Any anticipation for "Rachel Getting Married"?

A.O. Scott likes it. I'm looking forward to seeing Debra Winger in something substantial again.

Yeah, I've been anticipating this since reading the article in the NYT fall arts preview. This part pretty much sealed it for me:

And he decided pretty early on, he said, to approach “Rachel Getting Married” (Oct. 3) as if he were shooting “the most beautiful home movie ever made, trying to capture that feeling you get when you look at home movies, that you’re in the room, that this is really happening.”

I love stuff like that.

this movie is amazing. my favourite of the year possibly. i absolutely loved it.

and winger is fantastic. a small role but one that defines the entire movie.

plus fab five freddy! and sister carol! and robyn hitchcock! as themselves!!

I hope this purported "home movie" feel means he avoided those FULL-SCREEN CLOSE-UPS he is / was so fond of.

This looks like my type of film; I really can't wait. Also, the AV Club gave it an A!

do they ever give movies a V?

SO EXCITED

Moderate excitement.

will be fun seeing her in this role

neu hathaway vs neu katie holmes

vs neu mandy moore pillowfight round-robin championship

she was really terrible on SNL last night...

this is pretty good, I didn't know Hathaway had it in her. The Deep Dark Secret kinda melodramatizes things tho. And if grooms are really singing Neil Young songs during the ceremony and doing so much other mega-hip shit, I'm suddenly grateful for the chicken dance.

Bill Irwin and Winger standouts in support. The actress who plays Rachel is good but distractingly resembles the great Christine Lahti.

i love christine lahti. how bout that movie, leaving normal?

yeah i need to see hath. oo i could go tonight

(she always seemed like she had some pretty awesome talent, actually)

Amazing movie.

During the toast at the rehearsal dinner I cringed and looked away like I was watching a horror movie or No Country for Old Men. Hathaway is irritating, dramatic and self-absorbed in such a perfect way.

movie looks pretty fuckin lame but i would obliterate dat

did Rudy Ray Moore say "dat" a lot?

I still haven't seen this but probably will this week.

Let's go!

This lived up to my expectations. I could just watch rehearsal dinner toasts for hours.

Cool! I'm watching this tomorrow.

This lived up to my expectations. I could just watch rehearsal dinner toasts for hours.

― jaymc, Saturday, November 8, 2008 11:56 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

me too!!

Just saw this last night! My favorite of the year, I think! Really hard to watch parts of it because it felt soo real (thanks to the incredible performances, the brilliant script AND the stunning home-movie aesthetic)...I think it hits close to home for a lot of people; the 'this is not your family...but this is your family' tagline is so true.

so this is really Demme's Comeback Film, eh?

After that Manchurian Candidate remake he could have filmed himself sitting in a room and belching and it would have been a comeback.

(answer: yes, it's his comeback film!)

i thought this was pretty great

I liked this very much. Bill Irwin reminds me of every do-gooder, conciliatory dad I've ever met. Some lame review I just skimmed remarked on the "obligatory" happy ending -- did he watch the same movie?

Also -- wow, Debra Winger. That hug between her and the two daughters will keep me up at night.

I enjoyed this but I'm not about to call it the greatest thing ever.
Favorite thing about the film is the use of live music.

this is about as good as his Manchurian (ie, good)

Oh, right, you liked it.

A dissenter (ie, Worst Film of the Year):

http://moviesintofilm.com/2008lists.htm

When Rachel Getting Married wasn’t just plain stupid (as in the dishwasher-loading competitions between the family patriarch and his future son-in-law, set to a screechy, out-of-tune violin nervously sawing “Flight of the Bumblebee”), the movie trotted out the seldom-seen great actress Debra Winger (who, in a sleeveless black gown, looks radiant, although she's more delicate now than in the underrated treats of her well-spent youth, Mike’s Murder and Black Widow), then fulsomely coasted on her status as an aloof icon, and ultimately pulled the stuffing out of her and us with a scene in which Anne Hathaway (playing her junkie daughter) punches Winger in the face. Is this the only way Demme could (hope to) lend credence to Jenny Lumet’s stick people screenplay?...

Black Widow. What a treat!

Black Widow is crap! Mike's Murder IS underrated, although not the near-masterpiece of Antonioni-esque alienation that Pauline Kael described.

Which reminds me of an amusing little encounter I had with Lance Kramer at the opening night party of last February’s Portland International Film Festival. While we were dancing standing in place to the strains of a fez-sporting, faux-Egyptian ensemble (opening night film: The Band’s Visit), Lance, who only knew me from my writing, and was meeting me in person for the first time (and for the last time, as it would turn out) hit me up with: “You come across like an asshole!” Before I could even choke on my red wine in a Jack Benny-esque, “I beg your pardon,” young Lance emended his observation to, “but like someone who’s earned the right to be asshole.” Ah, yes, well, now, that’s more like it—isn’t it? Having earned the right, uh hum. (Elsewhere in the conversation, this blond bearded youth regaled me with an incredulous, “You seem so nice! You seem so nice!” Was he expecting the Son of Satan? And all because I pinched Philip Seymour Hoffman’s doughy cheeks?)

^^ yeesh

I see it isn't only music critics who suck.

Wait -- The Mysteries of Pittsburgh was actually filmed and released?

Haha for a second I thought that was you, s1ocki and I was like "wow mark pinched PSH cheeks?"

"Emended"?

This film is a horrible, shrill, self-indulgent mess.

YOU'RE a horrible, shrill, self-indulgent mess

Though having said that, the central scene where Kim faces off against her sister and father is pretty good.

xpost - I'm not receiving any international acclaim that I know of though

Man, that "worst of" list is almost Armond-worthy.

"this is about as good as his Manchurian (ie, good)"

I can't believe Morbius liked the remake.

Although compared to that awful Charade do-ever it seemed good, I guess.

I would like to see this.

That he refers to Armond White as a luminary is the most bewildering thing about the list.

Ooh, I take back my last comment.

Wow his hatred of 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days is just baffling.

hey, Nathan Lee thought it was the year's worst too! "Insufferable bobo hysteria." (bobo? is that avariant of boho?)

http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2009/01/vultures_critics_poll_the_comp.html

This asshole on Wall-E:

Hideous from the get-go, Wall-E announces in the very first scene that the writer-director, Andrew Stanton, knows nothing about setting images to music. Some fairly nice opening “shots” of planets viewed from the perspective of deep space are drained of their interstellar potency by Stanton’s insistence on scoring the montage to Jerry Herman’s tenth-rate show tune, “Put on Your Sunday Clothes,” with its inane lyrics (“There’s lots of world out there”) warbled by an awful male voice, redolent of Broadway’s distorted notions of folksy banjo players, that sounds like one of Alvin and the Chipmunks going through puberty. Not only is the song horribly written and sung, it’s further nudged along to fingernail-on-a-blackboard status by shrill orchestration that calls for the entire woodwind section to be pitched at the level of tin whistles.

anyone who spends 5 paragraphs patting themselves on the back for their iconoclasm before getting to their worst-of list deserves to be on a worst-of list of their own.

let's see yours, then!

Movie critics rarely get me riled up, but man, eff that guy.

Michael Crawford does sound like the Herman's Hermits guy.

Morbs, I can't imagine wasting that much time thinking of my list of 10 worst movies (shouldn't we all just be trying to forget them) let alone writing incoherent screeds about 'em.

no, I was asking for s1ocki's worst-critics list.

i dont have one

I guess I do have to appreciate that he keeps his "worst" list mostly focused on what I've found myself calling "significantly bad movies," though that could simply be a function of possibly being freelance and pre-winnowing down stuff like Meet Dave and the 10,000 B.C. remake.

Of course, by "significantly bad movies," I'm sure I didn't mean Wall-E.

