My blunt response was a strike back at you for giving such a dreadful reply.
The problem is that I don't see anything so great about its execution that it would redeem whatever flaws it has. Sure, I liked the film a lot, but in overall it doesn't offer anything quite like 2001 or Eureka. It draws attention to the characters because it delves into the effects of the war on them.
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"I'd really like to have as much money as you have, Oz" - robersora
"No you wouldn't. Oz's secret is he goes without food to buy that stuff. He hasn't eaten in years." - Brikhaus
"Often I get the feeling that deep down, your little girl is struggling with your embrace of filmfaggotry and your loldeep fixations, and the conflict that arises from such a contradiction is embodied pretty well in Kureha's character. But obviously it's not any sort of internal conflict that makes the analogy work. It's the pigtails." - Merridian
"Oh, Oz, I fear I'm losing my filmfag to the depths of Japanese pop. If only there were more films with Japanese girls in glow-in-the-dark costumes you'd be the David Bordwell of that genre." - Jimbo
"Oz, I think we need to stage an intervention and force you to watch some movies that aren't made in Japan." - Trajan
"No you wouldn't. Oz's secret is he goes without food to buy that stuff. He hasn't eaten in years." - Brikhaus
"Often I get the feeling that deep down, your little girl is struggling with your embrace of filmfaggotry and your loldeep fixations, and the conflict that arises from such a contradiction is embodied pretty well in Kureha's character. But obviously it's not any sort of internal conflict that makes the analogy work. It's the pigtails." - Merridian
"Oh, Oz, I fear I'm losing my filmfag to the depths of Japanese pop. If only there were more films with Japanese girls in glow-in-the-dark costumes you'd be the David Bordwell of that genre." - Jimbo
"Oz, I think we need to stage an intervention and force you to watch some movies that aren't made in Japan." - Trajan
- Eva Yojimbo
- Redbeard
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- Joined: Feb 17, 2007
- Location: Somewhere Over the Rainbo
- Gender: Male
Sorry, that was me channeling my inner Xard.Oz wrote:My blunt response was a strike back at you for giving such a dreadful reply.
All I can really say is that if you filmgasmed over Malick's cinematography and tones like I and a lot of critics do then you probably wouldn't give a flip about the characters and story, like most Malick fans don't. I don't think it ever draws attentions to its characters as individualized characters. They're archetypal mouthpieces that are never given to much detailing, or don't really drive the conflict, drama, or pacing in general. But I figured this out by watching Days of Heaven. Any director that cares about character/story/drama couldn't have made that film.
If you really want a lesson in how much Malick doesn't care for those aspects, watch Saving Private Ryan and compare the editing patterns and framing. In Spielberg's war film, everything is cut around the emotions/feelings of the characters in a typical Fordian fashion, while in Malick it's the setting that dictates the rhythm, and that's further broken down using music, sound, and the voiceover dialogue. He has a habit of using that voiceover (in all his films) as a kind of, errr, tone-pointer that tells us what part of the compass his focus is pointed at, and it's always set to that elegiac mode that he drags everything back to.
Malick doesn't care about his characters because he really just cares about how he feels about things, so his characters just become either mouth puppets or cardboard stand-ins for him to use no differently than you would lighting or art-design ("models" as Bresson called his actors). If his focus was really with the characters then he does pretty much everything possible to de-emphasize their importance. The voiceover dialogue, the parts about the effects of war, could have come from any soldier, and I think that's the idea.
Cinelogue & Forced Perspective Cinema
^ Writing as Jonathan Henderson ^
We're all adrift on the stormy seas of Evangelion, desperately trying to gather what flotsam can be snatched from the gale into a somewhat seaworthy interpretation so that we can at last reach the shores of reason and respite. - ObsessiveMathsFreak
Jimbo has posted enough to be considered greater than or equal to everyone, and or synonymous with the concept of 'everyone'. - Muggy
I've seen so many changeful years, / to Earth I am a stranger grown: / I wander in the ways of men, / alike unknowing and unknown: / Unheard, unpitied, unrelieved, / I bear alone my load of care; / For silent, low, on beds of dust, / Lie all that would my sorrows share. - Robert Burns' Lament for James
^ Writing as Jonathan Henderson ^
We're all adrift on the stormy seas of Evangelion, desperately trying to gather what flotsam can be snatched from the gale into a somewhat seaworthy interpretation so that we can at last reach the shores of reason and respite. - ObsessiveMathsFreak
Jimbo has posted enough to be considered greater than or equal to everyone, and or synonymous with the concept of 'everyone'. - Muggy
I've seen so many changeful years, / to Earth I am a stranger grown: / I wander in the ways of men, / alike unknowing and unknown: / Unheard, unpitied, unrelieved, / I bear alone my load of care; / For silent, low, on beds of dust, / Lie all that would my sorrows share. - Robert Burns' Lament for James
^ I always find myself not sure about what to make of Thin Red Line. That movie is the farthest I can imagine when I think about a film about the Battle of Gundalcanal. Yojimbo's comments above is the closet I have seen that showed me how I should look at the film and why it is such a great achievement. This is the only film by Malick I have ever seen so I cannot compare it with other films from his output.
