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Role Reversals in The Hustle

10/12/2020

By Zoe Leininger

The 2019 film The Hustle directed by Chris Addison is a clever remake of Frank Oz’s Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. Anne Hathaway and Rebel Wilson star in the roles previously held by Micheal Caine and Steve Martin respectively. The premise of two con-men in a turf war over an affluent tourist town is given a whole new perspective by making the main characters female. After thoroughly enjoying the film I was surprised to find that it was only given a 13% on Rotten Tomatoes. As a remake the film had to field a lot of negative reviews comparing it to the original, but I think that even though the film follows the 1988 version virtually scene by scene it finds something new in the story just by changing the gender of the characters.

The scene in the original where Freddy (Steve Martin) meets Lawrence (Micheal Caine) establishes the idea of the con as a way to get money out of women instead of the traditional man providing for the woman. Rebel Wilson’s character Penny has a deeper reason for why she performs her cons: she sees men using women’s sensitivity and emotions against them and decides to turn the tables. Instead of just being a humorously flawed rationale like Freddy’s, it sets up a deeper theme that is developed throughout the film. When Anne Hathaway’s character Josephine is teaching Penny how to do the sophisticated cons that she does she modifies Penny’s approach by saying that what men want from women more than sex is to be a hero. Men like to be able to come to the rescue of vulnerable women.

Penny (Rebel Wilson) and Josephine (Anne Hathaway) meet on a train

Freddy (Steve Martin) and Lawrence (Micheal Caine) meet on a train

What Josephine says goes beyond the idea of creepy men using women for their own pleasure. It speaks to an underlying societal tendency of men viewing women as weaker and a refusal to truly see them as equals. As Josephine says while explaining why her methods work “no man will believe a woman is smarter than he is.” Instead of fighting against this tendency, they exploit it for their own gain. This idea does come up in the original story when the men are themselves conned by a woman at the end of their own elaborate con, but when the con artists themselves are women the theme takes on a whole other meaning. Having the women be the focus of the story gives us a look at how it feels for strong minded women to have to operate within the confines of patriarchal society.
Alongside this is another theme of women supporting women. Penny initially spills everything about what she does to Josephine because as another woman she would understand her reasons for it. But after they find they are trying to do the same job in the same town they are at odds with each other. Josephine is trying to drive Penny out of Beaumont Sur Mer so that she can remain at the top while Penny sees an opportunity to expand her petty crimes to something bigger.
In a competition to see who can get money out of their target, Thomas, Josephine is pretending to be a psychiatrist helping Penny with her supposed psychological blindness. A scene in a club has Penny talking to a nearby group of women while Josephine dances with Thomas. To try to get him alone with her Penny tells the women that he was her boyfriend until Josephine stole him from her. The idea of sisterhood and women supporting one another is shown by how angry they are on her behalf and their willingness to confront Josephine to help Penny. In the 1988 version this happens but it is the bond of Naval service that is exploited by Freddy to get rid of Lawrence.

Penny explaining to the women at the club how Josephine stole her fiance

There is a significance to the fact that with Penny, there were no club or community ties needed for the women to feel connected. The burden of the patriarchal society is enough of a commonality that the women were willing to help a fellow woman. Penny, and then Josephine, betrayed that instinctive trust by using it in their conflict with each other. The scene highlights the phenomenon in culture that when women try to get ahead in business and their careers they often have to choose between supporting the other women around them and making sure they get ahead themselves.
Remakes of well loved movies tend to be judged more harshly than most movies. However, I felt that this film deserved a lot more recognition than it got. The plotline was nearly identical to the original, yet it was able to address some really key issues that get left out of films. Recently there have been quite a few films like Oceans Eight (Gary Ross, 2018), Ghostbusters (Paul Feig, 2016), and What Men Want (Adam Shankman, 2019) which have taken original films and gender swapped the characters to retell the story. They haven’t tended to have very good receptions because they were viewed as old and repetitive.
Even with stories that have been told before, it is a valuable exercise to look at how different the meanings of scenes can be just by switching the main characters from men to women. The Hustle is an enjoyable comedy that is cleverly made and employs phenomenal actors, but a lot of its value lies deeper within the context of the scenario the audience is presented with. Looking at the original and the remake side by side shows that the female lead version is about more than just having female leads. The film points out the disparity between the ways men and women experience the world. In the recent times of the #metoo movement and the 4% challenge to have female directors take the lead in studio projects this is an important message to spread and one that shouldn’t be glossed over just because a film reuses old jokes.

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Prisoners: A Review

10/9/2020

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by Mason Leaver

Denis Villeneuve is a director who is, in my opinion, criminally unrecognized. While his work has received great critical feedback, he is not the household name that he deserves to be. The man has an absolutely amazing career. The French-Canadian director started his career with a series of well received small budget films, such as Maelstrom (2000) and Incendies (2010). More recently, he’s directed films like Enemy (2013), Sicario (2015), Arrival (2016), and Blade Runner 2049 (2017). He is now directing the highly anticipated adaptation of Dune. There’s no doubt that Villeneuve is one of the most prolific directors working today, producing six films in seven years, all very well received. But I feel that his first film in this six film stretch, Prisoners (2013), is perhaps his best, and also least appreciated. Prisoners is a film packed with quality performances, cinematography, and story, and it represents Villeneuve at his very best.

