There are a lot of things to discuss in the movie, but I think the ending when Prabha saves the life of a man who turns out to be her husband is an interesting aspect to discuss.

We see that the relationship between Prabha and her husband is paper thin. It has been years since he contacted Prabha, and Prabha, just like many Indian women, is clinging to the relationship which is slowly vanishing and has nothing left in it. Because of this bond, Prabha does not explore other possibilities, even if she wants some support, as she thinks that this would not be fair to her husband. As the end approaches, Prabha senses that their relationship will soon come to an end, but she makes a desperate attempt to revive it by imagining a whole episode of her interaction with her lifeless relationship and estranged husband. We are shown that a man gets washed ashore lifeless, Prabha arrives at the scene and gives CPR but nothing happens, and then she gives mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, which is shown in somewhat of an intimate manner, and the man revives. This scene can be seen as a metaphor for the relationship that is dying; she decides to close the gap in the relationship, and this becomes her first attempt to forgive her husband and keep their bond alive.

The next scene shows Prabha entering the village hospital, where she cleans the wounds of the man. This is also shown in an intimate manner; although Prabha is a nurse and this is her duty, this time there is a deeper feeling as she cleans those wounds. This is her coming closer to him. Later, an old lady comes and mistakes them for husband and wife, which could be seen as Prabha’s traditional thinking still clinging to her, making her accept and forgive her estranged husband and seeing him as the light of her life. She then slowly gives in to this thinking, and we see that Prabha is forgiving her husband and accepting him.

But soon we hear a dialogue where she says that she doesn’t want him anymore. This was Prabha realizing that she was trying to revive a relationship that had long been dead, and that she cannot always make it the main light source of her life. She comes to terms with reality, realizing that the relationship has now ended and there is nothing left in it. She is finally liberated from the chains which were curbing her freedom all along, and now she sees that the true light of her life is the friendship she found with Anu and Parvaty. This scene is very beautiful, and we witness the liberation of all three characters.

These movies are getting dismissed as stupid, but they're giving me the same feeling as I got while watching A Serious Man before realizing that it's a retelling of Job. They have scenes in them that are clearly trying to make some sort of point, that people are kind of ignoring.

There's a strange overarching theme of fatherhood in Honey, Don't: Neither Qualley's character or Plaza's character had supportive fathers. Plaza makes a point of saying that her father died, when in fact she stabbed him. Honey's father comes back after being abusive and disappearing, to which Honey tells him "you're already dead, haven't you heard?" Honey's sister's husband isn't really in the picture, and I can't remember what is really said about him, if anything. The mother has difficulty controlling her daughter, who finds male companionship in a MAGA abuser. Chris Evan's character is using his role as a father figure in the church to manipulate hurt women under the guise of "guidance."

There's also a constant deliberate presence of bus stops, first pointed out explicitly by Mia's parents near the beginning of the movie when they pointedly and defensively talk about how they would never take the bus because they have a car, so they have no need. The way they talk about it, almost makes it seem like a symbol of being low class, which is reinforced by when Corrine was last seen at a bus stop with the "homeless man," though we later find out that he's a relative. The bus stop comes up most bewilderingly when Qualley is sitting at the station, mulling over the case: the church's advertisement is on the side, and the bus driver asks her if she's getting on board or waiting for the next one. He tells her something like "every bus is pretty much the same." Honey refuses to get on, and in fact never gets on a bus. This scene reminds me of some religious quotes and parables. Frankly, what the bus driver says is so strangely poignant that I can't believe it was written without a point in mind.

The title is also seemingly a pun on the idea of a "Honey Do" list, which is given by a partner... but Honey never has a partner long enough to get/give a list. Plaza's character, in her big villain speech, makes a point to talk about how Honey got "pussy regret" when she saw her poor house, the same house she grew up in. Honey denies this.

There are scenes that give me a similar feeling in Drive Away Dolls, but I won't go into detail as I've already written quite a bit and it's been a little while since I've seen it.

Anyway: does anyone else feel like this movie is trying to say something? There are even more scenes that I'm forgetting. I think Coen and Cooke are smarter than people are giving them credit. The movie feels unsatisfying as a film structurally, but I think that almost feels deliberate too. It's constantly undercutting your expectations.

Hi all, I’m trying to pin down a visual and stylistic trend in late ’80s / early ’90s cinema. Some examples I’m seeing:

• Beetlejuice / Edward Scissorhands (1988/1990). 
• Drop Dead Fred (the ending, 1991). 
• Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991). 
• Stay Tuned (1992). 
• Twilight Zone: The Movie (Joe Dante’s segment, 1983). 
• Amityville: It’s About Time (1992). 
• Death Becomes Her (Rossellini’s house, 1992). 
• Suspiria (1977) — maybe proto-version of this aesthetic

Common traits I notice:

• Highly stylized, exaggerated interiors, often in wealthy homes.  
• Skewed architecture, distorted spaces, sharp angles, dramatic shadows — very Expressionist.  
• Heightened, “elastic” physicality — actors feel almost cartoonish or nightmarish.  
• Deliberate “movie set” artificiality — nothing feels organic.  
• Reminds me a bit of Memphis design, though I’m not sure why.  
• Often appears in dream sequences, moments of absurdity, horror, dark fantasy, and surprisingly in kids’ films.

