Can You Ever Forgive Me Review

Everyone's got an actor that they seem to enjoy on-screen but others tend to dislike. Perhaps we just cling to the few good roles that they've had and excuse the rest of their garbage. Or maybe it's part of our idiosyncrasy. To me, I've felt that Melissa McCarthy has been that actor. It feels to me like she's in a similar position as Adam Sandler: loved by the industry, but despised by the public for participating in comedies that aren't even worth the dignity of the dollar bin. Barring the touchy subject of the Ghostbusters remake, she has gotten the reputation as overly reliant on simple slapstick humor and being seen as just loud and obnoxious. However, I happen to believe that she does well with the crass and brash character type, being able to hone in her strengths and mold them into whatever role she's put into. Think of it like how Jack Nicholson uses anger, or how Nicolas Cage uses his batshit insanity. She might not be on par with them, but she can offer more than just pratfalls.

Of course, if one wants to see what a comedic actor is truly made of, they always have to look to the dramas, and Can You Ever Forgive Me? looked to be the one that would bring Melissa's acting credibility up a notch. Based on Lee Israel's eponymous memoir, Melissa stars as the author, struggling to make ends meet as she's a minor name in the literary world. Her latest work on Estée Lauder hardly garnered any attention and her agent Marjorie (Jane Curtin) is hardly helping her out. As she does research for her next book, she comes up with the idea to forge letters from Noël Coward, Dorothy Parker, William Faulkner and many more. She works with her friend Jack Hock (Richard E. Grant) to sell the forgeries and begins to befriend a local bookstore owner, Anna (Dolly Wells), to whom she sells her letters to along with many others.  

Marjorie makes a point that the reason that Lee doesn't have the same level of fame as Tom Clancy is that the subjects that she writes about aren't "sexy". To some effect one could say the same about the film's concept. Forgery isn't exactly the most exciting crime to tackle. Marielle Heller understands this concern and manages to do an excellent job of elevating the entire experience. From the montage of forging and selling letters to the camera closing in and appearing from unconventional angles when the tension builds, the scheme takes on a more glamorous appearance. It does well to punctuate the emotion in a scene and maintain the attention of those that might not initially be intrigued by the premise. Peppered in the dialogue are an assortment of witty moments (mostly coming from interactions between Lee and Jack) and a seemingly romantic relationship brewing with Lee and Anna that add to the film's richness.

Without a doubt, Melissa McCarthy does a spectacular job in the lead role. As mentioned before, the aggressive and blunt personality that comes through in many of her roles is prominently on display. Lee Israel is portrayed as sophisticatedly uncouth, as she is both knowledgeable of figures in high society and is a foul-mouthed alcoholic. Her sensitivity comes through as much as her toughness as she is relatively vulnerable given her situation. McCarthy has found herself in roles that try to justify her hard-shelled nature as merely a protection mechanism to the harsh criticisms of the outside world, but Can You Ever Forgive Me? is where it expands beyond the need for subversion of her usual schtick. She is able to properly deliver the warts and all of how Lee conducted herself, and she does well to make sure that the audience gives a shit. 

Strangely, this biopic manages to feel a lot more proper, in that one can sense how it truly is a novel adaptation. Though many biopics offer the third person limited perspective in which the narrative is clearly told from the perspective of the main character, Can You Ever Forgive Me? approaches it in such a masterful way that it captures the thrill of a great page turner. Narration is strictly left to the writing Lee does within the film, details about characters and Lee's understanding of them are integrated subtly and superbly, and the pacing is so steady and organically done that no moment feels unwelcome. The last point is particularly impressive given that the film surprisingly does not dwell too much on taking breathers. At times this can catch one off-guard but it hardly feels unnatural. 

In writing, there is saying that you either live a life worth writing about or write about lives worth living. Lee transgressed her way from one to the other. And if it turns out that there was far more embellishment in this adaptation of Lee Israel's forgeries, it would still be something to take pride in, much like how Lee herself took pride in her forgeries. It captures the frustration of Lee's own interests being looked over by the public, the squandering of her talents that come from her doing as well as her ability to capitalize on her talent and the sardonic wit that carries her throughout life. For the desire to have a voice and be recognized for it is the driving force of any writer. Much in the same way, Melissa has strengthened her own abilities as a performer and Marielle has established herself with a truly captivating work of cinema.

