|
I spent the whole third act looking at the background expecting Jerry O'Connell and John Rhys-Davies to tumble out of a portal into this horrible world where the Lifetime channel was founded by MRAs. I kept telling myself "no way is the movie going to go this direction" and yet it kept diving under my worst expectations over and over again with every turn. It'd be fine if it were just an over the top silly movie, but its also deeply insulting in some of its implications, so gently caress this movie.
|
#
¿
Oct 5, 2014 00:07
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 27, 2024 12:20 |
|
|
Wandle Cax posted:It's so expected and yet still so depressing that the movie is attracting so many posts like this. Do you not have the ability to think for yourself? Where do you think I'm getting my opinion of this film from? I went and saw it because A)its fincher and B) the reviews were trending towards very positive, I came out thinking I must be insane because no movie had repulsed me remotely like this in a long time, and nothing in this thread comes even close to swaying me. Do you have a compelling defense for the film? It would be nice if someone presented one, especially since it sounds like I must be way off base here. I've read through the thread and it seems to be divided into two camps: those who have a similar opinion to me and those who feel like the characters were balanced in their respective failings, which even if you believe that, is no excuse for the film's prodigious use of mra memes. Come on off your high horse and make a case.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 5, 2014 04:45
|
|
|
sethsez posted:It's a bit bizarre to tell someone to come off their high horse and make a case when you haven't bothered to do so yourself. Say what you don't like about the movie ("MRA meme" does not constitute a full argument, at least be specific) so people have something to respond to, rather than just reiterating your disgust over and over. He accused me of having an unoriginal opinion so I didn't think it needed to be detailed out, especially considering I'm showing up on page four and that complaint has already been brought up with specific examples. I'll do it anyway: Memes include: False rape accusations Using a fake pregnancy as leverage Using a man's semen without his permission to get pregnant (personal fav) Men can't get custody in divorce settlements The media always sides with the woman These are all used to make Pike's character into the psycho-stare cartoon villain wife/girlfriend that misogynists are terrified of. That's the aspect of the film I find revolting. She is the bad guy, and the shittiness of Afflek's character can't hope to tip the scales away from that fact. The film somberly shows us that she has ruined peoples lives on a whim. Where is her motivation? Can we believe the old boyfriends fake rape story? Not sure, but its hard to doubt when she does exactly that to Harris' character. Again, like Afflek, Harris' character is a lovely creep, but he's such a loving cartoon too that it really feels like the film is punching down when she kills him, its ducks in a barrel. She is more often motivated by the requirements of the plot than what we get to see on screen. We're told in flashbacks, often narrated by the made-up diary, the reasons why Afflek's character is a bad husband in Amy's eyes. The trouble with this is that the diary was written to discredit him. Its not that I don't believe he's a lovely guy, sure he is, but the framing device throws most of the concrete evidence completely off, its a lovely way of presenting the story, and the only reason its done this way is to preserve mystery. edit: FourLeaf posted:Read my earlier post. It doesn't fit into either of your categories. Also Megasabin's posts. You ask: is it possible to write a female villain without it being misogynistic? Of course it is. Using all those memes I listed above is the exact opposite path towards that. I don't understand what you think is feminist about her or the film. Afflek's failings as depicted in the film are failings that both sexes often have in a relationship, while her plots are the kinds of hyperbolic made up poo poo that men who are afraid of women talk in hushed whispers about. MANIFEST DESTINY fucked around with this message at 05:56 on Oct 5, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Oct 5, 2014 05:47
|
|
|
CortezFantastic posted:I know it must be hard for people like you to understand, but people that subscribe to that poo poo are going to regardless. Most people walk going wow those hosed up characters made for an enjoyable film! Its not hard for me to understand, actually the whole reason it bothers me is that people see it and absorb it into their already twisted set of prejudices. Manifesting Amy's villainy in poo poo like using a secret sperm stash to trap him with her pregnancy is like writing a muslim villain with a giant turban running around with a bunch of Acme dynamite strapped to his chest. Amy doesn't just take a bunch of random bad deeds out of the grab-bag, every action she takes is very specifically something that men who hate women say that women do. She's not a real human being for us to diagnose, she's a textual element of the film and they chose all her methods. I personally thought the message conveyed by those choices was pretty clear.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 5, 2014 06:19
|
|
|
Bip Roberts posted:Do you only enjoy media that's impossible to misinterpret? I'm saying that the correct interpretation of the film is that Amy is a misogynist's cartoon. She's a literal tour of things that misogynists think women do. I wish there was another way of interpreting it, but all I have is her actions in the text. CortezFantastic posted:I'll indulge you. At one point I thought wow they are hitting all the tropes but then I remembered I can distinguish fiction from reality. Sorry this movie bummed you out. What are you trying to say here? The fact that it is fiction is exactly the problem. Someone chose that the bad guy would do these things, and they chose them for a specific reason. MANIFEST DESTINY fucked around with this message at 06:37 on Oct 5, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Oct 5, 2014 06:35
|
|
|
If that's the joke what's the punchline? What are we supposed to take away from the construction of the worst possible woman? That's what I failed to find in this, the conclusion is pretty much 'and she ruins his life but who cares because he sucks, the end.'
