An experiment; an attempt by Soderbergh to strip away the extraneous baggage of narrative cinema - and, in the process, the often debilitating obsessions with style and presentation - in order to get to the pure essence of film-making, as an outlet for spontaneous, creative expression. Soderbergh would subsequently refer to the finished product as a necessary purging; a way of going beyond the obsessive technical approach and over-reliance on the look and technique that had been so important to the atmosphere of his earliest work, so as to make possible the more liberated and immediate film-making approach of subsequent films such as Out of Sight (1998) and The Limey (1999). As a result, Schizopolis (1996) can now be seen as both the end and the beginning of something really quite wonderful; offering, as it does, the full stop following perhaps the most interesting and successful stage of the director's career - in which he developed on the cool and seductive Sex Lies and Videotape (1988), the dark and expressionistic Kafka (1991) and the underrated American masterpiece King of the Hill (1993) - and the start of a whole new chapter - in which the director found his greatest success with the highly acclaimed Erin Brockovich (2000), the Oscar winning Traffic (2000) and the hugely successful remake of Ocean's Eleven (2001).
In keeping with this idea of purging, we can see with Schizopolis an attempt by Soderbergh to indulge all of his various creative quirks and eccentricities before simplifying his style and vision in a way that would be beneficial to a mainstream American audience. Although he would create similar indulgences since - including films like Full Frontal (2002), Bubble (2005) and The Good German (2006) - those particular films often feel like extra-curricular exercises that don't, in any real way, relate to his more successful endeavours, such as the Ocean's Twelve (2004) and Thirteen (2007) sequels and his adaptation of the Stanislaw Lem novel, Solaris (2002). Whereas those films hid their post-modern reinvention beneath knock-about farce or widescreen spectacle, Schizopolis is home-made, experimental cinema at its most explicit and unhinged. From the narrative set-up, to the casting, to the use of editing, music and mise-en-scene, the film is literally bursting with ideas and ingenious abstractions, with Soderbergh taking influence from a number of far greater filmmakers - such as his personal heroes, Terry Gilliam and Richard Lester, to legendary masters like Jacques Rivette and Jean Luc Godard - and yet, still manages to produce a piece of work that seems true to his own unique style and individual creative preoccupations.
Naturally, given the nature of the film and the outlandishness of its characters and approach, Schizopolis often seesaws wildly from the inventive, to the stupid, to the genuinely inspired. It was and still remains a bold and daring work for the director; disregarding the lush cinematography and evocative period detail of Kafka and King of the Hill and instead developing the rough and ready, hand-held, matter-of-fact approach that he would continue to use on subsequent films like Traffic and The Limey. However, the presentation works, and the style of the film does well to convey certain themes and ideas that are expressed through the tone and opinions of a central character that is perfectly performed by the director himself. It also creates that feeling of something anarchic and aesthetically quite progressive; disregarding any such notions of box-office potential, industry trailblazing or self-congratulatory deconstruction to simply make a film that presents the pure, unfettered spirit, energy and imagination that only the very best of cinema can convey. It obviously won't be to all tastes - which goes without saying - but even so, I feel that Schizopolis is a truly unsung work within the director's career; stressing personal expression, ironic self-deprecation and genuine cinematic invention.
As it stands over a decade on from its initial release, Schizopolis can now be seen as a relic to the days when Soderbergh could (for me at least) be cited as perhaps the greatest living filmmaker of his generation; with the film capturing the sense of diversity, energy and complete control over all aspects of the production that can be noted throughout his work released during the 1990's. His more recent films might be more financially successful (and certainly not without merit), but for me, they simply fail to offer that same sense of inimitable defiance, unpredictability and that eccentric disregard for convention that his work was once synonymous with. It may not be wholly triumphant overall - and is certainly not on a par with the likes of Kafka, King of the Hill and the greater than you might remember it Out of Sight - it is, nonetheless, a work of pure vision; both mesmerising and maddening in almost equal measure, and punctuated by Soderbergh's static, deadpan performance and the capricious idea that anything could happen at any given time.
In keeping with this idea of purging, we can see with Schizopolis an attempt by Soderbergh to indulge all of his various creative quirks and eccentricities before simplifying his style and vision in a way that would be beneficial to a mainstream American audience. Although he would create similar indulgences since - including films like Full Frontal (2002), Bubble (2005) and The Good German (2006) - those particular films often feel like extra-curricular exercises that don't, in any real way, relate to his more successful endeavours, such as the Ocean's Twelve (2004) and Thirteen (2007) sequels and his adaptation of the Stanislaw Lem novel, Solaris (2002). Whereas those films hid their post-modern reinvention beneath knock-about farce or widescreen spectacle, Schizopolis is home-made, experimental cinema at its most explicit and unhinged. From the narrative set-up, to the casting, to the use of editing, music and mise-en-scene, the film is literally bursting with ideas and ingenious abstractions, with Soderbergh taking influence from a number of far greater filmmakers - such as his personal heroes, Terry Gilliam and Richard Lester, to legendary masters like Jacques Rivette and Jean Luc Godard - and yet, still manages to produce a piece of work that seems true to his own unique style and individual creative preoccupations.
Naturally, given the nature of the film and the outlandishness of its characters and approach, Schizopolis often seesaws wildly from the inventive, to the stupid, to the genuinely inspired. It was and still remains a bold and daring work for the director; disregarding the lush cinematography and evocative period detail of Kafka and King of the Hill and instead developing the rough and ready, hand-held, matter-of-fact approach that he would continue to use on subsequent films like Traffic and The Limey. However, the presentation works, and the style of the film does well to convey certain themes and ideas that are expressed through the tone and opinions of a central character that is perfectly performed by the director himself. It also creates that feeling of something anarchic and aesthetically quite progressive; disregarding any such notions of box-office potential, industry trailblazing or self-congratulatory deconstruction to simply make a film that presents the pure, unfettered spirit, energy and imagination that only the very best of cinema can convey. It obviously won't be to all tastes - which goes without saying - but even so, I feel that Schizopolis is a truly unsung work within the director's career; stressing personal expression, ironic self-deprecation and genuine cinematic invention.
As it stands over a decade on from its initial release, Schizopolis can now be seen as a relic to the days when Soderbergh could (for me at least) be cited as perhaps the greatest living filmmaker of his generation; with the film capturing the sense of diversity, energy and complete control over all aspects of the production that can be noted throughout his work released during the 1990's. His more recent films might be more financially successful (and certainly not without merit), but for me, they simply fail to offer that same sense of inimitable defiance, unpredictability and that eccentric disregard for convention that his work was once synonymous with. It may not be wholly triumphant overall - and is certainly not on a par with the likes of Kafka, King of the Hill and the greater than you might remember it Out of Sight - it is, nonetheless, a work of pure vision; both mesmerising and maddening in almost equal measure, and punctuated by Soderbergh's static, deadpan performance and the capricious idea that anything could happen at any given time.