I never thought I would come back to Evangelion after EoE,
But I discovered Re-Take (or it found me?) and
now here I am.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka FAN FOREVER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
But I discovered Re-Take (or it found me?) and
now here I am.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka FAN FOREVER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- Eva Yojimbo
- Redbeard
- Age: 38
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- Joined: Feb 17, 2007
- Location: Somewhere Over the Rainbo
- Gender: Male
Thanks for the comment, symbv. Honestly, I don't think TTRL is the best film to start with Malick with. I saw it back when it came out, around the same time as Saving Private Ryan, actually, and I vastly preferred the latter, probably for all the reasons The Oscars and most viewers did. SPR is a much more traditional film in every sense of the word. Later when I developed a love for the visual aspects of cinema and photography I came back to Malick and was blown away by Days of Heaven. To me, that's the perfect distillation of what Malick is about. I swear if it were possible I'd wrap myself in the visuals of that film like a blanket and never leave. But then there's other side for people that walk away and dub it "Wheat: The Movie", and for those I'd simply say "Malick isn't for you".
After seeing Days of Heaven I came back to TTRL and gave it a 10, and it's currently my favorite Malick and one of my favorites ever. I think once you've seen Days of Heaven then what Malick does (or attempts) in TTRL makes much more sense because you get where he's coming from. FWIW, I just loved that approach in the context of a "war" film, because it's definitely the kind of war film that's never been done before. What war film muses on about the themes of man and nature in all its ugliness and beauty while really lingering on that theme aesthetically in the visuals and music all while practically avoiding the specific topic of war? Apocalypse Now is the only real analog, but there's very little beauty to be found in it (maybe a kind of hypnotic ugliness). Ultimately, It doesn't matter what he's making a film about because it's always going to come back to that same tone, atmosphere, aesthetic, and stunningly gorgeous cinematography.
Cinelogue & Forced Perspective Cinema
^ Writing as Jonathan Henderson ^
We're all adrift on the stormy seas of Evangelion, desperately trying to gather what flotsam can be snatched from the gale into a somewhat seaworthy interpretation so that we can at last reach the shores of reason and respite. - ObsessiveMathsFreak
Jimbo has posted enough to be considered greater than or equal to everyone, and or synonymous with the concept of 'everyone'. - Muggy
I've seen so many changeful years, / to Earth I am a stranger grown: / I wander in the ways of men, / alike unknowing and unknown: / Unheard, unpitied, unrelieved, / I bear alone my load of care; / For silent, low, on beds of dust, / Lie all that would my sorrows share. - Robert Burns' Lament for James
^ Writing as Jonathan Henderson ^
We're all adrift on the stormy seas of Evangelion, desperately trying to gather what flotsam can be snatched from the gale into a somewhat seaworthy interpretation so that we can at last reach the shores of reason and respite. - ObsessiveMathsFreak
Jimbo has posted enough to be considered greater than or equal to everyone, and or synonymous with the concept of 'everyone'. - Muggy
I've seen so many changeful years, / to Earth I am a stranger grown: / I wander in the ways of men, / alike unknowing and unknown: / Unheard, unpitied, unrelieved, / I bear alone my load of care; / For silent, low, on beds of dust, / Lie all that would my sorrows share. - Robert Burns' Lament for James
- FreakyFilmFan4ever
- (In)Sufficient Director
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^ It is interesting to find a blockbuster Hollywood movie to be based on a Korean manhwa (manga)
I never thought I would come back to Evangelion after EoE,
But I discovered Re-Take (or it found me?) and
now here I am.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka FAN FOREVER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
But I discovered Re-Take (or it found me?) and
now here I am.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka FAN FOREVER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lars von Trier, you have done it AGAIN.
Von Trier qualified that “I don’t mean I’m in favor of World War II and I’m not against Jews, not even Susanne Bier” before digging himself deeper. “In fact I’m very much in favor of them. All Jews. Well, Israel is a pain in the ass but…”
As Melancholia stars Kirsten Dunst and Charlotte Gainsbourg, sitting on either side of Von Trier, stared at him agog, the director paused.
