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It does surprise and sadden me that it's so hard to have a discussion on Barbelith -- where I consciously try to be polite and reasonable -- without people getting so snarky and rude. I find it odd that my prompt for a bit of debate about this film is met with such resentment. If it wasn't for people disagreeing, discussion boards wouldn't have much interesting content; I don't know why there's this what the fuck, how dare you, why should I justify my choices to you response.
Admittedly my comment about Un Chien Andalou was kind of facetious, but it was fired off in five seconds as a rejoinder to this little barb:
That's nice. Now please tell me-
Surely we don't have to talk about films as if they're just a convenient platform for showing off our put-downs. There are more pleasant ways of talking to strangers about popular culture.
I find the following comment bizarre, if it's not a joke.
Nina Christianity
Yeah, I was brought up by an Andre Breton fan sweetie.
I mean, are we doing some high culture version of "my dad's bigger than your dad" here?
But I think "you mock-avant garde Columbo "was almost a nice compliment if it was meant for me. Anyway, I hope it's OK to keep discussing cinema on this thread.
Petey Shaftoe
kovacs - do you not think, then, that the film is intending to create suspense as to whether or not, or at least to what extent, Reznik is experiencing things that are not really happening? If that were not the case, if it were just a mood piece, that would address some of the criticisms being made if those criticisms were limited to the fact that one can guess certain things. However, a) I don't think the film works just as a mood piece rather than a mystery, and b) I don't think that's what it's trying to be. When Reznik sees those little notes, I am reasonably sure we are being invited to consider the question "who is writing these, and how did they get into his flat, and why?". Unfortunately since the "he's crazy!" option is stacked so heavily so early on, the most obvious explanation is the simplest: he's writing them for himself, and then forgetting.
This seems a fair point to me, and it is put in a friendly way too. I don't think our being pretty sure that Reznik is delusional and forgetting his own notes spoils the suspense, though. It's a similar set-up to Memento, where the protagonist writes himself notes, then forgets: but that doesn't mean the film becomes boring and pointless. I suggest that our knowing stuff the protagonist doesn't (eg. that he's probably writing notes for himself) still allows for suspense, because we don't know what this borderline-psycho is going to do or be driven to. I think there's still a pleasurable tension from the performance and the character, because he doesn't understand, and he's acting like a crazed rat with its maze changed. Just because we think Reznik's hallucinating and misremembering doesn't, I would say, mean it's a relaxed and easy-going scene when he accuses his co-workers of sabotaging a machine, or confronts Miller with his paranoid theories.
It's possible that I'm simply less sharp and insightful than the viewers who saw through the plot early on and felt the movie was absurd or flat from that point -- not defending myself, but I feel I wasn't trying to suss out the film, to compete against it, to second-guess it. I was content to let it carry me instead of trying to jump ahead. But perhaps I was slow not to click and then attempt to work out what was "really" going on -- however, as I watched it I was responding to Marie and her son as real characters in Trent's life, and I felt an enjoyable tension as to whether he would mess up this promising relationship for himself, or inadverently mess up the kid. I understood he was a screwy, neurotic guy, but that didn't make the film affectless for me.
Equally, the mysterious Ivan is clearly intended to be mysterious, but really explained very early on - why have the fact that he doesn't really work at the plant verified so quickly?
OK, and again maybe I was watching this in a different mode, or mood -- maybe just because I was enjoying it, I gave myself over to the film's machinations instead of trying to pick them apart. This isn't a criticism of anyone who took the latter approach, because I agree that when you're not enjoying something, the only way to pass the time might be to laugh at it and pull open its gaps. So that might be the key to our different responses. But, as I was digging the film and trusting it, I didn't conclude "Ivan doesn't work at the plant, so clearly he doesn't exist". Maybe it was just my suspension of disbelief and willingness to go along with the film, which again, you might see as sappy on my part.
Also, it doesn't help matters to compare The Machinist to a surrealist film, because it's not surrealist - if it were, then the fish motif, the focus on his in-car lighter, and the fact that it's always 1.30 would not hold any significance, and would not be explained point-by-point in that final reveal.
I can't deny that. My point, and I said it was flippant, was that you can't always ask for pedantic, realist explanations of every grey area in a film about someone suffering from delusions.
Our Regenerated Timelady
And that wouldn't be enough because why? It's a thriller that didn't bring the thrill, it plodded, you disagree but in this case you're in a minority of people who expressed an opinion but even that doesn't matter. You can't argue me into liking a film I did not like, especially by condescension and suggesting that only clever people can see the emperor's clothes.
I didn't think I was being condescending: in fact I thought the other side, the one you're espousing, was arguing that this film is rubbish if you're a clever viewer.
I think you're right that I can't convince you, or Nina, or Cameron. But surely that isn't the only point of this thread, this board? As I said, I posted on the first page because I felt people might be really put off seeing what I considered a really worthwhile film; so partly we are arguing for the unpersuaded who haven't decided whether to see The Machinist. But also, surely there's some value in just sharing opinions? I'm surprised you seem so hostile about that.
