actually it’s also a better Scorsese homage
what
can you expand on this
I watched it once like 15 years ago and all I picked up was that it was a bunch of reactionary pro-imperial jingoism
it’s not pro-imperial. before sparing the king’s life nameless says that “many people will die,” and the resolution is not a celebration of conquest, or of pacifism for that matter. the king is a historical actor and not a moral figure. the fight sequences are a series of negations - there are none where both parties want to fight, or they are intentionally thrown. any progression is a loss. the structure of the movie is the structure of the calligraphic sword character whose structure is narrated by the king - a series of negations or sublations that leads to absolute knowing in laying down the weapon. the english translation of tianxia as “our land” is completely wrong because absolute knowing is the realization of a world or universality, at the point where everything is lost. to be clear, it’s not an anti-imperial movie either, or leftist one, it just has a complex dialectical form which easily misreads as jingoism (and also risks naturalizing historical progress or valorizing nationalist quietism, like many interpretations of hegel also do lol).
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yeah also that
one more sleeps until the Irishman
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going to see irishman in a cinematheque like marty would want
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you will believe a 70 year old man can imitate the posture of someone 40 years younger
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what are you supposed to do while watching a 3.5 hour movie on your couch?
i feel like these things are actually easier to deal with in a theater experience, its like an endurance test and there is something kind of enchanting about being taken on that kind of journey with a huge room full of strangers
with this i feel like id just get bored and wander away about an hour and a half in. i guess i could try to treat it like a miniseries or something
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I pause it, throw some balls for the cats, have dinner, change into pajamas, whatever
I can happily knock it out in an evening but not like totally unspoiled, I’m a careless reader too, makes a second and a third go that much more rewarding
I’m too old to want to sit in one chair for that long anyway
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just got back from the irishman and it’s good imo
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I too have now finished watching the Irishman
wonderful coda for Scorsese, I didn’t know too much about this story and I can see why he was so keen to do it
honestly ridiculous given the identity issues at play that they wanted this cast but they were great and it’s not like he didn’t already make casino
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what an incredible last twenty minutes even with that strange cameo. looking forward to all the takes that this is yet another scorsese film that glamorizes the mobster lifestyle even with the sobering freeze frame captions that are expertly utilized.
I liked the score
the man loves his denouement (again, casino, I keep finding reasons to bring up casino lately)
I feel like we’re getting so many codas lately, I’m afraid that when all these oldsters fade away it’s going be like when boomers retire and instead of reopening their positions, nothing replaces them
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i really enjoyed the film. i took short breaks every hour to do something else, but despite the length, the whole thing manages to keep its momentum pretty well and doesn’t feel like it drags, which is pretty great.
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I just watched Concrete Kids, which I feel like does the best job of capturing the Kid Experience of anything I’ve seen in quite a while. It did sort of drag in a few places, I found myself impatient with it. But it’s a short movie, less than 90 minutes.
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saw Knives Out with my family knowing fuck-all about it going in except it was a Rian Johnson movie (i like him). I really enjoyed it!! a really warm, clever whodunit but i was particularly pleased (and surprised) by the subtextual commentary about immigration, class and race relations, white privilege, etc. Just wasn’t expecting it and it’s very sharp and well-observed. Some good rich white people being clueless dipshits content. Also Daniel Craig is hysterical in it.
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Bored at parents house I rewatched The Last Jedi for the first time. Weak in spots, but man, that really is a pretty good movie.
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