as i dream about movies they won't make of me when i'm dead -

Aronofskis ir pārvērtēts. Tas pats, kas Nolans, tikai vēl sliktāk.

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man aronovskis arī kaitina, bet lūk mother! likās īsts mākslas darbs un viņa labākā filma (ja nelasa pēc tam paskaidrojošās intervijas, jo viss, ko viņš par filmu saka, banalizē rezultātu, kas ir daudz spēcīgāka pieredze par viņa skaidrojumiem)

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Nu, nez, noskatījos treileri un - klasisks a., Feiferes u.c. tā kā rosinātu redzēt viņus, bet, nu, zinot a, un pieplusojot to, ko redzēju treilerī, laikam tomēr atturēšos.

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šī ir viena no filmām, kur treileris... es pat īsti nezinu, ko kāds gribēja panākt ar treileri

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Es nošērošu savas draudzenes absolūti izcilo un komiski garo heitrantu par šo filmu, ko Ciba neļauj ielikt vienā komentārā.

Part I

Ok, here is my rant about "mother!," in the form of an imaginary conversation with an Aronofsky fan. It is inspired by all the reactions to this film I've seen over the weekend, from the absolutely ridiculous fawning reviews to the thoughtful dialogue I read this morning on a colleague's wall.
It's almost 2000 words now. It's kind of insane, obviously. You've been warned. Also, SPOILERS.
M: mother! is misogynist trash.
Aronofsky fan: First of all, this movie is not trashy. You just don’t grasp his work’s complex, intricate allegorical structures, his masterful cinematic technique, and the way he mixes the profane with the sublime in order to push the boundaries of genre, cinematic representation, and audience expectations. Aronofsky went to Harvard, but he doesn’t talk about it. Aronofsky told Jennifer Lawrence, his lead actor and girlfriend, that her love of the Kardashians is “disappointing.” Aronofsky dares to be an auteur in a climate hostile to true cinematic vision.
M: We’re still talking about the man who made The Fountain and ripped off Satoshi Kon, yea? Just checking. I’ve taught freshmen with a subtler grasp of allegory. I’ve taught freshmen with a subtler grasp of *anything,* including plagiarism. I mean homage. This film is a stillborn Rosemary’s Baby, a defrosted Shining, a Crimson Peak with newer nightgowns. It’s like watching a child bash lego pieces together until they are broken enough to sort of fit. And that’s just him as a director. As a screenwriter, Aronofsky is so utterly incompetent that he throws the baby out with the bathwater. The little savory meal he serves up is not effective allegory (more on that later) or even a meaningful provocation. Neither is the rest of the schlock that happens after (more on that later, too). He’s just yelling loud enough to distract you. He’s been doing just that for years. Aronofsky is not an auteur. He is a hack (le haque if you’re French).
AF: Wow, just wow. I mean, Pi? Requiem for a Dream? Black fucking Swan? The psychological depths, the signature style, the daring vision! He explored the *relationship of the universe to mathematics,* ok? He convinced everyone that Natalie Portman learned ballet in three months! Have YOU done that? Has anyone else done that? No, of course not. I am so sorry that you misinterpreted his entire body of work so thoroughly. Nothing I can do about that, really. You’re just a lost cause. But let’s go back to this movie: You clearly haven’t read the Bible, for if you had, you’d surely know that this movie is not only an Important and Brave Work of Art, but also an Allegory with a capital A.
M: I was a Christian for twenty years. I’ve read the Bible multiple times. I’ve read a kids’ version with giant letters and pretty pictures. I’ve read the adult version, with smaller letters and no pictures. I’ve read the latter in two languages. I’ve studied it as literature in high school, which is a thing that can happen in certain parts of the world. I own Crumb’s “Book of Genesis.” So yes, I can recognize some shoddily cobbled together references if I need to. Did you have an actual point?
AF: Fine, but I can tell you didn’t read the Bible as auteur-ily as Aronofsky read the Bible, so let me break it down for you: Javier Bardem is God/creator. Jennifer Lawrence is Mother Earth/nature. Adam and Eve show up and make out, even though it’s gross because they are actually embracing their own sexuality. Cain comes over, kills Abel, is banished. Bardemofsky closes up his Garden of Eden because Eve broke the apple. There’s a flood because humanity does not know how to clean up after itself. Then there’s the Eucharist, but with actual cannibals. Then the whole thing burns down because everyone is still a sinner, but now with riot gear. BIBLE, duh.

