Egad ~ there's WHAT ~ something like a 30-year age difference between Swank's and Jones' characters, and we're supposed to buy that he's doing her some kind of favor??? {{{ Cringe }}}
Not to mention that Tommy Lee, for all his considerable acting finesse, has decades of hard drinking behind him which are taking their toll: he's starting to resemble the butt-hole of a prune, especially in his opening scene!
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So, you're a proponent of plastic surgery? Or should actors contact you personally to find out if they meet your attractiveness standards before continuing in the movie business. For someone with deep in their name, you seem to take quite a shallow view of the whole situation.
shareI have to laugh at the suggestion that I might endorse plastic surgery as I sit here with zero Botox (or any other procedure) and undyed long silver hair!
Please be real here:
When is the last time you saw a 70-something homely woman mount a 40-ish comely guy in a movie, AND act like she was doing him a big favor? And the audience was supposed to buy it?
Uh---huh....
In Hollywood, if even a middle-aged plump woman (Kathy Bates) finds a man attractive (James Caan, who is actually eight years OLDER than Bates), she has to tie him down and break his limbs to get his attention (MISERY).
Dear Deep,
- This was in the 1800's
- She was a virgin, and wanted to do it once before she offed herself
- He was the only guy I saw there
You are comparing today with 150 years ago. Apples does not equal oranges. She wanted to marry him out of a need to have someone help run her farm, not that she was hot to trot for his bod. If you don't get it, you don't get it. I've done all I can do to try to help.
Well, Timberwolf, I DO appreciate your input even if you haven't converted me. And, truth be told, we can discuss the Historical period from all sorts of facets if we want to bolster our arguments:
Women were much desired in the wild and woolly West as the pioneer life was so tough: by this movie's own standards, three of them couldn't cut the proverbial mustard and had to be transported back East: damaged goods.
In fact, women were sooo desired that, during the Indian Wars (sorry genocidal chapter) a military man named Hooker was commissioned to transport prostitutes by the trainload out to western saloons to service the soldiers. I have a colleague who is a much-chagrined descendant of this man, and she tells me that the women were initially called "Hooker's Girls" and eventually just "Hookers."
All this to make the point that, as "bossy" as Mary might have appeared, she was also landed, economically secure, comely, hard-working and sane. In other words, highly desirable, and shouldn't have had to be so desperate as to beg sexual favor from a grizzly, smelly old coot. Ugh.
But he WAS doing her a favor. He didn't want or need a woman and considering his age and how much he drank, his sex drive was probably nonexistent.
Mary Bee was definitely a catch, but he wasn't fishing. It's too bad he didn't realize how important it was to Mary Bee to be desired, but he is who he is.
and I'm saying that she was scraping the bottom of the proverbial barrel to have to turn to him, especially given that the runaway crazy lady got a taker in 2.5 seconds. You think guys wouldn't have come on to her in the past?
The whole scene was probably a TLJ fantasy, and typical of those indulged by Hollywood producers.
The runaway crazy lady was young and attractive -- and without the presence of mind to put up a fight. She got a "taker" all right -- she would have been passed around and left for dead. Did you think that guy was going to marry her?
Yes, Mary Bee was scraping the bottom of the barrel. That was the point. With all she had to offer, no one wanted her.
And there wasn't much in that barrel. The guy she had to dinner was a lout. Proposing marriage to him was the act of a desperate woman.
Of course the creep had no decent intentions toward the crazy one; I just used her as an example of how desperate the men were to get a woman. Yes she was younger and more attractive than Mary, BUT she was crazy and that will out. That jerk was sleazy as all get-out and obviously a foil to make TLJ's character (somewhat) more appealing.
My argument here (and I'm willing to fold the cards after this since we see matters too differently to really converse) is that the story seemed rigged to me. Mary could say she was as plain as dirt all she wanted to, but even with her looks played down, you couldn't disguise that sensual mouth and comely figure. "Methinks she protests too much."
She had far too much going for her to be deemed as hard up as depicted. It boiled down to, "You can't win for losing" in her case, and I don't buy it, knowing what I do re: that historical epoch. She was heading back East, too, where the population was greater and the pickings not as slim. No need to throw herself at a squatter and deserter who'd just turned down her marriage proposal.
We saw all that she had going for her. The men she encountered didn't. For whatever reason, she was 31 years old and unmarried in a part of the country where women were scarce.
We don't know why she wasn't snatched up by some smart man (or even a dumb one), but she wasn't. We've all met people with good qualities and thought "How are you still single?" Couldn't the same be true of Mary Bee?
I do get your point. Mary Bee asking Briggs for sex didn't naturally flow from what we'd seen of her. Why was she so desperate right then? Maybe a combination of being lost for a day and a night, the child's desecrated grave, the scary encounter with the Indians. Life is short, gather ye rosebuds . . . ?
