Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

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Re: Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

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Raxivace wrote:
Lord_Lyndon wrote:This is my least favourite Tarantino film. I even preferred Death Proof to it.
Lyndon man, I love ya but [gonemad].
I should probably give Once Upon a Time... In Hollywood (2019) another chance. And read some reviews beforehand. Maybe next year.
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Re: Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

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Yeah I don't think I'll be squeezing anything else in this year unfortunately. I did have one last anime I watched (A nice little slice of life comedy/melodrama thing called The Day I Became God whose final episodes hit bizarrely close to home for me specifically in its final three episodes. Really reminded me of rougher parts of my childhood at the end there in way I didn't anticipate going into the show), but I don't think I have a whole lot to really say about it.

Not my most productive year of film and TV watching, sadly.
"[Cinema] is a labyrinth with a treacherous resemblance to reality." - Andrew Sarris
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Re: Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

Post by Eva Yojimbo »

Raxivace wrote:
I wouldn't expect them to be very gamey since I know the general premise. As for literature I usually try not to cross-compare mediums anyway, and if anything I'd think a visual novel would be closer to graphic novels/comic books.
Hmm, I was going to say they're not quite like a comic since average "shot" in a visual novel isn't exactly composed in the way even a panel of a comic is, since those individual panels are still usually little mini-painting in their own right that work as a piece of a whole that is an an individual comic book page, which itself is a part of a single issue, and issues have larger context of overall volume or comic series etc., but in thinking about I suppose there is an element of that to it still.

In visual novels you typically get your paragraphs of text and narration and such on-screen, static background art, stock character sprites that cycle through different sprites as characters "react" to what other characters or doing or are speaking themselves or doing something else etc., and background music accompanying all of this. Occasionally you will get "CG's" (Standing for something like "Computer Graphics") that are composed drawings in their own right and these are probably most comparable to comic books. VN's typically don't have a lot of them (And usually once seeing them in-game you "unlock" ability to revisit CG's from the main menu of whatever game you're playing), and usually use them for particularly emotional or dramatic moments, or maybe an action scene or something, or a sex scenes if its a pornographic game.

None of this is a fast and hard rule of course, and now that I'm trying to "theorize" about the medium I guess what I'm really saying is that different artists and projects emphasize different aspects about the medium. Some games will have more CG's than others, some will put more emphasis on having a lot of character sprites, some put of more emphasis on "choices" than others and make finding the "True Ending" something of a puzzle in its own right (Kagetsu Tohya being a particularly nasty example of this, though there's the Zero Escape trilogy and such as well), and hell the guy who wrote Higurashi and Umineko says what he creates are "Sound Novels" more than "Visual Novels" since the music and sound effects tends to be what sets the mood for his stuff more than anything and barely has choices and such (I think Umineko doesn't even get one until like literally 70 hours in).

Thing is I dunno that medium has produced any particularly unassailable masterpiece really (Some might say this is because of how much of the genre is rooted in pornography and not "art" but well whatever), but its hard to tell how much of that is just me being a bit insecure about a super nerdy thing I like.
This is all genuinely interesting to me. Even though I haven't played/experienced any visual novels myself, I've always been fascinated by on-the-fringe mediums and art-forms that feel like they either haven't quite reached their potential or are on the verge of getting there with maybe a handful of works that are masterpieces or verging on that status. It's a big reason why I was initially drawn to anime and comic books... hell, it's a big reason I've even been drawn to porn and other "erotic art." All of these mediums feel like they're handicapped and stigmatized as either being juvenile or somehow innately less artistic than other mediums or genres, and I guess I like an underdog.

It's really funny about you making the visual novel-porn connection, because I have been thinking more again recently about the stigma surrounding porn as art... partially because I recently saw the very-lauded Teenage Lesbian by Bree Mills (which has both an uncut "porn" version and a feature-length non-porn version) and again found myself thinking that it's basically a very decent indie film that just happens to have uncensored sex scenes in it... which also are genuinely integral to the story given that it's all about the main character's sexual coming of age, especially in a time (early-90s) when being gay wasn't as accepted as it would be even a decade later. It's not a masterpiece or anything and it does have some obvious flaws--awkward pacing at times, some scenes that are only there to "make a point," maybe lacking a few "connective tissue" scenes that would make it feel less episodic--but it's not so vastly inferior the wealth of other indie films out there to make it "not art" just because it happens to have lengthy sex scenes, and it makes me wonder what it is about the sex that automatically makes people want to pitch it (and similar stuff) into the non-art trash. Even with run-of-the-mill porn that make no pretensions towards art or even being "mediocre indie films," surely there's some art to how it's shot, edited and performed, since even a cursory comparison with amateur stuff shows a pretty huge gap in the talent/skills of those involved. I've also found it kinda humorous how porn is basically identical to other artistic mediums in that innovators will come along with a new idea, and then that idea will get copied endlessly until people get tired of it until another new-something comes along to take its place.

Anyway, I hope it's not TOO weird I just went off on a tangent about porn! LOL I'd actually probably be interested in some of the visual novels that were more erotic in nature... not that I wouldn't be interested in non-erotic ones too if they're good or interesting.
Raxivace wrote:
Visconti's version was Ossessione, one of his first (maybe his first?) films and very much in his early neo-realist style. Maybe part of the disconnect is that the story was more shocking for the time than it is now?
Well we might be swinging back into such a thing being "shocking" if the people I see claiming younger generations are becoming more puritanical are correct, but I can't tell how much of that is pearl clutching about annoying "kids these days" on Twitter or whatever, or if its an actual upcoming shift in societal attitudes among post-Millenial generations.
I don't know if it's that kids are becoming more puritanical or if people are just becoming more polarized: more puritanical reactionaries responding to more sexually liberated media.
Raxivace wrote:
Pretty sure I never said Boogiepop was bad on EGF. Sure you're not thinking of Elfen Lied? Or I may have been talking about one of the LA Boogiepop adaptations as to those were pretty bad. It's not a perfect series by any means, but I remember liking it for the most part. It just doesn't stick out for being as good as something like Paranoia Agent or as bad as Elfen Lied.
Hmm looking it up again, I think I was confusing it for something you said about Ergo Proxy. That's another show I never watched lol.
Yeah, Ergo Proxy was really dull too.
Raxivace wrote:
Yeah, I think we fundamentally agree on this. I do vaguely remember finding those parts of the novel quite dull.
Yeah but isn't great that we agree on this? How wonderful and angelic you are for agreeing with me. You are the best. Let's spend three or four pages now talking about how awesome it is we agree. Now lets repeat this ad infinitum, because that's the Bram Stoker way.
[laugh]
Raxivace wrote:
Jet Alone is one of those eps. I think is better for what it represents thematically than for anything else. The actual battle/drama surrounding JA is one of the weaker "big monster battles" in the series, but what it says about the political forces and their role in the big picture is pretty important. I'd say something similar about Magma Diver and how crucial it is for developing a lot of the series' symbolic motifs, but as an ep. is pretty blah.
I dunno, this time I ended up really enjoying those episodes, maybe because they felt slightly "newer" to me than more famous episodes I had put way more time into thinking about and analyzing over the years.

