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What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993)
A Rare Instance of Beauty
I watched this film following the adamant recommendation by a friend. Having read the rather quirky premise I went into it expecting some type of ancient progenitor of the ever-so-popular A24 formula (a dominant emphasis on the eccentricity of the concept with little added substance). I've never been happier to be proven wrong, this movie was filled to be brim with grace, depth, composure, taste and tact from start to finish.
The performances were quite simply iconic: the understated and sensible Gilbert, the effortlessly natural and endearingly spontaneous Arnie, the complex and dark Momma, the intense and piercingly perceptive Becky, all the way down to John C. Reilly's and Crispin Glover's characters which, although technically to be labelled as "supporting", exude plenty of life and deep complexities of their own. Particular regard should be given to young DiCaprio's humbling talent in portraying such a difficult character so effectively and at such an early stage in his career. Although I'm admittedly not particularly fond of his current, adult endeavours, I now have no choice but to understand and respect his fame as being evidently rooted in enormous and glorious giftedness.
I won't go into specific detail regarding to the plot or technical aspects as a film this great commands being watched rather than described. Suffice it to say that I consider it somewhat of a rare instance of pure, pristine perfection. Every single aspect of production coalesced into an apotheotic crescendo of sublime earnestness, elevating the piece to heights which I had forgotten the art of filmmaking could reach. I can't remember the last time I saw a film so genuinely beautiful and honest, a film which you could tell the director was so deeply passionate and caring about to the point of setting aside all career-related strategising (making all the right decisions as to ensure the film's success rather than attempting to ensure his own long-lasting reputation as a "visionary" or whatever), a film which seems to bring out the very best of everyone involved in its making and do true justice to such a complex topic, thus evolving into something far greater than yet another "oh-so-quirky" premise for some hipster 30-something year-old to completely butcher via crass and uninspired execution. I would warmly recommend this to anyone.
Raising Cain (1992)
Riding Down The Lost Highway
An interesting take on Lost Highway's iconography. We have a wide array of mirroring elements which refer back to Lynch's movie, namely the TV screen as somewhat of a portal between realms, a split between the real and the apparent as a core pivotal point, complex multiplicities condensed into single physical forms, and several others points of contact ranging from blatant to covert. Though the movie clearly has its flaws, the experience that it allows you to access in my opinion more than compensates for technicalities.
The performances were all extremely solid. I noticed a dream-like quality to the cast composition and the actors' interpretative attitudes, as the characters all seemed to be somewhat aware of the tropes they were embodying yet simultaneously deviating from these through subtle twists and quirks of the uncanny variety. This distinct brand of semi-seriousness ends up conferring a certain flair of stunted Americana to the final product, at once meeting and subverting expectations (yet another reminder of Lynch's oeuvre).
A particular standout moment for me was the hospital scene in which the extramarital affair between the female lead and her secret object of desire (Steven Bauer - "Jack") first finds expression. The scene plays out in a hospital room in which Jack's wife is lying motionless on the verge of death. A TV set is present, showing images of a New Year's Eve's ceremony. The countdown is rapidly approaching zero, soon fireworks will appear. As the novel lovers' lips meet, the fireworks go off, but the corner of the camera's eye sees Jack's wife twisting and turning in her bed, in a manner which I found frighteningly sinister. Jack turns his attention to the TV screen in front of him and meets his wife's gaze in the reflection. Within the context of such a scene, one would at this point expect a turn for the melodramatic, but the wife's eyes are menacingly open, glaring back at Jack as if unleashing an ancient curse upon him. The whole sequence left a strong impression on me and at that point I knew this film was probably crafted with greater care than what some of the reviews on here might lead one to believe. Though certainly not perfect, I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss it as a lazy effort or missed opportunity.
