BBD Comments:
Man, did I hate ‘Night of the Demon’....
In his SELECTOR Comments for ‘The Party,’ Netti observed “The hard thwacks against an edgy Selection are far more interesting to me than the soporific salutes to an oft loved and viewed film.” It is my expectation that he will then be very “interested” in the commentary for his latest Pick, as ‘Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance’ is poised to get thwacked rather thoroughly.
I will say this, I didn’t pee.
Perhaps Chan-wook Park’s greatest achievement with this film is that it is almost impossible to look away. Like some horrible collision on the highway, there is a schadenfreude this film inspires in the viewer which makes the unthinkable sorrow throughout the story undeniably magnetic. Still, it fails in the end to make the horrors we endure resonate with any powerful epiphany. I was left feeling miserable at the end of this story.
Nubs reflected after the Pick about the aim of a Movienight Selection. At our founding, he reminded, we were responsible for the evening’s entertainment when we were the SELECTOR. If a film failed to engage, the SELECTOR was berated, and the rest of us sharpened our palates for what sort of film would work best next week.
Consider the beating that MONA took for ‘Wings of Desire.’ He endured some pretty heavy blows, not because ‘Desire’ is an awful film (quite the contrary), but because it was a FUCKING AWFUL PICK. Still, if we consider the Canon’s development since we lost the Stucco, we find a great many films that would have been savaged had they been brought when ‘Wings of Desire’ was shown. The post MOFO era, coupled with the WebSite going off line (that saved Netti from alot of thwacks for ‘Cría De Crappo’) has led to a Canon spotted with many Picks that would likely have been as badly beaten as MONA’s tone-deaf ‘Desire.’ It seems of late that we have become a bit more accommodating in our old age than we used to be. Is that such a bad thing?
I must admit, I am torn. Though I admire Netti’s willingness to be edgy and unexpected, he has been so with such regularity, that I no longer find it surprising (and at times like ‘Night of the Demon’ - it can be downright aggravating). Netti referred to Nubs’ excellent ‘The Hudsucker Proxy,’ as a “return to the palatable center.” In reviewing his Comments over the past year and a half, it is clear that Netti has always looked to push the boundaries of the Selection process. While I applaud the aim (and the bulk of his Selection History), I chafe at the suggestion that those who serve the ideology of aiming for a Slam Dunk are populists or communists simply because they want everyone to be able to count on a good time on Wednesday. It can be argued that some enjoy spending Wednesday watching a young girl drown and then be cut open for autopsy in front of her father, but I prefer those joys on a Tuesday Night.
For all the indicators that the Slam Dunk has somehow fallen out of vogue for Movienight, I must stand by the principles we set out at the Founding. The challenging part of Movienight should not be the film itself (though the record will show many “challenging” films have been Slam Dunks). The challenging part should be how, as SELECTOR, do I find a film that delivers an evening that the entire Crew will enjoy.
Maybe I’m old fashioned, but I still think ‘Wings of Desire’ was an awful Pick.
As too, I’m afraid, is ‘Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance.’
Onwards.
Bourbon Cookie Comments:
Ah Netti. Jokingly at the beginning of the film, actually during the drive over, everyone said be prepared to read. I love books, don’t get me wrong, but after having a few, freezing my ass off and shaking hands with Bob, my one working eye has a hard time concentrating and my bladder focusing on even the largest of prints. While I did enjoy this movie, as a Movienight Selection, my opinion wavers.
The preamble was misleading and once the movie started, I sighed and sat back for what I knew was going to be two hours of a fine movie, if only I were at home on a Saturday morning with nothing else to do but sip tea and think. I was proud that I was not confused about the characters and their dilemma as Tooda claimed to be. The story was interesting and intriguing but (not to sound cliche about it being the New Year and how I want to start it off), not the most uplifting mind boggling pick for the first of the year and for Movienight. I come to Movienight to be ENTERTAINED first and formost, not sit back and bear it.
At this point in Movienight history, from what’s been told to me and the (almost) year I’ve attended myself, I expect such a high level of Picks that I should fear following anyone, if I ever get the chance again, not the same old stuff. Yes everyone has their style, but I haven’t seen much difference in Netti’s Selections except for ‘The Party.’ ‘Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance’ was a fascinating story of people at their highest and lowest in life. Nothing I haven’t read in Reader’s Digest. It felt to me like many short stories all tacked together. Just when I thought it was over, his kidney was stolen, he got the money, his sister died, the little girl died, he took vengeance on the kidney people, he ate their kidneys, the father took vengeance, the radicals took vengeance, the saga continued again and again. The ending killed me because after how intricately the story was woven, they chose the end to talk down to me by explaining who the dudes were killing the father. I’d made it this far, come on.
