MovieChat Forums > The Tracey Fragments (2008) Discussion > Does this movie exaggerate people's stup...

Does this movie exaggerate people's stupidity/cruelty to create drama?

posted 15 years ago by PulpFictionWhatsInTheBriefcase
6 replies | jump to latest

I mean, there are a lot of examples I could go in to, but anywhere I lived, people see a 15 year old girl stumbling around at night naked with a shower curtain on, they're going to be calling the cops.

My brother in law used to drive a night time, high-risk bus route in Phoenix, Arizona for a bunch of years. Says you have to have a cop's eye for potential trouble and you have to act responsibly if for only the reason you have to cover your own ass and avoid liability.

I mean that is just one example. This is sort of like nihilism for the sake of nihilism. Everyone is apathetic or malicious to the point where they are almost cardboard cut-out villains. There is nothing redemptive in *anyone.* Come on.

It almost seems like this movie takes place in the early 1980s, there's really nothing modern about it.

[–] cinemajunky 14 years ago

And that's why I really think most of it is in her head. If she has borderline personality disorder, it would make sense from her perspective, that everyone is out to get her in one way or another. It's sort of a paranoid persecution complex.
Too bad the movie is so disjointed as it seems they sacrificed the plot in favor of the style. Lo siento...

__________________________________
I ain't your friend, palooka.

[–] jevicci 14 years ago

I agree with cinemajunky. A main function of this movie is that it's never entirely clear what is in fact reality, and what's a recollection or experience being interpreted through her own individual perceptions, or, for that matter, even just pure fantasy. It can be frustrating if you're looking for a coherent storyline, but that's not what this movie aims to deliver, in my opinion. I think it aims to convey what it's like inside the mind of a distraught and desperate young teenager, and in that regard, I think it does very well. Teenagers around that age often see everyone around them as stupid or mean, especially if they're in such a dysfunctional environment and as discontent as she is.

I forget the character's name, but the guy that picked her up from the alley and took her to his apartment seemed like the lone exception to what you're talking about. He seemed to genuinely want to help her. It's too bad things went so horribly wrong there.

It certainly is more than a little unrealistic that a 15-year old riding the bus at night and walking around alone during the winter with little more than a shower curtain wrapped around her would just be left alone like that, but the time frame here is also unknown. This may be just a few hours in the very wee hours of the morning when no one's really around. It's certainly possible.

[–] teadogg4 12 years ago

The big clue is that everyone in the movie mentions this mysterious blizzard that's supposed to be coming soon...

How many times do you see it snowing in the film?? By my count only one-- the VERY LIGHT snow coming down at the end. A girl in a shower curtain walking around in below-zero weather doesn't sound at all realistic.

Part of the fun of this movie is trying to nail down the facts, and separating them from fantasy.

HEY BABY LOOK AT MY EYES. I LOVE YA BUT I HATE YOUR LIES.

[–] mulhollandpsycho 14 years ago

The movie takes place inside Tracey's head. She says so in so many words, in a cut to her on the bus dressed in the shower curtain.

Think of what the shower curtain could represent. It's transparent. She's naked. Wearing a transparent article for clothing.

The psych tranny (yes, tranny, get over being "offended" people) accuses her of being delusional, & Borderline. I'm a psych major, and I've known my share of Borderlines. It's pure chaos for the sufferer, and everyone suffers.

Tracey probably isn't on the bus at all in the shower-curtain scenes.

Want a real incoherent film? Try David Lynch, or "Synechdoche, New York" by Charlie Kaufman. "The Tracey Fragments" is brilliant in its portrayal of mental illness without compromising the integrity of the audience (like "Shutter Island"). It's not all spelled out for you. ("Memento" spelled it out, but it was still a brilliant picture so I pardon it.)

I've been wanting for ten years to write something as clear as this movie.

[–] 14 years ago

[deleted]

[–] bradwhist 12 years ago

This movie is not a recount of what happened. Its Tracey's recount of what happened. She recalls a inaccurate and exaggerated version of the actual events.