#Myself in a competition at Cannes. And

[lunarriviera]

i have finished reboot & i am sad

it's bittersweet—i mean, it was time to be finished with it; i've been watching it literally over the course of the pandemic. but enough! all things must end, even the arduously dragged-out conclusion of a whacked-out chinese tomb raiding drama featuring poisonous gas, hordes of insects, zombies, hand crabs, flying carnivorous clams, and "coffin dew," which like all the rest of those things does not exist. ruminations and pictures and spoilers behind the cut!

1. so why is this xie yuchen the most boring xie yuchen out of all of them? i don't even know this actor's name because i never bothered learning it. also when the hell did he become a doctor and do sketchy operations on people without anaesthesia? he's wearing pink, he's rich, he has the same name; but there the resemblance ends. this is not the xiao hua we know and love. where is my bitchy swishy opera-singing organized crime boss? no wonder there's no chemistry between him and xiazi; this guy barely has a pulse. sorry to this man. nice sweater, tho.

2. i was trying to prove that pangzi says "that's not your xiaoge" (which he doesn't, those are bad subtitles; he just says "that's not xiaoge") and instead captured this adorable picture of drunk bai haotian. xiao bai gets a bad rap—mao xiaotong is adorable and sweet and honestly kinda hot when she's not trapped in a bowl haircut and overalls. i appreciate that wu xie, busily dying of lungs, doesn't have time or patience to explain to her why he's not available, but zhu yilong plays it wisely straight down the middle, face impassive. ship it or don't, he seems to be saying; i don't care, it's not up to me anyway—the viewer can read it however they want. (but wu xie does manhandle her on more than one occasion and that's also kinda hot.)

3. admittedly liu sang is very very pretty but i still don't want him in my pingxie, like mint in my chocolate chip ice cream. no thank you please. i have always considered myself a multishipper, a live-and-let-live fan; but this fandom has taught me i'm monogamous and i guess there's nothing i can do about that. still. look at liu chang's beautiful features. he made me care about jinx beyond just his function as a whump magnet, and that's an achievement. someday maybe his ouxiang will give him the hug he deserves.

4. speaking of beautiful just look at these total idiots. i'm going to miss their stupid faces. xiaoge drinking water, so he can be sober enough to take his drunk husband home and put him to bed. wu xie so plastered that i have inadvertently captured the one (1) image of the most beautiful man in the world making a derp face.

BONUS: whatever this beautiful cranky bitchy "doctor" has going on. which definitely involves feelings he still has for wu xie, after what happened in germany. (you know what happened in germany.)

and that's it, that's a wrap. in the meantime zhu yilong has been in cannes being absolutely heart-stoppingly fucking divine, and i will bet you a hundred flying carnivorous clams that the next time he's there, his film will be in competition. the condé nast cover story didn't hurt. with each entrée he cements his reputation and, more importantly, protects himself from the increasingly nasty sweeps of china "cleaning up" c-ent. i honestly don't know what there is to clean up anymore; there's almost nothing left. immortality and the live-action of tgcf not being released; justice in the dark just abandoned not even halfway through. this doesn't end well.

at least as far as lost tomb goes, though, i've decided i'm proceeding backwards—so next i'm watching sand sea/sha hai, because i want to spend time with mob widow wu xie (qin hao has won me over via gifset) and ji chen's xiazi. until then, pouring one out for li jiale and chuchu. and wu erjing i guess. 干杯!

[kansasjean]

one of those things no one talks about or pretends exist is failed dreams. like if you open Pinterest you'll find hundreds of quotes about regerts,,,, regerts and unchained dweams,,, "oh im 200 and my only regret is not chasing my dreams" like thats valid but I guarantee you the feeling of failing a dream is far worse. I know this is not what the masses want to hear. putting your all into something, dedicating your life to it, and then being told you just don't have what it takes, not making the necessary connections, or straight up blowing your chances is a life-devastating feeling.

like film school. I FoLLoWeD mY DwEaMs and went. Just to be told that I didn't have what it takes about any of it. and I have to finish my degree because it's too late to transfer but im essentially cashing in on broken glass. maybe I don't blame myself for trying but im now in #theworldsworstsituation where I have to watch everyone around me strike it while its hot and I can only get it lukewarm at best.

like first internships. very important in the industry. one of my friends is apprenticing an editor he respects. one of my friends got to go to Cannes. one of my friends directed a commercial for Apple. me... I got an unpaid development internship. and I like development, but it's not the dream. plus everyone told me it's getting replaced by AI first so GREAT!

and its not for lack of trying like my resume is stacked. just with poor people shit like minimum wage jobs (and management) and work-study. I don't have to money to fund short films, nor the friends to make them work. I'm not talented enough to win writing competitions, and i'm not pretty enough to act.

ending this post because throwing a pity party for myself is pathetic just like the rest of this diary. awww my life is so sad. kill yourself about it bitch idkkkkkkk

[melancholicspace]

Lately i've been struggling with my confidence

You know, I've been in love plenty of times to know what love should look like. I know when someone is pretty obsessed with me, or when someone loves me more than i love them, or when they are truly attracted to me.

I have these voices in my head that keeps telling me that Gelo doesn't find me pretty. Or even if he does, it's not as much as I want him to be attracted to me. I always feel like I have these silent competitions with other girls he finds attractive on TikTok or his girl friends. I always caught myself checking if he reacted to this girl's stories or check his activity logs on IG and immature stuff like that.

I couldn't help it. I feel really conscious and insecure because I don't really see him that he genuinely finds me pretty. The other day, I asked him what type of pretty do I have. And he told me that I'm pretty but I have acne scars and eye bags and all the flaws that I have in my face. I know he meant well, but the words pierced through my heart. It made me feel like he's just settling with what I look.

It made me remember that one time he's making an IG story when we were in church and I removed my mask because we were taking a selfie, then all of a sudden he asked me to wear it for the picture. I jokingly told him that he only wants to post me with my mask on. It made me feel ugly.

It made me remember about the time we were apart, he was in Aparri and I was in Manila. We were LDR for a month. So I frequently sent him selfies. Then one time I opened up about being insecure, then he assured me that I'm beautiful. But when I asked him to show me his gallery, despite the fact that I sent him lots of selfies every day, I never saw a single picture of mine in his gallery. He never saved it. It was a big deal to me.

It made me remember about how he accidentally clicked his likes tab on TikTok, and how I saw a bunch of sexy girls in his feed who dances seductively or wear really revealing clothes. Or just plain pretty girls. I felt insecure.

It made me remember how frequent he would post his ex girlfriend's pictures in his stories and tell the world how pretty she was. He doesn't do that to me.

It made me remember about how he saves a lot of pictures of other pretty girls. And how he took stolen pictures of his ex-crush/best friend so often when they go out. He doesn't do that to me.

I've been with someone that whenever we meet, the first thing that would come out of his mouth is "You look so pretty". Always.

I've been with someone who would flood heart reactions to my stories and reply to every single one to tell me that I'm so pretty like it was his first time to see it despite the fact that I already sent the picture to him on messenger.

I've been with someone who would ask for my picture almost all of the time just because he wants to see me. Because he finds me cute. And hypes up every selfie I send out of nowhere.

I'm not comparing. But with the experiences I had with other people I used to love, I can easily tell the difference if someone genuinely finds me attractive. Before, he only tells me I'm pretty when I ask him if I look pretty. He frequently tells me I'm sexy, but that's far different from being pretty. I told him about this. He's changed.

But for me, suddenly I feel like he's just doing it just because I called him out. Because he knows I'm right. He suddenly save my selfies. He suddenly stopped liking other girl's tiktoks. But I have this feeling that it isn't genuine. That he's doing it only for my sake. That he's forced in doing that because I'm his girlfriend, not because he meant it.

I know he's trying hard on his end to assure me as well. But when I opened up about how my insecurities are beating me up, suddenly the table have turned then it became about him. He then suddenly self pity his way out and told me that I made him feel bad because I feel that way. That I don't appreciate his efforts. That everything is just all in my head and he cannot do anything anymore because I'm rejecting his efforts in my head and continue to believe that I'm not pretty.

Probably he's partly right. That it's all in my head and the validation I need should just come from myself and not him.

Maybe I'm just craving for someone who feels proud to have me. The one who can genuinely tell people out loud that I look so pretty. I just couldn't see that he feels that way. I'm pretty sure I'll notice it if he really feels that way.

I feel so insecure. I don't want to open this up anymore because I feel like we would only fight if I bring up past issues again. Hay. I know I'm pretty. Plenty of people tells me I'm pretty. But I don't want to hear it from them.

I only want to hear it from him. Genuinely.

[awardseason]

Cannes 2022 — Festival Line-up

Competition “Holy Spider,” Ali Abbasi “Les Amandiers,” Valeria Bruni Tedeschi “Crimes of the Future,” David Cronenberg “The Stars at Noon,” Claire Denis “Frere et Soeur,” Arnaud Desplechin “Tori and Lokita,” Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne “Close,” Lukas Dhont “Armageddon Time,” James Gray “Broker,” Hirokazu Kore-eda “Nostalgia,” Mario Martone “R.M.N.,” Cristian Mungiu “Triangle of Sadness,” Ruben Ostlund “Decisions to Leave,” Park Chan-Wook “Showing Up,” Kelly Reichardt “Leila’s Brothers,” Saeed Roustayi “Boy from Heaven,” Tarik Saleh “Tchaikovsky’s Wife,” Kirill Serebrennikov “Hi-Han (Eo),” Jerzy Skolimowski

Un Certain Regard “Les Pires,” Lise Akoka and Romane Gueret “Burning Days,” Emin Alper “Metronom,” Alexandru Belc “Retour a Seoul,” Davy Chou “Sick of Myself,” Kristoffer Borgli “Domingo y La Niebla,” Ariel Escalante Meza “Plan 75,” Hayakawa Chie “Beast,” Riley Keough and Gina Gammell “Corsage,” Marie Kreutzer “Butterfly Vision,” Maksym Nakonechnyi “Volada Land,” Hlynur Palmason “Rodeo,” Lola Quivoron “Joyland,” Saim Sadiq “The Stranger,” Thomas M. Wright “The Silent Twins,” Agnieszka Smoczynska

Cannes Premiere “Outside Night,” Marco Bellocchio “Nos Frangins,” Rachid Bouchareb “Irma Vep,” Olivier Assayas (Series) “Dodo,” Panos H. Koutras

Special Screenings “The Natural History of Destruction,” Sergei Loznitsa “Jerry Lee Lewis: Trouble in Mind,” Ethan Coen “All That Breathes,” Shaunak Sen

Midnight Screenings “Moonage Daydream,” Brett Morgen “Smoking Makes You Cough,” Quentin Dupieux “Hunt,” Lee Jung-Jae

Out of Competition “Top Gun: Maverick,” Joseph Kosinski “Elvis,” Baz Luhrmann “Three Thousand Years of Longing,” George Miller “November,” Cédric Jimenez “Masquerade,” Nicolas Bedos “Z,” Michel Hazanavicius — OPENING NIGHT

[4seasonswithiu]

[TRANS] 220510 <BROKER> Film Press Conference - Lee Ji Eun (IU)

On May 10, the upcoming humane film <Broker> held an offline press conference with director Hirokazu Koreeda (video call) and actor Song Kang Ho, Gang Dong Won, Lee Ji Eun and Lee Joo Young.

