The Rule Of Three: Its Mike Leigh

Nuts in May completely brilliant (esp. when Keith starts wielding a branch). Abigail's Party also - somehow here the OTTness works. Naked unique and starngely I can't remember how I rated it - think I had some kind of moral objection that I probably wouldn't have today.

Life is Sweet + Secrets and Lies - humane, lovely, sad.

Secrets & Lies: BRILLIANT

Career Girls: RUB, although the welsh bloke is BRILLIANT

haven't seen any others.

Pete may be right that he is as good as his actors, in that he does allow them a lot of freedom, and they develop the script in improvisation with him, which gives them a much greater weight in the outcome than usual.

Peter Bradshaw in today's Guardian is fairly dismissive of the 'caricature' allegations, for what it's worth. He doesn't address the other major regular criticism, of being 'patronising', except implicitly rejecting it while addressing the first.

He co-wrote 'Baddiel's Syndrome' -> it is worth nothing.

I though Topsy Turvy was great after all and thinkl that sometimes it might be interesting if Leigh lifted himself out of the "gutter" to stretch his range a touch.

Sarah kept falling asleep and then waking up and saying "is anything happening yet?". Apparently I was laughing all the way through, though I don't remember.

Okay, well I'll watch it when I'm on my own then.

And Alfred Molina!!

"Vera Drake", incidentally, is amazing and worth seeing whoever you are.

did someone see "happy go lucky"?
should i stay or should i go?

I saw it a couple of weeks back.

It stuck in my mind for a bit - mainly because of the acting skills, especially Eddie Marsan as the Driving Instructor.

it's a bit grating but its heart is in the right place.

I don't take what Mike Leigh says at face value about Poppy being a happy character we ought to admire.

To me, she's yet another of his characters that's got trapped in a certain way of speaking and acting and the film is kind of about that.

I did find the (pre-bonk) pub scene with the social worker completely cringe-inducing.

the critics generally loved the movie, but the users comments in the "time out" review shows most people mainly hated it.

http://www.timeout.com/film/reviews/85152/happy-go-lucky.html?cpage=1&ccat=11#top_comments_main

a paradox, so to speak

not for the first time,of course, but the first for a Leigh movie.

I agree with 'Harriet':

...I'd describe myself as a Mike Leigh fan but this movie, from the story (or lack of one) to the two dimensional characters (in some cases one dimensional), and the unrealistic dialogue and acting seemed by turns tediously shallow and surprisingly irritating. I initially tolerated Poppy's exaggerated, monotone chirpiness because I guessed that there lay something behind it, an event or neurosis from her past that it was a reaction to, which would be revealed and form the basis of the story and bring the film and Poppy to life but that was not to be....

i liked 'naked' a lot when i saw it, 'meantime' almost as much. haven't seen anything else.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51ECTR9Q7QL.jpg

'everyone just say what you think'

i thought this was phenomenal! anyone who says poppy's chirpiness was unrealistic just hasn't met people like her - they really exist and yes they are trapped in it, to an extent, which you get glimpses of (for instance, when her co-worker's talking over a glass of wine about her daughter getting dumped - poppy is just incapable of summoning the sypathetic gravitas needed for these sorts of situations)

i thought it was a film about teaching - there was a dialectic between the methods of driving instructor, poppy, and the flamenco teacher - and even poppy's pregnant sister has a (very ineffective) style of "teaching"

I think the haters are too hung up on having poppy "explained" as if her happiness is some sort of psychosis or something. I though her character was laudable and the movie itself was swell.

the scene with the social worker and poppy and her friend and the kid in the classroom just broke my heart for some reason - just seeing these three people actually being good to this kid and really trying - i feel like you never usually see moments like that in movies unless there's some ulterior motive, like the kid has information that will lead to the killer

^^OTM

Saw this a coupla months ago, thoroughly enjoyed it.

i loved this as well. what made poppy's buoyancy really special, i thought, was that it wasn't the usual kind - floating over everything, skating over difficulties - but instead it allowed her to actually settle in with troubled people and, as it were, sink into their pain, untangling it (not without risk) like a knot.

and i loved the bright colors, the kooky threads, and the bicycle (sigh).

yeah the opening bike-riding scene was great, would marry her.

