Anticipating Linklater's "Boyhood"

just saw computer chess, did not recognize him.

Wiley Wiggins was in that?!

i think ethan hawke was my fave part abt this whole thing, like it was almost secretly a film about a deadbeat dad coming of age a decade and a half late. even towards the end he's still kind of giving shitty advice to mason but he's totally a way better dad than he's ever been up to that point

The audience sort of laughed/sighed/clucked at EH's "Women always wanna trade up" line near the end.

Because we saw so little of Mason's best friend, their relationship was ambiguous for me to wonder for a few minutes whether he and Mason were lovers and that's why they were nervous about attending the graduation party.

its just awkward bein a teen, man

Alfred hoping 'Richard Linklater' was a pseud for Gus Van Sant

i think ethan hawke was my fave part abt this whole thing, like it was almost secretly a film about a deadbeat dad coming of age a decade and a half late. even towards the end he's still kind of giving shitty advice to mason but he's totally a way better dad than he's ever been up to that point

Yeah, I think this is what I enjoyed most about the movie.

total number of shooting days: 39

http://www.austinmonthly.com/Austin-Amplified/March-2014/SXSW-2014-Q-A-with-Richard-Linklater-Ethan-Hawke-and-Ellar-Coltrane/

sheena is a dead ringer for joanna n -- otm!
i noticed that too and wondered if she was chosen specifically for that reason and then given the name "sheena"

also i knew that mason sr's dad looked like a famous person. charlie sexton -- of course!! dude totally has the look of a lifer in the music biz. great casting.

btw gross this weekend was over $1.7 M on 107 screens

Alfred hoping 'Richard Linklater' was a pseud for Gus Van Sant

Well, there was the nail polish too.

extra lols at Mason Sr marveling over Roger Clemens' pitching performance circa 2005, unaware that he's 'roided up.

i was proud and then then ashamed to know that year was 2005 based on clemens' ERA

and

What other ideas is he supposed to have -- YOURS? Rather perhaps you mean he has similar ways of expressing his sense of this period, which only makes sense.

You ppl sure paid a lot of attention to Wiley Wiggins. I've seen D&C 4 or 5 times and Waking Life at least twice, and every time he's mentioned I have to remind myself who he is.

― son of a lewd monk (Dr Morbius), Monday, July 28, 2014 10:01 AM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

no -- "ideas" was the wrong word i guess, i am talking really literally about the type of people linklater makes his young male characters, all tending to be variations of that boho slacker ideal just placed into different movies at different times. mason was very similar to me as a teenager! that's sort of the problem. his movies have these Authentic Young Male Experiences while the boys around the protag are all of lesser meaning, lacking that spark of significance and philosophy and vulnerability and artistic concern, and the girls are all just crushes or girlfriends or some sort of seductresses. i don't know why i expected different from him this time. i thought it was good up until the high school years but then linklater's favorite character to write surges forth. though you could tell he was gonna go that way with the "you spend all class looking out the window" comment in the beginning. i get very annoyed by writers who spend decades without ever divorcing their young characters with their own youths or their own ideas of what their youths should have been. i will say that his bio parents (even with hawke being another extension of this type) were well-written.

and when i say wiley wiggins i'm just talking about his character in D+C whose name i don't remember. had no idea he was in WW.

you're getting awfully huffy about something you found merely good, do you always yell your way into realizing you like a movie more than originally thought?

er had no idea he was in *waking life

WW, WL, etc

you're getting awfully huffy about something you found merely good, do you always yell your way into realizing you like a movie more than originally thought?

― linda cardellini (zachlyon)

aw you don't know our Morbs!

Yeah, it usually goes the opposite direction.

It'll happen with this one the more people that see it.

:p

you are confused

i do think Ed had it right that the Obama-sign scene was worth "cringing" over

http://www.slantmagazine.com/film/review/boyhood

(least enthusiastic review on Metacritic btw; just about right)

Note that Ed also says "the growth of our country's political climate," not "the decline of our country's political climate."

yeah well, I don't know what he's looking at. just us getting screwed over by pols across the demographic spectrum, perhaps, like any satisfied Democrat.

I'm sorry if I was yelling at you, zachylon. I didn't find this particular adolescent tiresome, I guess, bcz he was complaing about a society of compliant "robots" unlike anyone in, say, "the brilliant Her," or those two curdled middle-aged whingers in Before Menopause.

You're totally right. People complaining about a society of compliant robots never gets old or tiresome.

truth 24x a second

if that's what gets you going then boy do i have some immensely popular facebook image macros saying the exact same things you might like

just cuz dummies are saying something badly doesn't mean it isn't true.

