3 Hateful Links. 16 Nicer Ones.
Wednesday, December 30, 2015 at 4:15PM As you may have heard The Hateful Eight expanded a smidge early today into nearly 2000 theaters after the success of its roadshow weekend. So here are 8 links about the movie because we're feeling masochistic...
Variety The Hateful Eight is leading current movies in spending the most for TV ads
Deadline an interview with Hateful Eight's costume designer Courtney Hoffman. (Everyone knows I hate the movie but I actually liked her work in it a lot!)
Awards Daily Sasha struggles to suss out what Tarantino is doing with Daisy (Jennifer Jason Leigh) in The Hateful Eight and tries to make sense of the many journalist opinions on whether its an inherently "misogynist" work. I'd love to defend Tarantino on this front personally but I have to face facts. He hasn't written a good female character since Inglorious Basterds. He's lost that particular skill. But I don't think he's misogynist so much as betraying his ultimate misanthropy with his ugliest most masturbatory movie.
Escape From Minnie's Haberdashery (for more hospital climes)
Gothamist Russell Crowe throwing tantrums again -- this time about hoverboards
Guardian I'm eager to hear what our resident Australian Glenn thinks of their choices for best Aussie films of the year
Gawker "the year in Gay"
Empire first look at Michael Fassbender in Assassin's Creed
Vanity Fair picks the best new TV characters of the year from series including Daredevil, Empire, UNReal, Fresh Off the Boat and more
Antagony & Ecstasy Tim's razor sharp review of 45 Years is a must-read but then so is his...
Antagony & Ecstasy ...review of Carol. Basically he continues to be one of the web's most underappreciated frequently inspired film critics.
Meanwhile on Jakku...
Variety Carrie Fisher on her body shamers
imgur "how BB-8 works"
NPR Nigerians are getting excited about Star Wars... in large part thanks to John Boyega
i09 going to see Star Wars: The Force Awakens a second time? i09 has a list of 23 things to watch out for
LA Times talks to the designers of Mad Max, Star Wars, and Mockingjay sequels on their dives into genre work
LA Times and here's a dissenting voice on the cultural phenomenon if you're not feeling the love
Reverse Shot has an amazingly insightful lengthy review of The Force Awakens that grapples with the film only speaking its own Star Wars language and impatiently exploiting old adventures to venture out on new ones.
Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe are "Nice Guys" - Movies are make believe!
2016?
We're so not ready to go there. It's not really our practice at TFE to look ahead to the following year before the Oscars wrap (the true end to the film year) but I have bookmarked this article "61 Original Movie We're Dying to See in 2016" because it's cute on the rare occasion that people realize that non-sequels exist. The Guardian has no such anti-sequel slant in their "75 films we're excited about" and they go full in for any movie that drives traffic so say hello to the superhero films even the ones that are daring us to agonize over how bad they might be like the scowl-a-thon of Batman v Superman.
Reader Comments (12)
I really liked Hateful Eight (flees in terror)
I am also interested in Glenn's comments, but my main reactions are:
1. PARTISAN - whaaaa? That movie was awful
2. HOLDING THE MAN not making the list is a disappointment (for my money, this and FURY ROAD were the best Australian films of the year)
Regarding that Guardian list...
- I haven't seen all of the films, like SPEAR (which only played at Adelaide Film Festival and I wasn't able to fit it in) or SUICIDE THEORY (which has a very fractured local release history), but I generally like the list.
- Except RUBEN GUTHRIE. That movie was appalling.
- No HOLDING THE MAN, which is ridiculous to not include. It's my no. 2 aussie film of the year (behind Mad Max) and it's extraordinary and I love it.
- Travis, I too thought PARTISAN was very good. Perhaps the best I've ever seen of Vincent Cassel.
- I'm kind of worried I will see EMBRACE OF THE SERPENT and it will be diluted because I have already seen TANNA, which was an Aus-Vanuatu coproduction cast with native actors, using stunning cinematography, and so on.
reading the Guardian list, just found out Andrea Arnold of Fish Tank fame has new movie coming soon? Jumped up to the top of the anticipation list.
I agree with your thoughts on Tim's writing. I consider his reviews essential for anyone who loves film. Such a great writer.
Anyone who doesn't realize Jennifer Jason Leigh just created an iconic film character (one can only wish there would be a spin-off movie called The Hateful One) is missing the boat. Daisy is a character unlike any other in the history of movies, both in writing and in performance.
Whether the Oscars respond to it or not is irrelevant and it doesn't define its quality.
With this role and Lisa in Anomalisa, Jason Leigh, the most nominated person ever for the Spirit Awards, seems to be in a good position to regain her place as the most coveted actress by the most respected directors, which was the case in the 90's (the list of roles she turned down during her peak years, which she recently admitted to have some regret towards, is astounding).
