September 2024 Watch Part 1

Friday, 27 September 2024

What a month! With travel and moving, I had barely watched anything by the middle of the month, but that changed very quickly in the second half. Originally, I was going to post September’s responses as one single post, but it got a little too long to read comfortably, so I decided to break it up into two parts. The next one will be available to read closer to the end of the month.

As for my move, I think I’m settling in more here and getting used to the minute differences in just about everything. The weather has been absolutely gorgeous, though the frequency of the rain is taking some time to get used to.

Dumplin’ (2018, dir. Anne Fletcher)

Dumplin’ follows Willowdean Dickson, the daughter of a former beauty queen, as she enters her mother’s annual pageant to prove a point and honor her recently deceased aunt. It is a slightly-saccharine coming-of-age narrative based on a novel of the same name that deals with themes of loss, friends and family, and personal development. In short, I’d say this movie is sweet. I don’t want to call the story it tells “small” because that seems more insulting than I intend, but it has a certain focus to it that I enjoyed.

This focus (and its genre) meant that the movie was more of a journey of personal growth, rather than a work with a strong social commentary. This is best illustrated by an example—self-acceptance on the basis of weight is an important aspect of this movie. Willowdean dedicates herself to the pageant for several reasons, but in part to honor her aunt who passed away shortly before the events of the movie. This culminates in Willowdean growing emotionally, learning new skills in performance, and making a statement during the bathing suit portion of the competition with her best friend Ellen. I found that even though the statement was a small moment, it felt appropriate for the direction of the movie. Like many pageant-based films, the criticism of the type of competition is rarely the focus, but neither is making a statement on them at all (i.e., the point is not, “and pageants are actually great”). Rather, this film uses the pageant as a vessel to tell a certain story about personal growth. The conclusion it actually comes to is complicated; Willowdean acts selfishly and critically at times, and she grows to be more understanding of others. At the same time, though, we see the type of bullying she has faced from others and the judgement from her mother, however unintentional, about her weight. This aspect of the movie is a more subtle one, but Rosie’s focus on appearance is very much addressed in the runtime, and the judgement Willowdean (and to a lesser extent, her Aunt Lucy) faces is in part connected to the culture of pageants in her hometown. However, it is understood that these things are not mutually exclusive. The movie is not making a big statement, but it doesn’t intend to; it is about Willowdean’s personal journey. I have mixed feelings about this, but I think it did a good job at what it set out to do.

One of my favorite parts of the movie was the relationship between Willowdean and her mother, Rosie. A number of reactions I heard to this movie, both online and in person, was praise for the fact that Willowdean eventually accepted her mother, who had never done anything to hurt her. I thought this was a bit unfair to the movie, as it reduces the relationship that was actually depicted. It is unfortunately subtle about it, but the movie depicts Rosie airing her anxieties related to her focus on appearances. When Willowdean confronts her mother about this, Rosie does not deny it, instead explaining she was scared for her daughter. The film absolutely sits with this, understanding both perspectives at once. In a similar way, Willowdean is at times abrasive, unfair, and—as I saw one review say—just as judgemental as her mother. It is important both that the cruelty she experiences was unambiguous, but also that her resentment about those experiences was hurting her relationships. This was such a strength of the film, as it did not cower away from making Willowdean both a victim of meanness and an actor of it as well. Honestly, it felt very refreshing to see something that allowed for this complexity to occur.

All of which is to say—the movie is not particularly groundbreaking. It is predictable, cheesy, and yet still manages to be charming due to a sweet screenplay, talented cast, and stellar soundtrack. I’ll admit—this movie is something of a comfort film for me. It’s something I’ve watched several times before despite not really being into feel-good flicks, and it is the last thing I watched in my home country. There is a certain sweetness to it despite its formulaic nature that I appreciate.

Orphan: First Kill (2022, dir. William Brent Bell)

Orphan: First Kill is the prequel to the 2009 film Orphan that follows Leena Klammer/Esther Albright, an adult woman with proportional dwarfism, as she leaves a psychiatric hospital in Estonia to impersonate the young, missing daughter of a wealthy American family. It follows a similar plot to its 2009 counterpart, with Esther integrating herself into a family with the assumed goal of robbing them and leaving, and ending instead in calamity and death. However, rather than follow the perspective of the family, this film instead watches the events unfold from Esther’s point of view.

The point of view change allowed this movie to be something quite different from its predecessor; it shifted the focus in a way that allowed for the same basic story prompt and similar structural beats, but also let the movie be something of its own. The film actually does not start out from the Orphan’s point of view, but instead that of an art therapist coming to the hospital where she is held. This means that when the audience is introduced to the Orphan, it is through a violent and frightening perspective, which cannot be ignored as the themes of the movie become more apparent (even if it does reflect a genre expectation). Once the Orphan breaks out of the hospital, the film shifts more fully into her point of view, a framework that admittedly makes the twist predictable, but that I still found to be a thoughtful choice that used framing to its advantage. (Regarding the twist’s predictability, I found that with even a basic grasp of the plot of the first movie and the function of sequels/prequels in general, it was pretty easy to guess. But I say that as someone who was informed it existed before I began watching the movie.) Despite the twist’s transparency, the tension was still remarkable throughout most of the film. Actually, my only issue on this front came with the climax, which felt drawn out, a similar criticism I had when I watched the first film.

