I'm betraying my 14 year old self saying this because I cried like a baby when I watched it back then, even though you can barely hear it (even now the sound mixing is atrocious and you can't hear some of the lines clearly at all. Like how was this not considered proto-Mumblecore?) The soundtrack is fun but you don't know any of the bands outside of Simple Minds. It's an original movie that's been over-parodied. But it's stupid and makes no real sense.
Characterwise it works, sort of. You like the characters, you root for Bender. The confession scene is still raw and delivered with genuine emotion. But it's pretty contrived. Vernon's a control freak on a dumb power trip, Bender doesn't have to rise to his bullshit and it gets violent; Vernon should be sacked for locking a kid in a storage room. Or drinking beer on school premises with the janitor, even if he is coerced. You don't get why they all have to go with Bender to get the weed. But that's the real punchline, none of these characters are good. They're all flawed. (You never get the punchline to the naked lady joke). Oh, and how does Vernon not hear them playing records, unless you're led to believe at this point he simply doesn't care. This movie makes no sense.
There's a lot of subtler emotional moments interspersed between the drama, mainly Bender's reaction to Vernon goading him into striking him. It's part screwball comedy, part character drama. You can't really have a narrative, just incidents that draws everyone together to a point of mutual understanding. It's compelling for having nothing but a thin premise to hang itself on. Rich Evans saying all John Hughes movies are about rich kids complaining about how rich they are isn't entirely true. You assume Ferris Bueller is loaded but because the man's getting him down he's worthy of sympathy. But in this case, Claire's the only rich one and you still feel bad for her.
I had a whole theory mapped out in high school that the letter is true, every character has a moment they reflect another character, just by them getting wasted or Allison stealing shit, or Andrew assaulting another kid (criminals), Bender playing with Claire's make up (princesses) them all sprinting around the halls and Bender "trying out for a basketball scholarship" (athletes - yeah I'm stretching here), Claire proving she knows Molière despite shunning the nerds (brains) and they're all fucked up on some level from their parents and their bullshit (basket cases: "We're all pretty bizarre. Some of us are just better hiding it, that's all."). It's a very longwinded way of saying everyone's alike in some ways.
This was a movie I taped onto a cassette by holding up my radio mic to the TV speaker. I know it pretty much back to front, save for the scenes with Vernon and Carl in the basement, for some reason I didn't tape those because I was obsessed with the main characters, I guess. (Yes, I even know Brian's social security number). But getting to physically watch this on TV was harder. I had to rent it repeatedly or have my brother let me sit on the floor of his room and watch it when it was broadcast. Hardly ever getting to watch your favourite movies made them somehow precious. Netflix and DVDs kinda take that away; when you can have what you want when you want, the sheen comes off it.
Even if it's still a stupid movie that makes no sense. But you could pinpoint a moment that foretold the millenials vs boomers war:
Vernon: Now this is the thought that wakes me up in the middle of the night... That when I get older, these kids are gonna take care of me...
Carl: I wouldn't count on it.
Friday, 10 April 2020
Wednesday, 8 April 2020
Pretentious.
I didn't so much watch Knight of Cups as have it on in the background while I was doing random shit. Even with my lack of attention I wasn't lost that much about the plot. I don't know enough about Pilgrim's Progress to remark on the similarities, I just found the film to really highlight the pretentiousness of LA celebrities.
Each chapter encapsulates Bale's involvement with various women, passing through a disagreement with his estranged brother and the disconnection from his addled father. There were references to Twin Peaks (which I completely missed - apparently it's a song that samples Major Briggs's retelling of his dream about Bobby, which is actually one of my least favourite scenes in the show) and tarot cards, stuff I find interesting, and Dan Harmon has a tiny cameo, Erin wasn't as evident. I don't think I could appreciate stream of consciousness as a device in film. It doesn't capture me in book form, either.
There was too much of a detachment from Bale and his lovers, one of them just some girl who drags him down what I thought was Venice Beach, in a scene that was way too reminiscent of LA Story, where Sarah Jessica Parker convinces Steve Martin to go get a colonic. Dumbly enough, I think that movie did a better job taking the piss out of pretentiousness in LA. I've seen it a few times, though I can't remember if it was genuinely good. (I had a problem when I watched the same videos I also had a habit of watching some of the trailers instead of fast-forwarding them, so I wound up knowing them better than the movies themselves - LA Story was one of them).
