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March 28, 2024, 11:10:51 PM

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Nomadland

Started by rjd2, March 02, 2021, 07:12:01 PM

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rjd2

I enjoyed this.

Follows Frances McDormand on a Nomadic existence (!) after the recession where she interacts with fellow nomads, Amazon, family etc. Plenty of commentary on capitalism and the winners and losers of it.

It shares a key trait of the director Chloe Zhao's previous film the Rider, it focuses on a certain element of the American underclass who are rarely seen without patronising nor making them martyrs which is great to see. The Cinematography is gorgeous while Mc Dormand yet again brings so much humanity and warmth to her character.

The supporting case most notably David Stratham is also ace.

Zhao looking at the betting prices looks nailed on for the best director which is fantastic as it was rotten she was snubbed for the rider, while the film itself should edge out the likes of Mank etc for best picture.

4/5.

El Unicornio, mang

I liked this too. Quite bleak at times but with a lot of humour and heart in the character portrayals (some are real nomads) which gives it a lot of warmth. McDormand is fantastic.

Interesting that Zhao's next is $200 million MCU movie Eternals, couldn't be further from this kind of film.

thugler

I was really looking forward to this but it really didn't chime with me in the end. Felt like it should probably have been a documentary about the people actually in this situation rather than it all being from the perspective of this idealised character. There's an element of making this lifestyle look overly cosy and nice as well. The hardship and suffering of these people never really comes through as it should, instead there are lots of nice landscapes and pretty film making. Interesting that you mention it being critical of capitalism as I thought it was weak on this as well, it's lacking a sense of anger about what's happened, almost to the point of seeing it as some intentional mystical adventure rather than a fact of life for many when everything's gone to shit. I'd have rather seen more of the nomadic people, who were mostly fascinating when they were on screen, without the presence of McDormand's character's compassion face. If they are going to go with it being a drama it should have perhaps reflected the lived experience of the nomads rather than a hollywood version who recovers from setbacks very quickly, and has few personal problems, even eschewing the offer of help at times.

13 schoolyards

Yeah, the fact the lead is presented with a clear way out of this lifestyle but chooses to stay wandering annoyed me a little. Like pretty much everything, no doubt this way of life can be fun and satisfying so long as you have plenty of money behind you, but if you don't it seems extremely fraught - and while that came through early on with the other characters, as they fell away this seemed increasingly to buy into the idea of it being some kind of "new frontier" rather than a hobo nightmare almost everyone not cashed up would abandon the first chance they got.

El Unicornio, mang

Quote from: thugler on March 03, 2021, 10:41:26 PM
If they are going to go with it being a drama it should have perhaps reflected the lived experience of the nomads rather than a hollywood version who recovers from setbacks very quickly, and has few personal problems, even eschewing the offer of help at times.

I mean, her husband's dead, her home has become a ghost town, she can't find a job aside from the occasional work cleaning toilets or working in an Amazon warehouse, and her "route out" is crashing in someone's spare room. I find her situation the worst in some ways because she's kind of stuck between two worlds, neither of which she fits into, with the constant nagging dilemma of which direction to go. The nomads in the background are 100% on board with the life they've chosen and I think are the happiest as a result, while she's just kind of drifting in this purgatory with no real direction.

Quote from: El Unicornio, mang on March 02, 2021, 07:18:55 PM
Interesting that Zhao's next is $200 million MCU movie Eternals, couldn't be further from this kind of film.

Can't say that it's too surprising, the siren call of the Disney contract seems to attract many a 'serious' indie filmmaker in recent years. In fact you'd think that some people are only making these 'important' small films because they know that's the first step to becoming a Disney house director, having prestige to offer.

thugler

Quote from: El Unicornio, mang on March 04, 2021, 04:59:29 PMThe nomads in the background are 100% on board with the life they've chosen and I think are the happiest as a result

Yeah I think this is total bollocks in reality though isn't it. There are people in that situation who are having a real shit time and basically have no alternative. Now i know there are some people who choose a lifestyle like this (hell I know one or van dwellers myself), but it also encompasses people in all manner of difficulty in precarious situations. Sure the character has some problems but they aren't on that level whatsoever. She has well off friends and relations willing to help her out if things went to shit. No wonder Amazon seemed happy to let them film in their warehouses when the film doesn't even bother to be critical of them really, she even says at one point 'the money is good'. There are bits here and there that are quite strong but overall I think it misses the mark by some distance.

Bazooka

It was fine, nothing that left a lasting impression. I've watched quite a few documentaries on the subject that I found more compelling.

dissolute ocelot

I thought it was really good on the small moments and little details.