I’ve seen terms like “Burtonesque,” “neo-surreal,” “postmodern Gothic,” and “Neo-Expressionism,” but they all feel too broad. Burtonesque might be the closest…

Questions:

1.  Is there a recognized style/movement for this?    
2.  Other films from the late ’80s/early ’90s that fit this look?  
3.  Any essays, articles, or books that analyze this visual/narrative aesthetic?

Thanks for any guidance — this exaggerated period of cinema has fascinated me for a while!

**edited for format

To those who don't know, Zako Heskiya was a Bulgarian film maker primarily known for Soviet sanctioned war films. His film Torrid Noon was the first Bulgarian contribution to Cannes. He also opened door for many young Bulgarian film makers and is seen as a key figure in Bulgarian film making fraternity. Not much else is known about him and except Torrd Noon and Yo Ho Ho, I can't find any of his other movies but Yo Ho Ho was a fun eatch and I recommend everyone to watch it. It is available on Youtube.

Mexican cinema has long been at the forefront of magical realism, drawing on the region’s rich engagement with the literary genre as well as Mexico’s own indigenous and rural folkloric traditions. In the cinema of two-time collaborators Fernanda Valadez and Astrid Rondero, whose films confront the harsh realities of cyclical violence, poverty, migration politics, and organized crime in contemporary Mexico, magical realism serves as a vehicle for infusing modern subjects with transcendence and sublime mystery.

But their first two feature films go beyond conventional magical realism. Valadez and Rondero weave and blend diverse genre motifs in unexpected ways, and employ intricately layered narrative structures, plus brilliant and affecting cinematography. Despite their films’ tremendous formal richness, their directorial approach emphasizes directness and immediacy — never sacrificing intimacy for ‘cleverness’ or conceptualism. 

The result is cinema that is thought-provoking, deeply humane, expressionistic, sensitive, and spiritual. And they communicate beautiful messages about cyclical violence, inheritance, resilience, feminine strength, and humanitarianism in modern Mexican society.

Identifying Features: Weaving diverse genre motifs, through a distinctly Mexican prism

I wanted to explore the classical Hollywood genres that Identifying Features references, and how the film subverts them through its own lens — thereby contrasting the Mexican filmic perspective with the traditional American paradigm in smart ways.

1. (Inverted) Immigration Epic

Identifying Features’ foremost theme is migration, but rather than telling the familiar story of hopeful immigrants successfully assimilating into a new American life (as in Brooklyn (2015) or America America (1963)) — the film instead represents that genre’s “dark side of the moon.”

Here, the story is not a triumph in a new ‘land of opportunity,’ but rather the grief left behind in the old country after a loved one decides to leave (and in this case, never to be seen again). We remain in impoverished rural Mexico, with a devastated and confused mother. It is a story that could never be told in Hollywood, because it unfolds not in a promised land, but in one marked by absence and loss.

This disturbing ‘inverse perspective’ also evokes a common thriller-horror motif in which the protagonist is haunted by their own ‘shadow-self,’ the abandoned and repressed double which lingers silently after they have chosen to move on — e.g. the ‘tethered’ paraselves of Us (2019), Vertigo (1958), Enemy (2013), etc. In this way, the film reads as a classical American immigration epic, but viewed through a negated lens, in a hollow and subjugated space absent of America’s privilege and security. The film’s structure thus serves as a powerful metaphor for the marginalized political psyche of Mexico’s borderlands.

2. Under-the-skin Conspiracy Thriller

The mother’s search for her disappeared son begins within the conventional, politically-sanctioned bureaucracies — government offices and morgues. But when she is coerced into signing a fraudulent death certificate and denied the answers she seeks, she abandons the official system and descends into folkloric netherworlds: uninterpretable oracles, crackling bonfire visions, and half-seen omens. Her desperate descension from the orderly to the cultic evokes political conspiracy thrillers such as The Manchurian Candidate or The Parallax View (1974).

3. Western (or ‘Road Movie’) Aesthetic

As a mother searches for her lost son, laws and logic quickly fracture, and our hero is forced to travel a treacherous path on her own, encountering many trials and colorful characters along the way.

The film’s landscape — the desolate moral desert of Mexico’s fronteras — eventually takes on the texture and aesthetic of a neo-Western. It’s perilous and lawless. But it is also uncannily luminous, fertile with the answers she seeks. 

4. Supernatural Horror (as Metaphor for the Cartels) [spoilers ahead]

As in Issa Lopez’s Tigers Are Not Afraid (2017), the Mexican cartels manifest as invisible phantoms — terrifying and violent, but unseen. Like Freddy Kreuger and countless other canonical horror figures, the cartels strike under cover of darkness and abduct children in their sleep. Meanwhile, few dare to speak their name aloud or acknowledge their existence in public. The mother only learns about them through bonfire visions (where they take the form of a sinister demon), or through anonymous whispers secretly smuggled through a closed bathroom stall or cracked doorway. 

In the film’s finale, when the disappeared son finally reappears and speaks to his near-death mother, he murmurs, “They caught me, and now I can’t leave” — it is reminiscent of a child possessed and coerced into eternal bondage by an evil coven of witches or demons, never allowed to return to his loved ones.