And frankly I have better appreciation for them now still feeling fairly unique after watching shit loads of other mecha anime that don't even come close to the variety of "monsters of the week" that Eva has. After so many Tomino shows and such that have the same types of battles over and over, Eva having so much variety is astounding.
Yeah, I understand that reaction as I have it to music alot. I get tired hearing my favorite songs from my favorite bands so when I revisit their albums I tend to find myself appreciating the more obscure stuff that nobody plays/knows about because I haven't heard them a billion times. I imagine it could be the same with TV shows and episodes.

I also always appreciated the variety of NGE's MOTW battles. I remember commenting on that in the very first review I wrote for the series and posted on Amazon. It's perhaps an aspect that a lot of people really underrate when it comes to the series: even the more "mundane" aspects are still much more imaginative than most shows of its type.
Raxivace wrote:BTW, kuribo asked me this the other day and I didn't quite have an answer, but do you think the long train station shot at the end of episode 4 is "earned"?

Image
^This one, I mean. From the end of the episode.

I had somehow completely forgot about it, but really its close to much later elevator scene in length (Which ended feeling shorter than I remembered anyways).
I think so, but it's tricky answering questions like that because it's very much a subjective "feel" thing. There's a balance between letting a shot play long enough so that you can wring all the emotion/feeling/atmosphere out of it, including the added stuff by LETTING it linger for that extra time, and then letting it go past the point where you're just trying to wring blood from a stone. If that scene goes past that point I don't think it does by much, but I'm often a fan that of films that loves lingering on static shots of nothing (or not much) happening because I love immersing myself in an atmosphere that can only be done via spending enough time being there. That scene isn't really going for the same/similar thing, but the principle is still similar.
Raxivace wrote:
I'm forgetting what test/image you're referring to, but the Phantom Rei I generally just take to be one of the series' intentionally unresolved mysteries, and it's not hard to imagine why it would be haunting Shinji since that's kinda the idea.
It's episode 13 or 14, after the "recap" and Rei's soliloquoy, where they have Shinji trying syncing with Unit 00 and it starts going berserk and flooding him with images of Rei.

This has been weird pet thing for me, but I've never been able to tell if Shinji ever retroactively recognize "Phantom Rei" in episode 1 as well, Rei. And this episode didn't really make it clear to me.
I'd have to give it a rewatch since I don't remember that Phantom Rei appearance. AFAIK, Shinji never says anything on the matter.
Raxivace wrote:
Azuma's "Anime or Something Like It" was one of the first pieces of writing I read on NGE and hugely influenced my perception of the series. Didn't know he had a whole (translated?) book out.
Yup: https://www.amazon.com/Otaku-Database-A ... 0816653526

I remember that "Anime or Something Like It" article being pretty good, but in O:JDA he tries to use Critical Theory to analyze anime as a way to analyze "otaku culture" and uh yeah. He cites people like Zizek and just makes a bunch of weird claims throughout the book.

Still its a short book and seems to get referenced a lot, so it might still be worth reading if you're interested (I'm not quite done myself though). Maybe pirate a PDF or something, and then read it in jail because piracy is a crime. You wouldn't download an Evangelion after all.
Might be worth checking out. I think we've been over my ambivalence about Critical Theory before, but it can be occasionally insightful.
Raxivace wrote:EDIT: To expand on this, he complains that postmodernism, the loss of a unifying "grand narrative" in Japanese culture is why there is a loss of plot in in anime series, and Evangelion ruined anime and turned into a plot-less "database" of characteristics. I.e. shows aren't watched because of plot or story or theme and basically just flatout stopped having those in favor of a "database" of "characteristics" i.e. including a character based on Rei Ayanami but with cute verbal tic or maid uniform or whatever the fuck to appeal to "moe" audience, and that all anime after Evangelion are just reorganized tropes in some similar fashion.

I just think that the argument is not only nonsensical on the surface to me, it just kind of reeks of a general ignorance of art and broader art history from Azuma outside of the otaku stuff he's talking about (I'd argue you could say there's a "database" for any narrative art movement. Like you could make similar claims about Classical Hollywood. Hell we just kind of did with talk of "couple on the run" films. Is that really any different than talking about anime with "Rei clones"?)- to say nothing about how much fantastic stuff was coming out in the era he was writing in. Between Evangelion and the year 2001, you're getting stuff like Escaflowne, Cowboy Bebop, Big O, Satoshi Kon's rise, Miyazaki's most acclaimed films, Kare Kano, FLCL, Serial Experiments Lain etc., and I think you'd have a hard time arguing any of those have less of a "plot" than any of the formulaic 70's/80's stuff like Gundam he's contrasting the contemporary state of anime with.

This is to say nothing about how its just kind of a given that a shift from "plot" to "characters" is this terrible thing.