4. Another Gay Sequel: Gays Gone Wild
Don’t let the generic title fool you: This is the worst gay sequel ever.

he made this up, didn't he

I don't mind five grafs devoted to taking easy shots at bad films, but by his own criteria his writing is as bad as the entries on his list, and without the WTF thrill/disgust I get from reading Armond.

xp He didn't.

Don’t let the generic title fool you: This is the worst gay sequel ever.

ok this is genuinely funny

In Lee's defense, it is pretty gay and pretty much a sequel.

Is it the worst though?

Not to disappoint you, but probably yeah; it looks like a horny cereal commercial.

Those vulture lists (and Oscar-candidate burnout) make me genuinely excited to see Seven Pounds and The Happening.

OH NO IT'S HAPPENING

Those vulture lists (and Oscar-candidate burnout) make me genuinely excited to see Seven Pounds and The Happening.

more gay sequels?

BACK ON TRACK GUYS

i really loved this, thought rachel was maybe my favorite performance of the whole lot, would that my own wedding party would be an all-night rager

That hug between her and the two daughters will keep me up at night. <--OTM, this was crushing

Ha, talking about the actual subject kills the thread.

No, I really liked this without actually "liking" anyone in it.

hence, just like Altman?

he made this up, didn't he

― ^likes black girls (HI DERE), Friday, January 9, 2009 11:00 AM (Yesterday)

nope; we had this for a week at the cinema i work at. the end credits included a wacky song about chlamydia.

>>This film is a horrible, shrill, self-indulgent mess.

― chap, Friday, January 9, 2009 9:38 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

YOU'RE a horrible, shrill, self-indulgent mess

― s1ocki, Friday, January 9, 2009 9:39 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark<<

Nice to see ilx still as a welcoming place of dissenting opinion

I'm not really on the boat in comparing this to Altman, no.

Nice to see ilx still as a welcoming place of dissenting opinion

― Vichitravirya_XI, Saturday, January 10, 2009 10:10 PM (20 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

YOU'RE a welcoming place of dissenting opinion

well, that is true

The best-ten and worst-ten lists are interchangeable, and no sane person not privy to the voices in Thompson's head could hope to educe which list a given film might end up on.

The dishwasher scene might be my favorite moment, where it's so unclear who is being serious and who is funneling their seriousness through levity and who is just joking around in a rough and playful way. I love how the film captured so many moments where the characters themselves weren't aware of their own behavior or itnentions. And how (MINOR SPOILER) the main character never fell off the wagon.

This was really, really good.

Yes it was.

I managed to not click on this thread, or read any reviews besides Denby's so I'm a little surprised!

this was excruciating. i lasted 45 minutes.

was it like that Nicole Kidman movie that i didn't like? the one wth jennifer jason leigh?

Margot was so much better than this.

oh

No it isnt'.

who's better at playing a fuckup, anne or nicole?

Hathaway, but even if Kidman were the right answer, there's no one in the hysterical Margot operating on Rosemarie DeWitt, Bill Irwin, and Debra Winger's level of verisimilitude.

just love that word, the way it rolls of the tongue

I thought this was great, but it psychologically destroyed me for about two days.

I don't know what it says about me, but in the last couple years I never settled into a movie as comfortably as I did into this one.

maybe it says you like things that are screwed up

Or catharsis ... so long as it's not my family.

no one who LOVED this film is gonna book my wedding entertainment.

Good interview with Jenny Lumet on KCRW.

i don't think it says anything wrong about you; the Lumets are v good at Real People (TM), though I found the ones in this one to be a tad forced. it was definitely a good, if very small, film of not especially my type. hathaway is very good. I did not enjoy 100-however-many-minutes of the bride's haircut. I was amused by the wedding entertainment.

this was very very good. borderline great, even.

margot at the wedding was excruciating.

I watched it on a plane and therefore had to do my sobbing silently.

I found this VERY hard to watch. Discovered afterwards this was a common reaction. Talk of people feeling disorientated and sick on leaving the cinema. It really made me queasy. Partly the 'real'ness partly the camerawork.
The dad seemed to be in a comedy too which didn't help.

Also, would a bloke you'd met once in therapy who you gave a highly personal anonymous note to suddenly start banging on about it while you were sat getting your hair done in a barber's? I THINK NOT.

Yeah, that scene was the one false note for me.

Belatedly caught up with this at the cinema today.

Really liked it - but agree it is excruciating to get into at first, and then rewarding in terms of acting performances.

Thought the cinematography was fantastic - mixing hand-held and close-up shots, and the use of colour (dark and then colourful scenes matching the emotional atmosphere).

I see Piscesx felt strongly enough about the Dad's acting to leave a message on IMDB - but it didn't worry me unduly.

Rachel herself strongy remined me of someone on ilx's 'what do you look like' - but I can't quite work it out. Is it Robyn or perhaps LJ's former ladyfriend?

wow i thought this was going to be on a pieces of april tip but it was really, really, good

“the most beautiful home movie ever made, trying to capture that feeling you get when you look at home movies, that you’re in the room, that this is really happening.”

i was thinking this the whole time.

makes me want to go to weddings all the time! especially ones that involve musicians!

hathaway is cute and all but rachel herself could get it for miles and miles, wow, like MLP with a more realistic nose

also lol @ the idea that singing neil young at your wedding ceremony and having the women wear saris is mega-hip

no one who LOVED this film is gonna book my wedding entertainment.

― Dr Morbius, Sunday, February 8, 2009 9:18 PM (3 weeks ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

what is morbz saying here

ya really this looked like the funnest wedding ever

for everyone except kim

A friend of mine who gets self-conscious around pagentry and ornamentation thought that was turned out to be the ceremony rehearsal was the best wedding ever.

("thought that what turned out to be...")

I loved all the good wine on the table.

srsly tho i watched this w/ my gf and i was about to propose to her just so we could have an awesome wedding

hathaway is cute and all but rachel herself could get it for miles and miles, wow, like MLP with a more realistic nose

― homie bhabha (max), Wednesday, March 4, 2009 11:27 AM (2 weeks ago) Bookmark

^

holy shit, i never heard that donald harrison was in this. weird. i think i recognize the drummer in the rehearsal dinner scene too.

i loved how the music was handled in this. i'm trying to think of any other movie where the music is actually live and recorded at the same time as the dialogue. also i would love to go to a wedding with a good dj, dancehall mc's, cyro baptista leading a samba group, donald harrison playing some slow songs, etc.

also i felt like bill irwin kept slipping into some kind of weird accent. i thought for sure he must be german by birth or something, but apparently not.

i could see objectively how this movie was really good, well-acted, etc., but i can't really say i enjoyed watching it

one of my sister's best friends is in the wedding scenes

some of the hathaway scenes were pretty excruciating but i really enjoyed the rehearsal dinner & wedding parts. also i love the dude who played the recovering junkie, he's in a bunch of david wain-related stuff.

i liked this a lot, but I"m not sure I got the final scene...we're not to assume rachel went back to rehab, right? so how did she get in touch with the woman FROM rehab when she plainly states at the beginning that she never got her phone number, and the woman from the rehab says she "almost got fired for that" or something? or are we to assume they started some romantic relationship (seems lame)?

other than this one point I really liked this, and, although I know a lot of people in recovery, I have to say I don't know anyone who is a trainwreck in this particular way so that was nice.

the wedding did look like the best wedding ever.

by rachel I meant kim, obv

i read it that she wasn't planning on going back to rehab at the beginning of the movie, but decided to at the end. and yeah it seemed like they were implying that she had a trust with the rehab worker, so even if she didn't have her personal cell # she could have called the hospital if she was checking in again.

See, I heard an interview with Jenny Lumet who said that she left it deliberately open-ended.

so how did she get in touch with the woman FROM rehab when she plainly states at the beginning that she never got her phone number

seems like she could just call the center? dont know why shed have to call that specific worker.