The Old Man And The Gun Review

TIFF is in full swing in Ontario, delighting those with early-bird alertness and nest-egg-minded thriftiness. There was a lot for me to choose from: Should I try the blood pumping Widows by Steve McQueen? How about I opt for the captivating Damien Chazelle biopic First Man? What if I decide to go with the Italian political satire Loro from Paolo Sorrentino to delight in my more foreign tastes? The options were many, but the tickets were so few. Though I was tempted to engage in the political documentaries on the current American quagmire and felt that it would be fun to see how long I could last in Lady Gaga's latest attempt to imitate Madonna, I instead chose two quaint "based-on-a-true-story" films each involving a criminal element.

The Old Man And The Gun got my attention immediately through the idea of the "charming convict". A character that is criminal and charismatic, some may see the concept as a cheap way to provide some grey morality into a film, but those people are what I call snitches. One often is enthralled by the silver-tongued fox that weasels their way in and out of any situation, for their motives are not for power or vengeance, but rather for love. And seeing Robert Redford and Sissy Spacek partake in sweet small-talk immediately brought to mind I Love You, Phillip Morris, a favorite of mine for being one of the greatest charming convict stories out there. For both films also revolve around a specific characteristic of the charming convict to define the movie as a whole.

In the case of The Old Man And The Gun, Forrest Tucker (Redford) is clearly aware that the days are quickly fleeing for his age. Though he does well robbing banks without the need to fire a single shot, he is often concerned about what will come next for him now that his accomplices Teddy and Waller (Danny Glover and Tom Waits) move on from a life of crime. However, once he comes across Jewel (Spacek) from his time on the 'lam, the two hit it off and he manages to slow down. Meanwhile, Detective John Hunt (Casey Affleck) slowly awaits to capture him, while he too is concerned about how his life is going.

With a soft jazzy soundtrack and an even softer tone, each day feels pleasant, resembling the stress-free nature of retirement.  Crime scenes are treated like a coffee shop conversation, as the stakes lower with each reassuring quip from Forrest. The struggles of cracking the case take the form of minor migraines in which John makes the best efforts to piece the puzzle. What should be heart-pounding and intense is mundane, a routine, especially when the ticking of Forrest's stopwatch comes into play. Of course there is also the bond that forms between Jewel and Forrest, along with John's family life with his kids and wife, Maureen (Tika Sumpter) which add to the rustic Americana delight that covers this film.

It is however when Forrest is alone that there is an unsettling sensation. It is there that that we see his fragility, his willingness to defy the law as respite from his inability to defy death. Though he may seem comfortable with living next to a cemetery, he is at his core more uneasy. Only when Jewel offers her perspective does he become reinvigorated. It's par for the course of senior-centric cinema to focus on carpe diem, and The Old Man And The Gun certainly approaches it from a reasonable perspective. Much of the change from Forrest and Jewel is subtle, compromising on their limitations. Redford does well to show that Forrest's charm is how considerate he is, despite his isolation. Along with Spacek, their chemistry comes through strongly but slightly off-kilter, burdened by how incompatible their backgrounds are.

Despite how nice most everything was, it can almost seem like there is hardly any tension. The moderator for the film opened by saying how the director, David Lowery seems to make "elevated bedtime stories" and there are certainly times when it would be better to fall asleep. Much of Affleck's scenes carried no life with them, which while logical for a dejected detective, often felt like they were there as a formality to the film's structure. It did not seem to properly contrast well with Redford's more relaxed easygoing nature, since they would often trail off or leave hardly any impact. Not to mention that his voice was so slurred and muffled that a drunk with honey soaked cotton balls under his tongue seemed more coherent in comparison.

