Last week, my friend Sarah and I headed to The Neon Movies to see "Cyrus." The preview had lured me in--if you remember I posted it here on F&F a few weeks back--and I expected a quirky comedy from the Duplass brothers. Mark and Jay Duplass are cited as founders of the mumblecore genre in film--a movement characterized by elements such as low budget production, improvised scripts, nonprofessional actors, and a focus on relationships between twentysomethings. (I think a successful and enjoyable example of a mumblecore film is Lynn Shelton's "Humpday." Check it out if you can.) Anyway, for the first half of "Cyrus," I was cracking up and couldn't get enough of John C. Reilly's sad and absurd character. However, somewhere midway through the movie, the comedy disappears and it becomes a sap-fest with a typical rom com happy ending. I couldn't have been more disappointed; the previews lied to me and the movie, in my eyes, lost all credibility. If only the second half of the film had been able to keep up with the humor of the first half, then, perhaps, I would have been satisfied. I recommend that you don't waste your time on this film; you will be disappointed by the ridiculous turn it takes.
Yesterday, while I was in Indianapolis, I saw "Winter's Bone." A sucker for anything Sundance, I wanted to see this film after hearing about the rave reviews and multiple awards it had garnered from the festival in Park City. I had watched the preview and was not impressed; the dark Missouri background and characters adorned with wolf t-shirts failed to express just what the movie was about. From the preview I could tell that hard times had fallen upon the protagonist's family--a young, attractive, and persistent girl--and for some reason or another she was left to care for her two younger siblings. With shots of her doing household tasks like chopping wood and walking the children to school, the young protagonist is approached by the sheriff (you know he's the sheriff because his baseball cap says so) and is told that her father has put her family's house up for his bond. The problem is that the sheriff cannot find her father and if the missing criminal fails to show for court, the house will be taken away from the already destitute family. It becomes the girl's mission to find her father. That is what I got from the preview and I wasn't too enthused.
Despite this, I trusted the opinions of Sundance-related viewers and saw the film anyway. However, I didn't get much else from the film. (SPOILER ALERT) To me, the film presented a longer more convoluted version of the story present in the trailer--just with a few more cryptic details. The trailer fails to mention that Ree, the protagonist, has a mother that--for some reason or another-- has lost her marbles and is mute, constantly staring off into the distance. The film presents no explanation as to why this might have happened and she drifts into the dreary background. Another element not present in the preview is the role of drugs--it seems that Ree's father is being held on charges for cooking meth; other characters have their relationships with other drugs but most of it is kept very underwraps. So Ree searches for her father, but SURPRISE SURPRISE she doesn't find him. Rather she goes door to door like an old school salesman asking the neighbors--most of whom are related to each other by blood-- if they know where her father is. Nobody knows and nobody really wants to help; one neighbor refuses to talk with her and she pursues him, despite strong warnings against it. For this she receives a severe and (in my opinion) unwarranted beating. The rest of the film was pretty confusing and unclear to me (maybe i just wasn't following along closely enough or maybe i'm a little dense).
The standout scene of the film occurs toward the end. A group of rough looking women--the same group who beat the shit out of Ree-- take Ree to her father's body. They force a bag over her head and take her to an undisclosed spot; they all hop (facetious) into a canoe and take along a chainsaw for good measure. Upon arrival to the spot, the group of women force Ree to reach underwater and grab her father's body. She shakes while doing so and as if that's not enough torture, the women then propose she saws his hands off. Ree is incapable of such a grotesque task, so the ringleader of this group graciously helps the poor girl out. After that, the movie seems to end quite cleanly. Ree brings her father's sawed off hands to the sheriff, some anonymous person has paid the rest of the bond, and Ree, her younger siblings, and mute mother have their life back. Seemed far too inexplicably easy.
For some reason, I just could not get into this movie; most of the time I had no idea what was going on and the rest of the time I was sitting there appalled by the outfits. (elitist, i know, sorry.) If someone can explain to me what happened in this movie, please help me out! Who is the anonymous donor? Why did Ree's father get killed? What happened to Ree's mother? How did her father get into cooking meth? How are all these people related? Just so many questions that I do not have the answers to. Needless to say, I was not a fan and am very disappointed by the rave reviews promoted by Sundance.
Tomorrow I plan on seeing "The Kids Are All Right." I hope the preview hasn't deceived me. I have heard very good things about this and my uncle--who is sort of a cinephile-- sent me an e-mail expressly to tell me to see this film. On the other hand, my friend Annie saw it and was not that impressed. I shall see for myself soon enough.
No comments:
Post a Comment