Saw The Lobster, a film from the guy who directed Dogtooth, a similarly straight-faced absurdist take on contemporary life. In this film, we're in some extremely formal alternate universe where single people are so despised that they're sent to a hotel to pair up and hunt run-away singles with tranq darts. If the good, hotel-dwelling singles cannot find a mate, they are turned into an animal of their choosing. The hotel is an extremely unpleasant place, full of desperate people and hilariously awful and ham-fisted propaganda extolling the virtues of couple-hood. At a shooting range a waiter leans in to tell the protagonist "It's no coincidence that the targets are shaped like single people, and not couples."
The film's characters have the overly-formal that Wes Anderson's characters do. They say incomprehensible things with completely straight faces. Unlike Wes Anderson however, this is less tightly-shot and far less twee. I loved the iciness of it. The film also has something on its mind about modern romance. The singles constantly refer to some unimportant quirk of theirs such as shortsightedness or a limp and only look for others with the same quirk. I was reminded of the questions on OkCupid or something , determining your selection of future mates from essentially unimportant questions about books and music. On the flip-side are the run-away singles who are just as rigorously controlled. They may never flirt or get romantically involved. The whole thing is so fascinatingly clinical.
Like Dogtooth, I really liked this film. Also like Dogtooth, I wouldn't recommend it for everyone. It's very strange. Fascinating, but unrewarding in a conventional sense. The ending, which is essentially just a giant question mark, I think will especially annoy people. However I also think most people would find it funnier than I did. The film is funny in a way that you don't know how serious it expects you to take it. A compelling and interesting film anyway. As an aside, I really wish they'd shown the hotel for gay people. The opening bit where they inform the protagonist that "bisexual" is not an option at this time is a perfect encapsulation of the film. Funny, heartbreaking, arbitrary, but with an echo of reality.
Dec 11, 2016
Shivers
Saw Shivers, an early Cronenberg film. It was a fairly icky film about a worm-like parasite that makes the host organism sexually rapacious. The parasite spreads by leaping from the host's mouth but even so the lust-zombies created by the parasite seem to go for the boobs and junk a lot. It's filmed in the 70s and set in a High-Rise-ish luxury apartment complex. The 70s decor reminds me of sleazy films I've seen (I can't for the life of me remember which ones though. I've seen a documentary on porn in the 70s. Maybe that's what I'm picking up? I've also seen Salo.)
The opening of the film, I feel, lays out the whole thesis. A man and a woman are being shown an apartment by an oily salesman and meanwhile, presumably upstairs, an old man strangles a woman in a school-girl outfit, cuts her clothing off, and pours acid into her abdomen. She is one of the firs sex-zombies we discover, but I think the heart of this film is in the contrast of the glass-and-steel luxury suites vs the ugly sexualized violence going on within. There's a lot of women being attacked and the old horror trope of women being objects of murderous interest is here as well. I had a hard time looking past all of that.
This is a Cronenberg film however, and body horror abounds. The parasites (which resemble flaccid penises) move lumily around in people's abdomens and one central character (played by Cronenberg himself!) tries to make friends with the disease, to become its servant. This is another Cronenberg obsession: the normalizing of the pathological. The parasites were created, we learn, by a mad scientist trying to usher in a new age, where humanity will become beautiful animals, and the earth a never-ending orgy. This is an unpleasant idea but who can say but that it might not get a following?
The ideas are interesting but there's a lot of rape and near-rape and it's all fairly gross. It's unpleasant to watch and it's not clear what statement it's making (if any.) Apparently some contemporary critic decried it as sexist trash and while I don't think it's entirely sexist trash, I can see where they were coming from. An interesting film when viewed through a Cronenberg-ian lens, but might be best to avoid otherwise (unless sex-crazed zombies are your thing in which case go for it!)
The opening of the film, I feel, lays out the whole thesis. A man and a woman are being shown an apartment by an oily salesman and meanwhile, presumably upstairs, an old man strangles a woman in a school-girl outfit, cuts her clothing off, and pours acid into her abdomen. She is one of the firs sex-zombies we discover, but I think the heart of this film is in the contrast of the glass-and-steel luxury suites vs the ugly sexualized violence going on within. There's a lot of women being attacked and the old horror trope of women being objects of murderous interest is here as well. I had a hard time looking past all of that.