Near Dark (1987)
Surprisingly Tactful Mood Piece
Surprisingly taken aback by this one. I agree with many others who have reviewed it that the formula proposed here should not work, at least on paper. In practice, however, it somehow does. There is something dark and beautiful about the imagery, settings and atmospheres, which along with the rather serious tone of the performances significantly helps in selling a premise that would have otherwise been quite hopeless. The film managed to transport me into a dimension of secrecy, making me feel as if I was leading a forbidden existence alongside its characters, hidden from sight and in on a rather sinister and mystifying joke that only a few are permitted to get. The overall experience quite oddly reminded me of the photographic work of Bill Henson, as many of the latter's aesthetic features are coincidentally mirrored in the film's cinematography and environments: cold palettes, emaciated skin tones, the gentle disposition in the murderous female lead attesting to a liminal femininity suspended between innocence and malfeasance, the arcane nature of the youthful male lead's blossoming masculinity, the distant city lights reduced to out-of-focus blobs to serve as background for these ethereal, immortal yet tormented bodies cast out of time, bound to never age. I am pleasantly impressed with what such an odd concept managed to blossom into. I am looking very much forward to revisiting this in the future.
Haute tension (2003)
A Masterclass in Immersive Filmmaking
Thoroughly enjoyed this one. I won't dwell too deeply into subtextual elements and whatnot as it pretty much commands being taken at face value. The atmosphere was so sublime that I would consider this a mood piece rather than a horror film (given the connotative overhead that the latter term carries along). As soon as the image of the truck driver pleasuring himself with a severed head hit the screen (one of many iconic moments scattered throughout) I knew I was in for a wild ride - in retrospect, calling it wild is a severe understatement. I was hooked from start to finish and I felt bittersweetly about it having to eventually end. I believe this to be one of those rare products of optimal circumstances, as many of the elements that made it so impactful have to do with aesthetics, and these are generally tied very closely to the time period in which a film is produced. Had this been shot at any point from 2010 onwards, a digital camera would have likely been used, thus completely killing the outstanding textural work (the textures in this film are of the highest order, you can almost hear them. Cinematography and production design really coalesced into something special here). Moreover, a landscape cluttered with Toyota Priuses or, even worse, Tesla vehicles and charging stations would have pretty much annihilated any effort in making this feel even remotely unsettling (for these types of films, nothing kills the mood more brutally than a visual space which attests to its inhabitants' environmental sensibilities and strong moral fabric). Also notable is the remarkable absence of ostentatious branding from the costumes and sets. Again, nothing would have killed the mood more viciously than Nike logos plastered all over clothes, buildings or billboards, polluting the visual space and violently ejecting you from the cozy state of suspended disbelief which the film manages so masterfully to plunge you into. Great effort, I'm in awe. I would definitely recommend this to anyone interested in immersive viewing experiences which forcibly abduct you from your comfort zone and leave you stranded in unfamiliar and unsettling places.
The Long Goodbye (1973)
Slick and Elegant
Very slick and captivating overall. Vaguely reminded me of Inherent Vice given the liminal nature of the tone (forever suspended between seriousness and silliness). The cinematography of Vilmos Zsigmond is a touch of class, masterfully combining a wide aspect ratio, earthy and muted palettes and what felt like a rather odd lens choice for a mainstream production (the image was muddy, messy and a touch out of focus) into an oddly intimate, yet simultaneously grand amalgam. Elliott Gould delivers a magnetic and subversive performance, pleasantly endearing and yet adequately detached as to preserve the aura of authority which aptly emanates from the character. Thoroughly enjoyable viewing experience, another pearl from 70's that I'll be keeping at hand for a future revisit.
The Gambler (1974)
Theory and Praxis
I've had this film in my watchlist for the longest time and I finally got around to watching it. As per my usual, I went in blind and with no prior expectations.
The introductory sequence which ushered me into the story was atmospherically outstanding, notably elevated by a tense, somber and pathetic classical score (apparently a rendition of a Mahler piece, but don't quote me on that). I watched with eager interest what ensued, and quickly realised that the fundamental point of contention lying at the narrative's core seemed to be a difficulty in reconciling a life of theory with one of praxis.