“Now how can I get out of this sentence? Ok. I’m a Nazi.”
The Nazi comments came at the end of a sprawling routine in which Von Trier said his new movie “may be crap…there’s quite a big possibility that it might not be worth seeing” and mused that his next project with Dunst and Gainsbourg would be a 3 to 4 hour porn film “with lots of uncomfortable sex.”
"I'd really like to have as much money as you have, Oz" - robersora
"No you wouldn't. Oz's secret is he goes without food to buy that stuff. He hasn't eaten in years." - Brikhaus
"Often I get the feeling that deep down, your little girl is struggling with your embrace of filmfaggotry and your loldeep fixations, and the conflict that arises from such a contradiction is embodied pretty well in Kureha's character. But obviously it's not any sort of internal conflict that makes the analogy work. It's the pigtails." - Merridian
"Oh, Oz, I fear I'm losing my filmfag to the depths of Japanese pop. If only there were more films with Japanese girls in glow-in-the-dark costumes you'd be the David Bordwell of that genre." - Jimbo
"Oz, I think we need to stage an intervention and force you to watch some movies that aren't made in Japan." - Trajan
"No you wouldn't. Oz's secret is he goes without food to buy that stuff. He hasn't eaten in years." - Brikhaus
"Often I get the feeling that deep down, your little girl is struggling with your embrace of filmfaggotry and your loldeep fixations, and the conflict that arises from such a contradiction is embodied pretty well in Kureha's character. But obviously it's not any sort of internal conflict that makes the analogy work. It's the pigtails." - Merridian
"Oh, Oz, I fear I'm losing my filmfag to the depths of Japanese pop. If only there were more films with Japanese girls in glow-in-the-dark costumes you'd be the David Bordwell of that genre." - Jimbo
"Oz, I think we need to stage an intervention and force you to watch some movies that aren't made in Japan." - Trajan
Every word he uttered seemed to be him digging a deeper hole for himself. I mean, saying Israel is a pain in the ass is still understandable if not winning many fans in America (he surely could not care less about that) but trying to call himself a Nazi to get out of it?? 
I never thought I would come back to Evangelion after EoE,
But I discovered Re-Take (or it found me?) and
now here I am.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka FAN FOREVER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
But I discovered Re-Take (or it found me?) and
now here I am.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka FAN FOREVER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That's how von Trier rolls. Pretty much every press conference he attends is a fiasco. When he was at the festival with Antichrist last time I remember a similar situation in which he made a completely non-sensical fool out of himself. He doesn't just provoke us with his films - he does it all the time! I'm not sure if it's intentional or not, but I'm beginning to think it is.
"I'd really like to have as much money as you have, Oz" - robersora
"No you wouldn't. Oz's secret is he goes without food to buy that stuff. He hasn't eaten in years." - Brikhaus
"Often I get the feeling that deep down, your little girl is struggling with your embrace of filmfaggotry and your loldeep fixations, and the conflict that arises from such a contradiction is embodied pretty well in Kureha's character. But obviously it's not any sort of internal conflict that makes the analogy work. It's the pigtails." - Merridian
"Oh, Oz, I fear I'm losing my filmfag to the depths of Japanese pop. If only there were more films with Japanese girls in glow-in-the-dark costumes you'd be the David Bordwell of that genre." - Jimbo
"Oz, I think we need to stage an intervention and force you to watch some movies that aren't made in Japan." - Trajan
"No you wouldn't. Oz's secret is he goes without food to buy that stuff. He hasn't eaten in years." - Brikhaus
"Often I get the feeling that deep down, your little girl is struggling with your embrace of filmfaggotry and your loldeep fixations, and the conflict that arises from such a contradiction is embodied pretty well in Kureha's character. But obviously it's not any sort of internal conflict that makes the analogy work. It's the pigtails." - Merridian
"Oh, Oz, I fear I'm losing my filmfag to the depths of Japanese pop. If only there were more films with Japanese girls in glow-in-the-dark costumes you'd be the David Bordwell of that genre." - Jimbo
"Oz, I think we need to stage an intervention and force you to watch some movies that aren't made in Japan." - Trajan
....
I'm not sure if it's intentional or not, but I'm beginning to think it is.
In this case I should correct your post to "That's how von Trier trolls.
