Manderlay - LVT's S

[w/o horse]

When does my Orange County ass get to see it?

Come tonight, 10:30

Edwards University Town Center 6 Fandango
(Regal Entertainment Group) 4245 Campus Drive, Irvine, CA 92612, 949-854-8818

I'll be with a 1/16 black guy and a guy wearing a suit jacket.  I'll be wearing this red Cursive shirt I have on now.  It has a fairy on it.  You won't be able to miss us.

P.S.  Say you're my cousin from Alabama.  Or Idado.  We'll discuss it in the bathroom before the start of the movie.  Oh yeah let's meet in the bathroom and we'll just say we hit things off right away.  Even better.

[Pozer]

I'll be there, but you won't recognize me no matter how much I describe myself... I'll be with a chick.

[w/o horse]

I think the movie is for people who like to think about movies but don't actually enjoy watching movies.  Cinemasochists.  I enjoy reading Jeremy Blackman talk about the movie, I liked his Green Screen on Dogville, but there is no enjoyment in watching Manderlay at all.  LVT hates the audience here, while he used to toy with him.

And frankly, what wasn't obvious from the get-go.  The only real surprise is a situational one that has nothing to do with the meaning of the film - if you didn't know where he was going with the film right away I'm amazed.  Don't get me wrong, I strapped myself in for the end, I literally said to my friend "Get ready" when they were selling the harvest.  There was an exhilarating ride for thirty minutes, but I pay $8 for an entire park, not just one slide.  The rest of the movie is boring.  It's just fucking boring.  I completely agree with mod that the actors/characters aren't interesting by large, the situations aren't interesting, and the motions they go through were monotonous but not provocative.  And it was monotonous when it was provocative.  This isn't Grapes of Wrath or Master and Commander repetitive, as I realize plantation life would be repetitive and that you could justify the film with this, it's hate for the audience.

I can't wait to read what Blackman is going to say about the film.  I'll wait as long as possible until I see Manderlay again.  I think LVT's fans are allowing him to become more and more selfish with his filmmaking by calling stuff like this genius.

Spoiler:  The third in the trilogy is going to be LVT masturbating for two and a half hours.

[Jeremy Blackman]

I can't wait to read what Blackman is going to say about the film.

Page 7.

I think the movie is for people who like to think about movies but don't actually enjoy watching movies.  Cinemasochists . . . there is no enjoyment in watching Manderlay at all.  LVT hates the audience here, while he used to toy with him.

I guess I'm a "cinemasochist" then, because yes, the movie is unpleasant, and I enjoyed it for all its unpleasantness... I think "devastating thrill" from my earlier comments describes my experience. It's challenging, and it's a cinematic exercise, and it makes a point, and that's what I like about LVT.

You complain about it not being provocative enough after you essentially complain about its being provocative (and how he's hating on his audience with all his provocations). Am I wrong? And sure, parts of the film are slow, but I wouldn't use the word "boring." How about "deliberate"? It's part of the "exponentially increasing power." And I certainly think it was worth the wait.

[w/o horse]

I can't wait to read what Blackman is going to say about the film.

Page 7.

I think the movie is for people who like to think about movies but don't actually enjoy watching movies.  Cinemasochists . . . there is no enjoyment in watching Manderlay at all.  LVT hates the audience here, while he used to toy with him.

I guess I'm a "cinemasochist" then, because yes, the movie is unpleasant, and I enjoyed it for all its unpleasantness... I think "devastating thrill" from my earlier comments describes my experience. It's challenging, and it's a cinematic exercise, and it makes a point, and that's what I like about LVT.

You complain about it not being provocative enough after you essentially complain about its being provocative (and how he's hating on his audience with all his provocations). Am I wrong? And sure, parts of the film are slow, but I wouldn't use the word "boring." How about "deliberate"? It's part of the "exponentially increasing power." And I certainly think it was worth the wait.

Hey I want more than what's on page 7.  More is going to come, right?

As for provocative, I was talking about the subject matter.  Certainly the style is just as provocative as we would expect from LVT, but the material becomes so slow coming and brings up the same subjects enough times (The thing you hate serves a useful purpose, you shouldn't force an opinion, Grace is naive, Grace trusts people Grace shouldn't trust people - on repeat) that it ceases being provocative.

And the deliberate thing I don't agree on.  Like I said, I don't see there being enough justification.  No, here I'm contradicting myself.  It can be justified because LVT hates us now.

[Jeremy Blackman]

Hey I want more than what's on page 7.  More is going to come, right?

When I made my first comments there was really no one to discuss the movie with, but now here I am debating the movie with you, which is a very good thing.