This was quite good. I particularly liked how Leigh presents Poppy's effervescence with some ambivalence -- it's truly a multi-sided thing. On one hand, it allows her to occasionally be very charming, and you also sense that it's a useful self-preservation technique, that she never lets anything affect her too deeply. On the other, her refusal to be serious for even a second is sometimes infuriating. The driving instructor is clearly an asshole with a whole host of issues of his own, but I did frequently sympathize with his frustration with her. Similarly, there's something laudable about her goodwill and her effort to make friends with strangers wherever she goes (from shopkeepers to bums), but she doesn't seem to understand that people often don't want the same and that this isn't necessarily an act of refusal or rejection as much as a desire for compartmentalization.

I thought this movie was terrible. Like watching Katharine Tate do a David Brent impression for two hours.

Really enjoyed it.

In a way it was like Mike Leigh's answer to the Charming Indie Comedy. It felt a little like watching a Miranda July-type character through a less sentimental lens (pun intended?), or through the eyes of other ordinary people instead of the delusions of the character herself. I liked the character comparisons between the sisters, although the film took some easy potshots at the pregnant suburban one (the husband who secretly wants to play video games was a bit cheap.)

The driving instructor was fantastic.

Some of the user comments on that time out review are so fucking dumb

The driving instructor was fantastic.

The performance, yeah. Too bad he had to have a fucking "arc."

Really liked the first half-hour the best (has he ever used 2.35 widescreen before?). Then, esp in the last reels, it indeed becomes "minor Leigh."

The arc of the whole thing was a bit frustrating -- "See, her approach to life turns out to be right because she saves the day when the driving instructor almost flips out and also she gets a handsome boyfriend. Yay!"

I think her approach to life seems as (in)valid as anyone else's throughout. I see the instructor's meltdown meant as more of a poke through her wall, but not a "reprimand" from Leigh. (really, the d.i. having a crush on Poppy -- lame, ditto the "66" stuff.)

Whatever. Sometimes great things happen to nice people!

Yeah, fair enough. Even in Mike Leigh movies!

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a82/bobbysixer/nutterinmay.jpg

Just watching this again. I'm beginning to come round to agreeing with one of the reviews that said Poppy's personality is a kind of mirror image of Johnny's psychosis in Naked

All or Nothing - yay or nay?

one of his worst, seriously.

i think he's rubbish, but even when i didn't, this one stood out as a stinker.

good, minor

All Or Nothing is probably my favourite of his heavierweight films. I don't see what's minor about it! Timothy Spall is wonderful, desperate in it.

heavyweight?

spall plays a feckless twat who has a heart attack, and there are some stoic women.

it's kind of depressing but what's heavyweight in it?

In the sense that they can be reduced to "x is a so-and-so and there are some ywomen" then fine, no family drama is heavyweight. To me, it spoke eloquently of the human condition, and that's all I meant.

Lightweight Mike Leigh = something like High Hopes, which is much broader and, in that case, not even very funny.

I was hoping to hear Alba's take on Happy-Go-Lucky...

i thought all or nothing was loathesome. there are no believable characters, to me. the characters have no depth but all the annoying leigh style acting tics. Secrets and Lies and Vera Drake are much better. Career girls is much much worse.

Yeah, All or Nothing, struck me as sort of oppressive and Leigh-by-numbers, but Career Girls is actually one of my favorites of his.

Thanks, all.

I just saw Happy-Go-Lucky and loved it! And I want to say that Tracer's comments about it above are really sharp and insightful.

I'm not sure how much of an arc the driving instructor had. He was broken at the beginning and remains broken at the end. So I find the very end not so much happy as bittersweet, if even that. As Tracer said, it's all about teaching: who can be taught? how much time should/can we devote to one broken individual? The "keep-on rowing" end seems facile until you recall that the abused boy and the driving instructor have to keep rowing too. And not to belabor the metaphor too much but you're forced to wonder how their rowing will impact others, perhaps in a deadly way, e.g., the instructor road rage or even the abused boy's bullying.