The film <Broker> revolves around baby boxes, where parents can anonymously surrender their babies for adoption. One rainy night, a baby is left at the baby box facility. Sang-hyun  (Song Kang Ho) and Dong-soo (Gang Dong Won) secretly take it home. However, the next day, So-young (Lee Ji Eun) unexpectedly returns, looking for her baby Woo-sung. She decides to call the police when she finds out that her boy is missing. The two men’s explanation that they took him to find suitable parents willing to adopt him is hard to believe, but with nowhere left to go, she decides to join their mission to find new parents for her boy. Meanwhile, the police detective Su-jin (Bae Doona) and her subordinate Detective Lee (Lee Joo Young) have been investigating the case for the past 6 months, waiting for the decisive moment when they can catch the duo in act. This group of people, brought together by a baby box, set off on a journey that will lead to destinations they never expected.

When asked about Lee Ji Eun’s thoughts on going to the Cannes Film Festival for the first time, the actress shared, “It’s an honor. The movie has also been invited to take part in the competition category, so I will take this as a once in a lifetime opportunity and go there to learn many things as well as see and enjoy the festival thoroughly.” Lee Joo Young added, “I look forward a lot to basking in the France atmosphere with my fellow seniors, Ji Eun-ssi and the director.”

Lee Ji Eun will be making her commercial film debut through <Broker>, following hits like <My Mister> and <Hotel Del Luna> which many named them as the best dramas of their lifetimes. When asked about how she felt receiving the offer, Lee Ji Eun said, “It was after I got the script and before finishing reading it. I have worked with Bae Doona sunbaenim in a short film before this. As sunbaenim has already been cast in the movie, I phoned her and asked before I read the script. I have always admired Bae Doona sunbaenim, so I recall myself reading the script with more confidence and assurance after she told me that I would suit the role very well.” It was also revealed that Lee Joo Young teared up after reading the script, to which the actress shared, “There is this scene where Sang-hyun. Dong-soo, So-young, and Hye-Jin were having a conversation and trying to understand each other. There is this line So-young tells the other three, and it resonated deeply with me when I read it.”

About casting Lee Ji Eun, director Hirokazu Koreeda shared, “As I was stuck at home during the pandemic, I started binge-watching Korean drama series on streaming services. I became a huge fan of Lee Ji Eun after watching <My Mister>. Towards the end of the series, I found myself crying whenever she appeared in the drama, so I thought only Lee Ji Eun could be So-young and eventually made a casting proposal.”

Lee Ji Eun went on to reveal how she prepared for her role, So-young. “It was my first time playing a role of a mother and I wanted to portray these natural habits (that she would have), so I prepared a lot, like how to hold a baby or play with them. But in reality, So-young is a character who is not well-prepared as a mother, so I did not have a lot of opportunities to hold the baby. Appearance-wise, as shown in the stills and trailers, the makeup team suggested many styles that I’ve never tried before, like the smokey makeup and bleached hair, so I tried it. It was unfamiliar at first, but I think later on it helped me with concentrating on my acting.”

Song Kang Ho was surprised by Lee Ji Eun’s performance on the set. When asked about how he felt working with Lee Ji Eun, the veteran actor shared, “I have always been inspired by the works of Lee Ji Eun, Bae Doona, and Lee Joo Young, and they are such great actors that amaze me. As shown here, there is this scene where Lee Ji Eun was having a conversation with the detectives, Doona and Joo Young on the rooftop. Watching that scene being filmed during the night, I think not only her technique as an actress, but her sincerity and the way she expressed it was on-point. Her way of delivering emotions were amazing, from what I recall. I liked the other scenes too, but that particular scene was a very complicated one where she had to deliver her personal emotions and many feelings. I was amazed that she pulled it off so precisely and flawlessly, so I gave her a compliment separately afterwards. Even Gang Dong Won has not received one from me yet, it’s that rare.”

Flattered by the comment, Lee Ji Eun said, “I could still remember that moment vividly. It was actually a very impressive moment for me, not just during the movie shoot, but in my whole life which I think I will remember it for a long time. At that time, the sun was setting. Sunbaenim was done with his part for the day so he could have left, but he was waiting for me. I knew I would be the last to complete the filming on that day, so I ran to his car to greet him. I asked, “Why haven’t you gotten off work yet?” to which he said, “I was monitoring that scene just now, and I liked it very much.” Then the car left and the whole scene was really breathtaking and touching like it came from a movie, so I got teary. I even bragged about that moment to my parents too.”

When asked about Lee Ji Eun's experience working with Gang Dong Won on the set, the actress commented, “I relied a lot on Gang Dong Won sunbaenim when it came to dealing with the kids. He played so well with the kids (child actors) that I almost asked him to play with me as well. (Jokingly) Had we filmed a bit longer, I would have tried asking him (to play with me) too. Sunbaenim must have been exhausted on the set too, but he was always looking after the kids first and giving his best to play with them. Seeing that, I thought I had to become an actress with such great stamina too.”

About the possible barriers, challenges or anecdotes when working with people of different ages and backgrounds on the set, Lee Ji Eun remarked, “It was a set filled with cast members of different age groups. I was nervous at first too, but there were lots of adorable moments when we were filming with the two child actors. For instance, being thoughtful, the director tried to keep the set (environment) as comfortable as possible for the kids. So when it came to filming emotional scenes, the kids were all excited. And when it came to a scene where I had to cry, the kids were all in high spirits, finding the set fun. In many instances, we were at opposite poles. But later on, I think this somehow became a huge factor that calmed my nerves during filming. Thanks to these two actors, Seung Soo who played Hae-jin and Ji Yong who played my son Woo-sung, the set atmosphere was amicable throughout.”

As the interview wrapped up, Lee Ji Eun gave her final greetings, “<Broker> is a very heartwarming and thought-provoking film. On top of that, the film captures the unfamiliar yet affectionate sides that exist in every corner of Korea beautifully in visuals too. I hope many of you would show your support at the theatres.”

<Broker> premieres this May at the 75th Cannes Film Festival, and will hit the theatres on June 8, 2022. 

Compiled and translated by IUteamstarcandy

Sources (1), (2), (3)

[fuckyeahwomenfilmdirectors]

10 Most Anticipated Holdovers of 2020

Ten films that played at festivals or were released in their home countries in 2019 I can’t wait to see in 2020.

Animals dir. Sophie Hyde

Female friendship movies are my absolute favourite. An adaptation of Emma Jane Unsworth’s fantastic book about two hard-partying best friends whose lifestyle is starting to tip from fun into alcoholism Animals played at Sundance 2019 and already opened in the UK, but no North American release date yet, alas.  

An Easy Girl dir. Rebecca Zlotowski

I’ve been a fan of Zlotowski since her debut film Dear Prudence. An Easy Girl has Zlotowski taking a look at the dark side of the Cannes Film Festival. The film follows a teenager who becomes entranced with the lifestyle of her older cousin who secretly works as a prostitute and helps introduce her to her wealthy older patrons. The film played out of competition at Cannes and won an award there.

Flatland dir. Jenna Cato Bass

Bass is a rising star in South African cinema and also co-wrote the Kenyan lesbian romance Rafiki. Flatland is a modern western about a policewoman who returns to her childhood home to solve a murder caused by a shy woman now on the run with her pregnant friend.

I Was at Home, But… dir. Angela Schanelec

Schanelec became only the 4th woman ever to win Best Director at the Berlin Film Festival for this film which makes it intriguing enough to me on its own. The plot is about a young girl who goes missing and then abruptly reappears and I’ve heard extremely devise reviews from people calling it a masterpiece and others calling it pretentious garbage. Can’t wait to make up my mind which it is for myself.

Jezebel dir. Numa Perrier

The film was plucked from obscurity by Ava DuVernay’s distribution company ARRAY which promotes indies directed by women and men of colour. Jezebel follows a young woman who spends the last days of her mother’s life forging a new path as a sex phone operator. Reviews have been great. Can’t wait to watch.

Portrait of a Lady on Fire dir. Céline Sciamma

Okay, so maybe this is technically a 2019 release. After premiering at Cannes the film received a token release in North America for Oscar qualification (it was completely shut out, boo). However Neon is holding out on a wider roll out until February 2020. And while I’ve seen it already I can’t wait to bask in the film, so clearly Sciamma’s best work to date, once more.

Proxima dir. Alice Winocour

I’ve been so intrigued by Winocour ever since her weird, darkly sexy, historical romance Augustine (she also co-wrote the 2015 film Mustang). In Proxima she examines an astronaut’s decision to leave her daughter behind for a year as she pursues a space mission. Space, motherhood and Eva Green? Sign me up.

