Movie Review: Useless

Christina Olanick

2 ½ Stars out of 5 Stars 

Industrialization sucks for the little guy – it was true in the 18th century and it’s true today. Dickens made us care; Jia Zhang-ke, not so much. Useless is Zhang-ke’s documentary about consumer culture and the fashion industry in China, and its title couldn’t be more appropriate. Though artistically well done, it totally lacks original, thought-provoking substance.

The first part of the film depicts a clothing factory and the sterile, disposable culture of the city that surrounds it. Liberal use of long takes and minimal narration help draw the viewer into the environment, but the lack of narration also means a lack of context. What conclusions are we supposed to draw about this apparently clean, well-lit and humanely run factory?

One assumes nothing good, as the second part of the film focuses on designer Ma Ke and her artistic stand against the uselessness of consumer culture. She laments the loss of craftsmanship and the sense of meaning and connection people used to have with their possessions when they were hand-made. It's a perfectly valid point of view, though unenlightening for anyone who has already covered Marx in grade 12 history.

Ma Ke’s clothes are made of hand-woven material and have been buried in the earth for several months to give them a tangible connection to nature. Her collection would work as purely an artistic statement, but it’s presented during Paris Fashion Week, not in an art gallery. The collection is essentially unwearable, and is thus fashion at its most frivolous and useless. Zhang-ke, however, misses the irony.

The subject that occupies the last section of the film – the lives of out-of-work village tailors – is the most novel and interesting. Without any narration, though, to provide a context in which to frame what’s being shown, it’s impossible to engage with it in a meaningful way. On top of that, by this point Zhang-ke’s signature long takes have become so excessive and tedious that the end of the movie is all the audience really cares about.