08-25-2009, 09:37 PM
I Stand Alone directed by Gaspar Noe (French -- 1999)
I like movies about rugged individuality, the loner who stands up to the crowd, speaks his mind ("Hasta la vista, baaaaybeeee"), tells the emperor he's naked as a shaved banshee, and never backs down from a fight, no matter the odds. And that's what the title seemed to promise.
Then again, this is by the same director who recently amused me with Irreversible.
The protagonist -- simply called the Butcher -- is certainly a loner, and he definitely stands alone. But it's been a while since he won his last congeniality contest. He's a bitter former butcher fresh out of jail. What was he in for? Well, when his mentally retarded daughter (the mother left him for another man) has her first period, he misinterprets it as a rape, so he butchers the guy he thinks is responsible. That gets him in the slammer. So anyway, jail reforms him about as well as it does anyone, and he emerges with a wee bit of a chip on his shoulder. He seldom speaks aloud, but you hear his interior monolog throughout -- spoken in French, which means you read the subtitles -- an unrelenting rant against everyone and everything around him: caustic, bilious, hateful and sickening beyond belief. Because, you see, his mind is a stinking cesspool of hatred rotting in a bottomless sinkhole full of snot. You've got rationalizations for the most abominable actions imaginable. You've got one sick MF and the longer you watch this, the deeper you sink into his sick mind and the sicker you get, until you reach the point near the end when "holy shit don't do that!" happens, and "no no, you can't be doing that," and "eeek! eeek! stop that! stop that! you should never go there!" But it does, and he does, and your stomach churns up a ton of bile and for the first time in your movie-watching life you're getting downright nauseous but you can't take your eyes away, no, you're trapped in this MF's head and there's no escape and holy shit! Holy shit! Not that! Not that! Anything but that!
Oh, fuck.
This was the most depressing movie I've ever seen.
I like movies about rugged individuality, the loner who stands up to the crowd, speaks his mind ("Hasta la vista, baaaaybeeee"), tells the emperor he's naked as a shaved banshee, and never backs down from a fight, no matter the odds. And that's what the title seemed to promise.
Then again, this is by the same director who recently amused me with Irreversible.
The protagonist -- simply called the Butcher -- is certainly a loner, and he definitely stands alone. But it's been a while since he won his last congeniality contest. He's a bitter former butcher fresh out of jail. What was he in for? Well, when his mentally retarded daughter (the mother left him for another man) has her first period, he misinterprets it as a rape, so he butchers the guy he thinks is responsible. That gets him in the slammer. So anyway, jail reforms him about as well as it does anyone, and he emerges with a wee bit of a chip on his shoulder. He seldom speaks aloud, but you hear his interior monolog throughout -- spoken in French, which means you read the subtitles -- an unrelenting rant against everyone and everything around him: caustic, bilious, hateful and sickening beyond belief. Because, you see, his mind is a stinking cesspool of hatred rotting in a bottomless sinkhole full of snot. You've got rationalizations for the most abominable actions imaginable. You've got one sick MF and the longer you watch this, the deeper you sink into his sick mind and the sicker you get, until you reach the point near the end when "holy shit don't do that!" happens, and "no no, you can't be doing that," and "eeek! eeek! stop that! stop that! you should never go there!" But it does, and he does, and your stomach churns up a ton of bile and for the first time in your movie-watching life you're getting downright nauseous but you can't take your eyes away, no, you're trapped in this MF's head and there's no escape and holy shit! Holy shit! Not that! Not that! Anything but that!
Oh, fuck.
This was the most depressing movie I've ever seen.