EDIT 2: I'm continuing with the book and almost done with it, and now Azuma is complaining about how prostitution is ruining society as much as male otaku liking porn does. Man I do not have the energy to unpack this, but this just reinforces my belief that legitimate belief in the nonsense of psychoanalysis leads you to some dumb dumb dumb points of view.
Yeah, all of this sounds pretty bad, which is a shame given how insightful I remember Anime: Or Something Like It was. Doubly a shame since he seems to be one of the few academics discussing NGE that's available to be read in the west. I mean, postmodernism may have killed grand narratives for the artists that are immersed in and concerned with continuing the traditions of art history, but that only accounts for a small amount of artists out there to begin with. There are tons of people making art as if Modernism/Potmodernism never happened, and still making "unifying grand narratives" of their own apparently oblivious to the Critical Theorists' belief that they can't be doing what they've done. I mean, sure, it's interesting as a commentary and analysis on art history, but actual history is itself more complex than the narratives we make up about it afterwards.

I'm morbidly curious to hear if he has any arguments about how/why prostitution/porn are ruining society. I've heard this a lot lately from a variety of people and I haven't been able to extract any coherent arguments from any of them. AFAICT, most of it is just them exercising instinctual adaptations for ancestral environments (small-ish tribes in very hostile envirionments) that bear very little resemblance to our current reality.
Raxivace wrote:162. Evangelion 1.11: You Are (Not) Alone (Rewatch, 2007, Dir. Hideaki Anno, Masayuki, & Kazuya Tsurumaki)
163. Evangelion 2.22: You Can (Not) Advance (Rewatch, 2009, Dir. Hideaki Anno, Masayuki, & Kazuya Tsurumaki)
164. Evangelion 3.33: You Can (Not) Redo (Rewatch, 2012, Dir. Hideaki Anno, Masayuki, Kazuya Tsurumaki, & Mahiro Maeda)
165. Evangelion AVANT 1: 0706 Version (Rewatch, 2019, Dir. Hideaki Anno, Masayuki, & Kazuya Tsurumaki)
Will probably watch these whenever I get around to finally watching the fourth/final film. I do remember thinking each one was better than the last, with 3.33 really being a mind-fuck perhaps on part with the best of OG NGE.
Raxivace wrote:166. RahXephon: Pluralitas Concentio (2003, Dir. Tomoki Kyoda)
167. RahXephon Interlude: Her and Herself - Thatness and Thereness (2003, Dir. Tomoki Kyoda) -
Basically agree here. The series wasn't a masterpiece to start with but at least it had a great score and visual aesthetic, while the films just ditched much of that tried to breathe life into the dull-as-cardboard characters.
Raxivace wrote:168. Quantum of Solace (Rewatch, 2008, Dir. Marc Forster) -
License to Kill is a good touchstone for QoS, and I agree it's not as bad as some made it out to be. Ultimately it's just middling Bond.
Raxivace wrote:169. Meet Me in St. Louis (1944, Dir. Vincent Minelli) - Pretty fun for what it is, though I still find it a bit odd to watch Judy Garland in movies that aren't The Wizard of Oz.
Shame you didn't like this more. It's been one of my top 20 favorites for a long time. To me, I don't think any actual "Christmas Movie" captures the season better, despite being a pretty small part of the film in general. I think the cinematography is extraordinary, and the whole sequence of them putting out the candles/lights is one of my favorites in the history of film. The whole film just exudes this warm, lush, comfortable atmosphere that reminds me of of what it felt like being with family/loved ones at Christmas, even during the scenes that aren't about Christmas. I also appreciate how low-key episodic it is, and part of the film's magical nostalgia might be in how it feels like we remember childhood being, and I think the Halloween scenes really standout in that respect. It's strangely one of those films I always think I've underrated when I look back at my "Favorite Films" list, but every time I've even seen parts of it on TV I'm immediately enraptured by it all over again, so, yeah, I pretty much think it's an absolute masterpiece.
Raxivace wrote:170. The Magnificent Ambersons (Rewatch, 1942, Dir. Orson Welles, Fred Fleck, & Robert Wise) - Still a great film, still a butchered ending. I hav ea copy of the original Booth Tarkington novel this is based on now, so I'll probably watch this yet again next year and will find more to say about it then.
I need to rewatch this as the original version I saw was pretty terrible picture-quality wise. I remember appreciating Welles's visual style (as always) but it was hard to really enjoy it with the terrible transfer.
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Re: Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

Post by Raxivace »

Eva Yojimbo wrote:This is all genuinely interesting to me. Even though I haven't played/experienced any visual novels myself, I've always been fascinated by on-the-fringe mediums and art-forms that feel like they either haven't quite reached their potential or are on the verge of getting there with maybe a handful of works that are masterpieces or verging on that status. It's a big reason why I was initially drawn to anime and comic books... hell, it's a big reason I've even been drawn to porn and other "erotic art." All of these mediums feel like they're handicapped and stigmatized as either being juvenile or somehow innately less artistic than other mediums or genres, and I guess I like an underdog.
I dunno how many VN's are on the fringe exactly (Perhaps more pornographic ones are still), though I think they've grown in popularity over the years. Like Kentucky Fried Chicken of all companies has produced a VN about dating Colonel Sanders or something. Its wild.

Lot of VN's have been adapted as successful anime too, though sometimes adaptations don't come until years after the fact (Even for relatively popular titles like Muv-Luv Alternative).
It's really funny about you making the visual novel-porn connection, because I have been thinking more again recently about the stigma surrounding porn as art... partially because I recently saw the very-lauded Teenage Lesbian by Bree Mills (which has both an uncut "porn" version and a feature-length non-porn version)
Which is also case with a lot of visual novels with sex scenes, come to think of it. If "ero game" becomes popular enough all-ages version is released for console ports and such eventually that cuts down out sex scenes and maybe replaces them with something else. Even happened with Fate/stay night eventually, leading to debate among fans whether the porn scenes were better for the story or not, why the game had porn scenes to begin with and why they were cut etc.
--but it's not so vastly inferior the wealth of other indie films out there to make it "not art" just because it happens to have lengthy sex scenes, and it makes me wonder what it is about the sex that automatically makes people want to pitch it (and similar stuff) into the non-art trash.
Film Twitter seems to erupt into debates about sex scenes in mainstream films every few weeks, and these are some of the following arguments I've seen on there in some form:

1)Objectification of women is bad/male gaze/reinforces rape culture/etc.
2)Plot goes on hold for sex (The most lmao of takes)
3)"I'm an asexual person so I don't relate to sex scenes"
4)"Why don't you just watch porn instead. Its just a click away lol"
5)"I don't want to watch sex scenes with my parents in the room"
6)Sex scene looks fake/bad/etc.
7)Straight sex scene is used to reinforce hetero/cisgender-normative culture
8)Sex scene is empty pandering/wish-fulfillment/escapism/fanservice etc.
9)Sex scene was created through exploiting actresses, actresses wouldn't do nude/sex scenes if they had a choice etc.
10)Sexual politics of film make me uncomfortable etc.

