a great thrill to Senor Juan who has insisted all along that everyone has their price. I won’t give away the ruse, but suffice to say that the story is gratifying and excellent and worth seeing even for this one scene which is not at all what one would expect even if you think you know. It is morbid, yes, but perfect in its way.

The film, which I’ve said enough about, raises excellent questions that apply not only to immigrant experience of living in London or any immigrant anywhere (one certainly this writer can speak to; the difficulty and the dealings with officials and the frightening experience of what it means to be a foreigner in a country you, in many ways, call home.) Questions raised: Must we give up or sacrifice our patriotism to live legally elsewhere or can we love both? Is this love exclusive? Must all things have a price ~ survival for sure, but what price survival. How much are <i>you</i> willing to give to surface. Tautou clearly draws her line, but she goes a long way and even deeper before finally saying <b>Enough!</b>. The same is true of Okwe.

As the disgusting Senior Juan says to Okwe when he finally agrees, after much debate and saying no to the illegal operations, once he finds out the next patient is Senay, he agrees only to be told by Juan, “Holy shit… so you are human after all.”

The question: does this make him more or less human? Yes, he is helping a friend, but at what cost to both her and to him? He could a. kill her and while yes, it is better that he do the job as a trained doctor in his native land and not a butcher, but still… we are talking about trafficking human organs, friend or no friend, and all for a Green Card or Passport or legal papers anyway.

Does INS realize that this really happens? That there are those people so afraid, so desperate, so afraid that they are put in these awful positions and not by choice, but because for them, there are no options. That not everyone who is illegal is a criminal, and while it may be illegal under the eyes of the law, ask yourself if it is illegal in the context of what is humane and morally right. At a certain point, we see just how very blind justice is. It is as if she does not even <i>want</i> to see the human face of her decisions or laws, yet they are created for <i>our</i> and this film <i>their</i> protection. But who is “they” anyway and doesn’t INS have better things to do, like hunting down terrorists than terrorized young girls and young African men who have seen so much trauma and are so educated yet they are forced to drive taxis because the whole process of becoming legal is so very difficult not to mention expensive.

There is no argument for remaining illegal, but all one can say is that it is at least, <i>understandable</i> and anyone who is human should see this.

More, everyone does have a price; that is one thing I do know. Say you do not, but in the final account, we all do, it just varies and depends where. It is possible to be a Dirty Pretty Thing at once.

Aren’t we all.

B00018D3LE reviewed item

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