The best movie of 2008 and a film I hold personal affection for. I understand how some people won’t like it or won’t get caught up in it and that sucks for them b/c for me, it changed my life.
That’s all I can say for now, as I’m running out the door. I’ll leave it for DuShane to pick up where left off.
A mother and daughter came into the video store that I work at the other night to return Rachel Getting Married because the camera work reminded them too much of a documentary. =\
A good friend of mine, whose opinion I respect, shares your opinion BT — he found that he could not bring himself to like the film because the family was too “precious” and “unreal”. I happen to adore the film (my top film of 2008 too, Fredo) but I also understand that assessment. It’s hard to have sympthy for the woes of someone so privileged and contrived. It reminds me of some of the criticism leveled against Lost in Translation, because people felt that Charlotte was a whiny, spoiled brat that they couldn’t empathize with.
That said, the angst of someone who has so much doesn’t make the pain any less valid. The film resonated with me personally. As I told my dissenting friend, I know all too well what it feels like to be the black sheep, the family pariah. I’ve been at the brink and I know that place of desperation where you are humiliating yourself even as you are trying to find redemption and acceptance from everybody who hates you. Anne Hathaway captured that perfectly, and I admire her courage in playing someone so flawed and sometimes embarrassing to watch.
Putting aside the issue of whether this movie is good or not, I have a question about the movie itself and the director’s intent. I had a discussion (rather than an argument) with a friend over whether the movie portrays one sister as the good sister and the other as the bad sister, or whether it tries to draw a moral equivalence between the two sisters.
1.“There is this obnoxiously ideal multicultural backdrop for the whole movie, but it does nothing to disabuse us of the notion that we are watching a cringe-inducing melodrama play out entirely between white, upper-middle class, Connecticut suburbanites.”
Do you live in the suburbs? The multicultural background is a brilliant backdrop, and a wonderful comment on suburban liberalism. For example, in one of the most conservative states in the U.S. (Texas) I live next to a black family, a German one, a Spanish family, a Catholic, and a protestant family. In my house I have African, and Native American art… as well as photography from all over the U.S. even though I’ve never left the southwest. All of this diversity is obviously slightly offensive to you. And I do repeat this is Texas.
“I mean, seriously. Exactly zero non-white characters take part in the drama, even though they outnumber the white characters 2:1… The white folks (Kym, Rachel, and Paul) are arguing in the living room, and suddenly the three of them charge off to the kitchen to continue their argument, leaving Carol (the black stepmother) and Sidney (Rachel’s black husband to be) sitting there like “WTF?” It feels like parody when it happens, but then you realize it wasn’t supposed to be, and that just makes it funnier.”
Ummm… that scene is absolutely intentional. It’s making a point about how, although, these people are members (or prospective members) of this family they have little to do with the dysfunction contained in the plot of the film. That scene is the most obvious part of the film where Demme cuts everyone off from the film other than the three main characters.
2.“The only reason why this type of poorly done melodrama gets critical praise, nearly 30 years after poorly done melodrama could pass as something of quality, is because it’s shot with a handheld camera, and therefore looks like a European Art Film™.”
Really! You’ve seen European art film, wow! You really know your stuff so, you must be right. The camera is suppose to give the film a documentary feel. It’s ok to say you don’t like the camera, but don’t point to something that has nothing to do with anything related to the film and tell me it’s a genuine criticism of it.
3.“I’m sick and tired of watching movies about wounded protagonists who just can’t stand the fact that they have a nice house and a rich, supportive family they can depend on to help them through their problems.”
Absolutely. Rich people aren’t allowed to have the same feelings as us regulars. I mean where do they get off having genuine human emotion when they have money? We all know real rich people are all like Paris Hilton.
That statement is so ridiculous. Guess what! Rich people, or suburbanites, have fucked up lives, too. Your suggested addition to the plot adds a whole lot of contrivance to the film. And you seem to forget this film was made before the economic collapse.