Prisoners is the story of a father, Keller Dover, played by Hugh Jackman, searching for his daughter and her friend, who have gone missing on Thanksgiving day. Investigating the case is Detective Loki, played by Jake Gyllenhaal. The film follows the two men as they go to greater and greater lengths to find the missing girls. As Detective Loki dives deeper into the case, he must also reign in Dover, who begins a vigilante search for the girls. As the film continues the mystery unravels itself with plenty of fascinating twists and turns. The film is like Taken meets Zodiac.

Hugh Jackman as Keller Dover

Prisoners has a phenomenal cast, and their talent is put on full display. Hugh Jackman is by far the most notable of them all. He portrays Dover as a man of faith driven to the edge, willing to do absolutely whatever it takes to get his daughter back. The rage that Jackman brings to the character is often reminiscent of his time playing Wolverine. Jake Gylennhaal also does a great job, but he is given less to work with than Jackman. While Jackman gets plenty of opportunities to go absolutely off the rails and push his limits, Gylennhaal only really gets one very brief moment to lose his cool. This is no fault of the film’s: it is in the nature of Loki to be cool and collected. But Gylennhaal works within the limits of the character to bring about a great performance, even if he cannot be as loud and attention grabbing as Jackman. Terrence Howard and Viola Davis also bring great performances as the parents of the other missing girl. While avoiding spoilers, be prepared to enjoy unsettling performances from Paul Dano and David Dastmalchian.

Paired with the ever talented Roger Deakins (who also worked with Villeneuve on Sicario and Blade Runner 2049), the film is beautifully shot. While it’s not flashy, Deakins’ use of light and shadow creates an atmosphere that draws the viewer in. Some shots are nearly totally dark, save for small beams of light illuminating the subject. The lighting all feels very natural- no great differentiation in saturated colors. Instead, Deakins use a grounded style that makes for a “realistic” feeling to the dreary Pennsylvania landscape, homes and offices that highlights the most beautiful and brutal aspects of the environments we find ourselves in every day. Of course, this approach to drawing out interesting lighting from our everyday surroundings also plays into the themes of the film- what lies just beneath the surface of suburbia is very dark. The “every day” world is much more complicated than it can seem.

A use of Light and Shadow in "Prisoners"

Prisoners is a very dark film, forcing it’s audience to face some very difficult questions. One of the most prominent of these questions is the tension between the rule of law and frontier justice. Detective Loki, a man committed to serving and upholding the law, has to face a challenge to his principles as he sees the system failing. Every moment he is tempted to give in to his desire to ignore the law in order to find these children. Meanwhile Dover, a man of faith, beholden to a higher power, pursues a kind of frontier justice to rescue his daughter. The film does not answer the question of who is in the right here, it simply introduces us to this tension and asks us to wrestle with it.

Each of us has people in our lives who we say we would do anything for. Prisoners asks us if we truly mean that. Dover, in his frontier justice hunt for his daughter, resorts to horrible methods of torture. Yet he does what he does because he believes it is the only way to save his daughter, to protect what he loves most. The film asks us to question: is torture ever acceptable? Would we be able or willing to do what Dover does? Prisoners forces us to ask these questions and to see the reality of what torture is and where it comes from.

Paul Dano as Alex Jones (left) and Jake Gyllenhaal as Detective Loki (right)

Prisoners is some of Villeneuve’s finest work. The plot and performances are top-tier, and while it is a very long film at two and a half hours, Prisoners creates a tension so gripping but chilling that you cannot help but watch on.

Viewers who enjoy Prisoners may also enjoy Zodiac and the HBO miniseries True Detective.

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Discussion: I'm Thinking of Ending Things

10/8/2020

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Did you enjoy Charlie Kaufman's new film I'm Thinking of Ending Things?Hear our writers' discussion about it and leave a comment with your own thoughts on it.

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The Reality and Imagination that Creates Insanity: Color Out of Space Analysis

10/5/2020

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by Samantha Shuma

When we think of aliens, we may think of creatures from Star Wars or Alien. They typically have a humanoid or animalistic shape with weird, often slimy features. Although they look like something out of this world, they are easily comprehensible to the human mind. We do notably understand their reason for being, but we see them as a threat and do anything we can to destroy them. What if, like the concept of infinity, aliens were something completely incomprehensible to the human mind? You go insane from the amount of stress your brain is experiencing from just looking at it. Color Out of Space (Richard Stanley, 2019) takes aliens into this realm, and lets audiences watch a family go insane as they become surrounded by the Color (the alien of the film). It corrupts the minds of the family, making them hear, see and act differently. While they suffer mentally, their surroundings are affected as well. The Color absorbs into everything it touches, affecting plants, water, air, animal, and time throughout the film. The combination of physical and mental changes the family and their reality undergo is intense, and it is this combination that makes the family’s minds surrender to the Color.

The rest of this analysis will contain spoilers for The Color Out of Space. This film is a horror movie, which may contain some material of blood and gore. Reader discretion is advised.