This is the only Terrence Malick film I've seen, I saw the trailer for Song to Song, thinking by the plot it was interesting. But the floating camera work and disjointed dialogue is distracting. I get a sense he constructs a scene then just casually films it from multiple weird angles, which looks really creative until you think it might make you nauseated, like being on a ship at sea. Some of those scenes happen to be lavish parties hosted by one celebrity (whether you're meant to believe Antonio Banderas has K-parties or this is just a lot of people pretending to be high, I'm not sure), or raves or rock concerts. I was more fascinated by the dancers suspended from the ceiling in the rave scene, one being stuck in what looked like a kind of windsock that could be stretched to cover her legs like a mermaid's tail then used to suspend the dancer from an enormously high ceiling. I wanted to stop the movie and ask her how the fuck she was doing that. Can we make a movie about her, please? She's riveting.
I appreciate directors who try to show dreamscapes and how we would see images in our minds, much like Gondry's Eternal Sunshine, the creativity involved in the visual representation of something as fractured and abstract as memory itself is so effective at points. While Hal Hartley might basically choreograph a scene and be deliberate with his framing, Malick refuses to be so regimented. He allows the actors to frolic or pace rather than remain still, but there's no sense of them being directed as such. Bale's character falls to the whims of excess and debauchery, losing focus on finding the pearl of meaning, and as you follow him, you would be forgiven for losing focus too, which seems to be intentional. But the broken narrative of disparate voices don't really succeed in engaging you fully. I wasn't drawn in or captivated or moved; or even satisfied with the conclusion. It felt pretentious for pretentiousness's sake. Genuine art for art's sake.
Each chapter encapsulates Bale's involvement with various women, passing through a disagreement with his estranged brother and the disconnection from his addled father. There were references to Twin Peaks (which I completely missed - apparently it's a song that samples Major Briggs's retelling of his dream about Bobby, which is actually one of my least favourite scenes in the show) and tarot cards, stuff I find interesting, and Dan Harmon has a tiny cameo, Erin wasn't as evident. I don't think I could appreciate stream of consciousness as a device in film. It doesn't capture me in book form, either.
There was too much of a detachment from Bale and his lovers, one of them just some girl who drags him down what I thought was Venice Beach, in a scene that was way too reminiscent of LA Story, where Sarah Jessica Parker convinces Steve Martin to go get a colonic. Dumbly enough, I think that movie did a better job taking the piss out of pretentiousness in LA. I've seen it a few times, though I can't remember if it was genuinely good. (I had a problem when I watched the same videos I also had a habit of watching some of the trailers instead of fast-forwarding them, so I wound up knowing them better than the movies themselves - LA Story was one of them).
This is the only Terrence Malick film I've seen, I saw the trailer for Song to Song, thinking by the plot it was interesting. But the floating camera work and disjointed dialogue is distracting. I get a sense he constructs a scene then just casually films it from multiple weird angles, which looks really creative until you think it might make you nauseated, like being on a ship at sea. Some of those scenes happen to be lavish parties hosted by one celebrity (whether you're meant to believe Antonio Banderas has K-parties or this is just a lot of people pretending to be high, I'm not sure), or raves or rock concerts. I was more fascinated by the dancers suspended from the ceiling in the rave scene, one being stuck in what looked like a kind of windsock that could be stretched to cover her legs like a mermaid's tail then used to suspend the dancer from an enormously high ceiling. I wanted to stop the movie and ask her how the fuck she was doing that. Can we make a movie about her, please? She's riveting.
I appreciate directors who try to show dreamscapes and how we would see images in our minds, much like Gondry's Eternal Sunshine, the creativity involved in the visual representation of something as fractured and abstract as memory itself is so effective at points. While Hal Hartley might basically choreograph a scene and be deliberate with his framing, Malick refuses to be so regimented. He allows the actors to frolic or pace rather than remain still, but there's no sense of them being directed as such. Bale's character falls to the whims of excess and debauchery, losing focus on finding the pearl of meaning, and as you follow him, you would be forgiven for losing focus too, which seems to be intentional. But the broken narrative of disparate voices don't really succeed in engaging you fully. I wasn't drawn in or captivated or moved; or even satisfied with the conclusion. It felt pretentious for pretentiousness's sake. Genuine art for art's sake.
Thursday, 2 April 2020
Interview...
The young adult reading market had yet to be saturated with subpar, badly edited fare. But even if it had in 1996, I'd have ignored it, as I've always maintained. Interview With the Vampire weirdly became my favourite book back then, and something of an escape from the bullshit I was enduring that year. My teen angst was really being tested. I'd picked up a copy of the Vampire Lestat my brother had borrowed, and was sucked in by the beginning. But I can't remember exactly when I got a copy of Interview. It may have been after Christmas, or for Christmas in 1995. Getting a hold of certain books at that time required trips to Dymocks in Perth, where I had to harass some crotchety bitch to order in a book, then wait months for us to make another trip up to collect them. I can't remember why I couldn't just make a bookstore in Bunbury to get me the Last Unicorn. (I thought I'd lost my first Eerie Indiana book, turns out it was just sitting in the cupboard down south with the spine facing inwards and I never bothered to pick it up- they're harder to get now they're out of print). But I could get the Vampire Chronicle books in town. I didn't even know one existed until I saw it on someone else's bookshelf.
