Ye olde theatre of penzantial pirates, samurai

Subtlety is crucial to any good director's bag of tricks. Many times, a bigger payoff can be had by making the audience work toward a realization, rather than by manufacturing overblown emotion. Of all directors, Mike Leigh may know this best, to the point where his subtlety becomes problematic. His latest film, the Gilbert and Sul-livan bio-pic Topsy-Turvy, is a well-crafted, satisfying account of 19th-century English theater, in the vein of last year's Oscar-winner Shakespeare in Love.

COURTESY USA FILMS Jim Broadbent (as W. S. Gilbert) steps into the darker world offstage.

W. S. Gilbert (Jim Broadbent) and Sir Arthur Sullivan (Allan Corduner) supplied the words and music, respectively, in one of the most acclaimed theater partnerships of the late 19th-century. Leigh's film opens, however, at a point when their success has reached a nadir. The partners have grown distrustful of each other, and Sullivan wants to write more "serious" works. They're about to part ways when inspiration strikes Gilbert in the form of a Japanese cultural exhibition that he visits with his wife. Out of that lightning bolt emerges the Mikado, the musical that rejuvenates their careers. The first half of the film depicts the birth of the Mikado, while the second (and more engaging) half concerns the relentless process of perfecting a work of art.

Leigh's portrayal of the rehearsal process is an obvious metaphor for his own filmmaking process. Leigh does not generally write his scripts prior to beginning production; instead, he sketches out characters and a general narrative arc, allowing his actors to improvise until the film emerges organically.

But the question arises: if Leigh sees his own process reflected in the methods of Gilbert and Sullivan, who is Leigh's stand-in? Seemingly, Leigh is both Gilbert and Sullivan, at least in part—he emerges in Sullivan's internal war between high art and commerce, and in Gilbert's eternal unhappiness with the finished product, preferring the conflicts of construction to the imperfections of conclusion.

Topsy-Turvy is filled with playful good cheer and humor, particularly in the formal articulations of Gilbert's edged barbs, directed at anyone who dares stand in his path. "I'm sure we shall reap the benefits of your remonstrations in the fullness of time," he responds to an actor who offers unwanted criticism of a line Gilbert has written. He is a man uncomfortable with the niceties of domestic life and intimacy, but who is remarkably at home coaching his actors in the confines of a theater. One of the best scenes in the film is an extended sequence of Gilbert shaping his actors' performances: he jumps in whenever required to provide the appropriate inflection, or to show Grossmith (played with a remarkable mixture of delicacy and brutality by Martin Savage), how best to walk across a stage. Leigh fills this scene with his characteristic mirth, but the message is received, nonetheless: art is hard work, and don't you forget it.

Leigh, a politically committed artist, skirts a fine line in both his romantic portrayal of Gilbert and Sullivan and of 1880s London. Leigh celebrates their art wholeheartedly, but doesn't neglect to mention the contradictions inherent in a work such as the Mikado and in escapist art in general. In a discussion of the death of General Gordon at Khartoum, the ugly specter of colonialism rears its head and lingers for the remainder of the film—throughout, the plundering of another culture for the entertainment of the English population, and their stereotypical attitudes toward Japanese culture, are repeatedly referenced. Leigh wields a double-edged sword in a sequence where Gilbert indulges in a few playful jabs with his newly purchased samurai sword, providing the energy for his new enterprise. At the same time as we marvel at his newfound determination, it is understood that Gilbert is taking part in the worst sort of colonialism, complete with gibberish-Japanese shouting to accompany his thrusts. You must take the one with the other, Leigh seems to be telling us, and the film refuses to choose either.

Film

Topsy-Turvy Directed by Mike Leigh Starring Jim Broadbent and Allan Corduner York Square Cinema

In some ways, though, this message is disingenuous, because Leigh leaves us with an understanding of precisely how much all this humor and good fun cost. In a pair of matched scenes between the artists and their wives, both women raise the idea of having children, only to be rejected instantly. When Gilbert's wife Kitty, played with restrained emotion by Lesley Manville, tells him of a dream she had—of a woman whose husband cannot love who, "every time she tries to be born, strangles her with her umbilical cord"—understanding registers on Gilbert's face of the cost of his dedication to art over family. In a scene taking place during the initial performance of the Mikado, Gilbert ventures outside the theater and encounters a prostitute who shadows him along a dark alleyway. Two realizations take place at this moment—that this is the first time we have been outdoors in the film, and that outside the realms of theater and upper class society, a real, darker world exists. It is a shocking image, that haunts the entire movie.

Even in its eminently pleasurable reality, Topsy-Turvy is mere artifice. Genuine reality is an unseen layer of its world, which Leigh only allows us to glimpse briefly before withdrawing it. The director's conjuring trick for the film as a whole is just as great—he summons up an entire forgotten world, allowing it to glow momentarily before revealing it for the mirage it truly is.

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