The titular protagonist lives a double life as literature college professor by day and reckless gambler by night. During his lectures, we hear him speak of the importance of risk-taking, of which he bears a highly romanticised notion. High stakes are what make life gain weight and substance, a risk-less existence is essentially akin to an air-conditioned waiting room inside of which one patiently awaits death. Though I agree with the sentiment at a basic level, I wouldn't consider this to be a particularly resonant struggle in my own life, likely due to the fact that I never personally had the option to opt for a completely risk-free existence. However, I understand why it would be a source of great struggle for someone like the gambler, and it all became clear to me as soon as the film started to introduce us to his scandalously wealthy family.
In theory, he longs to be a fearless and daring übermensch. In practice, he is haunted by an oppressive safety blanket that keeps its grip tight on his psyche: no matter what kind of gargantuan debt he might manage to get himself into with ruthlessly murderous people, mommy will always be a phone call away, ready to bail him out in exchange for a few empty promises and tired litanies of repentance. The gambler is ultimately a victim of comfort, a quintessential byproduct of a world imprinted on the axioms of ultimate ease as the dreams of reason command, and which produce monsters as a consequence. His gambling is not the result of pathology, rather an act of resistance against deterministic conditions (a life of privilege which condemned him to the metaphorical "waiting room" mentioned previously). The gambler is willing towards his personal notion of power, and when viewed in this optic, the film becomes one of the more interesting and compelling character studies I've had the chance to watch in recent years.
Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974)
A Bleak Banner of Iniquity
I took multiple stabs at this film throughout the years, starting in 2017 following an enthusiastic recommendation from a friend.
I'm writing this review around the time of my most recent viewing, which occurred a couple of weeks or so back. I have to say that despite the amount of praise I had always heard this film receive, I never truly felt it hit the spot for me. I wouldn't have given it more than a 6 prior to my most recent attempt, but I now think it's a 9 and allow me to explain why.
First off, I do not believe this film particularly distinguishes itself in any of the technical aspects involved with its formal presentation. Everything appeared to be perfectly appropriate, yet standard. Locations are solid, performances are convincing, cinematography is adequate, pacing is good, the score is fitting. Nothing I would deem exceptional, but no glaring shortcomings either.
However, when we come to consider the story in itself, I would say that Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia features one of the most impactful narrative premises in the history of filmmaking, so much so that I believe it would have been equally as brilliant in novel form. I was only able to reach such a conclusion following a an active viewing session on a large screen with the use of subtitles (optimal conditions), allowing for full and deep immersion. The image of a lonely man (Bennie) who, having lost all that was dear to him, is driving through the scorching desert carrying a decomposing severed head in a bag as his car fills up with flies is what finally cracked my outer shell and lodged itself profoundly into my mind.
By the end of his journey, the head is anything of value he has left, and it only holds said value contingently to a group of people who have arbitrarily assigned one to it. The head is the embodiment of a rotten philosophy, and its intrinsic crudeness hyperbolically displays just how misguided value-assignment metrics and frameworks can become if left in the hands of perverted entities.
The head doesn't speak, the head doesn't move. The head, if anything, rapidly decays and attracts a broad spectrum of unwanted attention, as hoards of callous and deeply-corrupted people are also scouring the earth in search for it. The head is nothing but a lump of dead tissue that wraps around bone, inherently useless, the effigy of a vacuous and demented God for which Bennie traded in the greater part of his livelihood. The head is only symbolically valuable to a single person, El Jefe - and this is how the story manages to hit as hard as it does. It takes a single rich man to completely distort the value-assessment criteria of a multitude of people, causing them to promptly embark on morally slanted quests of appalling atrocity. One rich man's will to bend an army of hollow and ruthless opportunists into blind abidance. One rich man's will to forge a hellish militia set on tearing down society's very fabric in the name of a bleak banner of iniquity - that of better material prospects. And that in itself is a deeply unsettling thought. I applaud Peckinpah on this one. Would strongly recommend.