Radioactive dir. Marjane Satrapi

Satrapi (yes, that Marjane Satrapi) tackles the life of Polish-French scientist Marie Curie which Rosamund Pike playing Curie. I’m not always a fan of biopics but Satrapi has an intriguing eye and the cast (including Anya Taylor-Joy and Same Riley) is pretty fab.

Rocks dir. Sarah Gavron

I enjoyed Gavron’s beautiful look at the fight for suffrage in the UK (the aptly titled Suffragette). And I’ve heard nothing but good things about her latest film, Rocks, about a teenager (nicknamed Rocks) who suddenly finds herself in charge of herself and her younger brother after being abandoned by her parents. This wasn’t on my radar until several people recommended it to me, and when that many people start talking about a film I pay attention.

Saint Maud dir. Rose Glass

I am a scaredy cat when it comes to horror films, but the reviews for Saint Maud are so promising that I can’t help wanting to watch this one. A film about a pious nurse who takes things too far when trying to save the soul of her dying patient, the film also co-stars Jennifer Ehle (who is best known as Elizabeth Bennet in the ‘95 adaptation of Pride & Prejudice). Ehle is a lovely warm presence in every film she’s a part of and maybe one of the most underrated actresses of all time imo. Is Saint Maud the movie that will bring her more widespread recognition? I hope so!

[thexfridax]

Translated radio interview / transcript

Dance of the gazes and female desire

Susanne Burg, Deutschlandfunk, 26th of October 2019

// Additions or clarifications for translating purposes are denoted as [T: …]. You can listen to the interview (in German) here. Noémie speaks in English, but unfortunately you can’t hear most of it due to the simultaneous translation (or maybe you can if you have superhuman hearing). I’ve tried to combine the transcript with the recording where possible. Apologies, it gets a bit messy. //

‘Portrait of a Lady on Fire’ is about a female painter who is supposed to paint a woman, who doesn’t want to be painted. The film received the Best Screenplay in Cannes. Lead actress Noémie Merlant explains why this film is so special.

One of the films that has been talked about a lot in Cannes this year, in the queues, in reviews and finally at the award ceremony, was ‘Portrait of a Lady on Fire’. […] It is a period film, but turns many gender roles upside down and tenderly creates a utopia of liberated love.

[T: Omitted short description of film]

Interviewer: You play the painter Marianne, who is commissioned by the Countess to do a portrait of her younger daughter Héloïse. Héloïse refuses to pose. Marianne therefore has to study her face during the day and then paint her at night. Why did she even accept this commission? Does she think in the beginning, it is just a job like any other?

Noémie Merlant: She is a painter and is still at the beginning of her career. She wants to work and as a woman gets the opportunity to do so. At the time there were maybe around a hundred [T: womans 😘], who were painters. She is modern in the sense that she is and wants to work as a freelancer, [T: (as per recording) so she has to accept to work this way, in secret.]

--- [T: This bit is not in the recording for whatever reason]

I: She does that, she studies Héloïse’s face, they talk with each other. When does she start to feel guilty, because she is lying to Héloïse?

NM: I believe that she already feels a bit guilty in the beginning, when she accepts the job. This guilt is getting stronger, the more she feels for Héloïse. The more in love she feels, the more guilty she also feels.

---

I: How does their relationship change, when Héloïse finds out?

NM: [T: (as per recording) It changes everything, because then Héloïse accepts to collaborate,] she accepts to sit for the portrait. From this moment, it is about the collaboration of two women, and the love story can really begin. They collaborate on the same level, the gazes are horizontal. The concept of the muse is reinvented in this film – Héloïse is not a muse, [T: (as per recording) she is a collaborator. So this starts at that moment.]

I: Héloïse has a very strong opinion about Marianne’s painting. And Marianne is also not very happy about the result of her work at first. Why is that?

NM: Marianne has the opportunity not to marry, but to pursue her passion as painter. But she is stuck, she hasn’t really found her art. She is trapped in the constraints of a commissioned painter. But when she starts to collaborate with Héloïse, when Héloïse practically opens her eyes, that is when Marianne realizes she has to be sincere with this portrait, in this case it means the intimacy and shared moments of these women. Héloïse has found her way back in life, [T: (as per recording) and Marianne is back in life, too, so it’s easier for her to find the kind of truth in the portrait.]

--- [T: This bit is not in the recording either]

I: I read that the director Céline Sciamma was inspired by the painter Hélène Delmaire for the character of Marianne? How much did you look at her art as preparation for the film?

NM: It was important for me to closely observe Hélène at work, to absorb the gaze of the painter. She has a certain kind of gaze that all painters have somehow, when they work – how she looks at something that she paints and then at the canvas. I had to adopt this gaze, the eyes of a painter. I also observed her rhythm at work, her gestures and all the technical steps to create a portrait. You can see in the film that the portrait is reminiscent of modern art at first, the light, the shadows, how it’s built piece by piece. I find it important to understand this right from the beginning.

---

I: The dresses in the film are quite impressive, in my opinion. And they are also quite important for the protagonists in the film. How much does the dress, which you wear in the film, characterise Marianne?

NM: [T: (as per recording) This dress got pockets. It’s true at that time there were pockets,] but these were banned later on and disappeared from the dresses. These pockets were a step towards autonomy for women. As a painter these pockets are important for my character und also influence her gestures. There is also a cape that was made for the character of Marianne, it is more of a masculine cape. This dress, the pockets and the cape also helped me to get into the spirit of the character. Same for the fact that the dress with the corset was quite tight and heavy. The film also gives an idea how oppressive these social forces were, and with the heavy dress I could directly feel these restrictions. During the course of the film [T: (as per recording) the costumes get less (tight), and we smile more, we feel more, we desire more. And so the costume helped (with) that.]

I: It is a story about love and art, which takes place in the 18th century, but it also feels quite contemporary. How did the idea that the story is also saying something about the present time influence your interpretation of the role?

NM: [T: (as per recording) When I act, even if it’s in the 18th century…] I don’t think about these things, when I act. There are of course the costumes and the text that cannot be changed, but when I act and when Adèle acts, then we act together and are fully in the moment, we create that moment. But when I read the script for the first time, I was [T: in the bathtube] captivated by the film. This story has been missing so far. The stories of female painters were erased historically, and cannot be found anymore. Stories about women and the female gaze have been missing. There are only those with the male gaze, which became the universal gaze. [T: (as per recording) … it was really strong because it was necessary to share this (story) and give back this expression to the womans (sic), you know.]

--- [T: This bit is not in the recording either]

I: How does the atmosphere change on set, when it is mainly women working there?

NM: There are almost no men in the film. There are a lot of films with only men, but we don’t realise it. That is normal. This film is a kind of invitation for women and men to look at women as they are. We were indeed mainly women on set. It was different in the way… we were not necessarily freer, but maybe more ourselves and less intimidated, and there was just this horizontal gaze between all of us.

---

I: Marianne and Héloïse talk a lot with each other, but there is also a lot of non-verbal communication, especially when they start to fall in love with each other and which must take place in secret at first. How did you work on the non-verbal communication between the two of you?

NM: [T: (as per recording) Yes, the silence (is) a big part in the movie.] It was also all in the script already, the gazes, the gestures and so on. But we worked a lot on the details. An important detail is the music. There are only two pieces of music in the film. It was very difficult to listen to music then, it was predominantly silent. And when you then hear the music, you immediately thought ‘Wow!’ – this could also be conveyed through the volume. It is the same for the gazes, the touches and the silence between Héloïse and Marianne – all those details were already written down, but it is about how you fill them out, how you adopt these, and what you put in.  

Adèle has for example suggested a gaze, and it was always a different one, just like this, or with a smile. So it was a surprise, because I didn’t expect it. We worked on finding our autonomy in these. And even the breathing is important in this film. It influences every scene and their rhythm. If you finish a scene with an inhale or exhale, it changes everything. [T: (as per recording) That was great and really interesting, we were working on holding back, you know.]

I: You are in each scene of the film. What does that mean for your preparation and work?

NM: [T: (as per recording) Yes, it is exhausting, because you] have to be present the whole time – it is not about not losing control, that can be good sometimes – but to constantly be mentally present is more exhausting than being physically there. We didn’t work chronologically. It is important that the audience notices how my character and Héloïse’s change during the course of the film. And because we didn’t work chronologically, we had to carefully prepare each scene at the kitchen table, and carefully check where we are in the story, in the relationship, in the work.

In the beginning we both kind of wear a mask, we don’t show much of us, we are reserved and shy. And piece by piece, we open up a bit more. The eyes, the smile, the mouth, the dress, everything is more open. [T: (as per recording) So I had to really stay focused in each scene, where am I at that moment.]

I: You worked quite intensively on this film and it was then in competition at Cannes in May. How is it for you to see the film and yourself on the big screen?

NM: [T: (as per recording) I have a mix of feelings.] I am happy, because I love this film, it is great and I am proud of it. On the other hand, I always find it difficult to see myself or to hear my voice, [T: (as per recording) but I try to forget that and you know, appreciate what I see.]

Picture sources: [1, (c) Stephane Cardinale - Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images], [2], [3, NEON], [4, Joel C Ryan/Invision/AP]

[letterboxd]

How I Letterboxd #10: Chad Hartigan.

Filmmaker Chad Hartigan talks to Jack Moulton about his prescient new sci-fi romance, Little Fish, why radio silence is worse than a bad review, and his secret system of Letterboxd lists.

Chad Hartigan has won prizes at the Sundance Film Festival and the Film Independent Spirit Awards for his acclaimed films This is Martin Donner and Morris From America. He’s also been a Letterboxd member since way back, joining what he proclaims as “my favorite website” in 2013. Hartigan has always been an obsessive logger: he has transcribed all of his viewing data since 1998 and continues to work on filling in the gaps in his downtime.

Like many ardent Letterboxd members, Hartigan is a diligent list-maker, keeping tabs on his best first viewings of each year and assembling an all-time top 1,000 films over the summer (with an accompanying 26-minute supercut). Perhaps unusually for a member of the film industry on Letterboxd, he’s unafraid to hold back his opinions and regularly voices his critiques on even the most acclaimed films.