It's a shame that his performance does undercut some pivotal points for Hurt, but in fairness, it's not like the writing does any favors. They hardly go further into Forrest's shades, instead choosing to completely portray a nefarious mastermind of multi-million theft as no more than a polite grandfather. There is beauty in the mystery of who he is, but there would be more beauty in it if there was more muddling of what that was. It helps to add more complexity to the why of his criminal activity. Yet only two or so significant details get left behind. It may seem inconsequential, but these matters should be as meticulously constructed as Forrest's heists were. However, if one were to be robbed of more layered characters and scenes with an old-fashioned romantic journey of a charming convict, then I suppose there are worse ways one could be held up.

The Culture War And Consumption In A Partisan World

The culture war. It never ends. Though it became formalized back in 1990s when American cable news was just starting to shift from respected fourth estate to overbearing talking head chorus, the struggle has always been there and hardly shows signs of ever leaving. It is the glue that holds communities together, and in which we've come to approach pivotal moments in our lives. Much of it is thanks to the way in which said news (along with the advent of social media) has framed daily events, constantly going for the divisive, the controversial. Conversations hardly are level-headed and the topics tend to get more absurd each time. But much of the reason the news goes into hysterics is because the dialed-up tension brings in more eyes. Politics is seen more of a sports game than an intellectual discussion, and all of us partake in the spectacle to see our side win. It doesn't matter if the subject is abortion or whether to say Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays, all we need is the proper evisceration and we'll bask in the glow of righteousness. Afterwards we might feel dirty about the whole ordeal and wince at how partisan the world's getting, but we'll get back to gloating when our side wins another point.

It is truly insidious how much the current 24-hour news cycle and social media has fueled the culture war but the sources where it extracts the crude reactionaries are all around us. Our lives are inherently political by not just what we say and do but from what we buy and react to. We try our best to construct a set of principles that we abide to along with ones that we believe that society should strive to better progress. In doing so, we either directly or indirectly form the ways in which we consume media. Those that we choose as our intellectual beacons, the thoughts we have on the latest film or TV show or even our own diet or fashion say to ourselves and others, "this is what lies within my core". These aspects are what then push us into the communities that we want to be a part of and drive us to be hostile to those which are our adversaries. Those communities have within them individuals that then rise up and claim themselves leaders and influencers who then burst onto the monitors that we in turn like, comment are share. 

There is nothing wrong with coming to terms that life is political and to be aware of what you're doing in relation to how you wish to be defined in those terms. Indeed one must have that self-awareness and be willing to view the world through a political lens. However, if you can't knock those glasses off your face, what you're left with is utter frustration and misguided aggression. We see this with virtue signalling about how people aren't paying attention to some news, as if people cannot pay attention to both. We see it with overreaching pop culture analysis that opts to view the incredibly trivial as the highly significant. We see it with how people instantly turn to boycotting and destruction of a company's merchandise for violating its beliefs, only to find that it would never manifest into any resounding change or helps to raise their profits. None of this allows for proper reflection, rather it plays into a reflexive outrage that comes across as paranoid. 

Moreover, it is that very outrage that becomes amplified. It is the ammunition that the media loads up on and shoots across its networks to provide that rush of vitriol to others. They push more urgent issues to the side and engage in a sensationalist game of telephone where each outlet puts its own spin on it to push their agenda further. From this, what was a minor grievance becomes a rallying cry built on misconceptions and half-truths. Even worse is when an issue that is of urgency gets trivialized either through distorting it or by turning it into a selling point. Perhaps in some way it helps to bring the issue to the masses but ignorance is forced upon it, diluting its urgency for the sake of advertisement.

Some believe that because of this constant need to make mountains of molehills that we should just dull our senses to what goes on and try to look for simplistic compromises. This mentality presents problems by declaring everything as equally subjective and thus incapable of being properly debated. After all, how can one truly say whether apples or oranges are the superior fruit? It also does not resolve the mismanagement of priorities and only helps to ignore when smaller issues do add up to a troubling trend. 