This is a Cronenberg film however, and body horror abounds. The parasites (which resemble flaccid penises) move lumily around in people's abdomens and one central character (played by Cronenberg himself!) tries to make friends with the disease, to become its servant. This is another Cronenberg obsession: the normalizing of the pathological. The parasites were created, we learn, by a mad scientist trying to usher in a new age, where humanity will become beautiful animals, and the earth a never-ending orgy. This is an unpleasant idea but who can say but that it might not get a following?
The ideas are interesting but there's a lot of rape and near-rape and it's all fairly gross. It's unpleasant to watch and it's not clear what statement it's making (if any.) Apparently some contemporary critic decried it as sexist trash and while I don't think it's entirely sexist trash, I can see where they were coming from. An interesting film when viewed through a Cronenberg-ian lens, but might be best to avoid otherwise (unless sex-crazed zombies are your thing in which case go for it!)
Dec 4, 2016
Gallipoli
Saw Gallipoli, another WW1 film, this time about an obscure battle between the Turks and the Australians. I can't help but compare this film to yesterday's All Quiet on the Western Front. This one is more modern and shot in beautiful color but is much worse from my point of view. Whereas All Quiet does not focus on one particular battle, this one does. The definiteness and concreteness makes this film much more about a mismanagement of this specific battle. The truth is of course that people dying is precisely what war is designed to accomplish. The accident should not be that our team is dying when they should be killing, but that people in general are being killed full stop!
Anyway, this film was produced by Australian media-goblin Rupert Murdoch and stars Mel Gibson, so I was kind of going in with a grudge. The two central characters are Mel, a drifting laborer who enlists seemingly for lack of anything better to do, and a younger, blond son of a rancher who enlists I think wanting earnestly to fight evil. It was interesting that Mel's character often looks to this kid for guidance. The kid is stalwart and true, but relies on Mel to hunt and gather. I wonder if there were some gay subtext.
The kid is the more idealistic, brave, and cheerful of the two, inspiring a kind of hero worship. Again, war in this film is a sort of grand adventure. As the duo approaches the front line, they see Christmas lights on strings, burning bonfires, a merry scene. A mortar explodes and they grin and whoop with delight. Do they know they are going to die? Moments before the final battle scene in the film, the kid writes a letter home about how everyone on the front is excited and happy. They feel they are part of something bigger than themselves. This does not ring true to me. I believe the horseplay and boredom of the front, the casual attitude towards danger (if not towards death) but to dwell on these things is to make it seem like summer camp.
I've never even held a gun. I don't know what war is like but I doubt that it's like this, with dramatic music cues and gleeful, apple-cheeked camaraderie. I doubt it would be that way for me anyway. I think I would just be killed.
Anyway, this film was produced by Australian media-goblin Rupert Murdoch and stars Mel Gibson, so I was kind of going in with a grudge. The two central characters are Mel, a drifting laborer who enlists seemingly for lack of anything better to do, and a younger, blond son of a rancher who enlists I think wanting earnestly to fight evil. It was interesting that Mel's character often looks to this kid for guidance. The kid is stalwart and true, but relies on Mel to hunt and gather. I wonder if there were some gay subtext.
The kid is the more idealistic, brave, and cheerful of the two, inspiring a kind of hero worship. Again, war in this film is a sort of grand adventure. As the duo approaches the front line, they see Christmas lights on strings, burning bonfires, a merry scene. A mortar explodes and they grin and whoop with delight. Do they know they are going to die? Moments before the final battle scene in the film, the kid writes a letter home about how everyone on the front is excited and happy. They feel they are part of something bigger than themselves. This does not ring true to me. I believe the horseplay and boredom of the front, the casual attitude towards danger (if not towards death) but to dwell on these things is to make it seem like summer camp.
I've never even held a gun. I don't know what war is like but I doubt that it's like this, with dramatic music cues and gleeful, apple-cheeked camaraderie. I doubt it would be that way for me anyway. I think I would just be killed.
Dec 3, 2016
All Quiet on the Western Front
Saw All Quiet on the Western Front, a war story about German soldiers made pre-WW2 in 1930. It's a film about the pointless horrors of war and the blithe manner in which civilians will demand more sacrifices of their boys at the front. There are many powerful sequences. Most of the battles are horrifying and intense, even for such an old film. Unfortunately, this film was made shortly after talkies were developed so many times the protagonist will be delivering some bitter line about what hell life on the front is, but he'll deliver it in a loud, declarative manner, proudly proclaiming where he really should be bitterly mumbling.
