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Another Filner accuser comes forward...honest!
Sexuality can be joyous at all ages! Of course, sex should be welcome.— August 23, 2013 9:27 a.m.
Blue Jasmine review makes reader see red
Yes, it was more like a play and it was founded in a play. Allen took a great play and added depth and currency. This movie "showed" us much about people and about American life. He "showed" the lives of the characters in the ways they live--the apartments/houses--and in the relationships with the children and with lovers. This is an important reason for many of us to attend dramas--the most important reason. Maybe it is not your reason, but as a critic, you may want to open up to the many ways that people can appreciate movies. I read a lot so a film is more compressed for me than my usual experience of stories and information. As for the structure of the story, I can see how it was oddly jumpy. The narration was intrusive at first, but less so as the film rolled and became part of the total story. That, too, is a old literary technique, e.g., Greek chorus or voice of the narrator, that is employed to raise the awareness of the viewer, stimulate reflection through a layer of distance from the events unfolding. This is the opposite of being bombarded by explosions, asteroids, etc. The jaws of the entire house dropped when the pivotal scene of the downfall was revealed. And one way to evaluate stories is their impact -- the impact was undeniable. Often when a person is educated or focused on technical considerations, this very sensitivity can get in the way of the lens that many "regular" filmgoers bring to the experience. Critics may bring their own opinions, plus, hopefully, they will bring to the audience greater understanding of how the film experience was created. My favorite critic is Anthony Lane in the New Yorker whose reviews themselves are not just insightful, but so witty and well crafted as to be an aesthetic experience in the reading. I suppose anyone who creates for the general public might keep that public in mind.— August 10, 2013 7:27 a.m.
Blue Jasmine review makes reader see red
This movie has a lot of depth and addresses real social issues not often seen in movies. I refer to class, of course. That is the subject of this movie. The two non-sisters demonstrate the patterns and styles of two different social classes as well as the attitudes of the classes to one another. Allen is concerned with moral issues, as well. That the "higher" class is morally empty and exploitive is the tragedy of this movie. Yes, tragedy, since tragedy includes the fall of an elevated person, so say the Greeks (and also Tennessee Williams in Woody Allen's source material, *Streetcar Named Desire*. The women are both more sympathetic than comments suggest. The audience really feels for Jasmine, despite her flaws, and that feeling was palpable in the theatre audience at the end of the movie. The guys in the movie, c'mon now, are they more honorable, humanitarian or even interesting? Self-centered, greedy and childish overall, I have to say. One cool touch was the kids. Their incredulous and often reasonable gaze upon the adult world added a wonderful, subtle humor to the human "adult" predicament. Overall, the movie provoked more thought, stimulation and interesting complexity than most movies we have the opportunity to see.— August 9, 2013 10:35 a.m.