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TGM
03-09-2018, 08:13 PM
THOROUGHBREDS

Director: Cory Finley

imdb (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt5649108/?ref_=nv_sr_1)

TGM
03-09-2018, 08:13 PM
Man, I tell you, I dug the shit outta this movie!

Irish
03-09-2018, 09:43 PM
I want to see this but---is it worth $10 and a trip to the theater, TGM? Or better to wait for VOD?

Bear in mind I am both lazy and a tightwad.

TGM
03-09-2018, 09:59 PM
I want to see this but---is it worth $10 and a trip to the theater, TGM? Or better to wait for VOD?

Bear in mind I am both lazy and a tightwad.

Well for me personally, this is probably my favorite movie this year so far. It's a lot more subdued than the trailers suggest, but I really dug its quiet, minimal approach to this really twisted story. I found it incredibly satisfying in that regard, for similar reasons why I found A Ghost Story so immensely satisfying last year. I'm not sure I'd say it's a necessary theater experience, but it may well be worth going if solely to help support this kinda movie still actually getting into theaters, while they still do. So, I know you and I don't always agree on our tastes, so I'm not entirely sure if this is something that'd be up your alley or not. I could honestly see your reaction going either way with this one. But if anything else I've said piques your interest, then yeah, I'd say go for it. ;)

Mal
03-10-2018, 01:37 AM
Mild yay. The direction is obviously from a first time filmmmaker, which is both good and bad- Anya Taylor Joy is the true heart of this film and Anton Yelchin's bit part is some of his best imo. I found the motivations too thin however... Just wait til you escape and go to college, Jesus Christ.. you could do worse at the theater but this truly would be a good Redbox watch.

Ezee E
03-11-2018, 12:31 AM
This surprised me a lot. The trailer makes it seem Juno-esque funny, but it's more like an American Psycho.

Basically a 5-person play, and while there's some obvious first-timer directing moves, it's still an approach that's clearly trying. This is the kind of movie that makes me appreciate indie films. ANd I like myself a little modern noir.

DavidSeven
03-17-2018, 12:13 AM
This was much more distinctive and unique than its thin premise suggested it would be. Very well staged and performed. The ending wasn't quite as interesting as what preceded it. None of it is very realistic, so your enjoyment will probably hinge on how much you're willing to accept this as an artistic impression of life, as opposed to a believable portrayal. In that sense, it reminds me of something by Yorgos Lanthimos, especially The Lobster. It takes a little bit to get into the film's groove, but once I found myself there, I found it pretty absorbing. Good stuff.

Ezee E
03-17-2018, 12:20 AM
This was much more distinctive and unique than its thin premise suggested it would be. Very well staged and performed. The ending wasn't quite as interesting as what preceded it. None of it is very realistic, so your enjoyment will probably hinge on how much you're willing to accept this as an artistic impression of life, as opposed to a believable portrayal. In that sense, it reminds me of something by Yorgos Lanthimos, especially The Lobster. It takes a little bit to get into the film's groove, but once I found myself there, I found it pretty absorbing. Good stuff.

Yorgos' Teen Movie is a good way of putting it.

Pop Trash
03-18-2018, 03:46 AM
Except it's nowhere near the quality of The Lobster. Anyway, I thought this was OK. Like Zac said it has some first time film issues, which means it feels somehow overdirected and underdirected at the same time. The screenplay is stagey and closed off mostly to one house, so in order to get around that, it's obvious the director and DP tried really, really hard to keep it cinematic with lots of rack focus and tracking shots, but it doesn't add a whole lot to the storytelling. There's a lot of awkward pauses and after awhile you kinda want it to get somewhere since you know there is going to be a bit of dramatic violence, even though it's twisty enough for the viewer to not know exactly how it will play out.

There's been a thing lately, esp. on female centric websites about the oddity of so-called horse girls, and I think this is the first film to really explore that phenomenon, but I wish the film opened up more and showed us more about Olivia Cooke's character's life and her dealings with horses. Really, for a movie about a horse girl, I wish this had more horses.

Ivan Drago
03-26-2018, 06:52 AM
Maybe I missed out on the Kool-Aid you guys and my real life friends were drinking, but I didn't like this at all. Which is disappointing because there's a lot to like, such as the cinematography and lead performances from Anya Taylor-Joy and Olivia Cooke, but they're wasted in something that was trying to be The Lobster-meets-American Psycho without the ideas. Tonally it felt like the film adaptation of a play but everything about the play got lost in translation. I really wanted to like it but it just felt empty to me.