Hartigan’s newest film, Little Fish, is a sci-fi love story starring Olivia Cooke (Sound of Metal) and Jack O’Connell (Unbroken). Written by Mattson Tomlin, it’s set during an imagined pandemic—shot long before our own actual pandemic—wherein a disease causes people to lose their memories. It was set to premiere at the 2020 Tribeca Film Festival, and then postponed due to Covid-19. It’s now out in limited theaters and on demand, and we were delighted with the excuse to put Hartigan in the How I Letterboxd spotlight.

Olivia Cooke as Emma and Jack O’Connell as Jude in ‘Little Fish’.

You made a pandemic movie before the pandemic. How do you feel about accidentally hitting that unfortunate zeitgeist and now consequently being asked questions like this one? Yeah, strange. The questions are fine. If it wasn’t this one, it would be another that you would have to answer over and over again. One of the things that drew me to the project was that it felt like a fantasy that wasn’t necessarily rooted in reality in a way that my other [films] were. I liked that it’s old-fashioned in its attempts to purely take you somewhere and wasn’t intended to hold up a mirror to our times—but then in the end that’s exactly what it’s doing. I’m curious myself, and I’m checking Letterboxd to see the reactions from people because I really couldn’t guess what it would have been like [now].

Are there any prescient details you’re proud of getting right? I’m so grateful and happy that Jack [O’Connell] is wearing his mask correctly. That’s the number one thing that I’m glad we got right. I think it was very smart of Mattson to focus the movie on [the relationship] rather than the details of this global pandemic. I feel the reason it’s not in bad taste is because it dealt with those things as a backdrop and instead focused on people just trying to remember what’s important and clinging onto those that they love.

Onto our own favorite memory aid, Letterboxd. How did you discover us and how did you manage without us? I’ve been on since 2013, so I’m probably one of the earliest people to jump on it. I love the interface and the diary, just aesthetically it was really fun. I’ve been keeping track of what I see with analog [methods] for as long as I can remember. I have diaries and planners so I logged all that old information. If I was running for president, my platform would be that everybody is required to use Letterboxd comprehensively, because I just love to know what everybody is watching all the time.

Do you talk about Letterboxd in the real world with the other filmmaking people? Yes, and I’m often trying to convince them to join. Other filmmakers are more concerned about having their opinions on peers be public knowledge than I am, I guess. I’ve made four films now and each one’s been bigger and more widely seen than the last. The very first one was a total no-budget affair that couldn’t get into any festivals and I was very excited when I finally got it into the Hamptons Film Festival. It was about half-full and one or two people came up to me afterwards and said they liked it. This was pre-Twitter so I spent the whole next day Googling to see if anybody had written anything. I was so curious to see what people thought and there was nothing—not a review, not a blog—just total emptiness.

When the next film got into Sundance, there were people tweeting their reactions and actual reviews and I read everything. People were asking if the bad reviews hurt me. Absolutely not—nothing can be worse than the radio silence of nobody caring about the first film. The fact that people care enough to sit and write about this movie—good or bad—is a win, and I’ve carried that onward. I like to see what people think, it can be helpful in how you view the film as a success or failure. You learn and move on.

Jack O’Connell at least remembers how to wear a mask in ‘Little Fish’.

Some filmmakers have told us they’re kinder to films after making their own, but you’re not shy at all about being critical. How did making your own films change your perspective as a critic? I don’t consider myself a critic so that’s why I’d be less concerned with someone reading what I thought. Why should they put any stock into what I think? If they get hung up on it then that’s their own stuff because I’m not a critic. Like everyone else on Letterboxd, I just love watching movies. Obviously I can appreciate and understand some of the technical aspects maybe moreso than people who don’t make films, but at the end of the day, rarely that’s the thing that makes you love a movie or not. There’s a great bit in Francis Ford Coppola’s commentary track for Finian’s Rainbow where Fred Astaire’s doing a dance number and [Coppola admits] he totally messed it up because Astaire’s feet aren’t fully in frame. He’s very honest about his mistakes because it’s one of his earliest movies. Then he goes on to say that he thinks there’s the same number of mistakes in Finian’s Rainbow as there are in The Godfather, it’s just that he made mistakes on the things that don’t matter for The Godfather. No film is perfect, but if it can latch onto this one magical aspect that connects you to it, that’s what makes you love it or not.

You had a project where you chart the best films made by directors at certain ages as you reached that age. Tell us more about it. That was a great project. I got the idea when I was 26. This was back when I had a Netflix DVD subscription and it was just hard for me to randomly choose DVDs to throw in the queue. I needed a system. I decided to watch movies from directors when they were my age and see if there’s some common denominator, something I can learn. At that point, there weren’t many, there were films like Boogie Nights and Fassbinder films. Not many people had made stuff when they were 26 or 27, so it was very feasible. Every year there were more movies and more directors to add to the list and it became time-consuming. I did it all the way up until I was 34 and the reason I stopped was because I had a son and there was no way I could continue this level of viewing output.

My favorite part of your account is the fact that you log every viewing of your own films. You know for a fact that you’ve watched Morris From America 26 times and Little Fish fifteen times. Why do you log them? What counts as a viewing? I’ve clearly watched those movies many more times in little chunks but I’ll only log it if we’re sitting down and watching it from beginning to end. I have a ticket to see Little Fish in the drive-in on Saturday, so it’s going to be logged again. Why do I do it? Like I said, I wish everyone was required to use Letterboxd comprehensively. That’s what it’s there for for me, an accurate log of what I watch. This is psychotic behavior but I’m tempted to have a Letterboxd account for my son. I’ll do his views for him once he starts watching movies until he’s old enough to take over. It’ll just be, like, Frozen a thousand times but he’s not old enough to watch anything yet, so we’ll see.

Have you discovered any films thanks to Letterboxd discourse that influenced your approach to filmmaking? For sure, I can’t maybe say specifically, but once I dropped the directors my own age system I didn’t replace it with nothing. I’m a Virgo and I have a little bit of OCD, so I have to have some system. I’ve replaced it with a new complicated system where I pull from different lists and that’s now my main source of how I choose a movie to watch. I have like ten or twelve different lists, each about a thousand movies with a lot of overlap. One of them is my own list of every movie I’ve seen in a theater and I’ll go and look through that and if it’s something I want to revisit. Recently I rewatched Twister, which I hadn’t seen in a long time and is an old favorite from when I was in high school.

I have a bunch of private lists I cycle through; every movie nominated for a Spirit Award, every movie that’s won an Oscar, every movie that’s played in competition at Cannes, the top 1,000 films at the box office. There’s another great website that I use as a biblical resource which is They Shoot Pictures, Don’t They? and their lists of acclaimed films for all-time and the 21st century. I hit those up often. Something that I watched purely because of the very high Letterboxd rating and really loved is Funeral Parade of Roses. I try to see as many movies as I can that have a 4.0 rating or higher.

You respect the Letterboxd consensus. I do, but I don’t always agree with it.

‘Little Fish’ director Chad Hartigan.

Which is your most underrated or overlooked movie according to Letterboxd? I can say I was the very first person to log a movie called Witness in the City, which is an Italian noir movie I watched when I was doing my ‘directors my own age’ series. Literally nobody had logged it, so my review was like “whoa, I can’t believe I’m the first person to log this!”. It was very exciting for me because it’s great, but I’m the OG logger of that movie.

From your list of every film you’ve seen in a theater since you were twelve, which was your most memorable experience? The cheap answer is that it’s hard to top my own movies. The Sundance premiere of Morris From America at the Eccles Theater is maybe the best, but if I’m disqualifying my own films, seeing Scream 3 in a very packed theater in Virginia Beach was really fun, really rowdy. There was a trailer for a Jean-Claude Van Damme movie and I remember the climax was Van Damme going “you lied to me!!!” and everyone laughed. Someone did a George Costanza move later during Scream 3 and yelled out “you lied to me!!!” and everybody laughed again—so that’s a high. That’s the thing I miss the most about movie theaters, and the worry I have if theaters go away, is that so much of how we feel about a movie can be tied to the experience; who we saw it with, what we did before or after, what the crowd was like, or if anything strange happened. There are a lot of movies I have strong memories and affection for because of the experience of seeing them and I probably wouldn’t feel the same way about if I just watched it at home on my laptop.

I typically like to cap interviews off with what filmmakers thought was the best film of the past year, but we have your data to hand. For you, it’s Garrett Bradley’s documentary Time. Can you talk a bit about what makes the film stand out for you? One thing I learned about myself from the pandemic is that the motivation and desire to see new things is very closely tied to the theater-going experience for me. Once that was taken away and you could watch a new movie at home, it joins the pile of all the other movies. The fact that it’s new doesn’t really do anything for me. Why would I press play on Da 5 Bloods when I still haven’t seen Malcolm X? I gotta see Malcolm X! There wasn’t an urgency, so I saw far fewer films than in an ordinary year. But Time I found incredibly moving and important. Similar to what I liked about the Little Fish script, it’s so hyper-focused on one relationship and within that one story it has so much to say about larger issues and the world at large. It was an emotional and rich viewing experience.

‘Little Fish’ is on demand and playing in select theaters now. Images courtesy of IFC Films.

[hclfempty]

— here comes   !   PENELOPE LAURENT,   the   TWENTY   TWO   year   old   SENIOR .   she’s   known   as   a   darling   of   the   FINE ARTS   department   and   and   is   from   CANNES, FRANCE ,  penelope   reminds   people   of   PAINT   SMUDGED   FINGERTIPS,   MIDNIGHT   SPELLS   OF   INSPIRATION,   GLOSSY   LIPS   PAIRED   WITH   A   SHARP   GRIN,   THE   LINGERING   SCENT   OF   LAVENDER,   HUSHED CONVERSATION,   PROLONGED   EYE   CONTACT,   UNPREDICTABLE   BOUTS   OF   ANGER,   KISS   BRUISED   LIPS,   WILD   FLOWERS   WILTING   IN   CRACKED   VASES,   AN   UNNECCESARY   AMOUNT   OF   CANDLES,   A   COLLECTION   OF   FOUNTAIN PENS,   &   WINE   CONSUMED   STRAIGHT   FROM   THE   BOTTLE. 

hey gang! posse! squad! idk what to call you guys yet but hello! i’m tee ( although i go by ash/asha too so like take your pick really! ). i’m still kind of on cloud nine right now because i definitely thought i wasn’t going to be accepted and now that i’m here the imposter syndrome is kicking in BUT TRUST I’M VERY EXCITED TO BE HERE WITH ALL OF YOU!! penelope is as well...she just shows enthusiasm in very weird ways! oh, before i forget i’m in EST and 24 years old! just to finish introducing myself! now that that’s out of the way, on to penelope! 