And so on. Some of these views are more sympathetic than others.

Of course this is mainly about mainstream films as I said, without getting into erotica films or whatever really. If people just don't like sex scenes or erotic works or whatever then okay I guess, but yeah the criticisms can be a bit much. For whatever reason, standards people have for even mere existence of sex scene in a work seem to be much higher than action scene or music scene and so on.

EDIT: 11)I forgot my favorite take: "Masturbation opens a portal to the Devil". I can't find link to where I first read this, but at least one brave hero counters this false notion by recognizing that "your body is not a website".
Even with run-of-the-mill porn that make no pretensions towards art or even being "mediocre indie films," surely there's some art to how it's shot, edited and performed, since even a cursory comparison with amateur stuff shows a pretty huge gap in the talent/skills of those involved. I've also found it kinda humorous how porn is basically identical to other artistic mediums in that innovators will come along with a new idea, and then that idea will get copied endlessly until people get tired of it until another new-something comes along to take its place.
For Americans at least, I blame the Puritans.

The Puritans don't get enough shit.
Anyway, I hope it's not TOO weird I just went off on a tangent about porn! LOL I'd actually probably be interested in some of the visual novels that were more erotic in nature... not that I wouldn't be interested in non-erotic ones too if they're good or interesting.
Well I'm certainly not complaining lol.

If you ever play a VN let me know. I haven't played too much of the purely pornographic ones, but stuff I have enjoyed like Fate or Tsukihime or Muv-Luv tended to be more similar to case of that film you described above.
I don't know if it's that kids are becoming more puritanical or if people are just becoming more polarized: more puritanical reactionaries responding to more sexually liberated media.
When puritanical reactionaries are like 16 and using "woke" language to make their case though, it makes me wonder.

Like when I was a teenager was 50 year old religious weirdo conservatives making that case and pretty much everyone online hated them. It just feels odd to see similar types of arguments now coming from ostensible left-leaning people.

I dunno maybe I'm just an old fogey, already irrelevant. I think also just don't have much patience or interest in "culture war" stuff anymore, especially since it seems to be taking forms I'm not sure I even understand anymore. I rather just want to talk about the things I like and am interested in without having to do weird mental gymnastics to justify my interests to whatever rando online.
Yeah, I understand that reaction as I have it to music a lot. I get tired hearing my favorite songs from my favorite bands so when I revisit their albums I tend to find myself appreciating the more obscure stuff that nobody plays/knows about because I haven't heard them a billion times. I imagine it could be the same with TV shows and episodes.
Yeah, and in case of TV shows these episodes might have odd details overlooked that can change how you look at a character or something.
I also always appreciated the variety of NGE's MOTW battles. I remember commenting on that in the very first review I wrote for the series and posted on Amazon. It's perhaps an aspect that a lot of people really underrate when it comes to the series: even the more "mundane" aspects are still much more imaginative than most shows of its type.
Yeah, its surprisingly easy aspect of the series to take for granted.
I think so, but it's tricky answering questions like that because it's very much a subjective "feel" thing. There's a balance between letting a shot play long enough so that you can wring all the emotion/feeling/atmosphere out of it, including the added stuff by LETTING it linger for that extra time, and then letting it go past the point where you're just trying to wring blood from a stone. If that scene goes past that point I don't think it does by much, but I'm often a fan that of films that loves lingering on static shots of nothing (or not much) happening because I love immersing myself in an atmosphere that can only be done via spending enough time being there. That scene isn't really going for the same/similar thing, but the principle is still similar.
For me most surprising thing is that I just forgot about the shot, and that it doesn't have meme status that elevator shot does.
Might be worth checking out. I think we've been over my ambivalence about Critical Theory before, but it can be occasionally insightful.
If you do choose to read it I would also recommend companion/rival book "Beautiful Fighting Girl" by Saito Tamaki. Its also from Lacanian perspective unfortunately and some similar flaws, but it makes the case that the same cultures that Azuma criticizes are good. I think the first edition technically it came before Azuma's book, but they both take potshots at each other anyways through various newer editions and rerelease notes and such, all of which should be included in English translations. Books really could be read in any order.

EDIT: If you ever watch Otaku no Video it pairs wells with these books too, not only because of its general themes but also because Toshio "OtaKing" Okada is a guy both books use as an important reference point.
Yeah, all of this sounds pretty bad, which is a shame given how insightful I remember Anime: Or Something Like It was. Doubly a shame since he seems to be one of the few academics discussing NGE that's available to be read in the west. I mean, postmodernism may have killed grand narratives for the artists that are immersed in and concerned with continuing the traditions of art history, but that only accounts for a small amount of artists out there to begin with. There are tons of people making art as if Modernism/Potmodernism never happened, and still making "unifying grand narratives" of their own apparently oblivious to the Critical Theorists' belief that they can't be doing what they've done. I mean, sure, it's interesting as a commentary and analysis on art history, but actual history is itself more complex than the narratives we make up about it afterwards.
Yeah with Azuma its really "Americanization" of Japan in wake of World War II he seems mad about with this, but well again that's not exactly something that wasn't already happening.

