INHERENT VICE (No Major Spoilers)

Started by cronopio 2, December 02, 2010, 09:51:28 AM

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Jeremy Blackman

I just read a bit of wilder's review in the spoiler thread. I almost want to quote parts of it here. That review has increased my anticipation for IV probably more than anything else, including the trailer.

Okay screw it, I'll quote something:

(No spoilers in this quote obviously)

Quote from: wilder on October 05, 2014, 01:07:03 AMIronic that this is the film of PT's that has big studio backing behind it — WB is out of their minds. Yeah it has humor, but it's his least commercial movie by a mile, and I wonder what the fuck is going to happen come day one of its wide release when word of mouth spreads. The trailer is SO OFF — I don't even know what to relate the movie to as I've never seen anything else like it. Long Goodbye this Big Lebowski that — not even close. I'll say this - the movie makes you feel like PT is the only real filmmaker out there right now making anything new or pushing any boundaries to show you something you haven't seen before. You realize how rote everything else is in comparison, how many patterns most movies follow even in terms of "art film" style.

Axolotl

Wilder's post is pretty much the best thing that's been written about this movie yet by a huge margin. Bonus points for no pot puns.

Gittes

Quote from: Axolotl on October 05, 2014, 02:45:40 AM
Wilder's post is pretty much the best thing that's been written about this movie yet by a huge margin. Bonus points for no pot puns.

It's also exactly the sort of thing I was looking for by traipsing into this thread: an unspecific but also highly evocative sense of some of the reactions.

SailorOfTheSeas

a BUNCH of reviews are out, very mixed reactions overall which is what I expected and wanted. most people who criticising it are calling at incoherency of the film, emotional detachment and "2D/negatively" portrayed female characters. None of this comes as much of a surprise or means much; critics called TM emotionally detached and its one of the most emotionally immersive films ever imo. the apparently "sexist" portrayal of female characters is just a mix of people being too sensitive and not understanding the fact that this film chronologically is a prequel and prelude to boogie nights, with ptas filmography chronologically commenting on gender and equality, which (SO FAR) culminates with mackey confronting his past to (slightly) overcome his warped as fuck perspective on women in magnolia, barry fuckin up the sexline mattress man shit and the two equals falling in love at the end of PDL. Whatever people complain is incoherence im sure is just bs first time viewing cynical bs

   This is one of the my favourites from what ive read so far, from hitfix. no major spoilers at all:
http://www.hitfix.com/motion-captured/review-joaquin-phoenix-dazzles-and-delights-in-the-warm-and-woozy-inherent-vice

this and wilders reaction are getting me hella hyped

Punch

Here are the reasons why "Inherent Vice" faces a tough slog ahead.

1. It helps if you've read the book.
Even the press kit supplies details and context from the book that are entirely missing from the movie. Clearly, Anderson struggled to adapt this complex, rich source material and expects his audience to be familiar with the Pynchon novel. Anyone who has not read it will be lost. As someone who has not read "Inherent Vice"--I caught up with his first chapter later--there are pleasures to be had from the movie, but comprehension is not one of them. Yes, I look forward to seeing the film again.

At the New York Film Festival after party at Tavern on the Green, I asked Anderson about an amazing shot where Doc is walking toward the dark entrance of a massage parlor in the middle of a wide open dusty construction site. As he enters, we see a glimpse in the deep background of camouflaged soldiers ducking down behind mounds of dirt. It's unexplained. Anderson said there was a long complicated sequence in the book that provided inspiration for this cool quick sight gag. (At the press conference, he explained that he wanted to shoot on 35mm with a boxy aspect ratio suitable for the period. He insisted on presenting the movie in 35mm at the New York Film Festival--although the sound was muddy at Alice Tully Hall. The movie looked and sounded just fine as a DCP for the press hordes who lined up in the rain.)

Except for the ending and the unreliable narrator --added to supply a much-needed female voice--the adaptation is faithful. Anderson also admitted that he gave up trying to make sense, using Howard Hawks and Jules Furthman's famous Philip Marlowe movie "The Big Sleep" as his touchstone. "I couldn't follow any of it," Anderson said at the press conference. "It didn't matter. I just wanted to see what happened next anyway. So that was a good model to follow."

2. It's no "Chinatown."
While PTA is a gifted writer-director, with Pynchon he has met his match. ("There Will Be Blood" was his other lit adaptation.) The first half hour satisfyingly resembles "Chinatown," as our latter-day pot-steeped Jake Gittes is pulled into an ever-deepening mystery over which he can't seem to wrestle any control. He's knocked out and implicated in a murder, there's a missing femme fatale with a romantic-sexual hold over him (see Faye Dunaway's Evelyn Mulwray), a corrupt and powerful magnate (Channel View Estates) who is overhauling California real estate (see John Huston's Noah Cross), the sympathetic but ineffective city detective (see Perry Lopez's Lieutenant Lou Escobar), a long-suffering office receptionist, etc.

