silver linings playbook
So I watched The Silver Linings Playbook tonight because I was bored, didn't want to study, and wanted to see people fall in love. Also I fucking LOOOVE Jennifer Lawrence. Can someone please explain to me how anyone in their right fucking mind would ever ever EVER cast Kirsten Stewart over her? In anything? Even the role of petulant teenager? Because you know Lawrence would be able to make it look more genuine than actual real life petulant teen Kirsten Stewart. I bring this up because there've been rumors. I'm not saying it's true but it's deeply troubling.
Anyway, the movie was great. I think when you get older (I'm 24 but bear with me here) you start to come to terms with things. For example, back in my teens I would NEVER admit to liking movies centered around romances. Just never. It was girly and gross and only stupid girls liked that stuff and I'm not a girl. I'm beyond that. I'm beyond girly stupid girl things.
Pink.
But then I get older and I realized a lot of things, one of them being that as a woman I can define my womanhood however I want and I can be who I am, someone who enjoys potentially unhealthy portions of visual violence and rarely flinches at scary movies, and also enjoy a good quality love story. Sometimes it's nice to just see two people connect and work things out.
So anyway. Silver Linings Playbook. It was really good. I've never been especially drawn to Bradley Cooper's acting but I have to say he impressed me here. The entire cast was pretty winning. The story centers around two mentally ill people who through an uneasy friendship manage to make each other better. At first I had some serious issues with the portrayal of Tiffany, Lawrence's character. The world "whore" and "slut" was thrown around A LOT. But I decided I'd see where they were going with it.
The movie didn't shy away from the stigmas geared toward the mentally ill and the way that manifests against women and men. Promiscuity is not an uncommon way in which some women deal with depression and anxiety. It makes sense for several of the characters in the film to see Tiffany and her behavior and judge her. The filmmaker (a man) doesn't spare us from the male gaze either. Lawrence is stunning and the camera and the cameramen know it. But what I liked was the way the main character treated Tiffany. Wary of her, yet intrigued, he allows her to rope him into a dance competition in exchange for a potential reconciliation with his estranged wife. Tiffany, for her part, does try to help him. At first he has the same reservations about Tiffany as many do. Only he's very vocal about it. But as he gets to know her he learns to realize his own faults and misconceptions and he apologizes to Tiffany as well as displays real respect for her. That part is important because often times filmmakers ask us to just assume the male protagonist apologized for his indiscretions, especially those meant to insult a woman's sexual motives and practices, but Silver Linings actually puts it on camera. Yes Tiffany has been around the block. No that doesn't indicate anything about her quality as a person and no it doesn't mean it's ok to proposition her for sex.
The film makes Tiffany into a clearly unstable, deeply unpleasant, and yet sympathetic character. She's smart. She's funny. And she actually cares. I was worried they were going for the insane manipulative bitch who is turned into a better person by our male character storyline but was pleasantly surprised when it didn't turn out that way. Instead the movie steered us one way but laying bare our own misconceptions about a woman who sleeps with 11 people to deal with her husband's death and then turning it around to show Tiffany's genuine willingness to help Pat (Cooper's character) recover or at least find some sort of stability in his life.
She's not perfect. One scene in particular shows how Tiffany has earned her reputation among the denizens of her neighborhood. But at the same time you understand why she's better for Pat than his wife, who comes off as unfaithful but not insane or mentally ill. Which is another thing I'm on the fence but leaning toward positive about. There's not really any slut shaming over Pat's wife cheating on him, which is what led to his outburst which is what put him in the mental hospital int he first place. Bit by bit it's revealed that Nikki was demanding and that her and Pat's marriage was troubled but there's never a sense that it's all her fault. It's implied that Pat's continued instability and inability to deal with his bipolar disorder had put a strain on their marriage for quite some time. Pat's continued obsession with Nikki wasn't out of love but out of years of insecurity. He couldn't let her go because she was the first woman who loved him and made him feel good about himself, even as an overweight underachieving nobody.
Tiffany's husband on the other hand understood her. He was willing to work with her and help her. Their marriage ended because he died, not because she drove him away. One of the character's greatest traits was her honesty and how we were supposed appreciate it and respect it. She knows that she's promiscuous but she not going to apologize or feel ashamed for it. It didn't make it ok for men to assume she wanted to have sex with THEM, only that she was willing to have sex with more than one man. It didn't mean that she was befriending Pat based on sexual attracting. It only meant that she needed companionship as much as he did.
With all that said, the main issue I have with the film is how much the focus is on Pat. The movie is about Pat. That's fine. He's the main character. But I really don't think there's enough done to really explain how he's helped Tiffany. Tiffany began to get better too from her interactions with Pat. She didn't just exist so that Pat could get better. She's more than just the cure. She was a human being her was dealing with her own struggles. The film explains her backstory and Lawrence imbues her with real life and pathos but pretty much the entire film Tiffany is serving Pat's story. Sure Pat agrees with dance with her but he does it so that she'll help him. In the end the dancing helped toward HIS recovery. I would have been nice to get more on Tiffany's relationship with her sister so that it was as well reconciled as Pat's relationship with his brother. This would've also been nice because Tiffany's sister was played by Julia Stiles and when you underutilize Julia Stiles like that it's just wrong.