That's not to say that it's not understandable why some go down that path. After all, the culture war is a tedious ordeal. It tires the general public as much as it energizes it into a frantic shouting match.  Moderation would be a better status quo than what we have now. But there's yet to be a proper pivot back to the middle. We must not sacrifice our beliefs unless we have a good reason to. Neither should we be willing to be at each others throats so quickly.  It's hard to find common ground, but when it appears it is in everyone's best interests to solidify themselves in it and come around to strengthening it. If we are drafted into the culture war and thrown into the battlefield already, it makes no sense to run away. One has to go in and fight, maintaining their focus and keeping with them honor. Yet this is an unconventional war, one where friends can be made across the lines and extended breaks exist to ease the tension. Be armed when it comes to another battle, but don't point your arm everywhere expecting enemies to crawl out. 

Freiwerk and Forward - The Pushing Of The Product And The Plans For Itch.Io

FREIWERK - A COLLECTION MADE IN FREIZEIT

I'm sure y'all have seen me post about Freiwerk a lot lately. I've mostly been aggressively advertising it after a couple of teases at the start of August, just trying to make sure that I get it out to the corners that I'm most active in. After all, it is the first proper project I've ever made and I did spend quite some time assembling it together. I couldn't just post it and leave it be like other works I've made. Now that I'm dying down with the reposting of the product, I feel like I should try to provide more information on Freiwerk itself, what I think of the end result and what will be of the itch.io that has now been made thanks to it.

INCEPTION

I say that Freiwerk started in third year of university but the impetus to get something like it going has been something that I thought to look into during first year. I've been wanting to get some larger project going, one which would take a little bit more time than my average creation. I figured that by having more time dedicated to something, it would provide something that would be much more substantial for me and anyone taking part in it. I set a goal that by end of my graduation year I had to get something out. 

Around third year, I finally had the idea to make a collection of my work. Given the busy schedule I had, it figured that if I could just try to make a neatly made package of what I've done artistically, it would not only be reasonable but also serve as a good jumping board into doing other projects. I opted for a German title both to abide to artistic tradition of using a foreign language to heighten one's work and because I have a minor in it so why not include it somewhere. Though if I'm basing my creative decisions on minors, then I should have included a Poisson distribution to account for statistics.

The outline was made out and I knew it would be 10 sections with two serving more as bookends instead of showcasing my work (as I would have plenty of work to showcase). Later on I'd alter it so that it would become a way for people to get to know more about myself. It'd be like a personal portfolio. I included pictures I took, songs that I liked and some creative non-fiction I wrote about my experiences in life. To add to the project, I also decided that there would be some content that would be exclusively made for it - stories and artwork to be exact. That way, it would have a little more to offer than any old collection.

For the most part I kept it secret, not opting to be too explicit in this work in progress back when it was still just a few sections completed and barely half of the new content made specifically for it was made. Maybe I should have tried to make an earlier buzz about it but I didn't want to jinx the project by hyping it up too early and never getting it done. Once I was more secure that it would get completed, I went forth with providing more information. Shortly after that it came down to posting it.

EXECUTION

Having now released it, I believe it's lifted quite a load off my chest. I can finally say I got a project out there that I put a great deal of time into creating and which has a whole lot to offer. In doing so, I wanted to see what would become of it. While there has been some attention to it and I'm grateful for it, I believe the lack of such has allowed me to consider some problems in my approach. 

For one, the build-up could have been much better to show what Freiwerk would include. Granted it's more akin to a book than a movie in the sense that teasing the content would be more difficult, but it still would have provided better insight into what it'd be about. I could have done a video for it as I have other works, but given that I've hardly touched my Youtube channel, there probably wouldn't have been much of a change. I could've mentioned that the some of the art meant for the project, would be psychedelic collages, caricatures, a businessman with an octahedron for a head and a colorful Rorschach test of sorts. Or that the stories I made for it range from a postcard story about a soldier trudging through the desert to a spy dealing with a period of inactivity and boredom to the longest story involving a man and a talking gargoyle. Perhaps that would have helped.

The other big issue could be the length, as over 250 pages of content is quite a lot for a single project, especially the first one that serves as a jumping board for further works. Though it does speak well to my willingness to offer content (after all it is free), it nonetheless could make it hard for people to engage with it. 