4.“There was this very carnivalesque atmosphere to the whole thing (I also thought of Black Orpheus), and I think Demme figured it was enough to just have that going on…”
It is enough. The film is written, and performed in a manner that adds no contrivance to the film. Maybe it’s conventional (it’s not), but so what? Conventional plot done well is still good. The film is absolutely honest. It contains not a moment that isn’t truthful to both life in a dysfunctional family, and life in the suburbs (I have experience in both).
5. I hate to criticize great film, too.
It’s Bolo Tie’s world, and we’re all living in it.
Mugino:
I guess I feel like Charlotte and Kym are apples and oranges, as far as characterization goes. Charlotte’s journey—along with Bob’s—is one of self-exploration, of determining one’s role in the world. We learn that she went to Yale or something like that, but I don’t think we know enough about her to say she’s a “spoiled brat,” and certainly she doesn’t have that ditzy entitlement we would associate with one. She’s more of a cynical, distant type than anything else. I can imagine I’d feel kind of bored and aimless if I were an intelligent college graduate, and now my life basically just consisted of tagging along with a successful photographer boyfriend and living in hotels around the world. I could imagine this kind of character not being somebody’s specific cup of tea, but it would be difficult to argue that Charlotte is, in a general sense, not easy to relate to. There are tons of bored, aimless college graduates out there.
“Rachel Getting Married,” on the other hand, is a film specifically about redemption. The main question the film asks is whether Kym can be redeemed in the eyes of her family (and in her own eyes, to a certain extent). My problem, as I watched the movie, is that within 15 minutes, I absolutely hated Kym. And every single mishap or dust-up after that just made me hate her even more. And then she crashes a car in the woods, her sister tends to her wounds, and as an audience member, I feel like I’m being asked to erase every conception of her out of my mind, and buy a sort of Catholic confession version of forgiveness. The epiphany of this movie just wasn’t epiphanic enough, in the end.
“‘Rachel Getting Married,’ on the other hand, is a film specifically about redemption. The main question the film asks is whether Kym can be redeemed in the eyes of her family. My problem, as I watched the movie, is that within 15 minutes, I absolutely hated Kym.”
Exactly. People aren’t one-sided. Kym is very well-defined, but is ultimately a spoiled, rich kid, that had a difficult childhood. She’s not a one-dimensional character. She’s a real person. If you hate her, good. You don’t have the ability to feel anything for her? She’s a human. Are you saying you can only care about film characters if they only fit into a narrow description of what a good person is?
“Suffering is equally divided among all men; each has the same to undergo.” – Paul Bowles
The tell-tale sign of a mature human being is making the effort to use something called empathy to put themselves in other people’s shoes and to attempt to relate to their problems and situations even if the problems and situations in themselves may be unfamiliar.
Translation for Bolo Tie: The world doesn’t revolve around you.
The sign of a mature film critic is being able to utilize critical thinking skills to see the reasoning behind opinions they disagree with.
Translation for Bolo Tie: Some of these posters who disagree with you are just as smart, if not way smarter than you.
CAZ: But the film contains an epiphany specifically to elicit empathy from the audience. It became clear that I was supposed to follow along on this logic of Kym has a dark past —> Kym comes back and acts like an asshole —> Kym crashes the car in the woods —> Kym is bathed by her sister in a symbolic act of forgiveness —> Kym is redeemed!
I would suggest that Kym actually is a one-sided character, because she doesn’t actually change. She remains a toxic, troubled child of privilege, who secures a pardon from her family by engaging in a self-destructive tantrum.
What pardon? That scene has only the power you give it. I don’t see it as forgiveness… I see it as an act one of one loving family member to the other. A family that has deep fissures tends to have even stronger moments of deep love, and affection. I don’t see a resolution in the film at all, and I don’t see redemption. I see a family that is broken, but tries to repair itself… whether it’s successful is up to the viewer to decide. I personally see the family as still the self-destructive unit it entered the film.
