Song To Song - new Terrence Malick w/ Lubezki (Ryan Gosling, Michael Fassbender & Natalie Portman)

[TheGodling]

Set to Del Shannon’s 1961 hit “Runaway,” the film follows two entangled couples — struggling songwriters Faye (Mara) and BV (Gosling), and music mogul Cook, portrayed by Michael Fassbender, and the waitress whom he ensnares (Natalie Portman) — as they chase success through a rock ‘n’ roll landscape of seduction and betrayal. Cate Blanchett, Trevante Rhodes, Christian Bale and Haley Bennett also co-star.

(Other notable cast members who may or may not end up in the final movie (it's a Terrence Malick movie after all) are Benicio Del Toro, Boyd Holbrook, Val Kilmer, Holly Hunter and Clifton Collins Jr)



Del Shannon's Runaway is not only one of my all-time favorite songs but I actually told a chick I'm courting about the song the other day. She loves the Godling too so it might be destiny.

 

[StraxStrax]

Reminds me of Badlands for some reason.

 

[re'up]

I saw this yesterday, it's incredible and exasperating in the same 5 minutes, incredible, gorgeous direction, of whom there is probably no equal, layered, gritty shots of the Austin scene, and those who are lost and found within the SXSW, the cities quirky bars and parties. Private jet trips to Cancun, striking beaches, sweeping farmlands in Texas, skyscapes, modern homes, stunning condos, are all showcased with the directors trademark eye for beauty and imagery, amid a fractured, and dragging story of multiple affairs and aborted romances.

Fassbender is skin crawlingly creepy as a record prodcer/label owner reveling in his power, excess, and addiction to drugs, women, and self destruction. He stalks his prey, young, damaged, financially unstable, desperate women across the screen of his home, and condo, with views of Austin on all sides. He devours, feeds, releases, traps, tempts. It's disturbing to watch, though after awhile, I felt the same way I did in '12 Years A Slave', like if I see another shot of him leering and stalking a women across a room, with a mouthful of shrooms, or acting like a maniac, shirt all buttoned. It wore on me, Malick tends to repeat too much for my taste, and the movie is in general, probably 30-40 minutes too long.

Gosling is Gosling, exuding the same boyish charm, and innocence, with a hint of detachment, he's been doing for the last 6 years. All the acting is great, I really loved the French women, who enters 3/4 of the way through. Portman, Mara, are all really good. Malick confines and paints relationships into a series of games, teases, and child like playing, which perhaps for many they are, one is innocent and sweet, the other, through Fassbender, sordid, diseased, corrupted. The two worlds exist in beauty, yet are something else entirely.

It's a brilliant movie, which I grew tired of, which is how I feel about 'Knight Of Cups', which also tracked the hedonisim and corruption of the elite, and their perpetual unhappiness and yearning for escape in the form of all that is available to them.

 

[TheGodling]

Finally got to see it today and it is basically a companion piece to Knight Of Cups, both the good and the bad. Where KoC explored the empty, excess-filled lives of the Hollywood elite, StS does it for the music festival circuit, and with the always amazing Lubezki working the camera, it shows you this world in a way you've never seen it. But indeed the movie outstays its welcome with its unfocused narrative that shows the same characters doing too much of the same over and over. The performances are good, with an especially effective Fassbender as an enigmatic, (self)destructive producer. There's no doubt that Malick is a one of a kind film maker of the highest caliber, but as he starts to treat his films like poetry more and more, he should remember why many poems are short. Because the longer you try to express a feeling, the more repetitive it will undeniably become.