EDIT: I will also say this....there's a lot of effective imagery at play here, such as the wide shot of Amanda laying on her bed in her bedroom, the super-slow push-in of her on the couch at night, and both girls in Lily's backyard having a conversation while Amanda's playing a game of life-size chess by herself in the background...it's realistic and ponderous in its execution and I find myself thinking about them a lot.

Peng
05-27-2018, 10:53 AM
Yorgos Lanthimos has been mentioned, and it has some of the same problems I had with his film last year (even if that one's aesthetics is more overwhelming and precise) -- being so deliberately sterile it turns from productively off-putting to just 'off' in general. However, this has two things above that one: the sorely missed streak of real absurdist humor, and a compelling central relationship with two amazing performances, which makes the characters not merely pawns to be moved and prodded around like in Sacred Deer. 7/10

dreamdead
10-26-2018, 02:11 AM
To me, this had the Lanthimos feel, yes, but I also felt a lot of influence from Punch Drunk Love and its similarly bitter and yearning to be understood worldview. The delivery of Finley's dialogue is a lot more arch, but that sentiment remained. All of it feels very precise and mannered, but--as others mentioned--it doesn't really have a very clear meaning or need for why the girls don't just wait to escape the abuse. Because of the mannered nature, I felt a sense of upper class privilege when I instead wanted to feel something more interior of Taylor-Joy's character.

It's a film that has a precise script and overdone directing, but I do appreciate its overall aesthetic, even if I find it not wholly successful. Sad to realize that this was Yelchin's last work (we'd also just watched the ok Fright Night before this, and were realizing the range he possessed).

Dukefrukem
12-27-2018, 12:18 PM
I want to see this but---is it worth $10 and a trip to the theater, TGM? Or better to wait for VOD?

Bear in mind I am both lazy and a tightwad.

8-0 so far on MC, did you end up seeing this?

Irish
12-27-2018, 12:46 PM
8-0 so far on MC, did you end up seeing this?

Yes. I didn't care for it, but then I went in with high expectations. It wants to be Leopold & Loeb in a pencil skirt. I don't think it succeeded. The class messages are muddled, too, and kinda half assed.

Raw notes from back when:



# Thoroughbreds
dir. Corey TKTK
2018
----

- Pretty fucking thin.

- But I liked how Olivia Cooke's character declares herself immediately, etc, with those lines about how she can't feel joy.

- The whole murder plot is dull. The stepfather is a dick but not enough of one to merit death.

- Taylor-Joy doesn't have the range to pull off her character. She's supposed to be an enigma and her arc gradual. But all Taylor-Joy can do is telegraph her character's inner state and switch to stone-faced at the film's conclusion.

- Anton Yelstin is in this movie to provide it with a second act. The girls' plot to involve him in murder seems vastly stupid, but the movie needs it to get to the ending.

- The end reversal is obvious and the script takes pains to make it more obvious: The "psycho" girl isn't psycho and the "normal" girl has the instincts of a killer, once her middle-class values are shunted aside.

- Though closing moments were pretty good. I liked Cooke's monologue for the images it evoked and the ideas it presented.

- I can't tell if Anya Taylor-Joy can act. I couldn't tell what she tried to express through her character. Mostly she seems a beautiful young woman with nothing to say.

- Noticeable absence of sexuality, which was intentional per the director during an interview.

- Weird reviews. Comparisons to "Heathers" and "American Psycho," neither of which have anything to do with the tone, content, or intent of "Thoroughbreds." The former movies were obvious satires and played broadly. The latter one isn't a satire and plays straight, although there are some good, funny lines sprinkled over it.

- The movie's title? theme? is supposed to be about the rich, I guess, but this is like Hollywood's conventional view of the rich, the middle class view of the rich, the poor view of the rich. Ditto the tagline: "Good breeding gone bad." There isn't any particular insight there, and the girl's lifestyle---outside scant references to horses---doesn't seem removed from typical suburbia, living in split-levels, and quarter acre lots with badly mowed lawns.



Did you see it? What did you think?

Dukefrukem
12-27-2018, 02:14 PM
It's on my short list this week as I try and wrap up 2018.

1. Please Stand By
2. Thoroughbreds
3. Roma
4. Flower
5. Unsane

Dukefrukem
12-27-2018, 05:05 PM
Yeh Lanthimos does it better. I still enjoyed it though. But this needed way more humor than what we are left with otherwise it plays out like a straight up drama backed by some good performances from the two girls. I was not expecting the ending we were given, so that's a plus. And yes, the cinematography and steady cams make it feel almost Fincher-esk. I'm not sure I buy the motive enough but the dialog makes it fun.