Amanda Nguyen5 said:I mentioned the phone thing earlier, but honestly, the tension definitely lets up a bit. The "what's happening with the friend" subplot tries to be pushed to the background by showing us something else entirely, but it shouldn't work that way. For me, it worked, and honestly, the focus shifted more toward what's happening with them rather than "what's happening with her?". That question is still hovering in the air, like you said, but it’s definitely suppressed. Plus, when she returns to the hotel, we see that even the friend herself has suppressed her own "question," since she's basically half-asleep.
Can you make a movie tense at the exact same level the whole time? No, you can't. You go through a natural flow and slightly ramp up the intensity, but I've already said what I think about the tension in this specific film.
Don't get me wrong, I'll say it again: the movie is excellent.
And about what you said at the end, "once you realize what it's about." Man, I've seen so many times where people just skimmed over the plot and wrote things like "girls are aborting" and stuff, which is just stupid. The movie is intentionally made so that for the first thirty or forty-five minutes, you don't quite get what they want; instead, you see that whatever they want, they can't quite grab it (which is the whole point), all while the abortion theme is being shoved in our faces. It's unnecessary. It would have been better if nobody knew anything about the movie beforehand. Though, yeah, you really couldn't avoid that word.
Now I just remembered the beginning. Two genius little details: the main character first says she'll "handle everything with the conductors without any problems," and then when she gets back to the room and her friend asks, "Why did you come back?", she replies, "Don't be superstitious (you aren't a peasant, or something like that)."
Just three minutes later, she goes from being almost kicked off by the conductor to being saved by some nice people who give her a ticket. Then five minutes after that, when the guy tells her to buy 48 roses for his mom's birthday, she says with this slight hint of fear: "Why an even number? Never an even number."
Both those bits show she's screwed. Not heavily, but seriously screwed.
While the second one is deeply, seriously screwed (not regarding the abortion, but just generally regarding life decisions and behavior), but that's a different story.
Look, I'm not even worried about them, I'm just pointing things out.
Haneke is great, but don't go bringing up Haneke unless you want Xavi to ban you.
Either you're contradicting yourself, or you have no clue what you're talking about and you're just tossing out nonsense that cancels itself out.
I remember Wilde saying that fools contradict others while the wise contradict themselves, but honestly, there is no internal conflict here because there's simply no room for one. You almost hint at it later by mentioning a "lack of freedom" or "forced decisions," but I really don't get why you'd put two opposing ideas in the exact same sentence.
It's not that I care, I'm just saying.
I don't see it that way. It really just comes down to how you interpret things, because in my view, nothing was intentionally pushed into the background. To me, her friend stays front and center throughout the entire movie. Everything else—what happens while she’s away from the hotel, staying with her boyfriend and his family, and then later with him—is secondary, if we even need to call it that.
Amanda Nguyen5 said:I mentioned the phone thing earlier, but honestly, the tension definitely lets up a bit. The "what's happening with the friend" subplot tries to be pushed to the background by showing us something else entirely, but it shouldn't work that way. For me, it worked, and honestly, the focus shifted more toward what's happening with them rather than "what's happening with her?". That question is still hovering in the air, like you said, but it’s definitely suppressed. Plus, when she returns to the hotel, we see that even the friend herself has suppressed her own "question," since she's basically half-asleep.
Can you make a movie tense at the exact same level the whole time? No, you can't. You go through a natural flow and slightly ramp up the intensity, but I've already said what I think about the tension in this specific film.
Don't get me wrong, I'll say it again: the movie is excellent.
And about what you said at the end, "once you realize what it's about." Man, I've seen so many times where people just skimmed over the plot and wrote things like "girls are aborting" and stuff, which is just stupid. The movie is intentionally made so that for the first thirty or forty-five minutes, you don't quite get what they want; instead, you see that whatever they want, they can't quite grab it (which is the whole point), all while the abortion theme is being shoved in our faces. It's unnecessary. It would have been better if nobody knew anything about the movie beforehand. Though, yeah, you really couldn't avoid that word.
Now I just remembered the beginning. Two genius little details: the main character first says she'll "handle everything with the conductors without any problems," and then when she gets back to the room and her friend asks, "Why did you come back?", she replies, "Don't be superstitious (you aren't a peasant, or something like that)."
Just three minutes later, she goes from being almost kicked off by the conductor to being saved by some nice people who give her a ticket. Then five minutes after that, when the guy tells her to buy 48 roses for his mom's birthday, she says with this slight hint of fear: "Why an even number? Never an even number."
