Mark Reviews Movies: SWAN SONG

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Review by Mark Dujsik | August 5, 2021

Pat Pitsenbarger (Udo Kier) imagines himself on a stage. A spotlight shines on him as he parts the curtains. An eruption of clapping and cheers greets Pat strides to center stage. There's no one there, though. The seats of the theater are empty, but the applause continues.

The scene that opens Swan Song is like a fantasy of a memory that might only be a fantasy in the first place. There once was a crowd of admirers—or at least that's what the echoing ovation suggests.

Have they simply disappeared, as Pat's life moved on and his career as a hairdresser came to an end? Is this a fantastical memory of a past in which Pat was adored and celebrated, meaning the empty house now is only his realization of days long gone? Is all of it imagined, meaning the vacant auditorium is Pat's fear that all of this love and appreciation was never actually a part of his life—only a longing wish that was never granted?

Writer/director Todd Stephens' film ultimately is about these questions and one in particular: Did Pat's life amount to anything of significance? The people he loved either abandoned him or have died, and now, he lives in a nursing home somewhere in the outskirts of somewhere in Ohio.

He has no need to practice the craft that was his livelihood for decades, running a beauty shop in a small city. Instead, he spends his days carefully unfolding paper napkins and re-folding them so that their floral pattern becomes the focal point. Pat's idle hands have been hard at work. A drawer, some boxes, the shelf of his closet, and more parts of his room are filled with the re-fashioned napkins.

The world has moved on, seemingly without him or even much of a memory of him. That's the case, as he gradually discovers, in the city of Sandusky, where he tended to the hair and makeup of just about every socialite in the area, but it's also the case in a broader sense.

Pat is gay, and during his time, his existence and desires and everything about him was a fight for, well, his existence. So much social progress has been made in that regard, though, that Pat can sit on a park bench, watch two married men play with their children, and realize that those kids will remember their fathers, while the fathers might not even think of the battles he and his generation fought for them.

All of this, of course, sounds rather depressing, but Stephens doesn't see Pat—"based on a true icon," as some introductory text announces—as a tragic figure. The filmmaker only sees the character's outlook, his sense of being trapped in the past, and all of the grudges Pat has held onto for decades as the sources of any tragedy here. For all of its ruminations on legacy—or the lack thereof—and death, this is actually a rather encouraging film—bittersweet, for sure, but lovely nonetheless.

One day in his room at the nursing home, Pat receives a visitor. A local attorney (played by Tom Bloom) arrives with news of the death of one of Pat's former clients. In her will, she requested that Pat do the hair and makeup of her remains for the funeral. For his services, he'll be paid $25,000 from her estate.

The lawyer says it's a final gesture of apology. Decades ago, the woman stopped going to Pat's salon and started seeing his former assistant Dee Dee (Jennifer Coolidge), who opened a shop across the street. Pat isn't ready to forgive the betrayal, because, as we learn, it's a much deeper one in his mind—and possibly in reality—than one of business.

Changing his mind, Pat starts a long walk from the nursing home, through some farmland and the outskirts of the city, and to the funeral home. That's it in terms of a plot, because Stephens knows there's a certain, undeniable power in simply watching this character, traveling a lonely road of reality and his memories.

That's especially true when said character is played by Kier, who possesses such presence and who fully embodies a multi-layered sense of transformation in his performance. Pat becomes more flamboyant as his journey unfolds, obtaining a pastel green pantsuit and purple homburg to really come into his own, although that's just to say that he becomes more alive as he re-discovers some sense of purpose. Beneath that exterior, though, is a real communication of Pat's emotional evolution, as his perspective on what he meant and can mean to assorted people, some of whom he has never met, comes into focus.

Stephens begins with that sad image of Pat walking the roads—alone and feeling very much so—and occasionally fills it with other people, usually offering kindness. A woman picks up Pat in her pickup truck, listens to his story of how the love of his life died from AIDS, and, at the end of road, offers him a hand of comfort. Seeing a vacant lot where the house his lover built for them used to be, the current owners give a compassionate ear, a bag lunch for his trek, and an invitation to return. Dee Dee comes into the picture for some polite bickering and a bit more, as does the late socialite's grandson (played by Michael Urie), who offers a final note of how much Pat's life meant—even though he was never really aware of it.

More happens, as much as anything actually "happens" in the film. Swan Song, though, really is about the journey—of a man down a road, of our understanding of him, of his willingness to find meaning in a life quickly passing.

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