Amarcord is sort of his most prosaic in that it’s supposed to be quasi-autobiographical, it’s a bunch of quasi-idyllic Italians doing dumb shit in the 30s without much plot, but because it’s Fellini he can’t not make it quasi-fantastical and the whole thing has this wonderfully demented energy, it’s all impotent old men and large adult sons and busty schoolteachers and pissing and farting and drunks
the Nazis feature primarily as dismissed eccentrics who for some reason want to go to the beach in the winter which is like the greatest thing ever done with a period piece about fascism
the only thing about it that hasn’t really aged well is how basically every single male character is a sex pest who is only defensible for how incompetent he is at sex pestering but that’s not really an uncommon characterization of Italian movies
To be clear, when I say I will never watch a movie with a girlfriend’s wacky art show ever again, the issue is not that I find them incapable of enforcing the themes of a movie due to my idiot girl brain missing subtle things like characters speaking in a different voice in a movie about code switching or mirrored scenes of black people performing to a white audience, but that they’re the zenith of an exhausting sexist stock character and I’m fucking over it. STBY’s is particularly egregious in that it ends by setting up the stakes of the movie; not Cassius and Detroits’ relationship, but his ownership of her sexuality. (Luckily, it’s confirmed that they get back together before she’s penetrated by another man, whew)
My understanding is that it criticized Cash for this, though. Like, he says something idiotic and immediately (finally) suffers consequences for his earlier stupidity. I assume that implied he lost his relationship, too – the equus sapiens identify as not human and Cash doesn’t seem to in the doorbell bit; he may find redemption in Class Warfare but there’s no promise of a ‘cure’
I’m honestly not sure what you’re talking about? I’m referring to the end of the art show when Detroit kissed Squeeze. As I said, the stakes aren’t that their relationship might end (it already has, at this point) but that Detroit might have sex with someone else. The movie’s not condemning Cassius for anything. In STBY’s universe, the consequence of being a bad person is that the sex that you are entitled to might go to someone else.
(‘You’ and ‘someone else’ are male in this scenario)
I agree that the movie was setting that up, and it didn’t feel good to me in the moment either, but I believe that it was doing so to
a) reject it later, as described, and
b) because the perspective is limited to Cash. Most of the movie’s groaningly clichéd beats occur because we can’t escape him, and it’s consistently proving him wrong.
Can the movie use those beats to move plot and reject them at the same time? I’m not sure, and it causes that whiplash feeling, where your understanding of the movie’s moral universe keeps changing. But I’m down with it because it kept giving me the emotional experience of perspective widening, even on ground I’ve already trod.
I remember really liking The Good Shepherd when I saw it in the theater when it came out that one time which imdb tells me was 2006 when I was 22 and not to be trusted
I’m not sure I agree with a) because I’m still not sure what you mean by, ‘he says something idiotic and immediately (finally) suffers consequences for his earlier stupidity,’ or, alternatively, because I have a hard time considering the ending, which is an obvious, easy, plot twist joke, to have any bearing on the rest of the movie.
I’m willing to believe the movie is being sexist on purpose because I’m not sure how else a ‘we hunted the mammoth’ slipped in there unless it was an ad-lib, but, like, do I have to post the shitposting anime meme or whatever? Functionally, what’s the difference here? The movie certainly doesn’t seem interested in gender politics. I didn’t get anything out of the movie’s handling of gender, and it doesn’t sound like you did either? I didn’t get the feeling the movie was rejecting much of anything regarding it’s portrayal of women. The perspective widening effect didn’t seem to cover it. Like, what’s subversive about making a movie that’s not for, about, or interested in women? Girls learn that ‘real’ movies aren’t for them whatever age they move on from Disney animation, and the internet has made it quite clear that boys know as well. If you’re going to pull this shit is a self-proclaimed communist movie in the year 2018 you’re about to need a better reason than ‘the main character is a dumbass’
More explicitly, the end sets up an ‘oh yeah sextime reward’ moment and then Cash gets that ripped away. I do think it affects how we should view the movie as well as being an easy joke because it’s a strong gut punch against a happy ending. It says that The Struggle doesn’t end when we leave, and it reinforces the earlier futility of Cash’s triumphant media tour.
