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20th Century Women – 2016 Mills
- Mills is an absolute master of tone and intimacy. The film is filled with great montages (more on that in a second) breaking up small honest moments between superb characters acted out by a top-notch staff (bening, gerwig, Crudup, elle fanning, newcomer Zumann
- Gorgeous opening over the cost of santa barbara
- Sort of a rag-tag makeshift family of supporting characters with bening doing great work as the matriarch
- Bright 1970’s California colors—yellow kitchen
- Punk music photography montage
- No less than 3 talking heads songs are a character in the film- a sublime addition here
- Dueling opening voice overs by son and bening and then we’d get those two actors doing the background and future story via voice over (all we get in action is this snapshot in 1979) for the various characters- in fact, bening does her son’s and he does hers
- Lots of self-analyzation borders on getting a little tired
- 7-8 montages with voice over—(4 main characters, jimmy carter speech, punk)—actors doing their own epilogues
- Clearly a companion piece to 2010’s beginners by mills- that one was his father and this is his mother- a very strong pair of films
- Recommend/Highly Recommend border- leaning towards HR
Drake2017-10-02T14:42:33+00:00
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Have you seen C’mon C’mon yet? It’s remarkable visually but also astoundingly poignant. Mills is reaching for goals that have been attempted many times before, but he does it more successfully and beautifully than others have. It’s poetic realism to another level. I hope you like the film as much as I do.
@Graham- I have not had the chance to catch C’mon C’mon yet. I’m excited for it.
C’mon C’mon by Mike Mills is the definition of dedication to aesthetics and a narrative achievement that’s so damn superior that it’s impossible to think of something of equal enormity.
It’s a solid piece of cinema just with it’s exceptional writing and acting but it’s much more than that. It’s Mill’s best film and easily his most visually immaculate and structured.
It has scintillating interior and exterior photography plus swift camera movements from towards and away from the characters. Recurring shot of traffic and the cities it involves. Woody Allen’s Manhattan feels like a perfect companion piece. It makes the cities it’s characters. Exceptionally choreographed scene in the drug store when Woody Norman gets lost.
Phoenix, Gaby Hoffman and Woody Norman are perfect. Phoenix is arguably the performance of the year. This character after joker is not an accident.
It’s a Must-See after 2 viewings.
@M*A*S*H- Thank you for sharing. I have not had the opportunity to catch this one yet.
I couldn’t agree more. C’mon C’mon is incredibly pleasing to look at and thought-provoking to experience. Mills has skilled emotional and visual control over everything. The rapport between Joaquin and Woody’s characters is possibly one of the more memorable character relationship dynamics in recent cinema. Mills is attempting things that have been tried many, many times before, but he succeeds due to the tenderness and idle beauty with which he portrays his subjects.
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