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M: Hold up. Mother Earth is not a Biblical concept. Google it. Anyway. Is JLaw Mother Earth or is she the Virgin Mary? Is this a Biblical allegory or an environmental allegory? Choose one, I don’t have all day. If the consumption of her baby is supposed to be the Eucharist, then the baby is Jesus, which would make her Mary. Mary =/= Mother Earth. For that matter, newborn baby being eaten =/= Eucharist. The Eucharist is meaningless without a grown-up Jesus who can make the choice to offer up his body in sacrifice. Also, going back to the Old Testament (even though we were just talking about the New Testament, but who cares, Bible!), Bardemofsky – the God – should be the one to start the flood and light the final match and punish all the sinners. But he doesn’t. JLaw does. So is she also God now? Finally, where does it say, “God created the Earth, kinda, but really it’s his wife who rebuilds it periodically while rocking Southern Gothic by H&M?” Where does it say, “and on the seventh day he decided that it all runs on female heart energy, crafted by Swarovski?” That’s a B-plot for a second-rate magical girl anime, not a Biblical reference.
AF: Ok fine, but you’re just nitpicking. It doesn’t work *perfectly,* but then again what allegory ever does?
M: I don’t know, a good one?
AF: You can’t deny that this film is thoroughly infused with both religious and environmental, and also just *deeply humanitarian* themes. So how can you claim that this piece of cinema, a cinema so deeply steeped in philosophical questions about the fallibility of man, is misogynistic?
M: How can I claim a film allegedly based on the Book of Genesis is misogynistic? Is this for real your honest to God question?
AF: Yes?
M: ....Anyway. This is not a movie. It’s a middle-aged artist’s (I use the term loosely) embarrassing sexual fantasy about his younger, obedient, worshipful muse – a muse ready to place body and soul at the altar of his divine genius (and, conveniently, to tell every interviewer about the injuries she sustained during filming in the name of *his art*).
AF: You are conflating Aronofsky and his character. That’s lazy analysis and is just silly.
M: What, I shouldn’t conflate Aronofsky, a middle-aged screenwriter twenty years JLaw’s senior, with his character, a middle-aged writer twenty years JLaw’s senior? I thought we were doing auteur theory here, my bad. Fine. Let’s take Aronofsky out of the picture. What do we have? A God with writer’s block. And a woman. She’s billed as Mother, but she’s also an architect, engineer, interior decorator, cook, and cleaning lady. She has no desires of her own, except to fulfill her role as object and enabler. She is part-time vehicle for his art, part-time punching bag. She is so devoted to his art that she rebuilt his childhood home from scratch. She is so devoted to his art that she lives in the middle of nowhere with no outside contacts. She is so devoted to his art that she lets him alternate between ignoring and abusing her. She is so devoted to his art that she lets him destroy the house she built. She is so devoted to his art that she lets him feed her baby to cannibals. She is so devoted to his art that, on her deathbed, burned, beaten, and disfigured, she lets him take her literal heart out of her ribcage so he can do this all over again to a different woman. If you don’t see this for the narcissistic wankfest, the smarmy delusional drivel that it is, I can’t help you, but stop going on about allegory. What is the allegory in the following scene: When JLaw finally lashes out against her God/abuser, he [trigger warning for those of you who aren’t here for this rapey garbage] responds by assaulting her and giving her what she has wanted all along (the D!). She has an orgasm almost immediately (who wouldn’t, amirite?) and marital bliss is restored. “Curing” a hysterical woman via orgasm (short-term) and then motherhood (long term) sounds like a familiar trope, but I just can’t put my finger on it. Perhaps it was in the Bible?

