6u532b

-about as good as a movie can get while also not at all working for me — the rhythm is off, somehow

-blew my mind when I first watched it at age 17, but also such a viscerally unpleasant experience that I put off re-watching it for another 17 years
-honestly… still a really unpleasant watch for me (simply do not enjoy spending time with these characters), nevertheless there’s so many little moments that make me laugh or make me think
-and it’s just so singular that I end up really liking it — I guess I like thinking about it more than I like actually watching it!

-I’m compelled more by the craft than the narrative, which is a little too sparse w/r/t dramatic tension for my taste — but on the other hand, it fucking moves

-I know there are probably better examples of the “daylight noir,” “revisionist noir,” whatever you call it — more technically fluid or more narratively baroque (Chinatown, etc.) — but I love how warm this film is, even when it’s being clear-eyed about the corruption of the American system, how race and class hierarchies insinuate themselves into every part of life
-but it’s also about the way those hierarchies allow (and in some cases even require) a certain sort of intimacy between of different strata — not to be too Foucauldian about it, but the libidinal possibilities here are a feature, not a bug
-and since the protagonist is a black man instead of a white man, we get a kind of reverse noir narrative — instead of moving between a lower-class underworld and an upper-class, rarefied milieu, the story actually starts from near the bottom and then moves upward from there — and what makes this journey tense and unsettling is the knowledge that EZ places himself further and further at risk the higher up he goes — when he finally walks into a rich white man’s house and demands to be heard, we know he’s crossing a line because he’s at the end of his rope, he’s doing “what he should have done at the start” but couldn’t because he was conscious of his status as a working-class black man
-but at the same time, EZ’s neighborhood is a refuge, and he’s extremely proud to have his own house — it’s a “lower” place only from the vantage point of the central power structure, which takes segregation as a given — so funnily enough, the story has a happy ending, even though it shares so much with much more cynical, downbeat stories

-masterfully shot and edited — even with the addition of sound/dialogue (which is always purposeful) Lang composes the story visually, which (maybe paradoxically) makes the film feel totally present and alive — like it could have been made yesterday
-it’s been almost one hundred years, and nothing that happens in the story or appears on screen feels unfamiliar to me, nothing feels “historical” — maybe that wouldn’t be the case for someone a few years younger than me, or maybe I’m just too immersed in history for my own good, but that’s what really sticks with me from this viewing — none of the tensions demonstrated here have been resolved, none of the questions asked have been answered, the world has still not fully moved on from the moment captured here in this film — if anything, the technological changes that have happened since have only exacerbated things, without ever really changing them

-interesting vibe — extremely visually striking — some upsetting moments of police brutality, and some moments that made me laugh out loud — wirth watching again at some point

-I love that shot of them laughing at the movie together — my beautiful dumdums :)

-in his Great Movies entry for this film Ebert points out that although the story draws heavily from King Lear, the thematic framework is less centered on specific flaws of the main character (like in Shakespeare’s play) and more centered on the violence and instability inherent to a political system based in domination: “Instead of the story of a great man whose sin of pride drives him mad, Kurosawa has told the story of a man who has waged war all his life, hopes to impose peace in his old age, and unleashes even greater turmoil”
-I agree with this take, but Ebert mostly connects this insight to Kurosawa’s own life and status as a would-be elder statesman left aside by his native culture — I’m less interested in that, but I was struck much more on this second viewing by the sense that Hidetora’s sin is not any individual trait but just his catastrophic misrecognition of the system he is taking part in — as in my first viewing, the highlight comes in the middle, the assault on the castle keep that takes Hidetora by complete surprise and leaves him stunned, staggering, in denial — everything hits him all at once, and it hits so hard not just because he’s deliberately placed himself at the center of it all but also because he’s been denying what’s obvious about his world for so long that the tension has built up to such an enormous force that it could only possibly result in complete psychological collapse, all at once in that moment, the most important moment of his life, sitting there among the bodies and the flames
-it’s also just a shockingly beautiful film to look at, and the secondary performances are all extremely compelling in their own rights — it’s peppered with moments that would be the most memorable part of any other movie
-just about a perfect film, lovely and terrifying

-our most Hegelian film franchise

-watched kind of late in the evening and struggled with the slow pace in the first half
-but I did pick up on the cinematography — lots of interesting/meaningful framing and camera movement
-then the ending worked really well for me
-might like even more on a rewatch

