Everything Everywhere All At Once

really delightful. not really my thing totally but i can’t be mad at it

Film of the year.

I dunno, it seems like RRR is giving it a run for its money. (Haven't seen either yet.)

i saw it last night. the fingers dimension was especially powerful for me because in my pre-ILX days i used to have the most posts on radiohead/msgboard, and one of my many pseudonyms was "penisfingers". you have to forgive me for this, i was like 17 years old i think, but one of the qualities of the penisfingers character was that each of the penisfingers was 17 inches long. so, spoilers, when i saw the hot dog dimension, especially right after (i think) the scene where the guy with the pixelated genitalia, it immediately made me think that in this dimension, all of them had really, really long penisfingers, with some perhaps nearing 17 inches in length. it was like a really immature vision come to perfect life, and the part with the feet on the piano made me realize there was so much more to be found there

fingers dimension definitely my favorite part of the movie

they're not remotely similar movies trying to do the same thing but seeing memoria the night previous was prob a bad decision. reminded me i prefer movies that have a single iota of patience; this film has none. still, so fun, so who cares

i really thought the movie they were going to meta reference in-film would be The Matrix - my lips were saying it as the other words came out

i enjoyed the repeated references to “absolutely (story of a girl)”. my kind of silly a la the jennifer paige “crush” scene in the recent resident evil movie

I also think there's a lot of interesting stuff to be said about the different kinds of forces and themes and how they're reconciled, but hard to talk about without spoilers so waiting is probably in order

I saw this movie on the strength of the trailer and the amazing "Turn Down For What" music video (same directors). But I always have a problem with movies where the conflict is on a grand (multi-) universal scale. The more cosmic the stakes, the more the personal elements of the story feel trivial.

The movie deals with that tension in clever way, and gives the directors a perfect excuse to include every gag and visual idea they could ever want. But it also requires them to stuff the first half of the movie with exposition, and the second half with tedious emotional speeches. And it's all in vain, because ultimately the tension is irresolvable (for me, anyway). Either it's all too big for this one mother-daughter relationship to matter that much, or the conflict isn't as all-consuming as it's made out to be. I can't keep it all in focus.

I took that as a symbol that the personal relationships we have come to feel like the entire universe weighing heavy; sometimes a breakthrough in an individual relationship seems to affect everything else you know

I was waiting for one friend in particular's reaction to the movie -- among other things said friend's an author who also works as a translator between English and Mandarin -- and these threads say a lot worth considering:

I have never sit so still through a movie or laughed so fucking hard while watching anything alone as I did with #EverythingEverywhere, and oh my god it was a delight to understand the vast majority of the movie, I only didn’t understand the cantonese

— S. Qiouyi Lu 🧧 陸秋逸 (@sqiouyilu) April 9, 2022

I think we often try so hard to be hypermasculine because we know how much we’ve been emasculated by white supremacy, when really it’s like, the truest chinese masculinity is the one that completely exists outside white supremacist notions of masculinity and femininity https://t.co/NYWSYFsF6b

— S. Qiouyi Lu 🧧 陸秋逸 (@sqiouyilu) April 10, 2022

I still can’t believe they did this lmao like you don’t understand, traditional chinese homes typically have a courtyard where you enter through a round opening in the wall, and typically there’s a wall immediately behind the moon gate, and spaces to either side https://t.co/pWHZ9JDCRL

— S. Qiouyi Lu 🧧 陸秋逸 (@sqiouyilu) April 10, 2022

Good interview

https://gizmodo.com/everything-everywhere-all-at-once-interview-the-daniels-1848778652

This was fucking great

was amazed by the cast list when I first heard about this, and that's before I knew Santa Claus would be in it!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHOSiFzcHJ8

loved this, and would love to see more of Ke Huy Quan now that he's back in the movies.

