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moralityplay's Replies
"Hollywood makes dumbed down remakes for the whole world."
What are the dumbed down remakes that they've made? If they're dumb... Then why are they dumb?
What are the qualities of these original films that make them "not dumb?"
Is something "bland" or "basic" about LMI?
"The bottom line its a movie and its fiction. We may try to "read into" certain things but I dont see how we can actually back up these assumptions. And YES I still find this one distasteful and unnecessary."
I would stipulate to the idea that Reeves' treatment reimagines the Jenkins' character in a way that obviously renders him as longtime companion instead of latter-day, pedophilic sidekick. But the specter of sexual predation _looms_ in the scenes featuring Jenkins and Moretz anyway. By Design! "Don't see that boy again." The direction of the performers is specifically contrived to be _oppressive_. It puts me in mind of Lucile Hadžihalilovićs 'Innocence.' The film tortures you with the premonition of some kind of sexualized violence waiting to befall a little girl. But what Hadžihalilović conjures as misdirection, Reeve's conjures into a sense of dread, always at the periphery. Moretz's hand recoiling from that frayed sweater when Jenkins makes his pronouncement on "that boy" is calculated to elicit a particular protective instinct in my primitive ape brain.
"I was rather shocked when I saw the subject of pedophilia being resurrected again in relationship to this movie. The subject itself is distasteful enough. I see no reason to inject it into this movie and I intend to stand by that."
"The bottom line its a movie and its fiction. We may try to "read into" certain things but I dont see how we can actually back up these assumptions. And YES I still find this one distasteful and unnecessary."
Jesus... There's an entire chapter where Hakan goes trolling for middle-schoolers at the Stockholm public library. My recollection is that Linqvist crafts his description of Hakan in this episode as if he were in a kind of fugue state. As if his agency had been compromised by his biology. A state he is able to re-enter later as 'zombie Hakan.' And having been led to a restroom stall in a docile, suggestible trance by his sexual proclivities, to await service by a ten year old boy... What finally rouses him from the trance???
The realization that the boy's _teeth_ had been removed... to make him better at his work.
Upon my first reading of this chapter, I don't believe I had even yet observed that the author was using the boilerplate mythology of vampires (that everyone knows) to dramatize the moral-philosophical themes he was charting. And still, this bit of theater managed to register with me as _essential_ to Lindqvist's idea.
You've had _ten years_ ! If you haven't worked this out by now, it's easy to see how you could mistakenly suppose that all attempts to 'read into' the author's meaning are futile. When the quality of your own reading is this poor, how could you hope to penetrate this text?
"I was rather shocked when I saw the subject of pedophilia being resurrected again in relationship to this movie. The subject itself is distasteful enough. I see no reason to inject it into this movie and I intend to stand by that."
"The bottom line its a movie and its fiction. We may try to "read into" certain things but I dont see how we can actually back up these assumptions. And YES I still find this one distasteful and unnecessary."
It's been a decade since this movie was released. In a way, I'm delighted that it continues to conjure debate ten years later. But I'm also dismayed by what I see on this board. If this constitutes the depth of thinking about the artistic dimensions of the film or the novel that have been provoked, then it might be better to just forget them.
It's true that the worst are full of passionate intensity. You are just so damned sure of yourself. You know (just _know_) what is 'necessary' to an adequate reading of this narrative. Petulantly demanding to know if others have actually _read the novel_! Yet, you have conducted a comically facile, superficial 'reading' of the original novel's text. You're as bad as that legion of gay LTROI enthusiasts who earnestly believe Oskar's father is having a homosexual love affair with his drinking buddy!
Predation is probably the single most important facet of Lindqvist's interrogation of the state of nature. It manifests itself throughout the novel in different ways. Sometimes as allusion to animals in the wild. Sometimes as usury. And it's not an accident that two of his central characters include a vampire and a pedophile! The dimension of _sexual_ predation is essential currency to the philosophical concept he seems to be tracing. It can't be compartmentalized and disposed of as neatly as you seem to want.