Reading this thread, I'm so glad my boyfriend and I agreed that the wedding reception was totally fucking annoying. Drum circles and showgirls? Really?

it was a musical family

it wasn't a drum circle or showgirls, it was a samba group. it's a thing.

also i mean i hate drum circles and showgirls but afaic in the context of a wedding anything/everything goes

Maybe I'm taking it personally because I'm from a musical family, complete with a drum circle-loving dad who will have no say in the wedding reception arrangements.

I thought this movie was a pretty standard melodrama

hathaway is cute and all but rachel herself could get it for miles and miles, wow, like MLP with a more realistic nose

where were you when I was shouting this on WS09? I couldn't take my eyes off her.

it wasn't a drum circle or showgirls, it was a samba group. it's a thing.

My friend, who is from the Bahamas (like her mom's family were pirates and/ or rum-runners...we can't tell), had her wedding near Nassau two years ago, and her dad got a Junkanoo group to parade through - sort of like the Mardi Gras indians - and the scene where they came through Rachel's wedding totally reminded me of that.

Also, did you know that Bill Irwin, Rachel and Kym's dad, was the dancing FBI agent in My Blue Heaven, AND is a member of Clown Hall of Fame?

He's totally in the "Don't Worry Be Happy" video, too.

I would be dropping a nuclear bomb on all this wedding party.
Like The Swimmer without a pool. Dreadful.

they were an '80s hipster family

I saw Bill Irwin on NY stage in his pre-talking era.

Saw him play the lead in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf two years ago.

i think the first time I ever saw him was on Alive from Off Center with Laurie Anderson in the 80's. also famous to people with kids as Mr. Noodle's brother, Mr. Noodle, on Sesame St.

this movie was ass. EDITING MUTHAFUCKA DO IT SPEAK IT.

plus, can we stop pretending to care about the problems of privileged?

Who's pretending? I really care about them.

"I would be dropping a nuclear bomb on all this wedding party."

^^^

plus, can we stop pretending to care about the problems of privileged?

― macaulay culkin's bukkake shocker (bug), Saturday, May 2, 2009 8:52 AM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

lol are you a joke

no. i would care much more about these people if they couldn't afford to throw this absurdly lavish wedding. fuck them.

i know you're a troll but i'm still gonna respond anyway: it's a small wedding in their HOUSE. it's not like they're renting out the ritz-carlton.

i'm not trolling, i genuinely thought the movie was an inconsequential piece of fluff.

People never trot out that "problems of the privileged" bullshit when some rich action hero is killing giant spiders.

it's a small wedding in their HOUSE

and didn't they do their own cooking, and have their friends play music for free? cheapest wedding ever.

yeah this wasn't that lavish a wedding, if you've ever been to an actual wedding

hey man, giant spiders are everybody's problem

i guess macaulay culkin bukkake porn is more yr style

Remind me never to loan "bug" money.

I thin these "die rich ppl" folk love the human cockroaches in Apatow films

you thin?

You can never be too rich or too thin.

you can be too annoying though.

Who, me?

oh no! my goodness you are so the opposite of annoying.

just about everyone in this movie is though. in the 45 minutes or so i could stand of it anyway.

you are so the opposite of annoying.

I will tell my husband this.

haha, we all have our moments!

I agree that at its heart it's a pretty standard melodrama. But I really liked this as a sociological study, I guess you could say--more about a particular social class and a particular place. It's pretty devastating as well since it seems the family loves each other but can't forgive, especially the mother. Sometimes I'd rather see movies about wiser people, but then I guess there'd be no conflict.

THis movie gets my motor runnin

i have two sisters, both married. this movie gets a lot right about how wedding festivities can be sort of spiked with spite and resentment. the melodrama and upper middle class glitz is a little much though, agreed

'glitz'

yeah, certainly a lot of annoying bits, but there was also some stuff that really spoke to me and my experience going through my sister's wedding (and the year leading up to it, and the years after it).

There were a lot great performances in this, but the use of cinema verite to cover over the hoke in the script and the lazy auteurship all over the wedding (would it have killed them to give an explanation derived from the characters for the multi-culti Demme-doc casting? Does he really have to keep returning to the same well for color? Liked the Village Voice review asking why Jimmy Carter wasn't there) really did grate for me.

Demme putting Soft Boys and Feelies at the end of Truth About Charlie was random as fuck, but at least when he had the boombox turn into the singer in France it was Charles Azbavour, not Neil fucking Young.

Aznavour, rather

would it have killed them to give an explanation derived from the characters for the multi-culti Demme-doc casting

?

Since we never found out why this family had such a hard-on for the rainbow coalition (which JUST HAPPENED be stocked with people spotlighted in previously filmed documentaries by the director), one has to assume its because Demme wanted to film HIS dream wedding (this is also suggested in the bonus features). It would have been contrived, but I wish we knew more about why Rachel would want to have a wedding in a sari with Robyn Hitchcock and Sister Carol there.

the explanation was that the groom is a professional musician and is friends with a lot of other musicians

he needs to stop riding Demme's dick then.

and, professional musicianship aside, why the fuck Sidney would choose to sing a song about an aging west coast waitress from Harvest Moon other than that the director has been working with Neil Young for the better part of two decades.

I'm willing to accept Demme's liberal inclusiveness (in this case) because there's no hint that the characters' inclusiveness and penchant for saris makes them better than you and me. Demme's Rainbow Coalition ethos is as integral a part of him as Eric Rohmer characters quoting Racine on summer days.

yeah it's just sad for me to think of him being so pat and unimaginative about it. I mean you got the dude from TV ON THE RADIO surely he can hook you up with a fresh batch of musician extras

i didn't know the tune or that demme and neil young have a thing, so i just assumed that rachel likes that song

the only scene that almost made me walk out of the theatre was the dishwasher one.

yeah back in the day demme would have just had a dishwasher scene for the sake of it, without lumet slapping on a DO YOU SEE at the end. I really wonder how people would have taken the same script and actors if Chris Columbus had directed it straight.

and I totally get that aren't familiar with demme's pros and cons probably had an easier time focusing on the good stuff, chris columbus wouldn't have gotten debra winger, etc.

that people who aren't familiar

um, the casting isn't 'multiculti', the characters are. and the characters are multiracial not because of jonathan demme, but because of jenny lumet, who comes from a multiracial family. as for how we're supposed to regard it, if there is a how, it's as uncommon, perhaps, but not extraordinary.

maybe demme had something to do with the neil young pick, but is it really so hard to believe he might fit the character (ahem?) and/or milieu?

demme may explain some of the things i dislike about this - the over-the-top-ness and self-concious music stuff - but if i compare this (unfavorably) to any other work, it's Jenny's dad's Running on Empty, which I think goes for some of the same 'realist' family milieu, except i imagine i'd much rather be in Naomi Foner's family than Jenny's.

admittedly an adolescent and continuing personal favorite

wht ws wrong w/the dishwasher scene? the plate?

People are quibbling about some dumb shit in this thread.

what's the important shit, polyphonic

um, the casting isn't 'multiculti', the characters are. and the characters are multiracial not because of jonathan demme, but because of jenny lumet, who comes from a multiracial family.

demme says he first offered the role of Sydney to Paul Thomas Anderson, so I'm pretty confident that the variety of cultural touchstones comes from his desire to infuse the film with the sheer vibrancy of american life and world culture even though its about a family of uptight wasps in connecticut.

also demme in his spout blog interview says the dad was a music exec. did this ever come up in the movie?

Spout: Can you talk about the cultural diversity in this film? I think it’s really important, it struck me like this is the first movie of the Barack Obama, let’s hope, years. Because it had such an ease about the cultural differences and all of that. So, was that in the script or is that something you added?

