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12.14.2006
Distraction
A Scanner Darkly
Billed as something of a consciousness-exploring movie, I actually found that it was more an exploration of criminal theory. The gist: Keanu is addicted to a highly addictive, highly illegal, and societally pervasive drug. He is also an undercover agent assigned to surveil himself. Does he ever get mixed up! I liked it but thought it was not actually terribly thought-provoking. Ah well.
The Science of Sleep
Possible top 10 candidate. A lot to love about this movie, particularly its unique stop-motion montages and realistically awkward romance between a painfully likable Stephan (Gael Garcia Bernal) and his neighbor Stephanie (Charlotte Gainsbourg), both of whom are fascinating characters as individuals and acted fantastically, with the best chemistry I've ever seen between two leads. Highly recommended.
Cache (Hidden)
Very disappointing. Seems to be a love it or hate it type movie; I was ambivalent until I watched the filmmaker's commentary, at which time I moved squarely into the hate camp. The movie itself is shot like an Ozu film, with fixed camera positions and long periods between cuts. This certainly heightened the suspense of a tense film, whose essentially skeletal plot revolves around a man who has just begun receiving vaguely threatening surveillance shots of himself and his family. Perhaps the dialog is richer in French, but the English subtitles felt very forced; the filmmaker claims the purpose of the film is to explore feelings of guilt, but his representation of guilt simply did not conform to any behavior I would expect to follow from guilt. The backstory that slowly reveals itself is interesting, but not sufficiently interesting to justify this movie, in my always humble opinion. What moved it into my "hate" category was the filmmaker's misplaced pride in his work: in discussing Cache, he derided (a) writers who work any sort of resolution into their work, (b) media consumers who enjoy any sort of resolution in their media, and (c) writers who are not himself (which includes category (a) but is worthy of separate mention). I'm no great nationalist, but his claim that an American would have written one scene completely wrong seemed a slight overgeneralization, and his note that a "doctor friend" of his spent ten minutes after the end of the movie professing the genius of a specific scene in which he had not even detected within a busy frame the main action taking place, when edited for brevity and clarity, translated to, "my intelligence dwarfs that of society's best minds." This level of hubris shredded what little satisfaction my stupid American brain had found solace in after an irresolute, ambiguous ending, and led me to consider as a contrast the highly satisfying (albeit irresolute and ambiguous) ending of the thoughtful little gem I'd seen the night before. Forgive the relative quality of this note, as I believe my writing was clouded by my distaste for the filmmaker. I think that my main points are discernible regardless of my writing (and admitted possible scrambling of the filmmaker's comments; I did not go back and check my memory against the commentary for precision).
If your time is valuable, do not follow this link . Weffriddles is truly evil. It is mental crack: equally addictive and prone to induce binges at the worst possible time. Like during reading days/finals. Thank goodness that a mere 36 hours after it was brought to my attention, I vanquished all 58 levels. AND managed to include sleep and studying in those 36 hours!
Finally, three items. (1) I have taken my evidence exam. That means I am 3/6 (exams) or 6/15 (credits) done. This time next week I will be halfway through law school. (2) I got into the class that will take me to DC next semester to sit in on Supreme Court arguments and meet at least one of the good justices. A most excellent, though not unexpected, break. (3) This evening was the neuroscience holiday party, and an excellent source for a variety of foodstuffs and a bit of socialization.
Next day note: World's tallest man saves dolphins. Yep.
Billed as something of a consciousness-exploring movie, I actually found that it was more an exploration of criminal theory. The gist: Keanu is addicted to a highly addictive, highly illegal, and societally pervasive drug. He is also an undercover agent assigned to surveil himself. Does he ever get mixed up! I liked it but thought it was not actually terribly thought-provoking. Ah well.
The Science of Sleep
Possible top 10 candidate. A lot to love about this movie, particularly its unique stop-motion montages and realistically awkward romance between a painfully likable Stephan (Gael Garcia Bernal) and his neighbor Stephanie (Charlotte Gainsbourg), both of whom are fascinating characters as individuals and acted fantastically, with the best chemistry I've ever seen between two leads. Highly recommended.
