Without realizing it, I embarked on a Western masculinity mini-seminar, and I'm digging it. It started with paying for The Killing of Two Lovers on Amazon Prime (yes, I wish I could quit Amazon, and I mostly do, except for the streaming). I tried to go see TKOTL at Tower, but on the day I went, it said online that Tower was showing it (a Thursday) when I arrived, the theater was closed. It is open 3 days a week, unless that has changed in the last couple of weeks. That Angelika website is A MESS. And now that the Bee doesn't have movie listings any more, it's hard to figure out.
Anyway, I show up, ready for movie, no movie. So I rent it. The director went to grad school at UCD, and an earlier movie of his (God Bless the Child) is set in Davis (you really wouldn't be able to tell unless you already knew, it's just suburban streetscapes and parks). I watched God Bless The Child after TKOTL, but it's just kids (his real kids) being feral and if you like kids it would be awesome, but....
So TKOTL is set in some stark area, like, IDK let's say Montana. It's about a stoic beardy blue collar worker guy hurting over his marriage breakup. But with the scenery, the camera work, and the performances it's more than the sum of its parts. And there is one really unforgettable scene. It stuck with me (enough that I watched that other movie) and I really wish I had seen it in the theater.
Then, I decided to watch The Rider, the prior movie from Chloe Zhao before she won the Oscar for Nomadland. I remember seeing the big standup poster for it, I think at Tower, and just having no interest despite all the raves. I don't care much about Westerns. Wow, that movie is fucking incredible. It's a real family (that's the dad and son above, with the director) playing thinly veiled versions of themselves, and the protagonist's scenes with his disabled friend are just beautiful and heartbreaking. And his real, non-neurotypical sister is in it and she's so good too. And the scenes of South Dakota are gorgeous. There's a lot of horsebreaking and rodeoing scenes. My high school had a high school rodeo, and I don't know how many times I went but I enjoyed it. It's undeniably exciting. I always rolled my eyes when they played Lee Greenwood "proud to be an American" but ya know, there wasn't a lot to do in my town.
So this was just coincidental, but then I needed a book to read and I marveled that although we've had a copy of All The Pretty Horses forever, and I've read I think most Cormac McCarthy books, I had never read it. I am just loving it, I'm about a third done. It is so funny and man I wish I was riding horses across Mexico (not really, but I'd love to go anywhere, especially Mexico). I wonder if the Matt Damon movie is any good.
There's some extended horsebreaking in All the Pretty Horses Too and I don't even like horses but somehow I love to see/read about the art of breaking them? Maybe it's a new fetish, who knows.
After years of books by women, mostly about women (ever since #metoo and me realizing my own internalized misogyny), maybe I can let some male energy back into my media life, I guess.
10 comments:
All the Pretty Horses is my favorite McCarthy book. And it's tough to choose one.
do you recommend the movie?
If you enjoyed The Rider, check out the two other movies that have been dubbed part of the 'Art Horse,' trilogy for using the Western genre to look at class and masculinity in contemporary Western America. We Are Living in a Golden Age of Art House Horse Movies
The Mustang joins The Rider and Lean on Pete in a wave of stunning “arthorse” films.
1. Andrew Haigh's Lean on Pete, which is an adaption of Willy Vlautin (Reno native/musician)'s novel.
2. Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre's The Mustang that was filmed/is set at the Nevada State Prison in Carson City
I was way more moved by The Rider than by Nomadland and really hope that Chloe Zhao is doing a Marvel movie for the movie to fund other projects.
Thanks! I will def watch these soon. I feel the same way about Nomadland, I really liked it, but I got pulled out of it once I realized she was slumming it due to grief. That's not realistic for most folks living that way. I felt it was a cheap out.
Just watched the Rider. Pretty incredible. You touched on all the stuff I thought was great.
The dreaded quadruple post, I love it!
I watched The Mustang, which was a bit slow but good and very sad. I listen to Ear Hustle podcast but the sadness of incarcerated folks is almost too much to bear. The star of The Mustang is a somewhat charismatic actor but it would have been cooler if the story centered a non-white person, since white people are the minority of incarcerated ppl.
I finished All the Pretty Horses and I LOVED it. So romantic.
That was part of my issue with Nomadland, was it a story about wanderlust or about the economy pushing people on to the margins where the "gig economy" feeds off of their labor. Which I did appreciate that it just presented Fern's wanderlust without too much explanation beyond her life in Empire ending with her husband's death and the mine closure. Because the female wanderlust genre, like Wild and Eat, Pray, Love, it always turns into being less about the urge to wander/explore/be unmoored, and some loss in the domestic sphere. Robyn Douglas' Tracks is the only example I can think of that type of story where it refuses (because she wrote it) to turn it into some kind of self actualization quest, she just did because "it was there." However did also feel like a cheat not getting further into how her leaving her home and becoming part of a seasonal/contingent labor force is more the reality. That Fern and the people she meets are more the reality than what you see presented as "gig workers" or "digital nomads."
Ooh, I will watch Tracks!
Update: i watched tracks! i liked it. the camels were the stars
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