Of course I must discuss the elephant in the room—the themes of the movie regarding nationality and immigration, and the social commentary it aimed to make. (To some extent, there was also a question of the Orphan’s navigation of sexuality and disability, and more specifically how that relationship was used against her. This is something present throughout the movie, but the payoff it a little underwhelming and it’s mostly an aspect of the Orphan’s abuse, so I won’t discuss it in depth now.) For much of the movie, I debated over what it was trying to say at all, because the situation was so over-the-top it felt difficult to apply it to reality. But at the same time, this seemed both true to the camp aspects and the horror genre. This movie plays on American fears of foreign infiltration where the inherent premise echoes them; whether it does so successfully is a different question. To some degree, it makes sense for the Orphan to be violent and cruel, even when that feels wrong to apply to a stand-in for immigration, because it fits within the genre to do so. Also, the Orphan being a victim but not a perfect victim by any scope of the imagination feels actually very refreshing. I don’t remember what the 2009 film has to say about it, and I think it’s unfair to judge this movie based on that premise, especially since it appears to be responding to those ideas in the premise specifically. It almost seems to come to the conclusion that the abuse the American family puts the Orphan through is worse than what she does to them, through the frame of the Orphan and the insistence on the theme in lines like: “This is America. People like me matter.” While I want to judge this film on its own with regards to its conclusions, I cannot ignore the premise of the first movie that would take place following these events, but I also don’t exactly know how that would change what I’ve said here without a rewatch.

A lot of the conversation regarding the success of the movie’s themes have to do with its camp aspects, which I was fully prepared for and excited about. It had the over-the-top elements, but little of the theatricality (with the exception of Julia Stiles’ performance). Which is to say, this movie was camp, sure, but it lacked charm, engagement, interest. It was… boring, and not in a way that felt thematically appropriate or narratively rewarding. The themes felt like the most camp aspects of all, as it felt entirely on the nose throughout, exaggerating each element so you couldn’t ignore what it was trying to communicate. Other than that, though, it lacked a lot of the elements that I enjoy about camp movies. In that sense, I was disappointed. I watched it on the specific recommendation that it was a spiritual sister to Malignant, which I thought was a much better movie in pretty much all aspects. It had more captivating visuals, a different perspective on the exaggeratedness of the plot, and while the twist was similarly predictable, I never knew quite where it was going to go. Honestly, the only real similarity seemed to be the two films’ sense of humor.

Despite my complaining, this is by no means a bad movie. I was genuinely deeply invested throughout the runtime, and I think the themes are interesting, but upon further scrutiny, it was just underwhelming. I would recommend this movie if it came on naturally, but I would not go out of my way to see it again. It is very engaging; when I say I was on the edge of my seat, I truly was. Even though I guessed the twist literally the second we saw the family the Orphan would be staying with, that knowledge made me excited for the eventual reveal and observant of every character in a way that was satisfying and eventually rewarding.

Julia (2022-2023, created by Daniel Goldfarb)

Julia is a biopic following the career and life of television food personality Julia Child in the 1960s during the production of the first two seasons of her show The French Chef. The sophomore season delves with increasing frequency and depth into the lives of the supporting characters, and falls prey to the common pitfall of only being able to do this by adding a bunch of romantic subplots, though the general tone and pacing remain the same and the character analysis done through these new relationships was ultimately meaningful and enjoyable. The show is a comedy, although I never found it particularly funny; both the drama and production aspects were compelling enough for me to continue watching it.

The main thing that changed between the two seasons were the threads of thinking that characterized each; both dealt with feminism, broader social issues, and the impact of domestic labor. But season 1 presented questions about the ephemerality of television and food while season 2 dealt with the idea of mediocrity, both from a feminist perspective and also more broadly. This meant that the first season had strange pacing; time moved forward in the plot but left a lot of emotional beats unresolved. For example, at one point Julia’s father died near the end of the episode; she dedicated the episode of her show to him and then the whole thing was resolved by a time jump. I don’t think it was brought up more than once or twice throughout the rest of the show, actually, which felt narratively unfulfilled but thematically appropriate, I suppose. This season’s feminism was clear and present, though much of it was women having conversations about men and gender and feminism. The second season asked larger questions, and threads of other social issues were put in focus here to do with the theme of mediocrity. This was compelling, even though it sometimes felt heavy-handed, basic, and/or glossed over. I was impressed with its dedication to representing these cultural contexts. At times, this felt a bit overbearing, but mostly because the show was so strong with idiosyncratic detail and optimistic spirit that it felt removed from cultural context, even when those realities were brought up consistently.

