The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things (2004)

The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things (2004)
Directed by Asia Argento

I recently saw the documentary about Laura Albert (J. T. LeRoy) so that lead to looking at this byproduct of her work.

The movie is “better” than the J. T. LeRoy novel I read called Sarah. It wasn’t just the distasteful content, it was poorly written.  That is saying very little because I thought the novel was junk. I guess the explanation now it that it is a product of Albert digesting her trauma.

This movie is set in a similar lowlife truck stop abusive to children USA hick atmosphere as Sarah. But the thing is, it is a skillfully made movie. Asia Argento, who also stars as bad momma Sarah (this name again) knows how to make a horror movie. Perhaps it is in her genes. It has some nicely done CGI characters, a couple of recurring red birds, it all clips along at a brisk pace, it doesn’t bore the viewer. The kid who plays Jeremiah, her 9 year old son, is convincing. (I kind of wondered what the actor went through emotionally during this production.)
It’s all quite good, such as it is and taken on it’s own terms.
But I just have to ask myself, “Why?”

It’s a harsh little drama of this boy at the mercy of insane drunk, and otherwise drugged crazy abusive mamma. When he is taken away from her, his has to live with his crazy Christian religious fanatic grandparents who train him to preach on the street, beat his teen uncles, and give them all refreshing morning ice baths.

Is there a purpose for telling this story via film other than some sort of hipster attraction to low-life spectacles? Is it just another form of horror movie?
I was recently watching an interview with David Foster Wallace where he talks about moving image mass media and its bias toward sensation and spectacle in one form or another. He also said he didn’t have a TV because he can’t help but look himself even though aware of the inherent insidious attraction of this sort of product.
I guess I watched it for more or less the same reason. At least I still avoid murder, execution, and suicide viral videos in the “News”.

The End of the Tour (2015)

The End of the Tour (2015)

I tend to avoid biopics. They, as movies, generally have to focus of melodramatic moments. It is very hard to get inside someone via a picture show. They are mostly about celebrity actors and music stars, and usually I could care less what their lives were like. If I like someone’s work I probably don’t want to watch some actor pretending to be them and  going through all the biopic stuff such as drinking/drugging, beating/being beat by an intimate, going up and falling down, etc.

I have never read David Foster Wallace. Before viewing the movie I had not seen or heard an interview of him. I was aware of him in the sort of pop media way. And of course aware of the dramatic ending of his young life. I entered the viewing of this movie as a direct innocent as far as his own words, mode of speech, and even what he looked like, so I can’t say what a Wallace reader or “fan” would think of the movie.

I found the movie completely engaging and it stimulated an interest in Wallace. It is in essence a conversation, an interview between the writer and David Lipsky who has been sent to do a profile of him for Rolling Stone magazine. They talk and talk and talk, and it is makes for my idea of great entertainment, conversation about ideas and the culture we find ourselves living in. The Wallace character, though the script and actor Jason Segel,  is a guy who kind of thinks like me in some ways and it was good to see that expressed in a movie.

I went into the movie with a positive feeling about movie star Jesse Eisenberg. I can’t think of a movie with him that I didn’t like. OK I bailed out of The Social Network (ha! A biopic), and never watched the superhero movie he’s in, whichever one that was.. So if a potential viewer can’t stand Jesse Eisenberg, whcih I can understand, they might not bother with this movie. And his cigarettes smoking was delightfully unconvincing.
Anyway, good movie.