My argument here (and I'm willing to fold the cards after this since we see matters too differently to really converse) is that the story seemed rigged to me. Mary could say she was as plain as dirt all she wanted to, but even with her looks played down, you couldn't disguise that sensual mouth and comely figure. "Methinks she protests too much."
Good point ~ Once I saw her me sure of success, via her homestead, I too imagined she'd be intimidating!
shareDeepCinema.. I agree with you.
In real life, she would have been a prize to the men in the west. They needed a woman who could work next to them and the fact that she could maintain a comfortable home was a huge plus.
She had so many positives that she would have been able to choose a husband.
How was she heading back east? She was expected back home by July 4th. And if she had wanted a husband, why not get one in New York before she went West. Obviously she had ample means. That fine farm was not gained in a day, there was a substantial investment made. And you have to have deep secure pockets to not just survive the hard seasons, but expand and prosper. Her circumstances were a long way from hand to mouth, I would regard her as probably the wealthiest person in the area, and very powerful.
shareShe was scraping the bottom of the barrel, and the movie never denies that... TLJ isn't meant to be a catch, either - he's the last resort of a woman with no other offers.
We're never given a reason why she would be passed over, but equally we're never shown anything that contradicts that circumstance, either... so take it on face value; she's unwanted, and he is the only option she has.
"Your mother puts license plates in your underwear? How do you sit?!"
You might want to double check your history, because you don't have that story quite right. General Hooker was one of the failed commanders of the Army of the Potomac during the Civil War, one of the losers who preceded Grant. He always made sure that there was booze, gambling, and women available for his men around the camps. It was there that the women became known as Hooker's girls, and eventually just hookers. Unfortunately, he was nowhere nearly as good as dealing with Lee as he was at providing material comforts for his soldiers, which finally led to Lincoln bringing Grant east to deal with the Army of Virginia.
We provide ... Leverage.
A small point: After two weeks on the trail, they ALL stunk pretty bad.
shareYou never know what you will see when you come on imdb boards, or the Internet as a whole. But I have to say "the butt-hole of a prune" is one of the most original insults I've heard in quite a while.
I have come here to chew bubble gum and kick ass, and I'm all out of bubble gum.
Thanks! Your bubble-gum/kick-ass combo platter assures me you'd appreciate such.
It was played for a laugh and actually pared down from "a Platypus poking outta the butt-hole of a prune."
After all, TLJ did his best to look really atrocious in the opening scenes after the smokey, ashen explosion, all the better to afford contrast when he cleaned up and decked himself out later back East!
Well, of course the sex scene was cringe worthy - and yes, it was hard to believe from a modern perspective.
But I'm astonished that you would somehow isolate this desperate act within the context of her life.
Mary was constantly being rejected for her agency (and looks), and she felt so degraded by having to resort to such a desperate measure that she ended up taking her own life.
I'm also puzzled by your tendency to project your own assumptions and values onto the film's situations and characters (by citing screenwriting 101 and your disdain for nihilism in other threads).
If you want to understand the film on its own terms, cite your own moral disquiet at the film's sex scene and ending. It had this effect on you because the film achieved its desired result (trying to replicate the dire situation of women in the West, and the dubious nature of male redemption).
I didn't like the way things played out either - but I don't assume that's the film's moral failing. It's more a consequence of my own situation in life. Perhaps you're the one being vacuous by insisting that the film should pander to your sensibilities and/or some screen writing manual.
"Maggie"? I believe you're conflating Hilary Swank characters.
So now if a person (myself) comes on a chat-board to discuss a movie, and I bring my own values to the table, I'm being vacuous? Au contraire: Vacuous would be my being a tabula rasa and just accepting some old coot's May~December sex fantasy and being a-okay with one woman being sacrificed, three reduced to cartoon loonies. and another a sanctimonious mouthpiece for a patriarchal religion.
Yes, SOME of these depictions were true to era, of course, BUT:
There was potential here for one or more of the crazy women to articulate some truth about that age, and that went untapped. Same goes for Mary: if she was coming to the end of her rope, she could have expressed her anguish re: how all her efforts failed to fulfill her dreams, and he unfairness of it all.
Of COURSE I bring my own values to the table, as do you, only when yours differ from mine, I appreciate your perspective as other, and don't resort to ad hominem attacks.
We obviously all bring our values to bear when interpreting something, but it's also the obligation of the interpreter to (try and) distinguish between their interpretation and the object being interpreted.
I just take exception to such a superficial reading of a film from someone who calls themselves deep cinema. I've seen very little indication of depth in your response to the film because you refuse to see past your own assumptions and sensibilities (although the film is clearly an attempt to throw these very things into question).
I have to confess that I dreaded the possibility of a romantic entanglement between the two leads, and was very disappointed to see Mary implore George to marry her, and then present herself naked to him in a state of emotional distress. Taken in isolation, these scenes could be viewed as male wish fulfillment - a view encouraged by the fact that the actor also happened to be the co writer and director.