Sujo: Exploring cyclical violence and inheritance through symbolism and lyricism

While Identifying Features can only indirectly confront the invisible specter of the cartels through mysterious shamans, bonfire visions, and anonymous whispers, Sujo addresses that violence more directly — posing direct questions concerning inheritance and fate, and intertwining poignant symbols reflecting on one’s innermost nature and potential for renewal. 

The film openly addresses one of humanity’s grandest questions, one which Sujo himself poses to his teacher and mentor in the final act: “Is it possible to change your life?” 

Raised by a murdered sicario and surrounded by constant brutality, Sujo’s every encounter with cousins and neighbors is a reminder of the inescapable vendetta that shapes his life. Yet the film tempers this grim inheritance with empathy and aspiration, using repeated visual motifs of locks and keys (symbols of confinement and possibility) to highlight tension between his limitations and his potential, and between his inner constraints and the opportunities offered by the external world.

The most tangible inheritance Sujo receives from his father is, of course, his name. “Every name has a meaning,” he is told twice by two different female role models, “…even if it only means something to the one who gave it you.” Valadez and Rondero gift every character in the film with a richly meaningful and imaginative name, which draw clear and stark contrast to the cold, numerical monickers boasted by the cartel recruits in Sujo’s home village. Sujo’s father, notably, is called “El Ocho”; in the cartels, your number signifies your rank and your feared reputation. A given name, on the other hand, contains ineffable meaning imbued with deep love from one’s parents. In the film’s stunning final scene, we learn that Sujo is named after a beautiful, jet-black, and freedom-loving stallion his father was enamored with as a child — a reminder that even the notorious sicario was once an unspoiled boy, full of awe and reverence for the natural world.

Through the characters’ names and their natural environment, the film continually examines the tension between one’s nature and nurture. Ximena Amann’s striking cinematography frequently highlights wildlife (including Sujo the stallion) as reflections of inner nature, in its raw beauty but also its potential for savagery. Early sequences show a young Sujo entranced by grasshoppers, butterflies, spiders, dogs, and chickens, while eagerly completing his kindergarten homework on the names for foxes, porcupines, deer, frogs, and eagles. Perhaps Sujo’s reverence for Mother Nature was an unbeknownst inheritance from his father, too.

Conclusion

I’d love to hear your thoughts on these two films, and your personal favorites in Mexican cinema.

Regardless of one's politics, I think the perspectives Mexican artists and filmmakers on issues of immigration and human rights are more relevant now than ever. For me, independent Mexican cinema has become one of my most vital and inspiring spaces in modern filmmaking, and I’d value your opinions and recommendations.

[Edit: formatting issue]

I’m reading a book on the making of Fury Road right now called “Blood, Sweat & Chrome” by Kyle Buchanan and it has real interviews with the team behind the movie including George Miller. Mark Sexton, a member of the art department said “I have a very, very, very strong memory of George talking about Eminem for Max.

George Miller also said “He’d done 8 Mile and I found that really interesting, I thought, he’s got that quality”. It didn’t work out because Eminem didn’t want to leave home. Apparently, if they were able to do it in his home state, he would have.

What are some other real/alleged casting choices that are unbelievable?

Full thread here: https://filmwaffle.com/post/eminem-could-have-played-max-in-fury-road-castings-that-nearly-happened

I organized an AMA/Q&A with Stephen King, legendary author of books like IT, The Shining, Stand By Me, Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, Carrie, The Stand, Misery, The Mist, The Long Walk, The Life of Chuck, Christine, and lots more.

Many of his books have gone on to be adapted into film.

It's just gone live in /r/movies here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/1myuw3q/hey_rmovies_im_stephen_king_ask_me_anything_about/

He'll be back on Wednesday 8/27 at 12:00 PM ET to answer questions. Please head there if you'd like to ask Stephen a question. I recommend asking in advance.

The newest film adaption of his work, The Long Walk, is out in theaters worldwide on September 12th.

His verification photo:

https://i.imgur.com/OjkIWpn.jpeg

Please don't downvote opinions. Only downvote comments that don't contribute anything. Check out the WHYBW archives.

Daughters of the Dust was ranked #60 in the most recent poll for Sight & Sound Greatest Films of All Time (2022). Compelling, evocative, and more than a little mysterious, this was the first feature film directed by an African-American woman, Julie Dash, to receive a theatrical release in the USA.

It's about three generations of Gullah women living on Saint Helena Island, South Carolina in 1902, and as they prepare to migrate from the rural South to the North. The Gullah are an African American community who preserved significant African linguistic and cultural traditions, developing a unique culture and a creole language of their own.

As Roger Ebert described it, it's like a tone-poem about emotions. The Village Voice noted its "stunning motifs and tableaux, the iconography seemingly sourced from dreams as much as from history and folklore." If you haven't watched it before, I highly recommend it.

I found this one lady's comment about the movie quite moving, and it really speaks to the transcendence of cinema:

I have watched this movie several times throughout the years and I have always recognized the poetic beauty of this movie. However, I was always unable to sink my teeth into this movie. I watched this movie again tonight and this movie registered for the first time in my spirit. The issue before, I was not ready to receive the message of this movie. However, this year, I am experiencing a spiritual awakening. I am becoming totally comfortable with the fact that I am a woman who is a descendant of Africans. Unfortunately, in the Western world, whether we realize it or not, we have been conditioned to hate being descendants of Africans and to hate ourselves. Without realizing it, we spend our lives as Black people in the Western world running away from ourselves. For the first time ever, this year, I have been running towards myself. Once I ran towards myself, I realized that my energy is connected to Africa and it always has been.