The Color travels to Earth via a meteorite, crash landing in the Gardener family’s front yard. The meteorite glows a bright magenta, which is a color that can only be seen by the human eye. It’s a color that doesn’t actually exist, it’s our brain’s way of interpreting certain types of light (when you mix red and violet light, your eyes should see green, but the brain interprets it differently as a way brings the ends of the visible spectrum together) (Helmenstine, 2019). We don’t actually SEE magenta, our brains create it. So to literally see magenta would be incredibly taxing for the human mind to comprehend. Our minds would be affected differently, which is explored in film. The Gardener’s face some severe mental trauma from merely looking at it. The youngest child, Jack, falls victim first, believing he is talking with the Color, and that the well (the place the Color mostly resides) is his best friend. A little later in the film, The rest of the family, Nathan (husband), Theresa (wife),Lavinia (daughter), and Benny (older son), seem to go insane. Each character is affected by the color differently. Their downfall based around their initial mental problems. For example, Nathan is constantly worried of becoming his father, who was abusive to him growing up. The Color works that towards its favor, as Nathan becomes abusive towards his family, making sure his children don’t leave the house. Levinia believes in witchcraft, she hurts herself to perform rituals and believes the Color is her rituals being fulfilled. Since the battle against the Color is mainly a mental one, it exaggerates the mental weakness of the creatures it possesses to subdue them. By the end, the whole family has lost their sense of reality and becomes husks of their former selves, existing on a plane of existence different from anything we have imagined.

The family is basically doomed from the start, as the mental battle against the Color is already impossible to overcome. Their resulting mental state makes it impossible to be rational, but their minds aren’t the only thing affected by the Color. The environment surrounding the home along with the family’s physical bodies are heavily affected as well. The physical transformation everything goes through makes the Color not only a threat to the family, but to the whole planet. The meteorite the Color travels from is not made of any kind of rock we would recognize. It’s made out of some plastic material that dissolves over time. As the meteorite dissolves into the ground, the Color fuses into the surrounding land. This affects the growing of plants, which affects the animals. There are alpacas, a horse and a dog on the property. The horse and the dog become hostile and run away. The alpacas have a worse fate, from rooted grass and drinking the Color filled water, they get very sick. They lose their form as their bodies melt, eventually creating a slimy pile of unrecognizable flesh and bone. When Nathan goes to check on the alpacas, their form does not immediately bother him. It isn’t until their screaming makes him angry that he puts them out of their misery. If anyone in their right mind saw them, they would have ran, but Nathan didn’t seem to care. The fact that the family’s mind is being taxed so heavily by the Color makes it impossible for them to act rationally to run away or defend themselves.

The video below has content that may disturb some readers, discretion is advised.

The fact that the Color is incomprehensible makes it uncontrollable by anything on Earth. Since the Gardeners cannot process the Color fully, they have no means to fight against. Going back to the example of a Zenomorph from Alien, we can tell just by looking at it that it is dangerous. Its sharp claws and teeth make it anybody’s worst nightmare. Since we can look at it and understand it, we can find the Zenomorph’s weakness and ultimately kill it (as it is killed at the end of almost every Alien movie). Think back to the Color, it’s only physical representation is a misty gas of a color that doesn’t exist. The family never realizes there is something exterrestrial in their mists, the Color is never seen as a friend or a threat, making it impossible for the family to fight against.

A typical alien movie would have a crew on a spaceship fighting a slimy, flesh eating monster, but the Color is something much scarier than that. Although we the audience can see it, it is an unknown killer to the Gardeners. We see how it makes them hurt themselves and act aggressively towards each other, but they never realize what is happening themselves. Even when they do try to leave, they forget that they were trying to leave and mindlessly go off to do something else. Their minds wither away as the Color seeps into their air, water and plants. The Color isn’t something the anyone’s mind can really process. We do not know how to react when we cannot discern something as good or evil. As the film shows, we wouldn’t react at all. The family goes around like everything is okay, even as Nathan sits in an empty room talking to herself or Benny going down the well to save the dog (which isn’t down there).Their minds change as their environment changes, making the whole reality in around the home slowly change as the Color becomes more powerful. Everything, body, mind and environment, all changing at once helps the family adjust into insanity, making it easy for the Color to control them, shape them and kill them.

Work Cited:
Anne Marie Helmenstine, Ph.D. Why Magenta Is Not a Color of the Spectrum. 2019, www.thoughtco.com/what-is-the-wavelength-of-magenta-606166.

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Cursed: Series Review

10/2/2020

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By Zoe Leininger

After the finale of fantasy drama Game of Thrones (HBO, 2011) aired last year, many new shows like The Witcher (Netflix, 2019) and Carnival Row (Amazon Prime Video, 2019) have risen up to take the spotlight in this increasingly popular genre of television shows. This summer Netflix added a new show called Cursed to the mix. After having it recommended by a friend I was curious to watch it and see how it measures up to other fantasy shows I enjoy.
A twist on an Arthurian legend, this new show focuses on the young sorceress Nimue, also known as the Lady of the Lake. In this retelling Nimue is one of the Fae, magical beings who are being driven out of Britain by the humans. Hunted both by King Uther Pendragon and a religious group called the Red Paladins because of her possession of the Sword of Power, Nimue has become a symbol of hope for the struggling Fae tribes.
For anyone with a previous knowledge of Arthurian legends the show may be somewhat confusing at first. For instance King Uther and Arthur are shown to be about the same age, even though traditionally Uther is Arthur’s father. I kept expecting some revelation about their kinship through the first half of the show only to find that they never even meet. For anyone planning to watch it just keep in mind that the show is very different from any other King Arthur story and needs to be watched purely separate from the canon materials. It takes the stories of chivalry and a golden age of knighthood and transforms them into a world of magical persecution and an honor code that oppresses the people.