I never thought I would come back to Evangelion after EoE,
But I discovered Re-Take (or it found me?) and
now here I am.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka FAN FOREVER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
But I discovered Re-Take (or it found me?) and
now here I am.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka FAN FOREVER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Essentially he has been a troll ever since he started the Dogme movement. The only film of his I've seen from his pre-Dogme era is Europa which was quite fascinating although I'm not sure what to think of it. It's certainly more interesting than his later output. It's been too long since I've seen Breaking the Waves, but Dogville was just awful (ridiculously pretentious and clunky). At first I liked Antichrist, but later on I've begun to dislike it (thanks to Giovanni Fazio's review).
"I'd really like to have as much money as you have, Oz" - robersora
"No you wouldn't. Oz's secret is he goes without food to buy that stuff. He hasn't eaten in years." - Brikhaus
"Often I get the feeling that deep down, your little girl is struggling with your embrace of filmfaggotry and your loldeep fixations, and the conflict that arises from such a contradiction is embodied pretty well in Kureha's character. But obviously it's not any sort of internal conflict that makes the analogy work. It's the pigtails." - Merridian
"Oh, Oz, I fear I'm losing my filmfag to the depths of Japanese pop. If only there were more films with Japanese girls in glow-in-the-dark costumes you'd be the David Bordwell of that genre." - Jimbo
"Oz, I think we need to stage an intervention and force you to watch some movies that aren't made in Japan." - Trajan
"No you wouldn't. Oz's secret is he goes without food to buy that stuff. He hasn't eaten in years." - Brikhaus
"Often I get the feeling that deep down, your little girl is struggling with your embrace of filmfaggotry and your loldeep fixations, and the conflict that arises from such a contradiction is embodied pretty well in Kureha's character. But obviously it's not any sort of internal conflict that makes the analogy work. It's the pigtails." - Merridian
"Oh, Oz, I fear I'm losing my filmfag to the depths of Japanese pop. If only there were more films with Japanese girls in glow-in-the-dark costumes you'd be the David Bordwell of that genre." - Jimbo
"Oz, I think we need to stage an intervention and force you to watch some movies that aren't made in Japan." - Trajan
- FreakyFilmFan4ever
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Someone informed me of that after the movie, and everything about the movie started making sense. It was fun to watch, but literally was only good for over-the-top gruff tones and weird shark-jumping moments. I had fun watching it, anyway. I wish they didn't make it 3-D in post production, though. It looked awful. There are some glasses I hear that are supposed to make a 3-D image appear 2-D again. I might get those for these occasions.
- InstrumentalityOne
- Strawberries & Peaches
- Age: 29
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- Joined: Aug 10, 2010
- Location: Vienna
- Gender: Male
I still don´t know how I´m supposed to feel towards this movie though.
In German dub or in English?
Kind of remind me of where Al Gore is now....
I believe the message from the movie is not how you should feel towards it but what action you will take after watching it....
I never thought I would come back to Evangelion after EoE,
But I discovered Re-Take (or it found me?) and
now here I am.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka FAN FOREVER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
But I discovered Re-Take (or it found me?) and
now here I am.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka FAN FOREVER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- InstrumentalityOne
- Strawberries & Peaches
- Age: 29
- Posts: 6061
- Joined: Aug 10, 2010
- Location: Vienna
- Gender: Male
- Tarnsman
- Faustian Iodide
- Age: 37
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- Joined: Apr 28, 2011
- Location: Newport Beach, CA
- Gender: Male
Finally decided to watch Up because I was bored. Great movie. Hated the dog though.
I immediately went out and purchased a Hummer.
I immediately went out and purchased a Hummer.
Last edited by Tarnsman on Wed May 18, 2011 12:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.
"You, sir, are the very heart of the rot that has corrupted humanity from the very beginning!" - tehprognoob
"I know that "chan" is Japanese for something like Mr. or something like that" - TSDA
"If I wanted porn without emotional damage, I'd watch Rebuild." - Azathoth
"because Evangelion and Pokemon are the same show when you really get down to it" - esselfortium
"i obviously have low standards, i liked Eva." - Seele00TextOnly
"I know that "chan" is Japanese for something like Mr. or something like that" - TSDA
"If I wanted porn without emotional damage, I'd watch Rebuild." - Azathoth
"because Evangelion and Pokemon are the same show when you really get down to it" - esselfortium
"i obviously have low standards, i liked Eva." - Seele00TextOnly
And voted Republican I suppose?
I never thought I would come back to Evangelion after EoE,
But I discovered Re-Take (or it found me?) and
now here I am.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka FAN FOREVER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
But I discovered Re-Take (or it found me?) and
now here I am.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Asuka FAN FOREVER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- InstrumentalityOne
- Strawberries & Peaches
- Age: 29
- Posts: 6061
- Joined: Aug 10, 2010
- Location: Vienna
- Gender: Male
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