© Gilda Louise Aloisi
Abel Ferrara delivers a relevant COVID-era thriller, with Ethan Hawke showing impressive versatility in a contrasting dual role.
After premiering four films in the past two years, the most recent being a COVID-themed documentary, curated by Saint Laurent’s creative director, Anthony Vaccarello, 70-year-old filmmaker Abel Ferrara is back with anther pandemic film, starring Ethan Hawke: Zeros and Ones.
Four-time Oscar-nominated actor Ethan Hawke plays American soldier JJ, who’s stationed in Rome. His mission is to track down and defeat a threatening enemy, who’s tied to the Vatican being blown up. However, Hawke also plays JJ’s brother, a self-described revolutionary and a radical martyr who’s imprisoned and tortured by the ones who hold him captive. JJ finds himself questioning the meaning ‘good’ and ‘evil’, when surrounding himself with characters of different nationalities, viewpoints and cultures and wonders who is really responsible. The feeling of uncertainty during and after moments of chaos is a recurring pattern in the film.
Hawke shines in this dual role, portraying characters with almost polar opposite personalities. As soldier JJ, he delivers a silent and restrained character. One whose emotions are to be seen on his face, rather than by hearing him or observing his gestures. When he transforms into JJ’s brother, Hawke goes all out in a couple explosive scenes, screaming religious chants, declaring himself messiah. The contrast between those two characters and performances becomes most apparent when JJ watches a video of his brother being interrogated, showing the true versatility of this actor.
Zeros and Ones is stacked with different aspects and ideas. Ferrara’s description of the plot describes the wide scale of concepts within this film best: ‘Lockdown and war, danger and espionage, American soldiers, Chinese middlemen, Mid Eastern holy men, provocateurs, diplomats, rogue elements of the CIA and KGB’. Zeros and Ones touches on various dimensions, featuring (socio-)political subtext, religious subtext, and intercultural subtext. It’s a very chaotic combination, but one that greatly enhances the lead character’s arc and the setting of the film. Many events in Zeros and Ones bear resemblance to the West’s response to 9/11, the situation that originally inspired the idea behind the film. Ferrara, out loud, wonders what might happen next in our society.
As with many of his other works, instead of giving everything away, Ferrara lets the viewer make up their own interpretation of what’s really going on. Out of his recent works, Zeros and Ones might be the filmmaker’s most abstract work. There’s many similarities in the setting of the film to what the world has been going through for the past year and a half. A nearly empty Rome during a a lockdown, with characters wearing masks, regularly washing their hands and having their temperature checked by officials. Ferrara incorporated this setting in the concept for Zeros and Ones, while writing during lockdown. The combination of the disaster the film was inspired by and our current world makes for a timely and easily relatable experience. The idea of setting the film in our current times also added to the safety of the cast and crew. The production of the film had a small crew and went quickly, with the actors wearing masks and sanitizing.
Though the film is fairly fast-paced in terms of events occurring, Sean Price Williams’ grainy photography and a mellow score by Joe Delia. featuring dark bass, guitar and percussion tones make for a very lo-fi atmosphere. One that lets the viewer glide through the film, instead of taking it on a fast ride.
Like many other Ferrara works, Zeros and Ones certainly isn’t a crowd-pleaser and will polarize its audience, due to its high level experimentalism, but it’s another essential entry into the Ferrara canon for his true fans.
Zeros and Ones premiered at the 2021 Locarno Film Festival.
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