Demme: She wrote this four years ago. We never talked about that. To me, because we certainly wanted this to be the best wedding, to me there’s two things. One is, I like the pictures that I do to reflect the real America as it is today. And I’m a New Yorker and I can’t speak to what it’s like all over the country, but I can tell you that what we see gathered there at the wedding reflects very much what we see on the streets in New York and in workplaces all over our town.Also, I wanted this to be the best, best, best wedding ever. And to me that meant the best crowd ever. The most exciting crowd, the most stimulating crowd. And that’s, again, what you end up with. I think a kind of a predominantly white crowd is boring. It’s just not it doesn’t look like that. But, there’s an irony too, because it is an interracial marriage. We never talked about that. We never went, “Wow.” Because we all know interracial couples and stuff.

Spout: All the other elements: the Indian wedding, the Brazilian dancers…

Demme: Well, that’s Jenny Lumet’s fault. But, the thing I wanted to say there just in conclusion, that point that was Tunde Adebimpe who plays Sidney was the second person that I offered the part to. The first person I offered the part two was the American filmmaker who should be in movies because he’s so good looking and fabulous. And that is Paul Thomas Anderson. He came in and read the script at a table read with us. He was working on finishing up There Will Be Blood in New York. He was wonderful. And he passed the likeability test in a big way. I wanted, again because Jenny writes characters without regard to making them likable, and rooting interests and stuff. She tries to makes them real and fascinating and complicated. We needed not only terrific actors, but I thought people in the audience would like despite their vagaries. So, Paul was adorable as Sidney. I offered him the part and he said, “Jonathan, you’ve got to be kidding me. It was fun to do the table read, but a) I’m shy, and b) I’ve got this little movie I’m trying to finish and stuff.?? So, our casting directors I asked them to please, please, our whole movie was cast from New York. And I asked our casting directors to bring in our most gifted, likable actors.

And Tunde and also Mather Zickle, who plays Kieran, these are guys, they sat down across the table and I just liked them right away.??I liked being with them. I was fascinated by them. They were cute and funny and terrific. So, with Tunde, I was seduced a little bit by the fact that he’s the lead singer of a great cutting edge rock band called “TV On The Radio,” that is really wonderful. That kind of rock and roll allure. The other thing was I was excited by the fact that it made for an interracial marriage because that moves me. For me, and I’m the only person I can really go on, this makes it a richer and more meaningful experience, if possible. Now, P.S., when I saw the Obama convention, which Anne was at. And then, they did his speech, I don’t know if you all saw it, but 80,000 people. I was like, “Yo! It’s just like our movie!”

"Yo! It's just like our movie!"

the only scene that almost made me walk out of the theatre was the dishwasher one.

and the toast scene and the wedding party...

i mean, yeah, texture of irrelevancy and all, but GET. THE. FUCK. ON. WITH. IT.

demme says he first offered the role of Sydney to Paul Thomas Anderson, so I'm pretty confident that the variety of cultural touchstones comes from his desire to infuse the film with the sheer vibrancy of american life and world culture even though its about a family of uptight wasps in connecticut.

― da croupier, Sunday, May 3, 2009 8:43 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i really can't figure out wtf you're saying here... just tell us if you think this movie is too white or not white enough

ya I don't understand any of the past twenty posts : /

also demme in his spout blog interview says the dad was a music exec. did this ever come up in the movie?

don't recall. it explains the access though perhaps not the character or milieu. i went to school with a girl whose dad was a music exec - her sister's the star of 'my boys' - and seriously doubt her fam is like the one in this movie.

I think Anthony's saying that the racial mix of the wedding party seemed heavy-handed, like it was trying to make a Really Important Point about Multuralism In This Day And Age but pretending it was no big deal when obviously it was -- in other words, it made an issue out of it by not making an issue of it. I got that idea too (assuming I'm interpreting Anthony right anyway), and did think the musical guests at the wedding were random (partly because I'm not sure it was ever clearly explained what exactly Sidney did, and what sort of musician would have so many different kinds of close musical friends, but maybe I just missed that.) Fwiw, I liked the movie fine anyway, thought it got a lot of wedding-day/family reunion/divorced-with-grown-kids tension right (and I actually thought the dishwasher scene was really entertaining, if only because I've always taken undue pride in my own dishwasher-loading skills.)

The rehab center stuff at the end confused me a little, too, though not as much as the rehab center stuff at the beginning -- So, had they had some kind of innapropriate friendship that crossed lines that the worker (who showed up again at the end) was trying to downplay? Or did I just imagine that? It didn't seem to have any bearing on anything else.

"Multiculturalism," I meant.

And yeah, if the Dad was a music exec, I sure never picked up on that from the movie.

I think Anthony's saying that the racial mix of the wedding party seemed heavy-handed, like it was trying to make a Really Important Point about Multuralism In This Day And Age but pretending it was no big deal when obviously it was -- in other words, it made an issue out of it by not making an issue of it.

i think he's saying that too, and think i might see it as heavy-handed as well if i didn't live in a diverse major metro. i don't think the film "pretended" it was no big deal - it IS no big deal. but it's not like the film ignored it - while i don't know that recall whether the multiracial thing was ever explicitly addressed, the film made very clear the ways in which it was and wasn't an issue for the parties. i think anthony wants it to be less - is 'minimalist' the right word?

i should point out, perhaps, that i didn't like this movie very much, but i like what i think it was trying to do, in part

If this isn't just demme jizzing one world love all over the screen, then the colorful lives of these people outside of the family drama are totally underwritten. Are they superficial cultural interlopers on the level of gwen stefani rocking a bindhi or do they actually connect with this stuff on any serious level? Who knows?

and uh, I live in NY too.

i mean if i went to a wedding and they had brazillian dancers, snap dancing, robyn hitchcock, sister carol, a new orleans band, etc. I wouldn't be like "oh yeah NYC no biggie"

weddings are awful and boring

i'm friends with brazilian dancers & drummers, folk singers, djs, new orleans bands etc. (and i live in the lol midwest) so it doesn't seem wildly outlandish to invite them all to play a wedding

it's a movie--it's not real

didn't seem that weird to me while I was watching it--looked like a fun wedding

i mean if i went to a wedding and they had brazillian dancers, snap dancing, robyn hitchcock, sister carol, a new orleans band, etc. I wouldn't be like "oh yeah NYC no biggie"

― da croupier, Sunday, May 3, 2009 11:01 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

what would you be like

ugh

i'd be like holy shit where's jonathan demme?

i'd be like, "there's Anne Hathaway looking all hot and vulnerable, g2g"

weddings are awful and boring

― macaulay culkin's bukkake shocker (bug), Sunday, May 3, 2009 7:04 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

lol @ u

weddings are hilarious and fun

weddings are hilariously awful

weddings are awfully hilarious

guys

Not having seen this, is the main family pushing forward a bohemian Ivy League vibe? If so, then really the thing that makes this unrealistic is the lack of a Chinese wedding banquet.

(My wife and I seriously considered doing a Chinese wedding banquet, actually; the main thing that stopped us was realizing we couldn't afford it.)

ya but jonathan demme's friends are in it - how do you explain that

Demme and his friends would totally have gone to Dan's wedding!

the reason dan couldnt afford the chinese wedding banquet is because he paid jonathan demme to invite all his friends

there is certainly something poignant about seeing Jonathan Demme freak your wife's grandmother on the dance floor

so the money was worth it

oh yaeh, absolutely

The only part that I liked about this movie is when Anne/Kim does us all a big favor and asks the musicians to STFU. I just hope she'd done it earlier. Now if only she'd asked the camera man to go easy on the close ups, I would've almost liked her.

would it have killed them to give an explanation derived from the characters for the multi-culti Demme-doc casting? ... I'm pretty confident that the variety of cultural touchstones comes from his desire to infuse the film with the sheer vibrancy of american life and world culture even though its about a family of uptight wasps in connecticut.