Like as much flack as Kurosawa got for being "Japanese rip off of John Ford" or whatever, Ozu himself (The more "Japanese" director according to Godard in one of his more hilariously bad takes) was just as influenced by American Hollywood. Maybe even moreso for all I know.
I'm morbidly curious to hear if he has any arguments about how/why prostitution/porn are ruining society. I've heard this a lot lately from a variety of people and I haven't been able to extract any coherent arguments from any of them. AFAICT, most of it is just them exercising instinctual adaptations for ancestral environments (small-ish tribes in very hostile envirionments) that bear very little resemblance to our current reality.
I'm a little tired ATM but I'll hunt through my copy of Azuma's book again in the morning to find exactly what he says.
Will probably watch these whenever I get around to finally watching the fourth/final film. I do remember thinking each one was better than the last, with 3.33 really being a mind-fuck perhaps on part with the best of OG NGE.
Unfortunately last Rebuild has been delayed yet again because of covid, but at least it is finished. They're just sitting on it right now, and probably preparing Shin Ultraman.
Shame you didn't like this more. It's been one of my top 20 favorites for a long time. To me, I don't think any actual "Christmas Movie" captures the season better, despite being a pretty small part of the film in general. I think the cinematography is extraordinary, and the whole sequence of them putting out the candles/lights is one of my favorites in the history of film. The whole film just exudes this warm, lush, comfortable atmosphere that reminds me of of what it felt like being with family/loved ones at Christmas, even during the scenes that aren't about Christmas. I also appreciate how low-key episodic it is, and part of the film's magical nostalgia might be in how it feels like we remember childhood being, and I think the Halloween scenes really standout in that respect. It's strangely one of those films I always think I've underrated when I look back at my "Favorite Films" list, but every time I've even seen parts of it on TV I'm immediately enraptured by it all over again, so, yeah, I pretty much think it's an absolute masterpiece.
Hmm, you kind of want to make me rewatch it with some of this in mind. Maybe I'll try and do that next Christmas season.
I need to rewatch this as the original version I saw was pretty terrible picture-quality wise. I remember appreciating Welles's visual style (as always) but it was hard to really enjoy it with the terrible transfer.
Criterion blu is gorgeous, though that DVD from several years back wasn't that bad either.
"[Cinema] is a labyrinth with a treacherous resemblance to reality." - Andrew Sarris
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Re: Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

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Raxivace wrote:Otaku no Video

My iTunes library random play just played some Japanese song that was obviously from an anime, but I couldn't remember what it was. Turns out it was "Fight! Ota King" from Otaku no Video; an awesome song.
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Re: Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

Post by Eva Yojimbo »

Raxivace wrote:
Eva Yojimbo wrote:This is all genuinely interesting to me. Even though I haven't played/experienced any visual novels myself, I've always been fascinated by on-the-fringe mediums and art-forms that feel like they either haven't quite reached their potential or are on the verge of getting there with maybe a handful of works that are masterpieces or verging on that status. It's a big reason why I was initially drawn to anime and comic books... hell, it's a big reason I've even been drawn to porn and other "erotic art." All of these mediums feel like they're handicapped and stigmatized as either being juvenile or somehow innately less artistic than other mediums or genres, and I guess I like an underdog.
I dunno how many VN's are on the fringe exactly (Perhaps more pornographic ones are still), though I think they've grown in popularity over the years. Like Kentucky Fried Chicken of all companies has produced a VN about dating Colonel Sanders or something. Its wild.

Lot of VN's have been adapted as successful anime too, though sometimes adaptations don't come until years after the fact (Even for relatively popular titles like Muv-Luv Alternative).
I mean, I still consider comic books on the fringe despite the success of superhero films and the popularization of nerd culture in general. Maybe part of that is just because they weren't “cool" when I grew up, but maybe part of it is also that they've never been popular in the way films/TV and music are (and it still took films to make comic book superheroes popular). I feel like video games are similar despite the industry making more than films and music. So I'm basically putting visual novels in that same category.
Raxivace wrote:
--but it's not so vastly inferior the wealth of other indie films out there to make it "not art" just because it happens to have lengthy sex scenes, and it makes me wonder what it is about the sex that automatically makes people want to pitch it (and similar stuff) into the non-art trash.
Film Twitter seems to erupt into debates about sex scenes in mainstream films every few weeks, and these are some of the following arguments I've seen on there in some form:

1)Objectification of women is bad/male gaze/reinforces rape culture/etc.
2)Plot goes on hold for sex (The most lmao of takes)
3)"I'm an asexual person so I don't relate to sex scenes"
4)"Why don't you just watch porn instead. Its just a click away lol"
5)"I don't want to watch sex scenes with my parents in the room"
6)Sex scene looks fake/bad/etc.
7)Straight sex scene is used to reinforce hetero/cisgender-normative culture
8)Sex scene is empty pandering/wish-fulfillment/escapism/fanservice etc.
9)Sex scene was created through exploiting actresses, actresses wouldn't do nude/sex scenes if they had a choice etc.
10)Sexual politics of film make me uncomfortable etc.

And so on. Some of these views are more sympathetic than others.

Of course this is mainly about mainstream films as I said, without getting into erotica films or whatever really. If people just don't like sex scenes or erotic works or whatever then okay I guess, but yeah the criticisms can be a bit much. For whatever reason, standards people have for even mere existence of sex scene in a work seem to be much higher than action scene or music scene and so on.

EDIT: 11)I forgot my favorite take: "Masturbation opens a portal to the Devil". I can't find link to where I first read this, but at least one brave hero counters this false notion by recognizing that "your body is not a website".
To me, the real kicker is what you say about the standards for sex scenes being much higher than action or music. In fact, there's a semi-famous analysis by some film critic/theorist that argues that porn and musicals are essentially the same in that people come for the music/sex and the story is just there to connect the music numbers/sex scenes together. It almost certainly has something to do with how our instincts developed to navigate sex in a communal environment, but it's frustrating hearing people being completely unable to articulate points about this because it's all an intuition/feeling thing. I think that's also what interests me about it.

As for those arguments, I think some have some legitimacy and some don't, or some are only sometimes applicable.