Both those bits show she's screwed. Not heavily, but seriously screwed.
While the second one is deeply, seriously screwed (not regarding the abortion, but just generally regarding life decisions and behavior), but that's a different story.
Look, I'm not even worried about them, I'm just pointing things out.
Haneke is great, but don't go bringing up Haneke unless you want Xavi to ban you.
Either you're contradicting yourself, or you have no clue what you're talking about and you're just tossing out nonsense that cancels itself out.
I remember Wilde saying that fools contradict others while the wise contradict themselves, but honestly, there is no internal conflict here because there's simply no room for one. You almost hint at it later by mentioning a "lack of freedom" or "forced decisions," but I really don't get why you'd put two opposing ideas in the exact same sentence.
It's not that I care, I'm just saying.
Another take on this one. I didn't experience it that way, and I don't think the focus was really on the family bickering at the table. Especially since the camera stays completely static, keeping the lens locked on the main protagonist—who, let's be honest, definitely earns that title—throughout the entire scene.
Amanda Nguyen5 said:I mentioned the phone thing earlier, but honestly, the tension definitely lets up a bit. The "what's happening with the friend" subplot tries to be pushed to the background by showing us something else entirely, but it shouldn't work that way. For me, it worked, and honestly, the focus shifted more toward what's happening with them rather than "what's happening with her?". That question is still hovering in the air, like you said, but it’s definitely suppressed. Plus, when she returns to the hotel, we see that even the friend herself has suppressed her own "question," since she's basically half-asleep.
Can you make a movie tense at the exact same level the whole time? No, you can't. You go through a natural flow and slightly ramp up the intensity, but I've already said what I think about the tension in this specific film.
Don't get me wrong, I'll say it again: the movie is excellent.
And about what you said at the end, "once you realize what it's about." Man, I've seen so many times where people just skimmed over the plot and wrote things like "girls are aborting" and stuff, which is just stupid. The movie is intentionally made so that for the first thirty or forty-five minutes, you don't quite get what they want; instead, you see that whatever they want, they can't quite grab it (which is the whole point), all while the abortion theme is being shoved in our faces. It's unnecessary. It would have been better if nobody knew anything about the movie beforehand. Though, yeah, you really couldn't avoid that word.
Now I just remembered the beginning. Two genius little details: the main character first says she'll "handle everything with the conductors without any problems," and then when she gets back to the room and her friend asks, "Why did you come back?", she replies, "Don't be superstitious (you aren't a peasant, or something like that)."
Just three minutes later, she goes from being almost kicked off by the conductor to being saved by some nice people who give her a ticket. Then five minutes after that, when the guy tells her to buy 48 roses for his mom's birthday, she says with this slight hint of fear: "Why an even number? Never an even number."
Both those bits show she's screwed. Not heavily, but seriously screwed.
While the second one is deeply, seriously screwed (not regarding the abortion, but just generally regarding life decisions and behavior), but that's a different story.
Look, I'm not even worried about them, I'm just pointing things out.
Haneke is great, but don't go bringing up Haneke unless you want Xavi to ban you.
Either you're contradicting yourself, or you have no clue what you're talking about and you're just tossing out nonsense that cancels itself out.
I remember Wilde saying that fools contradict others while the wise contradict themselves, but honestly, there is no internal conflict here because there's simply no room for one. You almost hint at it later by mentioning a "lack of freedom" or "forced decisions," but I really don't get why you'd put two opposing ideas in the exact same sentence.
It's not that I care, I'm just saying.
I can't tell if my friend just pushed her question aside, if she was simply exhausted, or if she truly didn't care... But honestly, the woman is being foolish. That’s just the fact of the matter, and that's how I'd describe her decision to just sleep it off.
Amanda Nguyen5 said:I mentioned the phone thing earlier, but honestly, the tension definitely lets up a bit. The "what's happening with the friend" subplot tries to be pushed to the background by showing us something else entirely, but it shouldn't work that way. For me, it worked, and honestly, the focus shifted more toward what's happening with them rather than "what's happening with her?". That question is still hovering in the air, like you said, but it’s definitely suppressed. Plus, when she returns to the hotel, we see that even the friend herself has suppressed her own "question," since she's basically half-asleep.
Can you make a movie tense at the exact same level the whole time? No, you can't. You go through a natural flow and slightly ramp up the intensity, but I've already said what I think about the tension in this specific film.
Don't get me wrong, I'll say it again: the movie is excellent.
