Yesterday I saw the movie Precious. About the only thing on Earth more bleak, hopeless and depressing than Canada's men's hockey team.
This is what killed me. I read in a couple of places that, although grim, the movie had an uplifting ending. That totally escaped me. This movie ends with the 17-year-old mother of two, freeing herself from her abusive mother once and for all. Fine and good. Except she is a 17-year-old mother of two, one of whom has Down Syndrome. And the young mother reads at a Grade 8 level, has no prospects for anything for herself or her kids, AND is HIV positive. In the 1980s. Anyone who got HIV in the 1980s died. So I was not uplifted by seeing those little soon-to-be-orphan kids walking down the street with their soon-to-be-dead mother.
As I said to my friend as we left, yes, it was a movie, but that was not entertainment.
The End.
4 comments:
I do sometimes wonder why anyone a) makes these sorts of movies and b) why anyone watches them!!!
Thats not to say I don't enjoy a good drama, but this looked to be too much to take - well, judging by the trailers anyway...and now you have just confirmed that for me Nanuk.
Haven't seen this particular movie, but I did think that Dancer in the Dark was one of the most painfully heart-wrenchingly bleak movies I had ever seen...and I loved it (both times!)
Poor Bjork! It was horrible! but what an excellent performance!
JAW fan
Awaiting Mr. Anonymous's comments on Dancer in the Dark....3..2..1..
Actually, Precious is worth seeing for Monique's performance as the mean-ass mother. She is really mean-ass and very very good.
Why see Dancer in the Dark when you can stay home and stick a fork in your hand?
I did catch a few minutes of it on IFC recently - hilarious! Maybe I didn't get the fact anything so relentlessly dour can only be viewed as a comedy.
Subject for further research.
Post a Comment