The Women Directors Hall of Fame

I don't have time to read the whole conversation but I love characters that I hate.

I also don't think there is an abundance of great performances to choose from in this Hall of Fame.

I like John C. Reilly and for the reasons you gave, he comes across as a likeable everyday guy. And that's somebody I can relate to. It's funny, when you first mentioned him I could not remember which of these movies he was in? Then about 5 minutes later it hit me that it was We Need To Talk About Kevin. And he was fine in that too. But for me he didn't stand out due to the way his character was written, he had little screen time and didn't get to do much. Which was part of the story as he seems to be a father who's disconnected himself from the problems his wife is having and the problem with Kevin. You know good movie title if you think about, as his character never did want to talk about Kevin. He played his role well as a passive dad, so much so that it didn't impact me. But maybe a performance that suits the movie/character and is subdued...is the best?

It's all so completely subjective. It might be easier to come up with the Top 5 crummy acting performances. But not sure if I could, literally every actor in all the noms were good to great. Oh I know people didn't like Billy Zane much, but I think he too played his role well, as I think he was suppose to be somewhat pompous and vein.


It's hard to define a good performance and then separate it from other variables like: writing, directing, likability of actor, colorfulness of character played. And of course if one loves a movie it makes the actors in it seem better than a mediocre movie. Yup it's hard

So to bring this around to sports, which is my first love, so everything comes back to sports, how much stock do you put into the other factors that influence an individual's performance? So, like Tom Brady, would he be as good without Bill Belichick (sp?, I always mess up his last name)? Or how good are the Texas Tech quarterbacks that put up 5k yards every year outside of the spread passing attack they run? Or what about Draymond Green? He is good, obviously, but how good is he really when it is considered he is able to play the way he plays because he has the three biggest shooting threats in all of basketball to distribute to from a position that isn't traditionally expected to be a distributor, thus creating spacing issues for defenses especially considering all the off-ball movement and screens the Warriors run? Plus his defense is great, but he is certainly helped out by having guys like Thompson and Durant guarding the wings. If that sports metaphor runs too deep for people who don't follow sports, the point I'm trying to make is do factors outside of the performance itself that influence the performance give reason to weigh performances differently?

And by the way, as far as the best/favorite distinction go, I know a lot of people have a different approach with that.I feel like if something can grab me in a way to make it a favorite of mine, quality must have something to do with it, so I basically approach favorite/best the same. My problem stems from separating a piece of the puzzle from the puzzle and then judging that piece. Which is, like Citizen said, hard.

*Me yelling at the screen for a whole hour, the movie*

Okay, so I didn't like this. Which is a pity because the way it started, well, I wouldn't say it got me immediately hooked because something in the filming felt just plain serviceable and boring to watch, but at least the main character had an interesting premise.

At some point however it turns irredeemable. Like, I get why people can like this movie. I'm perfectly fine with that, after all, it IS a ride, it is intense and hard to stomach, and if only for the pure horror it may be able to generate the experience should be worth. But I didn't like it and unfortunately it didn't work for me.

This film has been compared several times to Von Trier, Noé, even Haneke's Funny Games... and the more I think of these comparisons, the less I find worthy in this movie. Funny Games is disturbing not only because of superficial empathy; in fact one could say that its actual trick is to detach the audience from the characters and make them feel bad about it; it is physical and visceral but above all it is psychological pain inflicted in the spectator through its meta narrative. Noé is ultra-violent and excessive like this movie, but it gives these elements a certain aesthetic that can be haunting and even if it isn't it has some identity. Von Trier is certainly problematic, but he goes further and under more solid grounds in his developments and ultimately makes things more memorable.

Nothing bad can happens is cruel and sad, but it is surprisingly pointless at that. One could say that it's an obvious attempt to achieve a religious metaphor but in the end to me it doesn't work at all. It doesn't make me care for the characters. In fact, it doesn't build up any sort of effective tension because there is so little background explanation behind the acts of the aggressors, and very little effective introspection on the main character, who becomes a walking stereotype with erratic behavior. I could forgive in a way that we don't know much about the motivations of Benno and his wife (sort of, if the dialogue at least in Benno's part didn't get so damn cringey at times), to make them feel like some sort of intangible threat for Tore, but it does try to offer their perspective, and as a result, it comes off as clumsy, random and unjustified, at points contrived. However what ruins the immersion in my opinion is the focus on Tore as a character.

It looks to me like Gebbe is not even trying to empathize with her main character. She plays with him, as a concept, she observes him from a rather unpleasant distance, and that's pretty much it. There is no effective emotional focus that makes him feel important as a character rather than a walking concept or a tool for the narrative, but on the other hand there is no effective emotional detachment either that could have made this experience more unique and disturbing. It wants to show Tore as an object of empathy, but doesn't even make an effort to use him properly as such. The only moments I think it manages to create something of value are through his cute love story with the daughter, which are, as opposed to the rest of the movie, filled with empathy and intimism; there are a couple scenes that really made me believe that this film could become great, and it's a pity that it ended up like this, with such a conceptually horrifying but bland in execution development that ultimately made it fail to me.