I am looking for movies from a film maker called Serik Aprimov but I have no clue where to look for them? He is a film maker from Kazakhstan. I have looked almost every place that I know of but couldn't find his movies. I don't know where else to look for and ask so I am asking on this sub. Of anyone knows about where I can find please let me know. That will be a big help to me.

I just watched a film called Flic (2005) and have many questions about the film. Particularly about what it means.

I got the vibe of several Kurosawa Kiyoshi films from it- Cure, Pulse and Charisma. I also thought of this film to be Lynchian due to the way it is merging reality and fiction.

What is the true reality of the film if it even exists? Is it all a dream thought by the protagonist as well see at the end? If so then we never learn of the identity of the killer right? On which is he really leaving the town? Or is he going towards it? Are there multiple interpretations of it?

Darn this is nerve wracking rightfully so. Might join my top 100 once i unravel it.

I feel Michael Cimino was lost potential

You know, I’ve been researching Michael Cimino and his career for quite awhile and recently I've been on a kick again, I think a few years and it still amazes me that he had it all with The Deer Hunter and lost it all and became a pariah with Heaven’s Gate. In spite of all that, I still think Cimino was lost potential.

With Cimino, I think Thunderbolt & Lightfoot is good fun, The Deer Hunter is his masterpiece and Heaven’s Gate is a lost masterpiece, though slow & long. What I like with Cimino is that he gives room to breathe with the scenes and its clear Cimino really enjoys the scenery and makes sure all of his shots are to perfection.

I will say with Cimino, he had a lot of unrealized projects that either weren’t made, almost made but got cancelled days before shooting or that Cimino really wanted to get made. I’ve made posts about these projects and sometimes I’d got back to those posts and make revised posts after finding new Information. Here is the most complete version of it- Michael Cimino's Unrealized Projects : r/TrueFilm

I always wonder if Cimino could get one project off the ground from his Unrealized Projects (like The Fountainhead, Frank Costello Biopic, The Yellow Jersey, Dostoevsky Biopic, Michael Collins Biopic, Man’s Fate, Cream Rises exe.) or accepted a director position (Footloose, The Bounty, The King of Comedy) that he could rehabilitated his image after Heaven’s Gate. But, researching Cimino, he really couldn’t compromise on his vision and I just think he thrives on difficult productions. I do know that he was originally the director of Footloose, but he just went bigger, darker & had more extravagant demands for the production and the producers decided he was too much of a liability and fired him. 

Also on difficult production & inability to compromise, after Heaven’s Gate, Cimino made Year of the Dragon, The Sicillian, Desperate Hours, & Sunchaser. Apparently, Cimino had a smooth time on Year of the Dragon, but on The Sicillian & Desperate Hours, they were difficult productions and Cimino went to war with executives. Apparently, there was a lawsuit on The Sicillian over the final cut and Cimino was kicked off the project. Desperate Hours was apparently 2 anna Half Hours long in his original cut and that but to 30 Minutes got cut.

I honestly think it was Cimino’s own hubris and inability to compromise that resulted in his decline. I think Cimino needed someone to reign him in, like with what Clint Eastwood did when Cimino directed Thunderbolt & Lightfoot, to make sure he got the necessary takes and not go insane like he did with Heaven’s Gate. Also, at looking at his unrealized projects, I feel Cimino had more to give and that I still think he is an interesting director with a lot of lost potential.

One thing is for sure. Absolutely everything within the frame is intentional and with purpose in a Kurosawa film. There's this one shot around the 43 minute mark (I think it's Sue's first shot, her standing and praying on the castle walls with another woman while Hitedora goes to visit her first). I really urge everyone to watch that shot once so you're able to follow what I'm trying to say. Really not great at explaining it via words but I'll try.

So at the beginning of the shot, Sue is praying alongside another woman in the frame. Hitedora enters the frame (climbs the stairs) and stands Infront of Sue (on the right side of the frame, the other woman is on the left side). The camera then pans to the right following Hitodera, leaving the other woman out of frame. But just for a second, the other woman slips into the frame right as she is moving backwards ie to the left side. I was so surprised as to this was the first slipup in a Kurosawa film that I've seen. Any other director's work and I wouldn't have even paid attention. But Kurosawa's shots are so controlled and the movement, blocking is so precise that I couldn't help but notice. I thought it was a slip-up, a mistake.

But then the shot continues, as we pan to the left again. Following the motion of Sue, who is moving backwards to make space for Hitedora as she bends down in front of him. Then I realized, even the other woman slipping into the frame just for a second was intentional. It was important as to show that she was moving backwards, making room for Sue & Hitedora, so that when Sue moves backwards it isn't jarring as to where the other woman went.

Do you guys see how precise Kurosawa's framing and blocking is? It is absolutely nothing short of masterful and genius. That is how much control Kuroswa had over his frames. It's just unthinkable to me how this man was even able to direct so many movies with the level of planning and meticulousness he put into literally each and every shot. He was truly a gift to the world of cinema.

