Discuss releases by Criterion and the films on them. Threads may contain spoilers!
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DarkImbecile
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#1
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by DarkImbecile » Thu Oct 15, 2020 1:51 pm
Minding the Gap
This extraordinary debut from documentarian Bing Liu weaves a story of skateboarding, friendship, and fathers and sons into a coming-of-age journey of courageous vulnerability. Over the course of several years and with his camera always at the ready, Liu records the rocky paths into adulthood of Keire and Zack, two friends from his own skateboarding community in Rockford, Illinois. As he does so, deeper parallels gradually emerge that ultimately draw the filmmaker into a heartrending confrontation with his own past. With an eye for images of exhilarating poetry and a keen emotional sensitivity, Minding the Gap is a powerfully cathartic portrait of fledgling lives forged in trauma and fighting to break free.
DIRECTOR-APPROVED SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES
- New high-definition digital master, approved by director Bing Liu, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack on the Blu-ray
- New audio commentary featuring Liu and documentary subjects Keire Johnson and Zack Mulligan
- New follow-up conversation between Liu and documentary subject Nina Bowgren
- New programs featuring interviews with professional skateboarder Tony Hawk and with Liu, Minding the Gap executive producer Gordon Quinn, and producer Diane Quon
- Four outtake scenes with introductions by Liu
- Nước (2010), a short film by Liu about two Vietnamese immigrants growing up American
- Trailer
- New English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
PLUS: An essay by critic Jay Caspian Kang
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Boosmahn
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#2
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by Boosmahn » Thu Oct 15, 2020 2:09 pm
I never thought Rockford would be mentioned in a Criterion release's description! I live fairly close to there... maybe I'll recognize some locations.
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aox
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#3
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by aox » Thu Oct 15, 2020 2:14 pm
I remember going into this two years ago with no expectations and was pleasantly surprised.
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DarkImbecile
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#4
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by DarkImbecile » Thu Oct 15, 2020 2:42 pm
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brundlefly
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#5
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by brundlefly » Thu Oct 15, 2020 2:54 pm
Yeah, recognizing that humanity is part of abuse should never, ever happen. It's not exactly a pat, uninvolved work.
Loved this film and am glad Criterion's adding Hulu to the streaming services they're repackaging.
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soundchaser
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#6
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by soundchaser » Thu Oct 15, 2020 2:57 pm
This isn't even the first film in the collection that asks us to sympathize with a domestic abuser. I haven't seen this documentary, so maybe Kenny is right, but his moralizing is kind of gross.
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brundlefly
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#7
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by brundlefly » Thu Oct 15, 2020 3:06 pm
He's got a personal issue with it, and admits he's speaking from a place of anger, but cinema has done angry revenge tales about abuse to the point where they're rote and numbing; there's more than enough room for a sensitive filmmaker surrounded by the cycle struggling to understand their place in it.
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domino harvey
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#8
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by domino harvey » Thu Oct 15, 2020 3:13 pm
I don’t care for way he replies with his personal story like he’s ended the debate. No one expects a survivor of this kind of trauma to necessarily be objective, and it’s more than fine not to be, but recognize both that not everyone who has had a similar trauma will respond in kind and those who haven’t aren’t required to cede to your side
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criterionoop
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#9
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by criterionoop » Thu Oct 15, 2020 3:14 pm
I haven't seen this since it came out, so apologies if I'm wrong:
I personally don't remember being asked to sympathize with any domestic abuser in the film.
The director, if I remember correctly, confronts his mother about the abuse he endured at the hands of his stepfather (and the mother's complacency in the matter by not doing anything). Now if Kenny is referring to Trump supporter in the film, toward the end of the doc you realize that the guy is a loser who is never growing up. But again, my perspective can be wrong since it has been 2 years since I watched this.
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domino harvey
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#10
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by domino harvey » Thu Oct 15, 2020 3:19 pm
I mean, I just rewatched Notorious and Hitchcock allows us to sympathize with a wife-murdering Nazi, so...