Also, at the very end, she's talking to the hunky social worker on her freakin' cell phone while her best friend is next to her in this supposedly idyllic nature setting. That ten-year-plus coalition starts to unravel as they row away and the camera pulls up into one of the "uplifting" crane shots. Not exactly a happy-go-lucky moment.

before i saw secrets and lies i figured i would hate it with every fiber of my being but it was so, so great

I was hoping to hear Alba's take on Happy-Go-Lucky...

― Bob Six, Wednesday, 21 January 2009 17:22 (2 months ago)

But he's evidently playing hard to get.

Oh well, perhaps Alba will give his views on 'Another Year'...

I thought it was a great - a return to the miserablism that is Leigh's natural metier after the mis-fire of Happy Go Lucky. Up there with his best films.

I think it's got a lot of depth. Still not sure what to make of the two led characters - Tom and Gerri- who seem initially warm but have a distinct edge. Lesley Manville is magnificent as Mary, the overly dependent friend, who becomes the centre of the film for me.

Lesley Manville at work - the best piece of acting I've seen this year so:

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/audiosrc/movies/MOVIES_BREAK_Manville.jpg

What would you say their distinct edge is?

I'm not sure if Mike Leigh intended it so, but I think it's a horrible film, not just because we can weep at the "poor Mary" thing, but because it seemed so suggest, to me at least, that Tom and Gerri's happiness comes at the cost of others' misery. That stable families can make others feel worse. That happiness is almost a zero-sum game.

I liked Happy Go Lucky a lot (too) but it did seem like he was rather in the grip of an idea, the idea of Poppy.

Well, Gerri for example, seems to go into professional counsellor mode and deals with Mary with a certain coldness at the time when she most needs help.

Tom insensitively reminisces about his and Gerri's amazing holiday, practically a sabbatical in fact, at a moment when Mary and his brother are feeling particularly vulnerable.

(looks like Ruth - Mark Fowler's wife - from Eastenders is being channeled in that photo)

The only jarring note is that the son - Joe - reminded me so strongly of George Osbourne in appearance.

Yikes.

The New Yorker didn't like it either.

IIRC, Karina Longworth's #1 of 2010 is Trash Humpers. FWIW.

Another Year, the 10th feature-length British soap written and directed by Mike Leigh

not sure i wanna read a silly overly-pleased with itself zing in the very first line of a nyt review

never heard of a "nooner" before either

Another Year, the 10th feature-length British soap written and directed by Mike Leigh

my second favourite karina

i always wanna read a silly overly-pleased with itself zing in the very first line of a village voice review

i hate mike leigh but also feel that karina longworth is a bad joke so

decisions decisions

this isn't her worst review, from what i saw in the 30 seconds i devoted to skimming it

'naked' is a rush, super conflicted and relentlessly unpleasant, the rest of the time he seems content to please sorta old ppl who 'read the guardian society pages'

he must hate those ppl even more than he hates himself tho

i always wanna read a silly overly-pleased with itself zing in the very first line of a village voice review

― Rockcrit from the Tuoms (nakhchivan), Wednesday, December 29, 2010

oh lol don't know what happened there

i think mike leigh is really suspect like in interviews and things, but i tend to like his films \o/

u confused her flaky challops for the sonorous bossman crowther enunciations of ao scott

dudes made some good movies cant front

one possible problem with the zing is imprecision

leigh has made far more than 10 feature-length... films, or tv films

but 'another year' is his tenth theatrical feature film not counting 'bleak moments' which probably didn't get a US release

so ok: but 'topsy turvey' can't accurately be zinged as a soap opera (nor 'naked' or 'vera drake')

wouldnt spend a lot of time workshopping karey longdub's zings iiwy

why not vera drake? because it's period? why not naked, bc u have time for it?

a feature length soap opera is a perfectly fine thing for a film to be, if it's a good one, and leigh works within that area. she's using it as a zing but it's a hollow one.

i like the zing cuz i kind assume she has never seen an actual british soap opea

_____ is the seventh feature length HBO serial from director _____

why not vera drake? because it's period? why not naked, bc u have time for it?

