As far as Duke can tell, Andi is alive and on the island. His first reaction would be confusion.
But he instantly determines that:
Duke is not shocked that Andi is dead and that Miles killed her.
From the screenplay:
If the target is people that think destroying a centuries-old masterwork beloved by the world that with proper curation could survive many centuries more isn’t funny, then I wear that badge as a code of honor. If you are in the group that believe destroying a world heritage work of art is a perfectly cromulent way for the poor to stick it to the rich–well, that honestly doesn’t suprise me remotely.
Edit: never mind
And I stand by it without hesitation or regret. I’d say the same thing about some mayfly destroying Starry Night, or the Parthenon, or the pyramids of Giza, or any other of the great world works of art.
I just rewatched that scene. He didn’t figure it out instantly. You see him look at his phone and he does look genuinely confused. He kinda wanders over to the corner and is off screen for a bit while the other characters are talking. Then he turns around and has a big smile on his face because he figured it out on that time he was off screen.
Did anyone know that Andi had a twin?
Yeah, Kate Hudson said Andi told them about her.
Technically, it’s a way for a woman to ‘stick it to’ the rich guy who stole everything he had from her sister, then murdered her sister to cover it up, then murdered another guy to cover that up, and tried to murder HER, and was almost certainly going to get away with all of it to live a life of dimwitted luxury.
If anyone’s to blame, it’s the Louvre for loaning a world heritage work of art to a narcissistic billionaire.
And not even that–the rich guy is then getting ready to push out a technology that’s going to kill more people, unless she can demonstrate to the world how harmful it is in a way that he can’t cover up with his massive wealth and power.
If a person’s response to “Sometimes you gotta burn it all down” is “murder is one thing, but setting a work of art on fire is too far,” the movie is unsympathetic.
Yeah. Honestly, i am also in the camp that destroying a major work of art is a crime against all of us. But Andi wasn’t just doing it out of revenue, or even to save her life. She was doing it so Klear didn’t burn down a big chunk of civilization. It was about to be pumped into a lot of homes and onto a space mission. “Why your sister walked away” wasn’t to hurt the shitheads, it was because she didn’t want Miles to bring down the world.
The thing is, Helen’s strategy only works if the above responses are the norm. Miles’ reputation is going to be destroyed because Miles put the Mona Lisa in a building filled with leaky hydrogen and then installed an override on the security system just for giggles and people will be utterly outraged at that.
Miles can get away with mere murder. He can suborn witnesses and pay for incredible lawyers and probably have a jury eating out of his hand because he’s seen as such a genius*. Even if he was convicted you’d still have a bunch of fanboys and probably politicians saying he was basically right and he’d become some kind of martyr for tedious anti-woke techbros.
He can’t get away with being responsible for losing the Mona Lisa, because setting a work of art on fire really is too far.
The less it matters that the Mona Lisa has been incinerated, the less effective Helen’s attack on Miles is.
That’s inside the world of the movie. From the outside, the film is OTT, satirical and contrived (and I mean that in a good way). It sets up a situation where destroying the Mona Lisa is (arguably) the right and moral thing to do. That is an outlandish and implausible situation by any definition. But it’s also an incredibly powerful story precisely because it’s so OTT. Destroying the Mona Lisa is an irrevocably drastic act, and it should alarm and challenge the audience. “Look” the film is saying (to me, anyhow), “this is how far you need to go. This is what it takes.” If you’re not a little shocked at the idea it’s worth destroying great art to overthrow the system, then you are Tyler Durden** and I claim my five pounds.
*Remember when a jury decided that literally calling someone a “pedo guy” wasn’t defamatory? The purpose of a system is what it does.
**In their inability to cope with the restrictions of society, their quest for unsullied truth and their encouragement of others to commit violent acts of iconoclasm, Benoit Blanc and Tyler Durden reveal themselves as different aspects of a nihilistic backlash against late capitalism. In this essay I will…a single shot rings out
You really are killing this thread.