Weird: I feel like this is missing the most on-the-nose arrangement of symbols going in this whole thing,* which is to have an event that is this magically harmonious mishmash of everything in the universe (yeah yeah harmony, see, like music), and then introduce the one bum note that inevitably brings out discord. I mean, let's not get so into trying to outsmart the director's intentions that we ignore the way stuff actually plays out on the screen.

Really enjoyed this, by the way -- and, reviewing this thread, it's apparently turning out to be the sort of thing where the stuff some people didn't like about it is just mystifying to me: father seems like he's in a comedy? His "leave me alone I am repressing terrible emotions" arm-flapping in that one scene just killed me. (Especially given its similarity to his daughter-is-pregnant girlish arm-flap.)

* okay, if you don't count the fork in the road

Hahaha also I don't recall thinking much about this either way while watching, but I'd say it's kind of an even bet on people named Buchman who toast "l'chaim" being WASPs, Connecticut or not

sorry, missed the last name - wrote off the "l'chaim" as more magically harmonious mishmash

Ha, the name actually stuck out to me because the father is "Paul Buchman," i.e., I'm pretty sure the same name as Paul Reiser's character on Mad About You

sorry, missed the last name - wrote off the "l'chaim" as more magically harmonious mishmash

― da croupier, Wednesday, May 13, 2009 6:43 PM (32 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i am really stumped as to why you think a themed wedding where one family is white and the other is black is so magically and unrealistically "harmonious"* that that the director owes you some sort of explanation

* despite the fact that isn't at all harmonious, unless you mean that like a race riot doesn't break out in the middle of it

i am really stumped as to why you think a themed wedding where one family is white and the other is black is so magically and unrealistically "harmonious"* that that the director owes you some sort of explanation

dude it's pretty facetious to bring up "one family is white and the other is black" as if that's remotely what people are talking about when they talk about the aggressive cultural variety found at the "themed" wedding. and "harmonious" was a direct quote of nabisco.

what else was i supposed to take "multi-culti casting" to mean

"wow this wedding has british rock stars, brazillian dancers, sister carol, a new orleans band, some kind of folk music quartet, hey is that fab 5 freddy..."

"blacks and whites marry! ACCEPT IT!"

it's a movie--it's not real

― Mr. Que, Sunday, May 3, 2009 11:26 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

then why are people bothered when you criticize it

Well those phrases were me, s1ocki, and all I mean is that I felt like there was a deliberate contrast between the happy melding of lots of different elements in the wedding (even just the visual elements of the set are a collage of different things, like saris here, Ethiopian art on the walls there; plus the literal harmony of all different sorts of music and musicians) ... it seemed to me like a clear and deliberate thematic contrast between that and then the introduction of a character who sort of inevitably brings with her and unearths all sorts of discordant stuff. (Apart from the way her mother disconnects from everything, I don't think there's a single point of disharmony or conflict that's not a direct function of Kym's presence!)

I dunno, my viewing experience was actually to sort of marvel at how that contrast was so blatant and on-the-nose and yet still functioned really well and didn't feel particularly sledgehammery.

vs

"wow this wedding has british rock stars, brazillian dancers, sister carol, a new orleans band, some kind of folk music quartet, hey is that fab 5 freddy..."

"what an objectionable display of multicultural aggression!"

xxxp

Well those phrases were me, s1ocki, and all I mean is that I felt like there was a deliberate contrast between the happy melding of lots of different elements in the wedding (even just the visual elements of the set are a collage of different things, like saris here, Ethiopian art on the walls there; plus the literal harmony of all different sorts of music and musicians) ... it seemed to me like a clear and deliberate thematic contrast between that and then the introduction of a character who sort of inevitably brings with her and unearths all sorts of discordant stuff. (Apart from the way her mother disconnects from everything, I don't think there's a single point of disharmony or conflict that's not a direct function of Kym's presence!)

I dunno, my viewing experience was actually to sort of marvel at how that contrast was so blatant and on-the-nose and yet still functioned really well and didn't feel particularly sledgehammery.

― nabisco, Wednesday, May 13, 2009 7:30 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

well i agree, i just am trying to figure out how croupier is saying the same thing and make it sound like something has to atone for!

because i found it sledgehammery, slocki.

If this isn't just demme jizzing one world love all over the screen, then the colorful lives of these people outside of the family drama are totally underwritten. Are they superficial cultural interlopers on the level of gwen stefani rocking a bindhi or do they actually connect with this stuff on any serious level? Who knows?

― da croupier, Sunday, May 3, 2009 10:58 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark

xpost - Like I don't think talking about this in terms of "casting" is at all relevant, really, because that exact same cast and the same characters could be portrayed involved in a perfectly traditional wedding -- what's notable is that everything about the event itself is this smooth and graceful melange of contributions from various places and traditions and types of people ... which is (and this metaphor is like so ridiculously present that I feel weird even pointing it out) much like, umm, the harmonious contributions of various musicians to a song

xpost - Yeah, see, it seemed to me that croupier, upthread, was viewing this as some sort of extraneous aesthetic choice of Demme's, like an unnecessary and unjustified tic or point of direction, which is why I'm stressing that it seems like one of the biggest and most basic thematic points of the story itself, as it was written

this movie is decent but its just a standard hollywood movie nothing special

honestly one thing i loved about this movie is that we don't see a lot of minor character backstory but there's a lot that you can infer - every character seems like they have their own stories, relationships etc but it's up to the viewer to guess at them or piece them together. xxp

this movie is decent but its just a standard hollywood movie nothing special

― cool app (uh oh I'm having a fantasy), Wednesday, May 13, 2009 7:37 PM (11 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

whoa. mind blown. what the hell have we been talking about? let's go for a walk or something guys.

dead bro plate was pretty sledge man

dead bro plate was the terriblest part of the movie

ya that was a bit on the nose.

seriously

fwiw I thought this movie would be like russian ark but it wasn't so that's why I'm posting like I am

thats kind of your fault

no its not

uh oh you had a fantasy

this movie was like noah's ark, what with the rain and everyone pairing off at the end

I'm stressing that it seems like one of the biggest and most basic thematic points of the story itself

i get taking it as a deliberate contrast, but i'm kinda curious what you saw as the "point" of it

what is the point of having children

every character seems like they have their own stories, relationships etc but it's up to the viewer to guess at them or piece them together.

i admitted up thread that if the occam's razor of "jonathan demme, this fucking guy" didn't explain why all his doc subjects were there, I might have enjoyed the movie more.

ya i mean... that didn't bug me because... well i still don't really understand why it bugged you

though it still would have been a lifetime movie made "voyeuristic" via shaky cam.

xpost i can live with that

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a128/liftedresearcher/for%20sale/dog.gif

it's a movie--it's not real

― Mr. Que, Sunday, May 3, 2009 11:26 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

― Mr. Que, Wednesday, May 13, 2009 2:30 PM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark

yea normally the 'it's a MOVIE guys come on!!!" works if some dude's ripping on some CGI-bullshit action sequence, but yea isn't demme totally going for a kind of realist docu-drama kind of thing? i think that's what caused a lot of people to be thrown off by the total harmonious/no republicans/no fat ugly relatives/all beautiful liberal artists -- the fact that the movie has such a realist approach in many ways but that the wedding was so over-the-top in uh, very un-realist ways?

but i definitely should say that i like nabisco's point about the 'harmony' of the multicultural wedding and everything being disrupted by hathaway's character and all that, that it works pretty well as a thematic device of the film

though it still would have been a lifetime movie made "voyeuristic" via shaky cam.