Blue K: I’m not sure how your psychoanalysis bears on anything I said. It should be obvious, if you read my argument, that I understand that “Rachel Getting Married” was attempting to draw an empathetic response from the audience. My suggestion is that this attempt was a dismal failure, because Demme/Lumet had already taken Kym well past the point where I could empathize with her. Their epiphany moment was a cloying, rinky-dink pseudo-suicide attempt. I mean, come on. How can this be regarded as anything other than pathetic?
“I mean, come on. How can this be regarded as anything other than pathetic?”
Again. This is the attitude that pisses me off. It’ss just childish bullshit. “I’m the only one that’s right. Anyone who disagrees is just an idiot.” I’m so goddamned tired of this. Your opinion is not the only one reasonable people can come to, Bolo. I think my argument for the film is just as reasoned as yours against, but I didn’t stoop down to calling your opinion pathetic.
I’m going to bed. I’m not in the mood to be told my opinion is pathetic.
So YOU couldn’t empathize with her, fine. Can you at least see that other people could?
CAZ: I guess I never really got the impression that the entire family unit held as much responsibility for the dysfunction as did Kym herself. My conception of the family is that it had about as much dysfunction as could be considered reasonable in most families, and then there was this one member absolutely starving for an unfair portion of the family’s attention. The family was kind of eccentric and new-agey in an oddly surreal and obnoxious way, but it didn’t feel particularly dysfunctional to me. Which is a lot of the reason why I didn’t empathize with Kym from the outset, because I looked at the people in her life, and all their apparent resources, and I said to myself, what is the big deal here? Everybody’s lives are imperfect, but very few people have imperfect lives in the midst of such comfort and social/financial/etc security.
I see a family that’s broken (because Kym came back and brought her drama to the fore), but tries to repair itself (because Kym attempts a pseudo-suicide of some sort, and they’re in the midst of trying to marry off their daughter, and don’t need a dead one on their hands at the same time).
CAZ and Kim for the win.
It was a great movie. Surprised me—I thought I was getting a chick flick and I got a moving, realistic examination of a screwed-up family. I could tell you stories about my own extended family that make this one look like Sesame Street, so empathy was not a problem.
Having had experience teaching both inner-city children and upper-class children, they both have issues (obviously). To disregard that is classism, plain and simple.
Blue K: It’s obvious that other people empathized with her. But personally, I have no idea how they came around to it. I feel like maybe white upper-crust type people are more likely to empathize with this kind of thing, or find these types of family problems interesting/intriguing. That’s all I can really come up with. Not only did I not empathize with Kym, but I felt like her problems were of the most trite, boring type. Again, this is “Ordinary People” with multicultural wallpaper.
CAZ: Wait, but I never said your opinion was pathetic. I said that the epiphany of the movie was pathetic. Get it right:
“Their epiphany moment was a cloying, rinky-dink pseudo-suicide attempt. I mean, come on. How can this be regarded as anything other than pathetic?”
Bolo, you’re missing the point. Nobody’s saying you’re wrong for NOT feeling empathetic towards Kym. Feel however you want, and you provided the reasons why you feel that way. Great. But you’re making value judgments against people who DO feel empathetic towards Kym. You see, how people FEEL isn’t a math problem with an objective “correct” answer where 2 + 2 always equals 4.
CAZ:
“Do you live in the suburbs? The multicultural background is a brilliant backdrop, and a wonderful comment on suburban liberalism. For example, in one of the most conservative states in the U.S. (Texas) I live next to a black family, a German one, a Spanish family, a Catholic, and a protestant family. In my house I have African, and Native American art… as well as photography from all over the U.S. even though I’ve never left the southwest. All of this diversity is obviously slightly offensive to you.”