This awkwardness aside it really is a good film when no one is talking. Even when they are talking, the substance (if not the delivery) is great. At one point the soldier protagonist returns to his hometown on leave. He's asked to speak before a crowd of students, all in the process of being whipped up into a patriotic frenzy by their teacher. He tells them about how war sucks, how they eat rats and have to murder people with shovel-blades. The students call him coward and shout him down. How can he fight against this mindset? I kept thinking of Umberto Eco's Ur-Fascism. These students are being told to embrace death, to celebrate only the honor of the battlefield. How can one soldier convince them that their mind will break under the horrors of war?
Another great scene is the very last scene which superimposes a field of white crosses with an early scene of the soldiers going off to war, their faces turning fearfully back, unsure that their enlistments were wise. This film enraged the Nazis of pre-WW2 Germany, was called overly pro-German by the Polish critics of the time. This film has aged a bit badly but I think it was exactly the right film for the time. Alas, due to studio meddling, it received cuts to make it more palatable to Nazi audiences and indeed some of that declarative delivery makes the characters seem very brave and indeed healthy given that they were apparently starving to death. I could see it easily re-cut to make the war look like a fun little romp, like an important and necessary event which would soon be repeated.
This awkwardness aside it really is a good film when no one is talking. Even when they are talking, the substance (if not the delivery) is great. At one point the soldier protagonist returns to his hometown on leave. He's asked to speak before a crowd of students, all in the process of being whipped up into a patriotic frenzy by their teacher. He tells them about how war sucks, how they eat rats and have to murder people with shovel-blades. The students call him coward and shout him down. How can he fight against this mindset? I kept thinking of Umberto Eco's Ur-Fascism. These students are being told to embrace death, to celebrate only the honor of the battlefield. How can one soldier convince them that their mind will break under the horrors of war?
Another great scene is the very last scene which superimposes a field of white crosses with an early scene of the soldiers going off to war, their faces turning fearfully back, unsure that their enlistments were wise. This film enraged the Nazis of pre-WW2 Germany, was called overly pro-German by the Polish critics of the time. This film has aged a bit badly but I think it was exactly the right film for the time. Alas, due to studio meddling, it received cuts to make it more palatable to Nazi audiences and indeed some of that declarative delivery makes the characters seem very brave and indeed healthy given that they were apparently starving to death. I could see it easily re-cut to make the war look like a fun little romp, like an important and necessary event which would soon be repeated.
Nov 27, 2016
Zack and Miri Make a Porno
Saw Zack and Miri Make a Porno, another film from Kevin Smith's "Askewniverse." Since it's Kevin Smith, you know this film is gonna be a bro-y, congenial film, kind of skeazy but fundamentally good-natured. It's the sort of film that might pass out on your couch but would probably also help you move. As you might gather from the title, the film is sexually provocative but, like Shortbus before it, it's very traditional deep down. It missteps with the sexual politics here and there in my opinion, but I'll talk about that later.
So this is a sweet little movie about two people realizing that they love each other, set in the winter hell-land of Pennsylvania. The winter of their smallish town is lushly and gloriously portrayed. The slush and the ice and the whining car engines, ice caked on door-handles and windshields, the hot coffee in thin, cardboard cups that you hope will warm you up but that get cold the instant you step back outside again, the salt stains on everyone's shoes and on the hardwood of every shop. Oh yes, it's all there!!
I really liked the winter and it works well as a metaphor for single life: cold, lonely, and hostile. Of course Zack and Miri get together. Why wouldn't they? Well, for starters because she's way out of his league. He's Seth Rogan, so he's this big sweet teddy bear, but this is the magical pixie dream girl, I think, making all of your wishes come true. Like the porno they make, this is also just wish-fulfillment fantasy.
Also, while I'm being mean, I really really didn't like the gay couple at the beginning. Both are very attractive but (if wikipedia is to be trusted) neither of them is actually gay (maybe there just weren't any gay actors available at the time???) One makes this big deal out of how important it is to indulge Zack's giggling school-boy curiosity and non-questions such as "so, you suck each other's cocks huh?" Later, Zack just quietly marvels to himself "they fight just like real people!" During the credits, the character return to deliver a gross-out monologue about one of their buttholes. Is this supposed to be funny and inclusive or something? Speaking only for myself here but I don't feel very included. I feel a bunch of straight guys put on silly voices and limp wrists and made fun of me and my friends for a while before patting themselves on the back for being broadminded. For being such an otherwise sweet little film, it's a really sour note. Also there's two black characters who have problems of their own but I am on less familiar ground there so I'll leave it to someone else to critique.