As the film progresses, intricate plotting and endless exposition ensue. By contrast, Roman Polanski and Robert Towne's "Chinatown" was a masterpiece of concision and clarity. No one is ever in doubt about what is going on. In "Inherent Vice," while there are brilliant scenes--such as a five-minute single take talk-fest between Wilson and Phoenix as the camera slowly bores in--many long sections of declarative dialogue are tedious and overwhelming. There's no absorbing them. "I was trying to be as faithful to the feeling of the book as possible," said Anderson.

Another apt comparison for this movie is Robert Altman's countercultural valentine to Marlowe, "The Long Good-Bye," which also looks disciplined by comparison. At the press conference, 12 of Anderson's cast (Brolin was notably missing) except for the typically silent Phoenix explained how "chaotic" and "loose" the shoot was, describing a freewheeling improvisational atmosphere on set.

Del Toro said that after multiple takes of a three-page monologue, he knew his lines. "It was like dancing, in a way."

"I thought it was me," said Michael Kenneth Williams of his one scene. "I thought you didn't like me."

"The logic becomes the chaos, the chaos becomes the logic," said Jena Malone.

3. Anderson needs to work on his women.
In my notes on the movie: "lots of hot chicks." Sure, the movie is based on Pynchon, but just about every woman in the film -- except for Newsom, Malone's ex-addict mom, Anderson's wife Maya Rudolph in a throwaway receptionist role and telephone call Jeannie Berlin-- is a babe, an overt sex object, someone to lust after. 'Twas ever thus in movies, and Anderson breaks out discovery Waterston here, who delivers the most erotic femme fatale and climactic seduction scene in recent memory. Her parents were beaming with pride at the after party, but is that all she can do?

Anderson seems to have been somewhat aware of this issue as he added Newsom's narration late in the game--it's not in the book. At the press conference Anderson admitted he was trying to add a good female voice and "as I started doing it more and more, the more it worked." There's nothing wrong, gentlemen, with including deeper women characters who are not defined by their sexuality.

4. A studio is releasing this movie.
Departed Warner Bros. movie chief Jeff Robinov pulled this project into the studio, and current co-prexy Sue Kroll adopted it as a favorite child. She is the genius behind bringing to market several delicate movies including Oscar-winners "Argo" and "Gravity," but in both cases the films delivered to all four audience quadrants. This one is targeted to smart adult cinephiles only. Anderson should be grateful that Kroll is making it her mission to sell this film, starting limited December 12 and broadening January 9 based on how well it does in theaters.

But this is a limited arthouse play. Expectations are bound to be dashed even for a movie budgeted in the $20 millions--but still, that's before even modest marketing costs.

5. Oscar potential is limited.
First of all, this is a comedy. And will be submitted to the Golden Globes as such. And it's hilariously funny--I particularly love Doc's inane note-taking, as though writing things down in his haze will help. Certainly, Phoenix deserves a nomination for Best Actor, but he did even better work for his nominated role in "Her." That's the problem. The Best Actor race is seriously competitive this year. And none of the fleeting supporting roles will register with the Academy actors, I don't think. Critics will be passionately enthusiastic, and "Inherent Vice" will place on many ten bests lists. But if it's a box office disappointment, that will hurt.

I do see a possible nomination for Anderson regular, cinematographer Robert Elswit, who is also in the running for "Nightcrawler," but this studio-backed picture is more likely to get the nod. I could also see production designer David Crank and costume designer Mark Bridges in the mix. The look of the movie is unexpected and jammed with nifty details. The 70s inflected score is packed with period riches as well as anachronistic contemporary music--but there may not be enough new material to make it Oscar eligible.

via http://blogs.indiewire.com/thompsononhollywood/five-reasons-why-inherent-vice-faces-a-tough-slog-20141006
"oh you haven't truly watched a film if you didn't watch it on the big screen" mumbles the bourgeois dipshit

©brad

Well that's just like your opinion Indiewire.

Dr_Chile

Are they implying Anderson is a misogynist? Jeepers creepers, did this writer see any of Anderson's other films? I haven't seen Inherent Vice, though I've read the novel many, many times and I can tell you that the book is set in a fictional Los Angeles circa 1970 a mere two years after the summer of love. So not only were people hornier at the time, Pynchon heightens that kind of liberating sexuality to Goliath size levels.

If Anderson has any artistic integrity (and he does, in spades, something a lot of American filmmakers lack these days), he will stay true to this, and it sure sounds like he does.