It's interesting to note that RottenTomatoes.com rates this movie at 72% from 110 reviews. So while the criticism on this thread is articulate and interesting, the majority opinion among journalists is actually very favourable. Those of you rubbishing it are, in those terms, expressing a minority opinion. Not that it matters.
I agree, but I had worked out the film was bad long before the twist came. The twist was bad and the rest of the movie was bad too.
Well, I hope you're joking with this idea that a film "is" anything in an absolute sense, as though you could discover its core quality (= good or bad) and that's that.
The cinematography was nice, I liked the use of green washes to make everything dull and grey. Bale and Jason Leigh were good, but wasted. But unfortunately I'm an uncouth barbarian that wants a good story with the pretty pictures, and in my opinion I didn't get it.
I think this is a very reasonable point of view. Again, I'm getting the sense that those of you who didn't like it disengaged with it pretty early on, whereas I didn't get that feeling of "OK, this is shit, eject eject" and continued to give myself up to it, probably forgiving it some flaws and bumps along the way. This may be a really unwise and pretentious suggestion, but maybe it is a bit like giving yourself up to a dream: if you break out of it, a dream does seem ludicrous and implausible but while you're succumbing and immersed, it seems to make at least adequate sense. You just accept what you're told and rationalise to cover the joins, if you're in the middle of a dream-story.
Big whoop. I don't see anywhere in my post the words 'this review is for the sole purpose of proving to kovacs that The Machinist sucks'. You disagree, your choice. Posting to say you disagree because you don't think my criteria (ie: I wanted to see a thriller, not a plodder) for judging it are valid, well fuck that quite frankly.
I didn't mean to give that impression. What I really meant was, please can you expand on your reasons. If I was brusque it's because I felt a little defensive about a film that I did enjoy being beaten to death by a gang of cackling haters. Or that's how it seemed.
More from earlier on:
I could go into detail about the few good aspects this film has, but... Nah. It's just a bit crap, really.
Problem #1: He says he's not slept for a year, and we're supposed to not realise that he's hallucinating everything?
Problem #2: His imaginary friend is basically Kurtz as played by Marlon Brando, and we're not supposed to be sure that he's not real?
I hope I can be forgiven for finding this pretty reductive and wastefully dismissive. I appreciated your points below, Petey Shaftoe, but to say "it's just crap, really" does seem a shame.
1. He says he hasn't slept for a year. But if he's clearly unhinged and abnormal, why is it you gladly accept this one claim as fact? When I heard that line, I didn't know whether I was meant to accept it as truth or not. It sounds crazily exaggerated. I felt part of the point of the film was that we're not sure how much is real, or true.
2. The main character was "real" in the film's terms, but he looks like something out of Arkham Asylum too. I didn't feel that Ivan's slightly freakish appearance immediately coded him as "imaginary friend". Enough of the "real" stuff in the film was odd and ugly.
Now please tell me- did he ever go to a fairground? Was he run over? Why did the guy who was his imagined nemesis not resemble him in any way at all? Why was the child epileptic? Why did he not remember his mother's bowl if he wasn't actually delusional? Who switched the machine on? Why did the fish heads bleed so much? Why did he have a landlady at all?
I don't know if you were being rhetorical here -- probably -- but I do think there are possible answers, and that's symptomatic of my willingness to accept the film on its terms rather than reject and scorn it as you do. As I said, maybe my approach to the film was too naive and accepting.
Did he ever go to a fairground: I felt he went as a child, and that the fairground scene in the present was probably imaginary, fabricated from the memory of himself and his mother, and the Route 66 imagery.
Why did his imagined nemesis not resemble him: I don't know why you'd demand this. Reznik is presumably projecting his own guilt for being a child-killer onto an imaginary figure. He would distance himself from that figure as much as he could, and so he makes Ivan into a terrifying bully totally unlike himself.
Why was the child epileptic: I think Reznik was imagining the child, but the epilepsy scene was a fantasy enabling him to deal with his repressed knowledge of having killed a child, but (because it's just a fit and the mother deals with it) having the boy not really be dead.
Why did he not remember his mother's bowl if he wasn't actually delusional: I can't answer this precise question about the bowl, but I don't know what you mean "if he wasn't actually delusional". I thought we were all agreeing he was delusional (I'm not using this word in any medical sense of course). That doesn't mean nothing in his life was real. I'm assuming he did go to work, for instance, but that he invented the day out with Marie.
Who switched the machine on: why do we have to assume anyone turned it on? Maybe it really was one of his co-workers trying to teach him a lesson. Maybe it was a technical accident. I honestly don't think this question needs to be answered for the film to be satisfying, though I understand that for you this is one of many holes.
Why did the fish heads bleed so much: the freezer wasn't working. I don't know if it's accurate that fish heads bleed, but they were going rotten, I think. There were flies around the room.
Why did he have a landlady at all: I'm not sure I understand your basis here. Reznik did live in a real apartment, as I see it. He did know Stevie. He did work as a machinist. I don't see why he shouldn't have had a landlady.
Anyway despite what may seem my grizzling during this post, I am enjoying talking about this film with those of you who dislike it. I wouldn't have spent (?) an hour answering your points otherwise. |
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