Lukas Moodysson

Must say I didn't really go for Italian For Beginners - it didn't really connect all that well. Can't think of anything specifically European off the top of my head but if you haven't seen After-life or Lone Star I think they both fit your description (albeit with slightly more philosophical bents).

I suppose that's one approach to teen lesbian films, yes...

In fact, since we're on a Scandiwegian tip, there really is nothing whatsoever wrong with "My life as a dog" if you're looking for something that teeters between bittersweet and feelgood.

Tag, it scares me when you pop up on the boards, makes me think you're watching us always. Brrr...

Rest assured that I am indeed watching you, silently, constantly, waiting for the perfect moment.

well?

while I admired Lilja 4 Ever in many ways, it did leave me depressed for a week, and unlike with together I didn't go back and see it four times.

http://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=10456

Well, a charcter has had a labial trim, so the film shows closeups of that and other disgusting surgical procedures at random points throughout the film. Don't repeat my mistake and buy popcorn.

As far as pointlessly shocking movies go (gummo, ken park, i spit on your grave) this movie has strong characters and acting, and a good sense of plot. You can still tell it's a Moodysson film, though a Moodysson gone mad and trying to make a snuff film.

Moodysson really relies on those abused teenagers too much. It's a cheap way of elicting emotion from the viewer. Even his snuff filoms are sentimental. But it's still not a bad movie (and it's way better than requiem for a dream).

i wouldn't characterize lilya 4ever as misanthropic.... just a bit opportunistic in its mix of moralism and exploitation (see also david lynch, cecil b de mille)

p.s. holy shit i am NOT seeing this film. i can't handle live surgery

Me too. But A Hole in my Heart is too sentimental if anything, not too misanthropic. But as Amst says, you need a strong stomach to sit through it.

do they also have crankysons in sweden?

Now, from what I hear, the surgery scene pales in comparison to the guy-actually-vomiting-in-a-woman's-mouth scene... (I'm sorry I had to type that, but I am just reporting what I have heard)...

sure is good crack, though.

http://www.cinemaniacs.be/images/lilya.jpg http://www.vujer.com/material/filmer/lilja_4ever.jpg

I know, it's weird. Maybe they just shuddered at the thought of English speakers pronouncing the J as hard.

bbc4 announcers have been pronouncing it 'Moddy-son' rather than 'Moody-son' which kinda spoils things. i'll ask our swedish PA if she's not off ill again.

I see your point, but it wasn't their story. Some films present a narrative from numerous perspectives, some just focus on one character's subjective experience, and "Lilja 4-Ever" chose the latter path.

I wasn't being sarcastic!

(the one thing i did laugh at was the kid called Tet, just because of his name. not that i didn't enjoy the film.)

Well, a charcter has had a labial trim, so the film shows closeups of that and other disgusting surgical procedures at random points throughout the film. Don't repeat my mistake and buy popcorn.

Yes, well, so my story...chose to go see this at the Prince Chaz with my friends instead of getting into to the bowels of MPC (which I sorta wanted to do) to see a free test screening of The Descent (which I couldn't have cared less about). But as Moodysson got a good reception when we showed Together at the school, I figured it was worth a try. Didn't know anything about A Hole in My Heart really before going in.

So before all this, we're out doing some miscellaneous Super 8 shooting, and I'd been digging on going to this Eritrean place that I saw a review for this week. So we go out there and order this meal for two that is huge, but great. Needless to say, I'm fairly full for a bit - a lot of air from the bubbly bread...

Anyway, we go into town and along the way, my bud briefly mentions that Moodysson's films have been getting progressively darker, and that this should be fairly gritty and intense. But I've seen a shitload of films, many gritty and intense, so whatever. He gets some Haagen Daz from the shop around the corner from the theater, and we go in. We end up getting comp'ed bc a schoolmate is working there, which is nice. But when he hears that we want to see the film, he's like, "really? Are you sure you know what you're getting into?" Yeah, whatever, let us in. I figure the least I can do for the freebie is patronize the concessions, so I order a medium sweet popcorn and a small Coke.

BIG MISTAKE.

I really was fine with the shock tactics for the most part; I enjoyed the experimentalism of it, and I think I could see what was going on and clearly there was a point. I even jumped in my seat at several points, which I rarely have occasion to do even once within a film. But as it worked its way towards the ninth circle. Yes, having anything to eat was a big mistake. You could sorta tell what was coming along, so when the moment occurred, I did something I've never once had to do before in a film - I actually looked away. I'm fairly emetophobic, so I didn't want to take a chance of going over the edge - esp. what with all I had eaten. Anyway, I looked back a bit too soon and caught a good amount of the tail end of things. Luckily I made it through fine, but at that point, I think I just disconnected with the film.