             FULL BIOGRAPHY!! – PINTEREST!! – PLAYLIST!!

TLDR;; Penelope Laurent was born in Seoul, South Korea to a young teenager mother who simply couldn’t afford to keep her. She put her up for adoption almost immediately after giving birth and luckily she ended up being adopted into the loving Laurent home. The Laurents are known to be very eccentric and nonconforming. Which certainly didn’t make them popular with their neighbors but Penelope was able to grow up sheltered from their judgement for the most part ( due to her own stubbornness really ). Her mom Dominique was a big figure skating fan. She used to call them ballerinas on ice and she shared that love with her daughter. They went to the ice rink pretty much every weekend for as long as Penelope can remember and once she got older and started to show a real knack for it, her mother fostered the talent by doing anything she could to pay for her daughter’s gear and lessons. When Dominique died shortly after Penelope’s 12th birthday, she kind of threw herself into the sport as a distraction from her deteriorating home life. Eventually she got recruited by a world renown couch and got a scholarship to attend the prestigious boarding school said couch taught at. Penelope was well on her way to joining the French Olympic Ice Skating team when her best friend went missing a week before Pen’s qualifying round. She was on her way to catch the train to her competition when she found out that Eleanor’s dead body had been found. Devastated and stubborn, Penelope chose to drive the four hours to her competition instead and ended up in a car accident that put her in the hospital for months and essentially ruined her figure skating career. She ended up at Harcourt on a whim ( truly, she just picked it out of the many pamphlets people gave her during recovery ) and she’s not really the most enthusiastic member of the society but she gets the job done and tries to have fun while doing it cause....who knows how long this will last right? 

  BEWARE OF ICY/HOT! ALL HAIL QUEEN OF THE FUCKBOIS! 

As far as her reputation on campus goes Penelope has a very active social life. She spent a lot of childhood and teenage years denying herself stuff due to her strict figure skating regime but after the accident that all went out of the window and she was suddenly allowed to do whatever she wanted ( as long as it didn’t involve too much spinning ). She’s not really a wild child per say, she’s too control obsessed to really let go but she has fun in her own ways. Penelope didn’t really have a major as a freshman and only decided on fine arts halfway through her sophomore year because it allowed her the most opportunities to dabble and not commit to anything in particular. She’s pretty much a jack of all trades but she has a soft spot for painting and photography. Some of her work has even been displayed at art galleries in and around the East Coast. Penelope is very hot or cold, one moment she’s super into something or someone and the next it’s like they don’t exist. She’s like that with her friends too. Sometimes they have her undivided attention and other times she’s ghosting for four days straight without a word ( and her disappearances have definitely increased since joining the literary society ). More than anything though Penelope is a lost girl who is just trying to find herself whether it be through her art, the society, or those who keep her bed warm. She had her whole life planned out and it was taken from her in one fell swoop, that’s hard to recover from. 

[hayaomiyazaki]

Any Cannes lineup you are excited for?

you know... i don’t necessarily get excited for any kind of festival or competition (◕︵◕) this might make me sound cringey and straight-up like a baby (lol ya...me), but i am really sensitive to excessive criticism and particularly comparison politics... i honestly don’t enjoy most film discourse, lists / proclamations like “best films of the year”, award shows, academia... which i learned slowly and painfully while doing my undergrad & graduate degrees in film theory 🙃😔 this may explain to the (very, very) few who may wonder why don’t post criticism whatsoever or even many of my own opinions on my blog.

idk if i’m the only one — especially because it seems like most people are either on film twt or some form of stan twt and i’m not on twt at all — but the incessant “cool kids” passive-aggressive / condescending / spicy film takes make me so uncomfortable. obviously this extends well beyond twitter to tumblr, as well. things like, to make up a totally random and fake example, “ya’ll watch one varda film n suddenly think ur hot shit and a worldly citizen lmfao...sit down”. that tone, you know what i mean? i really hate it — even if it’s not an attack on me or it’s something i actually agree with. i try not to follow people who post like that or create inherently one-sided conversations around that tone, but it feels so hard to avoid that these days! i know it’s just a mode of today’s collective internet humour, but every. single. space. for film discourse and appreciation is absolutely littered with this (no surprise, as “cinephilia” today is just an act of competition and totally unjustified gatekeeping) and it’s turned me off from the community so much that i really don’t keep up to date with things like festival slates and new releases the way i used to. even here, it just feels safer to keep to myself most of the time ┐(‘～`；)┌

🙃 why is everyone so judgmental and mean 🙃 and why do i feel like i’m the only person on earth who doesn’t want to talk about things i don’t like and why i dislike them 🙃

wow it really seems like i digressed doesn’t it!!! i apologise... i only meant to explain i haven’t kept up with cannes — especially because the european festival circuit is when the real assholes come out — and so can’t offer anything interesting or insightful. ur a very kind and engaging oomf, so i went ahead and took a look at the slate: summer of 85, heaven: to the land of happiness, peninsula, the real thing, enfant terrible, and earwig and the witch are the films i’m most immediately interested in, but the new filmmakers entries is massive and i have a feeling the festival’s most innovative storytelling will come from there. if you have any recommendations, please let me know! if u have any recommendations for films not privileged to be selected for this senselessly elitist cinematic dog show, also please let me know! and again uh sorry for the 7am rant i just want to bake a cake filled with rainbows and smiles and we’d all eat it and be happy 🌈🌈🌈

[whenrockwasyoung19]

Oscar predictions update (for Rocketman fans)

I’m obs a Rocketman stan, so I’m obviously rooting for Rocketman to sweep, but I’m essentially putting my bias aside to think objectively about Rocketman’s chances of becoming an Academy Award nominated/winning movie. Not to get too ahead of myself here, but I’m going to bet that both will happen. But in what categories? And what are the odds?

So, Paramount has been campaigning for the Oscars since May. Releasing the film at Cannes, screening it for the Academy, actively campaigning for the Baftas, releasing an official For Your Consideration campaign, having Taron present at the Britannia Awards, going to the Governors awards, and winning various smaller awards are all steps in a solid Oscar campaign. It also helps that Taron was just inducted into the Academy officially and that his chances of getting nominated for a Globe are high. It also helps that Taron is naturally very humble, sweet, and endearing. I don’t want to imply that Taron is playing some absurd long game in which his inherent likability is some kind of long game to get an Oscar. He’s just like that because that’s who he is. Conveniently, everything about his personality and position in Hollywood (as a young star who’s being boosted by established favorites) gears him and the film up for a successful Oscar campaign.

I have been obsessing over Oscar predictions lately. Obviously, I want some assurance that Rocketman will get nominated for various awards. And going by what some film snobs on the internet writing listicals say, Rocketman will likely be nominated in a few categories.

So far, there’s been talk that Rocketman could be nominated for makeup, sound mixing and sound editing, best original song, costume design, and best actor.

Now, the nomination and win that I think is a lock is costume design. I have seen some lists that excluded Rocketman in this category. Those people are just straight wrong. This year is a particularly limp year for costume design which increases Rocketman’s chances even more. There are, generally speaking, a few categories of film that get costume design nominations. All are on display this year and all are weak. There are a few period dramas out that could score a nomination such as Downton and Little Women. But their costume design is very much “seen it, awarded it.” Like the Academy has seen 1920s headpieces and Victorian dresses before. There are also the sort of miscellaneous ones. There’s talk of genre films like Ad Astra getting it, but like we’ve seen spacesuits. If the Academy was not impressed by spacesuits in First Man then they’re not going to be interested in spacesuits in a movie no one saw. Lastly, there’s the “regular clothes” category. This is when a movie gets nominated despite having fairly standard, contemporary costume design. They usually get nominated because that film has had many other nominations, and this is an easy one to toss into their pile. This years regular clothes pick is the Joker. Like, the guy is wearing a regular ass suit in weird colors. It’s remarkable how basic it is. So, the idea of any of these trite ass picks would get nominated and Rocketman wouldn’t is insane to me.

I’m not a sound design person, but I think it has a strong chance here. If Bohemian Rhapsody could get nominated for editing (despite a lot of people complaining about the editing) then anything can happen.

Makeup and hair styling: I’m not sure how this race will play out. Like with costume design, I don’t think there’s a lot of competition. But I think the amount of wig work could get this film a nom.

Best original song: this one is a lock for a nomination. It’s a great song. It has radio play so people outside of the industry have heard it. Also, I think the Academy has been chomping at the bit to give Elton another Oscar. So, I definitely think it can get a nomination, and I think it has a good chance of winning.

Best actor: this category keeps me up at night. It’s honestly such a tough category, and I don’t know what’s going to happen. He’s considered a strong contender, but nothing is guaranteed. I’m so afraid that he won’t be nominated. It’d be such a sign of the Academy’s blind spots, but also I’d just be sad like personally. So, what do all of these ramblings even mean? I guess it means that Taron has like 70% chance of being nominated, and I’m probably going to be a mess till the nominations come out.

[imagines-mha]

Hiiiiiiii! So I saw your Haikyuu!! fic with the female crush that behaved like a “typical shoujo manga male lead”(kudos to that anon btw too) and I absolutely loved it!!! So I was wondering if you could do almost like a part two? Or a continuation of the hcs but instead with Semi, Ushijima, Kuroo, Bokuto, and Iwaizumi? Please and Thank youuuuuu!!!