As for the content, I'm sure there might be some imperfections given that it is my first go-around, but that's a lot more subjective than the promotion. I would be guessing a lot more as to what landed and what didn't and they would probably be a lot more off the mark than I would assume. Not to mention that I would rather highlight the monumental achievement that it was than pick it apart. I do think that what I've done has been quite experimental and insightful into who I am regardless of where those reactions may lean. However, I do appreciate any comments regarding it though. Any feedback helps.

CONTINUATION

So now that I've completed Freiwerk, I've got a perfectly good itch.io opened up, eager for more to be placed upon it. I have thought about what other things I hope to get there. There are some older works that I might consider revamping and posting on there by themselves. However, I am thinking to do something more Photoshop-intensive and original projects that would be similar to the Siet Eh? section of Freiwerk. It also wouldn't be a bad idea to try making a game or a funky little executable given the nature of itch.io. Hell, I noticed that some people have included videos in there too, so that might be something to think about too. Though perhaps the smartest thing to do is to make some comics given all the characters I've made. The site's my oyster, and hopefully I can get another project out before the start of a new year. But for now, there's just Freiwerk, and I'm fine with that. 

The Happytime Murders Review

Around some point in my teenage life, I fancied myself a bit of a cinephile. For the most part it was because I had seen a lot of gangster films and works by Scorsese, sometimes together in the same package. It snowballed in getting me into Kubrick and Tarantino and Hitchcock and soon I found myself watching some French New Wave here, an underappreciated piece of animation there, I was broadening my cultural palate. As such, I came to accept the more cynical approach to the current landscape, that being that it is nothing but dreck. I agreed with those that saw Micheal Bay as the cinematic blotch of overblown machismo that dumbed the medium and rolled my eyes to no avail to the creative bankruptcy that the industry holds. In doing so, I basically didn't allow myself to have any fun.

Now that I'm older and wiser, I realize that dreck has it's place in the cinematic landscape as much anything else. You can't really expect each film to provide a greater insight into the human experience, toying with your emotions and leaving you awake pondering the deeper meanings that lie within it. You'd never get any sleep that way. Not to mention that Hollywood's always been playing to lowest common denominators, so viewing the current mess as "the fall of cinema" is neglecting to see the shitstains that the medium left behind. So while that teenager within me that thought only to spend his time with the Coens may see my willingness to view The Happytime Murders as only fueling the degradation of true art, I still figure it to be fine to go see the puppet show.

The gimmick of kid-friendly media going R-rated is nothing new. Many people have taken the approach of twisting saccharine animation styles and fluffy critters into foul-mouthed, sex-craven, bloodthirsty abominations. We already saw a similar revival of the gimmick with Sausage Party, a film that left more to be desired, especially by those who worked on it. Like it, The Happytime Murders takes a different approach to the standard formula, ditching the faux-Sesame Street approach and instead operating as a buddy cop film in which a human, Connie Edwards (Melissa McCarthy) teams up with the main puppet of the production, Phil Phillips (voiced by Bill Barretta). It also brought about a lot of obnoxious advertising that focused heavily on how so edgy and crazy the idea is, to the point people would much rather stick the whole cast, flesh and felt, into a giant blender and use it as sofa cushion. But it's only gonna be one of these kinds of films for a long while, Sausage Party has yet to bring anything else with it, I doubt this will. 

If you can set aside the edgy posturing and take in the elevator pitch itself, it has some potential to work as a silly raunchy roller coaster. Just keep upping the wildness factor as you go along and you'll be alright. The Happytime Murders seems to take a more muted, Who Framed Roger Rabbit styled approach and instead has the world relegate puppets to lower-class citizens, and in which Phil blew his chance at being the first puppet cop hired in LA, now working as a PI who gets hired to figure out why Sandra, the lass that causes him to jizz silly string until his mind goes numb, is being blackmailed. It's only until members from The Happytime Gang (the show-within-a-show that provided further tolerance for puppetkind) get picked off one by one that Phil finds himself back on the beat, having to butt heads with Connie to find out who's responsible for these crimes. 

