tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14812333.post9922953616127993..comments2023-11-05T02:01:53.847-06:00Comments on Antagony & Ecstasy: MANN'S MEN: MANHUNTER (1986)Timhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09491952893581644049noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14812333.post-74133409902001666572011-02-11T14:05:15.919-06:002011-02-11T14:05:15.919-06:00Arctor - I completely agree with your opinion of t...Arctor - I completely agree with your opinion of the review and the film. For what it's worth.<br /><br />Ps. I also loved the soundtrack. "The Big Hush" playing over the intimate scene between Dolarhyde and Reba is simply glorious.Q-Piehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04250665511557903059noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14812333.post-14790627645327213662010-06-09T11:40:35.386-05:002010-06-09T11:40:35.386-05:00Whoa, let's slow it down there a bit Zev.
1) ...Whoa, let's slow it down there a bit Zev.<br /><br />1) The only true insult is 'idiotic,' the rest of those are pretty weak tea. Calling something egregious is hardly an assault on their being.<br /><br />My comments ARE meant to criticize his overconfidence, though. I think the reviewer's name was Tim. I don't care what his name is, just the content of the review. <br /><br />2) you seem to misunderstand the nature of 'wrong,' too. <br /><br />An opinion can be wrong, and so can a fact.<br /><br />Tim's sloppiness IS wrong, Zev. Getting 2+2 =4 is wrong in an objective way.<br /><br />Unless you think that film criticism is purely subjective, why try and write about it? Zev, go back and reread Tim's reviews. He frequently makes little points to support his review's approach. That means TIM disagrees with you about what can or can't be wrong. He thinks, like me, that opinions can be wrong.<br /><br />Notice, too, Zev - that some (but not all) of my own comments I think are too iffy to count as 'right.'<br /><br />For example, I like the soundtrack to Manhunter, definitely a minority opinion and likely due to the synthesizers. Everyone thinks they're too cheezy. I leave that to personal preference. But the lyrical content of the songs definitely is in my corner. That part IS objective.<br /><br />Or, the much bigger issue of Hopkins versus Cox. I personally like them both very much. But Cox's role is far smaller than in Silence, for Hopkins. Different narrative structure. But again, your mileage may vary.<br /><br />The problem is, Zev, I don't think you thought through your comment very well, either. Everyone's got the right to express their opinion, but they also take a risk - both of you take the risk of being wrong, and you both are.<br /><br />Go back and re-read my comment, and see just how incomplete and poor the review is. Tim just doesn't understand THE fundamental thematic of Mann's work. If you don't think that is sloppy and egregious, then I'm afraid we part ways, because it IS sloppy, sadly so.<br /><br />If you think idiotic is too harsh, that's fine. I hereby apologise. I will not use that one or cross that sort of line. But, Tim probably realizes that his own stuff crossed a different line. He didn't put much effort into his reviews, and it shows.Arctorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11952210157510203883noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14812333.post-52937118060816940812010-06-09T10:27:59.734-05:002010-06-09T10:27:59.734-05:00Arctor--you seem to be confusing a different concl...Arctor--you seem to be confusing a different conclusion or interpretation with being "wrong". You never mention any factual inaccuracies in the plot or anything else, just a disagreement on the focus of the film and the quality of Cox's performance relative to Hopkins'. Opinions aren't the same as facts, and stating yours in detail doesn't make Tim's invalid.<br /><br />I haven't seen the film, but Tim's review gives me a strong idea of why he feels the way he does about it (which is still, on balance, positive). It's a clear and strongly stated argument. Disagreeing with his conclusions doesn't make them wrong.<br /><br />Huh, and I did it all without using insults like like "sloppy", "egregious", "ignorance", or "idiotic".<br /><br />Though I might recommend a little more proofreading, as I'm pretty sure the sentence "The fact that this was missed is a serious, glaring flaw in this reviewer's sloppiness" does not mean what you intend it to mean.Zev Valancyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10239062791827527067noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14812333.post-65463909668380180502010-06-09T02:33:35.240-05:002010-06-09T02:33:35.240-05:00Well, this wasn't such a good review. It gets ...Well, this wasn't such a good review. It gets some important things wrong (Dolarhyde's arc is crucial to the story, Cox is as good a Lecter as Hopkins).<br /><br />I've read a few reviews by Tim so far and he's smart but sloppy, he doesn't dig into the movies he's watching.<br />He makes bold comments at the start of a review and then doesn't really deliver the goods later on. This is a good example.<br /><br />The most egregious error here is missing Dolarhyde's role. <br /><br />This is a movie that is full of static, florid imagery. It is also about identity and selfhood - who am I? It is just NOT a movie about getting into the killer's mindset. <br /><br />The fact that this was missed is a serious, glaring flaw in this reviewer's sloppiness.