thread of mandy (2018), melted psychedelic drone directed by panos cosmatos

pacing/plotting problems

this is style, imo, but yeah this movie is only marginally less slow than black rainbow (but i've also found that ppl who find black rainbow tedious can think this one's a real thrill ride, who can say)

i argue that the movie is also about setting up a scenario that involves a chainsaw battle

re: pacing, i watched Mandy a day after watching The Sentinel for the first time, and it seemed to fly by

chainsaw vs. extended chainsaw was when i gave myself over to the second half of this movie completely

if I wasn't clear on the other thread, my problem with Black Rainbow wasn't with how slow it was as much as it was that the film retained that glacial pace even when all the tension and dread had already been leached out of the story - ie, everything that happens after she escapes the compound. The ending is one of the stupidest deus ex machina copouts I've ever seen, and he dragged it way the fuck out. At that point the pacing worked against the film.

you might like this one a lot more then

i also don't really know how the ending of black rainbow is a deus ex machina but i'll take your word for it. i find that movie's gradual transformation from a moody '70s cronenbergian body horror thing into a traditional slasher extremely charming

which, mandy does a similar thing: it pretty fearlessly goes wherever it's going to go

I preferred Beyond the Black Rainbow, which I know is bizarre.

i also don't really know how the ending of black rainbow is a deus ex machina but i'll take your word for it

SPOILIDAD

the central conflict is resolved by the villain *tripping on a fucking rock and braining himself* iirc

yeah he does that bc the protagonist is psychic

if all she had to do was make him trip on a rock why did she spend all that time running away

i mean, she freezes him in place and the moment he tries to break out of her control he dies in an embarrassing and dumb way, which i think is a fitting end for an acid-melted entitled male monster

but the particular path mandy takes is more satisfying/cathartic and less anticlimactic than the end of black rainbow so again i'm pretty certain you'll like it more

I'm guessing if I don't like gore/brutality Black Rainbow is a better choice?

hard to say, i remember the deaths in black rainbow all being pretty gross in one way or another

splitting heads hairs imo

you're either into his super slow mutated sense of pacing or not tbh, it's not really more complicated than that

The slowness of Mandy wasn't a problem. It does have a peculiar way of leaving in slack moments which most movies would cut, and uses tons of slow fades where most movies would have a hard cut. This worked really well in the creeping ambience of the first half. The slightly more tedious moments for me were the less visually compelling ones, like the visit to the pharmacist in the radio tower.

That felt like a nod to the eye clinic in Blade Runner to me. But it didn't quite pull off the febrile deranged feeling he was clearly shooting for.

pls someone let Cosmatos take over on the new Dune movies

this was super agonizing to watch, very few parts i enjoyed (such as chainsaw battle), would not do it again

did you go to the cinema though

i've seen it twice now, once in cinema and once not in cinema, and i don't like going to the theatre but i'd argue it's kinda necessary for that movie

Still waiting with increasing irritation for literally any theater in the sixth-largest city in the United States to get this. We had one host the one-night premiere, which I blew off for something else since the same email said "opening September 14," but since then the only option has been a 90-minute round trip to Bethlehem, PA.

after being extended a week here, it's being brought back tomorrow after a week off: get a cheap flight to Seattle, I'll go see it again.

hasn't been mentioned yet, i don't think, but the soundtrack rules. the last work of Jóhann Jóhannsson. i especially liked the black metal snippets, like when Red is going down the tunnel toward Jeremiah.

was mentioned in other threads' discussion before Brad sensibly split this one off

"Amulet of the Weeping Maze" is song of the year.

yes i saw it in the cinema, if this was on a tv i would have just turned it off lol

Oh yeah, there's a song from Red and the character's name is Red. I understand this movie now.

since then the only option has been a 90-minute round trip to Bethlehem, PA

what rough beast, its hours come round at last, &c &c

did not enjoy "beyond the black rainbow", but i was going to take a shot on this

sadly looks like tonight will be the last showing here, in theory i could drive to LA but it's only showing at midnight there. does that mean it's not doing so well?

the original release was one night only, so it's been doing great

Has been brought back to the AFI Silver for at least one more week; have a ticket for tonight.

well i rented it on itunes and - it was great!!

RLJ Entertainment, known for releasing genre movies ("Brawl in Cell Block 99," "Bone Tomahawk") and has handled movies starring Cage in the past ("Rage," "Dog Eat Dog," "Pay the Ghost"), moved forward with the usual game plan for "Mandy."

They released it in 75 theaters its first week, and had Cosmatos, Cage, and costar Linus Roache show up for live Q&As following some special Thursday-night screenings before its opening weekend, the hope being that exposure and the 94% Rotten Tomatoes score the movie has would bring in the audiences that a limited marketing budget a day-and-date movie can't.

And boy did it work.