― zvookster, Thursday, December 30, 2010 12:20 AM (24 minutes ago) Bookmark

because they're not zingable as soap operas i guess. doubt i'd like 'naked' now either way.

i know what she means, obviously, and it's sort of funny that this guy who gets compared with ozu is also dismissed as a maker of soap operas.

soap operas are shit and i don't think there is such a thing as a good one.

rmde at ppl comparing him to ozu

i do! and i can see that corrie at its best is much like leigh at his best (secrets and lies) but the influence goes both ways.

doubt i'd like 'naked' now either way.

i hated the film but having rewatched some of them i have to say that some that i thought were good at the time are terrible to revisit (high hopes, life is sweet), others have good and bad things about them but others still just get better and better (vera drake, secrets and lies).

xpost

i do! think there is such a thing as a good one (soap).

i remember kinda liking all or nothing

his treatment of working class characters may be more 'problematic' but it's less boring than his weird enduring love for social workers and teachers and stuff

ehhh. i haven't seen much ozu. i wouldn't roll my eyes at the comparison entirely, but ozu is clearly more interested in form, or is just more interesting formally. but, because of the culture-gap, partly, i don't get ozu's characters in the same way i all too 'get' leigh's and think they're bad.

less boring than his weird enduring love for social workers and teachers and stuff

only weird until you think about who goes to see mike leigh films </some murdoch press/telegraph guy>

i can't think of that many Leigh films featuring teachers or social workers - secrets and lies, happy go lucky, what else? - but why shouldn't he show that in a positive light? it's probably part of his interest that you see the work that people daily do and do well. it's not a weird enduring love, it's just part of what he's doing.

i think he's made a lot of shit films but some of them are incredible.

I like Leigh yet Naked bores me to tears -- and, yeah, it's unpleasant.

I haven't seen AY, but his last six or seven movies strike me as his best.

this film doesn't look like it would appeal to me but then again most of his films really don't until i see them, and i usually think they're pretty dope. and yeah karina l. is kind of a joke, like most of the vv media critics these days.

Leigh films I like:

Life Is Sweet
Secrets and Lies
Career Girls
Vera Drake
Happy-Go-Lucky

Leigh films I was meh on:

Naked
Topsy-Turvy
All or Nothing

(I'd kind of like to re-watch Topsy-Turvy, though. I feel like I missed something.)

Also saw a theatrical production of Abigail's Party, which was pretty good.

fwiw (nothing) Another Year is my favorite film this year

but his last six or seven movies strike me as his best.

With these last three, he's nearly lost me. "Condescending" is a fair word.

Imelda Staunton does give the best 5-minute performance of the year in this one, along with Charlotte Rampling in Life During Wartime.

the TV films of the '70s and early '80s easily beat these last few.

Meh. They're so indifferently shot.

I so don't care.

'nuts in may' is his best joint

This one is quite interestingly shot - with the photography reflecting the 4 changing seasons.

This is the only film I bothered to see twice at the cinema in 2010. I wanted to see it the second time to get a second impression of Lesley Manville's acting.

there was *so much* of her acting I think I got it twice the first time.

A+++

I recently found out that the main character in "Nuts in May" was based on my much-loved high school history teacher (and 1970s neighbour to Mike Leigh). Weird.

man, another year is super good

i thought itd be boring since its about old people but it owns pretty hard, totally not what i expected at all - only the third leigh ive seen, and by far the best (other two were topsy turvy and nuts in may)

found myself wishing we got more of the imelda staunton character, i found her captivating - but we basically did get more of her at the end

i have to admit ive been confusing this guy with mike nichols for years - which always made nuts in may really confusing for me because it makes me think of elaine may and etc.

