Nocturnal Animals (Tom Ford)

[number8]

http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRRFby0SZ9dP UKsB4QJ30HKKokK9L_HzXpwP2g1Etp A5bNM8fY1

IMDB (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4550098/)

[number8]

- This seems more like a mood exercise for Tom Ford (which he nails) than a fully cohered story idea.

- I liked A Single Man better.

- Jake Gyllenhaal is my favorite version of Leonardo DiCaprio these days.

- Going to see two Amy Adams movies only a couple of days apart has further convinced my previous belief that you can throw her in whatever kind of movie you want and she would not be the slightest bit out of place in them.

- Michael Shannon is the dramatic equivalent of Norm MacDonald and he is equally as perfect in every way.

[Russ]

I want to see this so badly. Have you seen it yet, 8? I look forward to your review.

[Ezee E]

Big fan of this. Like a mix of Lynch, No Country for Old Men, and an old romance movie. Lots of little details that should bring up discussion. Still trying to connect the dots of it all, but was enthralled throughout.

Hope Ford does more movies.

[TGM]

Holy shit, this movie was sooo good. Pretty much loved everything about this film. Definitely one of the year's best!

[Mal]

While I didn't LOVE LOVE this movie, there is so much to admire in the entire production and execution. It felt like so many things to me at the same time and all of them were earned. Michael Shannon continues to wow.

[Ezee E]

While I didn't LOVE LOVE this movie, there is so much to admire in the entire production and execution. It felt like so many things to me at the same time and all of them were earned. Michael Shannon continues to wow.

On reflection, it's weird that the best part of the movie is a fictional store within the fictional movie. Not sure if that means anything really.

Probably one of my favorites of the year, all said and done.

Hope Ford doesn't take as long of a period between movies next time.

[number8]

Fictional store?

[Ezee E]

Fictional store?

oops.

[Idioteque Stalker]

From what may be the worst opening credits of all time to the ineffective whimper of an ending, this was a total slog. Fine acting can't save it from being an incoherent, droning misery-fest that takes all the wrong cues from 21-Grams-era Inarritu while inserting a ludicrous amount of blunt psycho-symbolism and close-ups of unhappy people. Probably my least favorite movie I've seen this year.

[Ivan Drago]

From what may be the worst opening credits of all time to the ineffective whimper of an ending, this was a total slog. Fine acting can't save it from being an incoherent, droning misery-fest that takes all the wrong cues from 21-Grams-era Inarritu while inserting a ludicrous amount of blunt psycho-symbolism and close-ups of unhappy people. Probably my least favorite movie I've seen this year.

Not my least favorite movie of the year, but definitely one of the most disappointing. As good as the acting is, the story-within-a-story was riddled with cliches, while the riveting Amy Adams dramatically reading was full of surface-level substance. The opening credits were probably my favorite part of the whole thing for their outlandishness and surrealism. It's a shame that the rest of the movie didn't have more of that.

[Ivan Drago]

From what may be the worst opening credits of all time to the ineffective whimper of an ending, this was a total slog. Fine acting can't save it from being an incoherent, droning misery-fest that takes all the wrong cues from 21-Grams-era Inarritu while inserting a ludicrous amount of blunt psycho-symbolism and close-ups of unhappy people. Probably my least favorite movie I've seen this year.

Not my least favorite movie of the year, but definitely one of the most disappointing. As good as the acting is, the story-within-a-story was riddled with cliches, while the riveting main story of Amy Adams dramatically reading was full of surface-level substance. The opening credits were probably my favorite part of the whole thing for their outlandishness and surrealism. It's a shame that the rest of the movie didn't follow that up with something as daring or interesting.

[transmogrifier]

60/100


Tries to be both a high-minded analysis of the suffocating effect of social expectation on love, lust, and marriage and a pulpy dive into backwater B-movie stereotypes, it is only really the latter that works, even though it only works BECAUSE of the existence of all those scenes with Amy Adams looking mildly perplexed into middle distance.