I can see the merits of it, and just because something (finally) offended and shocked me utterly doesn't mean that I'm going to dismiss it outright, but I think it's going to be difficult for me to have anything positive to say in detail.

Honestly, maybe I would have been less overwhelmed if I had had spoilers. Which would have been a good thing.

i just watched 'together' & liked it a lot. reminded me of fanny and alexander a bit

mammoth looks fucking great:

my variety twitter feed just now popped up with a notification that mammoth has been reviewed. weird.

lots of comparisons to 'babel' which makes sense.

3rd world problems (done pretty heavyhandedly) vs. 1st world ennui & lyfe/work balance (had some resonance for me)

well casted/acted as most of moodysson's stuff - the maid's son was great

michelle williams in the kitched in front of the row of knives made me think of jeanne dielman

too much ladytron & ipod playlist soundtrack generally

just finally watched show me love (after really liking together and lilya 4-ever.) it's pretty adorable, probably too adorable, buthard to resist. i'm not sure i want to see either of his two more recent movies, but i guess i will eventually. i just think he's turned toward material that's more loaded than he really needs. he's very good with family and social dynamics, i think he does his best work at small scales. but maybe that's hard for a filmmaker to accept.

sorry, i mean three most recent films (forgot about container, which i've heard nothing good about).

Wow, "Together" was so goddamned charming!

Seeing the new punk teens movie tonight, hope the good word proves true.

http://www.filmlinc.com/films/on-sale/we-are-the-best

Yeah, I've only heard good things from folk I trust.

cool def want to see this

screening cancelled due to DIGITAL FAILURE!!! First time for me.

I saw the punk movie a couple nights ago: http://humanizingthevacuum.wordpress.com/2014/03/13/teenage-wasteland-we-are-the-best/

I saw it too, at a rescheduled screening. Hoping "Hate the Sport" becomes a hit.

just wait till Miley Cyrus gets it

loved lilya 4ever back in the day but i have the feeling i'd find it corny and obvious now

Hate the Sport has been a regular fixture in my head since I saw the film last year. I suspect it will take over the world.

its the best this movie

hate the sport!

https://soundcloud.com/strindberg-som-tortyr/brezhnev-reagan-fuck-off

omg

it's so catchy

excited to see this, but god knows if it'll play in my town

its so good.

i recently watched the experimental 1 he did w/ the jena malone voiceover 'container' - eh, kinda tough to engage w/ but she does get a nice trance enducing pace and tone going

hate the brody - http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/movies/2014/06/the-shiny-happy-fake-sweden-of-we-are-the-best.html

" But Moodysson doesn’t have an aesthetic principle to match: there’s no cannily retro style to his view of the past, no idea of visual composition that suggests the inner glow of halcyon reminiscences"

???

This is my favorite movie of the year by a long shot - maybe of the last couple of years.

That review is preposterous

Also would buy a soundtrack SO FAST - I guess I need to check like Amazon.swe maybe

Someone wrote that it's an adorable "puppy" of a movie in mostly good ways, that's about the size of it.

Brody is the absolute worst

Didn't realize there was a director thread, so I posted about this on a general music-film thread last week. I liked it, maybe not quite as much as a couple of you. My favourite scene was the final show--all it needed was Hedvig clubbing one of the yokels on the head with her guitar, like Sid Vicious in Texas.

We Are the Best! now watchable at home

on the flix?

beats me, I only do discs

If you don't mind living amorally it is on the torrentosphere.

I didn't know about this thread but yeah We Are the Best! is the best

Oh good I am watching it tonight.

we are the best is one of the best new movie I saw this year

moodyson rulez!

movies* (was correcting from "the best new movie", not sure if "boyhood" was better but at least it's top3)

I don't know who Rickard Brody is but I don't see what's wrong with that review lol. "cuteness as a unifying principle" seems accurate to me, and I liked the movie. The main thing it has going for it is how it's happy to just observe the kids being kids, kinda like THE GOONIES but a lot less obnoxious. I kept thinking during the movie how content it was to just be low-key and cute and there's nothing wrong with that but there's nothing wrong with wanting more too... RB is just being real about it...