But the subsequent turn of events - and our response to them - indicates that male wish fulfillment or fantasy were not the issue. This was an act of desperation and/or degradation that culminated in a very upsetting development. Her anguish was 'expressed' through her actions, and found expression in our own shock at her moral degradation.
George's subsequent murder of the hotel staff was also a reminder that we were dealing with a very unsavory (or amoral and self serving) character. You seem to think that the film endorses his machismo when it is clearly an indictment on his moral character or a reflection of the amorality of the era - but the film complicates our reaction by making his victims similarly dubious in character.
The film is an anti Western in that it does not offer the consolations of conventional narrative, and it's odd that you insist that you should have somehow felt consoled by it anyway. The film did not need to sign post anything because it trusted viewers to draw its own conclusions about troubling situations and characters.
I emphatically agree with you about one thing though - the 'mad' women were ridiculous characters given short thrift by the film, and I would have liked to have seen a more sympathetic (or rounded) characterization. I'd go so far as to suggest that the film's claim to feminism is compromised by reducing these three women to mere pretext and caricature.
I see the wish-fulfillment on the part of Tommy Lee Jones, not that of his character, Briggs, who was too much of a lout and reprobate to ever team up with a woman outside of the type of economic arrangement forced upon him when Mary rescued him from death by hanging, making her eventual demise via the same route all the more tragic.
SOME pioneer women DID survive, else the West would never have been settled, and by having Mary defeated, this nightmare takes out the best of them.
You want more depth? Mine may not jibe with your consciousness. But I am always aware that Life (the Manifest realm) feeds on Death (the Spirit realm), a yin and yang dance. And the better the caliber of those sacrificed, the easier it is for the living to be carried by their spirits. We see this all the time with the overused "noble widower" character who is granted sympathy and admiration for suffering his loss and spared the messiness of actual engagement with a living woman.
Mary deserved Life in all its manifest joys, rewards and pleasures, and to reduce her fate to something even worse than that which was served up the *crazy ladies* carries Briggs forward on a wave of honor he hardly deserved, one which he vaguely and briefly acknowledged before regressing into unconsciousness and thuggery. He even offloaded any felt obligation to honor Mary's sterling character onto the young woman to whom he proposed (another Ewwww moment).
Amen (Amama) for me on this topic.
P.S.
Have you seen The Keeping Room? "Left without men in the dying days of the American Civil War, three Southern women - two sisters and one African-American slave - must fight to defend their home and themselves from two rogue soldiers who have broken off from the fast-approaching Union Army." Unfortunately, I can't find it on Netflix; might prove antidote to this sorry tale.
I haven't seen the Keeping Room, and I'm not sure it has even been officially released yet (despite being made a couple of years ago). It probably hasn't been released because the film is seen through the lens of female experience - which is a sorry tale in itself.
It should be stressed that the movie is based on a novel written by a man in 1988 - and he is famous for offering disquieting views on male perspectives.
http://www.glendonswarthout.com/novels/homesman.htm
If you want to be upset by a woman's place in the world, its probably best to stay clear of the BBC documentary India's Daughters.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07yBWmSwF3E
I found the men's views of women so appalling that I had to turn it off. I only cite it because spirituality - in the form of the mechanism of karma - provides the social context for rape culture. As if to prove a point, here's a famous spiritual leader's view of women
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/drishtikone/2013/01/gandhi-also-blamed-women-for-getting-raped-do-misogyny-and-obsession-with-sexual-purity-go-hand-in-hand/
India? Hoo-Boy!
What do you make of the women's vigilante groups there? Excessive or necessity?
Thanks, Monkeygland (???) FYI: When you post a link, above the body of your text, there should be a number of helpful beige boxes, the third from the left being "Link." Highlight your link & click on link & that can make your suggestions "clickable" as they say.
http://www.glendonswarthout.com/novels
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07yBWmSwF3E
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/drishtikone/2013/01/gandhi-also-blamed-wo men-for-getting-raped-do-misogyny-and-obsession-with-sexual-purity-go- hand-in-hand/
Yes. I consider that one of the more brilliant metaphors I've ever encountered.
Watch the Hateful 8. Best insults ever - sack shooting bush whacker a personal fave
shareI thought his response was going to be his horse had fallen, and he couldn't get it up.........
Woah Nelly.......
🐴
I would say his face is as much the product of polo playing and living on a working ranch as hard drinking...
"That's the beauty of argument, Joey...if you argue correctly, you are never wrong..."
Yes, that too, of course!
But as a film columnist who was warned off him by other journalists who said he was impossible to interview and came across as a "mean drunk" I added that element.
Don't get me wrong ~ I enjoy his acting skills very much! But this movie largely disappointed me.
Hope Swank resolves her Father issues soon!
Two of the ugliest people in the world having sex !! YYYUUUKKKKKK
You obviously have never cracked open a history book. The combination of smug and ignorant is really sad.
Dunning-Kruger Effect on display.
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