bad movie rant

[arguchik]

wow. the movie "birth" starring nicole kidman is colossally bad. honestly, i think this movie has no redeeming value. the narrative has no overall point, and it progresses through several bafflingly idiotic twists and turns. it is almost impossible to believe that this woman (kidman) carries so much grief from the loss of her husband--ten years earlier--that she actually believes a 10 year old boy who claims to be her dead husband, reincarnated. as the plot clunks along, you're led to believe the kid, then disbelieve him, then believe him again, etc. and throughout, the characters do things that are just ridiculous. in one scene toward the end of the film, kidman's character and her age-appropriate fiancee are auditioning a string trio to play their wedding music. for some inexplicable reason, the kid is there, along with all of the couple's family members, and everyone is seated as though watching a concert. the kid starts kicking the fiancee's chair, and the fiancee gets so incensed that he attacks the kid, ultimately dragging him to another room, putting him over his knee, and spanking the living shit out of him. the assembled family members are shocked and dismayed, but nobody says anything. in two other scenes, adult men witness nicole kidman's character doing extremely inappropriate things with this boy--in one scene they are naked in a bathtub together (this is witnessed by the fiancee, who closes the door as quietly as he can), and in another, immediately following the spanking scene, she gives him a lingering kiss out on the street. again, the adult man who witnesses the kiss turns away and ignores it.

on top of all of this, we're supposed to believe that this boy's parents willingly allow their 10-year old kid to sleep over at nicole kidman's character's house (which she shares with her fiancee and her family, one of the creepiest and most confusing movie families i've ever seen). even the music was bad--inappropriately and oddly upbeat.

gah! such a bad movie! i can't think of anything positive to say about it, except that nicole kidman looks kinda cute with short hair (it was a wig, and i'm *still* wondering how they got it to look so natural, when her real hair is quite long). and it's good to see that lauren bacall still seems to have all of her marbles.

ok, back to my housecleaning...

Comments

[glaucon.livejournal.com]

weird.
I watched that this weekend too.

I kept waiting for someone to do something semi-sane or reasonable, but they never did.

I think there were two major points we were supposed to take away with us:

1. nicole kidman's character was deeply, deeply nuts - there may have been some hidden intent to hint that we all have a veneer of rationality that's about 1 millimeter deep and all it takes is the right stimulus to the right memory to peel it right the hell away

2. that the haute bourgeoisie is inherently morally bankrupt - at least to the extent of being paralyzed by unethical or insane actions by one of its own. this point is to some extent undermined by the kid's parents (pretty much our only non-HB characters) not taking a firm ethical stance either, but then it was made pretty clear that nicole kidman's character was lying to them about what their son was doing over at their house, so maybe that undermining is somewhat undermined.

but by and large - yeah - pretty assy movie that didn't make a hell of a lot of sense. pretty though.

[arguchik.livejournal.com]

you watched birth this weekend too? how freaking strange.

THANK YOU for making point #2. that was one of the most offensive things about the movie, for me. i think it is too...something (subtle isn't the right word; perhaps unintentional?)...in the film to amount to a real class critique, though. and of course there's all that undermining of undermined underminings you mentioned. it ends up being a confused mess of nothing.