Yeah enjoyed this very much. Clever and not afraid to be silly. Interesting to see it shortly after I saw Encanto — both use fantasy-film trappings to interrogate intergenerational family trauma.

fuckabees

saw this today, what a blast. deserves to become the major movie phenomenon of the year IMHO.

saw this today & holy shit
fucking brilliant
felt so good to watch w an audience, like a feelings purge but w ecstatic joyful what the fuck is happening laughter

For darn sure. That advance showing I caught was rollicking

It was a blast even in a half-full theater. I can’t imagine seeing this for the first time on a laptop or something- wouldn’t be the same.

there were a group of teens in the back row & one of the girls was scream-laughing hysterically at almost every line & it was v funny

great movie. usually i'm turned off by the level of heavy-handed emotional manipulation that was going on in this movie but it worked for me this time. it made me cry a little and i almost never cry at movies.

saw the adult Ke Huy Quan in Finding 'Ohana a few months ago and while he basically had about sixty seconds of screen time in that I was like "damn he is super charismatic as an adult" so I'm glad he got a chance to really get a role he could sink his teeth into.

The climactic fight scene is one of the greatest things I've ever watched.

Last two posts otm

I've spent the last week looking at random things and saying "even this _________ could be kung-fu!"

everyone otm. I fucking hate papercuts though, that scene was worse for me than any horror/gore/squickfest

same. i have never squirmed so hard in my life

for a minute i thought the challenges were only going to escalate from there and the movie would turn into a mindblowing version of jackass

papercuts were fkn ~horrifying~

xp: I mean, it kind of did! Or did you not see buttplug-fu as escalation?

i have to say, i did not. that part got a little cartoony for me, but the papercut scene actually made my neck nerves tighten and i couldn't look at the screen - i can't remember the last time i could not look at a screen

plus, i have very vivid, active dreams with mostly strangers, and never remember anything. i'm sure at some point i've seen or done some buttplug-fu in my dreams, so i may be emotionally primed

first Chekhov's Buttplug in history?

depends what kind of movies you're watching i guess

lol chekhov's buttplug

Racocoonie was killing me

omg that was hysterical

Juju Chewbacca ftw

the cast is so weird: an international superstar, a former child star who hasn't been in a movie in 25 years, a new young actress, an iconic actress who hasn't done much of note lately and who is playing way out of type, an elderly character actor who has been working consistently for like 50 years, and a surprise cameo from ... jenny slate

and yes, santa claus

apparently Slate was going to have an extra scene later in the movie but they cut it, so her last moment is finding her yeeted dog

lol I yelled Biff Wiff at the screen before realizing only wee on ILX would probably be excited about him

I was sitting there going "wait WHO IS THAT" every time he was on screen until I read this thread

I also was like "wait that's the dude from Glee" during the Racocoonie scenes

so sad that Wiff didn't say "everything has sucked lately"

Biff Wiff is in this? christ, now I have to see it

Agreed overall about the cast... a reminder that things can be so much more interesting when you don't just pick a bunch of recently-popping names. I do think Jamie Lee Curtis's profile is higher than it's been in a long time - the 2018 Halloween was a very big hit (top 20 for the year in the US box office - just a few slots below Crazy Rich Asians, which obviousky did a lot for Yeoh). And then Knives Out finished pretty close to that spot in 2019... I'd guess more young people probably know her than would have 10-15 years ago.

on nepotism - love Lena Horne's comment during her '81 one woman show Lady & Her Music re allegations that she was only cast as Glinda the Good Witch in The Wiz, cos her son-in law Sydney Lumet was directing it "nepotism, nepotism, nepotism - if you got it - use it"

its how world works - everyone uses whatever links they have to get ahead (and obv lena horne wasn't cast in The Wiz just coz of her son-in-law) but there are so many more serious issues for ppl to think about (esp in Hollywood)

of course deeply amused by all the people falling over themselves denying they had no easy access/step-up - just acknowledge it

that said there is no excuse for, say, brooklyn beckham

oh wait that's not how years work

― difficult listening hour, Wednesday, March 1, 2023 4:03 PM bookmarkflaglink

clicked forward to the 1989 oscars to start all over again and imagine my surprise there at meeting glenn close and meryl streep

she'll have more chances in the future for her work to get noticed

I would've nominated her for Wanda.

And it's worth remembering Kline got his Oscar for supporting actor there.

