"Once upon a time . . ."
-- Numerous Fairy Tales
Trying to review "Post-Modern Prometheus" from only one perspective is like trying to put out a raging fire with a squirt gun. It's not a lot of fun and it's not very effective either. One angle could say that what I saw was pure genius; I could also make a case for "Post-Modern Prometheus" being a pompous, overblown melange of every hackneyed schlock movie ever made. In fact, a third view gives me a different perspective that fits "Post-Modern Prometheus" somewhere in between genius and fodder for the paper shredder.
There were many things to like about this episode. The Film Noir look from the black and white photography was stylish but, at times, excessive. There were several effective uses of light and shadow by Director of Photography Joel Ransom, most notably in scenes where characters were framed in a soft light while the backgrounds were deliberately shadowy. Several of the interior shots in the Berkowitz house and at the Pollidori residence were artistic in their simplicity and elegance. I got the feeling that writer/director Chris Carter was going for something really special. This feeling would come and go several times while viewing the episode.
This fine work was then upstaged by the excessive lightning effects. At first, I thought this was kind of campy, a sort of exaggerated paean to the earliest horror movies put to film. But by the time the last lightning flash had lit up the background, it became distracting to the point of annoyance. I started flashing back to the comic strip "Peanuts" and Snoopy's novel that began, "It was a dark and stormy night . . ." I found myself praying that the lights would flicker and go out.
Musically, this was one of the series' finest moments. Mark Snow took his cue from director Carter and crafted an exquisite backdrop for the episode. Snow blended calliope and xylophone music as the main background score and built on his opus from there. There were scenes where violins were used to evoke tension, and then there were scenes where the violins sought to touch your heartstrings. Snow effectively used brass and cello to capture different moods within the episode, and the transitions from one type of music to another were seamless. This is one soundtrack I'd pay to have on CD.
Even CC's homage to Cher was used effectively, if not efficiently. Cher's cover of The Walker Brothers' "The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Any More" was a bit excessive, but it was used as a metaphor for the monster's life. This poor kid doesn't know the joys of love, and he spends his time as a recluse, shut off from a world that would shun him because of his physical appearance. The sun ain't gonna shine any more, indeed. It never shone in this poor kid's life.
I also enjoyed Cher's cover of Marc Cohn's "Walking in Memphis." While the song is about the restoration of faith, it also had a nice tie-in to Mulder's vacation in "Never Again," when he visits Graceland.
There was some nice attention to detail in this episode that should be mentioned. When the monster was burying his father, he exhaled and two foggy breaths, one from each mouth, were visible on the screen. The bite(s) taken out of the peanut butter sandwich were at right angles to each other, as they would have been had there actually been a being with two mouths. The in-joke with Dr. Nutter's Peanut Butter was, of course, a recognition of the fine work of director David Nutter, who directed many Season One episodes. Finally, there was the barely noticeable headline in the local paper, saying that the FBI Agents were missing while they lay unconscious for an indeterminate time on Dr. Pollidori's bedroom floor.
Major supporting characters John O'Hurley as Dr. Pollidori and Patty Tierce as Shaineh Berkowitz made the most of their meaty roles. O'Hurley was perfectly cast as the egocentric Pollidori, which was an exaggerated version of his J. Peterman character on Seinfeld. The arrogance and disdain O'Hurley displayed, not only through his voice inflections, but also though his facial expressions, were just far enough over-the-top to achieve the desired effect. Tierce breathed life into a stereotype, making her character come alive in a comical manner that had depth. She played the domineering mother to a tee, but then was able to vigorously come to her son's defense when he was threatened by a mob of angry townspeople.
Stars Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny were almost incidental to the story. They spent a lot of time just hanging out in the background, not saying or doing anything. There were several scenes in the Berkowitz house where either Shaineh or Izzy was talking while M & S just listened. They simply stood there while the monster explained his origin and life, and they were, for the most part, simply observers as the monster partied down in the final scene. The best moment of comedy again belonged to David Duchovny as he lost his balance twice after being exposed to the animal tranquilizer gas. I'm starting to think that DD's long suit is slapstick.
Gillian Anderson had her share of eyebrow raising at Mulder's musings, but managed to effortlessly shift her demeanor when she was talking about the science she loves so much. The problem was that neither she nor Duchovny was on screen enough to make a difference in this episode.
With many enjoyable aspects to this episode, one might wonder what problems I had with "Post-Modern Prometheus." They start and end with the writer and the director, Chris Carter.
The biggest problem with "Post-Modern Prometheus" was that Carter never seemed quite sure of what he wanted the final product to be. I could list twenty or more films that were paid a tribute the episode, from the imminently forgettable "The Thing with Two Heads" to "The Last Detail." At times, "Post-Modern Prometheus" looked like a morality tale. Other times, it seemed more like a spoof of the classic horror genre. But ultimately, it ended up being what I saw in the final act: it was a fairy tale. The contrived happy ending, where the monster is accepted for who he is, being invited on stage by a Cher impersonator, was straight from "Beauty and the Beast." The fairy tale theme ran through the entire episode, from the picture of Izzy with his pig in the Berkowitz living room to the penultimate scene in the barn, where animals create noises and the camera flashed on townspeople who resembled these animals. Even the name Pollidori is a derivative of polli, which means "chicken" in Italian. Animals are often used in fairy tales to represent humans, a la The Three Little Pigs. Finally, the closing where the background of a colored sky frames the closing of a book was the antithesis of "The Wizard of Oz" which starts in black and white and changes to color as the film progresses.
Personally, I'm a little disturbed that CC would foist a fairy tale on us and call it an X-File. There were funny moments, there were cute moments, and there were moments that simply didn't work. "Post-Modern Prometheus" was a mishmosh of several good ideas, any one of which could have worked beautifully. It felt as though CC tried to get all his good ideas into one episode, and he ended up with an episode that seemed as if it just couldn't decide what it wanted to be.
I stopped reading fairy tales a long, long time ago.
My Score: 5 out of 10