I was in the middle of reading the Interview the book when I saw the movie. I could watch it alone at home on the condition I stopped it when the Bill was on, took the tape out and recorded that show. Only then could I finish watching the movie. And I think it was the goddamn Guns and Roses cover of Sympathy for the Devil that really riled me up, but I basically loved the movie. I was 14, didn't know dick about film, and was growing obsessed with vampires. The point was, Rice's brand were the definitive to me. They were original enough they didn't adhere to common myths. I still think her basic idea of them is still pretty cool, considering her lore has gone off the deep end.
But since then, the movie's gone from a love to a hate then to a love, back to an appreciation for what it was capable of achieving at the time. My brother told me stuff about it after he'd seen it in a theatre, his descriptions standing out to me as fascinating. Meanwhile, it's still riddled with issues. We couldn't have the cherub Armand represented as such, Antonio Banderas had to be brought in to play to the gothic aesthetic modern audiences comprehended, since the movie needed to have appeal outside the book. Louis's brother and his traumatic death are reduced to a dead mother and child Louis briefly mentions at the beginning to explain his malaise. The harrowing trip through Europe in search of other vampires is dropped. All of these decisions make sense. Casting Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt would've been for commercial reasons. Introducing Kirsten Dunst, a pre-teen* somehow managing to really embody Claudia from age five to her mental age of 70, you can't say that was a bad decision, she does the part justice. But it wasn't until many viewings later I realised she was faking playing the piano by lightly dancing her fingers over the keys. I don't think Cruise was playing, I'm sure he had a hand double, but you could cut away from Claudia's imitations and still make it convincing. They used animatronics to replicate Lestat's death, that look a lot less convincing now. The special effects haven't drastically aged but they're not up to today's standards. So now I have mixed feelings about it. I thought Rice loved it and contributed to the script, and was so overcome at the premier she was left giddy. Then later, I heard she hated it. Oh, and River Phoenix died and had to be replaced by Christian Slater, which again was a good choice but I think it's probably much older than the nameless boy Rice envisioned (later revealed to be Daniel in Queen of the Damned - his intro chapter referred to him as "the boy from Interview" and the penny failed to drop for me right away). I think I could watch it now and basically just be annoyed by its flaws more than its achievements. Now I'm rereading the book, most of the scenes depicted in the movie are in my mind's eye now. And that's not a bad thing.
I don't think she went overboard with descriptions, however I think this book was subjected to heavy editing that the later books really needed. I liked the Egypt mythology/origin explanation. I like we don't get this until book three. I think on its own, the first book could've been a simple masterpiece that needed to be left shrouded in mystery. I haven't read the original short story for years, I have it in the compendium piece which is a tome I have stashed in a box in a cupboard. It's probably online somewhere. That had a more comedic tone. I'm pissed I also can't find an older documentary about Rice which I have on VHS and remember way too succinctly since I watched it a heap of times. And I can't think of any comparable books to Interview, you could argue it has shades of Lolita but there's nothing overly grotesque about Louis's connection with Claudia. Once she has a woman's mind you get what's going on, if you're grossed out by it, you're missing the point. And if you didn't know who she represents in Rice's life, she makes less sense. I also have the graphic novel of Claudia's story which I've only glossed over. I tend to collect these books as gifts now and don't spend much time with them. (I could now I'm confined due to that virus people won't stfu about).
The Chronicles were the closest thing I had to an obsession with an IP. I could spend ages crapping on about the terrible adaptation of Queen of the Damned. I thought there was some series now she'd gotten back the rights but Hulu dumped it, so now it's being shopped as a bigger package along with the Mayfair series. So this could go either way. I would watch it provided it stopped before things got shitty with the book series. I think I'd rather she and her son focus on making this good than her churning out more novels. I'm not psyched about it though. Like I'm not dying (pun intended) to see what they do with it. I think she wants some Game of Thrones level mastery to resurrect (pun not as intended) the interest in the series. At least there's something more complete about her book series it wouldn't go off the rails because of outside influences. She's capable of doing that on her own.
Either way, I'm loving reading Interview now but I'm not sure if this forced downtime will lead me further in. I can rationalise the revisit given I know the people I tried to garner interest from won't be wrested from their beloved book series. But then I had a better book series to read as a teen than all y'all did.