So like I said, this a bro-y movie. Part of it's charm is that it's kind of offensive and any oh-so-outraged blog posts are part of that package and that appeal. Under all of the sex jokes and boobies beats a warm and traditional heart, just wanting to see the guy and the girl get together. I enjoyed this movie. I just worry that someone out there will think this is an honest-to-god portrayal of how life works. So long as you're aware that this is just fantasy, there's no harm in it. A sweet, cozy little film.
So this is a sweet little movie about two people realizing that they love each other, set in the winter hell-land of Pennsylvania. The winter of their smallish town is lushly and gloriously portrayed. The slush and the ice and the whining car engines, ice caked on door-handles and windshields, the hot coffee in thin, cardboard cups that you hope will warm you up but that get cold the instant you step back outside again, the salt stains on everyone's shoes and on the hardwood of every shop. Oh yes, it's all there!!
I really liked the winter and it works well as a metaphor for single life: cold, lonely, and hostile. Of course Zack and Miri get together. Why wouldn't they? Well, for starters because she's way out of his league. He's Seth Rogan, so he's this big sweet teddy bear, but this is the magical pixie dream girl, I think, making all of your wishes come true. Like the porno they make, this is also just wish-fulfillment fantasy.
Also, while I'm being mean, I really really didn't like the gay couple at the beginning. Both are very attractive but (if wikipedia is to be trusted) neither of them is actually gay (maybe there just weren't any gay actors available at the time???) One makes this big deal out of how important it is to indulge Zack's giggling school-boy curiosity and non-questions such as "so, you suck each other's cocks huh?" Later, Zack just quietly marvels to himself "they fight just like real people!" During the credits, the character return to deliver a gross-out monologue about one of their buttholes. Is this supposed to be funny and inclusive or something? Speaking only for myself here but I don't feel very included. I feel a bunch of straight guys put on silly voices and limp wrists and made fun of me and my friends for a while before patting themselves on the back for being broadminded. For being such an otherwise sweet little film, it's a really sour note. Also there's two black characters who have problems of their own but I am on less familiar ground there so I'll leave it to someone else to critique.
So like I said, this a bro-y movie. Part of it's charm is that it's kind of offensive and any oh-so-outraged blog posts are part of that package and that appeal. Under all of the sex jokes and boobies beats a warm and traditional heart, just wanting to see the guy and the girl get together. I enjoyed this movie. I just worry that someone out there will think this is an honest-to-god portrayal of how life works. So long as you're aware that this is just fantasy, there's no harm in it. A sweet, cozy little film.
Nov 26, 2016
Nightcrawler
Saw Nightcrawler (thanks, John!) It was a very timely film about a complete sociopath who chases down car accidents and robberies to sell footage to news programs. He starts out the film as a copper thief, stripping copper cabling from rail yards and selling it to construction sites. Right near the beginning of the film, a rent-a-cop stops him and the protagonist attacks him and kills him, stealing his watch as he does so. That watch is focused on here and there throughout the rest of the film, a symbol of the swirling madness sublimed just under the surface of the protagonist's creepy smile and rapid-fire jargon of business management and self-help lingo. He's monumentally creepy.
In fact, I think he's too creepy. In their haste to make it obvious to the audience what a freak this guy is, they make him into such a howling horror-show that I don't understand how anyone could stand him for more than a few minutes before running in the opposite direction. Then again, I think I've met people like this, who believe that the secret to wealth and happiness is knowing which arms to twist. I regard them with a deep pity that I think would offend them, but I guess I haven't exactly run away from them.
Anyway, this film is quite timely, combining an update of the American Psycho with a heavy dose of cynicism for mainstream media (although, to be frank, the local operation in the film is supposed to be quite rinky-dink.) I've seen the film referenced many times in the more paranoid reaches of Reddit (although increasingly that's becoming the entirety of Reddit, alas.) I was also impressed with the film's sinister use of the internet and information. At one point the protagonist blackmails a woman into sleeping with him based on information readily available online about her. Chilling and important to remember from time to time: you're being watched.
A very nervy little film. Like American Psycho it's almost a dark comedy. Although I never had the stomach to laugh, the protagonist's business-talk is hilarious and freaky. At one point he forms a company composed only of himself and from then on refers to himself as "we" as in "I've noticed your increased work ethic recently and we think that you have great potential for advancement." It would be hilarious if it weren't so gross.
