the black swan part two

Okay, so just before I get started I just want to say that...Well, I still haven't decided how I feel about this movie.

Let's just examine the SamFactors, shall we?

Basically, everyone that reads this knows I have a serious problem when it comes to evaluating movies. One, I came of age in a time when my colleges were watching things like Avatar which was acclaimed for not plot or acting, but more like how-much-money-one-can-spend-on-movies-to-make-them-look-cool-ness (blasphemy, I know, sorry world). Two, I have always been inclined to use movies as an escape; as somone who normally isn't deeply unhappy with her life, I've always been drawn to glitzy, saccharine and happy movies - preferably with singing. Thus, I give you this declaimer: I am not a movie expert, nor have I really experienced much of life, I am inclined to like immature and saccharine movies and therefore have absolutely no reason to be taken seriously when discussing this movie.

Nevertheless, the internet is always lacking meaningless words (cough) so I give you! MORE BLACK SWAN COMMENTARY!

I think part of the criterion for a good movie is how much people talk about it; no, I don't mean like "wow, that movie seriously sucked ass" obviously, I'm talking about when people discuss a movie with the intention of coming to conclusions or analyzing it. I've definitely done that for this movie and so I can conclude that it was, at the very least, interesting, if not necessarily good.


I mentioned this before in my previous post, but the shaking camera had to go. Decidedly, not only was it uncalled for and cheap, but it also prevented the audience from appreciating the actual dance. Natalie Portman trained for months for this role (although someone told me today that she's pregnant with the choreographer's baby? I find that hard to believe, since anorexics find it difficult to conceive and she is definitely borderline anorexic...) and I just think that they should've focused more on this "art" that she worked so hard for, in both reality and the movie. By forcing the audience to see through the shaking lens whenever it was from her perspective, I essentially couldn't see the dancing, we were limited to just the feeling of the scene. If you're gonna make a movie about dance, show me the dance.

Even when she turns into the black swan, you're not watching her turns, you're just watching the weird special effects of the wings. (which, by the way, totally ruined her form. haha)

Finally, I'd just like to say that I'm no prude, but was Jackie eating out Nat totally called for? I think not. Bleh.

I still can't decide how I feel about this movie. It was confusing and strange but because I'm so often told that my taste in movies limits my understanding of them and appreciation of "good," I'm sure that this movie is worth seeing, if you don't mind being tortured by images of a woman stabbing herself in the face with a nail file. I had to watch "27 Dresses" twice today just to get that picture out of my head. Not that I mind mindless movies about weddings, but still. (shudders, that woman was so creepy!) Well. That's all that I can think of to say about "Black Swan."

In other news, I finally watched the episode of 30 Rock from this season that was live. HILARIOUS. Just FYI ("Why does everything look like a mexican soap opera?" haha). Parks and Rec is still also funny, but watch it BEFORE 30 Rock, because the latter is just so much better that if you watch Parks and Rec second, you'll be supremely let down.

Happy break!

the black swan part one

I can't decide how I feel about this movie. It was either really good, or just ridiculous.

Lets think this one out, shall well?

Well. The plot was certainly interesting. As a certain former teacher of mine so aptly noted, it was about wanting to be so perfect, make such a beautiful thing, that you're willing to die for your craft.

This makes sense, we see it at the beginning of the movie practically spelled out for the audience when the director makes the toast to beauty and all that jazz. Then, natalie portman's character, hearafter referred to as "Nat," goes on to work herself into the ground until she's absolutely gone nuts. Nutty Nat then kills herself after she's achieved "perfection" in her craft.

Well, apart from when she makes the guy drop her at the beginning, but if the Nat says she thought it was perfect at the end, then it was acceptably perfect.

Then, of course, you have the weird lesbian attraction to herself SLASH the girl from that seventies show Mila Kunis, hereafter referred to as "Jackie." (I should mention here that I could call them the correct names, but then that would be too easy and clear, right?) So...just...why? Well, Ahn, my former teacher said that she was using the lesbian attraction to herself as a "safe sexual release." Which I suppose would make sense, if she hadn't hooked up with the two guys when she was out with Jackie, which is obviously NOT a safe release. So is she just observing Jackie and then trying to be more like her? And in her warped mind, that means that she is obsessed with or in love with her?

I guess the sign of a good movie is that it makes you ask questions, right? Or should all questions have answers by the end of the last scene?

I'll try a list:


Pros:

I nearly peed myself when whoever it was appeared in the kitchen during the spastic scene after the other spastic scene when the girl stabs herself in the face.

I screamed and closed my eyes during the stabbing in the face scene.

I gasped when she supposedly stabbed mila in the gut.

Well. those are all reactions...

Cons

I hate the shaky camera - it's so overdone and honestly, I know something is wrong when the score is in a minor key and the sound gets really loud. You don't need to shake the camera.

Friggin almost had an epileptic attack when she was supposed to be high at the dance club. My god, I couldn't watch and my head hurt.

Why didn't the mom want her to see Jackie at the door? That was weird. She hadn't even done anything yet.

They really didn't show us the dancing. It just seems odd to focus so much on the story behind a dance, all for the "beauty of it" and then not show the actual dance. Oh sure, the final scene was nice, but even then we had super up close shots of Nat's face and very few of the actual dance. And the camera was so busy shaking and the effects that made her skin ripple all crazy during every other dance made it essentially impossible to see the show. After all that, I want to be rewarded with this supposedly perfect dance.

HOW THE F*** DID SHE DANCE WITH A STAB WOUND?! I mean honestly, there's just no way. Not that movies are about accuracies now, but that's just over the line....


Well. That was thoroughly inconclusive.

I'll sleep on it.