Nimue (Kathrine Langford) discovers how to wield the Sword of Power in a shot that hints at her name in Arthurian legends "The Lady of the Lake"

While being an enjoyable show with a compelling female protagonist and an interesting premise, Cursed is currently in competition with the shows mentioned above. With so much content available in the genre a show really needs to stand out to succeed. Unfortunately I don’t think that Cursed really offers anything new to the fantasy scene. It definitely has potential, especially after the first few episodes, but when viewers make judgments about a show a few minutes in it isn’t enough for it to just have potential.
The character of Nimue, played by Kathrine Langford, was developed well early in the show. We see from the start that she has powers that even the other Fae don’t understand. She struggles with being feared by both humans who hate magic and her own people. She has to grow into her role as a leader and symbol for the Fae despite this. Langford’s portrayal of this young woman’s journey to becoming a warrior queen is compelling and brings new life to an ancient character.
This being said, I found the side characters to be somewhat lacking in dimension in the first few episodes. Later on in the show there were mysteries and more depth uncovered about some of the other heroes and villains, but it wasn’t foreshadowed in a way that made me anticipate learning more about the characters. King Uther is a whiny, belligerent ruler who relies on Merlin, a drunk, washed up wizard with no magic. Father Carden, the leader of the Red Paladins, is shown as purely evil who does nothing but burn Fae. For how serious the show is trying to be, these over dramatic characterizations don’t do it any favors. Although more is revealed about the characters roughly halfway through the season, I think most viewers won’t watch that far because the earlier episodes don’t promise much.

A tribe of the Fae beings who inhabit the world of Cursed

The Witcher and Carnival Row shows that are competing with Cursed for the fantasy fan’s attention, aside from having a season’s head start on Cursed, have managed to do what Cursed attempted but fell short at. Carnival Row has a similar premise to Cursed with a variety of races of Fae who are oppressed by human civilizations, as well as a strong female character who is fighting against that oppression. The Witcher is also set in a fantasy realm and deals with themes of magic and destiny like Cursed, but isn’t afraid to poke fun at itself and the cliches of the genre. What both these shows did well that Cursed missed the mark on at first was a good ensemble of supporting characters who are engaging and fleshed out. Cursed jumped right into developing an involved plotline and the characters didn’t have much to them until later in the season.
I genuinely enjoyed watching the latter half of the season. The action began to pick up and the whole story became more cohesive. The characters were given backstories that made them seem more real and less like caricatures. It is a shame that the show couldn’t have found it’s stride within the first three episodes because there isn’t a lot there to make viewers want to keep watching.

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At the Intersection of Past and Future: Orientalist Aesthetics in The Wolverine

9/28/2020

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by Landen Kennedy

In conversation with friends early this semester, I discussed reasons why I would choose Japan as a dream vacation. My decision was guided by my fascination with Japan’s historical landmarks and traditional cultural architecture as well as their increasingly futuristic modern society. These two seemingly incompatible aesthetics, the ancient and the futuristic, reside side-by-side. Take for example Zōjō-ji, a Buddhist temple in Tokyo. It was built in 1393 and if you were to visit today, you would see skyscrapers in the distance behind it. The ancient temple surrounded by modern day Tokyo serves as a setting for a sequence in the X-Men spin-off film, The Wolverine (James Mangold, 2013).
The film follows popular X-Men character, Logan, AKA “The Wolverine,” as he is invited to Japan to meet Yashida, a soldier he saved from the atomic bomb at Nagasaki. Yashida seeks to help Logan by offering him a way to die. Logan is gifted (cursed?) with the ability to regenerate at a rapid rate, allowing him to not only heal from fatal wounds in seconds, but to also live for hundreds of years without ageing. While Logan is young and healthy, Yashida is old and dying of cancer. He seeks to perform a sort of trade with Logan. If Logan is willing to give up his immortality to Yashida, Logan will finally be able to die and Yashida will be able to live.
While watching the film, I found myself immediately considering the state of Asian representation in film. Though the film contains many Asian characters and actors, we are still watching a white character fight his way through Japan. I’m not trying to say that The Wolverine is a problematic film, as I truly enjoy watching it and don’t feel like I am taking advantage of another culture by doing so, but it does tend to fit within the parameters of Orientalist cinema.

