Midsommar (Ari Aster)

[Ezee E]

It’s been a long time since I’ve finished a movie, sat on my couch and stared, and then thought: I have no idea if I enjoyed that or not.

I was engaged, I was sucked in, but I’m just sitting here kind of staring at the TV trying to articulate an opinion, and I got nothing.

Sounds about right.

[MadMan]

My favorite genre.

Heh I seem to dig it, too.

[MadMan]

Irish most of your review makes me think of Siskel and Ebert when they would bash genre cinema. You're only one more review away from going on about how kids don't know what good cinema is and telling people to get off your lawn.

[Dukefrukem]

Need to sleep on it.

A lot of similarities to Hereditary. The difference is Hereditary was interesting with the unexpected events with our characters. Midsommar literally has the third act painted on the wall. Predictable and therefor less satisfying.

The most interesting and jarring part of the movie (the pre-title sequence) was never recreated throughout the rest of the film.

[Ezee E]

The drive in and initial acid trip of Midsommar sticks out to me as A+ filmmaking, but you nail the third act as how predictable and unsatisfying it is. I still fully feel that the worst is yet to come for the main character, all said and done... But I would watch it again for that first half.

[Dukefrukem]

This is an odd situation for me, because on one side I agree with everything in Irish's post, but the other feels like this should be experienced at least once. So, three star mild yay for me.

[Pop Trash]

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Wouldn't it be more predictable for her to simply be a final girl and escape rather than culpable and even accepting(??) in the death of her boyfriend and "friends" (really more of her bf's friends). Maybe it's just because I was (re)watching a grip of Friday the 13th movies around the same time, which even if they didn't invent the cliches, they certainly solidified them. I think Ari Aster is toying with known genre tropes in the way people get picked off here like a slasher film, but then implicates / exalts the Dani character. I wrote on letterboxd that it's almost a femme version of classic masculine money and power movies (The Godfather, Scarface, There Will Be Blood, etc.) instead of money and power, she "kills" for an idyllic feminine (and even feminist?) dream world.

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[Dukefrukem]

I'm not buying that. I wasn't convinced she would even accept all of that, especially the way she had handled deaths in prior scenes. (family and random people)

[Ezee E]

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Wouldn't it be more predictable for her to simply be a final girl and escape rather than culpable and even accepting(??) in the death of her boyfriend and "friends" (really more of her bf's friends). Maybe it's just because I was (re)watching a grip of Friday the 13th movies around the same time, which even if they didn't invent the cliches, they certainly solidified them. I think Ari Aster is toying with known genre tropes in the way people get picked off here like a slasher film, but then implicates / exalts the Dani character. I wrote on letterboxd that it's almost a femme version of classic masculine money and power movies (The Godfather, Scarface, There Will Be Blood, etc.) instead of money and power, she "kills" for an idyllic feminine (and even feminist?) dream world.

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Would be great, but she doesn't actually do any of that. She just receives affection for running around a pole and not tripping.

[Pop Trash]

Would be great, but she doesn't actually do any of that. She just receives affection for running around a pole and not tripping.

It's ambiguous by design. But the final shot should tip you off to what the film is about, really.

[StuSmallz]

Aster isn't a good director because directing is more than choosing the right angles and snapping pretty pictures and approving an edit. One of his jobs is to get performances out of his actors, but he hamstrung them with terrible writing and then allowed them to flop around the screen. Pugh is always watchable but she''s terrible here (and tbh I'm continually baffled at the his praise thrown at actresses when they either over-emote, telegraph, or do both, in scene after scene, for an entire production. Cf: Colette in "Hereditary"

What, you weren't impressed by Toni's endless parade of Jim Carrey-level facial contortions in that film?:

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[megladon8]

It’s been a long time since I’ve finished a movie, sat on my couch and stared, and then thought: I have no idea if I enjoyed that or not.

I was engaged, I was sucked in, but I’m just sitting here kind of staring at the TV trying to articulate an opinion, and I got nothing.

You said it perfectly.

Watched it 2 days ago and I have nothing coherent to say about it.

[Grouchy]

Wow, so many opinions all over the place about this film. Here are mine - it's a huge step up from Hereditary and goes towards fixing many of the problems I had with that movie, I defend the flawed romantic relationship which I believe is the heart at the center of everything and I do agree it goes on for far too long, but at least it gives us something new in the Horror genre which I believe is one of the hardest things to do right now. I think the whole film follows a deliberately fatalistic tone which is why we rarely see the characters win any small victories against the murderers and I also believe that the fact that they remain on site after witnessing the two violent deaths is meant to be purposefully satiric of the tolerant cultural stance they take as intellectuals.

Still, the movie never becomes as great and brilliant as its first 15 minutes or so.

[Pop Trash]

I also believe that the fact that they remain on site after witnessing the two violent deaths is meant to be purposefully satiric of the tolerant cultural stance they take as intellectuals.

Yuuuuuuuuuuup. Not sure why people miss this. Seems pretty obvious to me.