Man, TamTam, if that's only the third Leigh film you've seen, you're in for a treat.

I've only seen Naked, Secrets and Lies and Career Girls but I liked all of them v much.

Reading through this thread I noticed mention of a movie I've never seen . . . Nil by Mouth? Directed by Gary Oldman and Staring Ray Winstone? How have I never even heard of this? It sounds like it could be my favorite movie I've never even watched.

i have to admit ive been confusing this guy with mike nichols for years -

― weed hitler poop fart obama (Princess TamTam) Friday, February 11, 2011 10:45 PM (9 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

me 2. i'd previously only seen Naked, which i dont recall doing much for me, though i watched happy-go-lucky today & loved it tbh

ha remember when eddie marsdan was on everyone's oscar list as like dark-horse 9th-place best supporting actor for "happy go lucky"

Mr Turner

: O

amplify plz

(great Spall, good fillum)

Yeah he was fantastic and it was overall very good to excellent. I am a big turner fan and there were also specific resonances for me so I may be more inclined to overlook any flaws. But I felt like I wanted to see it again after it was done.

This was kind of the first time I had seen Leigh work so much with wider, grander cinematography, he may have done so in other films I haven't seen but I always associate him mostly with tight closeups on expressive and weathered faces and small interior spaces. This had all that too but I had never seen him work with dramatic landscapes and brilliant outdoor light and I was impressed with what he did.

The only complaints I had at all were the occasional "see, he is progressive" moments like the slavery discussion, but even that wasn't so jarring as it related to a painting.

big turner fan here too, wanna see this

prob literally no one i know will see it with me :/

Love Turner. Loved the film and yeah, can't wait to see it again. Pretty spot on.

i'm seeing this today.

The Internet makes it so hard to just unabashedly, unreservedly love things sometimes but I really loved this film

CAD I will see it with you! I am super excited for this movie!

I think mike Leigh is not properly marketed in the US. No one I know here seems to know his films. I was introduced by my wife who grew up much more on British and European media. Some youngster I was talking too the other night seemed to think from the trailer it was something in the vein of a bbc Jane Austen adaptation.

I've had the screener on my table for about ten days. Movie doesn't get a South Florida release for another ten days.

Loved this movie.

CAD I will see it with you! I am super excited for this movie!

― dr bronner's new and improved peppermint (soda), Friday, December 26, 2014 9:20 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

hey maybe we should do this! appears to open on the 9th here.

Didn't know that Ruskin was Elmer Fudd about his r's -- reminds me that I haven't read his art crit since my college Victorian lit class.

needs theater viewing fer chrissakes

agreed

Yeah, this was really impressive.

interview

First of all, what was for sure, is that I wasn’t gonna start at the beginning.... So here we are, spanning 26 years, you know. I was not turned on by the idea of the film starting with a baby being born in ‘75. Apart from anything else, we’d have had to find a small fat boy who looked like Tim Spall, who could draw and paint. I find that very boring, really. You don’t need to go through all that thing of having a younger actor and then changing to an older actor. I can’t be bothered with all that, and it’s not necessary, because the thing is to drop anchor. We’ve managed, I think, to put in backstory information laid into what you see without it being crass and crude, you know. Apart from anything else, it’s just to allow Tim Spall, within his acting range, to go through that phase. I think it’s more interesting to come in when it’s all happening, and then to move on from there. Anyway, all the interesting things that I wanted to deal with were from his father’s death, his relationship with Mrs. Booth, certain famous events, like the famous event that did actually happen, in the Royal Academy, where he puts a red blob on a painting; all that actually happened. And other things, and also that period, most importantly, where he was being more radical, and people were reviling him, not least amongst whom Queen Victoria, who loathed his stuff! There are no Turners in the royal collection to this day in London.

http://penguinrandomhouse.ca/hazlitt/feature/thats-fairly-silly-question-interview-mike-leigh

OTM about starting from childhood being boring -- a thing I hate not only about biopics but the whole genre of biography.

