write a book about this and stop bumping this thread to the top of the forum. LET IT DIE.
Perhaps we can trace the loose, hand-held feel of the camerawork to Demme’s documentary work. I read somewhere that Demme shot most of the film with little-to-no rehearsals so maybe he was trying to inject a documentary feel to the overall film, rather than make some “cheap attempt to be hip”. Robert Castle is handling ceremonial duties who appeared in Demme’s doco Cousin Bobby and Robyn Hitchcock is also at the wedding who appeared in Storefront Hitchcock (I know Corman is in there too who had nothing to do with his doco work but…). perhaps this was Demme using his experience of doco work on a fictional project to see what happens. This doesn’t negate Bolo’s feelings about the issue of race depiction but it may point to reasons for the camerawork.
Greaseman64: Shut your mouth.
Ben Cho: My only problem there would be that I have to know about Demme’s private intentions in order to understand why he handles the camerawork the way he does.
GREASEMAN64: Bolo Tie is masquerading in his social, anit-racist liberalism but he secretly hates people with red names.
hahaha Thanks for the insight Seks.
bolo tie
You not liking the film and the film being bad are not necessarily the same.
“Bad” and “good” are constructions of subjective opinion. I never argued that there is anything “inherently bad” about the movie. My conclusions are, and have always been, based on my subjective perception of the film. But at the same time, this doesn’t mean that we can’t make reasonable, convincing arguments about what constitutes “good” or “bad.”
I think if you struggle with racism on a regular basis I could see how the portrayal the multi-ethnic elements would annoy you.
I don’t think a person should have to struggle with racism on a regular basis to see the absolute awkwardness of how race is portrayed in this movie. I really feel like there are two camps here: people who are willing to overlook, or be willingly oblivious toward, the awkward racial scenario of the movie, and those who aren’t. But I can’t believe for a second that there are Americans who watched this movie and didn’t see the same thing I saw. The visual itself is just an objective fact. If you didn’t somehow process how race worked in this movie (either by objecting to it, or by deciding to ignore it, or by deciding to believe it’s some great statement about our “post-racial” world), then you are blind.