Did you read my argument? My problem with the world Demme and Lumet created is how it was packed to the brim with people from all sorts of different backgrounds, yet it was only the white people who took part in the drama itself. What do you think the “comment on suburban liberalism” was meant to be? I didn’t feel any racism, or tension about race, coming from the characters themselves. What I saw was a writer/director duo who brought in a bunch of different ethnicities (in fact, the non-whites almost certainly outnumbered the whites), but kept the drama all-Anglo. But I love how finding this just slightly off-putting is supposed to make me a racist. Nice implication there, buddy. Thought you really had that one locked down, didn’t you?
“Ummm… that scene is absolutely intentional. It’s making a point about how, although, these people are members (or prospective members) of this family they have little to do with the dysfunction contained in the plot of the film. That scene is the most obvious part of the film where Demme cuts everyone off from the film other than the three main characters.”
Okay, but what I saw in that was not a comment about these characters having no place in the family drama, but rather of the “ethnic” people having no place in the goings-on of the Anglos. Three white people carrying their fight out of the living room, leaving two black people behind looking at each other like “WTF?” carried a distinctly racial undertone for me, and that aspect of it didn’t feel intentional. Perhaps it gave me that feeling because, the entire time, I’d been seeing all of these non-white people, and sort of wondering when one of them would make a mark on the central conflict of the picture (instead of just standing up and talking about how they knew the bride and the groom, etc).
“Really! You’ve seen European art film, wow! You really know your stuff so, you must be right. The camera is suppose to give the film a documentary feel. It’s ok to say you don’t like the camera, but don’t point to something that has nothing to do with anything related to the film and tell me it’s a genuine criticism of it.”
That’s not my conception of art film, by the way (hence the trademark thing). At the time I wrote this, I was responding to several of the reviews I’d read, which praised Demme’s bold, artsy camera work. Sure, this kind of thing is neat to look at when you compare it to the cold, pristine, professional, and lifeless camera work of the average mainstream Hollywood movie, but just because the movie has an artsy visual veneer doesn’t mean that what you’re watching isn’t an embarrassing rehash of melodrama that passed through the bowels of the industry 30 years ago.
“Absolutely. Rich people aren’t allowed to have the same feelings as us regulars. I mean where do they get off having genuine human emotion when they have money? We all know real rich people are all like Paris Hilton. That statement is so ridiculous. Guess what! Rich people, or suburbanites, have fucked up lives, too. Your suggested addition to the plot adds a whole lot of contrivance to the film. And you seem to forget this film was made before the economic collapse.”
Rich people do, indeed, have fucked up lives! This is a fact. What I was getting at, in my comment, is that I am tired of hearing their stories. We hear their stories all the time, after all. And the economy was in the process of collapsing well before this movie came out. Do you think economic collapse happens overnight? I guess “The Wire” shouldn’t have been able to make that whole final season about the collapse of newspapers, either, since that trend didn’t really start to crystallize until well after the show was off the air.
“It is enough. The film is written, and performed in a manner that adds no contrivance to the film. Maybe it’s conventional (it’s not), but so what? Conventional plot done well is still good. The film is absolutely honest. It contains not a moment that isn’t truthful to both life in a dysfunctional family, and life in the suburbs (I have experience in both).”
Oh really? Well, I grew up in Connecticut, so nah-nanna-boo-boo you-can’t-get-me! What is this, a suburb-off? My question is this: what is the point of creating this carnivalesque atmosphere, and then insulating all of the ongoing drama from it? Is there any significance to this? Why not just have the drama without the atmosphere? Oh wait, because a bunch of ethnically-diverse people lounging around, but not actually taking part in the drama itself, gives it a more eclectic, updated vibe. This isn’t just any normal, white, well-to-do suburban family! They’ve got brown people in the background!
Blue K: When did I ever make a value judgment against anybody else for feeling the way they do about this movie? CAZ accused me of saying he/she (?) is pathetic, but I was clearly talking about the movie’s epiphany, not anybody in this forum.
“Their epiphany moment was a cloying, rinky-dink pseudo-suicide attempt. I mean, come on. How can this be regarded as anything other than pathetic?”
