WEIRDLAND: Moonrise Kingdom and Whiplash Video Essays

Thursday, October 06, 2016

Moonrise Kingdom and Whiplash Video Essays


Whether by naiveté, folly of youth or wisdom beyond (or within) their years, Sam and Suzy's unshakable devotion and determination is the stuff of care-free, cinematic dreams. Their love isn't born out of fickle teen attraction or hormone-starved passion nor does it burn out or fade at the first sign of trouble. There's such an innocence to their impulsiveness, however reckless, and such a sweet sincerity to their flight and affections, however mismanaged, that it's difficult not to root for the runaways, even when their liberation causes grief and panic among their caretakers. Alone in the wilderness, away from those who either refuse to understand or are ill-equipped to do so, they find exactly what they're looking for; exactly what they've been longing for since they began exchanging letters a year before. 

It's a pure and powerful desire; romance at its most distilled, safety as only a child robbed of security from an early age can see it. Sam and Suzy are Romeo and Juliet, Bonnie and Clyde, Annie and Alvy, Jack and Rose. Or all of them, for that matter, save a crucial difference: Sam and Suzy's fate is in the hands of Wes Anderson, which all but assures us that their relationship isn't doomed to tragic end. Source: www.blu-ray.com


Infused with a deep sense of film and literary history—from Salinger’s Holden Caulfield to Charlie Brown cartoons, Harold and Maude, Pierrot le Fou, and Summer of ’42—the world Anderson creates remains deeply his own. The video goes on to address how the dialogue both breaks from traditional filmmaking and supports the film’s overall style. The direct, affectless nature of the dialogue forces viewers to make their own decisions about the characters’ emotional states. This kind of frankness “mimics the earnestness of childhood,” while at the same time imitating “the emotional barriers we construct in adulthood,” leaving the protagonists to navigate between both extremes. Source: www.indiewire.com


This is a brief look into how writer/director Damien Chazelle shifts the viewers expectations in "Whiplash" starring Miles Teller, J.K. Simmons, Paul Reiser, Melissa Benoist, etc.

Miles Teller has signed on to voice the titular creature in John Stevenson’s The Ark and the Aardvark. The film is an animated riff on the Noah’s Ark tale, focusing on the aardvark’s perspective of what it’s like to survive a giant flood packed in a ship two-by-two. The Hollywood Reporter calls Teller’s character Gilbert a kind, funny soul who “leads a group of misfit animals though natural disasters and personal anxieties.” According to Stevenson, “Gilbert is young, spirited, sarcastic, and we couldn’t have found a more perfect artist to bring Gilbert to life in Miles.”

Teller is a huge talent who was entertaining as Peter in the Divergent movies and had his big dramatic break with 2014’s fantastic Whiplash, so maybe it’s time for him to flex his voice acting muscles. The Ark and the Aardvark doesn’t currently have a release date. You can see Teller back in the multiplex soon when his boxing drama Bleed for This opens November 23. Source: screencrush.com

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