Closer
Recently, it has been an ongoing trend, romantic films with unrealistic dialogue. Whether its purpose is to embellish an otherwise lackluster relationship or the screenwriter's nonexistent sexual prowess, this genre of film never fails to capture to capture the heart of the local Starbucks patron. (aka those who have acclimated to sugary, faux-coffee. Caramel Macchiato with 95% childish-teeth-rotting delight and 5% coffee)
Couple Nietzsche's cynicism and Jane Austin's eloquence, and you will have their constipated love child, 'Closer'. 'Closer' whose only legitimate cinematic accomplishment is successfully executing the world's first yuppie-quartet-orgy, is the spiritual god of this lot. Dialogue such as 'Lying is the most fun a girl can have without taking her clothes off, but it's better if you do' or 'What's so great about the truth? The truth hurts people - try lying for a change. It's the currency of the world' is peppered throughout the movie. By movie's end, as a sort of mutual consolation prize between movie maker and disappointed film goer, the viewer is treated to Portman bouncing about in a tighter-than-British/American-Blair/Bush-foreign-policy tanktop.
Fight Club
Critics who nitpick 'Schindler's List' for story pacing/character portrayal/lack of Nazi sympathy etc. Casual viewers who watch 'American History X' and admire Norton's chest tattoos. What do the two have in common? Those viewers have missed the point. To be specific, they haven't 'missed' the point, instead they followed a bloody, xenophobic tangent Goebbels would be proud of.
Fight Club has a different premise: how someone can assert themselves in a materialistic world. (though, I'm unsure if sparring with a half-naked Brad Pitt is enough to induce any epiphanies) There was one particular scene, I refer to, in order to convince someone this is not another veiled-homoerotic man film: a convenience store owner is confronted with a gun to the back of his skull. Tyler Durden threatens to kill the clerk if he fails to pursue his ambitions of becoming a vet. The clerk is let go, nameless Narrator, played by Norton, reprimands Tyler. Tyler rationalizes his actions, 'Imagine how he feels. Tomorrow will be the most beautiful day in [his] life. His breakfast will taste better than any meal you and I have ever tasted.'
An uncomfortable amount of viewers take the extremities into context like a religious fundamentalist. Dodgy, diluted varieties of fight clubs appear around the nation, chauvinism spreads akin to an Ebola epidemic. I'm not a hardcore specialist in Tyler's dogma. (I, who lacks the Y chromosome) Albeit, if you consider playing shooters on your Xbox360 whilst eating a bag of Cheetos a form of asserting yourself, to each his own.
3 comments:
Have you recently seen fight club for the first time? I was lucky enough to see it in the theater in '99. Its the only film I saw at the theater twice. It might even be my favorite movie. I wrote my final 6 page essay discussing three philosophical themes for my philosophy in the cinema class last quarter. It was a blast. A hybrid course that met once a week to watch good films. The lectures were in the form of podcasts.
I've watched this film 4 times and counting. The first viewing was around 2003, I was 15 going on 16. To be honest, around that time, I never understood whatever the hell Durden was talking about. Even now, I still feel that I'm only grasping this film on a surface level.
Btw, the cinema class you were referring to, is that the same film class that is offered at the EVCC?
It is the same. I bet you'd like it. It was a lot of fun. I'm sure I still have my essay somewhere on my computer, if I can find it I'll let you in on my take on the film if you'd like.
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