I express wonderment as to how anybody could feel otherwise, but there is no value judgment in that statement.
Having just now read Bolo Tie’s original post, I think I get it. The fact that you would take any issue with the black and white element in the film says more about you than it does Jenny Lumet. The idea of the black people in this film as wallpaper didn’t even enter into my mind; the farthest thing from my thinking was the issue of black people and white people. The only time it occurred to me was after the film; when I had time to reflect on it and I realized that the multi-racial aspect wasn’t even acknowledged, which was quite refreshing to see in a film. I imagine this reflects Lumet’s own experience growing up of mixed race.
Ugh, I just deleted my next paragraph. I really have no energy/interest to talk about this film. How weird is that? One of my favorite films and yet I don’t care to hear people’s thoughts on it or try to defend it. Haha. Sorry.
I’ll stay out of this thread and let you guys duke it out.
Fredo:
Thanks for contributing yet another attempt to paint me as racist, or “uncomfortable” about race. A movie that treats the interracial family as a normal thing—and I’ve heard this case argued many a time for “Rachel Getting Married”—would not not leave an entire potential cast of ever-present non-white characters so definitively out of the mix. Normal race relations doesn’t just mean that brown people get to stand in the room while the white people do all the talking. One would presume it also means that they get to do some of the talking themselves.
“Their epiphany moment was a cloying, rinky-dink pseudo-suicide attempt. I mean, come on. How can this be regarded as anything other than pathetic?”
Bolo, that is a value judgment. No, you didn’t call the people in the forum “pathetic”, I realize that. And trust me, CAZ does too. But your conclusion is that there is no way that the film’s epiphany “can be regarded as anything other than pathetic.” You’ve just invalidated the opinions of other people who feel differently about the epiphany, as if your opinion about it is the ONE AND ONLY one that people should arrive at.
And if you’ve noticed, I haven’t even said anything about the film itself. I actually can relate to at least some of the gripes you have with the film. What people object to is your self-righteousness about subjective values.
i think there was already a thread about this film where Cinema himself created it and of course i contributed…mmmm…deja vu i guess :P
Blue K: There is no value judgment in the statement. A value judgment would be “You are stupid if you disagree.” My statement underscores how completely and totally committed I am to my emotional interpretation of that moment in the film. In it, I ask how others could feel differently? I am grasping for convincing alternatives, not turning them away, as you seem to imply. But I’m sure we’ll be forced to spend at least a dozen more posts parsing this out because someone misread and thought I called him/her “pathetic.”
“Thanks for contributing yet another attempt to paint me as racist, or “uncomfortable” about race. A movie that treats the interracial family as a normal thing—and I’ve heard this case argued many a time for “Rachel Getting Married”—would not not leave an entire potential cast of ever-present non-white characters so definitively out of the mix. Normal race relations doesn’t just mean that brown people get to stand in the room while the white people do all the talking. One would presume it also means that they get to do some of the talking themselves.”
I don’t see why, just because their are brown people in the film, that they have to take part in the story. The whole of the main family is white so of course the film is going to focus on white people – because the film is about the family! The multicultural backdrop was a nice thing to have and added to the variety of the movie and at the end of the day you shouldn’t have to write brown characters, or any other group of characters for that matter, in to the main story just because they happen to be there.
“Normal race relations doesn’t just mean that brown people get to stand in the room while the white people do all the talking. One would presume it also means that they get to do some of the talking themselves.”
This really creeps me out. If you want to call Jenny Lumet an Uncle Tom, just do it! Quit beating around the bush.
To be honest, this is the first time I’ve heard this film be accused of being racist or offensive. Usually the complaints I hear about this film are about the film itself; that is to say, what IS on screen, not what ISN"T on screen. And if you want to complain about Demme’s direction or the script or the camera work or the performances or whatever, fine. Like A Woman Under the Influence, this is not a film for everyone and I’m cool with that.