Little by little, there does appear to be more zaniness that does come about, though there is less emphasis on elaborate set-pieces or full-on surrealism, and more on world building and darker humor. For instance, puppets get high on sugar, so much so that their most potent drug essentially would cause a diabetic coma to any human in an instance. The reason as to why Connie can survive a hit of the stuff? She has a puppet liver. It certainly is disappointing that there isn't a big Blues Brothers meets The Muppets Movie type action scene in it but I appreciate it letting the contrasts and quirks of the world settle into the viewer rather than feeling it needs to rub its furry blue balls into everyone's face like the trailers would have you thinking. 

Indeed the humor and the main performances carry the film, with Melissa and Bill providing great banter with each other and recognizing themselves as flawed cops that come to embrace each other despite their shortcomings. The other puppets work well to add "grit" to the concept while the humans tend to just exist as a matter of convention. Both have their fair share of cliches, but at least with the puppets it feels a lot more different given the expressions and voices they put on. It's not to say that Maya Rudolph, Joel McHale or Leslie David Baker don't get a funny line every once in a while, but they could have had more given to them or more creativity that would have let them be stronger. However, it was nice seeing Michael McDonald play a smarmy asshole again, he really manages to nail those roles despite looking like a relatively nice guy. 

Despite that, I would still stay that in terms of comedy, the film does its part. However, I'm not just gonna give a movie a complete pass because it makes me laugh. Youtube Poops make me laugh too and I'd say they have a lot more consistency than this film. See, as much as I know I'm watching a dumb movie, I am still watching a movie. And as such, I feel that it suffers from not following through completely with the ideas it presents. This mainly takes the form of the puppet-human dynamic. At times, this is explicitly and implicitly shown to be the case, other times it feels like society's moved on from that discrimination. The shift from subtle to blatant can also be jarring given that it doesn't tend to have good transitions into that shift and tends to be random at when it shifts that dial. That's not even mentioning other aspects like playing on puppet stereotypes, Phil's former lover, or further significance of The Happytime Gang. Overall, the story has a few genuinely clever moments, more forced moments, and some moments that could have been clever but end up coming off as unnecessary. It could have done better to explore the world whilst still keeping to the simplicity of playing off its gimmick and paced itself better rather than having to feel like it needed to hit all the beats of a buddy cop film. 

Perhaps I'm just warring with myself here, getting all pedantic about all the elements in the movie. The Happytime Murders is a movie where puppets say fuck while fucking and get fucking murdered. If it suffers a bit from not being a narrative masterpiece nor a properly fleshed out experience, then that's fine. All it really needs to deliver on is laughs and being entertaining. And to that effect, it delivers quite well on those criteria, fulfilling the cravings of those with that style of immature humor. It is odd how it is both bizarrely paced well (humor-wise) and paced clumsily (story-wise) and I still find it a shame that it couldn't go beyond into a silly flick that has a lot more going for it than people expect it to.But I think people will come to find themselves pleasantly surprised by some of its bursts of cleverness. I say if you just need to indulge in some goofiness, get the hand out of your ass and go give it a whirl. 

P. S. - Now that I'm thinking about it, I am kind of interested in seeing what more you could do with adult-themed puppet movies. Maybe Henson Alternative might have another work in the making that could really take the idea to some new places. 

Sorry To Bother You Review

Social commentary in media can seem so tacky nowadays. Everyone has a take that they're willing to throw out, and many of them tend to either be sanctimonious rants about going back to the old days or cliche-ridden satires that have more snark than bite. You can't blame people for wanting to have their two cents though, it's natural for us to reflect on our times. Given that life lately feels like running backwards on fire on a treadmill from velociraptors, there's even more urgency to say something about the horrifying, insane situation we've found ourselves in. But what has been said is tired in its approach and tiring to see in abundance. Sorry To Bother You however, is anything but tiring. It is the slap to the face that jolts you mind and your heart too.