But it's weird because loners refusing to settle down is such a cliche of American cinema (and even non-American cinema), and it closely followed that pattern, so a lot of it felt weirdly like a gender reversed version of a John Wayne movie or something. All of which contrasted with the verisimilitude of the details of life in a van.

lipsink

It was okay. Had some nice moments and McDormand is always fantastic. But it didn't really stick with me.

greenman

Quote from: Kermit the Frog on March 04, 2021, 05:07:08 PM
Can't say that it's too surprising, the siren call of the Disney contract seems to attract many a 'serious' indie filmmaker in recent years. In fact you'd think that some people are only making these 'important' small films because they know that's the first step to becoming a Disney house director, having prestige to offer.

I'd say part of the problem is though that theres not that much chance of moving beyond arthouse level budgets whilst making those kinds of films, at least not until you've done a big blockbuster and gotten a bit of leverage.

I'm guessing Jojo Rabbit wouldnt have gotten made with the kind of budget it had without Ragnarok. Something like The Favourite were an arthouse director manages to push into mid budget cinema without a big hit blockbuster under their belt has become pretty rare and even that was a long time coming.

Glebe

Watched this last night. Thought it was beautiful and moving with some great performances. I adore Francis McDormand anyway. That's my simple review.

Twit 2

Terrence Malick didn't take Disney money. But then, according to "Easy Riders, Raging Bulls," an exec loved Days of Heaven so much that he gave him millions of dollars as a gift. Telly took this, plus all his inherited oil money and fucked off to Paris to be a hairdresser, or whatever the rumour. O, to have endless ability and means! What a world we live in!

Dr Rock

Got bored halfway through and turned it off.

Twit 2

The appropriate and increasingly common response to all things big and small, that.

dissolute ocelot

Quote from: greenman on May 04, 2021, 11:53:17 AM
I'd say part of the problem is though that theres not that much chance of moving beyond arthouse level budgets whilst making those kinds of films, at least not until you've done a big blockbuster and gotten a bit of leverage.

I'm guessing Jojo Rabbit wouldnt have gotten made with the kind of budget it had without Ragnarok. Something like The Favourite were an arthouse director manages to push into mid budget cinema without a big hit blockbuster under their belt has become pretty rare and even that was a long time coming.
It does seem weird getting Zhao to direct superhero movies after this. With someone like Taika Waititi, his early films Boy and Wilderpeople (and Jojo Rabbit) are closely focused on the power of a boy's imagination, so getting him to do superhero films is a pretty obvious move. Most directors who made a transition from indie to blockbuster, like the Wachowskis (who started with noirish low-budget thriller Bound before The Matrix), Jon Favreau (Swingers to Iron Man), Peter Jackson, started making popular movies cheaply, so they maybe had to learn how to manage the machinery but didn't have to change their artistic vision.

How does Nomadland's small-scale research-heavy production translate to making a Marvel movie? Has she spent several years finding out what it's really like to be a superhero? Or was there a lot of CG in Nomadland I'm just not noticing?

Having said that, twats such as Michael Bay have been making big budget films for decades, and the Transformers movies are still shit in almost every department, so maybe anybody anyone could do better.

PlanktonSideburns

Liked this

Thought the shit emotional piano riffs were a bit dull and unnecessary tho

Glebe

Quote from: El Unicornio, mang on March 02, 2021, 07:18:55 PMInteresting that Zhao's next is $200 million MCU movie Eternals, couldn't be further from this kind of film.

Weird that Fern passes a theatre playing The Avengers.

greenman

Quote from: dissolute ocelot on May 05, 2021, 02:37:58 PM
It does seem weird getting Zhao to direct superhero movies after this. With someone like Taika Waititi, his early films Boy and Wilderpeople (and Jojo Rabbit) are closely focused on the power of a boy's imagination, so getting him to do superhero films is a pretty obvious move. Most directors who made a transition from indie to blockbuster, like the Wachowskis (who started with noirish low-budget thriller Bound before The Matrix), Jon Favreau (Swingers to Iron Man), Peter Jackson, started making popular movies cheaply, so they maybe had to learn how to manage the machinery but didn't have to change their artistic vision.

How does Nomadland's small-scale research-heavy production translate to making a Marvel movie? Has she spent several years finding out what it's really like to be a superhero? Or was there a lot of CG in Nomadland I'm just not noticing?

Having said that, twats such as Michael Bay have been making big budget films for decades, and the Transformers movies are still shit in almost every department, so maybe anybody anyone could do better.

You could argue I spose that really a lot of the look of Marvel films is done in house and the directors input is much more on the acting/writting side of things. The films do often tend to devote a lot of their runtime to quite small scale drama compared to your typical Hollywood blockbusters.

Again I wouldnt be supprised if her career path is direct a Marvel film, if its a sucess use that as leverage to make something more akin to her previous work but with a larger budget then another Marvel and so on.

How are people watching Nomadland by the way?