<br /><br />Almost every Mann movie has a mirror-like obsession with duality. In Heat, we have cops and criminals struggling similarly with their competence vs their private lives. Work versus intimacy.<br /><br />In Miami Vice, that obsession actually fused the two, so that the criminals actually become cops. But the perils of doing the job, of work, are definitive of his aesthetic.<br /><br />Look at Thief - a lone wolf criminal who is fooled into complacency just long enough to buy into a master criminal's Daddy schtick. Again, the family versus work, for the criminal.<br /><br />See a theme? see the almost montonous repetition? No, this review doesn't, clearly, because otherwise he couldn't write with such ignorance about Dolarhyde's presence in the film.<br /><br />As always, Mann is showing the tension between work and family, and often, between cop & criminal.<br /><br />It's the symmetry of the mirror - Graham is the FBI cop risking his family and his sanity by thinking into the criminal role, and Dolarhyde is the criminal trying to feel his way out of it. Get that?<br /><br />Ugh. What an idiotic review.<br /><br />Having said that, I fully agree that the jitter-edits are just a terrible, awful stylistic touch. For years I've just hated the moment when Graham shoots Noonan at the end and there is that stutter. My god! Tim is 100% right it takes you out of the film. I couldn't agree more.<br /><br />The other massive flaw in this review is the lack of comprehension of the role of the senses.<br /><br />Briefly, the movie is told from Noonan's viewpoint - it is a feast for the senses, full of lush sounds and images. What a preposterous image - Lecter's ultra-sterile jail cell and the whole damn building! (seen as Will races out in a panic attack)<br /><br />Absurd! Glorious! Contrived, too. But it fits with great discipline into the theme of the movie and the rest of its look. I loved it.<br /><br />Remember that scene with the tiger? The blind woman who 'sees' the man inside the monster? The blind woman who hears the heart of the tiger? (There are no real dragons, so a tiger is symbolically a substitute for a dragon, for her hearing Dolarhyde's anguish and dormant humanity. It's odd but touching that she listens to a great savage beast's heart - and this humanizes Dolarhyde. Marvelous complexity there, he's beautiful in his savagery, but inside it is a gentle, mysterious heart aching to see the light of day. Remember the light imagery that suffuses the film: "Do you see?" repeats Dolarhyde to the about to be killed reporter. The light that shines behind Joan Allen when Noonan's jealousy is distorting what is a very mundane moment between her and her coworker. <br /><br />Of course, WIll's epiphany is to realize that perception itself is a clue to the killer's identity, hence the psychedelically vivid imagery. <br /><br />For what it's worth, I love the soundtrack. YMMV. Especially regarding 80's synth. I love it. I will merely say the lyrics perfectly sync with the theme of the film.<br /><br />There's a lot more here. None at all was picked up by the reviewer, incredibly. Very disappointing to see such a flat, uninformed opinion. <br /><br />I could just keep going on, but it's too late. Time for sleep.Arctorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11952210157510203883noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14812333.post-29536583728446801692009-06-13T21:56:38.107-05:002009-06-13T21:56:38.107-05:00"The problem is thus not in Noonan, but in th..."The problem is thus not in Noonan, but in the film itself and Mann's treatment of the Dollarhyde subplot that it's such a useless waste of running time. Simply put, this is not a film about the mind of a serial killer, but about the man who tries to dig his way into the mind of a serial killer - a small and terribly important distinction. The Dollarhyde scenes are just plain "wrong", not because they are inherently bad but because they don't function with the rest of the film."<br /><br />I have to disagree with you, here. Dollarhyde's scenes are crucial to the film because they provide insight into what Graham is chasing and what he is risking by trying to get into this guy's mind. Unlike SILENCE OF THE LAMBS who presents Buffalo Bill as a pretty one-dimensional killer, Dollarhyde is humanized somewhat. We see the side that wants to be loved and thinks he finds it with Reba and then when he imagines that she rejects him for another man, anything that was Dollarhyde is eradicated by his Red Dragon persona, which is masterfully captured in the scene where Dollarhyde thinks Reba is kissing a co-worker. There is also a wonderful moment after Dollarhyde and Reba make love where he lies in bed and puts her hand over his mouth and begins to cry. This scenes demonstrates what a mess this guy is. There is nothing in any of the other Lector films that even remotely approaches this humanization of a killer. The other ones just show the killing machine side while MANHUNTER shows both sides of this guy. And that's what makes it better than SILENCE.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08164105442273577128noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14812333.post-43786339489738302672009-06-12T09:38:39.243-05:002009-06-12T09:38:39.243-05:00William Petersen runs laps around Ed Norton, perio...William Petersen runs laps around Ed Norton, period. Manhunter is phenomenal, even considering Red Dragon had an A-list cast. Joan Allen as the blind woman.. what a perfect movie all around. Even the music sounds ok, dated and all.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com