Stop mining for those Opals and put the Furbys in the safe as we cover the Safdie brothers film, Uncut Gems.
Released: August 2019
Directors: Safdie Brothers
Budget: $20,000,000
Worldwide Gross: $47,900,000
Breakdown and Analysis
- The fact that Adam Sandler initially rejecting this film confirms to KT that perhaps there wasn’t as much commitment to this.
- Oti suggested if Aaron Sorkin and the director of Taken 2 had a baby, it would be this movie. Based on the Dr Seuss book “Aaron Sorkin goes on an acip trip”
- It didn’t feel like there was a definitive scene structure. No room for reprieve. It is anxiety inducing, however there was no finesse to it.
- If KT wanted to be shouted at for 2 hours, she would have went back home to her parents. Is acting yelling? Where are the layers to that? Even his shouts didn’t have varifying decibels.
- There were no gems in the quiet moment to excavate in order to push the narrative along. What was the point of the story?
- There was no way anyone lived a life like Howard did without consequence. And that is what we were waiting on.
- We prefer fragmented, flawed characters because it leads to tantalising character development. That is not what we got here.
- There were frazzled pieces everywhere but what were we working towards? In the first 5 mins of the film KT thought we would be getting a horror film similar to the mythos of the Monkey Paw. An interesting cautionary tale on greed. People would do anything and sacrifice anything to get the black opal.
- The zoomed in shots with the opal into Howard’s colon was contrived and didn’t add to the story.
- What you first need to do is establish the character and then inform the audience why we should or should not care about the character. It was established quite early that Howard was constantly scamming people and had no intention to stop chasing that high. We didn’t need continual examples for an hour and a half. With Howard, the small wins were not enough. We see him win at the start, then pawning off Garnett’s ring and used that on a bet. Even after he got the $100k he bet it again. When he was crying to his girlfriend, classic emotional manipulation.
- Even at the point of being beaten to death, held over a window, naked in his boot he always chased the high. The possibility of that triumphant win is too enticing to not risk everything.
- KT does not believe Howard has a sense of morality. In order for him to scam people he knows, his family, he had to have abandoned the out of the box morality most of us are born with.
- Oti believes he had an end goal. Once Howard got the million, it would justify all the people he hurt. KT believes because he is addicted, it will never be enough. He will never feel bad and there is no peak. He will continue to push and push.
- KT was struggling to find the heart of the movie.
- Howard was a petulent child that needed a whopping. It didn’t matter thathe had won that $1MIL was not in the interest of paying them back. From this movie we learn that he would have taken theat $1MIL and bet it again. It was his moment of come uppance, but it would have been nice to have some sort of build up. Dialogue in the fact that he deserved it.
- If KT and Oti are having a fight and KT mentally builds a list of everything that Oti has wronged her and he says sorry straight away. To have almost 2 hours of anxiety build up and tension to just abruptly get shot, there was nowhere to release the tension.
Unrelated but vital points
- This is not a KT movie. She gravitates to wholly immersive, deeply personal stories. This was immersive but not in a way that was most welcome to KT.
- Painful fucks and chaotic yelling. We are starting a production company to have these quoted on a movie poster.
- Adam Sandler can have a black foot but RBJ cannot play a black man, according to Oti.
- It’s nice that Lakeith is getting roles.
- Uncut hearts, KT’s Toni Braxton cover tour is coming to an earhole near you.
For Your Reference
Oti
[imdb style=”gray”]tt2349144[/imdb]
KT
[imdb style=”gray”]tt0110912[/imdb]