As far as the movie’s lack of ability to say anything about women and gender beyond, ‘women both get dumped on and engage in the same split identities as men’, well, I don’t know how much more the movie can take on. It’s mostly about conveying the experiential reality of a working stiff waking up to the consequences of his actions in a capitalist system and is still dashing over territory, and it manages to imply an equal story for a supporting character. I think that’s pretty good given how bursting it is.
Representation is hard and especially because it’s a systemic issue – we need underrepresented voices across the board, but that doesn’t invalidate perspectives of several existing intersectionalities. I don’t believe that because black female leftists are critically underrepresented this movie failed in only representing black male leftists; it’s just, well, we need that movie too. I want to see it! Heck, I want to see her movie!
Interesting response from the director that touches on some of this. It’s a bit odd that he finds it necessary but other than that it seems relatively gracious. Don’t think this invalidates the critique at all, as a lot of this is not really evident in the film itself. But it gives a better sense of what he was trying to do, for all that’s worth.
‘Detroit isn’t sexist if, instead of a character written by me whose actions convey meaning, you just think of her as a cool girl with funny earrings who is just out there making her own decisions that mean nothing. But don’t like, ask why, if when and why she has sex with Cassius doesn’t matter, she doesn’t just like, do something else or maybe isn’t a girlfriend character who has sex with the lead. But anyways, you should have seen the assholes at the test screenings.’
‘As a man, I didn’t think much about it and neither should you’ is pretty damning if at least honest.
That’s not what I’m saying? I’m saying the movie sucks because it’s misogynistic. Which is all I have ever been saying.
I know we all hate the term dogpile so I’ll use a different term; I would like to think Selectbutton is a place where I could say like, ‘I don’t like this movie because it’s misogynistic and I think I’ll avoid movies that are broadly similar in the future’ without finding myself in the middle of a circle-jerk of posts and blood potions of men explaining to me the themes of the movie and all of the other stuff I probably just missed or something. Ya’ll can like a misogynistic movie, I don’t give a fuck, but don’t fucking do this shit ok?
regardless of intention, from my perspective it did seem like a bunch of arguments to say that birch’s reaction to the movie was “wrong.” i.e. mansplaining.
I need help to understand the difference between discussing contrasting analyses and mansplaining. To my eyes it reads as the same level of argumentative-ity we normally use when trying to suss something out.
I mean, I might be wrong here, but in my eyes it seemed like Birch was saying “This thing in this movie pissed me off.” And then a few people came to say “No, you interpreted it wrong and it shouldn’t piss you off.”
Like, if something pisses me off it pisses me off, and I have the right to be pissed off without a bunch of people telling me “no it was actually fine.” This is especially true when somebody is talking about a stereotype or trope that affects them directly, but does not affect you!
The point is that telling someone that their reaction is just wrong is at least a little patronizing.
What I thought I was saying was, “I think flaws in the movie’s construction created that reaction, but I think I don’t think that’s the meaning it’s trying to convey. I’m also not certain the movie would have been as good if it had changed in that way; those flaws might be essential to it.”
I definitely didn’t mean to come across as rejecting the truth of a reaction! I spend a good chunk of my life watching and reading feedback and the lesson is always, ‘you can’t dispute the reaction, but you can propose a different fix’. So my professional life is a series of interpretations of, why are they unhappy, and what is the underlying cause, and is it worth it to change it or would it even make it better?
I don’t mean to say that from a position as an expert in any discussion, just as the frame I bring when I react to someone’s reaction.
Is the professional voice inappropriate for discussions like this? This is a mode of thinking that I’m doing all the time and I find it fascinating but I don’t mean for it to grate.