Film Fatale: Watching Badlands During a Heatwave
I moved to the suburbs this month, not out of choice but necessity. The heat waves are rampant too. I’ve spent most days laying on my bed watching the sun through the trees, thinking about ordering a fan and then thinking about financial losses that would cause me. I compromise and sit in the garden, fully in the shade by 5pm. A car alarm goes off and a dog barks. I find myself yearning for a road trip with a distant lover. Get me out of here, now.
Badlands (1973) is the pinnacle sad girl heat wave summer flick. Sissy Spacek plays Holly, a teenage girl with a countryfied dissociative pout - surprisingly nonchalant about the handsome and older Kit (Martin Sheen) taking her along on a murder spree across the state. Holly’s monotone voice narrates the film, she observes her surroundings with an innocence but also a quiet awareness:
“At this moment, I didn't feel shame or fear, but just kind of blah, like when you're sitting there and all the water's run out of the bathtub.”
The voice over, as well as the music and landscape, gives the film a delicate approach. Seeing these events play out through the voice of the a young girl separates us from the brutality - it’s comforting and warm as Holly questions her life, her future, and so plainly observes Kit in his attempt to be a hypermasculine cowboy type figure. It makes the viewer become introspective too - the film gives us time to think, not just about the story on screen but the wider themes Holly is presenting, one of morals, loneliness, aimlessness and relationships.
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Holly makes us question her morals - similar to the real life on-the-run murder couple Charles Starkweather and his 13 year old girlfriend Caril Ann Fugate that Badlands was inspired by. Starkweather and Fugate also inspired the film Natural Born Killers (1994). This story has everything for the perfect American movie; the true story element, murder, romance, the natural beauty of the landscape and the moral tale of you will get caught bashing heads with do something bad enough and you’ll be a celebrity! It embraces the sadness and surrealism of this too, a look into desensitisation and inside the minds of two outsiders that view the world like they’re watching a movie screen.
Holly and Kit play Bonnie and Clyde, and just like Bonnie and Clyde they’re filled with that ‘what now’. Films that show the still aftermath moments stick out. They have the Hollywood rush of a murder or a hiest and then they’re left, still, post-adrenalin and in the desert. A ‘This isn’t like how it is in the movies’ type of movie. The film is debunking it’s own narrative - and it shows the only cinematic thing about life is the natural backdrop; the rose coloured sunsets and having the wind blow through your hair in the passenger seat. Their run-away fantasy becomes more and more fictious, and they’re left with eachother. All moments of action and relationships become futile and only the desert remains.
It’s overwhelmingly impressive how Terrance Malick manages to make empty space so dominating. Holly and Kit are eaten up by the dead land and clear skies, it makes it obvious to the viewer that they have no chance and they’re taking a road trip to the electric chair. With Holly so childlike (because she is a child) and Kit imitating the looks and mannerisms of James Dean, it’s a recipe for a slow disaster - a result of too many trips to their small town theatre and a lack of direction and hope.
One of my favorite moments in the film is when they play house in the trees. Holly has her hair in rollers and imitates a housewife role amongst the temporary home they’ve built for themselves. Kit can’t fish so he shoots his gun in the river to retrive food. Holly tries on eyeliner.
“The films conveys dissonance and detachment in such a lyrical and romanticised way, and it captures the melancholic juxtaposition between the stillness of nature and the hopelessness of people.”
They’re completely detached from the outside world and they construct a fantasy environment, domestic but completely rogue. As Holly’s narration continues, the film takes a solemn turn but still accompanied by the sweet, hypnotic soundtrack. It makes the murders almost forgettable as they build their treehouse and Holly paints her face. It convinces us that they don’t know what they’re really doing, but that breeds a whole different type of danger. It taps into that societal scare of popular culture ruining the minds of the youth and creating rabid killers, something that will always be around weather it’s in news papers or a Facebook news feed.
The films conveys dissonance and detachment in such a lyrical and romanticised way, and it captures the melancholic juxtaposition between the stillness of nature and the hopelessness of people. We join them and feel the same as Holly, enamoured with the scenery and unnerved but enticed by Kit and their criminal endeavours. It’s an unforgettable watch, and perfect for these dry summer days where it’s too hot to think but you’re still waiting at the window for something to come along.
Words: Charlotte Amy Landrum
