What are you even talking about?Originally Posted by Michael_Bay
There were any number of ways SLP could have ended that weren't trite rom-com cliché.
What are you even talking about?
There were any number of ways SLP could have ended that weren't trite rom-com cliché.
Artimus sums up my persona thusly: You're so lovable but you scare me.
NO, BDP. Rom-Com love and suicide were the ONLY two options, obviously. I mean, what movie were you watching?
Clearly SLP is the new Romeo and Juliet.NO, BDP. Rom-Com love and suicide were the ONLY two options, obviously. I mean, what movie were you watching?
Artimus sums up my persona thusly: You're so lovable but you scare me.
Re: SLP's ending, I see the point of view that it's too neat but I don't agree. The ending really works because we were prepared for it in the Hemingway scene. Cooper criticizes the ending to Farewell to Arms by stating, "life is hard enough as it is." The ending also works because it fits as an appropriate ending to the story that's being told here. It's a pretty honest take on relationships that most movies get wrong.
Right, I mean, the "happy ending" was sorta the explicitly-declared project of the entire movie. I wasn't a huge fan of the shot it ended on, just from like a cinematic perspective, but honestly that movie was never NOT going to have an unambiguously happy ending.
I liked this. I'd easily rank it last of the likely BP nominees I've seen, but I still really liked this.
De Niro was just kind of there, and I thought JLaw was great (not quite as substantial as most Best Actress winners, though--I expected and wanted more of the character), but Bradley Cooper really, really impressed me. For some reason, his really stuck with me.
So yeah, good movie. Not great, but still an enjoyable time at the theater (my audience LOVED this) and I look forward to revisiting it.
Just because a film explicitly states that it's going to end happily doesn't mean that it should.
I'm still well within my rights to think that it would have been preferable if something a bit less clichè
Artimus sums up my persona thusly: You're so lovable but you scare me.
TBH, I wasn't expecting that ending. Thought they'd go with some depressing stuff.
You are right. I just believe if Russell spent a scene (a really good scene imo) having his main character argue an optimistic point of view with regards to endings, and concluded with anything but, Russell would have came across as hypocritical. It also would've exposed a loathing Russell had for his main character.
Sure, and for me this is definitely a good-but-not-great movie. I just feel that to whatever extent this movie does work it's in how it manages to transpose these specific characters onto a traditional Cary-Grant-style rom-com structure. Unlike you I do feel that most of this movie was played for comedy and/or romance, and the few exceptions to that (the fights, the scene on the street with the children) happen in the first two acts. I think in a very self-conscious way it's the anti-Cuckoo's nest, instead of starting out with goofy fun and devolving into third-act tragedy, it begins with the tragedy and devolves into third-act goofy fun. And I think to whatever extent that's cliche with traditional rom-coms is sort of the point, because it's decidedly not cliche with these characters. It's the rom-com where these characters get to play out the rom-com role, instead of the inherent tragic role we see in Cuckoo's Nest, Rachel Getting Married, Royal Tenenbaums and so forth.
The point of the Hemingway scene wasn't just to announce what the movie's doing, but to lay out the philosophy behind it: life provides tragedy enough, why don't these people get to have their movie fantasies just like everyone else does?
Again, I don't think this is a great movie, but the lighter, rom-com structure is the backbone behind what makes it as good as it is, in my opinion. The super-serious, real-life version of this movie sorta sounds like my nightmare.
Well, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree.
Artimus sums up my persona thusly: You're so lovable but you scare me.
I don't mind happy endings at all. But I also don't think that a dance competition can cure mental illness. Unless....it does and I've been doing it wrong this whole time.
I have no rhythm.
Artimus sums up my persona thusly: You're so lovable but you scare me.
I don't think there's any suggestion of that at all, though? One aspect of this movie that I really like is that the three things it actively promotes in terms of dealing with mental illness are 1) professional help, 2) medication, 3) staying active and positive. For as much as Cooper's character gripes about his time in the hospital/seeing his therapist/taking medication, for me it was very clear that he absolutely needed all of those things. This was no Garden State.
For me the movie's main problem was pacing. The whole thing grinds to a bloody halt during the weirdly convoluted betting scene that sets up the final act.
At least Braff had the courtesy of ending his film on a more ambiguous note w/r/t it's characters' futures, even with the airport scene cliches.
T E A M R I V E T T E
Hey, airport scenes aren't cliche, man! Anyway, I agree that SLP's ending wasn't ambiguous.
For those two characters any ending would be ambiguous. Unless the last scene is made by Ryan Murphy.
At the dance competition, I was totally waiting for "My Cherie Amour" to start playing as the music for one of other couples, as the final test of Pat's mental state.
I didn't mind the ending, as Pat's illness was never presented as something completely untreatable, but maybe they could've shown him routinely taking his medication or made a few more references to his therapy later on in the film, thrown in a line or two about him being on different medication this time that didn't make him so "foggy", etc.
I saw this tonight and it was amazing. The script is a bit mechanical in the sense that you can see Russell twisting and turning the gears to set everything up (Tiffany magically knows everything and anything about sports! The bet has to include a football game, and a dance competition, and all of the money so that the dad can live his dream! There's a mean judge that always gives low scores until she decides to overscore the protagonists!), but I there there is a lot of both truth and humor to be found in between those moments. Cooper and Lawrence have such an offbeat and graceful chemistry that is rarely seen in these kinds of movies. I also really enjoyed the outlook of Cooper's character on life -- it's a message that could be too trite in the wrong hands or as part of the wrong movie, but I think the filmmakers really make it work here. It's not about unbridled or unrealistic optimism, but trying to make the best of what you have in front of you.
I'd love to see Cooper and Lawrence find some way to pull an "As Good As It Gets" at the Oscars, because this film and their performances are really exceptional (and far better than that film was).
WE'RE GONNA FIGHT!
This weekend...one last chance to save Halle's career from complete oblivion. Oh, wait...
"...it's already done."
#THECALL.
I agree with basically everything here. Cooper in particular was a revelation. His performance could have so easily been an over-the top collection of tics, but he made it organic and believable as a character, working with the fact that his performance does call for tics without abusing them. I think that, given this performance and the set of projects he's choosing lately (Place Beyond The Pines, The Falling, reteaming with O. Russell for his Abscam movie) that I'll be very excited to see what he'll do next (Cue convenient ignoring of Hangover Part III's existence).
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