We both had a very similar reaction to Nothing bad can happen and We Need to Talk to Kevin. If you haven't read my reviews which are linked on the 1st post, check them out.

Question: you refereed to We Need to Talk to Kevin as 'torture porn', would you say the same of Nothing Bad Can Happen? If not, why?

Sorry you didn't like it but I did enjoy your review!

The one film Nothing Bad Can Happen reminded me of was An American Crime and that was purely because of the brutality of both crimes and the fact that others got involved. I found some of the comparisons odd too. I also don't believe for a second this was based on a true story from the searching i've done on it, not that that has any bearing on the films quality of course.

It reminded me a little of Boys Don't Cry.

The film i watched today Tomboy was exactly Boys Don't Cry storywise except it's about young kids and there's no violence.

Just quietly sneeking in here because I'm not involved in this group but

1. I really enjoyed We Need to Talk to Kevin when it first came out. Urgh.
2. 'Torture porn'? When did that happen (the commentary I mean). First of all, that's a badly made up term by a bitter, sad old film critic who imagined some weird-arse bromance with Eli Roth who probably refused to take him to a torture basement for rich individuals polluting asia that influenced his thinking about Hostel, and the ridiculous bloody term took up speed on the net like a dust bunny on meth, but when on earth did that ever happen in the movie? I must have blotted it out. And second of all - I forget. Sorry. Will return when/if it returns.

Thank you for indulging me nd resume normal broadcast.

@cricket Thanks! I'm sorry I didn't like it, that doesn't mean the movie is bad of course! But it seems very divisive and I'm on the other side this time.

I'll check!

It's funny now that you say it because all I could think of when I was going to write this commentary was something like "We need to talk about Kevin except worse", since the film by Ramsay has some more genuine emotion and Tilda Swinton achieves some empathy. But I forgot to bring that comparison I guess.


That would be me!

To be fair I talk about "emotional torture porn", putting focus on "emotional torture". What I mean here is that the character of Eva is put in several situations that seem to exploit the idea of her vulnerability, in a way that feels cheap and devoid of pathos. Case in point with the scene of the company dinner. Like, I understand what is the movie trying to transmit during these scenes, but the cruelty is overblown, and far more than necessary to reach the point, ultimately making me question if the approach of Ramsay is sincere. To me it felt rather exploitative and mean-spirited; and the point is precisely that Ramsay wants to generate empathy for the character through this pathway. I don't mind if a movie intentionally strips a character of any sort of human relatability for its own purpose, be it for comedy, for gore, for exploit... but the case of We need to talk about Kevin is different because it really wants to make us feel for Eva as an individual. But it does in a way that to me feels disrespectful to the character and, ultimately, way more focused on extracting the raw emotion than understanding and actually empathizing with the character.

I thought you might have been talking about emotional torture so thanks for clarifying. I agree. It was quite a self torture experience to get through that sad, sad relationship. I really enjoyed reading your reaction to that movie nd it's perfectly fine that you dont like it. It sure as hell aint no skip through the park or tip toe through the tulips.

I really like your writing style and look forward to seeing more of your PoV.

I think that sums it up quite well! There are certain similarities in how difficult these films are to watch. I also agree with your idea that the director lacks empathy with the main character and is almost on the side of the torturers in making bad things happen to the main character just for the sake of having bad things happen to the character (although in Nothing Bad Can Happen this is pretty much implied from the title...)

I gotta agree with this. While Ramsey truly gets us to feel for Eva, it was a lot of hardball and unnecessary cruelty. There were quite a few times when I couldn't understand the abuse, and, after learning what became of the husband and sister, it hit home even more.
I would understand the abuse, since, they can't hurt the son, but to see that she lost a child AND a husband to his violence made that tailspin even worse.
Like the @sshole at the party that claims no one would have her. REALLY?!
Though it does add something even more to the young man in the wheel chair who sincerely asks how she's doing.

Nothing Bad Can Happen is my final watch so I'll see where it that goes for me. Kind of curious since @cricket's noms have been intriguingly polarized for me and regardless of how I've reacted, they all have, across the board, been pretty intense viewing.

I highly value something that can get under my skin without anything overly graphic nowadays. Sascha Alexander Gersak's portrayal of Benno and the chicken scene especially haven't left me, honestly those have stuck with me more than anything in this Hall of Fame. I actually made a really gross post that i deleted explaining to Cricket what his nom did to me. If you didn't get the same intense feelings i got from the film then i can see how you'd not like it, it was definitely all pointless but it worked on me in a strong way anyway.

I think it would have worked better if it was less obvious. Like if she was possibly imagining that everybody hates her, the paranoia of it, but it's quite blatant.

The only way I could see it as more plausible is if perhaps she defended Kevin in some public way afterwards and people can't forgive her for that, that perhaps they thought she was betraying her husband and daughter as well as the other kids by standing by him. But we don't get to see what happened after the incident, we only know she's still going to visit him.

I do like the paranoia aspect, that would have been an intriguing way to go.

I was doing the same thing, trying to find a justification in the hatred beyond anger-fueled grief. They never say it's her son, it's HER they hate.
I couldn't find anything for after either except her giving up the home she never cared for.

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