I've always felt like ilx takes it easy on Moodysson when he does things they would be harsher on other directors for, if they were doing them in service of subjects u guys are less inherently sympathetic towards... Maybe I'm full of doodoo but thats just the feeling I get.................

i'd agree that the movie was a lot of fun within its (self-imposed) limitations but certainly didn't leave much to chew on.

yea i was not really into it tbh

i liked it, i think there's plenty of room for movies like that in my life, but i wouldn't begrudge anyone thinking it was complacent

Loved the movie, tried to understand Brody's objections but boy does he work himself up into a pompous lather over some weird things. "It’s a cynical sale of good feelings, a pious positivity which, with its lack of self-questioning, has the chill of propaganda." Does it really?

brody is an posuer, whose beard is but one of his affectations. he's a caricature of the smug intellectual who assumes the posture of "expertise" on matters of which he knows little. he seems to have stepped right out of woody allen movie sometimes.

ha poseur -- i can't type.

it's sometimes easy for me to mistake brody for a serious person but then i read one of his periodic columns in which he waxes philosophical about film history, a subject on which he is as much a pompous dilletante as the new yorkers' regular critics.

check that--they are less pompous.

I just watched this movie an hour ago! I really liked it, got the spirit of punk right although maybe a bit too cute perhaps. Brody article is ridiculous - "propaganda"?! ffs

What I both like and dislike about reading Brody is the tinge of Armond - the chest-puffing fulminations against movies admired by all those credulous mugs who can't see as clearly as he can.

took my wife to see it and she said it was meaningful to her bc she was a huge music fan and in a couple bands in her early twenties and there is something pretty political in this movie abt how young women aren't taken seriously, albeit told in a more lighthearted manner. but the pain and frustration is there in this movie as fun as it is.

The feminism's loud and clear. I don't know how Brody thought there was no conflict, just because it was handled lightly. I've read his review again and I can't imagine how anyone could get that angry about this movie. This bit is hilariously tone-deaf and ignorant about the history of punk.

"for that matter, their punkishness isn’t even an attitude, it’s a minor and bloodless style statement, a matter of distinctive but unexceptionable haircuts and garments alone, without piercings or tattoos, without inclinations to violence and without anarchic rejection of convention and order."

i think the movie is incredibly aware of how punk can be both "a bloodless style statement" and more meaningful, and this is indeed one of its themes.

B-but no piercings or tattoos!

i mean the girls exhibit anxiety about exactly that issue!

the movie does kind of mock the way that some punk degenerated into overfamiliar psuedo-political posturing (the way that the boys in that other band sing songs about a soviet leader who'd been dead for several years), but it's also sensitive to the way that the girls' rebellion has real meaning in the context of their lives, helping them to build a strong sense of self-worth and identity. which has a political dimension.

xpost

it's funny that the older brother is into joy division as if the age and consequent intellectual difference between him and his sister is somehow isomorphic to the different between punk and post-punk

otm. Their rebellion is small but it's huge and vital to them and that's where a lot of the comedy comes in as well - that adolescent problem of perspective. And of course the fact that they're born too late for punk's insurrectionary years.

I love this film. One of the best films I saw all year.
What I love best is how much of it is about the process of actually forming a band and finding ways to overcome the things that stop you achieving your vision
it really benefited, imo from being a 'nice' film with little real peril or conflict.

Brody in a nutshell: passionate, unpredictable celebration of films he loved last year let down by boring, posturing dismissal of 10 critics' favourites just to show how different he is. http://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/best-movies-2014

the film seemed to end at what would be the mid-point of where other films on a similar subject. that is, it ended on a note of what might seem like a mixed success at best--a kind of anti-triumph rather than a real "success." but i think that was in keeping with the themes of the film. even if i wanted it to go on another 30 minutes!

sorry for bad typos.

xpost

i won't read that; reading brody seems about as useful (and good for my blood pressure) as reading armond white at this point.

i keep thinking that if i ever met brody i'd have to fight the urge to pull on his beard. i wonder if after he sees a movie it's filled with popcorn and spittle.

Woah..

***NEW TITLE ANNOUNCEMENT***
Coming to Blu-ray in January from Arrow Video

The Lukas Moodysson Collection

•FUCKING ÅMÅL-2K resto
•TOGETHER-4K resto
LILYA 4-EVER
•A HOLE IN MY HEART / CONTAINER
•MAMMOTH
•WE ARE THE BEST!#FilmTwitter #Bluray #ArrowVideo #Cinema #Film pic.twitter.com/4SjXNlU1Ut

— Dawn of The Discs (@dawnofthediscs) October 27, 2022

wow there is a sequel to Together set in 1999, playing at TIFF: https://tiff.net/events/together-99

I haven't kept up with Moodysson, but I loved the original Together

Yeah it was good