The Films of 2021
-
domino harvey
- Dot Com Dom
- Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 2:42 pm
Re: The Films of 2021
I enjoyed Belle too, though not as much as the two of you. I think it has a lot of problems and tonal shifts and narrative conveniences and confusing elisions (what's up with the fairy godmothers?) and every facet of the plot strains credibility way past breaking, even for a fantasy like this. But it also has some terrific large-scale set pieces involving the titular musician, and I certainly didn't expect the film to end with a Breakfast at Tiffany's riff. I don't know, it won me over as it went on, but between this and Ready Player One and the actual MetaVerse, every "open world" VR universe seems to have the same limited ideas and barriers when these new worlds literally have access to anything
-
Mr Sausage
- Joined: Wed Nov 03, 2004 9:02 pm
- Location: Canada
Re: The Films of 2021
The Novice (Lauren Hadaway)
Anyone remember that dumb Sean Astin sports movie, Rudy? The one where a terminally mediocre football player decides to apply a psychotic level of commitment to the game, and the movie rewards him for it with a tidy bit of luck at the end to make it seem as tho' it were worth it? I always hated that movie. Not only because, to any right thinking person, it's a fantasy that seems to celebrate sysiphean irrationality, but because they showed it to us in social studies in grade 12(?), and the trite didactic point behind that irked me.
So here's a wonderful corrective, The Novice, a movie that understands the exact psychological and physiological costs of the kind of obsessive, irrational commitment that Rudy tried to celebrate. Isabelle Fuhrman, the titular orphan from the horror series of the same name, is a college freshman named Alex who, for reasons she cannot articulate, joins the rowing team and becomes consumed with the activity to the point of total collapse. The film offers no explanations: it doesn't psychologize, or apply sociology, ideology, or any broader narrative form to give a wider shape to what's happening or ground it in ready-made concepts. What it does it send you deep into the subjective experience of insistent, driving obsession whose sheer will to control increasingly implies a total lack of it. The visual style is expressive and subjective; it renders the world from its main character's eyes, a world often drowned out or distorted by her monomania, often in subtle but occasionally unsubtle ways (this movie has one of the best and most oddly unsettling uses of rack focus I've ever seen in a movie). The movie focuses on what Alex sees and how she sees it, sticking closely to her point of view. But the filmmakers are clever: they avoid the temptation to make a closed system, where the only values in the film are the ones of the subject. Alex's experience dominates the film, but it gets punctured every so often, so we get a chance to see outside her subjectivity to appreciate what she, and by extension we the audience, have been missing, or even what Alex has kept hidden. That is, we see very clearly and in depth how Alex views herself and others, but we are not forced to share those same feelings and values out of a lack of anything else to hold on to.
This is a worrying, sometimes harrowing experience; you watch, helpless, as someone drives themselves into unhealth for reasons they cannot begin to acknowledge, and that you as an audience member can hardly begin to unpack. And, again, there is no explanation offered beyond a few hints and suggestions, and you are otherwise left free to wonder at the unknowable depths of another person's brain. This is not exactly a horror movie, but it does share something with movies like May and In My Skin, movies that treat worrying and unhealthy subjectivities as they collapse into themselves in distressing ways. The Novice is less horrific than either of those two, but shares their commitment to empathizing with difficult and unknowable psychological states shared by characters who are often unsympathetic, but who you come to know deeply and worry for. And, like both, it has a powerful central performance, one that anchors the entire movie and never falters amid the difficult and complex emotions on display. I hope Fuhrman continues to get interesting and intense roles like this. This is as affecting a movie I've seen in a while. It's carefully made, with often subtle, detailed storytelling that rewards rewatching (later context illuminates earlier actions that I thought nothing of at the time).
Anyone remember that dumb Sean Astin sports movie, Rudy? The one where a terminally mediocre football player decides to apply a psychotic level of commitment to the game, and the movie rewards him for it with a tidy bit of luck at the end to make it seem as tho' it were worth it? I always hated that movie. Not only because, to any right thinking person, it's a fantasy that seems to celebrate sysiphean irrationality, but because they showed it to us in social studies in grade 12(?), and the trite didactic point behind that irked me.
So here's a wonderful corrective, The Novice, a movie that understands the exact psychological and physiological costs of the kind of obsessive, irrational commitment that Rudy tried to celebrate. Isabelle Fuhrman, the titular orphan from the horror series of the same name, is a college freshman named Alex who, for reasons she cannot articulate, joins the rowing team and becomes consumed with the activity to the point of total collapse. The film offers no explanations: it doesn't psychologize, or apply sociology, ideology, or any broader narrative form to give a wider shape to what's happening or ground it in ready-made concepts. What it does it send you deep into the subjective experience of insistent, driving obsession whose sheer will to control increasingly implies a total lack of it. The visual style is expressive and subjective; it renders the world from its main character's eyes, a world often drowned out or distorted by her monomania, often in subtle but occasionally unsubtle ways (this movie has one of the best and most oddly unsettling uses of rack focus I've ever seen in a movie). The movie focuses on what Alex sees and how she sees it, sticking closely to her point of view. But the filmmakers are clever: they avoid the temptation to make a closed system, where the only values in the film are the ones of the subject. Alex's experience dominates the film, but it gets punctured every so often, so we get a chance to see outside her subjectivity to appreciate what she, and by extension we the audience, have been missing, or even what Alex has kept hidden. That is, we see very clearly and in depth how Alex views herself and others, but we are not forced to share those same feelings and values out of a lack of anything else to hold on to.
This is a worrying, sometimes harrowing experience; you watch, helpless, as someone drives themselves into unhealth for reasons they cannot begin to acknowledge, and that you as an audience member can hardly begin to unpack. And, again, there is no explanation offered beyond a few hints and suggestions, and you are otherwise left free to wonder at the unknowable depths of another person's brain. This is not exactly a horror movie, but it does share something with movies like May and In My Skin, movies that treat worrying and unhealthy subjectivities as they collapse into themselves in distressing ways. The Novice is less horrific than either of those two, but shares their commitment to empathizing with difficult and unknowable psychological states shared by characters who are often unsympathetic, but who you come to know deeply and worry for. And, like both, it has a powerful central performance, one that anchors the entire movie and never falters amid the difficult and complex emotions on display. I hope Fuhrman continues to get interesting and intense roles like this. This is as affecting a movie I've seen in a while. It's carefully made, with often subtle, detailed storytelling that rewards rewatching (later context illuminates earlier actions that I thought nothing of at the time).