This is a good film. It's unsettling, darkly funny, ugly, and sleek. It does what it needs to do and left me feeling icky afterwards (although I do feel like the film's bullet missed me because I neither create news nor do I watch it so I'm completely outside of this struggle.) But this is no simple, pat little flick, it wants to hit people and scare them, like a cut-rate news team leading with a story of a double-homicide.
In fact, I think he's too creepy. In their haste to make it obvious to the audience what a freak this guy is, they make him into such a howling horror-show that I don't understand how anyone could stand him for more than a few minutes before running in the opposite direction. Then again, I think I've met people like this, who believe that the secret to wealth and happiness is knowing which arms to twist. I regard them with a deep pity that I think would offend them, but I guess I haven't exactly run away from them.
Anyway, this film is quite timely, combining an update of the American Psycho with a heavy dose of cynicism for mainstream media (although, to be frank, the local operation in the film is supposed to be quite rinky-dink.) I've seen the film referenced many times in the more paranoid reaches of Reddit (although increasingly that's becoming the entirety of Reddit, alas.) I was also impressed with the film's sinister use of the internet and information. At one point the protagonist blackmails a woman into sleeping with him based on information readily available online about her. Chilling and important to remember from time to time: you're being watched.
A very nervy little film. Like American Psycho it's almost a dark comedy. Although I never had the stomach to laugh, the protagonist's business-talk is hilarious and freaky. At one point he forms a company composed only of himself and from then on refers to himself as "we" as in "I've noticed your increased work ethic recently and we think that you have great potential for advancement." It would be hilarious if it weren't so gross.
This is a good film. It's unsettling, darkly funny, ugly, and sleek. It does what it needs to do and left me feeling icky afterwards (although I do feel like the film's bullet missed me because I neither create news nor do I watch it so I'm completely outside of this struggle.) But this is no simple, pat little flick, it wants to hit people and scare them, like a cut-rate news team leading with a story of a double-homicide.
The Faculty
Saw The Faculty, a very 90s sort of update of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. It has a lot more big names than I remember. Elijah Wood is there with his giant blue eyes, and Josh Hartnett plays counterpoint, with his little cat-like eyes. A lot of eye-related attractiveness going on. Anyway, the film is fairly goofy fun. The plot is ludicrous of course, with the 20-something-year-old "teenagers" getting high on caffeine and also caffeine is somehow more dehydrating than salt? Bad science aside, there's a fun sense of the teenagers getting together, falling prey to paranoia and never knowing quite who the enemy is. Good sci fi stuff.
It is fundamentally a dumb and harmless movie, but it's got a lot of (possibly unintentional) creepiness in how the heroes behave. There's something sinister in the eagerness of Josh Hartnett's attractive genius stoner character to go homicidal on his teachers. The songs "School's Out" and "Another Brick in the Wall" feature heavily on the soundtrack. I think the film cynically believes that there's a part of kids that really do want to murder their teachers (one teacher even hamfistedly says "I'm the authority figure here!" before Hartnett mincingly sneers her back into submission.) The parasitic alien makes everyone serene and calm. It's a false calm of course, and the violence of the main characters gives the film some grey shades, but why is it that calm is a sign of external and alien control? I wish I had been told a more comforting lie.
The movie is dumb (and for me nostalgic) fun. It's clearly not a movie with a ton on its mind, which exists only to give kids of the 90s what is cynically assumes they want (teacher-murder) Is that what kids want? It isn't what I wanted. Eh. A miss.
It is fundamentally a dumb and harmless movie, but it's got a lot of (possibly unintentional) creepiness in how the heroes behave. There's something sinister in the eagerness of Josh Hartnett's attractive genius stoner character to go homicidal on his teachers. The songs "School's Out" and "Another Brick in the Wall" feature heavily on the soundtrack. I think the film cynically believes that there's a part of kids that really do want to murder their teachers (one teacher even hamfistedly says "I'm the authority figure here!" before Hartnett mincingly sneers her back into submission.) The parasitic alien makes everyone serene and calm. It's a false calm of course, and the violence of the main characters gives the film some grey shades, but why is it that calm is a sign of external and alien control? I wish I had been told a more comforting lie.
The movie is dumb (and for me nostalgic) fun. It's clearly not a movie with a ton on its mind, which exists only to give kids of the 90s what is cynically assumes they want (teacher-murder) Is that what kids want? It isn't what I wanted. Eh. A miss.
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