Bad Boy Bubby (1993)
Variations on a Theme
An interesting companion piece to Jonathan Glazer's "Under the Skin" (2013). Follows along the lines of a similar premise, being centred around a deeply alienated individual exploring a strange and foreign world with child-like wonder and naivety. While Under the Skin stood out to me in terms of superb tone-setting and a mystifying yet bewitching narrative encryption, where Bad Boy Bubby excels, in my opinion, is in the rawness of the aesthetics and how these are used, in conjunction with a rather straightforward narrative structure, to convey meaning subtly, implicitly and all the more poignantly. Many of the film's images, although cleverly stripped of ulterior meaning and thus self-evident in what they are showing, are nevertheless deeply impactful and disturbing to a degree which I think surpasses Under the Skin (Bubby's dead parents lying around a destroyed room with their heads wrapped in plastic comes to mind). The environments are drenched with a sense of hopelessness, the light is at once harsh, frail, blinding and smothered. To all of this are juxtaposed the aesthetic conditions of those closest to Bubby: his mother is morbidly obese, filthy-looking and tyrannical in both appearance and attitude. She is largely indifferent to her son's personal needs and treats him as a tool in her ownership, exploiting him for both sex and companionship (leading also to some very disturbing images). Bubby's estranged father is equally grotesque in terms of presentation, and his stunning nonchalance towards the circumstances that are unfolding before him makes one wonder about the amount of inner and outer ugliness that such a man must have been exposed to in his life in order to develop such a strong stomach. For the most part, except for sparse heartwarming moments of compassion and understanding, the world that is portrayed in Bad Boy Bubby is one of oppressive bleakness, bewilderment, aggression, despair and indifference. And yet, although all of this is easily assessable both during the viewing and in retrospect, the filmmaker's hand manages to remain very nicely concealed throughout. The impression that's left isn't one of an embittered, biased director imposing his own pessimistic worldview onto the audience, but rather what feels like a believable rendition of a hyper-individualised society which has lost all sense of community and charitable cooperation. But how does someone like Bubby factor into such a world?
While the alien in Under the Skin seems bent on imposing its own logic onto the foreign world it has accessed, stepping into it bearing a-priori objectives, Bubby is instead portrayed as being entirely passive and consequential to his environment, thus morphing into a conduit through which the world as a whole becomes able to express itself. This strictly-reflexive condition causes Bubby to generate much interest in the crowd under the provisions of his unfiltered, revealing genuineness being framed within a context of artistic expression (such as the musical stage). Within such types of contexts, his authenticity, which would otherwise gravely misalign with what the norm could possibly deem as acceptable, becomes re-configurable as a form of socially-justified transgression and is therefore not only allowed but even celebrated. What the film manages to very poignantly convey through the use of its idiosyncratic protagonist is how people don't seem capable of dealing with reality (which Bubby embodies) outside of controlled settings that can allow a proverbial "way out" - the ability to dismiss what's taking place before them as some type of artistic artifice or malignant / deliberate provocation, thus providing them with a way of mitigating the potential informational hazards that could result from being forced to confront difficult concepts head-on. Bad Boy Bubby manages to get this point across quite well, and it does so by the sole virtue of presenting the facts clearly and directly. The use of symbols is very limited (if not entirely non-existent) and whatever the film ends up conveying is what the unmitigated, natural progression of the events happened to be conveying, making the piece an outstanding example of Iceberg theory application.
I would recommend watching this as a double feature in tandem with Under the Skin, as I believe the two films are mutually complementary of one another and in very interesting ways.
