I think you give the film too much praise. It was nothing more than a decent movie with excellent performances. I love, love, love what the film tries to do. I love, love, love that it’s not yet another super-hero franchise movie. In terms of what the movie delivers it deserves no more than a single love. It was good above average fare. I suspect the recognition this movie is getting is somehow indicative of how little we expect from Hollywood these days.
Good point!
I liked liked liked 
the experience of watching a film that I had no idea where it was going. It was working its own agenda, and we weren’t privy to it until the end.
I mean, I like Thor and Justice League and their kind, but it isn’t like it’s hard to know where the film is going. The details may change, may be well done or poorly realized, but the destination is clear.
In* TBoE,M*, you didn’t know if it was going to be a revenge film, a redemption film, a Big Conspiracy film, or whether justice would be served (on any character) at all. You couldn’t even be sure the film had clear cut “good guys” and “bad guys”, or whether or not there even would be closure on any of the issues.
This alone kept me interested and on the (figurative) edge of my seat. The fact that the film didn’t suck when it got to the end was a big plus, and I think is part of the point you are making. We don’t see enough non-formulaic good movies any more. Enough clever/smart movies.
Golden Globe Awards
Best Motion Picture - Drama
Surprised more than anything, movies I enjoy rarely do this well. Doesn’t mean much for the Oscars, but if this puts butts in the seats and gets more of these stories made into films, this is a good thing.
Best Screenplay - Motion Picture - Martin McDonagh
Quality screenwriting. I wrote of a “coming wave of writer/directors that can pick and choose cast and crew (that) are going to save Hollywood” and McDonagh is the type I’m talking about. The down side is that Hollywood tends to focus all its investment on past performance: A terrible investment strategy that may now benefit McDonagh, but certainly won’t save Hollywood on its own.
Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Drama - Frances McDormand
The irony isn’t lost on me that this year’s Golden Globe best actress for this film famously slept with the director and producer of her first film. AFAIK she’s still sleeping with him 34 years later. Also ironic is now typing with a battered and bruised shoulder received when I first made this observation. Not her best performance IMO, thought it could have been played differently, but the role itself was inspirational and politic.
Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in any Motion Picture - Sam Rockwell
More surprise, about damn time, maybe the eunoia award is starting to mean something.
As an afterthought: Or maybe I’m just getting closer to the average age of the dinosaurs that actually vote for these things.
My wife and I went to see this Saturday night, not knowing it was nominated for a GG (we don’t see many movies in the theater), and the next night it won. It was our first movie in the theater since last year’s Moonlight, which won the BP Oscar the next night. I think we’re getting good at this.
What’s an “eunoia award”? I’m stumped.
Movies he enjoys.
D’oh!:smack:
Odd side effect of the Golden Globes: there are actually people complaining about Sam Rockwell’s award on the grounds that his character was a racist.
Since when is voting on an actor’s performance supposed to take into account the qualities of the person he plays? Should Carroll O’Connor lose his Emmy awards because Archie Bunker was a bigot? Should Anthony Hopkins lose his Oscar on the grounds that Dr. Lecter was evil?
Hey, you were just asking a question.
That’s one of the stupidest things I’ve ever read. Do people not have enough real problems in the world?
You’re kidding. I’m biased because he’s my absolutely favorite actor and I was ecstatic that he won, but man, his character had an arc and did actually learn something and become something more. He (surprisingly, actually) took the letter about love to heart and changed. That’s something to celebrate.
I liked the movie a lot, especially because of Sam Rockwell and also Woody Harrelson’s performance, but do see the flaws. The girlfriend was funny but a cartoon character and even Sam Rockwell’s character was a cartoon for a while.
I had someone say on another message board that Woody Harrelson’s character
raped his wife on the “last day”, since he took her hand, and she said “we are not doing this” and he said “we are”.
File that one under “stupid liberal idea of the day.”
Even though later that night she
thanked him for the fuck
and
complimented his cock?
I just watched the trailer and I think I will like this film.
Someone told me it was very strange, particularly with an ending that doesn’t go as expected, which made me think it might be a structural mess, but maybe the structure is not the point.
I think this film is brilliant. I wouldn’t call it a structural mess at all. It just doesn’t wrap it all up, neat and tidy.
Word of caution: The trailers made me think comedy. It’s not. (Part of that may have been my fault since I was expecting something like Seven Psychopaths or In Bruges.) It very definitely drama and dark at that. There are some light moments, but it ain’t comedy.
It’s not a structural mess, it just isn’t structured like a modern mainstream film. Characters don’t always behave like we expect movie characters to behave, and people aren’t always the one-dimension people they first appear to be. Characters who you might think are going to be important sometimes aren’t. And the ending could be termed “unsatisfying”.
I’m not trying to say it’s a genius film, or “only smart people can like this film”, or my “fav” putdown “it doesn’t have explosions so you won’t like it.” It’s not inherently better, but it is different. One could make an argument that the ending is a cop out (so to speak), but, I think it works.
For those that like this kind of film, this is the kind of film they like.
I think it’s going to be hard to watch, but I still want to try. I got my husband interested based on the trailer.
It’s actually not that hard to watch, not in the same sense Rabbit Hole is, for example.