Logan (Hugh Jackman) inside of the Buddhist temple Zōjō-ji

Orientalism is a term coined by Edward Said. His idea was that the Western world viewed the Eastern world through a lens of mysticism and magic. Originally his writings were focused on the Middle East rather than East Asia, however, his idea still applies. Many Western made movies about the East fall into this mystical trap. Big Trouble in Little China (John Carpenter, 1986) is set in Chinatown, San Francisco and still manages to create a world where sorcerers and demons run amok. Take other films, such as The Great Wall (Yimou Zhang, 2016) in which a white main character leads a Chinese army in battle against an army of monsters, as an example of this trend. Today, while that fantasy-like orientalist view still exists, there seems to be another kind of orientalist view, one in which the East is a hyper-futuristic society.
The Wolverine constantly interweaves the ancient and the futuristic. Logan visits Zōjō-ji for a funeral, where the yakuza show up to cause trouble. Logan fights them off, but what is interesting about the scene is the usage of modern firearms within an old religious site. It’s a jarring and strange sight to see, made stranger by the fact that an archer picks off gang members from the rooftop. As the battle progresses and Logan escapes with Yashida’s granddaughter, the target of the yakuza, he finds himself on a bullet train. The train serves as a symbol of the future, and Logan even comments on the fame of the train saying, “This is one of those bullet trains, right? So what do they do, like, 300 miles an hour?” When the yakuza board the train, Logan fights them again, but this time they are armed with knives or short swords rather than guns. It’s a reversal of the modern within the ancient, so now the ancient is within the modern.
There are many other instances of this intermingling. In Yashida’s traditional style home, high-tech medical technology stands out like a sore thumb, yet because of the film’s aesthetic, we are not as jarred as Logan is. Towards the end of the film, Logan fights his way through an old village against ninja-like archers as he makes his way to a futuristic factory. In the factory he faces Yashida in a mech-suit designed to look like samurai armor. This is a sequence that truly captures the themes of old and young, as Yashida sits in a high-tech weapon made to look like ancient armor, and as he absorbs Logan’s regeneration power, Yashida’s old, withered face regenerates into the young face we know from the beginning of the film. The old becomes the new, and the new comes from the old. This is what the film is all about, as the characters, aesthetic, and even a subplot about Yashida’s inheritance all touch on this concept of continuity and growth.

Yashida (Hal Yamanouchi) inside the futuristic Silver Samurai armor

The film not only deals with orientalism in terms of the aesthetic of the setting and the characters, but it also uses the device of putting a Western character in the East as a way of making them feel uncertain. I do not call The Wolverine orientalist to insinuate that the film is negative or in any way harmful. I simply refer to it as orientalist to draw attention to the way Japan is shown to us in the film. As with other orientalist films, the setting is used to serve the character. Logan is thrust into an unfamiliar environment and his powers are taken away from him for a brief amount of time. This film is trying to tell a character driven story about Logan dealing with mortality and the will to continue to live. Using a setting that Logan is unfamiliar with, modern day Japan, the character can be even more uncertain about things.
This device is used in films such as The Outsider (Martin Zandvliet, 2018), about an American G.I. who joins the yakuza after release from a Japanese prison, or Lost in Translation (Sophia Coppola, 2003), about two Americans who meet in a Japanese hotel and fall in love due to their shared feelings of estrangement and loneliness. The Wolverine falls somewhere between these two films. The Outsider was met with much controversy, similarly to The Great Wall, and Lost in Translation achieved critical acclaim including an Academy Award for Best Writing, as well as a Best Actor, Best Director, and Best Picture nomination. While The Wolverine isn’t a masterpiece, it isn’t a disaster either, and it actually shows us some deep themes through the use of the ancient and the futuristic.

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The‌ ‌Farewell‌ ‌Review‌

9/25/2020

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By Ravi Ahuja

The difficult tightrope walk of maintaining your cultural identity in a strange land is one that every immigrant is familiar with. Often, they are ostracized for being different in their new home, only to go back to their motherland and be viewed as a foreigner in their own country. Culture is more than the food we eat and the clothes we wear, it is even more pervasive than the language we speak, it is the very way we view the world and our place in it. This is the struggle that Chinese-American Billi (Awkwafina) finds herself in when she discovers that her dear grandmother Nai Nai (Zhao Shu-zhen) is dying of terminal cancer. Given a prognosis of only 3 months to live, Billi’s family in America returns to China to spend time with Nai Nai before she passes. In keeping with Chinese custom, however, Nai Nai has no idea that she is ill, as the rest of the family hides her test results and status from her.
Director Lulu Wang chooses to take what could have been a forgettable Adam Sandler-type goofball comedy in a more dramatic route, using dark comedy in unexpected and subtle ways. This story feels all the more emotional and real because it is; Wang wrote this story based on her own experience of having to lie to her grandmother about cancer. Although her grandmother eventually recovered, she never even knew about the seriousness of her illness or the secret kept from her until The Farewell came out.

This movie is more than just interested in the idea of cultural identity, it is all about it. Billi serves as the stand-in American, asking the questions and saying the things that most westerners would. Isn’t it wrong to not tell Nai Nai that she’s dying? What if she wants to say goodbye? How do we have the right to hide something so important from her? The movie never says that she’s right or wrong for thinking this way, but expresses the eastern perspective from the rest of her family, allowing the audience to choose for themselves what they think. As Billi’s uncle puts it, “in the east, a person’s life is a part of a whole”. Nai Nai herself chose to do the same as her family is now doing when her own mother had a terminal illness. In something of a meta moment Billi is interrogated about living in America compared to China and is repeatedly asked which is better, to which she can only answer “they’re just different”.