The Hitcher (1986)
The Dark Night of the Soul
I saw the relatively high rating and decided to give this a shot. I was going in blind, but the fact that the film was labelled as a horror and made in the 80's gave me a rough idea of what was to be expected (meaning some amount of camp and a low degree of self-seriousness). I was dead wrong, I was pretty much floored by the opening sequence alone: the lonesome car driving through the desert just before nightfall as a menacing storm is brewing in the background reminded me of the big open landscape sequences in Badlands, only exponentially more sinister. I started to suspect at this point that I had stumbled upon something special, and as soon as Rutger Hauer appeared on screen my suspicions were confirmed. I believe that putting this film into words would be doing it a disservice but I'll try to spend a few sentences on it regardless. The atmosphere is distinctly tense and dreamlike from beginning to end. The logic of the film, although reminiscent of it, is clearly separated from that of the world that exists outside of it. I would generally dismiss this as a negative aspect, but in the context of this specific picture John Ryder's perverted brand of omnipotence bestows a metaphysical quality upon him which elevates the character from a campy slasher-trope type to the incarnation of some dark, higher intent. The film feels like a fevered hallucination, the aesthetics of which are impeccably suggestive: the textures are grimy, the interiors are gloomy, the characters' skins are stained and sweaty. As alluded to previously, the logic that the characters surrounding the protagonist seem to abide by is nightmarishly slanted, leaving you feeling a deep sense of dread at the thought of being stuck in a foreign land with no allies, no reasonable people willing to lend a helping hand. Topping it all off is the soundtrack, which I wouldn't know how to even describe: although clearly a product of its time, it seemed glaringly subversive in a multitude of aspects, menacing enough to nicely complement the on-screen mayhem yet occasionally inducing highly atypical emotional interpretations of some sequences and imagery. All of the film's elements seemed to harmoniously tie into the same core concept: somewhat familiar, yet deeply foreign. As the story was approaching its climactic culmination, I started to believe that what I was witnessing must had been the turmoiled crossing of a threshold, the hallucinatory internal journey of an agonising Jim Halsey trapped in a flaming wreck after a deadly, initial collision with the truck (in the beginning of the film, he barely avoids crashing into one). This may not be the case as intended by the filmmakers, and likely so, but I'll always stand in admiration of any artwork capable of summoning such wild and enticing convictions in me.
In closure, a lot of films have tried (and many still do) to earn the right to be defined as "Lynchian", to varying degrees of merit. I believe that this film not only fully deserve such a title, but that it also contributed to expand, in my personal view, what the term could come to entail if approached radically, differently, subversively. I would strongly recommend giving this one a chance.
Two-Lane Blacktop (1971)
The cars that men drive.
I first watched this movie in my teens and didn't think much of it at the time. I re-visited it recently out of a renewed interest in Warren Oates and although many of the characteristics which had originally turned me off were still glaring (slowness in pace, scattered patches of redundant dialogue centred exclusively around cars and speed), everything seemed to come together thematically this time around and I truly felt like I finally understood the film. At the time of this second viewing, I was able to envision the cars that these men drove as symbols for their individual approaches to life. The choices they make in terms of tuning are the strategies which they each have personally elected in moving forward - forward to nowhere, it should be pointed, as destination is presented as merely an afterthought to them. Speed is what matters: raw speed, for the sake of itself. All this power being harnessed, all this frenzied pursuit of an ever-increasing degree of potential freedom, which never finds release in the form of a tangible attainment. The quasi-religious worship of speed on the male main characters' part perfectly reflects modern tendencies in self-referential accumulation: seeking money for the sole sake of simply having money, available should you come to eventually find use for it but never accumulating it with the preemptive intention of deploying it in function of a clearly-defined cause or project (the disarming absence of a Daimon). Following in on this line of thought, the road becomes a symbol for life itself, a hank of interweaved strings (pathways) each leading towards the most disparate potential destinations. In the film, destinations are often picked by the characters to varying