"If a person can't afford dog food, they shouldn't have a dog."
The movie's essence felt like it could be distilled into that line spoken by the grocery store clerk. During the Q&A after the showing, Reichardt talked about the context surrounding when the movie was made and the pervasive pro-bootstraps anti-handout narrative that existed. It's frustrating thinking about how that narrative has not gone away and just abstracted itself into all other parts of contemporary life. Life is more…
I'm sure the movie is trying to say *something* about generational trauma, but there's just not much there and I don't think is saying anything novel or noteworthy.
Intellectualizing the movie about a killer toy monkey aside, there were a handful of moments and kills that had me laughing out loud. Great to see in da theater as long as the people next to you aren't taking multiple phone calls.
The movie's biggest missteps are the moments when it gets…
A rat walked across the aisle when komm susser tod started playing
It so successfully allures the viewer into falling in love with the tranquility of life's subtleties that it becomes easy to overlook how Hirayama may ultimately feel about his own life. It’s not just taking his reactions and mannerisms at face value but also the possibility that Hirayama’s (antisocial) behavior is not him unlocking the secrets to a peaceful life but instead a sacrifice he has made that has given both fulfillment and discontentedness.
I don't believe this is a…