Actor Awkwafina shines in the main role of Billi, perfectly capturing the repressed emotionality that she cannot show, else Nai Nai will discover something’s wrong. Her on-screen chemistry with Zhao Shu-zhen is also terrific, with their relationship being full of joy and love. Nai Nai’s joy and zest for life draws a very sharp contrast with Billi’s near mourning, and it makes her secret illness all the sadder.
The film is also visually beautiful, with a palette of mostly earth tones and muted pastel colors, although there are also some scenes with much richer and more vibrant colors. Most scenes also try to play around a dual-color scheme, usually some form of blue and brown, which adds a sense of balance in a very aesthetically pleasing way. The camera is almost always static with relatively long takes, allowing the characters to have conversations and exist around each other without being edited together. The relationships all feel more real due to this choice, the positive emotions being drawn out as well as the negative, the awkward, the sad.
Although not Wang’s directorial debut, with her first film Posthumous coming out in 2014, this is easily the film that has skyrocketed her to the mainstream, and deservedly so. The intensely emotional and personal angle this movie takes is only bolstered by its dark and ironic comedy, and I can’t recommend it enough.
The Farewell is now streaming for free on Amazon Prime.

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Tower of God: Analysis

9/21/2020

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Tower of God (神之塔), directed by Takashi Sano in 2020, is an animated series that is considered a “breakthrough” in the genre of Japanese anime. But what exactly is so special about Tower of God? The plotline, soundtrack, characters, and art are definitely factors that contribute to Tower of God’s popularity, but is that all there is to it?

Tower of God is the first Japanese anime series adapted from Webtoon, a collection of digital comics originating from South Korea. Before this, most Japanese anime were adapted from Japanese Manga. Unlike Japanese manga creators, who are professional, Webtoon creators are mostly made up of amateur writers submitting their work online as a hobby. When amateur work has a chance of becoming popularized and turned into an official TV show, this gives everybody a chance to write their own story and create their own content. Most anime today are adapted from professional Japanese manga.

A characteristic of Webtoons that separates it from manga other than the language difference is the way it is presented. Generally, Japanese manga are printed and sold as a hard copy. On the other hand, comics from Webtoons are designed to be read on a mobile device, so each volume is presented in a continuous vertical strip. They are also more likely to contain color, which most manga lacks, and some Webtoon comics contain music and bits of animation.

Tower of God was created in collaboration with Crunchyroll. Many recent streaming sites such as Netflix have been releasing “originals”, which is content funded by the streaming service. Most Netflix originals, such as Stranger Things, are only available on the platform they were released on. Similar to Netflix, Crunchyroll is a streaming service containing mostly animated content. Tower of God is one of Crunchyroll’s first “originals”, a project that launched recently in the year of 2020.

As stated previously, another factor that contributes to Tower of God’s popularity is the main storyline. The plot revolves around a boy named Bam, who lives his entire life in a small cave under the tower. One day, a girl named Rachel finds Bam in the cave, and teaches him about the outside world. When she leaves Bam alone in the cave to enter the tower, Bam decides to do whatever it takes to meet her once again.

When Bam eventually enters the tower, it becomes clear that his motives are very different from all the other characters. All of the characters are climbing the tower because doing so will allow them to have a wish or desire granted. For instance, a humanoid crocodile named Rak Wraithraiser, aspires to reach the top of the tower in order to find something that “transcends all things”. In contrast, the protagonist Bam simply wants to be reunited with Rachel, the only person who was with him during his time of loneliness in a dark cave. Rachel herself entered the tower in order to see real stars, which were rumored to be visible at the top of the tower. Unlike the others, Bam does not wish to reach the top of the tower.

Each layer of the tower is filled with tests and danger. A powerful administrator who has reached the top manages the trials of each layer. There are many hopeful contestants who want to make it to the top, but only those who have the sheer willpower to do so will be able to make it.

Along with an alluring storyline, Tower of God also boasts a masterful soundtrack. The director of sound, Kevin Penkin, became well known after composing music for the award winning anime Made in Abyss (Masayuki Kojima, 2019).

Tower of God’s success has also been an influential aspect in the production of other anime adapting the Korean Digital Comics. More content similar to Tower of God, such as Noblesse (2020) or The God of Highschool (2021) will be released within the next couple seasons of anime.

Overall, the joined efforts of production companies collaborating with Crunchyroll have created a one of a kind series displaying its ability to compete with traditional Japanese anime. With a powerful plotline, an immersive soundtrack, a set of interesting characters, and a unique origin, the anime Tower of God has the ability to push the entire genre of anime to a new level.

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Road Rage Gone Deadly: Unhinged Review

9/18/2020

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by Samantha Shuma

With a lack of films being shown in theaters, the few that are released have a lot to live up to. Unhinged (Derrick Borte, 2020) does not disappoint. It is a simple story done right; the combination of characters and special effects make the film’s runtime fly by. Unhinged scares audiences with the contrast of relatability and dramatics. This serial killer flick draws on our fears of car crashes and the uncontrollability of deadly situations. Real life fears come onto the big screen and characters drive for their lives from a man who has mentally fallen off the deep end.

The rest of this review contains spoilers for Unhinged, reader’s discretion is advised.

