Am I crazy though? It felt like I’ve seen the 70s character quirks over and over scans as cliches to me...
― Evan, Monday, 21 February 2022 20:27 (two years ago) link
It's not fresh like Phantom Thread, which seemed as if he were breaking new emotional ground; American directors don't touch this sort of conception of love as a game you can still take seriously. It's like Ophuls directing a Mazursky script. I saw it again in January and am prepared to crown it his best.
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 21 February 2022 20:30 (two years ago) link
Magnolia’s score did what I think PTA wanted it to do tho? To keep the entire movie at a heightened state of anxiety for 3+ hours?
― Max Hamburgers (Eric H.), Monday, 21 February 2022 20:30 (two years ago) link
congrats, PTA!
The only film-score mismatch I can think of in PTA’s work is There Will Be Blood come to think of it
― Max Hamburgers (Eric H.), Monday, 21 February 2022 20:35 (two years ago) link
inasmuch as Greenwood music only works with Thom Yorke's dispatches.
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 21 February 2022 20:35 (two years ago) link
last two posts are deeply wrong lmao
― STOCK FIST-PUMPER BRAD (BradNelson), Monday, 21 February 2022 20:50 (two years ago) link
*cues Greenwood thunder*
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 21 February 2022 20:51 (two years ago) link
one of my most memorable theater experiences is the seasickness i felt when greenwood's score starts up in there will be blood
― STOCK FIST-PUMPER BRAD (BradNelson), Monday, 21 February 2022 20:52 (two years ago) link
pta's way of making the landscape from which they extract the oil feel full of doom and hostile to any kind of humanity
― STOCK FIST-PUMPER BRAD (BradNelson), Monday, 21 February 2022 20:53 (two years ago) link
That's a movie where it's a necessary complement, yeah.
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 21 February 2022 20:56 (two years ago) link
In my film class today we discussed sound design: music, special effects, etc. PTA came up as an example of a director who can use music diegetically and non-diegetically well and also for spectacularly ungainly reasons. The wall-to-wall score in Magnolia came up as an example of how he can do it badly.― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, February 21, 2022 3:25 PM (forty-five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, February 21, 2022 3:25 PM (forty-five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink
Would pull my kid out of this college
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Monday, 21 February 2022 21:12 (two years ago) link
me in professor Soto's class
https://c.tenor.com/sCdo8DW21XQAAAAC/boo-outrage.gif
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Monday, 21 February 2022 21:13 (two years ago) link
can't stand Radiohead, Greenwood's scores for PTA and Ramsey and Campion are v good
― bad luck banging, or Lorna Doone (sic), Monday, 21 February 2022 22:22 (two years ago) link
I'd also differentiate between using period music to fix time and/or to capture a mood, like with "Life on Mars" here, and using something counter-intuitively, like PTA using "Jessie's Girl" in Boogie Nights in the midst of this violent, chaotically surreal scene. The former is the lowest level of imagination--it can be great, but as Darin says, the music does the heavy lifting. With the latter, I give most of the credit to the director (or person in charge of the soundtrack).
― clemenza, Tuesday, 22 February 2022 01:08 (two years ago) link
My example of "great soundtrack, inert movie" is Almost Famous.
― Halfway there but for you, Tuesday, 22 February 2022 01:31 (two years ago) link
That's an example of a startling PTA use of music xpost
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 22 February 2022 01:47 (two years ago) link
I love a few things from Almost Famous: "Tiny Dancer," of course, but also "America" as William flips through his inherited record collection, the couple of Led Zeppelin songs, and one or two other things, I think.
Best of all, when Dirk, sitting on the couch and in close-up, realizes the song describes his relationship to Amber and smiles.
― clemenza, Tuesday, 22 February 2022 01:50 (two years ago) link
This movie didn't entirely work for me but the "age gap" discourse has been a typical shambles. It paints everything with the same brush and is about defining what's out of bounds for artists to explore, not about generating thought.
This is dumb bcuz the guy explored it and made a huge movie about it and is getting critical acclaim and anyone that disagrees is labeled with having bad takes.
― kurt schwitterz, Tuesday, 22 February 2022 04:26 (two years ago) link
So what's your good take?