SPOILERS THAT YOU DON'T WANT TO READ

As for provocative, I was talking about the subject matter.  Certainly the style is just as provocative as we would expect from LVT, but the material becomes so slow coming and brings up the same subjects enough times (The thing you hate serves a useful purpose, you shouldn't force an opinion, Grace is naive, Grace trusts people Grace shouldn't trust people - on repeat) that it ceases being provocative.

I think many things are revealed (and provoked) toward the end when things start spiraling backward, and Grace leaves the town precisely as she found it (visually, at least, with Timothy tied up for lashings). What about the revelation that Wilhelm wrote Mam's Law, and the whole Stockholm Syndrome dimension, and rejection of freedom in favor of falling back on familiarity and security, the slaves rejecting freedom altogether after being disappointed with a false freedom (which was imposed at gunpoint), and of course my favorite, the problem of how one helps people regain the human desire for democracy after they have been so deeply trained to advocate against their own best interests. That's enough for me.

[Gamblour.]

BEYOND JEREMY BLACKMAN SPOILERS

I like that Von Trier made a choice for these characters. I'm sick of movies bringing up the idea of ideas, but not passing any judgments. At the end, when the black people decide to live in self-imposed slavery, my friend was like "Man, von Trier thinks black people are stupid." When that's a lie, he thinks everyone's stupid. But if you take this as yet ANOTHER allegory about colonialism and the war in Iraq and etc, it's by far the most interesting idea, film, and judgment made about all of it. The idea that say black people or Iraqis would want to live under the tyranny they began with, after the idea of democracy was thrust upon them, that's truly scary and very interesting.

Losing the Horse, this is not Cinemasochistic. It's a movie for people in love with ideas and their manifestations in cinema. We're presented with all the ideas visually and have to extract them afterwards, which makes it compelling. But the film takes on something else once you extract that thesis and go back into it looking for more proof. In this sense, the film was great. Very heady, cerebral, and moving. It says a heck of a lot.

However, the sheer pompous audacity one must have to come to another country and wag their finger at us, shoving pictures of the world trade center in our faces at the end, that's pretty despicable. I guess American film audiences and makers are just getting a taste of their own medicine. How many times have we passed judgment on other countries? Probably too many. And that one ember of American pride in me burns when someone pokes at it, but when I think about it, they're probably right.

Now, as for the aesthetic of the film, the sets or lack thereof and sound design and all the decision making, I don't know what it adds to the idea of the film. The lack of walls, I guess I can see a stretched metaphor, but really that is all just an exercise for von Trier and nothing more. In that way, the film becomes amazing on two levels, instead of one gigantic level. This film is so goddamn interesting, it really reminds me of French New Wave cinema, and how they just kept trying to find new things to do. I think von Trier is his own wave of films.

[squints]

the first review that made me interested in seeing this 

[godardian]

I saw this recently, and I thought it was an accomplishment. I thought that it was more complex than Dogville, and I like that von Trier feels free to change the entire meaning of the Grace character (the way I saw it) in this film. In a way, I felt that she represents in Manderlay what was oppressing her in Dogville.

Very, very didactic and very, very entertaining. May the politicized and polemical tradition of Brecht and Godard live on through this "USA Trilogy!"

(P.S. - Someone asked what the chalk-outline/stage set contributes. I'm pretty sure that it is to define the terms of the film and its intentions, so that there is absolutely no mistaking that the filmmaker does not intend what we are seeing to be taken only on the level of "realism" or drama, but to heighten the artificiality to an extreme so that we are visually stimulated and clued in to perceive it in the intended way. This is a love-it-or-hate-it proposition, to be sure, but I found it refreshingly ballsy and decisive, not to mention engaging and frequently beautiful.)

[Gamblour.]

I didn't realize Dogville had been shot in the same manner. I need to see it I guess. But I like your explanation godardian, I guess I should have picked up on it, it's pretty obvious (no offense to your interpretation, but I think it's so right that it was staring me in the face)

[Jeremy Blackman]

I didn't realize Dogville had been shot in the same manner. I need to see it I guess.

The deconstruction thing plays a much bigger role in Dogville, and I'm sure it would make a whole lot more sense if you saw that movie. In Manderlay it's just kind of taken for granted.

[w/o horse]

I still think this movie sucks dick.

Come alive forum!

No but I saw it on a top 2006 list and was wondering:  for those who saw it months ago, has it festered?  Has your appreciation grown?  Have you thought about it at all?

I hadn't thought about it once.

[Pozer]

for those who saw it months ago, has it festered?  Has your appreciation grown?  Have you thought about it at all?

I still think this movie sucks dick.

well i don't feel this way about it, i know that much...

nice rhythm, good that it was the second installment in the trilogy, not as strong as dogville by any means.  that's pretty much my feelings.

oh, and crappy dvd package.