I love foreign films. But seeing the same story told time and time again, that people will kill for anything, I’m losing interest. Whether it’s a little girl thinking she killed her father because of how he acted after her mother died, or a blind man killing everyone to defend a village, or people just plain ol’ dying and still not being satisfied, I want more.
I believe in Netti and his vision of Movienight, I just wish he’d broaden his horizons.
Brandon Comments:
I think I’ll be one of only two Members who will be reviewing this film in a positive note; the other being the Selector, Netti. But that’s how it goes at MovieNight. Sometimes you’re a pauper, and sometimes you’re a poet. Sometimes you’re the windshield, and sometimes you’re the bug. ‘Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance’ was most definitely viewed as the bug this time around.
Right off the bat, I loved this movie. It was dark and eerie, funny, twisted and, most importantly, it was unusual. Two tales of revenge happening simultaneously, involving the same handful of people; both for different reasons, which turn out to be very similar reasons as the film progresses. I thought the characters were fascinating, although I couldn’t tell the difference between Ryu’s lover and his sister, which made for a very interesting sponge bath in my eyes. But once that was settled and established – the difference between the two women – the pace of the film again picked back up and the story unfolded beautifully.
Sure, ‘Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance’ has some very brutal scenes, but so does life. And I think we have to be reminded of both the good and the bad in life through the one vehicle that the Crew shares together…which is movies. There are only adults present at our screenings, and I would hate to think that we would have to censor a great Selection for the sake of a few gross moments. And the idea for a rating system for future Selections that was mentioned after the film ended, well, I think that might be the worst idea ever to fall upon the mighty Backyard.
But if you really want some type of a rating code, I suggest following these three rules:
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1.No picture shall be produced that will lower the moral standards of those who see it. Hence the sympathy of the audience should never be thrown to the side of crime, wrongdoing, evil or sin.
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2.Correct standards of life, subject only to the requirements of drama and entertainment, shall be presented.
3.Law, natural or human, shall not be ridiculed, nor shall sympathy be created for its violation.
These were the “moral” codes that Hays set forth for the Motion Picture industry in the 1930s, because too many people were kissing in films. We really don’t want a rating code for MovieNight, do we?
Nubs Comments:
And the nominees for Worst Movienight Sequence of all time;
Nominee #1- From ‘Cría de Crappo’- the wonderful scene where the girl is called to her mother’s deathbed so she/we can watch her writhe in agony and clutch at her bleeding vagina until she is lifeless.
Nominee #2 Also from ‘Cría de Crappo’- the completely long and useless scene where the sisters apply makeup and dance to the same song repeatedly followed by an even longer and less useful scene where the sisters play hide-and-go seek.
Nominee #3 Slim gets to represent when Harvey Keitel wore that red dress and was chased around the hot, barren land down under in the lukewarm but extremely barren movie, ‘Holy Smoke!’
Nominee #4 Though Coolbaugh is gone, the legend of ‘Straw Dogs’ will unfortunately be burned into my Movienight nightmares as the wife seemingly gets what she deserves when she is beaten and raped and we are supposed to believe she mostly enjoys it, and then another friend gets to hold a shotgun to her face and take his turn.
Nominee #5 I know it’s surprising that Netti has another entry here, but how about the chilling sequence in ‘Night of the Demon’ where our hero is asked to dance around with a small stuffed animal and pretend it’s a ferocious tiger? What was really chilling is when the audience realizes that’s the scariest scene of this Halloween Pick and there is an hour left.
Nominee #6 Most recently in ‘Mr. Vengeance Meets Something Unwatchable with Subtitles,’ our hero discovers his sick sister, and reason for the movie, dead after suicide in a bathtub overflowing with her blood. He rushes her dead body and the cute crying girl he’s kidnapped to a riverbed so he can bury her under large rocks. After the random retarded man pokes at the girl left alone in the car she falls in the river, flails and screams to deaf ears and drowns, her dead body bobs up against tree. The father of the girl is called to scene where, after confirming the body, and for no other reason than to illustrate the gratuitous nature of this film, the father watches the autopsy of the little girl and we, the audience, get to listen to extended sounds of her organs being disemboweled. Next we get an excruciatingly long funeral scene for the little girl as her mother howls and faints repeatedly capped off by the shot of the girl’s flesh simmering and burning inside the casket. Cut to the father stricken with grief at home as he envisions and hugs dripping, dirty, ‘The Ring’-like ghost of his daughter leading him to thoughts of revenge and the second half of this unbearable movie.