She really is an actress like no other - no vanity, no glamour, just pure courage and an inquisitive mind.
I didn't have a problem with Daisy as a character. I didn't have a problem with the treatment she endured. I had a problem with how much exaggerated abuse was inflicted on her by the makeup department.
The black eye was one thing. Now stack on the extremely exaggerated (and sometimes really bad looking) use of blood, bruising, teeth busting, swelled up nonsense and you start to question whether or not Daisy could even see well enough to face people in conversation before the intermission. She's the ONLY character shown injured for half of the film and it's a jarring contrast to say the least. By the end, she looks like the possessed girl in the basement in Evil Dead; you know, totally unrecognizable as human.
Now, I do think there's merit in arguing that QT wanted people to recognize the male characters relishing in misogyny because they were told Daisy was a criminal. Even then, we only get to see Daisy react one time to this violence: when she mouths off at Major Warren early in the film. That scene is just used as a way to justify the poor treatment of Mary by establishing her as an unapologetic racist. But other unapologetic racists in the film don't get smashed in the face every time they open their mouths, which somehow means being a woman is worse than being a racist after the unconditional surrender of the Confederacy.
I think you're right, Nathaniel, in that Daisy probably reads better on the page than she did in the film. The edit removed JJL's reaction to the constant stream of abuse until the final chapter and by then it's too little, too late to justify the central character's insignificance when she's supposed to be in so much of the film.
And I agree with your view on casting the role. JJL is great in the film, but a more physically intimidating actress, one you might believe is a danger to herself and others, would have been a better pick. Imagine a Kristen Johnston type towering over The Hangman, dragged around by a chain on her wrist. She could clearly stand toe to toe with the men if she wasn't being held prisoner. Someone as small as JJL would have to rely on her mouth and kind of puts the whole 10K bounty for a murderer plot device questionable.
@ Robert G
By what you wrote, you seem to imply you were expecting verossimilitude? In a Tarantino film?
Daisy knows she is going to be physically punished when she defies John Ruth and she does it all the same. Why? Because she can take the abuse, because she has experienced abuse before in her life and that is part of the reason she is mentally ill. She is actually using the violence inflicted upon her as a way to put the rest of them on the edge, letting them know she is unpredictable and unreachable. I felt every time she received some physical punishment, she fought back by not showing defeat and later on, even laughing at it. Hey, if the other guys were not in cahoots with her, it wouldn't be surprising that she would suffer sexual violence as well. I actually believe it to be very realistic that those characters, being prone to violence, being ignorant and misogynistic as they are, would treat a criminal who is teasing them the way she is with the amount of brutality that they do. Why that could even be an issue that would prevent anyone from appreciating the greatness on display is the real mystery to me.
I don't justify Daisy's treatment. But my reaction to that was the same I have with The Three Stooges all my life, I'm not particular interested or angry. Just bored, sometimes. I feel it is cartoonish, and Tarantino always played by these rules when it come to physical abuse (or verbal, btw)
The "problem" is that nobody else in the film receive this kind of treatment. JJL character is the ultimate outlaw, leader of a depicable band of brothers. I wonder what would be the movie if (alert: spoilers!!) Daisy would be on the cellar instead of his brother? If you think about, it would be totally different.
I'm most annoyed, really, because that's the same treatment Iñárritu gives upon Di Caprio on another absurdly violent film and NOBODY says anythin about this. I'm aware of the difference between "representation of a character" and "permormance of a character" But Di Caprio is asked to play FOR REAL in the name of TRUTH (ringing a bell with Birdman, perhaps?) and those things become a blur when The Revenant got so serious about it that becomes, plain and simple, misanthropy. Maybe Leo being a man and a commited actor as he is, deserves it. Abjection for men is more gullible, no?. Even more so when REAL. Pity, since Tarantino plays for effect, and Iñarritu for REAL. So, who's the worst kind of basterd, me thinks?
I'll only say if Di Caprio is given a nomination for his endurance test in that film (wich I despise, way more than H8), then JJL should be nominated too, or we'll have a reason to say the Academy REALLY is all about liking misanthropy, but not when it comes to women. And the rest of the critics, too. Go figure!
I did thoroughly enjoy the Hateful 8 and oddly enough YOU just said the same thing I think of it. It's qt masturbating for 3 hrs. And call me a slut but I loved every second (well, almost, Minnie ironically was the main reason the only chapter she was featured in was tolerable, that and Channing if only for the ridiculous way he announces his name). I will admit tho he's getting sharper with his themes and worse with his actual characters who voice and carry QTS themes. As much as I loved Daisy Domergue a little more fleshing would have been nice. And I was talking about QTS status as a feminist director which I disagreed with. Sure he writes good women roles but how many are there per film? And what is the reason for that? Why does he absolutely have to include men as a majority?
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