Spider: C/D?

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thot this was a v. good movie/ending confused me (which is the correct interpretation etc. maybe that's da point muhaw!)

― naked as sin (naked as sin), Saturday, 18 January 2003 01:34 (twenty-three years ago)

With further hindsight, this was absolutely brilliant. (ps. answer my thread, FuXoRs!)

― naked as sin (naked as sin), Saturday, 18 January 2003 16:01 (twenty-three years ago)

Was Dave Q hired as location manager for this film?

― N. (nickdastoor), Tuesday, 21 January 2003 10:48 (twenty-three years ago)

I didn't realise it was Miranda Richardson playing both parts till th end! (this happened with Mullholland Drive too. I have a problem with faces).

― N. (nickdastoor), Tuesday, 21 January 2003 13:02 (twenty-three years ago)

Really, does no one have anything to say?

I agreed with whoever it was who compared it to a Dennis Potter play. It was v.Brit Lit. But somehow cinematic too. I was puzzled by it.

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 23 January 2003 16:28 (twenty-three years ago)

Um. Nobody does cold, detached austerity quite like Cronenberg and his ability to stay tightly and elegantly controlled is truly amazing?

― Lara (Lara), Thursday, 23 January 2003 16:35 (twenty-three years ago)

I agreed with whoever it was who compared it to a Dennis Potter play
that was me, here:
what new movies do you like?

what was confusing about the ending, n.a.s.?

er warning: SPOILERS coming soon on this thread I guess

― Jeff W, Thursday, 23 January 2003 16:59 (twenty-three years ago)

i.e. it showed how his mother supposedly actually died but is that the genuine event or not, or is it meant to be equal in possibility to the earlier scene where she's killed?

― naked as sin (naked as sin), Thursday, 23 January 2003 18:05 (twenty-three years ago)

I thought M.R. played three parts, Mother, Whore and Landlady.
I read it as everything we see where Spider isn't in the scene is his imagining of what happened.
Spiders encounter with the 'lady' in the pub leads him to believe that his Dad killed her and brought home a whore to replace her. A kind of realisation that all women are sexual beings, including his mother.
The switch from M.R. to the actual Landlady is a signpost to the viewer that much of what we've seen has been as Spider sees it.
I guess. What do I know though? I was fucked on hash cookies when I saw it.

Naked, I don't think she died for real, just symbolically for Spider.

― Simeon (Simeon), Thursday, 23 January 2003 18:22 (twenty-three years ago)

I guess it doesn't matter whether Spider really did kill his mother or not. He's mental.

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 23 January 2003 23:13 (twenty-three years ago)

I'm fine wit it being ambiguous, I just wasn't sure it was suppose 2 b.

― naked as sin (naked as sin), Thursday, 23 January 2003 23:19 (twenty-three years ago)

But are you fine with that not mattering either?

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 23 January 2003 23:31 (twenty-three years ago)

I can accept it and continue wit me life.

― naked as sin (naked as sin), Thursday, 23 January 2003 23:37 (twenty-three years ago)

I think that's for the best. Good luck with everything.

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 23 January 2003 23:40 (twenty-three years ago)

two weeks pass...

it's all about memory and time constructing identity. there's obv also a freudian element: the mother role is essential and destructive. because his mum *cheated* on him (leaving him for his father), he of course disintegrates. the way he (his clothes, the half-way house,...) in present day seems time-less shows how much he's punished by his (constructed?) past. does it matter that it all happened? no, fictional or real, his memories haunt him. oh the way the gas firm is like this GIGANTIC wall obstructing his view (to the future?) shows how much the past really *fucked him* up. it is just totally frigging classic. he's clearly constructed his own reality (when he was young). i love the way you, the viewer, slowly realize he's actually seeing his mother. it's an extremely sad story. he'll never be in the present unless he resolves his past. but by facing the fact he's not seeing things as they are/were, his past (present and identity) will of course completely crumble to pieces. how do you start again from scratch?

― nathalie (nathalie), Monday, 10 February 2003 16:47 (twenty-three years ago)

Don't know what you're all going on about, but I reckon Toyah's much better off with him than that Jon bloke.

(sorry)

― James Ball (James Ball), Monday, 10 February 2003 17:09 (twenty-three years ago)

pret-ty lame, milhouse

― naked as sin (naked as sin), Monday, 10 February 2003 20:46 (twenty-three years ago)

one month passes...

Just saw this last night. Spider unravels the fiction he's created, only to discover (?) that the reality is if anything more difficult to live with. Elsewhere, the recovery of suppressed memory = transcendence, possibly normality. Here, not at all. The problem I had I suppose was that the tissue connecting his fiction and the presumed reality (I see no reason that the scenario toward the end shouldn't be the reality) was, if not overstated, then a bit facile: Horror at female sexuality -- IRL his mother checking her figure in the mirror, making out w/dad in the courtyard. In fiction the unnaturally shrill laughing of the harpies at the bar, bad teeth, sordid scene in the viaduct. Not purely Freudian but has the kind of simplicity I distrust in psychology. So Cronenberg's clarity while impressive may be a drawback here? The interesting bit is the portrayal of the father, who in the fantasy is both Spider's bogeyman and the agent of his, er, wrath. In the fantasy he is a bit of an cipher, which I think is appropriate.

Um, yeah.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Sunday, 16 March 2003 22:35 (twenty-three years ago)

A few strange shots violating the 180° rule here--they must be deliberate, but they come at odd times. Also in the theater I saw it the projectionist didn't have enough light coming through, so it was even more washed-out than it was supposed to be.

I thought the two or three "idyll" scenes where Spider is relaxing with the hospital inmates in some bucolic paradise were very strange--beautifully done though. What do you think was their purpose?

― Amateurist (amateurist), Sunday, 16 March 2003 22:37 (twenty-three years ago)

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