Following Cassius's rise through the ranks as a telemarketer down in Oakland, Sorry To Bother You sounds like a standard rags-to-riches story in which the protagonist must come to learn the folly of their greedy ways once they're in too deep. The story beats of his desperation for money, the betrayal of his "true" self and so on all call to a familiar and lackluster character arc. Sure, it's funny seeing Lakeith Stanfield and Danny Glover being dubbed over by David Cross, and there is quite a polished yet indie style to the production based on its tiny quirks, but for the most part it appears to provide nothing more deep than a puddle. Indeed the film itself doesn't really have much else to say that would warrant a doorstopper of a book to be published about it. But Sorry To Bother You is not concerned in lengthy diatribes. It's concerned with hitting you with what its got as hard as it can.

Much of what allows Sorry To Bother You to stand out from other stories like it is its forceful lack of tact regarding the way capitalism has affected our lives. Elements of Boots Riley's Oakland (and America) follow from Idiocracy's blatant style of commentary. Many of the people are barely getting by, living in tents or having to get ready while they're in their car. Wage slaves are essentially just slaves with hardly any wage at all. Those that are on top are literally above the rest of the working class. Hell, it even goes into the deterioration of standards in pop culture aspect by having a show where people get the living shit kicked out of them. Why? Just for the hell of it. That's not even mentioning the more obvious aspect of the black characters in the film having to pass as white to get any kind of legitimacy. All of this provides wonderful background the the main story, providing us with a world that is as frank as it is dark. Furthermore, it works perfectly at a time when subtlety is spelled in all caps.

The film itself is quite hilarious amid all the mayhem that occurs. The trailers emphasize the white acting but it's far from the only source of humor. From sight gags, to clever lines to just how crazy the story's willing to go, there's a lot that'll get one laughing as well as thinking. The fantastical elements of the movie have a particular contribution to the comedic aspect of the film with half of them serving as visual flourishes and the other being actual events in the reality. At times they both can come across as forced, as if they're trying to get a laugh from you from the sheer awkwardness of the situation. Other times, they go beyond what one expects and leave you cackling in utter confusion.

The characters in Sorry To Bother You offer interesting glimpses into Riley's views regarding politics, society and identity as a whole. Cassius perfectly exemplifies the malaise of the working class feeling more disposable and worthless with each passing day, contemplating about how worth it their lives will be given the inevitable heat death of the universe, clinging onto the fantasy of making it and holding onto it once they've had. His higher ups show a far more corrosive side of the system that he's a part of and how much they're willing to let those below them eat their cake. His friends (and girlfriend, Detroit, who does well to challenge the world with her artistic abilities) however manifest the ever-growing anger that the working class face and the need to take action, no matter how small it may be. For the most part they are all well contained, though a few have some ideas going for them that hardly come to any kind of conclusion.

All in all, if you want to see a film that cuts through the bullshit with its message and provides an experience that is as bizarre and thrilling as the daily news on acid, Sorry To Bother You is ready to take your number and tell you about the amazing experience it has to offer you.

The Cartoonish Vilification Of The Insanely Rich Innovator/Entrepeneur

I've been thinking about Elon Musk a lot lately. How he managed to strap his car into a space shuttle and launch it into space to the tune of David Bowie, creating an image with such poetic beauty that it could very well be the cover art of a soft-science fiction novel. I think about the Falcon Heavy launch of his both in the grander context of what it means for space exploration, and in the more selfish context of one's innate need to leave their mark on the world in some unique manner. After all, it's impressive that the rockets were able to break off and land in the exact locations with no problem. Moreover, the adolescent in me is just fucking hyped that there's a cool looking sports car out there floating around the Earth with a dummy astronaut on it. But really, the impact of the Falcon Heavy launch is not why Musk is on my mind. It's more his image.

While some see Elon as the next Tony Stark, others just see him as a young Lex Luthor. Many cite his views on urban planning as elitist, his interests lying more in bombastic spectacles out in space rather than helping out down on Earth. Not to mention he's not big on unions. Just around the time of the Falcon Heavy launch, Elon got into disputes with the unions, and has offered to his employees that if they go against them, they can enjoy all the frozen yogurt and rollercoasters they desire. Under this context, the launch doesn't appear as a symbol of humanity being on the edge of spatial exploration more than an over-hyped ego-stroking of a megalomaniac.