Serious question though. How on Earth was Akira Kurosawa able to direct so many films, even after how much thought and effort he put into each and every shot? How is it even humanly possible? Was he just so gifted that he could just think of shots in a whim? Was there some techniques he used? Or is it really just a lot of effort and planning put into each and every one of his work?

What a terrible movie.It drags on,and on,and on,and on,and on.It feels like a chore.The first hour and a half is literally pointless dialogue and facial expressions that don't really portray any kind of emotion (at least for me,staring at the camera for 3 minutes straight doesn't do anything for me)

And the barn scene? You don't see people burning.The guy that got poured petrol on him? You don't see that.This movie tells a lot of things but doesn't show anything to make it "disturbing".

And the ending? What the fuck is happening? The kid shoots a poster of Hitler for 3 minutes while random ww2 footage flashes on screen.

Complete waste of time.There's actually a good movie that has the same themes which is good and it's name is "Men Behind The Sun" from 1988.It's in Chinese and it's 100 times better than this POS movie.

I want the 2 hours of my life back.

Studio Ghibli's tear-jerking masterpiece, "Grave of the Fireflies," chronicles the difficult lives of two orphaned Japanese children, Seita and Setsuko, nearing the end of World War II. As Japan's military forces desperately fight against the Allied Powers, its home-front is assailed by fire-bombings, food shortages, and death.

The horrid effects of war reach these children, and Seita struggles to maintain morale for his sister's sake, despite what hardships they face. Rather than fight for his country or volunteer for public service, Seita dedicates his life to Setsuko; a fact that earns him scorn and mockery from his aunt, who expects him to volunteer and offer his skills to the war effort. Despite the difficulties unfairly thrust upon him, Seita seldom finds sympathy from anyone else. While all attention is trained on Japan's military efforts, everyday struggles like Seita and Setsuko's go by unnoticed.

Yet, in the face of a country that refuses to recognize his struggle, Seita never leaves Setsuko--no matter how inglorious times get. He provides for her, keeps her spirits high, and maintains some level of happiness and comfort in spite of their modest means and lack of parental figures. It's a lot for such a young boy to take on, and though his honor slips at times (resorting to stealing food from farmers and neighbors to feed his sister) Seita's mission is honorable at its core: he wants to support his sister. And surely, times are only so tough because of the ongoing war--a circumstance he never chose.

"Grave of the Fireflies" takes place during World War II, when American planes and Japanese ships sought to strike down their enemies, and armed men swept bloody battlefields; but ultimately, the film is about the unceremonious battle fought by forgotten people. The brave soldiers who didn't step onto a battlefield, and never raised a gun in their country's honor, but stayed behind to protect their loved ones, and made for them the best of a horrible situation. Seita was one such soldier, never honored, never celebrated. And his was the war they never showed you.

Thanks for reading. Check out the video below if you liked this! Have a good day!

Hi everyone!

I'm looking for books recommendations about the Technicolor era. Ideally, I'm looking for something that discusses how this new technique (at the time) impacted the visual language, cinematography and narrative of film-making.

But honestly, I'd be interested in anything tangential, that can shed a bit more light in how cinema changed during those years.

And also I'd be most interested if anyone knowledgeable on the subject wanted to share some of their knowledge, of course.

Thanks in advance to all!

For me, del Toro’s output since Pacific Rim just wasn’t that great. I don’t like Pinocchio the character. And Netflix movies are almost always duds. But I gave this one a try when it came out as my daughter wanted to see it, and was absolutely blown away by how good it is. Last night I watched it for a second time, and if anything it was even better.

This film delivers the unexpected at every turn, going to places that you would never expect from what’s ostensibly a kids film. Or is it even a kid’s film? Geppetto’s son dies in a bombing and Pinocchio is carved from the wood of the tree that grew over his grave. Geppetto cuts it down and makes the puppet in a night of drunken grief. It’s pretty heavy stuff, and that’s before you get to the Italian Facism, minor religion-bashing, more bombing-related deaths, as well as musings on life and death in general. If it is a kids’ film, it couldn’t be accused of talking down to its audience.

Pinocchio himself is kind of annoying, but interestingly that’s the POINT. He’s an agent of chaos who doesn’t behave in ways that are conventionally endearing to the audience or the other characters. And why should he? This film is actually interested in how an immortal artificial person with no experience of society might actually behave, and how he grows as a character over the course of the film.

It’s a crazy mish-mash of tones, and I can see some people being turned off by that. But I think it works really well, and is hugely ambitious for trying. The second time round, when you know where it’s going, it works a lot better. Overall it’s a great companion piece to Pan’s Labyrinth, with which it shares several of GDT’s usual obsessions.

What are your thoughts?

Hi everyone! I am doing a presentation on the topic of nationalistic propaganda in movies for my exam and I would be really grateful if you would take a few minutes to answer the questions. The survey is anonymous and only your age range and gender will be shared. Thank you in advance to everyone who participates, here's the link:

https://forms.gle/XvJEubMNF5TdeBaV6

I was struck by how much time the movie Sinners spent driving home the point that the Juke Joint was never going to be a success, regardless of vampires.

