Reaction to First Reformed
Added 2022-09-01 21:35:22 +0000 UTCI didn't get where this one was taking me in the first half. By the end I still was confused where it had led me to. But it made me think a lot. I appreciated this one.
Comments
Thanks for watching! I hope this gets some more people interested. I didn't like the end at first, and I guess I still wish it was different, but I do appreciate it more after three viewings. This movie is pretty straightforward. It deals with big shit, but what it wants to do is simple. Despair vs hope. Condemn all of creation for the pain we experience within it, or grab onto something hoping it can pull you through (while, as Toller notes, knowing that there is no hope). Toller rejects the choir lady because 1) she's annoying but more importantly, 2) he doesn't believe that he's worthy of love. You can see him cringe when she talks about how he needs to be taken care of, and it's not just because he's not into her. It really feels like he's stung by the sentiment itself. In the back half, he and Mary get closer and he's reminded of the comfort we can get from others. But it's corrupted by his despair (the magical mystery tour dissolving into environmental catastrophe). At the end, both hope and despair reach a crescendo. The movie ends with them making out but she appears so suddenly that we're unsure if it's real or not. Hope and despair never resolve. As Toller says, being human is to hold both contradictory ideas at once. This movie is so good. I love that Toller is basically possessed by the angry spirit that killed Michael. Michael himself is such a great character. I love the detail that his laptop background is the starving polar bear. It's so earnest/loud/cringe and really speaks to the environmentalist in me. The despair is done so well. It just feels so real, the scenes where Toller is doomscrolling and Michael is emotionally singing stories of activists who were martyred protecting trees or peat bogs. Michael's absurd yet touching toxic waste dump funeral
Solomon Wong
2022-09-03 04:34:11 +0000 UTC