― da croupier, Wednesday, May 13, 2009 7:49 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

why, because it's about mothers and daughters and sisters?

one thing i loved about this movie is that we don't see a lot of minor character backstory but there's a lot that you can infer - every character seems like they have their own stories, relationships etc but it's up to the viewer to guess at them or piece them together.

^ yeah, and part of why this works quite well is that this actually matches the experience of, like, attending a wedding, where you do not entirely know the stories of the other guests but there they are, doing whatever it is they do. (there were also some amusing things that seemed to take place entirely in that background, which was interesting in the same way -- e.g., seeing the original maid of honor looking happily wrecked on the dancefloor and then unhappily wrecked the next morning)

the only blank-filling thing that got me was some line that I maybe misheard about a young Kym modeling something on the cover of Seventeen?

My favorite bit of verisimilitude in this, btw = when the young Asian guy is giving a toast and says "it's, like, love, you know..." and trails off and there's a exactly-right pause before everyone laughs happily at him

xpost - I think that contrast is just as much of a premise as it is a point -- if a lot of what this film is about is harmony between different people (and families) and the ways in which it's broken or maintained ... and your main character is someone who's responsible for constant low-level discord and also the central discordant event that's screwed up this family, and she's returning for an event that's not just this harmonious thing but a wedding, a literal joining of people into new families ... I mean, what kind of "point" are you looking for, beyond that this is the subject matter of the film, and that its makers seem to be holding up that kind of harmony as a pretty wonderful ideal that can also be really difficult to get to or reconstruct once it's broken?

the only blank-filling thing that got me was some line that I maybe misheard about a young Kym modeling something on the cover of Seventeen?

i think the idea was that she had some kind of modeling/acting career and maybe (?) the drugs led from that

Line in the script (not sure if it made to screen exactly this way):

RACHEL
You wore a lilac sweater with a cat face on it on the cover of Seventeen Magazine when I was at fat camp.

if you're trying to suggest what a rich culture-infused life your characters have, surrounding them with the subjects and stars of your previous movies is probably the laziest possible way to do it (i mean does anyone praise recent tarantino for this?), and you have to expect some people might think it's about you instead of the fictional characters.

the total harmonious/no republicans/no fat ugly relatives/all beautiful liberal artists

this seems slightly untrue, by the way; I'm not sure why we'd make the assumption that this event was somehow washed of any of the normal stuff surrounding wedding parties. (doesn't the father even joke about wanting certain people seated far away from him?)

(xpost - yeah, Max, it's not hard to fill in, but it seemed like one of those things that maybe prompts more questions than it's worth)

haha croup i admire yr vendetta against demme

was donald harrison in some previous demme project?

vendemme

if you're trying to suggest what a rich culture-infused life your characters have, surrounding them with the subjects and stars of your previous movies is probably the laziest possible way to do it (i mean does anyone praise recent tarantino for this?), and you have to expect some people might think it's about you instead of the fictional characters.

― da croupier, Wednesday, May 13, 2009 8:00 PM (46 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

so basically you think he's showing off.

Nah, I think Miccio likes Demme -- he dislikes what he sees are the recyling of Demme-esque tropes and expecting the audience to sit still through them.

sister carol is a "demme-esque trope"?

this movie is such a lazy rehash of the indian-themed wedding in silence of the lambs

if you're trying to suggest what a rich culture-infused life your characters have, surrounding them with the subjects and stars of your previous movies is probably the laziest possible way to do it

Thing is, I'm guessing a minuscule proportion of people who saw this film know this, and a minuscule proportion of people who know it care about it -- pretty much the sole extent that this occurred to me is going "oh right, Robyn Hitchcock, Demme does like him"

yeah i mean if his point really is to make it seem like the family lives a magical life of culture (which i'm kind of on the fence about anyway), why NOT personalize the movie by using stuff demme is genuinely into?!

hey at least the feelies and the talking heads didn't play the wedding party, right guys!

"something wild" definitely happened tho

i never suggested its not an idiosyncratic reaction, nabisco.

sister carol is a "demme-esque trope"?

Actress:

1. Rachel Getting Married (2008) (as Sister Carol East) .... Wedding Guest

2. Married to the Mob (1988) .... Rita 'Hello Gorgeous' Harcourt
3. Something Wild (1986) (as 'Sister Carol' East) .... Dottie

the audacity of re-using a performer he had worked with 20 years ago!

it's like he lazily casts her every two decades

Also seems weird to view the presence of musicians around this as an attempt to make some bold claim about the rich awesome lives of the central characters, as if the point of the film is just to make the characters seem cool or something, rather than just following the on-screen suggestion that all of these people are just contributing something of theirs to the "harmonious" wedding (from musical stuff to, I dunno, the groom's sister's dip)

for a movie critic you really have a hard time with people criticizing stuff you enjoyed.

"a lot of this stuff is really familiar demme imagery, found it distracting"

"oh yeah, like the indian wedding in silence of the lambs! fuck you!"

xpost to slocki

i thought that's what we here for dude!

i mean couldn't i just as easily say "as a music critic, you really have a hard time with people disagreeing with you"

if i was posting ad hominem shit like that, sure.

but i'd rather keep this a friendly disagreement about a movie that's fun to argue about than get any more personal than that!

sorry where was i getting ad hominem there??

If I remember right, on BBC Front Row, either the interviewer suggested or Demme said how he was basically getting his "family" together for this movie, in the sense of Sister Carol, Robyn Hitchcock, etc.

i wish that hannibal lecter had eaten everyone at the wedding!!!!!

Or had Meryl Street been cast as the mom.

if they had served fava beans with a nice chianti i would be onboard with the laziness argument

haha woops really should read the definition of a word more closely before i use it. just feels like you're trying to dismiss an opinion in really facetious ways ("what do you have against blacks and whites marrying?" "O RLY is there an indian wedding in his other films HUH?").

as if the point of the film is just to make the characters seem cool or something,

this is a good point, none of the central characters in the movie really seem that cool at all, which notable since they're successful musicians, junkie ex-models, etc.

rachel getting married to the mob

the audience feels cool

when do I get to see saris

you feel cool because you named yourself cool app

you are the reason why they should lock this thread

you know, the thing that was weird, script-wise, about the sledgehammery plate incident is that it was only used in a heavy way after the audience learns what it's about -- during the first third of the film people are repeatedly and directly bringing the kid up without its seeming like a really huge trigger. (obviously this is explainable, like a physical object and memory are a whole different thing from a conversational reference, but still, I guess that's an odd way in which the script kinda shifts reality to let the audience catch up with what things mean.)

"wow this wedding has british rock stars, brazillian dancers, sister carol, a new orleans band, some kind of folk music quartet, hey is that fab 5 freddy..."

wow this NY movie has B- and C-level NY-centric music personalities

yeah, the fam was clearly supposed to be jewish - they had the same name as a jewish guy from a tv show, that's how you know - but that's one goyish fucking jewish family, at least on the dad's side (him and sis, and really anne too and oh hell debra winger while we're at it; TVOTR dude is the most jewish person i remember from the thing)

gabb you suck, I only said that's why I noticed the name

"Buchman" can also just be a German name, which is why I said it was kind of a wild bet on their being German "WASPs" who enjoy Hebrew toasts

yeah, the fam was clearly supposed to be jewish - they had the same name as a jewish guy from a tv show, that's how you know

i was serious, btw

just watched an old mad men episode and realised where i'd seen rachel before

she was on "rescue me"'s second season, too

i thought this was amazing and that s1ocki was otm itt

gabbneb and miccio going back and forth has to be more tiring than running the boston marathon

re the dishwasher scene

i think the idea of it was pretty devastating but there were so many problems with it

1. the thing was stacked in the middle of their plates at the front of the cabinet and we're supposed to believe that the father was shocked to see ETHAN'S PLATE

2. i think most anyone would've been able to keep their composure in that situation - the kid has been dead for presumably... 12 or 15 years? i think he could've just picked it up and set it aside and cracked a smile