It's a small thing, but for some reason I keep thinking about the Ruskin scene, the moment where Ruskin is describing the ocean painter he finds boring (claude something, forget the name), and Turner is kind of sitting there thinking the guy is full of hot air and finally weighs in that "Claude ___ was a genius," and the other painters agree. It just rang true for me somehow, the way there's always that artist's artist that the artists speak about in reverential tones but not many other people seem to get, someone otherwise out of fashion or "boring," but who does something subtle or technical that other artists appreciate. Anyway it just seems like a good example of a way that the movie gets artists right where most other movies about artists fail.

I loved this movie.

Really want to go see it again while still in theaters, if it is. Probably won't get a chance.

it hasn't even opened in South Florida.

In that scene there is also that flippant, pie comment from Spall, another even smaller thing but still good!

Man alive, Ruskin himself was an artist and a very great one at that.

The envy and suspicion among artists who are generally on friendly terms was also portrayed beautifully, subtly. Plus the scenes of his father buying pigment, grinding pigment, stretching canvas... All things I had read about Turner's old father actually doing and not quite understanding how he could get his dad, of all people, to do such laborious work. It was beyond poignant for me to see this come to life.

I wouldn't call Ruskin a great artist, an influential thinker and accomplished design artist maybe?

excellent writer and terrifying husband

"There have been various representations of Ruskin and they are always, by definition, incredibly dull. … I just thought it would be a good wheeze to render him in this way," Leigh states. "There is no suggestion on my part that that is a documentary representation of Ruskin."

It's a shame that people may see this and assume Ruskin was some kind of fool. I've no idea what Leigh means by "by definition... dull".

The Ruskin scenes were really funny. I'm so glad they were in there.

I watched the movie bearing the criticism in mind and I didn't see a fool so much as an artful (heh) hustler, ponderous like many mid Victorian men and thus typical.

An overindulged spoilt Edwardian child was my reading, a prodigy ruined by his parents, but still pretty fucking good at what he does.

^^ this

"Edwardian" means seventy years later, no?

I should have said Georgian, sorry.

I didn't think it was portraying Ruskin as a fool, just a bit of a self-sniffing windbag.

needs theater viewing fer chrissakes

― touch of a love-starved cobra (Dr Morbius), Monday, January 5, 2015 4:33 AM (2 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Absolutely. Finally saw this this weekend -- it's just now made it to our flyover screens. Really enjoyed it all the way through. Spall is so much fun to watch, getting multiple meanings out of every grunt and snort. No idea if that's anywhere close to the real Turner, but that doesn't matter, it works for the film's conception of him. And the way the landscapes and seascapes are shot not so much to look like his paintings as to suggest what he saw in them that he carried through to his paintings -- seeing the world through his eyes.

This and Topsy Turvy are my favorite Leigh films. He should do more period biopics! One thing I love is that he really tries to give the details of daily life in another time -- to the degree that it is disorienting at first, it feels like a somewhat alien place. Which is what it would do, of course. That's something a lot of period films don't even bother to try, they just give you modern people and mores in period dress.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UxEqqRa_Tn4

Y'all should watch Hard Truths!

Genuinely excited to see it, and I’m not a particular Leigh fan, even though Keith in Nuts in May was apparently based on my high school maths teacher. It’s not out here till the end of the month.

As ever, Mike Leigh somehow talks engagingly for an hour without really giving much away.

i know the ending of hard truths was intentionally open-ended to make you think about what could happen next but i'm enjoying thinking it's a setup for the big sequel harder truths

great movie btw. i'm not a mike leigh expert though i've seen a smattering of movies from the range of his career, but i agree that's weird to think that the guy who makes these small, incisive modern character studies also made "topsy turvy." i really need to see "mr. turner"

I didn't think of it as opened-ended as much as the door closing on Pansy's options, after escaping her present life became a possibility.

Loved seeing this, especially after our collective celebration of David Lynch. This is such the opposite of Lynch's work: no angles, line readings, moments of laughing at the characters from a distance; the opposite of a dream.