Even if Remmick neve showed up, the KKK was coming, and there's no way Smoke and Stack could kill that many white guys **and** get away with it.

Even if the KKK didn't show up, the Juke Joint would inevitably go broke because too many customers paid with plantation tokens.

Even if the Juke Joint turned a profit, the Chicago gangs were going to eventually figure out who stole from them and come for revenge.

So, that's a lot of time spent on multiple dooms coming down the line. Why was that important to the story?

This seems like an incredibly personal film for Polanski. Made at a time when he was about to be cast out of America and face the prospect of decades in prison it would be impossible not to bring his biography into a proper reading of the film. The question of whether the film is informed by his very real persecution at the hands of the Nazis or media circus surrounding Sharon Tate’s murder or his perception of persecution for his own crimes is irreconcilable.

The character of Trelkovsky is constantly othered either for his race and his seeming inability to fit in. He can’t understand the reason for the way he is treated despite staying out of everyone’s business and trying to be a good guy.

You could say this isn’t strictly Polanski making a point about his own perceived persecution but every attempt to rein a reading away from that lens is fraught. Polanski has said he had to get a project going with Paramount and knew the book had been optioned and was kicking around but the choice still seems pointed. Choosing to cast himself and put himself out there also seems a significant choice. Even a reading of the film via Kafka immediately conjures both The Trial and Metamorphosis, with Trelkovsky as the victim. The difference with Polanski of course is that his persecution is born of a very tangible crime. His unfortunate quote about how “everyone wants to fuck young girls” really lends credence to the narrative of someone who thinks they’re just like everyone else being othered by a society of hypocrites.

So is he playing the victim? Is this film just 2 hours of masturbatory “who, me?”? I‘ve been chewing it over and while that’s absolutely there and it may be the most prominent modern reading of the film, it seems too easy and too reductive. The film is too good to be just Polanski jerking off and throwing himself out of a window because the world sees him as a sexual deviant. The film achieves psychological horror of the highest order, on par with The Shining or Don’t Look Now. The truth is I’m not sure Polanski or anyone in Hollywood at the time thought too deeply about his crimes. Yes, the film is self-victimizing, but there’s so much more to it. The film itself embraces the ambiguity of whether the actions of those around Trelkovsky are happening in reality, or in his mind. The question of whether his othering comes from without or within is left to the viewer.

Down to brass tacks: were The Tenant to exist in a world where Roman Polanski hadn’t drugged and raped a 13 year old we would be able to laud it for its razor sharp examination of what it means to be othered in society. We would say how Polanski’s own persecution by the Nazis, expat life in Paris, and vilification in the wake of Sharon Tate’s murder informed his directorial instincts and helped him craft one of the most tense and fraught pictures of paranoia and vilification ever put to film.

Link to Letterboxd version: https://boxd.it/aOW1x7

I’ve been revisiting Zorro’s Black Whip, and while I enjoy it for what it is (Linda Stirling is awesome and the action’s solid), the more I think about it, the more I see it as one of the biggest missed chances in pulp cinema.

Republic had the rights to Zorro. They had a female lead in the mask. They released it in 1944, when women were literally keeping the world alive — building bombers, ships, and weapons while the men were overseas. Women didn’t just “help” the war effort, they saved lives and saved the economy.

So imagine if Black Whip had actually tied Barbara Meredith to Zorro’s mantle — a true passing of the torch. That would have mirrored reality: women taking up roles of power and responsibility when the world needed them most.

And imagine how it would’ve hit the kids in those matinees: little boys and little girls sitting side by side, both getting to see themselves in the Fox. Brothers and sisters sharing the same legend, not divided into “hero” and “sidekick.” That’s powerful stuff.

Instead, Republic used “Zorro” as a brand name and gave us a fun, but disconnected, heroine. No legacy, no generational myth. Just another popcorn serial.

I can’t help thinking: if they’d had the guts to make her Zorra or explicitly the heir to Zorro, it could’ve been groundbreaking. A female pulp hero tied to a legendary mantle, decades before comics and films started playing with “legacy heroes.”

What do you all think — am I reading too much into this, or was Black Whip really a cultural wave that fizzled before it could crest?

What happens with the the pink slippers in Mr Chow's Singapore apartment and what does it symbolise? When she visits Mr Chow's aparement, why does Mrs Chan go to pick them up, hesitate, and then stop (and you just see feet in her black heels)? Is it symbolic of Mrs Chan trying to decide/choose Mr Chow, and being in a relationship with him?

In HK, is she wearing them as an almost try out of being Mrs Chow? So in Singapore when she hesitates, she decides not to, and leaves?

The pink slippers must have some significant to be there in his apartment, but I can't think of any other explanation for them being there beside some symbolism?

HAHA, I don't know how or WHY this has been on my mind so much the last few days... I guess because I rewatched Inception... As I was watching it, it dawned on me that in the majority- NOT ALL- of his roles since 2002 (when he did Catch Me If You Can + Gangs Of New York) have featured him in this borderline sleazy pseudo-tough guy salesmany type of vibe. 2002 seemed to be the delineating year where he matured into something more than pretty-boy, albeit a very talented pretty boy actor, as those earlier roles are ones I've come to prefer to the sleazy salesmany/conman later ones.

And watching Inception again, it kind of just reminded me of a variation on this theme...