And about what you said at the end, "once you realize what it's about." Man, I've seen so many times where people just skimmed over the plot and wrote things like "girls are aborting" and stuff, which is just stupid. The movie is intentionally made so that for the first thirty or forty-five minutes, you don't quite get what they want; instead, you see that whatever they want, they can't quite grab it (which is the whole point), all while the abortion theme is being shoved in our faces. It's unnecessary. It would have been better if nobody knew anything about the movie beforehand. Though, yeah, you really couldn't avoid that word.
Now I just remembered the beginning. Two genius little details: the main character first says she'll "handle everything with the conductors without any problems," and then when she gets back to the room and her friend asks, "Why did you come back?", she replies, "Don't be superstitious (you aren't a peasant, or something like that)."
Just three minutes later, she goes from being almost kicked off by the conductor to being saved by some nice people who give her a ticket. Then five minutes after that, when the guy tells her to buy 48 roses for his mom's birthday, she says with this slight hint of fear: "Why an even number? Never an even number."
Both those bits show she's screwed. Not heavily, but seriously screwed.
While the second one is deeply, seriously screwed (not regarding the abortion, but just generally regarding life decisions and behavior), but that's a different story.
Look, I'm not even worried about them, I'm just pointing things out.
Haneke is great, but don't go bringing up Haneke unless you want Xavi to ban you.
Either you're contradicting yourself, or you have no clue what you're talking about and you're just tossing out nonsense that cancels itself out.
I remember Wilde saying that fools contradict others while the wise contradict themselves, but honestly, there is no internal conflict here because there's simply no room for one. You almost hint at it later by mentioning a "lack of freedom" or "forced decisions," but I really don't get why you'd put two opposing ideas in the exact same sentence.
It's not that I care, I'm just saying.
Nothing was misunderstood here. The movie is excellent. We're all on the same page.
Amanda Nguyen5 said:I mentioned the phone thing earlier, but honestly, the tension definitely lets up a bit. The "what's happening with the friend" subplot tries to be pushed to the background by showing us something else entirely, but it shouldn't work that way. For me, it worked, and honestly, the focus shifted more toward what's happening with them rather than "what's happening with her?". That question is still hovering in the air, like you said, but it’s definitely suppressed. Plus, when she returns to the hotel, we see that even the friend herself has suppressed her own "question," since she's basically half-asleep.
Can you make a movie tense at the exact same level the whole time? No, you can't. You go through a natural flow and slightly ramp up the intensity, but I've already said what I think about the tension in this specific film.
Don't get me wrong, I'll say it again: the movie is excellent.
And about what you said at the end, "once you realize what it's about." Man, I've seen so many times where people just skimmed over the plot and wrote things like "girls are aborting" and stuff, which is just stupid. The movie is intentionally made so that for the first thirty or forty-five minutes, you don't quite get what they want; instead, you see that whatever they want, they can't quite grab it (which is the whole point), all while the abortion theme is being shoved in our faces. It's unnecessary. It would have been better if nobody knew anything about the movie beforehand. Though, yeah, you really couldn't avoid that word.
Now I just remembered the beginning. Two genius little details: the main character first says she'll "handle everything with the conductors without any problems," and then when she gets back to the room and her friend asks, "Why did you come back?", she replies, "Don't be superstitious (you aren't a peasant, or something like that)."
Just three minutes later, she goes from being almost kicked off by the conductor to being saved by some nice people who give her a ticket. Then five minutes after that, when the guy tells her to buy 48 roses for his mom's birthday, she says with this slight hint of fear: "Why an even number? Never an even number."
Both those bits show she's screwed. Not heavily, but seriously screwed.
While the second one is deeply, seriously screwed (not regarding the abortion, but just generally regarding life decisions and behavior), but that's a different story.
Look, I'm not even worried about them, I'm just pointing things out.
Haneke is great, but don't go bringing up Haneke unless you want Xavi to ban you.
Either you're contradicting yourself, or you have no clue what you're talking about and you're just tossing out nonsense that cancels itself out.
I remember Wilde saying that fools contradict others while the wise contradict themselves, but honestly, there is no internal conflict here because there's simply no room for one. You almost hint at it later by mentioning a "lack of freedom" or "forced decisions," but I really don't get why you'd put two opposing ideas in the exact same sentence.
It's not that I care, I'm just saying.
Before I watched this, I had absolutely no clue what I was getting into. I've actually reached a point where I've stopped doing any research on the internet about films, watching trailers, or reading synopses... anything, really. I just realized that watching a movie that way is much more rewarding. So, I didn't have any idea what this was about; I just popped the disc into the player and hit "play."