Twit 2

I imagine huge numbers, due to algorithm telling them it's a thing. Huge numbers turn off because they don't understand cinema. Lots of people who like that kind of thing haven't got round to it cos busy or can't be arsed anymore.

Old Nehamkin

Quote from: greenman on May 05, 2021, 03:14:07 PM
Again I wouldnt be supprised if her career path is direct a Marvel film, if its a sucess use that as leverage to make something more akin to her previous work but with a larger budget then another Marvel and so on.

People often moot this "the system works!" idea of indie filmmakers getting a sweet "one for them, one for me" deal as reward for signing up to the Disney/blockbuster franchise machine, but has this dynamic actually materialised for anyone so far? Taika Waititi probably comes closest at the moment with Jojo Rabbit and an upcoming sports comedy film on either side of his next Thor sequel, but his immediate directing schedule after that seems to comprise a Willy Wonka reboot for Netflix, a live-action Akira remake and some sort of Star Wars movie.  Meanwhile Chloe Zhao's next reported project after her Marvel movie is a new Dracula reboot for Universal. Just seems like the system is designed to ensure the "ones for them" progressively stifle any space for the ones for anyone else.

sevendaughters

It's just modern hackdom repackaged as auteurism. Grab the money. Total bullshit.

SteveDave

Quote from: greenman on May 05, 2021, 03:14:07 PM
How are people watching Nomadland by the way?

I've not seen it yet but it's on Disney+

Twit 2

I haven't seen it and probably won't, mainly because I'm not sure it's gonna be anything other than some nice bits that remind me of other, more cohesive films.

chveik

Quote from: sevendaughters on May 06, 2021, 10:52:18 AM
It's just modern hackdom repackaged as auteurism. Grab the money. Total bullshit.

it seems perfectly logical to me. nowaydays sundance films and blockbusters are two faces of the same shitty coin, tedious middle-class dramas on the micro level and celebrations of the industrialo-military complex on the macro level.

sevendaughters

Quote from: chveik on May 06, 2021, 03:16:01 PM
it seems perfectly logical to me. nowaydays sundance films and blockbusters are two faces of the same shitty coin, tedious middle-class dramas on the micro level and celebrations of the industrialo-military complex on the macro level.

kernel of truth but probably slightly lacking in generosity.

PlanktonSideburns

Quote from: sevendaughters on May 06, 2021, 10:52:18 AM
It's just modern hackdom repackaged as auteurism. Grab the money. Total bullshit.

Maybe they just can't be arsed after doing a few good films

PlanktonSideburns

My work life's  been a bit like that

zomgmouse

I quite liked this overall but couldn't get past McDormand and Strathairn as the two leads when everyone else was populated by actual people (mainly because of the subject matter). Of the three Zhao films I've seen, this is the one I liked the most, I think because she kept things a bit more still.

greenman

#29
Quote from: zomgmouse on May 07, 2021, 02:12:14 AM
I quite liked this overall but couldn't get past McDormand and Strathairn as the two leads when everyone else was populated by actual people (mainly because of the subject matter). Of the three Zhao films I've seen, this is the one I liked the most, I think because she kept things a bit more still.

McDormand is so well known for a certain persona I found it took awhile to get beyond that and indeed I felt the film as a whole took a little while to get going, maybe the landscape photographer in me taking but I felt the strong attachment to natural landscape was gotten across very well by the end, actually felt a but Mallicky  but without the grand concepts.

There is I spose the feeling "so your paying attention to this kind of cinema now? about time" with the Oscars when films like Wendy and Lucy have come and gone, I have a feeling its probably not going to last and we'll be back to the same old next year.

Quote from: Old Nehamkin on May 06, 2021, 10:22:52 AM
People often moot this "the system works!" idea of indie filmmakers getting a sweet "one for them, one for me" deal as reward for signing up to the Disney/blockbuster franchise machine, but has this dynamic actually materialised for anyone so far? Taika Waititi probably comes closest at the moment with Jojo Rabbit and an upcoming sports comedy film on either side of his next Thor sequel, but his immediate directing schedule after that seems to comprise a Willy Wonka reboot for Netflix, a live-action Akira remake and some sort of Star Wars movie.  Meanwhile Chloe Zhao's next reported project after her Marvel movie is a new Dracula reboot for Universal. Just seems like the system is designed to ensure the "ones for them" progressively stifle any space for the ones for anyone else.

Waititi is doing Next Goal Wins still isnt he? I spose with people like James Gunn and the Russo's you could argue there not really arthouse directors and there Marvel films do represent the cinema they most want to create.

There really isnt much of any appetite for risk in Hollywood though these days, even Jojo Rabbit you could point to a pretty big name cast. The "one for me" arguably needs more than just the director but also at least one bankable actor as well.