1. This is probably the most complex point to tackle because there's so many different angles to address, but at best I'd say it's an argument against sex scenes being done in a particular way—one that merely emphasizes what a man would want to see without respect for either a female perspective or the female characters' emotional/subjective states—but not against sex scenes in general. Also somewhat silly given that plenty of women direct/have directed sex scenes, including actual porn. I think we talked about the concept of male/female gaze years ago on the old IMDb, but I'm very skeptical of the concept in general as it implies that men/women see things the same way as other members of their own sex/gender and that there's major differences compared to the opposite sex. Actual data suggests there's a lot of overlap, and though there are differences too those differences aren't often what people think.
2. Is stupid since it implies sex can't be a part of a plot.
3. Is merely a subjective preference.
4. Obviously because porn and mainstream films with sex are different, even if the lines can get blurry.
5. Is also subjective, and the easy answer is: don't. Watch them by yourself.
6. Like point 1. Is really only an argument against the way they're done; but if you can't think of any examples of them being done well then you're basically just saying you don't like sex scenes.
7. I don't really agree it reinforces heteronormative culture, but the majority of people are straight/cis, so unless you demand they all stop making movies with sex scenes I don't see any solution here. Curiously, one thing actual porn is really good about—far better than mainstream media—is embracing all forms of the LGBT community. Like, Evil Angel were doing trans films long before all these trans issues became something everyone talked about.
8. Some can be, sure, but I'd certainly like to hear why it's necessarily any of these things more than anything else you might see in a film that people like.
9. Obviously false since plenty of actresses do turn down such roles. Also has the utterly misogynistic assumption that women don't like sex and would never agree to have sex on camera (real or fake) without being exploited/manipulated/coerced, basically denying their agency.
10. Not even sure what that means.

I don't know about masturbation opening a portal to the devil, but gooning while high on cannabis certainly feels like it opens a portal to somewhere!
Raxivace wrote:
Even with run-of-the-mill porn that make no pretensions towards art or even being "mediocre indie films," surely there's some art to how it's shot, edited and performed, since even a cursory comparison with amateur stuff shows a pretty huge gap in the talent/skills of those involved. I've also found it kinda humorous how porn is basically identical to other artistic mediums in that innovators will come along with a new idea, and then that idea will get copied endlessly until people get tired of it until another new-something comes along to take its place.
For Americans at least, I blame the Puritans.

The Puritans don't get enough shit.
That's certainly a big influence on our particular culture, but America is hardly alone in its rather repressive views on sex. It's tempting to blame it all on religion, but religion is just a manifestation of things a lot of people already believed anyway. The bigger issue is where THAT came from and why it persists even in a society/culture long past where many of the concerns that gave rise to it are irrelevant.
Raxivace wrote: If you ever play a VN let me know. I haven't played too much of the purely pornographic ones, but stuff I have enjoyed like Fate or Tsukihime or Muv-Luv tended to be more similar to case of that film you described above.
I will for sure. Any one you'd particularly recommend as a first?
Raxivace wrote:
I don't know if it's that kids are becoming more puritanical or if people are just becoming more polarized: more puritanical reactionaries responding to more sexually liberated media.
When puritanical reactionaries are like 16 and using "woke" language to make their case though, it makes me wonder.

Like when I was a teenager was 50 year old religious weirdo conservatives making that case and pretty much everyone online hated them. It just feels odd to see similar types of arguments now coming from ostensible left-leaning people.

I dunno maybe I'm just an old fogey, already irrelevant. I think also just don't have much patience or interest in "culture war" stuff anymore, especially since it seems to be taking forms I'm not sure I even understand anymore. I rather just want to talk about the things I like and am interested in without having to do weird mental gymnastics to justify my interests to whatever rando online.
One thing I've learned listening to Holly Randall is that even among liberals and feminists there's apparently a schism between what are known as “SWERFS" (Sex Worker-Exclusionary Radical Feminists) and… whatever the term you'd use for the opposite. I've yet to read anything in-depth on the subject, but I think their basic argument stems from your points 1 and 9 above, often paired with the notion that any kind of sex-work is just reinforcing the patriarchy. So there's definitely at least one branch of liberalism and feminism that are definitely anti-sex (or at least anti sex-work). I should probably look into their arguments some more, but I find all of these claims really dubious.

For me it's not so much about justifying my interests as it is trying to get to the bottom of why people really feel how they do, including myself. The more difficult it is often the more interested I am in it. I think the whole sex-in-media is fascinating precisely because it's a huge clash of some of our most primal instincts with the newest aspects of our society, and trying to untangle that interaction is fascinating… at least to me.

Part of it may just be that as I've gotten older I've come to realize that I really am an aesthete who just appreciates things/experiences I find beautiful and immersive—whether that's the cinematography in a Hou film or the sound produced by a classical orchestra or two attractive people having sex, I think my enjoyment of them all stems from the same fundamental place. So it feels increasingly weird to me to put anything sex-related into its own separate category and pretend as if the reason I enjoy it is radically different from the reasons I enjoy other media when I know it's really not.
Raxivace wrote:
I think so, but it's tricky answering questions like that because it's very much a subjective "feel" thing. There's a balance between letting a shot play long enough so that you can wring all the emotion/feeling/atmosphere out of it, including the added stuff by LETTING it linger for that extra time, and then letting it go past the point where you're just trying to wring blood from a stone. If that scene goes past that point I don't think it does by much, but I'm often a fan that of films that loves lingering on static shots of nothing (or not much) happening because I love immersing myself in an atmosphere that can only be done via spending enough time being there. That scene isn't really going for the same/similar thing, but the principle is still similar.
For me most surprising thing is that I just forgot about the shot, and that it doesn't have meme status that elevator shot does.
I think it's because the elevator shot is more comical. Like, it's MEANT to emphasize the cringey/uncomfortableness of the characters, and lingering there just emphasizes that effect, so it fits in well with meme culture. That shot/scene is more serious in nature, maybe even a bit more mysterious in terms of exactly what the intent is. I think I like it in large part because of that mystery; it's really intriguing. The elevator scene is more instantly grokable.
Raxivace wrote:
Might be worth checking out. I think we've been over my ambivalence about Critical Theory before, but it can be occasionally insightful.
If you do choose to read it I would also recommend companion/rival book "Beautiful Fighting Girl" by Saito Tamaki. Its also from Lacanian perspective unfortunately and some similar flaws, but it makes the case that the same cultures that Azuma criticizes are good. I think the first edition technically it came before Azuma's book, but they both take potshots at each other anyways through various newer editions and rerelease notes and such, all of which should be included in English translations. Books really could be read in any order.
Always interested in little academic spats like this. Reminds me of the old Bordwell/Zizek feud!
Raxivace wrote:
Yeah, all of this sounds pretty bad, which is a shame given how insightful I remember Anime: Or Something Like It was. Doubly a shame since he seems to be one of the few academics discussing NGE that's available to be read in the west. I mean, postmodernism may have killed grand narratives for the artists that are immersed in and concerned with continuing the traditions of art history, but that only accounts for a small amount of artists out there to begin with. There are tons of people making art as if Modernism/Potmodernism never happened, and still making "unifying grand narratives" of their own apparently oblivious to the Critical Theorists' belief that they can't be doing what they've done. I mean, sure, it's interesting as a commentary and analysis on art history, but actual history is itself more complex than the narratives we make up about it afterwards.
Yeah with Azuma its really "Americanization" of Japan in wake of World War II he seems mad about with this, but well again that's not exactly something that wasn't already happening.