Anyway less than a week to go until it hopefully wins everything (I can dream), and this is the most detailed interview with Hsu I've read yet:

https://ew.com/movies/stephanie-hsu-profile-everything-everywhere-all-at-once/

The Daniels did the opening for tonight's Colbert

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23sRimLcTBk

awesome

Still need to read that multiverse book mookieproof recommended.

― Came Here to Roll the Microscope (James Redd and the Blecchs), Tuesday, April 5, 2022 1:38 PM (eleven months ago) bookmarkflaglink

which book Mookie?

i'm not really into this movie, representation politics can be kinda ridiculous, and i love JLC, but if JLC ends up being the only one to win from a movie with a predominantly asian/asian-american cast, that will not be a good look.

Good thing then that won't happen as Ke Huy Quan is as close to a lock as anything this year.

KHQ seems like a lock, and Yeoh has a decent chance. The movie is a enough of a success story and has given such visibility to the cast/crew/directors that even JLC wins a legacy Oscar (essentially) it's NBD

I was kind of surprised that the "directors who worked up from doing creative music videos" to movie pipeline ended up making a film so similar to the Spike Jonze/Michel Gondry era of twenty years ago

but it was a pleasant surprise

Roll on Sunday. Meantime:

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2023-03-10/queer-movies-parents-family-coming-out-identity-sexuality

As I said on FB: I can sense that for those for whom the film didn't work it may seem that these kinds of pieces read as trying to force you into liking it, but I've seen plenty like this and heard similar and sometimes a piece of popular art just hits harder.

I tried to watch this with my most respected movie friend this past summer, and when the first action sequence at the IRS office came around he wanted me to turn it off.

I then watched it by myself and was somewhat put off by all of the chaos and cheesy effects, but saw that there was a story behind it

Watched it again recently and the story became much more clear and poignant. The movie is still a TikTok/Youtube/video game obfuscating mess, but I can now see how it is groundbreaking and has a very distinct aesthetic point of view

:-)

Ya. Glad this did well.

<3

lol I'd like to see this movie inspire a whole bunch of shitty knockoffs a la "Pulp Fiction." Imitators, start your engines! (Not you, OGs Spike Jonze/Michel Gondry, just keep doing whatever it is you are up to).

Get Morty

Wrong supporting actress won

Good title for what's happening now.

https://t.co/Y7WfQgfoU6 pic.twitter.com/VwRHMFWlsj

— Mr. Bedtime (@InternetHippo) March 13, 2023

I liked this piece by Justin Chang, who's ambivalent about the movie but happy for its success: https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/awards/story/2023-03-12/oscars-2023-everything-everywhere-all-at-once-best-picture

Yeah I liked that as well. Obviously I feel much differently about the film but that’s a thoughtful disagreement there instead of whatever screed Wells has.

Good piece, sticks the landing with a quality Dad-pun. In theory I like the idea that more than prestige Oscar-bait films can win best picture; they don't need to because people can already tell they're prestigious. So while I can't imagine ever seeing this movie a second time and struggled with it the first, I like the idea of it winning more than I like the movie itself. Even if somewhere in the multiverse murk I feel it moves us one step closer to Pomplamoose winning an Oscar.

Wrong supporting actress won

I agree with this on paper but ... seeing Hsu unabashedly cheering for JLC's victory was a nice consolation

Even if somewhere in the multiverse murk I feel it moves us one step closer to Pomplamoose winning an Oscar.

LOL, they're totally going to EGOT now

Meantime most of the core cast is in this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RAeemjfVvM0

speaking of fwiw I've seen next to no comic book movies.

Good thread

I liked EEAAO a lot, think it’s the best action comedy since Hot Fuzz etc. but I also think it’s an interesting adaptation of the fantasy of fixing our problems by exploiting another land that we see in things like The Tempest and earlier 20th c sci fi.

— Isaac Butler (he/him) (@parabasis) March 13, 2023

I was hoping that someone would have thanked Kathleen Malone of the 2005 Cincinnati IRS office.

_Still need to read that multiverse book mookieproof recommended.

― Came Here to Roll the Microscope (James Redd and the Blecchs), Tuesday, April 5, 2022 1:38 PM (eleven months ago) bookmarkflaglink_


which book Mookie?