My favorite film of 2024. Feel like it's already in danger of being considered a "minor work" but then I think of how much I love Another Year and Happy Go Lucky and I guess they got the same treatment.

We got a discussion in the A Real Pain thread about Happy-Go-Lucky.

Ouch. I know personally that intergenerational trauma is a bitch, but that was grueling.

Mr. Turner is great. I actually need to go back and rewatch Topsy Turvy sometime because it didn't click with me as a college student who was into Leigh because of Secrets and Lies and Career Girls and Life is Sweet. But my enjoyment of Mr. Turner (and to a lesser extent Peterloo) make me think I'd like it better now.

I should see Naked again, having only seen it the week it opened. It was so much of its time, such a pure early-90s Gen X movie, and I only mostly remember the long scene after hours in the empty office building.

Something I loved about Hard Truths was that Pansy most of all reminded me of embittered male characters: Thewlis in Naked, Kingsley in Sexy Beast, Jack Nicholson in more things than not. I guess there have been supporting characters like Diane Weist and Judy Davis in Woody Allen movies, but I'm not sure I've seen a protagonist like that before.

We got a discussion in the A Real Pain thread about Happy-Go-Lucky.

― the talented mr pimply (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 20 January 2025 16:01 (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

I've seen so few Mike Leigh films. Only HGL and Another Year. But I would rank Happy Go Lucky as one of my favourite films of all time so it's no wonder I enjoyed A Real Pain, which (as has been discussed a little in that thread) has a good few parallels

Something I loved about Hard Truths was that Pansy most of all reminded me of embittered male characters: Thewlis in Naked, Kingsley in Sexy Beast, Jack Nicholson in more things than not. I guess there have been supporting characters like Diane Weist and Judy Davis in Woody Allen movies, but I'm not sure I've seen a protagonist like that before.

― braunschweiger winter (Eazy), Tuesday, January 21, 2025 9:57 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

it's not really the same but tilda swinton in problemista is maybe the broader version of the character of pansy? didn't 100% love that movie but her performance is great

The Swinton character is a 'terrible boss,' kind of like Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada. I just realized that Laurie Metcalf's mom in Lady Bird is a bit like Jean-Baptiste, as someone who sometimes winces at their own behavior but can't help but be themselves and be difficult.

Good comparison -- Metcalf also constitutionally unable to have a good time, seems to will bad tidings on herself and others.

At least Lady Bird proffers a clue: "My mother was an abusive alcoholic."

there's a few on Criterion right now, I watched High Hopes last night and enjoyed it a lot

Decent radio doc on BBC

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002752j

an interesting take on Hard Truths: https://completeworks.substack.com/p/diagnosis-fiction

Amis' The Green Man is worth reading.

That feels like a lack of recognition and empathy on Butler's part. (Then again, I'm not a fan of his.) My mom was a whole lot like Pansy, but no one put a label on her (other than "bitch" or "difficult"). The character was too familiar for me to experience her with a diagnosis in mind.

Amis' The Green Man is worth reading

agreed, good book

xp we'll have to talk about Butler sometime

an interesting take on Hard Truths: https://completeworks.substack.com/p/diagnosis-fiction🕸

Although Eazy’s point is good too.

that was well-written and interesting but this: "Instead, I want a movie that, if it’s purporting to exist in the real world, at least has one mention ever that mental health care exists." there are millions of families where nobody ever mentions mental health care and never would. even if they thought of it they wouldn't mention it. i don't think its uncommon.

i haven't seen that movie though. it is easier to think about these things now when watching a movie. i imagine that if i ever watched a cassavetes movie now i would just be diagnosing and prescribing like crazy. but i certainly didn't do that when i first saw them. things change.
i do think that watching someone who is obviously in pain or in need of help and the movie ends and they are still in pain and still need help is kinda agonizing but also unfortunately true to life in a lot of people's cases.