In the end the best part of the film was still Lawrence. She's once of those awesome actresses who can convey so much emotion with just a deadpan face. I really can't wait for her to do more independent films like this. Big budget films like the Hunger Games and X-men are great because it puts her on the map, gives her some extra cash, and allows her to continue to pick roles she wants to do. But stuff like this is where she really shines.
Anyway, the movie was great. I think when you get older (I'm 24 but bear with me here) you start to come to terms with things. For example, back in my teens I would NEVER admit to liking movies centered around romances. Just never. It was girly and gross and only stupid girls liked that stuff and I'm not a girl. I'm beyond that. I'm beyond girly stupid girl things.
Pink.
But then I get older and I realized a lot of things, one of them being that as a woman I can define my womanhood however I want and I can be who I am, someone who enjoys potentially unhealthy portions of visual violence and rarely flinches at scary movies, and also enjoy a good quality love story. Sometimes it's nice to just see two people connect and work things out.
So anyway. Silver Linings Playbook. It was really good. I've never been especially drawn to Bradley Cooper's acting but I have to say he impressed me here. The entire cast was pretty winning. The story centers around two mentally ill people who through an uneasy friendship manage to make each other better. At first I had some serious issues with the portrayal of Tiffany, Lawrence's character. The world "whore" and "slut" was thrown around A LOT. But I decided I'd see where they were going with it.
The movie didn't shy away from the stigmas geared toward the mentally ill and the way that manifests against women and men. Promiscuity is not an uncommon way in which some women deal with depression and anxiety. It makes sense for several of the characters in the film to see Tiffany and her behavior and judge her. The filmmaker (a man) doesn't spare us from the male gaze either. Lawrence is stunning and the camera and the cameramen know it. But what I liked was the way the main character treated Tiffany. Wary of her, yet intrigued, he allows her to rope him into a dance competition in exchange for a potential reconciliation with his estranged wife. Tiffany, for her part, does try to help him. At first he has the same reservations about Tiffany as many do. Only he's very vocal about it. But as he gets to know her he learns to realize his own faults and misconceptions and he apologizes to Tiffany as well as displays real respect for her. That part is important because often times filmmakers ask us to just assume the male protagonist apologized for his indiscretions, especially those meant to insult a woman's sexual motives and practices, but Silver Linings actually puts it on camera. Yes Tiffany has been around the block. No that doesn't indicate anything about her quality as a person and no it doesn't mean it's ok to proposition her for sex.
The film makes Tiffany into a clearly unstable, deeply unpleasant, and yet sympathetic character. She's smart. She's funny. And she actually cares. I was worried they were going for the insane manipulative bitch who is turned into a better person by our male character storyline but was pleasantly surprised when it didn't turn out that way. Instead the movie steered us one way but laying bare our own misconceptions about a woman who sleeps with 11 people to deal with her husband's death and then turning it around to show Tiffany's genuine willingness to help Pat (Cooper's character) recover or at least find some sort of stability in his life.
She's not perfect. One scene in particular shows how Tiffany has earned her reputation among the denizens of her neighborhood. But at the same time you understand why she's better for Pat than his wife, who comes off as unfaithful but not insane or mentally ill. Which is another thing I'm on the fence but leaning toward positive about. There's not really any slut shaming over Pat's wife cheating on him, which is what led to his outburst which is what put him in the mental hospital int he first place. Bit by bit it's revealed that Nikki was demanding and that her and Pat's marriage was troubled but there's never a sense that it's all her fault. It's implied that Pat's continued instability and inability to deal with his bipolar disorder had put a strain on their marriage for quite some time. Pat's continued obsession with Nikki wasn't out of love but out of years of insecurity. He couldn't let her go because she was the first woman who loved him and made him feel good about himself, even as an overweight underachieving nobody.
Tiffany's husband on the other hand understood her. He was willing to work with her and help her. Their marriage ended because he died, not because she drove him away. One of the character's greatest traits was her honesty and how we were supposed appreciate it and respect it. She knows that she's promiscuous but she not going to apologize or feel ashamed for it. It didn't make it ok for men to assume she wanted to have sex with THEM, only that she was willing to have sex with more than one man. It didn't mean that she was befriending Pat based on sexual attracting. It only meant that she needed companionship as much as he did.
With all that said, the main issue I have with the film is how much the focus is on Pat. The movie is about Pat. That's fine. He's the main character. But I really don't think there's enough done to really explain how he's helped Tiffany. Tiffany began to get better too from her interactions with Pat. She didn't just exist so that Pat could get better. She's more than just the cure. She was a human being her was dealing with her own struggles. The film explains her backstory and Lawrence imbues her with real life and pathos but pretty much the entire film Tiffany is serving Pat's story. Sure Pat agrees with dance with her but he does it so that she'll help him. In the end the dancing helped toward HIS recovery. I would have been nice to get more on Tiffany's relationship with her sister so that it was as well reconciled as Pat's relationship with his brother. This would've also been nice because Tiffany's sister was played by Julia Stiles and when you underutilize Julia Stiles like that it's just wrong.
In the end the best part of the film was still Lawrence. She's once of those awesome actresses who can convey so much emotion with just a deadpan face. I really can't wait for her to do more independent films like this. Big budget films like the Hunger Games and X-men are great because it puts her on the map, gives her some extra cash, and allows her to continue to pick roles she wants to do. But stuff like this is where she really shines.