degrees of exactness, idealised to the point of pseudo-worship, and then infallibly discarded in favour of another, more exciting hypothesis. None of the destinations mentioned by any of the characters throughout the film is effectively reached by the time the end credits begin to roll: another example of the idealisation of an end as a masturbatory practice that is, yet again, self-referential in nature. What this process of endless reconfiguration poignantly conjures is a sense of underlying listlessness and oppressive indecisiveness, exemplified by the characters' inability to commit to a transcendental goal, cause or ideal of sorts. The character played by Warren Oates (G. T. O) was the most interesting and complex to me. A man who devoutly embodies the chameleonic vow of endless reconfiguration which modernity seems to demand from each individual, morphing his personality in relation to the interlocutor at hand in order to match/exceed external expectations, with a personal brand of stunted opportunism (I say stunted because yet again, opportunism implies a clear goal to be attained through it) being always the sole, perverse and rather misguided objective. He is a hollow shapeshifter haunting the highway, appropriating the lives of others through fantastic litanies of invention which he habitually recites to those "chance encounters" he actively seeks out along his endless journey to nowhere. The figure of G. T. O comes off as powerfully tragic: a man trapped in a vicious cycle of compulsive validation-seeking, maniacally embellishing his own backstory in a way which hints at a profound, colossal desperation. Also noteworthy is the inclusion of a female logic into this otherwise man-dominated domain, encompassed by the character of The Girl, which in a sense functions as a guide that we, the audience, follow into this strange and foreign world of cultish speed-worship. The Girl is much more poised and detached from dynamics of male competitiveness and strenuous pursuit. When trying to access the speed-centric existential framework thus described, she quickly fails (both self-admittedly and by external metrics): the protagonist (The Driver), while attempting to teach her how to drive, declares her incapable of doing so, and she opposes little resistance to such judgement. The two start making out shortly after, prompting her to proudly declare: "this I can do". Yet another layer to the metaphor is thus unveiled to us: the reduction of females to afterthoughts or tools (The Girl is confined to riding in the back of the car, never in the front and by her own admission, treated "just like a tool"). They are foreign witnesses to a world which they don't belong in, allowed to tag along for the ride on the drivers' terms but never enabled to appropriate the driver's seat. The inference is a somber yet oddly topical one: in a world ruled by the logic of speed (aimless accumulation), romance and meaningful human interaction, as disjointed from material pursuit, have no room to exist.
The Stepfather (1987)
Had Kubrick directed this, it would be on Criterion.
An amazing effort overall. Quiet and subdued, barely any violence at all (greatly subverting my expectations when I watched it) but realistically portrayed when present. Lead performance is fantastic, plot strings along believably and I never felt as if I was watching a genre film. Apart from a couple of 80's cliches and a handful of instances in which I felt exposition was being pursued at the expanse of logic, the film's artifice almost completely dissipates after a certain point and the atmosphere truly manages to engulf you. In regards to exposition, even though I made mention of it being present, I believe that the way in which this film truly elevates itself above similarly-categorised "competitors" is that expositional tactics are never applied to the stepfather's character. He remains very nicely shrouded in a thin veil of haze from start to finish, allowing you to only catch a faint glimpse of his motivations: just enough to peak your interest in him, but never too much as to kill the allure of the mystery (the importance of providing such glimpses should not be underestimated: the original Halloween falls flat by modern standards due to Michael Myers being more akin to an enlightened stoic monk than the "personification of pure evil". What is much more effective at unsettling modern audiences is the relatability of the evil-doer, rather than its total, alien-like detachment from the world it operates in). If you are an emotional viewer, there is a lot here to enjoy. If you are an intellectual viewer, there is surprisingly a lot to read into the film as well, for instance by viewing the stepfather as the embodiment of America itself, bent on exporting (imposing) its characteristic values on others (other countries) via a mixture of violence and manipulatory deceit. Again, what a great effort. I was very pleasantly surprised. Had Kubrick directed this it would be on Criterion by now.