more phony was the kirk douglas movie from 1953 i watched the other night where he is the tortured holocaust survivor who runs from the police in israel for the entire length of the movie and the last shot is him crying on his knees and being hugged by a beautiful woman while he cries "I need help!" it was an early cry for therapy. but it felt off somehow because the minute before he was holed up in a house with a rifle and screaming at the authorities. but the ending was what people were HOPING the ending would be. help for the traumatized camp survivor. and them not getting shot to death by the police.

if someone has never seen those play for today/bbc movies they really should. grown-ups. abigail's party.

got this from wiki:

In 2012, Leigh participated in that year's Sight & Sound film polls. Held every ten years to select the greatest films of all time, contemporary directors were asked to select ten films. Leigh named the following ten:

American Madness (USA, 1932)
Barry Lyndon (UK/USA, 1975)
The Emigrants (Sweden, 1970)
How a Mosquito Operates (USA, 1912)
I Am Cuba (Cuba, 1964)
Jules and Jim (France, 1962)
Radio Days (USA, 1987)
Songs from the Second Floor (Sweden, 2000)
Tokyo Story (Japan, 1953)
The Tree of Wooden Clogs (Italy, 1978)

Leigh participated again in the 2022 poll selecting the following ten films:

The 400 Blows (France, 1959)
Barry Lyndon (UK/USA, 1975)
The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (Romania, 2005)
The Gospel According to St. Matthew (Italy, 1964)
Here Is Your Life (Sweden, 1966)
How a Mosquito Operates (USA, 1912)
Loves of a Blonde (Czechoslovakia, 1965)
Some Like It Hot (USA, 1959)
Songs from the Second Floor (Sweden, 2000)
Tokyo Story (Japan, 1953)

also kirk douglas was a clown and you had to imagine a world where people would have sympathy for a clown.

i do think that watching someone who is obviously in pain or in need of help and the movie ends and they are still in pain and still need help is kinda agonizing but also unfortunately true to life in a lot of people's cases.

Just back from watching Hard Truths at the cinema, brilliant stuff, but so bleak, you can just feel the final glimmer of hope drain away in that last scene. I was watching with my wife and wow Pansy is just like her mother (a woman I've lived with for about 5 years) - though my father in law is far from meek and tacit, so the actual family dynamic is quite different.

I saw it yesterday and have been meaning to post. Also thought it was brilliant.

It's bleak and tragic, but also very funny indeed. The showing I was in the whole audience was laughing out loud uncontrollably many times, especially in the first half or so (in particular the dinner scene and the whole sofa shop/supermarket/dentist/doctor portion).

The cinema was full of old white people and they didn't really laugh at all, even heard one of them remark on it not being funny. but yeah, the whole furniture shop bit! we were laughing at least.

I've just seen it and didn't like it much at all.

I'm slightly shocked to read above that the audience was "laughing out loud uncontrollably many times" because this film is as bleak as it can be, and I thought it was like being stuck with someone who is suffering from a serious mental illness and being unable to help them.

Certainly the audience were not laughing in the showing I went to (I didn't study the audience demographic, but it was at the Brixton Ritzy).

With regards to demographic, I didn't study the audience either, but I'm in Glasgow and saw it at the GFT, at a relatively quiet showing.

I wholeheartedly agree that it was bleak (and tragic, as mentioned), but there was dark humour there as well for me. I felt that was intentional.

I thought it was his best film since Happy-Go-Lucky and basically left nothing on the table about what it’s like to have someone like this in the family. There are definitely moments that can seem funny to outsiders but when you’re around this every single goddamn day, it’s a whole different story, and this film nails it. Even the last act is perfect - you can have sympathy for what makes someone become this way, but it doesn’t change the fact they still act horrendously and incessantly inflict damage on everyone close to them, and yes, people have their limits and will eventually hate them for it.

that was well-written and interesting but this: "Instead, I want a movie that, if it’s purporting to exist in the real world, at least has one mention ever that mental health care exists." there are millions of families where nobody ever mentions mental health care and never would. even if they thought of it they wouldn't mention it. i don't think its uncommon.

Are we to assume that Isaac Butler is familiar with mental health care provision on the NHS in the UK?

Im team #Peterloo