Ari Aster's MIDSOMMAR (2019)

^^^

one of the funniest bits is when Christian is fleeing from what he's just done with the young girl and starts to run toward the building the women are in, but then hears their screams of anguish-turned-strength and realises that that's definitely where he does NOT want to go

Haha, yes. I really adored this film, if you couldn't tell. I have to keep reminding myself that the commune are bad, because I just want to go there and scream it out with my girls. That scene completely floored me.

Emil.y super otm

There was a LOT of humor in this movie! Not just dialog but visual and physical performance gags. Overt ones. It blows me away that anyone wouldn't notice. My audience laughed a lot.

I just saw it a second time, having in the meantime seen some criticisms here and on twitter that seemed persuasive, but I loved it even more this time tbh

xpost There was *not* a "LOT" of humor in this movie. Come on. Like, maybe some sort of rueful inevitability, but I couldn't call this a satire, or even a black comedy, and it's inconceivable to me that anyone could view it as such. I mean, I heard stories of people laughing during "Hereditary," too, but I think that's more people letting off steam.

Anyway, I totally understand that different viewers bring different things to the screening, and different viewers project and receive different things. I didn't find the psychological stuff remotely compelling or convincing, or the boyfriend a compelling or convincing antagonist, so my mind wanders to what might have made it a better horror film. Like I said, even though I thought it was full of shit, it didn't make me mad, I don't regret seeing it and I wouldn't tell someone else not to see it. Maybe they'll get more out of it than I did. Hey, I love it when people get something from art. All I know is that if dude turns in his next script and it ends with a bunch of naked people chanting, he should try something else.

did you not laugh when the old lady pushed on his butt, or when they got invited to the austin powers screening, or when the extract from the lew tree did nothing to protect the dudes in the temple from pain, or when the lady was like "yeah that sounds right" when reynor mentions that he ate a pube

That's just off the top of my head, there's loads more!

There are enough lines of dialogue in this film that are actual unequivocal *jokes* to make it “a LOT” of humour (just one of the top of my head: “I’d like to give her a bath), even before you add in cringey social comedy (virtually every interaction) and humour in the performances (Christian’s reactions during the consummation scene)

Plus all the shrooming humour was spot on

the extract from the yew tree did nothing to protect the dudes in the temple from pain

I did love that. Guy kinda goes "Well at least my self-sacrifice will be blissed out and peaceful...OH MY GOD WTF."

(Which to me just ties in further with the whole NOT-supernatural functioning of the movie. Really does feel like a "I double dog dare you!"/"Haha you fell for it" scenario.)

Also FWIW this new review today goes in further on a trauma/recovery/community angle; we've talked about it plenty here but it's a further summation.

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/alisonwillmore/midsommar-ari-aster-florence-pugh

FWIW, I thought the guy screaming in agony was my favorite bit! Just underscored that, no, there is no actual magic at work here. Though that doubly underscored that there really is no incentive for this wacky colony to survive. Just ... drugged-out brainwashing and tradition?

But if you're asking, no, I didn't think the cringe comedy was funny or believable, I didn't think the one obnoxious guy and his constant quips was funny (a colony of guys like that vape dude is my idea of horror movie hell), and no, I didn't think the butt pushing or pube in the food was funny. because they've already established this colony as strange and tradition bound and wrapped up in fertility rituals and whatnot, so if the guy was picked basically as a breeding stud, why would I be shocked or even find it amusing that they treated him more or less as an animal? That's no stranger than anything I'd seen already.

So what did happen with the missing book?

"I didn't find the jokes funny, so it wasn't a comedy." got it

The humour wasn't in him being treated like an animal, it's that "I think I ate one of her pubes" "yep, sounds about right" being a hilarious exchange in itself. I mean, arguing about humour is a futile endeavour, but I feel like you're trying to say that the humour is absent, rather than that you personally didn't find it funny - the former is just wrong, the second is, y'know, absolutely fine.

Obnoxious guy *was* hellish, which is why it was hilarious and the best fun that he got murdered.

xp

I think the implication is that it wasn’t actually missing but as josh had just been killed after being caught with it, they announced its theft as a misdirection/plausible reason why josh & the other guy went missing

Oh yeah, I thought that was super obvious, too?

Considering how little anyone seemed to care about the disappearing guests ...

Oh, and didn't find the Austin Powers joke funny, either, just thought it a banality, like the kind of outdated bestsellers and movies you find sitting in vacation homes or whatever. But hey, if that's your standard for comedy, life's gotta be pretty funny!

I liked that Buzzfeed article. Don't agree with much of it, but it makes some good points and observations.

Anyway, I'll step away for once. Clearly some of you love this film far more than I dislike it, so more power to you.

Oh, and didn't find the Austin Powers joke funny, either, just thought it a banality, like the kind of outdated bestsellers and movies you find sitting in vacation homes or whatever.

Well, yes, it is this, except that this vacation home is a weird cult in Sweden that's going to kill everyone you're there with. Banality + extreme weirdness = unexpected combination = comedy, ba-boom!

Vape guy’s lines were like half actual funny (if still awful) gags and half just witless xenophobia - and there’s so much of it, it’s really wearing. It was kinda cruel to deny the audience an onscreen death for that guy

Just read the Buzzfeed article, and I think it's the closest to how I felt about the film that I've read so far.

Btw to clear up an earlier point of confusion, the may queens are a yearly midsommar thing and not only a part of the 90 year festival - the guy (pelle?) showed dani a picture of “last year’s May queen” in the apartment

I also think he lied to her about losing his family now that I think about it. The trauma/“what else do I have to lose” feeling Dani has that leads her to the communal experience was the best through-line of the film for me. What Emil.y said about hiding in the latrine/screaming it out w the community is the key to understanding why she went there. If you remove that/rewrite the movie to minimize her loss there’s not much left. Her loss and total aloneness in the world is another character in the movie imo.