Of coursseeee i cann!!!! 💕💫💕💫

Semi

💜 He seems stoic, but whenever he has a crush it’s game on. He’s gonna be SMOOTH as hell if he’s gonna win you over

He plans his moves accordingly. It’s the first time he’s ever properly spoken to you outside of your friend group. It’s your first date, and he’s gonna do all he can to make you fall for him

💜 He goes to the spot where you both are meeting, and the more he approaches the more he notices the change in atmosphere...since when have the trees around here been cherry blossoms?

💜 The date is filled with nothing but surprises. When you pick a bunch of flowers and hand them to him in perfect condition he’s almost floored with a blush. How the hell is she beating him at his own game?

Tries his hardest to be competitive and win you over faster than you’re winning him over- but the comparison is like a snail going against usain bolt in the olympics: you’re just that smooth

💜 He feels like a schoolgirl around you, and it doesn’t change after that. He’s always filled with butterflies and covered in a rosy red blush whenever he sees you...but he loves it

Ushijima

🐮 Okay this man is Ushijima Wakatoshi. He may be a softie to his friends, but to the rest of the world? He’s stoic, he’s blunt and he’s cold-hearted

🐮 You however, are the female embodiment of Tamaki Suoh. So you can imagine how this relationship goes down

🐮 He honestly loves your flamboyency. He loves how you compliment him loudly, not caring about his tough exterior- because internally he feels so soft and bashful at it all

🐮 He loves how you carry yourself, like you’re constantly on the red carpet waving to thousands of fans

🐮 He loves your confidence, and how sweet you are to everyone, but he loves how extra sweet you are to him and how you don’t care how obvious it is

🐮 He doesn’t even try to one-up you- he just basks in it because who doesn’t love all that attention from their crush? He does, however, try his best to be smooth. Key word: try

Kuroo

❤️ Daddy’s smooth as hell. He’s a fuckin nerd, but whenever he has a crush, he is smooth as hell

❤️ However, when this crush happens to be you- he doesn’t know what hit him. How the HELL are you so enchanting???

❤️ “You guys are seeing this, right?” He asks Kenma, Akaashi and Bokuto as you walk into the school, attracting attention from everyone else in the hallway.

“That’s just her fanclub-“ kenma kindly notifies him, typing away on his phone like it was normal for a teenage girl to have her own fanclub in the school

❤️ He’s the one who tries his best to win you over though. He’s already been won by you, now it’s time to finally get you back for that

❤️ He tries to use his intelligence. He waits for a moment where you fuck up in school so he can swoop in and help you, but it never comes. When you’re around, he always shows off a little more in volleyball- but he can’t even tell if you’re looking or not and it’s sooooo annoying

❤️ He gets so frustrated, so one day he just decides to wait until you’re alone and pounce, winning you over with his charm

Until you kabedon him.

❤️ He’ll grow flustered but quickly catch your game and smirk down at you while you call him out on all his bullshit and tell him that it’s obvious he’s been trying to get your attention

He doesn’t deny it, he just waits for you to give your opinion on him. It’s the best feeling ever when you kiss him to shut him up

Bokuto

🖤 If Kuroo was shocked you have a fanclub, prepare for him to be the opposite. He’s your number 1 fan

🖤 “ISN’T Y/N SO BEAUTIFUL?!?!” He squawks to his team, Akaashi sighing

“You’re never going to get her to like you if all you do is act like she’s a celebrity Bokuto”

🖤 However Bokuto never lets that stop him. He’s destined to win your heart- he just knows it. You guys are SOULMATES (he compared your zodiac signs once on a magazine and he hasn’t let it go since)

🖤 He doesn’t stop trying to win you over though. He basks in your attention and follows you with large eyes whenever you enter the room

“SHE LITERALLY SPARKLES WHEN SHE WALKS” he’ll exclaim, watching you dazzle the rest of your audience with your charm

🖤 When you guys go out together on a date, nothing can calm his nerves. It’s like meeting his hero, it’s like winning nationals, it’s like going on a date with (Y/N)

🖤 You guys go for a walk, and everything you say makes him feel like melting. You make him feel so beautiful, and he does his best to make you feel the same

But when it starts raining and you pull out an umbrella for the both of you, he practically faints

Iwa

💙 Nope. No way is he gonna let his crush make him weak. He’s Iwaizumi Hajime. He’s the 2 year long winner of the daily arm wrestle competitions. He’s the ace of seijoh. He’s not gonna ever feel like the more submissive one in a relationship

Until he meets you

💙 Your charm could make a lion bow down to you. You literally carry sparkles wherever you go and you make boys and girls swoon before you

That includes Iwa, who realises he may or may not have a crush on the school’s sweetheart

💙 ‘i just won’t tell anyone, i’ll ignore it til it goes away, i’ll keep it to myself, nobody needs to kn-‘

💙 Suddenly he was looking up into your sparkly (E/C) eyes. How the HELL did he trip???? How the HELL did you catch him????

Mark that down as one of the most embarrassing moments of his life

💙 “You should watch where you’re going next time-“ you smiled smoothly, and for the first time ever Iwa had nothing to say

💙 From then on it becomes common for you to make the strongest guy in the school blush and grow flustered- and it becomes a thing between the both of you

💙 Seijoh LOVE you because you’re his only weakness and you quickly become close woth the team too (even though they all may or may not have a teeny thing for you, but who doesn’t?)

[thinkaboutnetwork-blog]

How Balika Vadhu’s Avika Gor And Her Friend Manish Raisinghan Won The Cannes 2017

How Balika Vadhu’s Avika Gor And Her Friend Manish Raisinghan Won The Cannes 2017

For everyone wondering what actress Avika Gor was whipping up at the Cannes red carpet, we have all the dough. The Balika Vadhu-famed actress wasn’t alone; she was accompanied by actor/friend Manish Raisinghan. The duo – they seem to have taken a sabbatical from television – weren’t just hanging out by the French Riviera. They had a real task at hand. Like pitching their production, I, Me,…

[arabgoldenstars]

[trans] 181214 Jessica Interview With일간스포츠 (Ilgansports)

181214 JESSICA INTERVIEW WITH일간스포츠 (ILGANSPORTS)

Jessica, who is expanding a solo singer and as a business woman, said “I have a big picture. It’s not like I’ve engaged on something in particular, instead, it’s a work I’m progress that I’m painting little by little each year. I think I’ve drawn one third of it, but thankfully up until now I think I’m filling my painting in a good way. When years pass, I, too, wonder how this picture will be completed. For now, starting next year there will be many interesting things.”

– You said you are a work-aholic

J: I’m so lucky to work while enjoying it. It’s fun because I’ve chosen a job I like to do, and because it’s fun I can carry it out gladly. Because I enjoy what I do, the quality improves, and because I get along well with my staff I can work hard.

-It’s been a while since you released a single.

J: It’s an event song. Honestly, although I’m constantly working on an album, because there has been many projects I was a bit busy this year. When I’m preparing for an album, I like to dedicate my entire time to it and immerse myself, this year I didn’t have time to do that. But because I’m constantly working on music and receiving demos, I talk a lot with the composers as well. I must release an album next year.

-Is it the first time you challenge yourself with a carol song?

J: I’ve always wanted to sing a Christmas song. When I first heard ‘One More Christmas’ I thought “this is it”. With a youthful vibe, it’s a song that makes your holiday happier. Since it’s an exciting and lifting vibe, I hope people who listen to it spend their holidays happily.

– Do you have any plans for a holiday party?

J: I really wanted to do it. Luckily, my sister Soojung’s and my schedule matched so we are going skiing to the United States. When our times match we go on trips.

– I heard that you went on a vacation with your family recently.

J: It had been a really long time (since the last vacation). It’s hard to gather all of us so when we can we must go on a trip. This time I went right after a schedule but it was really fun. My family and I went to Athens and Vienna, which he hadn’t been to before. Because our parents came it’s different than when it’s just my sister and I, but we still had a great time.

– It seems you’re very relaxed being solo for 5 years.

J: It’s always hard to adapt. Whenever something is new, everything seems harder. Of course, there were many setbacks because it was a new start. I’ve had a lot (laughs). There’s times of despair, and there’s times when you become so discouraged you wish to give up but thankfully my personality isn’t like that. Instead, I’m the type to strive to win. I’m very competitive, and I’m not shaken up by other people’s words. I think ‘Let’s see who’ll win’ and I push myself more. It’s a process that must be done carefully and consciously, not recklessly. I’m following my choices and I’m moving forward towards my future to see how it changes.

– Who or what do you turn to?

J: I talk a lot with the company’s president and our team leader. They give a lot of support to the people around them, it’s not that they cheer for you particularly, but just by sitting by their side I gain strength. I think it’s good that I’m surrounded by people with good energy.

– Isn’t it hard to work as both a singer and a business woman?

J: I think it’s all right. If singer Jessica can express herself through music, brand creative director Jessica can eventually show my identity through products. People ask “Which job do you like the most?” but I’m doing both because I like both. These days there’s many people who do different things too. Of course, I don’t want to do only one thing. What is obtained through various activities is great.

– You have your own brand and you are constantly desired in the fashion industry.

J: I think they are different. People who give us suggestions also say “You are the one who this this, let’s do this together”. Because we understand each other we don’t really collide. And since different regions have different contracts and time periods, it’s good to be able to show different brands in my own way.

– You’re a CEO-like fashionista, but do you personally think you dress well?

J: I don’t particularly think I dress well. I’m the one who knows me the most. Face, body, frame, I know it all very well so I know what looks good on me. Of course I know I have to switch things up. Since I’ve been active for a long time I’ve had many opportunities to try different types of fashion. As I’ve worked with different brands and media, I naturally learned how to dress myself.

– If you had to pick between warm-tones or cool-tones?

J: It depends on my mood. It’s a bit embarrassing to say it myself, but makeup artists say that my face isn’t fixed to a single tone and goes well with any tone. I’m not sure what looks good on me but I like that I can show different emotions based on the color scheme.

– Fans say they want to see you with blonde hair.

J: I want to go blonde but it’s hard because my hair is weak. My hair is really thin and it looks healthy right? But when you try touching it like this you can feel how frail it is. I want to go blonde but I’m scared of bleaching it and I’m worried about how damaged it would get if I dye it, so I can’t. I hope the fans can endure it.