*I keep finding out a whole bunch of people I think are older than me were born the same year, including her. So yeah, she really did get to mack on Brad Pitt at age 12.
I was in the middle of reading the Interview the book when I saw the movie. I could watch it alone at home on the condition I stopped it when the Bill was on, took the tape out and recorded that show. Only then could I finish watching the movie. And I think it was the goddamn Guns and Roses cover of Sympathy for the Devil that really riled me up, but I basically loved the movie. I was 14, didn't know dick about film, and was growing obsessed with vampires. The point was, Rice's brand were the definitive to me. They were original enough they didn't adhere to common myths. I still think her basic idea of them is still pretty cool, considering her lore has gone off the deep end.
But since then, the movie's gone from a love to a hate then to a love, back to an appreciation for what it was capable of achieving at the time. My brother told me stuff about it after he'd seen it in a theatre, his descriptions standing out to me as fascinating. Meanwhile, it's still riddled with issues. We couldn't have the cherub Armand represented as such, Antonio Banderas had to be brought in to play to the gothic aesthetic modern audiences comprehended, since the movie needed to have appeal outside the book. Louis's brother and his traumatic death are reduced to a dead mother and child Louis briefly mentions at the beginning to explain his malaise. The harrowing trip through Europe in search of other vampires is dropped. All of these decisions make sense. Casting Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt would've been for commercial reasons. Introducing Kirsten Dunst, a pre-teen* somehow managing to really embody Claudia from age five to her mental age of 70, you can't say that was a bad decision, she does the part justice. But it wasn't until many viewings later I realised she was faking playing the piano by lightly dancing her fingers over the keys. I don't think Cruise was playing, I'm sure he had a hand double, but you could cut away from Claudia's imitations and still make it convincing. They used animatronics to replicate Lestat's death, that look a lot less convincing now. The special effects haven't drastically aged but they're not up to today's standards. So now I have mixed feelings about it. I thought Rice loved it and contributed to the script, and was so overcome at the premier she was left giddy. Then later, I heard she hated it. Oh, and River Phoenix died and had to be replaced by Christian Slater, which again was a good choice but I think it's probably much older than the nameless boy Rice envisioned (later revealed to be Daniel in Queen of the Damned - his intro chapter referred to him as "the boy from Interview" and the penny failed to drop for me right away). I think I could watch it now and basically just be annoyed by its flaws more than its achievements. Now I'm rereading the book, most of the scenes depicted in the movie are in my mind's eye now. And that's not a bad thing.
I don't think she went overboard with descriptions, however I think this book was subjected to heavy editing that the later books really needed. I liked the Egypt mythology/origin explanation. I like we don't get this until book three. I think on its own, the first book could've been a simple masterpiece that needed to be left shrouded in mystery. I haven't read the original short story for years, I have it in the compendium piece which is a tome I have stashed in a box in a cupboard. It's probably online somewhere. That had a more comedic tone. I'm pissed I also can't find an older documentary about Rice which I have on VHS and remember way too succinctly since I watched it a heap of times. And I can't think of any comparable books to Interview, you could argue it has shades of Lolita but there's nothing overly grotesque about Louis's connection with Claudia. Once she has a woman's mind you get what's going on, if you're grossed out by it, you're missing the point. And if you didn't know who she represents in Rice's life, she makes less sense. I also have the graphic novel of Claudia's story which I've only glossed over. I tend to collect these books as gifts now and don't spend much time with them. (I could now I'm confined due to that virus people won't stfu about).
The Chronicles were the closest thing I had to an obsession with an IP. I could spend ages crapping on about the terrible adaptation of Queen of the Damned. I thought there was some series now she'd gotten back the rights but Hulu dumped it, so now it's being shopped as a bigger package along with the Mayfair series. So this could go either way. I would watch it provided it stopped before things got shitty with the book series. I think I'd rather she and her son focus on making this good than her churning out more novels. I'm not psyched about it though. Like I'm not dying (pun intended) to see what they do with it. I think she wants some Game of Thrones level mastery to resurrect (pun not as intended) the interest in the series. At least there's something more complete about her book series it wouldn't go off the rails because of outside influences. She's capable of doing that on her own.
Either way, I'm loving reading Interview now but I'm not sure if this forced downtime will lead me further in. I can rationalise the revisit given I know the people I tried to garner interest from won't be wrested from their beloved book series. But then I had a better book series to read as a teen than all y'all did.
*I keep finding out a whole bunch of people I think are older than me were born the same year, including her. So yeah, she really did get to mack on Brad Pitt at age 12.
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