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Movie Reviews: Spoilerific
Happy very belated birthday to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
oceloty!!! I hope the day was wonderful for you.
Review of Junebug
I really, really enjoyed this film. I thought it was very funny and very sad. The tone is rather interesting: there's this constant air of expectation--suppressed violence or other emotion. I was edgy almost the whole film, waiting for something to happen to release all the tension, but that something almost never happens.
Ashley (played by Amy Adams) is a phenomenal character. She is immature and so full of idealistic hopes and dreams. She's almost impossible not to like, I think. You want to protect her. One of my favorite moments is, after declaring that she will probably hate George's new wife, when she decides on first glance that she loves her.
I also particularly liked George's father.
My friendkrayat says in his Movie Blog (which is an excellent spot to go to if you're looking for movie recs; Krayat has varied and eclectic film taste): It's interesting, for example, that the director would choose to reveal the husband George to the viewer through the eyes of his cosmopolitan wife as she attempts to meld with his southern family. We learn about him as she does, and it's apparent there are things she doesn't know. But the scenario in which the wife is surprised at a church social to hear her husband singing impromptu harmony rings false, contrived. As does much of the picture.
I agree with him that revealing George through Madeleine's eyes is a great way of letting us learn about him and about her through her reactions to what she learns. I disagree with him however about George singing the hymn. The reason that it worked so well for me is that George is singing "Softly and Tenderly," the lyrics of which read, "Ye who are weary, come home." All the while he's singing this his mother, who believes he's gone astray from his family values and from the church, is bawling big mamma tears. I've experienced that many a time on the few occasions I let my family drag me to church...sitting there in the pews and getting sidelong glances when the preacher mentions iniquity. LOL
Review of The Squid and the Whale
This movie took me on an interesting journey, emotionally. When it first began, I was struck by how funny it is and by how much I sympathized with Bernard's character, even though he's an ass. At some point, though, my sympathy for him begins to wane and by th end of the movie, I think his character is pretty much vile and awful. The wife seems to exist merely as a foil for Bernard (see! I can't even remember her name LOL); we don't get inside her character the way we do the others. (This is deliberate I think; I listened to Terry Gross interview the writer and all he wanted to talk about was Bernard's character and how awesome it is)
The most poignant moment for me is the one near the end when Bernard has had a heart attack and they're wheeling him away on the stretcher. He says something esoteric to his wife, thinking they're having this profound moment, but what he says only serves to remind her of how he's mistreated her. It's a profoundly sad moment and one in which the audience realizes that he's simply incapable of reacting in any meaningful way with his family.
oceloty!!! I hope the day was wonderful for you.Review of Junebug
I really, really enjoyed this film. I thought it was very funny and very sad. The tone is rather interesting: there's this constant air of expectation--suppressed violence or other emotion. I was edgy almost the whole film, waiting for something to happen to release all the tension, but that something almost never happens.
Ashley (played by Amy Adams) is a phenomenal character. She is immature and so full of idealistic hopes and dreams. She's almost impossible not to like, I think. You want to protect her. One of my favorite moments is, after declaring that she will probably hate George's new wife, when she decides on first glance that she loves her.
I also particularly liked George's father.
My friend
krayat says in his Movie Blog (which is an excellent spot to go to if you're looking for movie recs; Krayat has varied and eclectic film taste): It's interesting, for example, that the director would choose to reveal the husband George to the viewer through the eyes of his cosmopolitan wife as she attempts to meld with his southern family. We learn about him as she does, and it's apparent there are things she doesn't know. But the scenario in which the wife is surprised at a church social to hear her husband singing impromptu harmony rings false, contrived. As does much of the picture. I agree with him that revealing George through Madeleine's eyes is a great way of letting us learn about him and about her through her reactions to what she learns. I disagree with him however about George singing the hymn. The reason that it worked so well for me is that George is singing "Softly and Tenderly," the lyrics of which read, "Ye who are weary, come home." All the while he's singing this his mother, who believes he's gone astray from his family values and from the church, is bawling big mamma tears. I've experienced that many a time on the few occasions I let my family drag me to church...sitting there in the pews and getting sidelong glances when the preacher mentions iniquity. LOL
Review of The Squid and the Whale
This movie took me on an interesting journey, emotionally. When it first began, I was struck by how funny it is and by how much I sympathized with Bernard's character, even though he's an ass. At some point, though, my sympathy for him begins to wane and by th end of the movie, I think his character is pretty much vile and awful. The wife seems to exist merely as a foil for Bernard (see! I can't even remember her name LOL); we don't get inside her character the way we do the others. (This is deliberate I think; I listened to Terry Gross interview the writer and all he wanted to talk about was Bernard's character and how awesome it is)
The most poignant moment for me is the one near the end when Bernard has had a heart attack and they're wheeling him away on the stretcher. He says something esoteric to his wife, thinking they're having this profound moment, but what he says only serves to remind her of how he's mistreated her. It's a profoundly sad moment and one in which the audience realizes that he's simply incapable of reacting in any meaningful way with his family.