I think that in those roles- which he seems to have been largely typecast in, again, save for the obvious few exceptions- that he really does well, but that his style and limited range don't carry over so well to things like period pieces, which is ironic considering he won his Oscar for one and was lauded for his performance in the other period film(s) he's been in. Look, I'm aware I'm probably alone in this and going against the grain, but now that I've noticed it, I can't unsee it or change the way I feel about it.

Kind of like how at this point Deniro, Pacino, Stallone, Jackson, etc., are essentially just themselves in most of their roles these days, so too does Leo seem to be. I think he's really done a swell job growing into his skin and being him, but that it's also seen him flex his range less, which he seemed to do much more in his earlier career, which in retrospect, I think I prefer. Maybe the roles weren't as strong as some of the characters he'd mature into playing, but it was just nice to see him display some kind of range... although it too was under an umbrella- back then, the pretty boy umbrella- if you think about it... now it's just a different one, I guess.

It's hard to articulate exactly what I'm even getting at, as even I think he's a solid actor on a surface level, but how much "acting"/morphing into another persona is he actually doing vs. just reciting the lines and going through the motions... I feel like he lacks depth and when I watch him, I have hard time getting lost in the character as I always just see (post-'02) Leo... With truly great actors, I don't get that- I have no issues immersing myself fully in their characters. Leo's gotta' be the most east-coast-sounding California native ever...

We're at an age of diminishing returns on long running film series. Part of the reason is that, no doubt browbeaten by the sheer number of entries, cineastes have gone from salivating over what the new Star Wars or James Bond film might hold, to feeling that to make another entry into a series is to risk ruining it.

I actually think it's an overreaction that throws the baby in with the bathwater. So many great works of art are serialized: I mean, The Odyssey is a sequel to the Illiad. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings is a sequel - in thre parts no less! - to The Hobbit. Wagner's Ring and Mann's Joseph and his brothers are in multiple parts. Does this serialized form make those works any less artistic?

I think a film series rises or falls on three criteria:

1. How good or bad are the individual entries, taken in sum, are?
2. Is the number of entries such that it's starting to get to be 'too much'?
3. Do the various entries hold together, narrative and stylistically?

Critieria [1] and [2] are surely the most subjective of the bunch: how many films in a series is too many? I'd say Marvel is too many films [1] for me, but its fans will tell me there's still a world full of comic-book material to explore (which I would argue is to miss the point but nevermind).

As for how good the entries are [2], I've never felt that Star Wars, for example, had really managed to justify its remarkable longevity on the strength of the quality of its entries. I always felt that out of the entire bunch there was only one truly outstanding movie, and it's The Empire Strikes Back from all the way back in 1980.

Criteria [3] is perhaps the easiest to discuss and it's what I'll focus on today. Specifically, I want to focus on how a film series holds togerher stylistically. I think they key here is to have a single hand guide the series through its variosu entries. There are several film series associated with certain filmmakers: Transformers with Michael, Star Wars with George Lucas. The early Bond films were the product a small cotoire of filmmakers - Terence Young, Guy Hamilton and Lewis Gilbert - alternating on entries and followed-up by their own second unit directors in Peter Hunt and John Glenn. For a while, Harry Potter was strongly associated with David Yates.

More decorously, the current iterations of Dune and Lord of the Rings are associated with Denis Villenueve and Peter Jackson. The latter had some interesting things to say about this topic: "When you talk about how Jaws and Star Wars created a franchise mentality in Hollywood that still exists, the only thing that Lord of the Rings did is promote the idea of backing a filmmaker on that level. Warner Bros. still does with Christopher Nolan on Batman, but even that only happens when it happens."

At the same time, Jackson has a jaundiced view of auteur theory. All his films are credited not to his name but that of his company. "The one credit you will not see is 'A Peter Jackson Film.' I refuse to allow that, and never will. Movies are collaborations, and I would never make that kind of possessive claim on such a collaborative piece of work." Following this, he has - as we shall see - attempted to keep a certain team in place throughout his oeuvre.

I compare that with the Lucas example, not as part of some hackneyed, fallacious notion that Lucas somehow owes his reputation to Marcia or to producer Gary Kurtz, but simply to show that his films don't have a particularly strong cohesion in terms of either the parameters of his own involvement, but even more importantly in terms of the larger crew.

Reddit is funky with tables so I note only a few core categories below. I've left an empty row at the point that the series swapped hands to Disney, and also tried to keep tabs with the overall runtime (sans credits):

So not only had Lucas - in spite of his association with the series - only directed four films and principally wrote five, but he did so increasingly with different people all around. If we had room to go deeper, the discontinuity becomes even more apparent: by hiring Shushitzky for The Empire Strikes Back, we effectivelly have a completely different camera crew with a new gaffer and grip. By Return of the Jedi, we chang DP and gaffer yet again, as well as bringing in new editors (although Marcia also pitched in), a new art director and a new costume designer.

By the prequel trilogy, George Lucas returned to write and direct, but except for Ben Burrt, John Williams and Dennis Muren it was a new crew, and while they stuck through the trilogy except for the sound department they didn't work on the animated films. After selling the entire enterprise to Disney, there was an attempt to pull a lot of the same people for The Force Awakens: Kasdan writing and Burrt doing the sound, most notably, but it was mostly Abrams' film. Much of his crew - but not all - returned to The Rise of Skywalker, but didn't work on The Last Jedi, nor on the spinoffs.

