First Reformed

[wilder]

Script

[jenkins]

of course the ending made perfect sense. or rather, it wouldn't have been a thematically complete movie without the ending. it's a positive movie in that regard. i'm still more into Taxi Driver really, which i think is an overall darker movie. it's not that global warming doesn't concern me i've just never contemplated suicide because of it. that doesn't strike me as helpful. and personally i'm not really counting on love in my life. so the movie doesn't really go in the directions of my thoughts. but i can't imagine a tidier package of a movie about the thoughts expressed in this movie, and it calmed me as movies about reckless nerves calm me.

[jenkins]

it's not that new dimensions open unto me through my memories of First Reformed, it's that i like remembering First Reformed. Scorsese says he's smart but Schrader is an intellectual. anyone not truly an intellectual can spot an intellectual. what i mean is it really is a different type of thinking. and Schrader shows miraculous narrative form, time and again

the narrative catalyst for the priest's misery comes from the death of his son, which was initiated by his own idea, and resulted in the end of his marriage. except that is what the narrative mentions, and really the supreme question is did his misery begin with his own birth--did his misery begin when his life began. after the suicide in the woods the policeman mentions the suicider's dad being morose and it being in the blood. i can't remember everything the priest says about his family. but anyway my point is a series of disasters culminate in the ending, but were disasters the problem or was he?

he was the problem, of course he was. his boss mentions this, during an internet-famous discussion scene, in which his boss swivels his chair. his boss says the priest spends all his time in the garden meditating and he needs to open himself to the rest of the world. this is true. the boss mentions traveling to other places, this is a good idea. his boss puts him down actually, saying he's only a priest at a church no one attends and is really a tourist spot, that's a bad idea, saying that to someone, is a bad idea, so mean, really, on a pathway to being helpful but damn. and the chair swivel: brutal.

love is the end for the priest--it's what takes him out of his garden--but what will that love mean and does it change who he is, that's a good question, but what we're looking at now is not the woman who's pregnant and single since her husband suicided, we're looking at the woman who loved the priest without him being able to love her, in fact he was spiteful to her, and blamed her for bringing him down, he was seeking someone who would lift him--and ahh what an illusion that is, ahh how the ending does not suggest permanence. love is real but for how long, and was a lack of love ever the real problem...

[raptoroblivion]

Finally saw this film. Loved it. Along with You Were Never Really Here and Sorry to Bother You, a call to direct action but also a reminder to love, which is hopefully the catalyst for your actions.

[Drenk]

I do read the end as a delusion; I see no end or solution to the despair. *whistling*

[Alethia]

I think that's a totally fair assessment, however, just for my heart, I need to believe the ending literally happened. I just need it.

[raptoroblivion]

I do read the end as a delusion; I see no end or solution to the despair. *whistling*

If the ending is a delusion, then obviously death is the end/solution to the despair, no?

[Something Spanish]

I'm not overly up on transcendental stuff as much as most cineastes. Seen my fair share, just have yet to take a deep dive on the style. As long as you've seen one of each, Ozu, Bresson, Dreyer, I think you're in the clear. First Reformed truly lives up to the hype of a bleak, timely masterstroke of an artist who has been gearing up for this release his entire career. Schrader's voice here is so powerfully intimate, his trembling rage so vociferously damning, you're smacked into reminder of this man's shattering talent. Hawke slays the role, one akin to a pious Travis Bickle. You feel his pain through every facial contortion, his soul and faith as concaved as his cheekbones.  Maybe a bit too much Winter Light meets Diary of a Country Priest, but a riff is a riff, and when riffed by Schrader it's all good.
I think the ending happened, too, in spite of its creator's interpretation. I see it as more redemptive than was probably intended.