Unhinged is a horror, thriller that hinges on the message of road rage. A mother (Rachel) and son (Kyle) in a mid-size car cut around a truck, who doesn’t drive away during a green light. The truck’s driver, Tom Cooper, confronts them, asking for an apology. When Rachel refuses to sincerely apologize, her worst nightmare was destined to become a reality. Cooper wants Rachel to really feel sorry, saying what he is doing is all her fault. He tracks down where she, her friends, and family are, killing them off one by one, planning to leave Rachel for last. The characters are constantly fearing for their lives, and that fear transfers onto the audience.
With few characters and the main setting being the inside of a car, the plot could have been bare. The concept of an extreme case of road rage is a simple one,

but there are other elements that make the film more interesting. The most influential visual elements are the car crashes. Most cars involved do not contain major characters, but they still influence the story. Tension builds with every crash, each becoming more destructive. The amount of collisions increase throughout the film, complementing the story as the killer, Tom Cooper, gets closer to his targets. As cars flip, collide, and combust on screen, we jump out of our seats imagining us as the passengers. The film uses the reality of car crashes to instill fear. The true nature of car crashes is scary enough, and the film lets each crash speak for itself. Each crash stands alone, not accompanied by overused jumpscare sound effects or exaggerated explosions. Audiences are forced to sit in horror as destruction and death unfold in a very realistic manner. It makes the film visually compelling while adding drama to the simple story.

As well as the crashes work in intensifying the story, there are other fear factors that pull audiences out of the experience. Rachel’s phone is stolen by Cooper, which reveals the fear of personal information falling into the wrong hands. It plays a big role in how Cooper terrorizes Rachel and her family, but it is shown in an unrealistic way. The point is to immerse audiences, and they are drawn away when they have to think about the film being unrealistic. The point is to immerse audiences, and they are drawn away when they have to think about the film being unrealistic. Some details can be dismissed by our suspension of disbelief. However, when films mess up something we experience everyday (i.e. phones), audiences start to disconnect. The film works against itself when Cooper goes through several apps on Rachel’s phone. Although her phone has no password (that detail being forced into the film since people normally have a phone password), Cooper accesses apps that would have their own form of security (ex. banking app). Audiences cannot be scared by this because it is shown in an unrealistic way.

Finally, the film wants us to be afraid of the idea that its events can happen to anyone. At any moment, you could find yourself driving for your life as a man comes to kill you, your family, and your friends. Although events like this unfortunately take place in real life, it is not terribly likely. Cooper attacking Rachel and her family is scary enough, the fact that a random person could come up to you and do the same thing becomes a bit ridiculous. The ‘this can happen to anyone’ message is over-emphasized in the film (and the marketing), it makes me laugh more than anything.
Most of the ways this film wants to scare audiences are a little silly, but the film is still an enjoyable watching experience. For someone that enjoys horror movies, there are some good scares that have been missing from modern horror movies. Instead of relying on cheap jumpscares and horror tropes, Unhinged takes a more realistic and destructive approach on an unconventional story. The story is not terribly complex, which lends itself to be visually interesting. Take a horror filled joy-ride down twisted streets and flying debris, it is certainly worth the price of admission.

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If You're Not With Me, Then You're My Enemy: How Revenge of the Sith Captures the Post-9/11 Paranoia

9/15/2020

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by Landen Kennedy

Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen) is confronted by his old master, Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor)

In an era fraught with division and constant political bickering, many fans would prefer to think of Star Wars in apolitical terms, choosing to use the films as escapism from daily life rather than a reminder of them. This is a fine way to view the films, however, when viewed through a political lens, it is not hard to see parallels between the rise of The Empire in Revenge of the Sith (George Lucas, 2005) and the paranoia that gripped American politics in the aftermath of the September 11th terrorist attacks. Viewing this film through the lens of Post-9/11 cinema lends much more thematic weight to it, resulting in not only a better film experience, but also an opportunity to better understand the real world.
Revenge of the Sith tells the final chapter of Anakin Skywalker’s fall from the Light Side of the Jedi Order, and his descent into the Dark Side of the Sith. The transition from hopeful keeper of peace and justice to the deadly warrior of anger and hate is the core of Anakin’s story arc during Episodes I-III of George Lucas’ “Prequel Trilogy.” Anakin does not simply decide one day that he will join Palpatine, the corrupt Chancellor of the Republic and future Emperor, but makes this switch over lengthy periods of paranoia and hopelessness. To understand his transition to evil more fully, viewing the first two films in the Prequel Trilogy can add a lot, however, the third installment is where most of this transition occurs. The events of the previous two films weigh heavily on Anakin and directly influence his actions within part three.
At the start of the film, Anakin and Obi-Wan Kenobi are on a mission to rescue the Chancellor from Count Dooku, a Sith Lord and leader of the military enemy of the Republic, and General Grievous, Dooku’s droid army General. During a lightsaber fight between Anakin and Dooku, the Chancellor convinces Anakin to murder the Count in cold blood, an act no Jedi should ever perform. Palpatine pushes Anakin to leave behind his moral ideology because, “It’s only natural. He cut off your arm, you wanted revenge.” This is the first instance we see Anakin’s emotions used as a tool to turn him into an evil opressor. In fact, as time has gone on, films have become increasingly interested in exploring character psychology, both in the realm of genre films, such as Star Wars or the popular superhero films, as well as in more realistic dramas. This tendency to dive into the head of a character to find the root of their emotional and mental state is one of the staples of Post-9/11 Cinema.
A film such as Zero Dark Thirty (Kathryn Bigelow, 2012) is a great example of this. We see Maya, a CIA agent deal with the stress of finding Osama Bin Laden. In American Sniper (Clint Eastwood, 2014) we watch Chris Kyle deal with the PTSD of being a sniper in the Middle East, having to make tough moral decisions without time to process or think them through, often leading to the deaths of people he does not necessarily want to kill. Though not a real-world example, Revenge of the Sith explores Anakin’s emotions as he exists within an Order that has very strict rules and has lost its way, being generals in a war when they claim to be peacekeepers. It leads to a loss of identity for Anakin, as someone who wants to express love and seek justice for his past pains. He has defied the rules of the Jedi Order by secretly marrying a Senator and the pair finds themselves expecting a child.