3. the whole movie was basically based on people causing scenes and this one was pretty nonsensical and if the rest of the movie wasn't so good it might've undercut all the great dramatic 'scenes'

4. the whole premise of a son-in-law/father-in-law quirky harmonious competition that involves a dishwasher is just preposterous

was just one scene tho, anne hathaway was amazing

one last thing that alfred mentioned: i thought the best moment in the film is when the dad cries and starts doing those hummingbird hands in front of his eyes - he had this feminine sort of quality about him that was perfect and the crying thing was kind of just a great little moment that got across the father/daughter relationship between the three

just watched an old mad men episode and realised where i'd seen rachel before

Rosemarie DeWitt has done a lot of TV. She's also on United States Of Tara and had a show called Standoff.

the best moment in the film is when the dad cries and starts doing those hummingbird hands in front of his eyes - he had this feminine sort of quality about him

Yes, totally -- I was unsurprised to learn that the actor is also a clown, because he used these body movements so incredibly well. One of the great things about it was that it was the same type of hand motion he made when he learned his daughter was pregnant, so it carried from a joy movement to a suppressed-emotion don't-touch-me movement.

the dishwasher scene is just too long. you expect some kind of twist, since it's such a happy scene in an otherwise unhappy movie. it just dragged, though, like the party after the ceremony and the toast scene.

I love the dishwasher scene for all of its layers.

haha, i watched this with my wife last week, she was fuming at the endless parade of musicians at the wedding.

that Sparks song about chicks digging metaphors = can't always be depended on

"this is tedious"
"but honey, it's a metaphor"
"oh, that changes everything, i'm really feeling it now"

I might actually have had that reaction to the structure of Q&A/Slumdog Millionaire

i don't know if i dare ask this, but how in the hell were the musicians a metaphor

they're dishwashers

lol

and toasters

the toast scene is where the movie really clicked for me - i really initially hated the choice to use handheld cameras (especially because they are sooo shaky in the first few scenes) and the toast scene was really the first point in the film where i felt like i was in on a "home movie" and not a film using handheld cameras as a device

works for me

I didn't really like margot at the wedding that much but I thought that was better than this

No way - the wardrobe in that movie sucked.

another thing about the toast scene is that the emotions didn't feel acted - like, maybe more movies should be based around totally awesome events that people want to "act" cuz all the laughs and smiles during the toasts seemed totally genuine

i was thinking that maybe only the specific actor/actress knew their own speech that way the others at the table were free to react more 'normally'?

ok reading the past few posts I thought I was forgetting a scene where people load up toasters or something

i also thought tunde adebimpe was great in this - in a way it's a good first role: he's acting a role where he is an awkward, reserved outsider in a movie stuffed with high quality, experienced actors

I forgot who upthread picked on Demme and Lumet for using "Unknown Legend" in that scene, but DeWitt's reaction shot as she listens to Adebimpe singing is the best indication that it works.

the wedding scenes were super fun to watch (especially the snap dance scene!) but just any time kym was shown on screen i found myself really wishing that she wasn't going to do something stupid to fuck everything up - tension!

i also thought that kym was going to commit suicide

Rachel Getting Married; Kim Committing Suicide

sequel!

i don't know, i just find weddings to be annoying and tedious, so those long scenes gave me an unpleasant feeling of deja vu.

i haven't been to a wedding since i was... 6? so i don't feel your pain, sorry

i find weddings to be fun and rad

yeah im super pumped about my friends getting married eventually tbh - then again all my friends are jazz musicians and aspiring dancehall MCs also jazzy jeff

going to the first wedding of a high school classmate in october i am so fuckin siked

weddings are so much fun

except for the part where you have to listen to "Love Shack," but whatever

ts: wedding crashers vs rachel getting married

TIN ROOF, RUSTED

Dear HI DERE,

Stop it. Stop it right now.

Best,

Que

guys weddings are awesome

everyone otm

how can you not like an awesome large party w/ all yr friends + free booze

maybe it's just me, but at the only non-family wedding i've attended i only knew like 2 people. pretending to have fun with people you don't know is exactly why that toast scene irritated me, and it left a bad taste in my mouth for the rest of the movie.

Weddings are always awesome unless there is no booze AND no dancing AND you don't know anyone there.

also: LOVE SHACK POLL

maybe it's just me, but at the only non-family wedding i've attended i only knew like 2 people. pretending to have fun with people you don't know is exactly why that toast scene irritated me, and it left a bad taste in my mouth for the rest of the movie.

― casual racism fridays (bug), Wednesday, June 10, 2009 7:08 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

sounds like u were the life of the party tho

i mean come on, weddings where you don't know anyone are the best!

Weddings are always awesome unless there is no booze AND no dancing AND you don't know anyone there.

Aka a Mormon wedding we went to four or five years ago at the officers club at a base near DC - the maid of honor, my wife and I got HAMMERED in shifts in the bar downstairs.

We were frowned at by the elders-in-attendance. Scary old Mormons.

haha that is still awesome, though

Weddings are awesome except for the hangovers.

Weddings are awesome except for the strange hybrid of narcissism and union.

And the alcohol poisoning. xp

no way, alcohol poisoning and narcissism are awesome

yes, that's what I usually tell the bride and groom upon congratulating them.

(xxpost)

pro tip: if you don't like weddings, avoid a movie called "Rachel Getting Married," there is probably going to be a wedding in it

i don't know if i dare ask this, but how in the hell were the musicians a metaphor

I don't know if I dare repeat this, but I am curious.

Weird: I feel like this is missing the most on-the-nose arrangement of symbols going in this whole thing,* which is to have an event that is this magically harmonious mishmash of everything in the universe (yeah yeah harmony, see, like music), and then introduce the one bum note that inevitably brings out discord. I mean, let's not get so into trying to outsmart the director's intentions that we ignore the way stuff actually plays out on the screen.

― nabisco, Wednesday, May 13, 2009 1:58 PM (4 weeks ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

pro tip: if you don't like weddings, avoid a movie called "Rachel Getting Married," there is probably going to be a wedding in it

you look like what the guy from death cab for cutie sounds like

i think it was the robyn hitchcock troubadour on the lawn thing that set my wife off

I got annoyed that no one looked uneasy or bored during the toasting scene or the ceremony, except Hathaway, of course, the black sheep. And everyone had something appropriate and touching to say even though their characters were supposedly ad-libbing.

The dishwasher scene was interesting.

I really disliked how patronizing the movie was. The shoehorn poignancy of the cake cutting. Practically the entire ending. Someone doesn't want the audience to make a mistake about what any one character might be feeling.

And the multi-culti thing discussed already - it seems so self-congratulatory! The movie seems that way, not the characters.

And everything was in perfect taste - the movie pandered to its audience's tastes. And some DJ plays dancehall or something and everyone dances. Everyone dances to everything, including the old people, and no sits it out as if to say, Do young/old people really like this music. Someone improvises on - what was it, an alto sax? - and everyone is moved. I think in a typical mixed crowd more people will be bored by jazz than not, but in this fantasy land people are weeping they're so moved.

And the family members, including Rachel, behave so pettily and become so frequently shrill that too often the movie seems to be screeching at you. The person I saw it with pointed out to me that that is how sisters are, and I think she was talking about herself and her own sisters, which she has a lot of. But even that idea about how sisters are I found repulsive. And anyway, the movie didn't seem to have natural emotional cadences. A lot of the emotions behind actions and words seemed exaggerated beyond theatricality, and contrived.

Not worth writing a paragraph, but Manchurian was obvious and not good at all.

i had a very different reaction than you but i wonder if maybe it had less to do with the movie and more to do with your own experiences with family and weddings vs. my experiences with those same thing

And the multi-culti thing discussed already - it seems so self-congratulatory! The movie seems that way, not the characters.