Such a view is perhaps a little too cynical (as well as ignorant of Elon's altruism and efforts to invest in greener energy), but Elon's not the only one to get negatively caricatured. Many other millionaires and billionaires get equated with the likes of Montgomery Burns, Gordon Gekko and Scrooge McDuck. It's only fitting that as you amass more wealth while others are left starving or struggling, that those on the latter will see your stockpiling as pretty dickish. But it's not just the grossness of one's net-worth that gets people riled up. It's also in adopting the role of the entrepreneur or the innovator. Those in this role often get more of the anger and vitriol than those in the entertainment industry. Sure, one might have some problem with the out-of-touch nature of the Hollywood types, but it's never to the extent that someone like Musk would get.

Of course that makes sense since the innovator/entrepreneur does more to affect people's lives and the way society (or politics in particular) acts. As such, it becomes important to look closely at the attitudes and the choices that these figures make, and be critical of what they choose to do with the money that they have. But these perspectives, couched with the general hostility that comes with the super-rich, often become harsh character studies of these people: Steve Jobs gets viewed as a fake-deep cut-throat, Oprah Winfrey as the jolly exploiter of human misery, Mark Zuckerberg as an alien weirdo; the current US president, Donald Trump, has been portrayed as an ignorant, idiotic, highly egocentric buffoon so much, it's not even funny anymore. All of them are created from actual problems that these people and their practices have created, but at times the over-reliance on these portrayals can prove to be overbearing.

Much of the problem stems with how these caricatures serve not so much to highlight the sins of the subject but rather to virtue signal about one's righteousness. When I was a teenager, I developed a massive hatred for Steve Jobs for how damaging his cult of personality was on others. To me, it bred this smug self-satisfaction among others who thought themselves as these unique individuals on the cutting edge of technology. However, I found that the more I bitched about how one shouldn't worship the turtleneck techno-hippie, the more I found that people weren't much too interested in talking with me. That's because I was more focused in turning this image I had of the devil that was Steve Jobs onto people to either chide them or make myself feel better for not buying into the hype. 

This problem was a lot worse when Trump was running as president. So much of the media was focused on building up this horribly exaggerated image of him to then parade around as a deterrent to supporting him,. This didn't really manage to convince those that were with him to deter, if anything, it only managed to magnified the posturing and hypocrisy of those who were using the caricature. The same could have been said for myself with Steve Jobs as I owned an iPod and would admire Bill Gates (who while more altruistic certainly was just as cut-throat, if not moreso). As tired as this conversation is to hear, it nonetheless emphasizes the problem with overuse of caricaturization. Rather than explaining the actual problems that exist with these individuals in a frank manner, one instead partakes in waving an image of the insanely rich innovator/entrepeneur with devil horns in the faces of others, expecting that they'll be converted rather than become apathetic or more ardent in their support.

It also isn't quite as fair to be so heavy-handed in the hatred of these individuals. It's not to say that I would outright condemn someone for being justifiably perpetually upset with how these people emphasize the massive economic inequality in the world (lest it reaches an obnoxious virtual signalling as stated above). But it is important to take in account the grey shades of the world every once in a while. There are very few people out there who are so truly bereft of any good, and for as much as innovators and entrepreneurs destroy, they also create. One needs only to look at the ever-explosive debate about Walt Disney to how each side of him left their mark on the world. Much as I greatly disagree with Elon's views, it's still remarkable to see what noble projects he's attached himself to as well as how he's managed to so thoroughly capture the public's imagination with the Falcon Heavy's launch. 

There would be no sense in me condemning the cartoonish vilification of the insanely rich innovator/entrepeneur. I think Jeff Bezos is the ultimate embodiment of everything wrong with capitalism. I take an insane amount of joy seeing Mark Zuckerberg fail in his efforts to be relatable to us humons. And some of my favorite MadTV sketches are the ones that portray Oprah as a nearly demonic being. It is both important to destroy the idyllic images that they wish to have portrayed upon them so as to not follow them blindly and cathartic to punch upwards at those who are probably too busy to care about what burns we lob at them. However if anything meaningful is going to come from pointing at their flaws, it's not going to be achieved merely with the plastering of their evil caricature all over the place.