Equilibrium

[rm]

I finally watched Equilibrium.

I remember when it came out and wanting to see it despite the awful reviews, but I never got there. Then fandom erupted in squeeing over it for about five minutes, and I still couldn't get motived. Then all this time later I got it from Netflix but was too busy with work, auditions and costuming to get to it, and now finally.

It's... so strange, in that the dialogue is awful, the plot holes immense, the naming of things terrible enough to be nearly unacceptable (fortunately for this film, Chronicles of Riddick happened, and you just can't beat "Necromonger"), the issue and message over simplified, everything that's not sledgehammer obvious is nearly too subtle to be clear, etc etc etc.

And yet, it's one of the most visually intelligent films I've ever seen (and beautiful, and references other films in ways that are something other than a director going wink-wink nudge-nudge -- I mean this is a world where people burn films, and are shown doing it, and remnants, reminders of films presumeably destroyed in this world are echoed trhough the film that tells this story -- it's all meta and neat), and the ending is profoundly, weirdly, surprisingly dark -- obvious sure, but it's the place you always want movies like this to go and then they lose their nerve. This doesn't.

I watched the first 90% of the film thinking this, instead of The Vampire Lestat, could have saved my life when I was twelve, had the timing been different, and the last 10% of the film realizing it would have made me an appallingly cold child (something that would have probably been useful for a few years in there).

It's not a good film, and in all ways easy to describe it is, in fact, pretty damn stupid. But the attempt that it is, is worth seeing, especially if you have any interest in toltalitarianism as portrayed in film, as this manages to slide right through everything from Metropolis to Leni Riefenstahl to the vastly inadequate but still echoing film version of 1984.

Really interesting if you allow yourself to accept it merely as a sketch of a film orchestrated as if it were merely the same nightmare its creator had been having since the age of nine.

For a full day of flawed science fiction, following it with 28 Days Later and then Gattaca would work nicely. That said, 28 Days Later scares the crap out of me, and Gattaca makes me cry and this... just reminds me of my smile, and that my friends, is a little creepy.

Comments

[feyandstrange.livejournal.com]

Despite its many flaws, Equilibrium touched me in a lot of ways. I've got all kinds of drama around the idea of enforced medication, emotional medications and the like; and also of "acting" unemotional, hiding any feelings, in order to survive or eventually accomplish goals. And the ending was indeed gutsy and true despite some of the cheesiness of it all.

It's almost as if it was a mediocre adaptation of a novel, and if it had been, we'd all be saying the novel was better and the film was a bit cheesy and lame and off; but the story is powerful enough that it came through despite some of the weaknesses or excesses of the film. And it would have had one hell of an impact on my teenage years, too.

I think there's a few weird parallels to Cyteen in there, actually, in that whole control of emotions/public face game thing.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Absolutely on Cyteen, I almost got into that, but I thought my review was self-absorbed enough as it was. It really linked to some things in that for me as well -- in large part because Cyteen does have a lot of detailed descriptions of people's facial expressions, and so with so much of this film hinging on all those enigmatic smiles as well as the degree to which AE1 set a very convoluted series of things in motion -- yeah.

And yeah, I have big issues about emotional expression too (any emotion I displayed as a id I was told was false, and that I was just doing it to get someone to do what I wanted or to make them feel bad), so yeah... I couldn't quite be touched by this -- there wasn't a way in... but I was touched that it was made, and intrigued definitely by whatever it could have been.

[monkeycurious.livejournal.com]

I just saw Equilibrium a week ago because I a friend wanted to see it for her psychology class. Go figure. As bad as it was, we still did talk a lot about the main characters sudden emotional responses and where they came from, which were natural, which were learned, culturally define ways of reacting and conditioning (even though, of course, we do come back to that in the end).

The concept of the film is way more interesting than the film ends up being.

I wasn't sure if I liked the gun kata or not, but it looked fantastic and kind of made sense in a weird way.

And yes, visually brilliant and beautiful.

[rm.livejournal.com]

I liked the idea of the gun ata more than how it looked in most cases (they had no budget and it showed), but where it worked, I thought it was fabulous.

And yeah -- the learned emotional response stuff and the small degree it touched on that was really interesting. When someone mentions the word "friend" merely being vestigial I was totally intrigued.

[kalyx.livejournal.com]

I was frustrated by how obvious it was. I guess I just like a film that is heavier on the subtext, but then when I look at the message boards for my favorite films, people seem to not get any of it. Like today, I have been obsessing over Pillow Book (nothing new really) so I went to the imdb message board and was shocked at so many dumbasses who didn't seem to get that Jerome was made into a Pillow Book. A rather obvious and important plot point that is shown quite graphically. And with I'll Sleep When I'm Dead, there were too many posts asking why Davey killed himself. Ug.

So I guess it is no wonder why I constantly bitch about the lack of any subtlety in US films. Apparently, the American population is just too slow for subtlety.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Heheheh fair enough. I tend to find a great deal of pleasure in really flawed films, maybe because it's easier to see the mechanics of the attempt.

I should see Pillow Book again -- I saw it in the theater when it came out, and was suitably impressed, but it was of the sort of thing that I felt like I could never make myself watch again, although I've rescinded that rule with a few films lately.

That said, The Cook, The Theif, His Wife and Her Lover is still to visually engraved in my memory, that I don't think I'd ever have to see it again because I'm sure I've forgotten none of it, and quite frankly, I half wish I had. Incredible film, but got under my skin and wouldn't leave.

[tsarina.livejournal.com]

Gun kata! One of my alltime favorite cinematic fictions. The commentary track is hilarious because the director talks about all the crazy shit they did to make up for having no budget at all.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Is the commentary all on the same disc with the film? I was going to send it back to Netflix today, but if that's particularly comical perhaps I should hold on to it to watch that.

[tsarina.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's on the same disc. It's very interesting stuff, especially when they talk about brute force solutions to lack of camera gear.

[rm.livejournal.com]

What I can't understand is how they got those actors to commit to that project. Because the cast is pretty impressive for a movie as plagued with oddities as it is.

far closer to matrix meets Farenheit 451 than 1984, i thought

[random-goblin.livejournal.com]

it is actually a film which is well worth watching again, the first time around lots of bits made me wince at the lack of subtlety.

However going back over the film knowing the end, you can read the whole thing quite differently, as games within games within games. And so while everyone keeps a pretense that they are only aware of what seems to be going on, they are actually all playing the deeper levels. Very similar to medieval japan in this regard.

it also features one of the best bit of cimeatic shorthand i think i have seen, the use of the lie detector as "i know you know i know you know" device is to my mind brilliant. The sheer depth of cinematic reference is stunning, i particuarly like the citizen kane reference, oh and the hommage to the matrix goverment lobby scene.