|
|
#
¿
Oct 5, 2014 07:47
|
|
|
Lil Mama Im Sorry posted:The main themes of the movie are deceit, manipulation, and control-- and in the third act love-- and with all the unreliable narration and characters, not to mention the not-so-subtle dialogue about bending and shaping an audiences' perception, I don't understand how you could take a surface level reading of the film's "misogyny" without seeing that it's just a facade probably meant to make you feel some type of way. There's a lot more going on with these characters if you don't get caught up in the "hey, in this hand I have false rape accusations," and miss what's happening in the other hand. Saying that Amy is a misogynistic caricature isn't my reading of the film, its just a statement about the character. Of course, the themes of the film are "deceit, manipulation, and control", Amy's character embodies all of those in the worst way. Not sure I agree with you that love shows up in the third act. What more is going on with the characters that I'm not seeing? The amount of screen time devoted to them interacting where its not a false flashback is pretty limited, and the vast majority of the film is devoted to unraveling Amy's machinations. There's not much you can get out of interactions with an insane person, it never speaks to real world relationships because everything we see of them is either A)Amy's fictionalized history or B)Amy enacting her crazy schemes. What is the film saying about relationships? Is it not outshined by the blinding supernova of Amy's psychosis? Maybe they should have toned that down...a lot? mkay0 posted:My interpretation of the ending- That it's absurd to think the woman doing these things could actually exist, unless she were mentally ill. Our protagonist, another caricature, the beta male, has to put up with it. Yeah, it is absurd to think such a character would exist, and I don't think anyone is confused about the fact that she's the villain. If you're confused about why people would still have a problem with it, try and imagine a film where the villain is a racist caricature, pick whatever race you want and imagine that all the evil deeds they do are based specifically on the things that racists say about that group. Would anyone get away with making such a film? Doubtful, unless it was a full on satire and even then you have issues. Is this film a satire? People in this thread have said so but without satisfactorily saying what exactly its meant to satire. You could see it as a full on exploitation style film where we're just meant to bask in the character out of a misogynist's worst nightmare, but if that were the case why aren't we given anything approaching sympathy for Amy? It can't be a revenge film if the film establishes she's evil from the start. What I keep saying here is that the film has all the hallmarks in its over the top nature of some kind of parody, but I just can't pin down what its trying to point at. It would make sense if Afflek's character hated women like his father and Amy, after being long subjected to it, internalizes that and explodes in this kind of revenge, but the film never presents any of that, instead it actively undermines the history of the characters by establishing it as a falsification. MANIFEST DESTINY fucked around with this message at 16:47 on Oct 5, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Oct 5, 2014 16:30
|
|
|
Yeah, I read it. So if she's JUST a villain wielding misogynist tropes, how does that make it any better? Its a non-defense. Its making the mistake of talking about a fictional character as if they're real, and not the author's construction. Yes, as she says, its interesting to see a character turn around what has been projected upon them, but unfortunately we don't see enough projected upon Amy in the film. If anything, it should have been a film about her taking revenge on her parents. She says this, too: quote:Her violence, her anger is a very female form, and that’s what I’ve always been interested in portraying, from Sharp Objects on, is the particularly female brand of psychological violence, which is very different from a male, and scarier, I think, often. Which I find pretty telling, in terms of the authors perspective. MANIFEST DESTINY fucked around with this message at 17:45 on Oct 5, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Oct 5, 2014 17:42
|
|
|
FourLeaf posted:So if you've seen it, do you also have a problem with Do The Right Thing? Because it basically does everything you're saying for black people instead of women. It includes all sorts of negative stereotypes racists say about black people, and all you have to do is find the clips of it on YouTube to see people using it to justify their racism. So what was the point of that movie? Is Spike Lee just racist? Or is there something that makes it different from, say, The Birth of a Nation? Its been over a decade since I've seen it so I really can't address that, I'm pretty sure he doesn't force them all onto one character and make them into the villain though. Its totally valid to incorporate those elements into a book or a film if the purpose is forcing the audience to confront them, to comment on them, to show them from another perspective. Flynn seems to be saying she's using the tropes because they make for a fun pulp villain, so it doesn't sit right with me. Just recently the news was plastered with a woman apologizing for "her role in" getting knocked unconscious in an elevator, so then when Fincher puts out a film whose super villain is a woman with the extraordinary power to fake abuse it leaves a bad taste.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 5, 2014 19:39
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 27, 2024 12:20 |
|
|
LividLiquid posted:all of the other women in the film are fully-realized characters. All of them? I think the best female character in the film is Greta(? I think that was the name, the one who robs Amy), she's obviously multifaceted, and completely believable. The sister is fine, but she doesn't get a whole lot to do despite her screen time, she's there for Afflek to bounce his thoughts off of. The detective is the obvious choice but if you replaced her with a male actor I don't think you'd have to change a single line... not that that is inherently a bad way to write a female character, especially in that role, but its neutral territory outside of the subtext of the FBI scene towards the end. Then you have a whole slew of lovely one dimensional female characters, with very different roles but all very dumb: the Nancy Grace stand-in, the college girlfriend, the groupie type that takes a selfie with Afflek, the idiot neighbor, etc. Besides that there's just Amy's mother who is simply required to stand around and seem cold and rich.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 6, 2014 22:15
|
|