– You have a very honest and realistic personality.

J: I’m very down-to-earth. If it doesn’t seem plausible I give up and do something that can be done. I’ve been like that since I was young. When I was a trainee too, if there was a song I couldn’t sing I’d say “I won’t sing it. It doesn’t suit me.” and find another song. I’d rather show the things I can do with confidence. I think it’s a constant trait. People usually put in effort into the things they can’t do, right? In my case, because I know myself well, I think it’s a waste of time and get over it quickly. I’m not always in the right but I trust myself.

– How did you come to sing a contract with the American agency UTA?

J: We held many meetings with different companies but I felt that UTA was different from other companies. It was a company that cared more about my career than business. They considered the future and made a plan, and gave me support. More than anything, they tell me I am young. In Korea, I feel the issue about age because I’ve been active for 12 years, but they tell me “You are still young so let’s take things slowly. There’s many things we can do.” They feel like a warm family.

– Is there a reason for picking a big company?

J: I think there is a leader for every industry. There is a leader for every place in the world, the same goes for the entertainment industry. It’s not something I’d join recklessly out of spite and because I know that country well I wanted to be with the best people in the industry. Thankfully, joining UTA was a win-win situation. They said were also looking for people like me. They told me “You’re a unicorn” because they thought I was perfect.

– I think the expansion of K-Pop is also a huge factor.

J: Yes. I think seeing ‘K-‘ in music, fashion, beauty, etc. is a heavy influence. When I go to a foreign country I hear the word ‘K-Pop Star’. I can’t deny it. Sometimes I hear that people know of me. Not just towards me, but I think a global door towards Asia has been opened.

– You also went to Cannes Film Festival this year.

J: It was a new experience. I went as a guest of a jewelry brand and I was also surprised. When the liaison first arrived I asked ‘Why should I go?’ ‘What I’m I supposed to do there?’ but they told me it was one of the usual events of the brand. I also didn’t know that at Cannes Film Festival important brands held a party and they even invited several people who aren’t movie actors, like influencers, to attend the red carpet event. I was invited to be at the red carpet for 10 minutes but because it’s so wide I thought a lot about how I should stand there. It was a new atmosphere.

– Seeing the actors, did you think of challenging yourself with acting?

J: I have plans of acting. When singing the contract with UTA, we discussed various areas. I hope I get a good opportunity (to act). It’s a time where Asian people are getting attention overseas so I think the response would be good.

– What do you do on days when you don’t have a schedule?

J: I don’t do anything (laughs). I don’t really like exercising. I put resting first and only when I have a trainer I exercise. I really love eating so I just eat well and rest.

– The pictures you took with actress Park Min Young became a big topic.

J: We’ve been friends since pre-debut. We met when I graduated from 3rd year of middle school to my first year of high school (T/L: In the US that would be going from freshman to sophomore in high school). We have a 3 year difference and back then she was a big unnie. When you’re a kid you feel the age difference more strongly, you know. If unnie asked me to dance I would dance. If I came from Korean class I would use what I learned with unnie, when I learned a new word I really wanted to use it. I still remember when I learned the word ‘straight hair’ and I told unnie, she’s someone who has seen me grow up.

– You’re in an open relationship with the company’s president, is it going well?

J: Yes, it’s just that I don’t want my fans to be upset and I don’t want to be loud about it.

– Is there a secret to self-care?

J: Watch the amount of food you eat and drink water. Those are the two most important. If I want to each chicken I only have two pieces. I usually eat half the chicken but if I need to regulate the amount I refrain from it.  I’ve never been able to stop eating. Instead I drink a lot of water. It helps digestion. I can’t even measure how much water I drink. My mother calls me a carp (type of fish).

– Did you fulfill the plans you had for this year?

J: I had the goal of being healthy and I’m very healthy right now. I wanted work to be more fun and I had a lot of fun working. Luckily, I had the chance to visit many countries. I said I wanted to have many encounters and I learned from meeting with many cultures and speaking with others. There’s something you can learn in every country. Isn’t it wise to have those kind of experiences?

– Is there something you want to try next year?

J: To mature accordingly to my age. I hope I can expand more and I become the kind of person that expands their horizons. Next year I’ll be 30 and I think I’m ageing naturally. Next year, too, I want to raise B&E a bit more and to deliver a lot of music.

– Is there any content you are preparing?

J: I’m thinking of trying fun things with my sister. Starting from the photoshoot on January, I think we’ll be able to make fun contents. These days we have YouTube, Netflix, and other platforms so now that I think about it there’s many fun things I want to do with my sister.

– We’re also anticipating a new album.

J: This year there wasn’t a lot music schedules but I want to release an album next year. I want to try to concentrate on music a little more for those who are waiting. I hope they can anticipate me next year.

English trans cr;  gldn_star translations

[buddaimond]

Kristen Stewart translated Q&A interview with Grazia, Cannes 2018 issue

Already twice in official competition with Olivier Assayas, the American actress, ambassador of Chanel, returns this year on the Croisette as a member of the jury.

What was your reaction when Thierry Frémaux invited you to the jury?

I had trouble getting used to the idea! This festival symbolizes all the reasons why people make movies, which are the same to me. When I came here for the first time, I was a young actress who had made some commercial movies, and I was already counting my luck. Today, I feel at home, I feel fulfilled. I know I'm where I want to be.

Have you ever played such a role in a festival?

No it's the first time. I envision it as a mini-cinema school. During these ten days, each of us will have a different experience about a movie. This is the principle of a jury : to bring diverse opinions. Nobody is wrong or right. You just have to react honestly, be guided by your guts.

 Do you know your companions in the next fortnight?

One or two, only. Before arriving, I locked myself in my hotel room for two days to watch everything they did, to prepare myself. And then Cate Blanchett as president jury, not bad at all!

 What do you expect from this edition, the first since the hurricane unleashed by the Weinstein affair?

I want to see strong, political, committed films. I want to be moved too. But the cinema is always a little late; It takes time to make a movie, there can not be an immediate change. We will certainly see first results, the storm has long been rumbling.

In 2017, Jessica Chastain is said to have been disturbed by the representation of the woman in some films of the competition. Are you hoping for an improvement this year?

Yes, I want to see women uniquely embodied, women whose personal stories are so specific that they are not "women's stories" but individual stories. Films centered on female characters are too demonstrative: women succeed in overcoming adversity, saving the world ... I would like to know the inner life of a woman rather than witness an artificial takeover.

Last year you presented your first short film, Come Swim . Are you going to direct again?

Yes, I'm working on my first feature film.

Pictures by Julien Mignot on IG

[analogscum]

SCUM IN THE AISLES #4 (The House That Jack Built: Unrated Director’s Cut)

Sometimes, in order to seek out the weirdest discarded slices of celluloid trash that cinema has to offer, one must leave the confines of their crappy apartment, and go to an actual movie theater. This is a column recounting my excursions into the b-movie wilds. This is Scum in the Aisles!

PART 1: ANTICIPATION

“You’ve all bought tickets for a Lars von Trier film, so you know what you’re getting yourselves into.”

With this, Justin Timms, the founder of the Brooklyn Horror Film Festival, and our host for this evening in a dark and chilly corner of Greenpoint known as the Film Noir Cinema, ceded the floor to the film we had all gathered to experience, The House That Jack Built. A two and a half hour art house serial killer epic by perhaps the most controversial filmmaker alive. A film that prompted both mass walkouts (anywhere between a dozen and a hundred people, depending on who you ask) and a ten minute standing ovation when it premiered out of competition at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. A film which has since been decried as a gruesome, sadistic, mean-spirited slog by some, and praised as a beautiful, self-reflexive act of provocation by others.

Timms, for his part, had just seen the film for the first time along with the crowd from the first screening of the evening, and he looked positively shell-shocked. All around me, the crowd buzzed with nervousness and excitement. What sort of celluloid horrors awaited us? Would we be able to stomach what was splayed up on the screen? Would cinema’s angry Danish trickster god once again succeed in getting under our skin and raising our cockles? Or had his flagellations, both towards himself and the audience that improbably keeps coming back (myself included), grown tired and stale?

Our host had claimed that we knew what we were getting ourselves into simply by showing up to watch a Lars von Trier film…but did we?

PART 2: SYNOPSIS

The House That Jack Built follows Jack (Matt Dillon, turning in a career best performance) over roughly twelve years of a very eventful life. Jack lives somewhere in the Pacific Northwest, he’s an engineer who dabbles in architecture on the side. He comes from a wealthy family; his inheritance allows him to buy a large plot of land by a picturesque lake and build his titular house. However, what Jack really loves, his true passion in life, is annihilating other human beings. Jack is not just A serial killer, he is THE serial killer. Dude makes Jeffrey Dahmer and Ted Bundy, both of whose real life exploits are alluded to via Jack’s activities in the film, look like slouches.

As von Trier likes to do, the film is divided into five chapters and an epilogue. The five chapters are each devoted to a specific murder out of the nearly hundred he commits that is supposed to make us understand why Jack does what he does. I’ll get to the epilogue later, because I have FEELINGS about it. Similarly, as von Trier also likes to do, Jack narrates these chapters in the form of a confession, in this case to a man named Verge (Bruno Ganz). With the first two chapters, von Trier catches us off guard by deploying humor. Aside from the violence, which is indeed quite brutal, von Trier manages to wring genuine laughs out of the absurdity of these situations. In the first chapter, Uma Thurman plays a rich woman with a flat tire who is so unpleasant and annoying that you can’t help but root for Jack to kill her. In the second chapter, Siobhan Fallon Hogan makes the mistake of believing Jack when he knocks on her door, first pretending to be a policeman, then incredulously switching gears and pretending to be an insurance salesman, before a comedy of errors involving Jack’s cleanliness-based OCD, a very annoyed local cop, and a telltale trail of blood ensues. The audience I saw it with tonight ate these moments up, partially laughing at the jokes themselves, then perhaps doubling down when we realized how inappropriate it was to be laughing in the first place.