Like as much flack as Kurosawa got for being "Japanese rip off of John Ford" or whatever, Ozu himself (The more "Japanese" director according to Godard in one of his more hilariously bad takes) was just as influenced by American Hollywood. Maybe even moreso for all I know.
There weren't many classic directors from any countries uninfluenced by American cinema; it was almost impossible not to be. Ozu certainly loved American cinema, but I think he was perceived as being “more Japanese" merely because he did break many typical Hollywood conventions and helped forge his own unique style/language… though even with that I don't know what made it particularly “Japanese" beyond his subject matter. Like, his penchant for very symmetrical editing is straight out of Eisenstein.
Raxivace wrote:
Will probably watch these whenever I get around to finally watching the fourth/final film. I do remember thinking each one was better than the last, with 3.33 really being a mind-fuck perhaps on part with the best of OG NGE.
Unfortunately last Rebuild has been delayed yet again because of covid, but at least it is finished. They're just sitting on it right now, and probably preparing Shin Ultraman.
We've already waited over a decade, so it's not like another year-or-two is going to kill me!
Raxivace wrote:
I need to rewatch this as the original version I saw was pretty terrible picture-quality wise. I remember appreciating Welles's visual style (as always) but it was hard to really enjoy it with the terrible transfer.
Criterion blu is gorgeous, though that DVD from several years back wasn't that bad either.
The version I saw I don't think was from any official DVD. Seemed like the quality you'd expect from some public domain copy or something. Might've been a pirated version, I don't know.
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Re: Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

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I'll respond to the rest later, but I juts have to say that based on that Pornhub link I'm glad the PS Vita found the dignity in death it was not able to have when it was alive.
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Re: Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

Post by Eva Yojimbo »

Not being very familiar with the PS Vita I have no idea what you're talking about!
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Re: Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

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The PS Vita generally didn't sell very well IIRC, and yet it seems 9.1% of people accessing Pornhub through a console at the time did so through the Vita.

"Vita means life", and yet the Vita died. However in death the Vita was able to bring people to Pornhub. This contradiction can't be explained; it must be a miracle.

EDIT: Fixed link.
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Re: Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

Post by Eva Yojimbo »

Ah, that makes more sense.
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Re: Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

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Eva Yojimbo wrote:I mean, I still consider comic books on the fringe despite the success of superhero films and the popularization of nerd culture in general. Maybe part of that is just because they weren't “cool" when I grew up, but maybe part of it is also that they've never been popular in the way films/TV and music are (and it still took films to make comic book superheroes popular).
It also depends what you mean by "comic books" too I guess. Like Marvel/DC stuff sells relatively poorly in U.S. from what I understand, but is also routinely beaten by manga sales (I think Attack on Titan volumes were even making New York Times Best Seller lists for a while there) and especially by "graphic novels". And by "graphic novels" I don't mean like Watchmen or whatever, but stuff by like Dav Pilkey and his successors that are intended for younger audiences.

I'm sure reasons for Marvel/DC not being much of a powerhouse in comic book world anymore despite success of movies and video games with same characters is for a multitude of reasons, but its an interesting phenomenon.
I feel like video games are similar despite the industry making more than films and music. So I'm basically putting visual novels in that same category.
Again I think it depends on which games we're talking about. Like those shovelware puzzle games you can download on your phone are insanely popular. They may not have same audience as like VN fans or people that get into Dark Souls and so on, but its a broader category than is often given credit for by nerds on the internet.
To me, the real kicker is what you say about the standards for sex scenes being much higher than action or music. In fact, there's a semi-famous analysis by some film critic/theorist that argues that porn and musicals are essentially the same in that people come for the music/sex and the story is just there to connect the music numbers/sex scenes together.
Yeah we've talked about that before so its probably what I had in mind lol.
1. This is probably the most complex point to tackle because there's so many different angles to address, but at best I'd say it's an argument against sex scenes being done in a particular way—one that merely emphasizes what a man would want to see without respect for either a female perspective or the female characters' emotional/subjective states—but not against sex scenes in general. Also somewhat silly given that plenty of women direct/have directed sex scenes, including actual porn. I think we talked about the concept of male/female gaze years ago on the old IMDb, but I'm very skeptical of the concept in general as it implies that men/women see things the same way as other members of their own sex/gender and that there's major differences compared to the opposite sex. Actual data suggests there's a lot of overlap, and though there are differences too those differences aren't often what people think.
Lesbian porn being more popular with women than with men kind of surprised me the most here. I always assumed that was more popular with male audiences since that was something I always liked a lot, but that appears to have only been assumption (At least based on Pornhub statistics).
2. Is stupid since it implies sex can't be a part of a plot.
Indeed, but there's also unstated assumption in these types of criticisms, I think, that plot progression is the most function of a movie, and not character or theme or honestly even just aesthetic pleasure of beautiful people bangin'.
7. I don't really agree it reinforces heteronormative culture, but the majority of people are straight/cis, so unless you demand they all stop making movies with sex scenes I don't see any solution here. Curiously, one thing actual porn is really good about—far better than mainstream media—is embracing all forms of the LGBT community. Like, Evil Angel were doing trans films long before all these trans issues became something everyone talked about.
Outside of porn, I sometimes get the impression that people aren't aware that openly LGBT films and such are hardly some kind of new phenomenon.

Like even in early 90's you had people like Greg Araki running around making stuff.
10. Not even sure what that means.
In retrospect I should have rolled this in with point 1, but this was meant to be a catchall that covers stuff like, say, the near-rape scene in Wings of Honnemaise that people claim "ruins" that movie and such. Basically the people that think being made to feel even mildly uncomfortable by a movie is the worst thing imaginable.