To be clear, I’m not saying it’s hunky dory to burn a work of art: it’s appalling. But the viewer should be shocked, and then stop to think about why that, and not murder, is so shocking.
I’m reminded of a few decades ago when the Taliban was dynamiting ancient statues of Buddha. I mentioned to a friend that it was this irrevocable act that was more disturbing to me than anything else they’d done, because once these statues were gone, they were gone forever. My friend responded, in so many words, “What the hell is wrong with you? When they stone women to death, those women are gone forever too. Statues are just art, and blowing them up is never as bad as murdering a single person.”
Their criticism stuck with me and was obviously intellectually sound; but it took years for my emotional response to catch up.
This movie sets up a similar moral conflict, and if it gets people to question why they’re valuing a work of art more highly than a human life, well done.
(And add my voice to the chorus of praise: I love your insights into this movie!)
(Thanks for the kind words both)
This is an excellent real-life example of how we react to the destruction of art (and I was guilty of the same emotional response). Part of that of course is novelty. In both murder stories and real life, we are not shocked and indeed expect murders to happen. They’re part of the way things are, part of the system if you like. But destruction of art is abnormal and has the shock of the new and unexpected. (Shades of Nolan’s Joker speech about how soldiers are meant to die violently but important men in suits are not, if we’re adding to our “early 21st century commercially packaged avatars of nihilism” list).
But yes, beyond that shock, you do have to think about what, exactly, you value. In part, Andi is valueing the Mona Lisa against not her sister’s life, but against Justice. (Or retribution if you’re being uncharitable.) Yes, she’s also saving lives by sabotaging Klear (as you and @puzzlegal point out) but a big part of her motivation (which may have been sufficient?) is to destroy Miles’ impunity.
I admit, I find it easy to justify Helen’s actions if they save lives. If it was just about obtaining justice for someone who was already dead I probably agree she was right but I’m a lot less confident.
I don’t think I’d agree, if it were only about justice, but I tend to have a pretty jaundiced view of justice and think it’s on far too cordial a relationship with vengeance. If all she’s doing is aiming for justice for her sister, I don’t think it’s a fair trade.
But it’s a completely understandable trade. Her twin was murdered, and the smirking idiot who murdered her is smirking at her and saying, “Not only will I get away with murder, but I’ll get away with stealing her glory and memory, because I have all the power and you have none.” It’s a situation calculated to drive her into a hellraising fury, and her actions, even if not morally justified, are completely understandable.
Even though we all knew something terrible was going to happen to the painting, my brain basically did a security-system whoooosh-thunk! to protect my suspension of disbelief once Helen decided to burn it.
And you’re right:
We view the murders of Duke and Andi and the attempted murder of Helen with a typical “hey, this is what happens in movies.”
So if Darren felt so much visceral shock that he “desperately” wanted to see Helen murdered on screen, it’s hard to see how that’s anything but an unqualified success. Darren, how often do movies elicit that sort of reaction in you? Hell, priceless art is destroyed in movies all the time. How often do you feel that strongly about it?
Is it clear (heh) how much Helen understands the dangers of Klear? Didn’t they do an exposition dump about it during the final confrontation? The addition of a potential apocalypse provides justification for Helen’s terrible act but, given your excellent analysis, weakens the ultimate message.
Also, did anybody get Cat’s Cradle vibes when they showed us Klear?
She had her sister’s journals. They explained everything about Klear.
As a counter-point, the Taliban weren’t just destroying those statues because they didn’t like the art, they did it because they didn’t like the ideas behind the art. The point wasn’t to destroy the statues, it was to destroy the religion that created them, to destroy an idea, and a whole culture built on that idea.
That they were ineffective in the larger goal doesn’t alter what their goal was.
And that’s why that particular example was so heinous. Just burning the Mona Lisa to entrap an asshole pales in comparison.
That’s right. 