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The Narrator Returns
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#11
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by The Narrator Returns » Thu Oct 15, 2020 4:04 pm
I want to be glib and leave it at that the use of a certain Mountain Goats song over the credits would put to rest any idea that this movie soft-pedals domestic abuse, but I'll be bigger than that and agree with those here who say that this is a very understanding work about every element of the cycle of abuse, and reducing it to sympathy for an abuser is a pretty big misrepresentation.
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Boosmahn
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#12
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by Boosmahn » Thu Oct 15, 2020 4:09 pm
I'm assuming that Mountain Goats song is from The Sunset Tree? Such a powerful album.
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mfunk9786
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#13
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by mfunk9786 » Thu Oct 15, 2020 4:38 pm
Boosmahn wrote: ↑Thu Oct 15, 2020 4:09 pm
I'm assuming that Mountain Goats song is from The Sunset Tree? Such a powerful album.
Been listening to it a lot recently just out of coincidence. It is indeed a stunning album. It's "This Year," btw.
Anyway, I haven't seen this film but came in to share Kenny's take, so there it is. I hope he's doing ok personally, because he's been doing a lot of this lately. As a friend of David Foster Wallace, he was so up in arms about the brief mention of Wallace in Charlie Kaufman's new film that he was railing about how Kaufman was now on his pay no mind list (to put it politely) for days. I would not put too much stock in his bloviating, and I say that as someone who likes his writing quite a bit.
But from what I can gather, Zack Mulligan is the person in question that Kenny is taking issue with the portrayal of.
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Luke M
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#14
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by Luke M » Sun Oct 18, 2020 4:31 am
domino harvey wrote:I mean, I just rewatched Notorious and Hitchcock allows us to sympathize with a wife-murdering Nazi, so...
Certainly there's a difference between a fictional character and an actual abuser, correct? Assuming this is a documentary?
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hearthesilence
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#15
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by hearthesilence » Sun Oct 18, 2020 1:36 pm
Hitchcock's aesthetic and theories may be at odds with what's being discussed here (though it does perhaps revisit that ancient debate over cinéma vérité's core principles).
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hearthesilence
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#16
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by hearthesilence » Sun Oct 18, 2020 1:41 pm
mfunk9786 wrote: ↑Thu Oct 15, 2020 4:38 pm
Boosmahn wrote: ↑Thu Oct 15, 2020 4:09 pm
I'm assuming that Mountain Goats song is from The Sunset Tree? Such a powerful album.
Been listening to it a lot recently just out of coincidence. It is indeed a stunning album. It's "This Year," btw.
Anyway, I haven't seen this film but came in to share Kenny's take, so there it is. I hope he's doing ok personally, because he's been doing a lot of this lately. As a friend of David Foster Wallace, he was so up in arms about the brief mention of Wallace in Charlie Kaufman's new film that he was railing about how Kaufman was now on his pay no mind list (to put it politely) for days. I would not put too much stock in his bloviating, and I say that as someone who likes his writing quite a bit.
But from what I can gather, Zack Mulligan is the person in question that Kenny is taking issue with the portrayal of.
I think this came up with
Manchester by the Sea, which he initially rated pretty well on letterboxd only to eviscerate it publicly. He's since been open about his struggles with alcoholism, and thankfully he's been on the wagon for at least a decade now, but likewise his perspective of that film was also shaped by personal experience.
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mfunk9786
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#17
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by mfunk9786 » Sun Oct 18, 2020 2:54 pm
Luke M wrote: ↑Sun Oct 18, 2020 4:31 am
domino harvey wrote:I mean, I just rewatched Notorious and Hitchcock allows us to sympathize with a wife-murdering Nazi, so...
Certainly there's a difference between a fictional character and an actual abuser, correct? Assuming this is a documentary?
There is; it is
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whaleallright
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#18
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by whaleallright » Sat Oct 24, 2020 8:28 pm
Kenny's self-appointed guardianship of the David Foster Wallace legacy rubs me the wrong way—even when I basically agree with whatever objection he's voicing—in part because it sometimes seems like he's just relishing another opportunity to remind people he knew the guy.