And then something unusual happened: Instead of people ordering the movie on VOD, they took to social media and demanded a wider release so that "Mandy" could open at a theater near them.

https://www.businessinsider.com/surprise-success-of-nicolas-cage-movie-mandy-causes-shift-in-theater-release-strategy-2018-10

BRISTOL, Tenn. – A man who police say was run over with a lawn mower while trying to kill his son with a chain saw has had to have his leg amputated.

violent incidents that aren't in Mandy

"pls someone let Cosmatos take over on the new Dune movies"

yesss

i think this is my favorite movie of the year. is it insane to hope that it gets oscar consideration? cage, Riseborough, director, cinematographer....all deserve some recognition.

also i like to think of the two blonde cult members as 'slack jawed yokel 1 and slack jawed yokel 2'

"pls someone let Cosmatos take over on the new Dune movies"

yesss

Yeah I can see the result being interesting, but Cosmatos’ style works best on a smaller scale IMO. Plus we already have the Lynch Dune.

Peter Travers of Rolling Stone calls Mandy 'a hoot, a real old-fashioned good-timey romp! See it with your best gal's ma!'

Kinda feel like there's a stain on my soul now that I can never fully scour away. Fuckin' evil. Deeply admire the commitment to pulling zero punches. Not sure I ever need to see it again. Fairly sure I will nonetheless see it again soon.

(I joked that Cosmatos wanted to drop an isolated slice of cinema verite into the proceedings and asked Cage to go through his usual morning bathroom routine while the cameras rolled.)

Also: looking for recommendations of other films that exude unrelenting cosmic darkness (Possession is as far as I've gotten thus far).

I'd say THE WITCH is pretty good at that

I’ll throw in my usual recommendation of The Lords Of Salem.

I also recommend STARRY EYES.

I must be drawn to cosmic darkness as I've seen all three! It occurred while watching that it reminded me of nothing quite so much as Twin Peaks: The Return.

Introduced my Mandy crew to Outer Space sometime just before we watched the former. You could say it was a day for feel-good cinema, I suppose.

It's both

I want FromSoft to make a Souls game about it

Beyond the Black Rainbow is decent as well. I'm starting to like what this director does, despite not really being in the mood for Mandy the first time I attempted watching it.

It felt like a cross between "Evil Dead II" and (appropriately enough) "Raising Arizona."

I saw Mandy just once when it came out but one thing I recall is that it's free of firearms? Like tons of crossbow violence but no actual guns

I think one of the devil bikers fires a gun at Cage before he gets run over.

Watched this a second time recently with my kids, who hadn't seen it. I think I enjoyed it even more the second time, just sinking into the spacey lunatic vibe.

Probably make a good double feature with that Nic Cage Lovecraft movie.

It's just, how do I put this, a confluence of all the aesthetics I like and it's the film that really made me appreciate Cage

I'm still on the fence about him. I just read "The Age of Cage" and couldn't come to any conclusion other than: sometimes his stuff works, sometimes it doesn't, it really has little to do with the quality of the film he's in, and I'll miss him when he's gone. There were a couple of really specific things in this one that I suspect he inserted, like references to the Carpenters and Galactus, and honestly, I found them distracting enough (however fleeting) to take me out of the movie a bit. I also thought he was maybe a little too old for the role, but when you're one of one there aren't a lot of alternatives. Though the bad guy gave some serious Cage vibes himself.

Cage was originally going to play the bad guy. I admit I'm so-so about the Carpenters thing because, much as I get what he's trying to do, the idea that you'd have to be a narcissistic psychopath to enjoy them doesn't chime well with me

I liked this a lot more in the first half than the second - still great to look at but the slow creeping dread was much more interesting than the bloody revenge flick.

Ever rave about a film to a friend and then when you sit down to watch it you just know they're not enjoying it but you both persevere in awkward silence? That.

I've seen this film probably about 5-6 times and every time until now, I saw it largely as an action revenge romp with awesome psychy art-horror leanings and even some LOL comic moments. But good god, this time it felt so slow to begin; every line of dialogue delivered molasses-slow, every shot monolithically silent. I don't remember it this way at all, but it goes to show how watching a film like this in the wrong context can completely change your impression of it.

gotta dump the friend not the film

I love that despite all the violence there are no firearms, everything is swords and shit

I've seen this film twice, both at the cinema, where it ought to be seen

How's his latest coming along btw?

i think seeing it at the cinema is absolutely the thing as opposed to late-night "after the pub" viewing

...I don't remember it this way at all, but it goes to show how watching a film like this in the wrong context can completely change your impression of it.

I've had this happen. Sometimes it's ruined movies for me. It has also happened when I've watched movies I thought I loved while on the wrong substance that I guess just made me see the movie in a different light.

yeah I feel like Mandy isn't a winding down after the pub film. Unless the winding down is still being kind of hype and getting just stoned enough

I was stoked to show two friends "Floundering". They did not enjoy it.

"Shakes the Clown" used to be my litmus film test.