The detail came in really every element, but I want to highlight the sense of physicality. Both the general space occupied and the way characters occupied that space felt so unique to the show. The sense of movement was so idiosyncratic—the clumsiness, the careful maneuvers around the kitchen set, the way characters took up the frame—and allowed the audience to feel like they were in the same room. That feeling of being entrenched in the world of the show was at times overwhelming, and while I want to see this as an overall positive, I’m not sure that’s fair of me. I think it demands more nuance than that, where the effect of such a sense was not merely a feeling within the audience but also an active component of the creation of the story. Specifically, I thought it contributed quite a bit to the use of fictitious elements within the overall plot, at least in the second season of the show.

I learned fairly early on into my watch that the show made heavy use of fiction in its telling of these events. When the show began to discuss technological innovations by The French Chef’s crew, I dug into whether or not these were accurate to reality. (They did use the overhead mirror, but I don't know if it was invented for the show.) Rather than finding that information, I instead discovered that major elements of the story are partially or entirely fabricated; storylines and conversations are embellished, timelines are fudged, and entire characters are invented and inserted as major roles into the story. On the one hand, I do think it makes sense as an effort to tell a wider variety of stories and make the show narratively appealing, but on the other, I began to wonder whether or not it was appropriate for the show’s creators to do this. This article suggests that they did not intend to “wander too far afield,” but season 1 has Betty Friedan meet Julia by chance and criticize her show and season 2 has an invented storyline involving the FBI. While I saw some claims that they used Child’s personal history as inspiration, the drama that was created for the season finale seemed a little too unbelievable. At some point, those fictional additions that had seemed so inconsequential in the process of dramatization of real life events became something entirely transformed: grotesque reimaginings for a modern audience’s dramatic sensibilities.

I surprised myself with how caught up in this debate I was, as historical accuracy is generally not something I get hung up by. After all, the process of translating real events for the screen with even the best of resources available will beget some inaccuracy; it is an expected and even positive part of the filmmaking process. But it’s different when entire aspects of someone’s life are fabricated, and it seems especially pertinent in a show with such prominent themes and ideals. Sara Franklin wrote an article regarding the misinterpretation of Judith Jones, Child’s editor on her cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking. This article unpacks the use of fictitious elements to the extent the show took it to in biopics and the effect of what it does for our view of a specific historical figure (i.e., a real-life woman). In it, she says:

We see the producers almost go there when Julia and Avis DeVoto discuss Paul Child’s increasing grumpiness about Julia’s busyness, her fame, the demands pulling her away from their couplehood. In the show, Julia treats it lightly—she says she doesn’t mind giving men that little boost to their ego by downplaying her own ambition, success, and feelings of torn-ness. It’s all said so casually, as though it bears no weight. Why, I wondered watching the scene, do we continue to peddle such oversimplified narratives? There was real pain there—it was Julia’s, it was Judith’s, it was (and remains) so many women’s—but in this televised rendering, it is flicked away in a mere moment as Julia’s tiny red car putt-putts out of the WGBH parking lot.

This takes an interesting turn in the second season, which discusses a variety of contemporary social realities to varying degrees of accuracy. I was particularly struck by one interview in which creator Daniel Goldfarb suggests regarding the inclusion of these issues, “It’s what could have happened.” I think the idea of making this show into a type of speculative fiction, that suggests alternative realities that could’ve occurred if the world were different, an intriguing concept. I’m not sure how well it works for something that is also representing verifiable historical moments and figures. It seems strange to me to suggest, “This isn’t what happened, but what if it did?” That is not to say mythmaking has no place in historically-inspired media, but I question if the extent is too far. I saw one comment on the article by Franklin that insisted it’s not a docuseries, but a fiction, and that viewers are smart enough to tell the difference. I think this is a bit of an unjust response, and not merely because it’s not a question of intelligence (perhaps instead the extent to which one is informed). I think the question instead becomes, Why use real people at all? What is the effect (on both the show and our view of the past) of using real people’s lives and names as a prop for this effort, rather than envisioning this world from scratch? Where do we draw the line for such a debate, and who should be the one to do this?

As you may have guessed by now, I didn’t come to any conclusions about this. Each time I wanted to criticize the show for doing something wild and zany, I could think of an example of some show or movie in which history or its actors are used in this way, props in a greater message that doesn’t necessarily use a true canon of events to support itself. I often say that my biggest hope for a piece of art is that it can inspire thought and dialogue, and I find myself able to do nothing beside. I can’t tell you how many people I’ve subjected to hearing me talk about this topic of conversation in the time it took me to get through this show. I suppose I’ll ruminate on it some more, but I don’t know how to conclude my line of thought here.

This show is so interesting in so many ways. Aside from the question of fiction, it has a distinct sense of space and style. So often do we look away from the drama and world outside the production of The French Chef, instead hearing about it secondhand as characters pass on the news to each other—and sometimes going so far as to remind us a few times about something we have already seen. The show is so much about the value of the most mundane and yet meaningful aspects of one’s life: cooking, yes, but also the trivial conversations that still keep us informed of our loved one’s lives. It suggests an importance to these things I can’t help but agree with. It is something very distinct, and imbues its every element with that sense.