Let me explain. One of the things that I find lets down a lot of otherwise fun grindhouse nonsense is that even the best of these films usually run out of ideas, or make you suffer through lulls between show-off setpieces (see for example the film I saw immediately after this, Blood Father). Here, however, Ford is able to direct the hell out of effective set pieces (the entire kidnapping sequence is very well done) and then just cut back to Adams pensively staring at a wall. That way, the pulp nonsense holds up all the way through, and we can channel our dissatisfaction with the film as a whole to the rather shallow exploration of artistic drive and social pressure to conform.


I think the film would have actually worked better if the two stories had been intercut without any knowledge that one was a book until right near the end (yes, it could have come across as a gotcha twist, but I think it would have allowed for more investment in the rather prosaic real-world scenes as we try to figure out why there are two Gyllenhaals and why no-one thought of casting Isla Fisher as an Amy Adams facsimile before).

[Peng]

Great elements in isolation (Jake Gyllenhaal's performance, MVP Michael Shannon, Laura Linney's hair, the final shot, and so on) that never quite cohere to make its hollow core, even if by design, resonating enough, although that final shot helps rally up a bit. Must say the matching of the novel's more disturbing passages to the offense(s) in the framing story that initiated the creativity-as-revenge gives me major skeevy. It really would help if we have even a tiny bit of Gyllenhaal's perspective in the present timeframe too, because as is this feels like the film shifts its judgemental attitude, including some real bad implication along with it, onto Amy Adams too much.

[Henry Gale]

Spoiler-y I guess, since I talk about the ending in broadstrokes.

Yeah I think I really liked it just about up until the end. It just feels like it should ramp up to a real-world conclusion as impactful as anything in the book, and I realize it's kinda its point that it doesn't. But at the same time ―and I realize the movies were made at similar times to this just be one of those cosmic movie-making coincidences ― I think its final image and similar ideas surrounding it were done almost exactly and much more stunningly for the ending of a film that was nominated at the Oscars for Best Original Screenplay that I think seeing it again without the same weight or thematic perfection just made it sit their hollowly for me. The Lobster, if I was being too cryptic. I just don't think it says anything the film hadn't already said to that point for it to put so much emphasis on it as its closer. (I even have issues with the book's ending too, but that's a whole other story.)

Basically I'm pretty in line with what most of you said, in the liked it to the in-the-middle range.

Gyllenhaal was really good but if anyone needs to play more than one role in a film it's Shannon. Side note, I didn't think I could be bigger fan of him, but then back in September at TIFF seeing him in-person inside the Gala for Loving and then unexpectedly right after that on the big block-wide carpet for this (which I didn't end up watching until last night) the same night kinda confirmed he is just the awesome goofy, perfectly awkward, and genuine dude you'd hope to witness. Sadly, I didn't see him the night before (http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2016/09/11/02/382ECCB700000578-3783616-image-m-90_1473556693634.jpg).

[Irish]

I think its final image and similar ideas surrounding it were done almost exactly and much more stunningly for the ending of a film that was nominated at the Oscars for Best Original Screenplay that I think seeing it again without the same weight or thematic perfection just made it sit their hollowly for me. The Lobster, if I was being too cryptic. I just don't think it says anything the film hadn't already said to that point for it to put so much emphasis on it as its closer. (I even have issues with the book's ending too, but that's a whole other story.)

Wait, how do you mean? That they both end with images of a woman sitting alone in a restaurant? How do you view that as thematically similar?

[Henry Gale]

Wait, how do you mean? That they both end with images of a woman sitting alone in a restaurant? How do you view that as thematically similar?

Well, the endings aren't doppelgangers, but this one's instantly made me think of the other. Also that both male lead's final appearances portray them in a state of choosing to present himself as "blind" as a way of fulfilling a falsified version of themselves they feel will serve the imaginations (or arbitrary social structures) of the women left waiting for them at their tables, as we the audience are left with the ambiguities of if the men ever intended on being there / returning at all. The Lobster's end scene has a lot more cinematic meat and nuance to it and keeps me thinking about it, stirred, at least a year later. Nocturnal's has not been doing that since yesterday, outside of mild confusion as to why that was the choice.