― Chris L, Tuesday, 22 February 2022 04:47 (two years ago) link
disagrees with what
― bad luck banging, or Lorna Doone (sic), Tuesday, 22 February 2022 05:35 (two years ago) link
the critical acclaim
― kurt schwitterz, Tuesday, 22 February 2022 05:37 (two years ago) link
kurt you hate this movie on such a personal level that all of your arguments feel like a form of revenge. hard to engage with
― STOCK FIST-PUMPER BRAD (BradNelson), Tuesday, 22 February 2022 06:55 (two years ago) link
isn’t there tumblr for this kind of stuff
― auld gang syne (k3vin k.), Tuesday, 22 February 2022 08:42 (two years ago) link
What about my about-the-70s movie tropes issue? I just wanted someone to tell me why I'm wrong
― Evan, Tuesday, 22 February 2022 15:32 (two years ago) link
well going into the film completely blind, for the first few minutes i thought it was vogueishly set in the 90s, which would make sense perhaps?
― Urbandn hope all ye who enter here (dog latin), Tuesday, 22 February 2022 15:47 (two years ago) link
The first few minutes are just in the school, right? Makes sense.
― Evan, Tuesday, 22 February 2022 16:25 (two years ago) link
fucking loved this, it was crammed with the joy of throwing images on the screen, haters can go to hell.
― assert (matttkkkk), Saturday, 26 February 2022 12:54 (two years ago) link
My kinda review tbh ^Hope to watch it this weekend
― circa1916, Saturday, 26 February 2022 16:14 (two years ago) link
The age gap discourse is dumb because it doesn't acknowledge how the dynamics actually play out onscreen.
I don't think that the soundtrack does the heavy lifting but I do think the fetischistic evocation of a bygone era - which includes the soundtrack sure but also production design and plot points - does. It's almost like a video game, where so much of the appeal is allowing you to walk within a particular world. So Evan I think your about the 70's movie trope issues are valid, but I do think it's that at its highest possible level.
That being said, it's also just funny! The crazy business ideas, the weird showbiz kid behaviours, that amazing scene with Sean Penn and Tom Waits (even tho casting Penn in the first place should be a bigger point of problematic contention than age gap and supposed racism both).
― Daniel_Rf, Saturday, 26 February 2022 16:25 (two years ago) link
A friend and I are going to do a Zoomcast on this and Zola next week, so I went to see it a second time tonight. Had two deer cross in front of me on the way home, one right after the other; I almost died for a PTA film.
It just seemed longer this time--there was a point where I thought, "Jesus, there's still Sean Penn, Bradley Cooper, and the politician to go." I think the best thing about it is the ending, which is the kind of storybook thing I tend to fall for. I think the worst thing is the whole Bradley Cooper detour, which seemed pointless.
No one's mentioned John C. Reilly under the Herman Munster makeup--maybe it's too obvious, but I got a kick out of recognizing the voice.
Is Lucy Doolittle literally supposed to be Lucille Ball, or is she a composite? The song her troupe sings is "Yours, Mine and Ours."
― clemenza, Sunday, 27 February 2022 05:24 (two years ago) link
hmm it seems as if twitter has stumbled upon the john michael higgins scene from this film
― roflrofl fight (voodoo chili), Monday, 14 March 2022 20:43 (two years ago) link
nah people noticed that a long time ago. it's the reason I'm uninterested in seeing the movie, and I consider myself a PTA fan otherwise. uninterested in seeing white guy doing an Asian accent whether he's the putative target of the joke of not, I don't really need white guys appointing themselves the makers of that joke.
― J Edgar Noothgrush (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Monday, 14 March 2022 20:52 (two years ago) link
I have really enjoyed in discussions with friends about it the occasional "it's only one scene!" though, like a small bite of shit doesn't spoil the beautiful auteur filet mignon
besides which it's two scenes
― STOCK FIST-PUMPER BRAD (BradNelson), Monday, 14 March 2022 20:59 (two years ago) link
I miss Morbs for what he might say at this point
― Max Hamburgers (Eric H.), Monday, 14 March 2022 20:59 (two years ago) link
same
― kurt schwitterz, Monday, 14 March 2022 21:07 (two years ago) link
Not because he’d be right, obv. But better he say it than me, even more obv.
