This was my first thought after finishing the movie for the first time. “Holy shit, that was really funny.”
I’m curious about this too, although I think you have to accept being confused on first watch with this movie, as it seems hard to avoid… (I felt the exact same as you the first time fwiw).
It seems that many people have trouble with that. I had a look at the wiki and some of the critics at the time had some takes…
"Lynch cheats his audience, pulling the rug out from under us. He throws everything into the mix with the lone goal of confusing us. Nothing makes any sense because it’s not supposed to make any sense. There’s no purpose or logic to events. Lynch is playing a big practical joke on us.
Talk about being on the wrong side of history…after 6 or 7 watches, if anything the plot is TOO clean / simple.
(also watching it now that I’ve seen a lot more movies, it’s funny to realize how much this draws from the (old, French) movies by Rivette…the whole “Betty&Rita go on a quest” part is straight up lifted from “Céline & Julie” and “le pont du nord”.)
1 Like
I haven’t been watching many “puzzle movies” recently, but Charlie Kaufman’s “I’m thinking of ending things” was a painful watch. Partially on me for trying to watch this on a weeknight but this just made my head hurt and not in a good way.
In general I think this is kind of a genre that’s hard to pull off because if the “puzzle” is too complicated then that requires multiple watches to be enjoyed but then you also need the movie to be so good that the viewer will actually play it again…
since this is the “mulholland drive” hype thread (at least until LKJ rates it lower than Fury Road), this is the one case where this actually works (I probably watched it 2-3 times without really understanding it and still loved it), but I can’t think of many examples like this…
to give just one example of famously hard to decipher movie, when I watched “Primer”, I had zero idea what happened in the second half, and I’m sure it could maybe be fun to read the explanation on paper (I didn’t even bother with that lol), but actually rewatching the movie when there’s noting inherently appealing about it ? would feel like work…
anyway all this to say that I’d be more keen to watch “puzzle movies but low brow”, even though I can’t think of examples right now (it seems that the “triangle” and “timecrimes” recs above fit that bill ? added them to watchlist)
2 Likes
Also, Lost Highway.
1 Like
“chatgpt, write me an alien 1 sequel starring Great Value daisy ridley” was my evening, every piece of every plot point, setting and exposition had 6 fingers.
Independence Day/ID4 is finally streaming for free on Tubi.
2 Likes
Blink Twice
That’s gonna be a no from me. In the good column: it’s usually not boring (though the final act drags a bit IMO) and director Zoe Kravitz does make a pretty visually interesting movie that hopefully portents some promise in her future projects. In the bad column: this shit is stupid. The unseen truth in the movie is unlocked by a dreadfully dumb plot device, the social messaging is ham-fisted, and the ending is probably harmful to the overall product; I would probably be more annoyed by that if it was a Love Lies Bleeding situation where I felt like there was a failure to land the plane smoothly after a great trip. In this case, I was going to tend negative on the movie even before the ending, so it’s whatever.
Not the worst thing I’ve seen this year, but I don’t recommend it, and there’s a chance I’m still going a half-star too generous with this.
2.5/5
2 Likes
I was interested in seeing this till I read its SA revenge story. I can’t stand that genre of film.
1 Like
I can’t claim an opposition to the subgenre in general, and I thought the trailer on this one was intriguing, but the movie just doesn’t have the goods.
I do think that it’s another solid performance for Adria Arjona’s resume. Even though I increasingly think with time to digest it that Hit Man wasn’t very good, I still think she popped in it. And she was a strong contributor to the excellence of Andor. I think she was a bright spot here. Keep casting her in stuff please.
Armchair Expert, one of my favorite podcasts, has a retrospective on Without a Paddle this week as Dax Shepard stared in it. Id never seen so it so decided to watch.
Without a Paddle (2004)
Whoa boy this is bad. Like really bad. I can’t think of a redeeming quality. It’s not funny. The story is awful. The acting is terrible.
Stick to podcasting Dax.
Grade: D
1 Like
Saw Strange Darling on recommendation from this forum and went in blind. It was very good.
My wife and I thought about bringing our 15-year-old with us and I’m glad we didn’t. There are some things that would have been very uncomfortable to watch with him.
3 Likes
hahah burn
I was actually thinking the other day that there is not a single celebrity I can think of that would be compelling to me as a podcast host. I thought this bubble had already popped but it seems they’re just moving down the chain to lower-tier, cheaper celebrities. Instead of one big huge mountain of cash on fire for Obama or Harry and Megan, they’re doing tons of smaller piles of cash on fire for… Amy Wambach? Give me a break.
Give it time maybe? It took a while for people to get used to the idea of movie starts doing TV and vice versa. Having said that, talking off the cuff for an hour and being engaging is a whole different skill set form being a good actor or a good president or a good… whatever it is the royals do.
He is legit a brilliant podcast host talking to either movie stars or neuroscientists.
He is S tier 100%.
Yeah Armchair Expert is great.
1 Like
Haha I got a soft spot for this movie I dunno why, it’s not good tho
1 Like
Strange Darling
Was slower to get to this one because the little summary capsule did not really intrigue me, but good word of mouth was enough to get me to give it a go. It’s very good. Beautifully shot, really well executed. I was even higher on the movie before a final act that was in no way bad, but just didn’t fully keep up the momentum of the ride that I was really enjoying. Still, this has enough juice to tentatively slip into my top five releases so far this year.
3.5/5
2 Likes
