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Old 10-28-2016, 10:44 AM   #186
teh b0lly!!1
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The Royal Tenenbaums

https://www.movieposter.com/posters/.../106/MPW-53193


so this came up as a rec in one of the other threads, and seeing as lately i've been oddly impatient about watching long, 'heavy' films, this seemed like a good, quality, light one to start with to get back on the horse.

i'd never watched a Wes Anderson film before, so his whole brand of visual style was new to me. among all the aspects that make this movie a fairly strong effort, i think the single most arresting one is the way it looks and feels. it must take such an incredible amount of work to make a film this clean, symmetrical, tidy, and shot-for-shot perfect. it is so ocd, in fact, that my brain almost found it a tiring task to handle, if that makes any sense. the way the characters are immaculately dressed and stylized (reminiscent of a Woody Allen movie in that regard, i thought), the juxtaposing of colors, the color palette in general, the particular angles from which scenes are shot, the sheer mathematical perfection of it all. really impressive, idiosyncratic, and unique. even a kubric film doesn't go for that effect on every single shot.

many favorites to name, but i especially loved the camera work on this scene:



the actual meat of the film, was more obscure for me. i found it to be incredibly dense, and while interesting, layered, and intricately composed- the amount of detail to pay attention to (along with the visual stuff i just talked about) made this feel like filling your mouth with more than you can chew. i say in many of my 'reviews' that i greatly appreciate efficient and skillful storytelling, that knows when to simplify rather than overbear (cause that is essentially the easiest way out of an artistic fork in the road), so i will repeat if here. maybe it's just my thing and i'm stupid, i dunno.

the plot\dialogue, i found, was split in a pretty jarring fashion between the first and second halves of the film. it was so wonderfully absurdist and peculiar during the first half - the dialogue was so off the wall, walking this incredibly thin line of barely making sense as a 'real' conversation (regarding the directions they sprawl into), and usually being incredibly offensive to one of the parties in a very passive-aggressive, subtle way. it was seemingly bright and cheerful, but it had a very dark undercurrent that i really loved, but then came the second half (or maybe one third, doesn't matter) and sweetened it up a considerable amount, coming down to very mundane resolutions that i found slightly disappointing.

i felt like, at the beginning, the storytelling had this certain 'veil' you needed to be able to crack your way through in order to decode what the characters were really about, but then nearing the end it got so simple and transparent, it felt artificial, in a world that was intentionally plasticized to begin with. it's still an interesting contour, no doubt (wow did i really just use 'contour'? lol check out this guy) but was less to my liking.

the casting, as a roster of names, was fairly offputting for me. gwyneth paltrow, ben stiller, owen wilson - not exactly my type of people. but i must say their roles were pretty well tailored for them, and they all delivered solid performances, ranging from decent to actually pretty good. especially gwyneth paltrow. she had a depth to her character and her gaze, that i'd never seen from her before, and almost certainly never will again. gene hackman was awesome and entirely believable as this completely loathsome, yet inexplicably likable character. owen wilson is forever going to be annoying for me, i can't be the only one, but he did co-write the script with Anderson so i guess there was fuck all to do about him participating in it.

on a final note, i really hated the multiple occasions in this film that indirectly legitimized animal abuse. Royal Tenenbaum is portrayed as a good sport who loves dog fights, and it's even insinuated that he takes he grandchildren there - seriously what the fuck? that's just not cool. also, a dog gets run over, and is promptly literally replaced in a couple of minutes by a (5000$ store bought pure breed) dog. then you have a hawk that is carried around from place to place with a cover on its head and eyes, etc. but mainly the dog fight thing portrayed as a juvenile joy, that just really rubbed me the wrong way.

ok. let's see - post not long enough; did i tell you that i met devin townsend?

Last edited by teh b0lly!!1 : 10-28-2016 at 11:00 AM.

 
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