MovieChat Forums > I Saw the TV Glow (2024) Discussion > The Matrix but if it was ACTUALLY pro-tr...

The Matrix but if it was ACTUALLY pro-trans and a quality movie.

posted 6 months ago by Narwhale37 (1227)
10 replies | jump to latest

-Better acting.
-Better cinematography.
-The trans narrative is more clear than "oh we just decided to act that in later"
-The movie remains properly ambiguous
-Has other messages about nostalgia, isolation and parenting
-No tacked in romance
-Keeps you guessing the entire time
-The redpill and bluepill thing is still there, but the creators trust you to pick for yourself.
-No cringe latex trenchcoats

Sure there's actual criticism for this movie, but most haters are just upset that it doesn't support their particular political opinion.

[–] DavidM (875) 5 months ago

It isn't a trans film, as much you can say the protagonist is asexual, but overall he is an inadaptated omega male.

I don't care if the director is trans, It doesn't transform the film into trans propaganda, It has meaning without that.

[–] CMX (265) 5 months ago

"Gender identity and dysphoria are prominent themes in Schoenbrun's work. They have frequently described I Saw the TV Glow as a film about the "egg crack", a term for the moment in a trans person's life when they realize their identity does not correspond to their assigned gender."

It is a trans film. Why do you insist that its not?

[–] DavidM (875) 5 months ago

Because it works perfectly without that. What in the movie is exactly about being "trans"?

[–] CMX (265) 5 months ago

The fact that the writer/director says its about trans. Do you have an issue with that?

[–] DavidM (875) 5 months ago

I mean in the movie, not information from the outside. The meaning from the films comes from themselves, not from outside information, and there isn't anything about transexuality in this film, just a sad story about lonely people.

[–] Narwhale37 (1227) 5 months ago

So it's just a bad movie then?

[–] DavidM (875) 5 months ago

It's good, a very good atmosphere, although the third act falls flat and the script doesn't have the balls to fully enter into the fantastic/supernatural aspect of the plot the two first acts hinted at.

[–] Narwhale37 (1227) 5 months ago

I would've preferred a Joker-like ending where it turns out he was just making up everything

[–] DavidM (875) 5 months ago

That was the ending, wasn't?

[–] NiteEyas (5) 5 months ago

I appreciate ISTTG but I don’t understand why it’s being compared to The Matrix. Also, I feel that the trans thematic undertones of The Matrix are just as clear as in ISTTG, considering it came out two decades prior. The Wachowski sisters didn’t just J.K. Rowling the transness in there - they admitted explicitly to the trans themes, around the time they came out, after years of it being a popular interpretation.

Also also I get the romance in Matrix feeling tacked on, from a storytelling standpoint it totally is, but I think it was just of the utmost importance to show that people outside of the matrix (gender binary) can have love and sexy romance. Seeing it as a gender-confused kid only ten years ago gave me such hope, I can’t imagine what it must have felt like in 1999.