Barbenheimer: Part 1 of 2
This is the kind of film I really don’t want to criticize, because we don’t get nearly enough other stuff like it. However, mr. Nolan has been in need of an intervention for a while now, and unfortunately all of the issues that have been plaguing his films since The Dark Knight Rises show up to some degree here. Visually it might just be his best film, and there’s some tremendous acting in here, particularly by Murphy and RDJ. However, it makes the common biopic mistake of treating its subject matter like a Wikipedia entry, thereby not focussing enough on character and perspective. As a whole, the film feels more like a long extended montage, I don’t think there are many scenes that go on for longer than 60 seconds. There’s a strong ‘and then this happened, and then this happened’ feel to it, which definitely keeps up the pace, but it refuses to stop and let an emotion or idea simmer for a while. There are moments where you get a look into Oppenheimer’s mind, but because the film wants to cover too much ground, it’s (like everything else) reduced to quick snippets. It’s the kind of approach that’d work for a 6 hour long miniseries where you can spend more time with the characters, not for a 3 hour film. I can already tell that I won’t retain much from this, in fact a lot of it is starting to blur together in my mind. There are also issues with some of the dialogue and exposition, such as moments where characters who are experts in their field talk in a way that feels dumbed down for the audience, or just straight up inauthentic. Einstein is given a couple of cheesy lines, college professors and students interact in a way that would never happen, Oppenheimer gives a lecture in what’s (according to the movie) supposed to be Dutch when it’s really German; you have to be way more careful with that when you’re making a serious drama. Finally, there are once again major issues with the sound mixing. I actually really loved the score, but occasionally it’s blaring at such a volume where it drowns out important dialogue in the mix. I’m lucky enough to have subtitles, but Nolan desperately needs to get his ears checked, or maybe he should’ve asked some advice from Benny Safdie since he’s pretty great with experimental sound mixing. My overall feelings are almost identical to the ones I had regarding Tenet; Nolan needs to rethink his approach to writing, editing and mixing. This film as a whole doesn’t work, but there are still more than a few admirable qualities to it.
Edit: I rewatched this at home to see whether my feeling would change. I still stand by what I wrote in July, though the sound mix seems to have been improved for the home media release. It sounds more balanced and I didn’t miss one line of dialogue this time around. I’m slightly raising my score because of that, but besides that I still think it’s unfocused, overedited, awkwardly staged and scripted etc.
5.5/10
Season 3 is when I gave up on this show being subversive. It's laughably corporate. Ridiculously so. For a program that started out about a group of people who were all about the punk attitude and so anti-corporate they were working to take down the biggest corporation. The show has done nothing but suggest they were morally wrong for doing so. I expected the show might suggest how they did it was wrong. I expected the show might suggest things aren't better. I expected the show might push that they failed, but the last thing I expected is the show to constantly undermine the morality of taking down a literal evil corporation. To the point where this season is about restoring Evil Corp without a shred of irony. I realize 2017 wasn't 2020 but protests against racism and the government and corporations weren't uncommon. I don't understand how they can so frustratingly miss the point episode after episode, season after season. I kept expecting someone to realize the deeper layer. I figured there's no way this show is just going to ignore the bigger picture here. This is the season I realized I was waiting for it to happen and that it wouldn't ever happen.
I was absolutely floored for instance when they killed off all the minority characters from the f.society crew in such pointlessly racialized ways. Romero the black guy was killed in a literal drive-by off screen and the two brown characters were framed for terrorism. I believe even in the new f.society gang everyone I recall was white. It's so distractingly awkward it detracts from the general narrative because I keep expecting a deeper level at play. There isn't. It's a remarkably surface level show now that we're past the phase of unreliable narrator twists. Season 2 was a mess of the constant unreliable narrator and the backfill episodes and most of that is gone now so Season 3 is much easier to follow but that doesn't help the major themes and the issues with them.