Please feel free to vote or submit your own nominees in the Comments Section below. I have to say Netti is an odds on favorite to win.
I don’t have much to say about this Selection. The common thread with all these nominees is it’s the point where I tune out and mentally walk out on the movie since there is no precedent for how to do so physically on a bad Pick. I suppose since Brandon considers this Pick as worthy of his Wednesday, I cannot call it an air-ball (the opposite of a Slam Dunk). I finally got over the idea that Netti was fucking with us as an institution with this latest offense. I am, again, giving Netti the benefit of the doubt that he, like my brother Craig, and Coolbaugh on occasion, and others outsiders who’ve chimed in with awful suggestions - earnestly believe an intense, depressing, gratuitous shocker is what we should be forced to sit through. And let’s remember this format forces the audience to trust the SELECTOR.
I believe that this is a free country, but we are a private club of hand-chosen friends asked to entertain each other every Wednesday. It is a lot of responsibility but as long as the effort is genuinely in the interest of considering our unique audience, I will not walk out. After 3 years, 105 movies, a constitution of rules, and a shit-load of comments and reviews after every effort, one should be able to make a fairly educated guess as to what will fly on Wednesday and what should be shown on Tuesday.
Thanks for trying.
SELECTOR Comments:
This is good storytelling. Really good storytelling. The central character Ryu is at a moment of mortal desperation. His sister whom he loves very much is very near to death. In need of a kidney, for which he has no means and little time to procure, he is taken in by a simple sticker above the urinal that he's pissing in at work. It reads: "Organs for Sale". From this moment begins the unraveling and the end of several lives. Moral compasses will become askew and ultimately broken. Logic and reason will be fractured by an onslaught of unintended consequences. The film doesn't let you go. I concede, that in a moment or two, it is gratuitously violent. Apart from those moments, however, the violence is rendered beautifully, eking out every moment of tension that is not just mechanical (as in the torture porn films) but emotional. Emotion is what sets this film apart from standard shock-schlock. The swipes of blades, swings of bats, the jolts of electric shock, are earned as much by their skillful portrayal as they are by the loving caress, the gentle laugh, and the gleam of a hopeful smile.
The script carves out territory that at first blush might seem just gore obsessed revenge fodder. It's cruelty and bleakness might deafen a viewer from hearing the mythic undertones at work here. It is an up to the minute Greek tragedy. A tragedy without the decline or falter of a noble hero but rather the squeezing of resolutely civilian class. Their options limited by circumstance, they concoct schemes complex and illusory as the politics of the anarchist. They imagine the possibility of the least damage to all involved, stemming from the same place as a white lie, though admittedly not as extreme only to find that the path to hell is paved with good intentions.
I was very eager to share this film. I chose it over some others because I felt some softer films would lose out to the cold weather, but much more than that, I think its some of the best filmmaking of the decade if you can take it. Apparently most of the Crew was left unavailable to its quality, because of its violence. I understand that. The genuine and considered discussion that occurred afterwards yielded some valid points, and I found it enjoyable. I love a good discussion especially when there's enough gravity to make it mean something rather than a play at debate club. I suspect that the words nihilism and gratuitous will be included in some of the reviews. And I must disagree with that characterization. We have had films in the archive, well received films, that were just as, if not more violent. ‘City of God’ is filled with killing. The joy of murder in that film is pure nihilism. Who survives that film to move on to understand the nature of the world we live in? A new breed of vicious killers. Hostel*? Audition? The brutality of these films get a pass. They rejoice in our tolerance for violence because it is predicated on our ability to laugh at it. That to me has the stink of nihilism more so than watching people make a truly moral choice that seems to be justified by the presumed beneficial ends.
The last few days in thinking about what it was that I was going to show, it became clear to me that the twenty or so films that are sitting in the magazine are all films that I think are on the edge of being accepted as appropriate Movienight picks. The group is absolutely on my mind, but really my catalogue of films to choose from are from the films I love; the films that cause me to think, reflect and consider my position in this world, laugh at the world, love the world, hate the world. It is very difficult for me to ignore those films that loom large in my mind. I'm sorry if I doused the mood or killed the high but I am surprised by the weakness in my Movienight brethren. There is no ability to abstract one's self from a movie? No chick flicks indeed.
I guess Movienight has relegated itself to the quality and pursuit of comfort food? To celebrate our past experiences only? To pat ourselves on our backs for what we already know? I was excited to bring this film to the group. I think it is excellent. It's not a chick flick. It's tough. It keeps you in your seat. I humbly accept the lashings if they are to come.
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