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Bottom line: No, I don’t care what movie he claims he made. This is the movie he DID make – a movie that says we should give abusive male auteurs infinite do-overs with an infinite number of women because the next try might be *it*, damn it! The next attempt might be true perfection! Who cares if she got burned? She liked it. She’s ok with it because she understands that she touched greatness, and we are all blessed for it. By the way, I wonder if Woody Allen and Polanski sent him a gift together or separately. What do you think? But I digress again.
AF: No, no! You’re not supposed to read her as a real woman. She’s a symbol. She’s an archetype. Mother Earth is not a person! You can’t *really* hurt a non-person! It’s different when a non-person gets almost raped, severely beaten, and then burned because it serves the film’s artistic vision. Don’t you see? Your reading is so surface-level. This is much deeper than that!
M: The artistic vision of almost raping, severely beating, and burning non-persons (colloquially known as women) as long as the successful realization of male genius is at stake? Yes indeed, I’m glad we finally agree.
AF: That’s not what I said! Think about what the Mother *represents* and stop obsessing over your narrow reading for a second. I understand you feel this way because you are a woman, but consider this: Aronofsky is clearly not OK with any of this. Yes, you could say this movie is autobiographical and that he, an auteur, had absolute creative control over all of it. I see that, but also it comes from a place of deep self-loathing. He is condemning Him(self). He obviously hates Him(self). He hates himself AND all of us for what we are doing to our Earth/nature/women/his girlfriend. This means the movie cannot be misogynistic.
M: Ok, this needs a two-part answer. Firstly: I’m not supposed to read her as a woman in a film literally called “mother!” ? In a film peddling antiquated nonsense about motherhood’s transformative powers? A film about a subservient younger housewife who just wants a baby in exchange for all her free labor? A film that’s nothing but glorified arthouse torture porn so utterly basic in its misogyny that it needs to add gendered insults to a scene of a woman being punched in the face, in case we missed the point? Nice try. If you bring gender stereotypes to a gunfight, you better fire them by the second act. See how I mixed in a pretentious reference together with a bastardized idiom? I went to Yale, but I don’t talk about it. Anyway, this movie does not fire any of its stereotypes. It embraces them fully. It roughly pushes them against a wall and fucks them silly until they start to *like it*.
Secondly: Aronofsky is condemning Bardem’s character and himself? Where? When? God is never harmed. God gets the magical heart crystal. God will get to write more poetry because God’s poetry is beautiful. It’s so beautiful that it makes JLaw cry and whisper, “it’s beautiful” in between rapturous tears. God might even get an Oscar. But ok, let’s assume Aronofsky is hating on himself. And? No movie in the history of cinema has simultaneously featured a self-hating male artist and heinous gendered tropes? For that matter, no self-hating male auteur is also capable of genuinely hating women? Heinous gendered tropes have never been a vehicle of male narcissism and self-affirmation masquerading as tortured soul-searching, both on screen and beyond? Hmmm, I guess not, you’re right. Sacrificing women repeatedly in the hopes of finally attaining ultimate redemption for the wicked God/man – finally making sure that we all know that his acts of violence were definitely *worth it* - is absolutely not misogyny. It’s art.

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paldies, tagad skaidrs, ka nav vērts skatīties.

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es sliektos nepiekrist, bet vēl nevaru, es esmu tikai otrajā daļā.

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vopšem, es izlasīju, un vispār es to uztvēru kā tieši ņirgāšanos par vīriešvaroni most of the times, it sevišķi par viņa "mākslu", un par šo viņa narcismu.

bet man tā filma likās diezgan komēdija visā visumā, varbūt ar mani kaut kas nav labi.

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Es neesmu redzējusi, tikai dalījos ar šo komentāru. Jānoskatās, protams, lai kaut ko pati varētu pateikt, lai gan es nezinu, vai es to gribu. Viss izklausās pēc vēl viena Antikrista, no kura es izskrēju ārā.

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Luk, recenzija, kas piedava mother! skatit ka komediju: https://www.google.lv/amp/www.indiewire.com/2017/09/mother-best-comedy-2017-darren-aronfosky-jennifer-lawrence-1201878147/amp/

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Ja davilktu līdz Monty Python, es teiktu, komēdija. Citādi jāskatās komēdijas definīcija.

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