Masterpiece, the apotheosis and logical conclusion of Mann’s digital fetish, every frame exists just to be evocative, nothing matters here beyond being immersive, it’s dew point: the movie.
The directors cut is objectively a better movie, an actual movie, one that hangs together. But the climactic drug bust/shoot out is drowned in that Nonpoint “in the air tonight” cover, which is odd.
He was like 25 and made a whole movie about being high on coke and then coming down super hard. He got Burt Reynolds, and his incredible hair, to be in it. Mark “stay prayed up” Wahlberg is phenomenal in it.
It’s wearing a lot of Scorsese and Altman, but it does sing on its own terms. The whiplash shift from humor to horror belongs to Anderson, it’s its own thing.
“Be respectful, this is Rollergirl”
What’s coming will destroy whatever we have. It’s not good.
Adam Curtis, in an interview last year, talking about whistleblowers:
“The old model was investigative journalism, where you would find a whistleblower, or documents, to expose the corruption to us – the readers, the viewers – and then we would get angry and pressure lawmakers. That doesn’t work now. When I read that rich people hold their money in tax havens, I think, “Yes, I know that, but I also know that nothing is going to happen about it.” In…
“Shit on the people and what they want and what they’re ready for. I don’t give a goddamn about the people and what they want. This is the face of someone who has fought long and hard for the good of the people without caring much for any of ‘em.”
Maybe Tommy Lee Jones’ Thaddeus Stevens is right. Maybe we should try electing folks who are smarter and better than us (even if they don’t try and hide it!), instead of…