William Burchett:
But the problem with this argument is that the multicultural backdrop isn’t just a backdrop. Many of the people who make up this backdrop are going to be family members soon, and the rest are family friends who are apparently close/important enough to invite to a wedding. Carol (the stepmother) and Sidney (the husband to be) would seem like prime candidates for inclusion in the actual drama, but they play nothing more than bit roles. I mean, Carol is their stepmother, for crying out loud. She’s in the family! Yet she’s given barely anything to do in the movie. It’s absurd.
So I’m not arguing that some kind of equal opportunity thing is necessary across the board in all films. But in this case, that was sort of a glaring concern for me during the entire movie. A bunch of non-whites were placed in the film prominently enough that I was constantly wondering when they would have some sort—any sort—of effect on the drama.
bolo tie
I’ll get the ball rolling with some comments I made about the film on my blog…
1. There is this obnoxiously ideal multicultural backdrop for the whole movie, but it does nothing to disabuse us of the notion that we are watching a cringe-inducing melodrama play out entirely between white, upper-middle class, Connecticut suburbanites. I mean, seriously. Exactly zero non-white characters take part in the drama, even though they outnumber the white characters 2:1. The idea that they would not be called upon by Jenny Lumet’s script to do anything other than act as wallpaper for the duration of the film (to what, prove to us that we should care about these white folks, because you know, they’re not the stuffy white suburbanites of yesteryear?) is kind of narrowminded and slightly offensive.
There was one brief moment that left me rolling on my ass (though Demme obviously didn’t intend for it to happen): The white folks (Kym, Rachel, and Paul) are arguing in the living room, and suddenly the three of them charge off to the kitchen to continue their argument, leaving Carol (the black stepmother) and Sidney (Rachel’s black husband to be) sitting there like “WTF?” It feels like parody when it happens, but then you realize it wasn’t supposed to be, and that just makes it funnier.
2. This is exactly like (the once Best Picture winning, but now terribly dated and embarrassing to watch 1980 film) Ordinary People, except the suburban locale is populated by wedding guests from every possible cultural background. You’ve still got this standard tearjerker story, and the idea is that we’ll learn more about “what really happened” as the drama unfolds, because the characters are too pent up to say what they’re really feeling, and blah blah blah blah. The only reason why this type of poorly done melodrama gets critical praise, nearly 30 years after poorly done melodrama could pass as something of quality, is because it’s shot with a handheld camera, and therefore looks like a European Art Film™.
3. I’m sick and tired of watching movies about wounded protagonists who just can’t stand the fact that they have a nice house and a rich, supportive family they can depend on to help them through their problems. Why couldn’t this movie carry out the same premise, only just as the family is being ruined by an economic depression? That would make it a hell of a lot more interesting, and I would give so much more of a shit about this protagonist’s eternal angst. In short: sad, rich people bore the living shit out of me.
4. After watching this, I thought it also felt somewhat like Virginia Woolf’s brilliant To The Lighthouse and tried to imagine what it might have been like had Demme’s camera really been more fly-on-the-wallish and truly free-floating, instead of just shaky and artsy. There was this very carnivalesque atmosphere to the whole thing (I also thought of Black Orpheus), and I think Demme figured it was enough to just have that going on, that he didn’t really need to invite it to the fore, or let it bear at all on what were actually fairly conventional family drama plot points. What makes To The Lighthouse so brilliant is that Woolf’s narrative lens gives us interesting insights about fairly stock, mundane goings-on. Rachel Getting Married has an equally mundane story, but Demme doesn’t take any steps toward real insight.
5. I hate to criticize movies like this, because honestly, it’s a good thing that a movie shot in this way, with this kind of atmosphere, etc. can exist and make millions in ticket sales and be raved about by ordinary folks or whatever. I just wish that all the good things about it weren’t a way to repackage the standard, conservative tripe of decades past.
6. Rachel Getting Married is to the family drama what torture porn is to the horror genre.