For the past few months, I've been trying to watch as many Best International Feature submissions as I possibly can. For The Film Experience, I reviewed 33 of those titles, including nine of the 15 shortlisted films, with most of the remaining finalists being taken care of by other writers. Still, one feature remained unreviewed on Oscar nomination morning, and, as luck would have it, that very same production nabbed a somewhat surprising nod. I wish I could say I was happy about The Man Who Sold His Skin's triumph, but Tunisia's seventh ever submission and first nominee proved to be a disappointment…
It's easy to see why so many have showered praise upon Kaouther Ben Hania's latest feature. The Tunisian director has devised a bold satire to criticize how the so-called Western countries have been mishandling the current refugee crisis. Taking inspiration from the work of Belgian artist Wim Delvoye and German Tim Steiner, the filmmaker tells the story of a person who's turned into a living work of art. In real life, Steiner had his back tattooed and poses in museums as part of exhibitions, an intersection of painting on a human canvas and performance art within a gallery setting. The creation has been met by much polemic. It only intensified once the artwork was sold to a private collector and Steiner signed a contract that states his back will be flayed on the occasion of his death, the skin preserved.
In The Man Who Sold His Skin, the tattoo isn't a collection of religious imagery but a mocking immigration visa. As for the displayed man, rather than a German tattoo enthusiast in collaboration with an interested provocateur, the narrative presents us with a Syrian refugee who chooses this fate as a path to enter Europe. Rather than an artistic impulse, a known decision that reveals autonomy over his body, the piece's hero is someone who's driven by necessity, by despair, to sell his skin. It makes for a shocking premise and a blistering criticism of a society that allows the transport of economic commodities more quickly than people, even when their lives are at risk. Capital trumps humanity, property more important than any person's wellbeing.
Maybe someone could take this collection if interesting, if inflammatory ideas, and make a good movie out of it. As much as it pains me to say so, Kaouther Ben Hania's not that someone. Her staging is elegant, how she moves the camera through the curated non-space of the museum, its white walls and mirrored labyrinths making for a delicious scenery to set the camera free. However, if the director wanted to plea for empathy, her gaze feels disquietingly objectifying. The camera's always treating the titular man like a sinewy prop, using him as a mechanism for facile shock, easy sensationalism. As Sam Ali, the unfortunate canvas, actor Yahya Mahyani delivers a committed performance, negotiating sharp tonal swerves with balletic precision, illustrating ragged despondency with admirable variation, even humor.
No other cast member is as gifted as The Man Who Sold His Skin's intrepid leading man, and none of those actors ever manages to resolve the pitfalls the script throws at them. As the Mephistophelean artist who makes Ali into a museum piece, Koen De Bouw verges on inappropriate camp, referencing Faust with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. Dea Liane fades into the background as an underwritten love interest. Monica Bellucci cannot make sense of the pseudo femme fatale she's been saddled with. Their faltering only highlights the film's overall troubles, its voracious taste for provocation always getting in the way of any genuine engagement with political ideas, artistic considerations, humane conundrums.
The result feels muddled and repulsively shallow, not to mention alienating. Despite representing the rare African production celebrated by AMPAS, The Man Who Sold His Skin is mainly set in Europe. Its vision of North Africa otherized to the point of abstraction. Sam Ali's fears are never explored, his situation serving only as a jumping point to an outlandish premise. The glossy movie treats him with as much feckless disregard as the people who, from within the narrative, deny his humanity and then pat their backs in bouts of liberal hypocrisy. The ending is the maximum example of this, illustrating how contrived twists are more important for this team than a clearheaded exploration of the refugee crisis. It's cheap, if beautiful, bluntly brainless even as it dresses the part of the self-important arthouse sensation.
It's with great sadness that my coverage of the 93rd Academy Awards' Best International Feature race comes to an end, concluding with a sour note instead of a sweet fanfare. Reading others' reviews and some commenters of The Film Experience, one attests that many people love The Man Who Sold His Skin, making my dispirited response to its nomination a rarity. I'm glad others are happy, I envy their contentment, to be frank, but I can't help but feel there were better choices from within the shortlisted titles, not to mention the wide field of international submissions. Out of the five titles left, I'm pulling for a Quo Vadis, Aida? victory, though a win for Another Round or Collective wouldn't be lamentable. I hope it's not The Man Who Sold His Skin.
How do you feel about the Best International Film race at this year's Academy Awards?