-great to see this in a theater and with an audience
-such a beautiful film about such ugly things — I think it’s the best example of the revisionist western framework, the turning away from the “good guy with a gun vs. bad guy with a gun” narrative — every character that drives the action of the story thinks they’re doing the right thing, and each them is at least a little bit justified and a little bit complicit (even Strawberry Alice)
-why is it satisfying when, at the end, William Munny finally drinks the whiskey and heads into town? — I don’t think it’s because he’s in the right (he’s only out for revenge at that point), I think it’s because he is being honest with himself about the consequences of the actions he has taken, and will soon take again — I don’t know if that’s really irable but it’s very compelling cinema

-dense text — I think I liked it, but I’m also probably not the target audience

-it’s about pretty privilege, and cumming in a tunnel

-pretty sexy… but narratively underwhelming

-not Carpenter’s most perfect film but probably my favorite of his — so many intriguing ideas and images all thrown together, slowly heating up until it boils over
-mirrors, dreams, writing upon writing, a secret sect, the competing rationalisms of science and the Church, reversal of time and gravity breaking open into irreversibility, a sleeper awakening
-the stuff with homeless people doesn’t hold up great but he atones for it in They Live

-great art style
-got some good chuckles
-goes on slightly too long
-apparently “forgetting the umbrella” was the great scourge of the 1990s Japanese domestic sphere

-mildly interesting

Watched on Sunday May 25, 2025.

Watched on Saturday May 24, 2025.

Watched on Friday May 23, 2025.

Watched on Wednesday May 21, 2025.

Watched on Tuesday May 20, 2025.

Watched on Monday May 19, 2025.

Watched on Monday May 19, 2025.

Watched on Monday May 19, 2025.

Watched on Sunday May 18, 2025.

Watched on Thursday May 15, 2025.

Watched on Wednesday May 14, 2025.

Watched on Monday May 5, 2025.

Watched on Saturday May 3, 2025.

Watched on Thursday May 1, 2025.

Watched on Thursday May 1, 2025.

Watched on Wednesday April 30, 2025.

Watched on Wednesday April 30, 2025.

Watched on Tuesday April 29, 2025.

Watched on Saturday April 26, 2025.

Watched on Friday April 25, 2025.

Watched on Friday April 25, 2025.

Watched on Monday April 21, 2025.

Watched on Saturday April 19, 2025.

Watched on Saturday April 19, 2025.

Watched on Friday April 18, 2025.

-movie club meeting #2
-forgot how meditative this film is, in between the crazy parts — but I think it went over well, especially once Nobody shows up
-Neil Young score still rips — Gary Farmer still hilarious — ending still hits like a brick — death to America — may it one day be worthy of a beautiful death

-thrilled I could watch this for the first time in a theater — looks great on a big screen — the big moments hit very hard
-maybe Lynch’s most “semiotic” film, in that it’s so obviously in conversation with particular images and tropes that seem decode-able in a conventional way (which for the most part is not true of his other films) — and I can see how that might come across as a replacement for actual characters and narrative choices, but I think the thing the movie is doing is exploring how those images and tropes actually facilitate the characters’ sincere emotions and desires, in a way that is maybe uniquely American
-will have to watch it again sometime and see if I cam tease that out more

-too protestant!! not scary!!

-even weirder than I was anticipating
-read the novel almost two decades ago but in my memory it really does have the vibe of “it’s actually very unsettling when woman after woman throws herself at you for no clear reason” — Anthony Perkins kind of an obvious casting choice in that regard but he does, uh, nail this
-need to watch again at some point, may end up loving it

-movie club meeting #1
-very fun to watch with friends
-lots of capital-c Choices (acting, stunts, set, costumes, etc)
-the emotional core of the story is big and dumb and obvious but god damn it it works

Watched on Wednesday March 26, 2025.

Watched on Tuesday March 25, 2025.

Watched on Wednesday March 19, 2025.

• Persona
• Aguirre, the Wrath of God
• Cure
• Birth
• Ran
• Alien
• Mulholland Drive
• Certified Copy
• Zodiac
• It Follows

...plus 50 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Movies that (for good or for ill) draw on and/or represent the cultural entanglement of trans life, psychiatry, sexuality, the police, and murderous aggression

• Psycho
• The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
• Dressed to Kill
• Tenebre
• Sleepaway Camp
• The Silence of the Lambs
• Predestination
• Border
• Knife+Heart
• Titane

...plus 3 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

• A Dark Song
• A Field in England
• Agnes
• The Brood
• Chanthaly
• The Exorcist
• Ganja & Hess
• The Gift
• I Am Not a Witch
• Impetigore

...plus 28 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.

Movies about communication and persuasion

• Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters
• Pig
• Arrival
• A Separation
• Cure
• The Insider
• Happy Hour
• Nope
• Birth
• The Constant Gardener

...plus 12 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.