I chose to focus on theatrically-released feature films: getting into TV films like the Ewok films would not only fail to make the series come across any better, but it would also not allow us to do an apples-to-apples comparison with the other series we explore. This, in spite of the fact that those TV films are actually as much part of Lucas' oeuvre as The Empire Strikes Back had been.

These changes help explain why the films don't, ultimately, cohere particularly well as a "unit". Not just because of any quirks of plot continuity, changes in scope of ambition and visuals, but stylistically as well. This is not always a bad thing: The Empire Strikes Back is a lot BETTER than Star Wars, but it also feels very different, because it has a different director and different writer. Even if the plot congeals between it and its predecessor - which I never felt was the case - we can sense that a different hand is guiding us through the piece.

Indiana Jones is somewhat more cohesive, with four out of five films having all been directed by Steven Spielberg, produced by Frank Marshall and had a story co-written by George Lucas. I actually think that's partially why it hadn't had much longevity beyond those four films: it's too associated with Spielberg for anyone else to step in and not just do a pale imitation. But even within the Spielberg entries there's still a lot of variation, perhaps made more understandable given the more episodic nature of the series:

Harry Potter hits even nearer the mark, with a staggering seven-movie directorial run from David Yates, eight-movie run from writer Steve Kloves, and all of it produced by David Heyman and author JK Rowling. Still there are big variations here: even Yates had neither originated the Potter films nor had the opportunity to bring the Fantastic Beasts films to a close. Here, too, the changes are not always to the worse: Azkaban is a lot better than Chamber of Secrets, but it also represents a huge stylistic departure from the preceding film.

Rather, the most remarkable example takes us back to where we started. On his Tolkien productions, Peter Jackson had been especially keen to "draw the same people back again because they are the beating heart, they're the spirit of the film." The number of films is smaller than in the Star Wars and Harry Potter examples, but in terms of volume - screentime and plot incident - it's almost equivalent, and that's not even counting projects under the broader Tolkien "umbrella" - audiobooks, a whole slew of video games and the first season of Rings of Power - that much of this crew worked on.

A very rudimentary table - going into more depth across the various departments would show an even greater unity but is beyond the scope of a Reddit post - shows how much the same people are still onboard all those years later.

There are examples like the Nolan Batmans (the less is said for any attempt to do a great DC series the better) or Villenueve Dune films, but those are much shorter film series. There would have been no room here to include the Marvel films and while some filmmakers got a run at two or three Marvel movies, on the whole they wouldn't have fared well in this study.

Nevertheless, it is significant that a Marvel "style" had emerged which is fairly consistent across the various films. But where other film series strive for continuity at the higher common denominator and fall short, Marvel instead achieves stylistic continuity at the cost of dumbing everyone's films down into a kind of made-for-TV action-comedy style.

I think this sort crew retention (which is to say nothing of the cast), to the varying extent that we've explored today, with the last example being the most extreme, is what distinguishes a film series - a group of people deciding to make multiple entries on a single subject - from a franchise.

Again, Jackson has the quote: "The studio decides what the latest, greatest 'franchise' or fad is, and they market, they shape the films and they hire filmmakers." By the very nature that the studio (e.g. Marvel) or a willfull producer (the Broccolis for Bond) remains a constant and the filmmaking team changes from entry to entry, any sense of creative authorship is lost.

However, by the same token, even if the series retains the same captain but with a different crew of shipmates, it's never going to sail in quite the same way. But if the same entire pool of people are making the films start to finish, that is not the case. This gives film series - provided they answer the other critieria for a succesfull series - an artistic merit that's not inherently any lesser than any one-film endeavour.

It took me 14 years to work up the courage to finally sit down and watch Melancholia. As someone who has suffered on and off from depression over the years, I always wanted to view it but I knew from the outset it would be a slog. It was playing in theatres near me, so I finally went to see it, and boy am I glad it did.

First off, criticisms of the movie are valid. I'm not saying people are wrong. However, there is a clear link between the film and experience of depression/anxiety, and if a viewer either has no experience with it or empathy, they will likely despise this film, calling it "self indulgent" or questioning the characters motives, saying they don't make sense.

I see criticisms about the first act more than the second. "How could she act so selfish?" "Why doesn't she just not marry him?" "How could she fuck that guy!?"

What's ironic about this criticism is that it's playing in to exactly what LVT is criticsing about how others treat those who are depressed. To them, its a selfish person engaging in self-indulgent acts against the better interest of both themselves and others, because it's an invisible disease. He portrays it so realistically from an outsiders perspective that we never really get to peer in to how Dunst truly is feeling, just how she is observed from the outside, and for that I truly believe it's a rorschach test on the viewer.

Similar to how people react to the length. It pulls you in to the depressive feeling. A long, disjointed scene, where you don't really understand the time or space you're in... it's exactly how depression feels. It's a painful experience, and if you can't relate to it, you're not going to appreciate it.

The rest of the movie is pretty self explanatory, so I won't go in to too much detail, but I do love the separation between the sisters and how each of their mental illness shows up as they react to events around them.

Curious to know your thoughts.