However, the laughs quickly dried up once chapter three began. This chapter involved the shooting of children, and was the focus of much of the ire directed at the film after Cannes. Indeed, especially in a post-Sandy Hook world, the violence in this section was almost unbearable. Aside from seeing children gunned down in graphic detail, Jack then conducts some, shall we say, amateur taxidermy with one of the corpses, making for the second time in two films that von Trier has given us the nightmare image of a child with a horrifying rictus smile (shoutouts to the baby from Nymphomaniac Vol. II). Chapter four details the gruesome fate of Jack’s one and only girlfriend, played by Riley Keough. Von Trier ratchets up the tension here to near intolerable levels, foreshadowing a horrific act of mutilation a good ten minutes before it happens, and then showing it up close, in nauseatingly graphic detail. Most of the audience, myself included, watched this scene through our fingers.

Now, very quickly, I’ll say that, yes, for most normal moviegoers, the violence in this film will definitely be a lot. But speaking as a connoisseur of horror movies and weirdo genre experiments, it wasn’t anything outside of the ordinary. In fact, I found the violence in Antichrist to be way more upsetting and visceral than most of what you see in this film.

Chapter five sees Jack conducting a gristly experiment in his industrial freezer involving full metal jacket bullets. He also picks up a spiffy red hooded robe. This is where we catch up with the beginning of the film, and see Verge for the first time. As it turns out, Verge is here to chaperone Jack to the fires of Hell. This is where the Epilogue kicked off, and where the audience, myself DEFINITELY included, started to get a bit antsy. I seem to recall an old maxim that goes something like, you can do anything to an audience aside from bore them. Well, unfortunately, I found this Epilogue to be almost unbearably boring. Aside from some stunning imagery, it was mostly tedious and pretentious, straining for some sort of higher message that was just unnecessary. If I had to sum it up in one sentence, it would be: Tarkovsky by way of Tim and Eric. Normally that would be a compliment coming from me. All the pretty pictures in the world means nothing if the audience is reaching for their coats.

PART 3: INTENTIONS

So what is von Trier trying to tell us with all of this madness? What does he want us to take with us once we leave the theater? If you follow his filmography, it’s not a big scoop to say that von Trier’s most recent work, starting with Antichrist and continuing through Melancholia and the Nymphomaniac films, have been somewhat autobiographical, sort of his version of State of the Union addresses. The House That Jack Built feels like the culmination of this stage of his career. In this film, von Trier puts himself on trial, with Dillon’s Jack as his surrogate. Just like with the Nymphomaniac films, there are many, many, MANY flowery, pseudo-philosophical digressions on a number of topics, accompanied by slides and bits of archival video (I’ll bet someone out there is kicking themselves for ever having introduced von Trier to Shudderstock), including the poetry of William Blake, photography, love, deer hunting, gothic architecture, and Glenn Gould. One especially epic digression finds Jack opining on dessert wines, the Third Reich architect Albert Speer, and finally the artistic integrity of von Trier’s own cinematic oeuvre, complete with clips from his previous films. Ballsy, no?

I would be lying to you if I said I understood everything that von Trier was trying to convey with these digressions. However, it is definitely clear to me that this film is meant to function as sort of a statement to the jury in the court of public opinion. Von Trier has always put himself at the forefront of his films more so than most directors, displaying his name alongside, or sometimes above his actors (hell, for this film, he even devoted an entire poster to himself). This, of course, means we the audience tend to read his films as glimpses into its maker’s psyche more than we would for most other directors, which is not entirely fair in my opinion, but it’s a blessing and a curse that von Trier has brought on himself. So what does he want us to understand about himself after we’ve seen The House That Jack Built? It seems to be something along the lines of, yes, every awful thing you’ve said about me is true, and you could never hate me as much as I hate myself, but I only answer to a higher power. Which, yeah, ok...but is that enough? Or, to put it more succinctly, is that even that interesting of a conclusion? We’ve now sat through nearly ten hours of von Trier’s cinematic therapy sessions over the last decade, and he basically ends it all by pulling a Tupac on us: only God can judge me.

PART 4: MISANTHROPY

The best and most succinct description of von Trier’s modus operandi as an artist that I’ve yet to hear comes from the excellent YouTube movie review show Welcome to the Basement. During their most recent episode, while giving a (largely negative) critique of Dogville, co-host Matt Sloan describes von Trier as “a provocateur that has the talent to back it up.” Indeed, if von Trier was entirely the sum of his detractors claims, then he would’ve been forgotten a long time ago. He does indeed have the cinematic bonafides, and they don’t let him down here: the camerawork in this film is gorgeous and intimate, the editing is kinetic and fast-paced, and as usual von Trier knows just how and when to perfectly deploy a pop song for maximum disarmament.

The most resounding jibe against von Trier is that he is a raving misogynist, due to the almost ludicrously awful levels of suffering that he puts his female protagonists through. For his part, von Trier has defended himself in the past by saying he is actually fighting against the patriarchy by showing the awful trials that women must endure in a society run by men. It’s a fair, if slightly dubious claim. Personally I’ve always been kind of dumbfounded that we seem to hold von Trier to these moral standards based on the fates of his fictional characters that we just don’t with other directors. What makes him an exception in this case? Wes Anderson and Yorgos Lanthimos depict gruesome animal deaths left and right in their films, but does anyone legitimately think that they hate pets? However, when it comes to The House That Jack Built, I cannot and will not defend von Trier against these accusations of misogyny. Almost none of the female characters in the film are even given a name, and the one exception, Keough’s “Jaqueline Simple,” is derided constantly by Jack and called stupid because of her last name. It becomes especially stark and uncomfortable when, at one point, Verge observes that the women Jack has discussed strike him as “unbelievably stupid,” as if they somehow deserved to die because of that. Jack just shrugs and says that he also killed men, but he just so happened to choose these stories of killing women “at random.” Mhmmm. Not buying it this time, bucko.

Then again, you could argue that, since this story is told from the perspective of a man who unapologetically murders women in the most gruesome and debasing of ways, it would be dishonest or nonsensical to show them otherwise. But that brings up a whole other can of worms: what does it say about von Trier himself that he seems to seriously identify with a mass murderer? At one point, the film alludes to, and seemingly tries to make excuses for, the infamous press conference following Melancholia’s Cannes premiere during which von Trier compared himself to and jokingly sympathized with Hitler, an act of provocation which earned him an unofficial “ban for life” from the festival (obviously this did not last). And perhaps I’m reading too much into this, but the scene where Jack experiments with killing multiple people at once with a single full metal jacket bullet reminded me of a director at work, setting up his shot, changing the angle, making sure everything is just right, except in this instance, the camera is replaced with a high powered military grade rifle. Jack does remark at multiple times throughout the film that he sees his killings as a sort of art. Does von Trier relate to this sentiment? Does he see the creation of art as an act of love, as Verge does, or more like Jack, as an act of decay and degradation? I’m guessing more the latter than the former.

PART 5: DAMNATION

As good as Sloan’s summation of his modus operandi on Welcome to the Basement was, I have my own go-to log line: von Trier’s story is the story of a man who got everything he wished for, but was still miserable. For the first part of his career, von Trier was determined to an almost psychotic degree to be seen as one of the great auteurs of cinema. Anyone who didn’t agree was the fucking enemy. When his 1991 film Europa, which was up for the Palme d’Or at Cannes, won the Jury Prize instead, von Trier lashed out, calling that year’s jury president, Roman Polanski, “the midget” during his acceptance speech, and later hurled his trophy into the French Riviera in anger. But then his luck began to change. His next film to play in competition, 1996’s Breaking the Waves, won the Grand Prix and was nominated for an Oscar, and 2000’s Dancer in the Dark finally won him his long sought after Palme d’Or. After years of angrily bashing the world cinema establishment over the head with his own inflated opinion of himself, von Trier was finally one of the most respected and discussed filmmakers of the day.

The thing is, once you’re on top, there’s only one way you can go. He never finished his proposed “Land of Opportunities” trilogy, completing only the first two installments, Dogville and Manderlay, both of which were met with mixed to negative reviews. Von Trier soon found himself spiraling into depression and alcoholism, twin demons that he has wrestled with cinematically over the course of the last decade. It would not surprise me if The House That Jack Built was von Trier’s final film. On one hand, it feels like the thesis statement, the grand summary, of what he’s been trying to say with all of his films. On the other hand, in recent interviews, the guy just looks terrible. He’s frail, he’s got the tremors, his hair is unwashed and ratty and his clothes look ill-fitting and dirty. Despite getting sober not long after the Melancholia press conference debacle, it’s clear that alcohol abuse has taken quite a toll on him. Perhaps its gauche and inappropriate to speculate from afar on von Trier’s mortality, but he’s already done it himself, by making The House That Jack Built.

EPILOGUE: FUTILITY

Now that I’ve reached the end of this jeremiad of a review, I have to wonder, what was it all for? You’ve probably already made up your mind about whether or not you’re going to see this film. You’ve probably already got a very strong opinion on Lars von Trier, both the man and his work. Some of you are probably judging me for even having paid money to see this film, which is your right. Odds are, whatever you think about this filmmaker and his films are not going to be swayed either way by anything I have to say. And even if you did want to experience The House That Jack Built like I did, you can’t: last night was the only night that von Trier’s “Unrated Director’s Cut,” the one that screened at Cannes, is going to be shown in theaters (a stunt that has apparently landed IFC Films in hot water with the MPAA), before an R-rated version is released next month. Was this a shameless promotional ploy? Yes. Did it still give us weirdo cinephiles the feeling that we were part of a super naughty super secret club? Absolutely. I didn’t know anyone in that dark and chilly corner of Greenpoint, but I feel connected to them for life, since we all went through this cinematic journey to Hell together. So, then, now that we’ve descended into the flames, how to describe The House That Jack Built? It is vibrant and stuffy and brilliant and maddening and hilarious and terrifying and pretentious and vulnerable and prescient and infuriating and awful and a masterpiece. In other words, it is a Lars von Trier film. You know what you’re getting yourself into.