Telling Anderson he needs to include "deeper female characters who are not defined by their sexuality" is redundant as I doubt this writer truly understands what he or she just saw.

porgy

Quote from: Dr_Chile on October 07, 2014, 12:12:03 PM
Are they implying Anderson is a misogynist? Jeepers creepers, did this writer see any of Anderson's other films? I haven't seen Inherent Vice, though I've read the novel many, many times and I can tell you that the book is set in a fictional Los Angeles circa 1970 a mere two years after the summer of love. So not only were people hornier at the time, Pynchon heightens that kind of liberating sexuality to Goliath size levels.

If Anderson has any artistic integrity (and he does, in spades, something a lot of American filmmakers lack these days), he will stay true to this, and it sure sounds like he does.

Telling Anderson he needs to include "deeper female characters who are not defined by their sexuality" is redundant as I doubt this writer truly understands what he or she just saw.

Welllllll, I dont know.  I've seen the movie.  It's definitely not PTA's most female friendly film.  It's clear from any of his movies he can write any kind of character of any kind of gender (though I can't recall a PTA film with any amount of racial diversity...), this movie is not exactly the best example of that.

matt35mm

Quote from: porgy on October 07, 2014, 04:44:56 PM
(though I can't recall a PTA film with any amount of racial diversity...)

HARD EIGHT, BOOGIE NIGHTS, and MAGNOLIA have a good amount of diversity. PDL has Luis Guzman, as well.

porgy

Quote from: matt35mm on October 07, 2014, 05:46:45 PM
Quote from: porgy on October 07, 2014, 04:44:56 PM
(though I can't recall a PTA film with any amount of racial diversity...)

HARD EIGHT, BOOGIE NIGHTS, and MAGNOLIA have a good amount of diversity. PDL has Luis Guzman, as well.

Boogie Nights is due for a rewatch on my part, forgot about Cheadle. 

Magnolia tho?

AntiDumbFrogQuestion

Quote from: porgy on October 07, 2014, 05:55:12 PM
Quote from: matt35mm on October 07, 2014, 05:46:45 PM
Quote from: porgy on October 07, 2014, 04:44:56 PM
(though I can't recall a PTA film with any amount of racial diversity...)

HARD EIGHT, BOOGIE NIGHTS, and MAGNOLIA have a good amount of diversity. PDL has Luis Guzman, as well.

Boogie Nights is due for a rewatch on my part, forgot about Cheadle. 

Magnolia tho?


Marcie? Gwenovier? Dixon?
....scenes cut featuring Orlando Jones aka The Worm?

Ok, that last one doesn't cut mustard, and that's only three characters, none of them main characters...but there's some diversity fo' yo'' @$$

porgy

Quote from: AntiDumbFrogQuestion on October 07, 2014, 06:12:25 PM
Quote from: porgy on October 07, 2014, 05:55:12 PM
Quote from: matt35mm on October 07, 2014, 05:46:45 PM
Quote from: porgy on October 07, 2014, 04:44:56 PM
(though I can't recall a PTA film with any amount of racial diversity...)

HARD EIGHT, BOOGIE NIGHTS, and MAGNOLIA have a good amount of diversity. PDL has Luis Guzman, as well.

Boogie Nights is due for a rewatch on my part, forgot about Cheadle. 

Magnolia tho?


Marcie? Gwenovier? Dixon?
....scenes cut featuring Orlando Jones aka The Worm?

Ok, that last one doesn't cut mustard, and that's only three characters, none of them main characters...but there's some diversity fo' yo'' @$$

I personally wouldn't count that as diversity.  wasn't there a study that said like men are more likely to think that things are diverse to some degree as long as there are at least one woman for every 3 men or something like that?

I definitely wouldn't fault PTA like people fault Wes Anderson in terms of racial makeup.  It's pretty complicated.  Like Marcie and Jim both are pretty annoying and flawed in that scene, but the "angry black lady" and "rapping youth" portrayal, I don't know.  Those characters definitely aren't meant to be developed characters but not sure that them being that 1 dimensional feels all that good.  Not sure how I felt about those pseudo stereotypes being used to develop the whiter characters. On the other hand Gwenovier is clearly an intense dimensional character.

AntiDumbFrogQuestion

I'm not gonna get too far into this, but I really wish The Worm had been left in Magnolia, only if to have some deep thoughts in that film voiced by the actor originally known as the "7-Up Yours" guy.

If anyone thinks this film is anti-female, or just not considerate of the "fairer sex", then they can take it up with Thomas Pynchon. If Sortilege narrates the tale, then there's a failure to notice that the scope of this film is all contained within a female character, and if you're too dumb to see that, then who cares.

SailorOfTheSeas

Dixon is like the one of the few fuckin characters who actually sees the bigger picture and gets it, which he expresses through his rap

Alexandro

filmmakers are not supposed to be the united colors of benetton...