Anakin Skywalker and his secret wife Padmé Amidala (Natalie Portman)

Anakin has gone through a tragic event in the past film in this trilogy. His mother was stolen and killed by Tusken Raiders, a species of desert-dwelling warriors. After his mother’s death, Anakin, in his anger, murders every Tusken Raider in the camp. After 9/11, Islamophobic hate crimes spiked. According to FBI statistics, these hate crimes increased from 28 to 481 occurrences (Kuek Ser). Anakin’s retaliation against those who wronged him is similar to the pain many American’s felt after 9/11. Though the majority of American’s did not stoop so low as to commit hate crimes, the statistics clearly show an increase at some level. The death of Anakin’s mother is kind of his own personal 9/11. Because of his failure to save his mother, and the pain of losing her, when he begins to have premonitions that his wife will die in childbirth, Anakin is vulnerable to the temptations of Palpatine. The Chancellor reveals to Anakin that he is a Sith Lord, an enemy of the Jedi, but also claims to have the power to save Anakin’s wife from death.
Because of Anakin’s uncertainty in the safety of his loved ones, he is susceptible to allowing Palpatine to sway him to the Dark Side and turn the Republic into the Empire. This paranoia reflects that of the American people after 9/11. Because the attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon was so unexpected, sudden, and devastating, the American people were immediately angry. In this anger, we went to war in Afghanistan and are still involved to this day. I am not going to choose a side as to whether or not war in the Middle East is a good idea or a bad idea, but there are certainly groups of people who fall on both sides of that line. After nearly two decades, that immediate anger has dissipated to an extent, and those who at one point may have yearned for war and revenge, might now think that the war is unnecessary and that we should not be involved.
Either way, many Americans felt this fear and paranoia that they were no longer safe after such an unprecedented attack on American soil. Because of this, many freedoms were willingly given up. Just look at what General John D. Ashcroft was implying when he stated that preventing terrorist attacks was more important than solving crimes after they had been committed (Liptak). Examine how the US Government used the paranoia of another terrorist attack to justify The Patriot Act as a way of increasing the government's abilities of surveillance of the American people. It would seem Lucas is onto this new facet of American life, one in which the government seeks safety and freedom at the expense of morality and personal freedoms.

Chancellor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid) manipulates Anakin's fear, swaying him to the Dark Side

In one of the film’s most profound sequences, Palpatine declares himself Emperor, much to the joy of many in the Galactic Senate. Anakin’s wife, Padmé, says to herself, “So this is how liberty dies, with thunderous applause.” She sees the Senate choosing security over liberty and disagrees fundamentally. We can even see the effects of this today, in heightened security measures, reliance on police to solve every issue, and violent anger at the police when they fail or when they overstep their bounds. I won’t try to start a conversation on police in modern America, however, I do not find it controversial to point out that both sides view the police in different ways. They’re either too aggressive in pursuit of safety or they’re nothing but heroes. There seems to be no middle ground, and the issue has become a battleground of division among the American people. This paranoia that started at 9/11 has turned Americans into each others’ enemies, the same way that Anakin’s paranoia turned him against his friends.
Another line drives this comparison between the Dark Side and the paranoia that engulfed America during the Bush presidency after 9/11. When Obi-Wan confronts Anakin in a last-ditch effort to turn Anakin back to the light side, Ankin exchanges dialogue with his old master. “I have brought peace, freedom, justice, and security to my new empire.” A few lines later he says, “If you’re not with me, then you’re my enemy.” This line is nearly impossible to hear and not connect to the famous line by President Bush days after 9/11, “Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists” (eMedia Mill Works) This line fully shows the government’s response to uncertainty. In essence, if you do not support every action of the government in combatting terrorism, even if it means giving up some of your liberties, you are supporting the enemy. Anakin fully believes this, and the citizens of the galaxy accept Palpatine’s declaration of forming an Empire because it means that they will be safe.
In order to create an Empire that could be used to oppress the masses, Palpatine uses the fear, anger, and paranoia of those beneath him to convince them that their liberties must be given up to make their safety certain. Many in the age of COVID-19 are seeing this same situation play out again. Should citizens follow every single rule set out by the government out of the uncertainty that COVID will affect them or their loved ones? It’s a difficult conversation to have, and one that I do not seek to answer here, however, the fact that these questions that popped up after 9/11 are returning because of the ongoing pandemic has made Revenge of the Sith as relevant now as it was in the years following September 11th.

Works Cited:

Kuek Ser, Kuang Keng. "Data: Hate Crimes against Muslims Increased after 9/11." The World. 12 Sept. 2016. Web. 12 Sept. 2020.

EMedia Mill Works. "Text: President Bush Addresses the Nation." 20 Sept. 2001. Web. 12 Sept. 2020.

Liptak, Adam. "Civil Liberties Today." The New York Times. The New York Times, 07 Sept. 2011. Web. 12 Sept. 2020.

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