They’re both maddening films on occassion, at least 20 minutes too long and either artless in presentation while entertaining (Bridesmaids) or only artful in presentation while refusing to entertain (Melancholia). Bridesmaids is shapeless but for the memorable shapes of its hard-working women. Melancholia frontloads with all of its best sequences and images and then spins its wheels in repetition and fussy inconsequential details that go nowhere just as oblivion should be hurtling towards us. (“Auntie Steelbreaker”?, the whole ad campaign storyline…though I love that the models in the ad look like a pile of dead people.) And yet… And yet…
Together they define 2011 better than any other picture for me. I have struggled quite a lot in the past and particularly this year with depression. Fused together, I think of these two films as the most insightful movie ever made about the condition. Bridesmaid’s “Annie” is lost in her own self pitying rut and to the movies immense credit the jokes are spun organically from this pain rather than shoving it to the side for easier less-character specific laughs. “Help me. I’m pooooor” and that great sequence when Melissa McCarthy literalizes Annie’s self-abuse for her as just two examples. Meanwhile that comic imp Lars von Trier literalizes the size of depression (it always feels gargantuan, unstoppable) until its planet-sized and then calls it for what it is. Depression can be rough on those in the orbit of the suffering. Self destruction isn’t enough for Justine; she’s taking the whole world down with her. Von Trier may be a true genius but he’s never been a subtle one.
The Film Experience on Bridesmaids and Melancholia
(Source: thefilmexperience.net)
And my dislike of Rooney Mara is suddenly justified
Okay it’s probably taken out of context, but still. Girl, be grateful.
I love Judi Dench and her gravely-ass voice.
Meryl as Kate in Taming of the Shrew, can you even imagine? That final monologue (around 2:50) is just killer.
butyourelikereallypretty:
But You Like Really Wanted To Be Lisbeth Salander.
UUGH I didn’t realize Anne Hathaway was up for/campaigning for that part. Gross gross gross.
I totally forgot Adam Scott was in The Aviator. Oh my lanta that hair.
mn70s:
Lake of the Isles, Minneapolis, June 1973
During the early 1970s, the newly created Environmental Protection Agency hired freelance photographers from around the country to document the condition of America’s environment. Many of the best known photos from the EPA’s Docuamerica Project show the United States at its 1970s worst, but the images of Minneapolis—taken in the summer of 1973—are almost bucolic in comparison.
Image via National Archives
(via kristinaslovelythings)
Is it just me or is Jean Dujardin just the hottest? Maybe not with this mustache, but seriously LOOK IT UP.
(Source: lawyerupasshole, via thureris)