Cache (Hidden)
Very disappointing. Seems to be a love it or hate it type movie; I was ambivalent until I watched the filmmaker's commentary, at which time I moved squarely into the hate camp. The movie itself is shot like an Ozu film, with fixed camera positions and long periods between cuts. This certainly heightened the suspense of a tense film, whose essentially skeletal plot revolves around a man who has just begun receiving vaguely threatening surveillance shots of himself and his family. Perhaps the dialog is richer in French, but the English subtitles felt very forced; the filmmaker claims the purpose of the film is to explore feelings of guilt, but his representation of guilt simply did not conform to any behavior I would expect to follow from guilt. The backstory that slowly reveals itself is interesting, but not sufficiently interesting to justify this movie, in my always humble opinion. What moved it into my "hate" category was the filmmaker's misplaced pride in his work: in discussing Cache, he derided (a) writers who work any sort of resolution into their work, (b) media consumers who enjoy any sort of resolution in their media, and (c) writers who are not himself (which includes category (a) but is worthy of separate mention). I'm no great nationalist, but his claim that an American would have written one scene completely wrong seemed a slight overgeneralization, and his note that a "doctor friend" of his spent ten minutes after the end of the movie professing the genius of a specific scene in which he had not even detected within a busy frame the main action taking place, when edited for brevity and clarity, translated to, "my intelligence dwarfs that of society's best minds." This level of hubris shredded what little satisfaction my stupid American brain had found solace in after an irresolute, ambiguous ending, and led me to consider as a contrast the highly satisfying (albeit irresolute and ambiguous) ending of the thoughtful little gem I'd seen the night before. Forgive the relative quality of this note, as I believe my writing was clouded by my distaste for the filmmaker. I think that my main points are discernible regardless of my writing (and admitted possible scrambling of the filmmaker's comments; I did not go back and check my memory against the commentary for precision).
If your time is valuable, do not follow this link . Weffriddles is truly evil. It is mental crack: equally addictive and prone to induce binges at the worst possible time. Like during reading days/finals. Thank goodness that a mere 36 hours after it was brought to my attention, I vanquished all 58 levels. AND managed to include sleep and studying in those 36 hours!
Finally, three items. (1) I have taken my evidence exam. That means I am 3/6 (exams) or 6/15 (credits) done. This time next week I will be halfway through law school. (2) I got into the class that will take me to DC next semester to sit in on Supreme Court arguments and meet at least one of the good justices. A most excellent, though not unexpected, break. (3) This evening was the neuroscience holiday party, and an excellent source for a variety of foodstuffs and a bit of socialization.
Next day note: World's tallest man saves dolphins. Yep.
posted by Max Greene at 12:55 AM
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3 Comments:
I, too, was ambivalent about Caché. What ultimately drove me away was the fact that we were supposed to assign guilt or at least serious anxiety to the actions of Georges as a very young boy, which didn't seem to correlate very well to national guilt/anxiety over colonialist tragedies.
Particularly paired with Fast Food Nation, Linklater's films this year felt to me like mood pieces to further unsettle the already unsettled. Thom Yorke's Eraser is then the obvious and perfect musical counterpart. It's not truly effective protest art because the dark forces that could/should be opposed seem so nebulously omnipresent.
Ahh I do think Eraser is a perfect comparison. And re: Cache, I think that's a very apt wording (and much more concise than mine) for a very apt critique. I suppose taking a cue from your brevity, I was trying to express also that part of my objection was stylistic: that Haneke took what could have been a very interesting subject and made it intentionally "difficult" (e.g. with an ambiguous plot and unnatural dialogue) for no reason that I could discern save simply to display his own intellect. I would have given him the benefit of the doubt and assumed some artistic reason had I not watched the commentary, which (again) consisted of Haneke explaining these "difficult" aspects primarily as intellectual flexing on his part.
Snarl. I do not like you. I was PLANNING on doing something interesting with my night, watchinig a movie, etc etc, but for the past like 4 hours all ive been doing is that site. I am on 38 now but i have to sleep. blah.
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