No one would call you dummy to your face

I would.

Oh wait, would we have to be in the same room together?

Eric, let's not bring your pillow talk in here.

*our

A book full of clippings.

The general atmosphere is very "Golden Girls"-ish.

Thank Christ those seasonal gay threads are over

anyway, why hasn't Linklater been called out as a Grumpy Old Man for putting his Facebook Zombie monologue in the mouth of a poor teenage actor?

http://31.media.tumblr.com/64d92f610a8a106a5075318c6ba08323/tumblr_mn6xfvQyVM1sp9olpo1_500.gif

johnwayneshootsthegoldengirls.gif

why hasn't Linklater been called out as a Grumpy Old Man for putting his Facebook Zombie monologue in the mouth of a poor teenage actor?

cuz he's almost model-handsome

http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lj02wyz89E1qakh43o1_400.gif

anyway, why hasn't Linklater been called out as a Grumpy Old Man for putting his Facebook Zombie monologue in the mouth of a poor teenage actor?

― son of a lewd monk (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, July 29, 2014 8:27 AM (41 minutes ago)

the (really great) Vulture profile on Ellar Coltrane you posted upthread says it was the kid's idea:

Linklater would give him extracurricular assignments: “When you find yourself alone talking to a girl in an intimate situation, go home and write it up.” Two write-ups — about Star Wars and the evils of Facebook — made it into the movie.

Ellar Coltrane: A New Hope

this is cute

amorbsable

his movies have these Authentic Young Male Experiences while the boys around the protag are all of lesser meaning, lacking that spark of significance and philosophy and vulnerability and artistic concern, and the girls are all just crushes or girlfriends or some sort of seductresses.

i don't think there's only one kind of teenage protagonist to portray, & so sure there are probably wilder terrains into which linklater could drag his movies about youth, but i do think that portraying a teenager with reference to the distance between him & his peers, or by focusing on the myopic solipsism of adolescents, is something that would be common to a lot of those portrayals, rather than evidence that they're all the same. it's a key characteristic of that group, perceived specialness & vividness & realness compared to others. those monologues aren't there as conversation with the viewer, they're there as demonstrations of his thinking & priorities as a, whatever, nineteen year old; semi-sanctimonious, internalised & attempting to distinguish himself. reminded of gus van sant's beautifully captured kinda anomic youths in paranoid park - you aren't watching it to hang out & be persuaded by the insights of teenagers but to be reminded of the kind of logic that felt available, then.

paranoid park is sort of the opposite though -- a singular teenager desperately yearning to fit in with the cool subculture kids (with casualties) who aren't really presented as special (other than for the aesthetic wonders of being good at sk8board), and neither is he, he's just a kid dealing with the depression of teen ennui/shitty experiences/accidentally killing a dude/really wanting to feel loved. the narrative structures mason as having that special spark as though other kids his age aren't all filled with those feelings of romance. not necessarily saying that linklater presents him as being better than everyone else (there's clearly some self-awareness of youth/naivete) just that he only likes writing these male characters built around vulnerability/sensitivity/artistic inclinations/philosophy-garble-a-la-waking-life while that one character's peers blend in with the normal old wallpaper of life, or they're girls that "get" him but are too busy being girls to "get" him enough. it gets boring!

if he has that "special spark," it's because the movie is about a kid whose has a talent that may or may not be realized. That ambiguity is important! There's no suggestion that his future is made

couldn't POSSIBLY get as boring as Paranoid Park

yeah Linklater has been a tot hottie for decades but after the teo films preceding this one he goes back in the line.

There were things I liked, and I was never bored, and I definitely liked it better than the last two Great American Films, The Master and The Tree of Life. What’s most admirable about the film--that it almost wholly stays clear of manufactured great moments--is also kind of where it fell it a little short for me, though. I wish it had risked a few of those. In the end, I just was never really moved, like with (to pick the most obvious parallel) the Apu Trilogy.

--interesting how much Mason’s girlfriend looked like a young Patricia Arquette; I thought Ethan Hawke was about to mention that when they were talking on the club’s balcony, but no one ever did
--Lorelei Linklater as the daughter must have done a great job, because there were times when I really hated her
--not sure what was up with the music; there was some at the beginning, then it would disappear for long stretches...not saying I wanted American Graffiti or Dazed and Confused, that wouldn't have worked at all, it just felt unfinished; Yo La Tengo was nice
--having Arquette essentially go through the same thing twice with her second and third husbands was odd (though it set up a funny line from Mason)
--liked the ending

Saw it at a multiplex, and the theatre was more than half-full for an afternoon screening (holiday Monday here)--more than I expected.