[Irish]

Well, the endings aren't doppelgangers, but this one's instantly made me think of the other. Also that both male lead's final appearances portray them in a state of choosing to present himself as "blind" as a way of fulfilling a falsified version of themselves they feel will serve the imaginations (or arbitrary social structures) of the women left waiting for them at their tables, as we the audience are left with the ambiguities of if the men ever intended on being there / returning at all. The Lobster's end scene has a lot more cinematic meat and nuance to it and keeps me thinking about it, stirred, at least a year later. Nocturnal's has not been doing that since yesterday, outside of mild confusion as to why that was the choice.

That's very cool. Quoted to draw attention -- I never would have picked up on the similarity between those two images.

(I don't quite agree on some of the details, but who cares?)

[Dukefrukem]

This is another movie I wish I watched before the Oscars. Loved this.

[Dukefrukem]

-

- Jake Gyllenhaal is my favorite version of Leonardo DiCaprio these days.

-

I dont understand this criticism. Please explain.

[number8]

I dont understand this criticism. Please explain.

It was a praise, not a criticism. I find their intensity-oriented acting style very similar and I think Gyllenhaal does it better.

[Dukefrukem]

It was a praise, not a criticism. I find their intensity-oriented acting style very similar and I think Gyllenhaal does it better.

All 5 of your posts were positive, then why did you Nay the movie?

[number8]

Because I didn't think it was a good movie. My first two bullet points were not positive statements, and the next three were just about the actors.

[TGM]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=as87xE-uJF4

[Grouchy]

I admit being confused by the ending too, because while it's perfectly anticlimatic and in tone with the downer feel of the movie, I was invested enough in the real timeframe as to expect... an ending.

Other than that I was very engrossed even as the metaphoric qualities of the novel became more obvious. It's a hell of a directorial effort and the ensemble is so very good.

[Skitch]

What in the fuckity fuck did I blind buy here?? Wowzers, this is a picture. Half hour left

[Skitch]

Huh...I didn't really get the ending? What is going on here?

[transmogrifier]

Huh...I didn't really get the ending? What is going on here?

As far as I remember, the ending is basically Gyllenhaal's character's big fuck you to his ex-wife (Adams). Basically, she didn't think he had the ability to make it as a writer and she cheated on him, divorced, and remarried. Gyllenhaal then writes this "great" novel, the story of which is played out for us in the movie (it is possible that the novel has parallels to their real-life story, but it has been too long and I don't remember). She is engrossed and wowed by the book, and arranges a meeting with him, possibly with a view to reconcile given her current unhappy marriage. He stands her up. The end.

[Skitch]

As far as I remember, the ending is basically Gyllenhaal's character's big fuck you to his ex-wife (Adams). Basically, she didn't think he had the ability to make it as a writer and she cheated on him, divorced, and remarried. Gyllenhaal then writes this "great" novel, the story of which is played out for us in the movie (it is possible that the novel has parallels to their real-life story, but it has been too long and I don't remember). She is engrossed and wowed by the book, and arranges a meeting with him, possibly with a view to reconcile given her current unhappy marriage. He stands her up. The end.

Okay, thats how I took it as well. Just making sure I didn't miss something. I was wondering if there was a deeper insinuation between the abortion and maybe even a possible suicide...since the story was mirroring/metaphoring...maybe he got so far as to get the dinner invite and then killed himself because his character died in the book.

Maybe I'm looking for more than there is.

[Ezee E]

It's just a terrible ending for what was otherwise a really good movie beforehand. Hard to think of a movie that is like that.

[Skitch]

It did feel like they didn't know how to end it.

[Idioteque Stalker]

This may be my most hated movie ever. Just thinking about it makes my gorge rise.