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cdnchris
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#20
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by cdnchris » Tue Jan 05, 2021 6:35 pm
mfunk9786 wrote: ↑Thu Oct 15, 2020 4:38 pm
But from what I can gather, Zack Mulligan is the person in question that Kenny is taking issue with the portrayal of.
Yes, I'm pretty sure that's who Kenny is referring to, not the stepfather. I'm not sure whether spoilers are required, but I'll keep it a bit vague as not to "spoil" anything as it comes up in the commentary, too: in the group commentary (there is a second commentary just with Liu that I haven't listened to yet) this is brought up and the person in question doesn't want to talk about it while one of the other participants does push it a bit, explaining that something "obviously" happened based on a recording, but they're walking on eggshells, pushing it but not. They're also talking remotely (one is sick and apparently awaiting a COVID test result) so I think that allows them to brush it off and not take it on directly since they're not in the same room together.
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mfunk9786
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#21
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by mfunk9786 » Wed Jan 06, 2021 12:33 am
whaleallright wrote: ↑Sat Oct 24, 2020 8:28 pm
Kenny's self-appointed guardianship of the David Foster Wallace legacy rubs me the wrong way—even when I basically agree with whatever objection he's voicing—in part because it sometimes seems like he's just relishing another opportunity to remind people he knew the guy.
Glad someone said this. It's exhausting.
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swo17
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#22
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by swo17 » Fri Jan 15, 2021 1:28 pm
cdnchris wrote: ↑Tue Jan 05, 2021 6:35 pm
mfunk9786 wrote: ↑Thu Oct 15, 2020 4:38 pm
But from what I can gather, Zack Mulligan is the person in question that Kenny is taking issue with the portrayal of.
Yes, I'm pretty sure that's who Kenny is referring to, not the stepfather. I'm not sure whether spoilers are required, but I'll keep it a bit vague as not to "spoil" anything as it comes up in the commentary, too: in the group commentary (there is a second commentary just with Liu that I haven't listened to yet) this is brought up and the person in question doesn't want to talk about it while one of the other participants does push it a bit, explaining that something "obviously" happened based on a recording, but they're walking on eggshells, pushing it but not. They're also talking remotely (one is sick and apparently awaiting a COVID test result) so I think that allows them to brush it off and not take it on directly since they're not in the same room together.
There's actually a point in the commentary where he says she lied about him being physically abusive, so as to explain the recording of her repeatedly threatening to kill him
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Black Hat
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#23
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by Black Hat » Sun Jan 17, 2021 2:25 am
What exactly is the beef here and what is it trying to achieve? I mean the whole point of art, as far as I understand it, is to make you uncomfortable within your peace and to criss cross those lines in ways that force you to reckon with your emotional response. Minding the Gap, in this regard, was one of cinema's most successful attempts at achieving this in recent memory so what gives? I just can't help but to think that so much of these various outrages, outside of those cynical enough to profit off of it, are simply attempts to avoid dealing with uncomfortable feelings with the righteousness more born out of a narcissistic desire to sanitize the world than it is anything else. Who cares if this approach kills what's left of the art space right? We'll always have more 'prestige tv' to binge. Sigh...
Glenn Kenny's a very nice man so this is less a rebuke of him personally and more of a comment/observation on the Twitteratti at large.
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yoloswegmaster
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#24
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by yoloswegmaster » Mon Jan 25, 2021 8:34 am
Minding the Svet
Is it normal for a reviewer to predict that someone will replace the booze for a "deadly dose of fentanyl" in order to stop their pain? He's also claiming that a lack of father figures is the major cause of crime, poverty, and social unrest.
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CSM126
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#25
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by CSM126 » Mon Jan 25, 2021 9:11 am
yoloswegmaster wrote: ↑Mon Jan 25, 2021 8:34 am
Minding the Svet
Is it normal for a reviewer to predict that someone will replace the booze for a "deadly dose of fentanyl" in order to stop their pain? He's also claiming that a lack of father figures is the major cause of crime, poverty, and social unrest.
I’m just thankful he didn’t segue into some nonsense about blaming lesbian adoption or something after I read that.
The man’s a buffoon (there’s a Dr. Seuss book for ya: The Buffoon with the Bassoon!).