Attitude, Attitude, Attitude
After my doctor's appointment in the city Friday, I walked around for a while. At one point, I heard two women asking someone for directions to "32 Central Park West." When one of them pointed to the small plaza in front of the Plaza Hotel and referred to it as "Central Park," my "Oh, hell no" reaction forced me into the mix. It turned out the woman who misidentified Central Park was also misstating the number of the address they wanted, because it was actually 320, not 32. I put it through my phone's map app and had them take a photo of the results, which listed an estimated time and three possible routes through Central Park, which I pointed them too. (Did they have their own map function on their phones? Who knows? It would've been churlish to suggest it.) After I left them, I wondered if I should've just told them to walk along 59th Street until they reached the west end of Central Park, turn right, and then look left at building numbers, but considering how deeply clueless one of the women were, that might also have been too difficult. I often wonder if the many people I give directions to actually get there, I truly wondered about this pair. They might still be wandering Manhattan now.
I saw an automaton of artist Yayoi Kusama in a window at Louis Vuitton (short video 1, short video 2). Someone nearby asked me if it was a real woman, and I said, laughing a little, "No."
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I recently watched The Menu. The first half is great, but it starts to go off the rails in a bad way in the second. It's not as smart as it thinks it is, and it isn't subtle, but it left me with some things to feel and think about and worth watching. It has moments of dark humor: the bread course really made me cackle. Most of the actors are great throughout, especially Ralph Fiennes, Anna Taylor-Joy, and Nicholas Hoult.
Some viewers were annoyed that almost all the characters were unlikable, but that was the point, that's why they are where they are. While I can see how some people might not like that, it's complaining that the water you got was wet. A few claimed that they didn't want to root for Margot enough, which I side-eye. How hard does someone have to work for you not to want them to be tormented and finally killed?
Some things that particularly bothered me:
* The Man's Folly course, which starts with a member of the staff stabbing the chef for his unwanted sexual advances to her and then his ostracization when she refused both times, tells the male diners to run and try to avoid capture by the staff. With the setup, everyone, viewers included, expect major consequences for being caught. Instead, all the diners are just found by staff and brought back to the dining room. Nobody so much as strains an ankle.
* The chef says he's committed to his murderous finale because he's lost the joy of making food for people. Margot, who saw a photo in his room commemorating his early years making excellent cheeseburgers, demands he make a cheeseburger for her, nothing haute, just beef with American cheese topping it, and fries. AS he cooks the burger, the chef looks happy. Upon receiving the burger, Margot takes one bite, leaves him in suspense for a bit, then says that it is a good burger, but her eyes were larger than her stomach so she wants to take it all to-go. He gives her the food in takeout containers, lets her go... then continues the rest of his plans with no further deviation, that brief flare of joy meaning nothing more to him. That didn't quite work for me.
* At the end, the diners seem to have accepted and approved of their fate, which I didn't buy for a second because there wasn't much setup to that. Some of these people are truly selfish assholes, which I'm not but I wouldn't accept being burned alive.
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Knives Out was okay, some fun. I probably would've liked it more if I'd seen it in the context of when it first came out and without years of hype.
I saw an automaton of artist Yayoi Kusama in a window at Louis Vuitton (short video 1, short video 2). Someone nearby asked me if it was a real woman, and I said, laughing a little, "No."
+++
I recently watched The Menu. The first half is great, but it starts to go off the rails in a bad way in the second. It's not as smart as it thinks it is, and it isn't subtle, but it left me with some things to feel and think about and worth watching. It has moments of dark humor: the bread course really made me cackle. Most of the actors are great throughout, especially Ralph Fiennes, Anna Taylor-Joy, and Nicholas Hoult.
Some viewers were annoyed that almost all the characters were unlikable, but that was the point, that's why they are where they are. While I can see how some people might not like that, it's complaining that the water you got was wet. A few claimed that they didn't want to root for Margot enough, which I side-eye. How hard does someone have to work for you not to want them to be tormented and finally killed?
Some things that particularly bothered me:
* The Man's Folly course, which starts with a member of the staff stabbing the chef for his unwanted sexual advances to her and then his ostracization when she refused both times, tells the male diners to run and try to avoid capture by the staff. With the setup, everyone, viewers included, expect major consequences for being caught. Instead, all the diners are just found by staff and brought back to the dining room. Nobody so much as strains an ankle.
* The chef says he's committed to his murderous finale because he's lost the joy of making food for people. Margot, who saw a photo in his room commemorating his early years making excellent cheeseburgers, demands he make a cheeseburger for her, nothing haute, just beef with American cheese topping it, and fries. AS he cooks the burger, the chef looks happy. Upon receiving the burger, Margot takes one bite, leaves him in suspense for a bit, then says that it is a good burger, but her eyes were larger than her stomach so she wants to take it all to-go. He gives her the food in takeout containers, lets her go... then continues the rest of his plans with no further deviation, that brief flare of joy meaning nothing more to him. That didn't quite work for me.
* At the end, the diners seem to have accepted and approved of their fate, which I didn't buy for a second because there wasn't much setup to that. Some of these people are truly selfish assholes, which I'm not but I wouldn't accept being burned alive.
+++
Knives Out was okay, some fun. I probably would've liked it more if I'd seen it in the context of when it first came out and without years of hype.