AND being able to snag a few lols while she’s going through a patently horrific time in her life is basically the only way one can survive.

Lols that are definitively NOT at her expense

Sorry to pop in again, but does it matter that as she is apparently acclimating to the cult she is also constantly being plied with who knows what kind of drugs? That whole May Queen sequence, she is tripping balls and seeing things. So is Christian. Kind of runs counter to any narrative about power and agency when you are constantly getting roofied.

Another question. If she did not win the May Queen celebration, would they have killed her as well?

She doesn’t care about the drugs afaict

She knows and is like whatever sure gimme the tea.

Yeah "roofied" implies being drugged without your knowledge, which I don't believe she ever is.

I was under the impression that Christian was given some sort of strong, disorienting aphrodisiac. He might have taken it willingly, but he didn't know what it would do. Likewise the tea, who knows what that shit was or why she was given it, but to say she (or he) was in control of her faculties I don't think is accurate, even if she or he willingly gave themselves in to it. I dunno, I find that a problematic thematic snag. Are there any times on the commune they are *not* drugged? Who knows.

I didn’t say she was in control of her faculties — I said she didn’t care. I feel like you don’t grasp her mental state very well.

Did any of them care?

The scholarly guy definitely did.

About what drugs they were taking or being given? Don't recall that.

No he cared about his scholarly pursuits. I thought he was trying to be polite wrt their customs and take in all they offered, mushrooms and psychotropic tea and all. To his chagrin!

Was I right that he seemed to know about the cliff sacrifice the night before? When the guy said the name, he gave a glimmer of recognition and refused to tell the others. So he knew what was coming?

I wasn't sure if it was the sacrifice he knew about or another part of the festivities. I imagine that it was probably a different bit (or he was faking knowledge to get one over on his fellow anthropologists?), because even though all those dudes are shitheads it would still be a bit of a stretch to think that he'd be cool with it and not warn anyone. Really not sure about this, though!

Re: the drugs - it's made clear in the first ten minutes of the film that these are grad students who regularly get high. Even when Dani doesn't want to take the mushrooms at first it's pretty obvious that that's because she's not in a good headspace and wants to orient herself, not because she's shocked at the idea. However, the more interesting thing to me about the 'consent' to taking drugs/participating in the rituals is that her initial reluctance is mirrored by Christian nearer the end trying to turn the mushroom tea down and then begrudgingly going along with it anyway. As she grows stronger, he gets weaker, as she becomes more accepted by and accepting of the community, he becomes less desirous of the things he wanted from them (the sex, the drugs, even the knowledge). She's overtaken him and they both know it.

Hmm, that's interesting (even though we never know if they're ever *not* on drugs). Unfortunately, I just don't find their relationship that interesting, but hey.

Just saw this, and I havent read this thread at all so maybe these rambly thoughts have been expressed already, but just felt completely empty, rote & procedural. I guess much respect if it worked for you I thought it was total off-the-rails mess.

Like as soon as the Mysteriously Wholesome Foreign Friend says that they're all invited to his Mysterious Home Village for "ceremonies and rituals" 15 minutes into the movie we all know what the entire structure & plot beats are going to be. And making us sit through 2.25hrs of ominous foreshadowing for the big reveal to be that she chooses to kill the mean boyfriend and join the cult just left me with a big "that's IT?"

Part of the problem might be on my end, since all the foreshadowing seemed so obvious and right out of Genre Horror 101 that I kept assuming the film was one step ahead of me and that eventually there would be some turn or twist that played on the fact that everything was so rote and obvious, but no, it just turns out that they're a weird random-ass murder cult that murders people for no real good reason beyond the fact that they have screentime to fill. (And tbf I'm not exactly looking for plot realism in a film like this, but everything about the cult & its backstory felt like such a horror movie nonsequitir that it was hard for me to take any of it seriously.) The psychology & character arcs were similarly so telegraphed & breadcrumbed that the final shot just felt totally superficial to me. If ppl found it satisfying fair enough, I just feel like if that's all we were leading up to, we could have gotten there at least 35-40 minutes sooner.

Also I liked Hereditary and had no problem with the gore in it, but I felt the gore in this - thinking specifically of the 8?10? closeups of smashed faces - just felt totally childish and juvenile to me. The whole thing just seems like if Green Inferno went to grad school.

Really hated stuff like the scene when the Swedish guy announces the next days ceremony (which ends up being the cliff jumping sacrifice), and the scholarly guy recognizes the name and is reacting with facial expressions like "oh shit, wow thats crazy", and Dani out of nowhere asks "is it scary?" I thought that line was totally totally unmotivated - it was after the first day, which was joyful hanging out and drug taking, an admittedly Dani had a bad trip but she'd have no reason at that point to expect anything scary would happen. It seemed so clumsy and obviously intended to telegraph "THE RITUAL WILL BE A VIOLENT GORY SACRIFICE" that when (after 15 minutesof tedious ceremony scenes) the ritual was revealed to be a violent gory sacrifice after 15 minutes of tedious ceremony, I was just very confused about what this movie was doing and what it expected from me.

Also last gripe but fuuuuck the way they used that disfigured/disabled character, leave that shit back in 70s sleaze-horror, its 2019 dude.

lots of reference to this community as a "cult" itt and not sure that's the appropriate term...more like a religious sect if that's not too fine a distinction

iirc a "cult" is generally understood to center around a charismatic leader/founder

replace "random-ass murder cult" with "random-ass murder religious sect" in my post above

Man some of y'all have some strange approaches to watching movies

Is it scary was one of the lines that made me laugh

Man some of y'all have some strange approaches to watching movies