And everything was in perfect taste - the movie pandered to its audience's tastes.

I still don't understand this complaint. Demme doesn't ask you to congratulate his or this family's good taste; some of the speeches and clothes are in fact tacky to my eyes and ears, and that's okay. This is how THIS family acts. Besides, the point is clear: look at all the tension boiling underneath the surface of this "perfect" family.

the kid has been dead for presumably... 12 or 15 years?

I think it had been more like 5.

Besides, the point is clear: look at all the tension boiling underneath the surface of this "perfect" family.

More like: look at how that jerk Kim is ruining the perfect wedding with her stupid drug problems, hey remember when she killed little bro?

But even that idea about how sisters are I found repulsive.

they are, have you ever been around sisters? FUCK THAT.

i liked this movie i mean yah what i remember it wasnt all that subtle but on the other hand that scene where anne hathaway got slapped in the face so maybe emotional subtlety is overrated

yeah seriously--the movie was totally within the non weird realm of brother and sister interactions

I mean, the sister's relationship seemed totally real and not theatrical at all

More like: look at how that jerk Kim is ruining the perfect wedding with her stupid drug problems, hey remember when she killed little bro?

Yes but by the end they realize that the fuck-up is trying and that the real villain is their emotionally unresponsive mother. You know, like in Ordinary People.

I H8 U MOM

i think most anyone would've been able to keep their composure in that situation - the kid has been dead for presumably... 12 or 15 years?

Speaking as someone who lost a family member 21 years ago, this is kind of bullshit. Especially at emotional life-changing family events, you have no idea how that resurgence of grief can sneak up on you and blast you with hurt. It may not be the weeks-long extended agony that fresh grief can be but that type of emotional response even decades after a death is more than possible; I saw it with my parents at both my wedding and my brother's wedding.

(Having not seen the movie, I don't know if the portrayal was at all convincing, but as a baseline act it's not at all far-fetched.)

yeah i understand finding the moment forced or contrived (or a disappointing "point" to an otherwise colorful stand-alone scene) but his reaction is in no way implausible. Irwin was great, and I'd love to see him do more dramatic work in film.

Even though I'd heard about his stage work (dude did Virgina Woolf!) It was really was weird at first to see Mr. Vaudevillian from Bobby McFerrin videos and the Cosby Show being serious.

Yes but by the end they realize that the fuck-up is trying and that the real villain is their emotionally unresponsive mother. You know, like in Ordinary People

oh come ON. The greatness of RGM is that there really are no villains, in that Jean Renoir sense. Even Debra Winger has her reasons; it's impossible to dislike her (and you understand why she had to make a life apart from her girls). Mary Tyler Moore is just a kewpie doll with calcified joints.

I'm not saying it's not more nuanced, but the climax clearly was the sisters bonding over her spurning them. Everything after that is basically mutual acceptance, even the mega-wasp maid of honor gives Kym a nod.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDIQp5pbAl8

this is a controversial movie

dude did Virgina Woolf

I read this in a way you didn't intend and immediately thought wow, he looks good for his age

haha i thought about amending in another post but figured i'd wait and see if someone caught it

re: the plate and events that stir feelings of loss/grief, btw, doesn't this occur ... about one night's sleep after he learned that his daughter is having a child?

I should also note, btw, that I don't think anything in this was even close to as theatrical or contrived as just the standard conventions of a film drama, but I can see how certain scenes feel that way in contrast to the floaty home-movie aesthetic around them -- there are definitely seams where you notice that you are shifting from loose improvisational stuff to a Scene. (I actually think the plate thing is one of the more interesting instances of that, because what seems like some fun scenic malarkey -- a dishwasher competition -- suddenly prompts a living-room drama scene.)

Even though I'd heard about his stage work (dude did Virgina Woolf!) It was really was weird at first to see Mr. Vaudevillian from Bobby McFerrin videos and the Cosby Show being serious.

― da croupier, Thursday, June 11, 2009 4:30 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

did u know he's doing godot on broadway now with nathan lane and john goodman? want to see.

nathan lane's the big uhhhh in that but I hear he's good

ya.

Sisters, yeah. And I hate women, too.

I was thinking last night that I don't think it would work on the stage, that it was dramatically dishonest. No villains? That's Sophocles & Aeschylus. That's a big, fat so-what.

The movie didn't let the conflict(s) breathe and be real. You could see straight through the scenes to the author's original outline on the page.

I haven't seen this since it came out, which isn't that long ago, but probably just long enough to not really have my impressions down right.

I didn't really have any problem with its aesthetic except that it was overstuffed with diegetic music sources. I think for the most part the handheld camera handled spaces well, even if the movie lacked spatial connectedness. Plus it made me kind of motion sick.

And the wedding seemed overplanned, and how could it be without someone not showing up or screwing up or whatever?

The families - in some ways they were indistinguishable except for being different races. Families are more heterogeneous and weddings become lumpy. It doesn't seem like anything is happening at this wedding, that anyone in it is real except for Rachel and her immediate family. The drama's very sealed off from its own movie.

Even Debra Winger has her reasons; it's impossible to dislike her

Oh, I disliked her plenty. And Kym was completely right, her mother was culpable in leaving her in charge of the child.

I liked this very much. Bill Irwin reminds me of every do-gooder, conciliatory dad I've ever met. Some lame review I just skimmed remarked on the "obligatory" happy ending -- did he watch the same movie?

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Tuesday, November 11, 2008 2:59 PM (7 months ago) Bookmark

I remember feeling the same way as whoever that reviewer was.

This lived up to my expectations. I could just watch rehearsal dinner toasts for hours.

― jaymc, Saturday, November 8, 2008 6:56 PM (7 months ago) Bookmark

This was the most trying, armrest-clawing part of the movie.

That's how I felt, and it was intentional.

Every toast I've heard like theirs is endless and self-congratulatory.

It's so strange that people had such differing reactions to those toasts, and I can't really mentally account for it -- I don't think it's a matter of what kinds of weddings people go to, but I don't know what it is. I thought there were a lot of points of great verisimilitude and richness in a lot of them: I think I mentioned the part where the young Asian guy trails off in his inarticulate stoner toast and everyone laughs, and I was also interested in the father's nods to the serviceman in the groom's family, the way you clearly sense/assume an anti-war position on his part and the diplomatic/generous way he just keeps saying "we want to see you home real soon"

(he does it multiple times and each time it's just so perfectly and naturally in character, with different inflections that just make so much sense)

I can appreciate this, these opinions about the toasts.

I just watched this movie. I knew that it was supposed to be like kinda dramatic/heavy or whatever but I wes in no way prepared for what an unpleasant and excruciating viewing experience this would be. Everything about the wedding and its planning and etc was so fucking spot on (despite it being such a ridiculous wedding), like all the very trite "humorous" shit ppl would throw in and the way everyone laughed at it and all that, which made the whole amends thing feel so much more real. Also I haaaated the hand-held camera at first but came to appreciate it as the film went on.

i do really like this movie

"I didn't expect you to kill him, sweetheart You weren't supposed to kill him!"

favorite film of 2008, though it'd be interesting to see in again.

Everything about the wedding and its planning and etc was so fucking spot on (despite it being such a ridiculous wedding), like all the very trite "humorous" shit ppl would throw in and the way everyone laughed at it and all that, which made the whole amends thing feel so much more real.

ha i feel like this is part of what i liked about it, though.

Loved this movie and made me an Anne Hathaway defender 4 lyfe. Dishwasher scene still kills me.

oh shit, bill irwin. the clown.

Like, I don't remember the last time a scene shifted tone so suddenly and yet so naturally at the same time.

jaymc, why are you reviving all these movie threads from 5–10 years ago?

5.

someone's gotta do it.