#film: strange days

[vizreef]

SQUID prop (Superconducting Quantum Interference Device)

from Strange Days (dir. Kathryn Bigelow, 1995)

[notbecauseofvictories]

very strongly feel that moist/adora is the only actual romantic relationship terry pratchett ever wrote.

[300films]

underbelly/vicarious/heinous

[sollucets]

charn x only wanting to win and not caring about anyone

[all-or-nothing-baby]

i would let her do unspeakable things to me

[currymanganese]

Maybe I'm tripping, but I doesn't this fit seem familiar? 👀

Ayo at New York Fashion Week | Angela Bassett at the screening of Strange Days at the New York Film Fetival in 1996

Streamlined fit vs. Zoot suit

[flateric420]

if someone was to make a movie adaptation of life is strange 2, which ending would people prefer?

[of-fear-and-love]

Strange Days (1995)

[hairtusk]

[mayonneise]

need someone to hire me to voice act in their film or somethiny agh. or i needbto meet art students at uni or get friends to start a studio with or something

[steampunkforever]

Something that nostalgia glasses, buzzfeed "remember this?" quizzes, and the one-two-punch of the GWOT and financial crisis seem to have erased from the cultural memory the fact that the 90s, despite the idyllic glow of general prosperity, were fraught with strife.

There were escalating racial tensions and a renewed conversation around police brutality as it became clear that the Reagan 80s prosperity wasn't trickling down to quite everyone, genocides and rumbles of upcoming genocides, a feeling of "what now" as capitalism won the cold war and had to find a new direction, and the ever impending doomsday date of the new millenium. This was not a peaceful time in which to watch rugrats, you were all just kids who didn't know about the Waco Siege or Ruby Ridge.

Turmoil is visible in the documentation of cultural sickness that films like NBK, but also in the 90s extension of the cyberpunk genre, most notably Johnny Mnemonic, but also in the subject of this filmpost: Strange Days. Strange Days is classed with my favorite type of thriller: a fairly run of the mill neo noir that does a classic plot but within the trappings of the exotic setting. Strange Days does what Double Indemnity or the Maltese Falcon does but within the cyberpunk context.

Set in a near-future hyperpolice state LA, the film follows Lenny, an Ex-cop now underground skin flick distributor who sells videos you experience in first person POV, like the Cyberpunk 2077 Braindance but this time its minidiscs. He's also absolutely pathetic, and has his head kicked in as he gets thrown out of one venue and into the next plot point, dodging a police brutality cover up and his ongoing feelings for his scornful rockstar ex.

The last time I heard this film mentioned was some reddit millennial posting a tik tok video refuting James Cameron's critique of modern cinema, in which they called Strange Days one of the few original stories he'd worked on and inferred that it was a bad film and a flop. Naturally, exposed to this film by a trusted mutual whose taste I hold in high esteem, I had to watch the movie itself before I could make full judgement on how wrong this tik tok moron

Box office aside, I want to go on record and say that once more Tik Tok film criticism has failed to rise above the gutter. Strange Days may be campy cyberpunk, but it's certainly a more engaging film than people give it credit for. It's a fun near-future romp, and while Kathryn Bigelow's direction has much to do with this, the worldbuilding and performances are too fun to discount soley on the flimsy word of some computer idiot on the adhd video app.

Well worth the watch, as recommended by some computer idiot on an equally bad microblogging site.

[rahullkohli]

Pedro Pascal + Ethan Hawke as Silva and Jake in Strange Way Of Life

[marsbotz]

the world is so beautiful and there is so much content out there if you look for it

[soft-serve-soymilk]

Wow I love asshole gay people (things have ALIGNED in the ASTRAL PLANE and Pav is WATCHING SOMETHING?? 🤯)

[margueritegracq]

Godddd I LOVE the change on perspective of Ellington as you read atwq. Like she very much the "femme fatale" mysterious girl archetype (as much as someone who's like 15 can be a femme fatale) to the reader (because ofc we're seeing this through Lemony's perspective and L's gonna L) but then as we go along we have more and more holes poked in this picture L has built up of her until all the stuff we know about L almost comes crashing down in a way in the 4th book as we realize that LEMONY has been more mysterious more suspicious and altogether more "Ellington" than Ellington the whole time

[currymanganese]

I'd watch tf out of a

Strange Days (1995) and The Matrix (1999) double feature at a movie theater, would pay through the nose to see this actually. It'd be a cyberpunk extravaganza, cede roughly five hours of your day to the movie gods to contemplate existentialism, the vicissitudes of life and hot people in various stressful situations kicking ass (AND falling in love). 💖💖💖