GIRLS talk (the Lena Dunham thread)

am i automatically supposed to give a shit about poor people but not about rich people

I've also heard the opposite argument, the why-make-art-out-of-other-people's poverty argument that seems to suggest ALL films should be about people who are at LEAST of the same social status as the filmmaker/potential audience, which is deeply weird.

It's interesting that a desire to see a higher level of awareness of the characters' privilege translates to some as a demand for an apology or a lack of desire to see a movie about rich people. Kinda not the same thing at all.

i think its really 'self-aware' but not entirely self-critical, like these are the worst impulses and decisions and stuff but its not about how terrible its just like, this is how it is

i tend to think that the best art is usually made about people from the same social/economic background as the filmmaker, this is not a real Rule at all but i guess im saying id rather lena dunham make this movie and whit stillman make those movies and john updike write about rabbit than have them all try to do like "menace II society" or something

OTM. Although the attempt might be horrifyingly absorbing.

anyways her character is not rich, her parents are better off than average. she leaps head on into being working poor. Having the puffy white cloud of conditional support beneath you is nice, but her story seems to be about what happens when you've always had gentle hands carrying you everywhere and then the palanquin stops and you gotta figure out how to be a grown up.
the "I feel like I'm entering a really exiting period in my life right now" / "What are you talking about? Everything you own is in garbage bags on my kitchen floor" joke is very much dead on with my experience during that time and feels pretty real. sure it's privileged, but she's hyperaware of it and seems to be primed to make good stories within that space

a desire to see a higher level of awareness of the characters' privilege

i mean i think there are lots of parts of 'tiny furniture'/what ive seen of 'girls' thats really aware of how privileged some of the characters are but they maybe still dont know what that means, how they should deal with their comparative privilege not knowing the right tone to strike or pose to take or w/e like knowing w/o really understanding, being 22

^

as a guy who DID move back home with his parents after college i suspect i'll find things to sympathize with here

I don't think that it's about rich vs. poor, it's about the stakes being so small that Tiny Furniture/Lost In Translation/etc. wind up being about "this is how it is" for the overprivileged. Which is just not a very interesting story to tell.

I loved 'Wendy & Lucy,' which is also kind of "this is how it is" (you could criticize Michelle Williams's character's choices and how it all could have been easily avoided, etc.) but there's real shit going on there.

anyways her character is not rich, her parents are better off than average.

(will totally cop to being a Stalinist about the wealthy, fwiw)

I will allow for the possibility that I didn't particularly care for the movie in large part because it's so grueling to watch people in their early 20s wrestle with the inherent douchebaggery of being in one's early 20s.

Have said elsewhere that my response to Metropolitan after 30 minutes was "nuke them all from orbit," Tiny Furniture was not this bad.

it's about the stakes being so small

'what is a life worth?'

i tend to think that the best art is usually made about people from the same social/economic background as the filmmaker, this is not a real Rule at all but i guess im saying id rather lena dunham make this movie and whit stillman make those movies and john updike write about rabbit than have them all try to do like "menace II society" or something

I get your point max but I guess it really depends on how much the filmmaker has a public presence that forms part of the conversation around the film. Obviously with LD that is a factor, but not every artist fits neatly into some social or economic type and it always seems like a much bigger deal than it should be. If you only make work about who you are and where you are from, you can easily turn that into an examination of identity or you can just come across as totally self-absorbed. I think it is to Lena Dunham's credit that folks ITT seem split on that question.

"anyways her character is not rich, her parents are better off than average."
basing this on the promo language where she asks her parents for 1100 a month for the next two years to get on her feet and they straight up laugh at her; the rich would shrug and put up with that shit methinks
anyways, i'm talking about a show I haven't seen yet; I should shut up until I see the pilot.

I loved 'Wendy & Lucy,' which is also kind of "this is how it is" (you could criticize Michelle Williams's character's choices and how it all could have been easily avoided, etc.) but there's real shit going on there.

Didn't love W&L, but otherwise this is OTM.

in any case, she is hella primed to be A BIG THING and a VOICE OF THE MILLENNIAL GENERATION and i am curious to see how she/this holds up to broad scrutiny
anything's better than miranda fucking july

OTM

TRUTH. BOMB.

Don't know enough about Kelly Reichardt to know if she has experience of being young and broke in nu-recession America, but I'm going to assume not.

I get your point max but I guess it really depends on how much the filmmaker has a public presence that forms part of the conversation around the film. Obviously with LD that is a factor, but not every artist fits neatly into some social or economic type and it always seems like a much bigger deal than it should be. If you only make work about who you are and where you are from, you can easily turn that into an examination of identity or you can just come across as totally self-absorbed. I think it is to Lena Dunham's credit that folks ITT seem split on that question.

― og (admrl), Thursday, April 5, 2012 2:02 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

oh yeah i agree with this

Is Louis cK "richer" than Lena Dunham? Is he really more "self-aware" or is he just much harder on himself? He's also much older of course and balder and fatter

louis ck is now hella rich
also balder fatter and more penis endowed

why the pootie tang royalties alone

He certainly doesn't portray himself as being rich though

xpost

Endowed him with more penis?

more penis than lena presumably

doubling back on that promo joke, i love that it looks like her parents have taken her out to dinner to tell her the support teat has been tapped; that's such a privilege moment.
some of my redneck friends just came home and found their shit in bags by the trailer park door and the folks said happy birthday and good luck out there

He certainly doesn't portray himself as being rich though

In the first season when the school bus breaks down he gets each kid their own limo.

ha, forgot about that

Lena Dunham's life of privilege is no less interesting to me than Larry David's or James Bond's or etc.

Novel James Bond was a rough, poor kid who found it difficult to interact with polite society IIRC

nevermind privelege, "the lives of young people in NYC" is a pretty tapped vein, were you guys this pumped about How To Make It In America?

"pumped" is a bit strong, but I haven't seen How To Make It In America. Was it funny? Tiny Furniture was pretty funny.

i dont think people are psyched about girls because theyre psyched to see another depiction of the lives of young people in nyc

How To Make It was about as funny as the early Entourage seasons, with a different kind of name-dropping.

I don't much about How to Make It in America. For a long time I thought it was a crime story but apparently it's about fashion?

two young guys from Brooklyn want to be designer/entrepeneurs, so they fail miserably at selling skateboards and then at making jeans and then one of them bangs Gina Gershon and there's a chance for success and then the series gets cancelled

Luis Guzman was probably the saving grace of the whole affair as an ex-con who actually starts a successful, normal business selling energy drinks

wow, this sounds bad

imagine Entourage if Vince wanted to be Michael Kors instead of Brad Pitt and was still doing commercials and waiting tables

number of GIRLS on the GIRLS talk thread = 0

i'm lurking.

i count at least 2 in the first few posts?

Oh yeah, horseshoe made one post. I stand corrected. (Donna is not a GIRL, btw)

i been done fooled

i figure you're all girls unless your display name starts "Mr."

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/3/3b/Boys_Don