Like obviously I'm not talking about people that get legitimate PTSD flashbacks and such from horrible assaults in their life, but regular people that straight up can't handle any kind of attempt at tackling a mature theme.
I don't know about masturbation opening a portal to the devil, but gooning while high on cannabis certainly feels like it opens a portal to somewhere!
So I had to look up what "gooning" meant.

Image
That's certainly a big influence on our particular culture, but America is hardly alone in its rather repressive views on sex. It's tempting to blame it all on religion, but religion is just a manifestation of things a lot of people already believed anyway. The bigger issue is where THAT came from and why it persists even in a society/culture long past where many of the concerns that gave rise to it are irrelevant.
Yeah I dunno. It's a good question.
I will for sure. Any one you'd particularly recommend as a first?
There's a lot out there. For more "pure" VN's, Tsukihime isn't too long and tackles some of the sexual content we've talked about here. I think Fate/stay night handles most of its ideas better and has better production values on top of it (Especially if you get "Realta Nua" rerelease of FSN, as well as a patch that allows you switch between content from original version of that game and the re-release at will), but Tsukihime was pretty influential in its own right and will make for interesting comparison with the Remake that's finally coming out. The main character of Tsukihime fights a chair at one point too, and frankly that chair had it coming. Plus for both Tsukihime and FSN there are the various sequels and spinoffs I posted about already.

For VN's that still have a lot of "adventure game" genre in its DNA:

-Zero Escape trilogy (Nine Hours Nine Persons Nine Doors/Virtue's Last Reward/Zero Time Dilemma), which has puzzle segments based on escape rooms
-Ace Attorney series, which is courtoom mystery comedy/drama thing. I generally really enjoyed these even when they got bad
-Kojima's games, Snatcher and Policenauts. I never got too far in Policenauts, but these games are where he really developed his wordy style that got so (in)famous in MGS1-4. And honestly kind of explains the nature of the long CODEC conversations and such.
-I don't think is available anymore, but Banshee's Last Cry got on an iPhone port at one point. The original SNES game came out in like 1994, but the iPhone port tried to reach that "iPhone puzzle game" audience I mentioned above (Unfortunately it did so by whitewashing the cast). Still, its kind of neat game that later VN's clearly took influence from.

And there's stuff like Higurashi/Umineko that I think are interesting but heavily flawed. House in Fata Morgana is another game I think has some really strong elements but its art style being more overtly gothic makes it pretty different from other VN's. I mentioned Muv-Luv trilogy as well, but I think the final game of that gets really bloated and overdone despite some interesting things.
One thing I've learned listening to Holly Randall is that even among liberals and feminists there's apparently a schism between what are known as “SWERFS" (Sex Worker-Exclusionary Radical Feminists) and… whatever the term you'd use for the opposite.
I thought "sex-positive" was the term for the opposite, but I might be wrong or way out of date here.

SWERF in general is a new one for me though. I had heard of TERFS before though.
Part of it may just be that as I've gotten older I've come to realize that I really am an aesthete who just appreciates things/experiences I find beautiful and immersive—whether that's the cinematography in a Hou film or the sound produced by a classical orchestra or two attractive people having sex, I think my enjoyment of them all stems from the same fundamental place. So it feels increasingly weird to me to put anything sex-related into its own separate category and pretend as if the reason I enjoy it is radically different from the reasons I enjoy other media when I know it's really not.
In other online circles I hang out (Less so nowadays), people are starting to fall into trap that media consumption defines who you are as a person and if you like "bad" media or have "bad" sexual fantasy or whatever else you're probably a bad person, and I just don't have interest in these kinds of people anymore.

Like I agree that why people make distinctions about sexual content is interesting, but moreso from afar IMO. That's just me though.
I think it's because the elevator shot is more comical. Like, it's MEANT to emphasize the cringey/uncomfortableness of the characters, and lingering there just emphasizes that effect, so it fits in well with meme culture. That shot/scene is more serious in nature, maybe even a bit more mysterious in terms of exactly what the intent is. I think I like it in large part because of that mystery; it's really intriguing. The elevator scene is more instantly grokable.
I had to look up "grokable" too. What even are these words...

But yeah I generally agree with this.
Always interested in little academic spats like this. Reminds me of the old Bordwell/Zizek feud!
Yeah, kind of. Unlike Bordwell/Zizek these two at least try to make it come off like they respect each other, but its hard to tell how much of the nuances there is lost in translation, or just "Japanese politeness" or whatever else. Still, its funny.
There weren't many classic directors from any countries uninfluenced by American cinema; it was almost impossible not to be. Ozu certainly loved American cinema, but I think he was perceived as being “more Japanese" merely because he did break many typical Hollywood conventions and helped forge his own unique style/language… though even with that I don't know what made it particularly “Japanese" beyond his subject matter. Like, his penchant for very symmetrical editing is straight out of Eisenstein.
I just think Ozu makes a fascinating counterexample to fears of Americanization corrupting "purity" of Japanese art or whatever.
The version I saw I don't think was from any official DVD. Seemed like the quality you'd expect from some public domain copy or something. Might've been a pirated version, I don't know.
This DVD was how I first saw the film. Pretty good for the time it came out.
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Re: Raxivace's 2020 Movies or: (Neo-General Chat IV: Jimbo Gets Lost in Deadwood)

Post by Raxivace »

Eva Yojimbo wrote:I'm morbidly curious to hear if he has any arguments about how/why prostitution/porn are ruining society. I've heard this a lot lately from a variety of people and I haven't been able to extract any coherent arguments from any of them. AFAICT, most of it is just them exercising instinctual adaptations for ancestral environments (small-ish tribes in very hostile envirionments) that bear very little resemblance to our current reality.
I did a quick look through the book again, and it seems his argument is just by fulfilling base sexual needs through prostitution/porn instead of through complex interaction with other people (which would be desire. The desire to have a wife you have sex with but also sit at dinner table with etc.), it leads to selfish anti-social behavior somehow, because only humans meet both desires and needs while animals only have needs. A society that only meets its needs is an "animalized" one and now Japan is animalized society etc.

Again it just seems like weird thinly disguised nationalism to me.
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