― Max Hamburgers (Eric H.), Monday, 14 March 2022 21:10 (two years ago) link
Finally saw this last night, I liked it way more than I thought I otherwise might. The Higgins' scenes were definitely uncomfortable and unnecessary. Like I imagine the idea was to show how this kid had some less than savory people to lean on with his unorthodox upbringing but feel like it could have been accomplished in a less awful way.
I will say I agree with Brad's (and someone else's, tbf) take on the almost magical realism of the Penn/Waits/Cooper detour. It felt like a less malicious turn of the Alfred Molina scene in Boogie Nights in the whole, "can you believe these batshit Hollywood people" kind of way. It was cartoonish to heighten the force with which Alana had been wrested from her day-to-day malaise into an entirely different universe that was overlaid on the one she usually experienced. In the comedown from this is when she connected with the political thing and found a direction.
― a superficial sheeb of intelligence (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, 14 March 2022 21:18 (two years ago) link
I don't remember if Morbs was pro or con PTA but I think we definitely would have butted heads about it. Still so sad he's gone.
― J Edgar Noothgrush (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Monday, 14 March 2022 21:28 (two years ago) link
I rescreened before it left cinemas, and on second pass the Higgins character’s idiocy definitely seemed intended to show the level of client Gary could attract as a teenager (and his mom’s solo clients clearly a separate thing). One capable, hard-working bar/restrauteur, and one clueless oaf with a shiny white smile. Though both of them are sincere in their belief in Gary, respectful as well as indulgent!Also cf my post about his jobs upthread, the waterbed call center is indeed the same one-room office as the PR company - no extra commitment to expenditure there.
― beepy fridges (sic), Tuesday, 15 March 2022 00:14 (two years ago) link
regardless of the particular merits of that scene, the moralistic discourse surrounding this film in general has bummed me out
― roflrofl fight (voodoo chili), Tuesday, 15 March 2022 13:04 (two years ago) link
showing a racist person makes a movie racist.
― 《Myst1kOblivi0n》 (jim in vancouver), Tuesday, 15 March 2022 17:43 (two years ago) link
It's not that as much as it is, if you get racist shit directed at you in your actual life, how much of it do you also want to watch in your entertainment?
― castanuts (DJP), Tuesday, 15 March 2022 17:46 (two years ago) link
I think part of what's in play here is that the movie is, despite being a period piece, very much a movie-made-today. So even if, to give PTA the benefit of the doubt, he was using a trope/joke that would've been absolutely of the movie's time period, it still cuts differently than finding a similar scene in a Hollywood movie made in 1971.
― Max Hamburgers (Eric H.), Tuesday, 15 March 2022 17:50 (two years ago) link
(I do think PTA was clumsily trying to introduce it as something that would've just been part of the fabric of that era. But if the movie feels like a 2021 movie in nearly every other regard, is there an expectation that the movie reflect our supposed evolution on these matters? Probably yes.)
― Max Hamburgers (Eric H.), Tuesday, 15 March 2022 17:51 (two years ago) link
I really don't understand where the disconnect is happening. Everyone got what they wanted: PTA made his movie and it got widely distributed. People who thought that part was racist got to air their complaints.
It's like arguing over Rotten Tomatoes scores at this point or writing PTA fan-fiction to own Twitter users. Even in the criticism I've seen, it's not like saying the pinball movie is Birth of a Nation
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Tuesday, 15 March 2022 18:09 (two years ago) link
People interpret movies differently! That's OK!
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Tuesday, 15 March 2022 18:10 (two years ago) link
I'm a big fan of the movie but wholeheartedly agree it was completely unnecessary to the fabric of the film. It was super jarring, though probably less because I knew about it in advance. If I didn't know about it, it probably would've been angering because it seems so sudden, stupid and hateful? But yeah, I get the intent of it.
Can't hate on anyone who considered this a brickstop. I guess I'm lucky that all the idiots I've met who spoke in a racist accent were just traditionally racist as compared to... whatever this is supposed to be
...and it wasn't half as funny as Josh Brolin's "MOTO PANCAKU!" bit from Inherent Vice, so this is definitely some kind of weird, specific bugbear for PTA
― Nhex, Tuesday, 15 March 2022 18:49 (two years ago) link
like chinese american in a theater full of laughing whites bummed?
― kurt schwitterz, Tuesday, 15 March 2022 21:08 (two years ago) link