movies where you disagree w/ the screenwriters on who the 'good guys' are

I had a poster of Alex and his droogs from A Clockwork Orange on my dorm room's wall my freshman year of college and, now that I've gone through the adult arc of cringing at the unconscious motivations that make kids put things like that on their walls, especially in that moment, I think it's just really funny

there's something in dude's brains where they either figure shit out or they're adults with Scarface posters in their man cave who think Walt and Tony Soprano are cool and the protagonist is always good and cool

obviously by a couple years into college I was very enlightened and watching Koyaanisqatsi with my friends and thinking it was deep and good and cool

which is also assigning deeper meaning in a kind of cringe way, but I can look back and laugh at that, too

tbh they kind of wanted you to think "heisenberg" was cool for part of breaking bad (he wasn't) even if they make it clear walter white is a bad man (it is like the ultimate nerd power fantasy at times). they also put you on tony soprano's side for a while by giving him relatable problems and surrounding him with even worse people. both shows turned on the characters eventually but I'm not sure the hero worship is a *total* misreading

What about Sam Spade? I would've included him in the poll of Maltese Falcon villains now.

Sam Spade is literally described by Hammett as "a blond Satan" in the book.

there was some point during the Trump presidency that I realized that there is an entire section of the male population that completely missed the point that Walter White and Tony Soprano were bad guys.

― Western® with Bacon Flavor, Wednesday, July 20, 2022 11:00 AM bookmarkflaglink

there are entire Reddit threads about how Walter did nothing wrong, I thin kwe were clowning on a few bad hot takes in the BB thread after the Ozymandias episode. it blows my mind that anybody bought his heroic father story, even in Season 1.

there ain't no good guys. there ain't no bad guys.
there's just you and me and we just disagree.

i'm gonna hurt you for making me think of that song

obviously by a couple years into college I was very enlightened and watching Koyaanisqatsi with my friends and thinking it was deep and good and cool

of course, this is a dorm room stoner staple. i wouldn't say the movie is terribly deep anymore, but i think it's still good and cool. pointed me towards a lot of woo-woo mindfulness/eastern philosophy stuff that i take some comfort in and ponder still today

i haven't seen either sequel, they don't look very good. i was really disappointed by samsara, it was gorgeously shot, but pretty incoherent overall

Even at the time I enjoyed it as basically a lava lamp for the glass jams

Breaking bad et al belong itt in as far as those Redditors disagree w/ the screenwriters on who the good guys are I guess

Dan Fielding was obviously the hero on Night Court

seems like a good thread to drop this conversation starter

These are mostly all good movies, c'mon pic.twitter.com/5JmlACsVhr

— Shoegaze Dad 🇵🇭 (@yeoldedad) July 20, 2022

Dan Fielding was obviously the hero on Night Court

― F'kin Magnetometers, how do they work? (President Keyes), Wednesday, July 20, 2022 2:27 PM (four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

otm

xp huh, I've seen people make graphics like that for years and that's a new variation

Thinking back to breaking bad even in the first couple of seasons for every moment of “Heisenberg” being ~badass~ there were a dozen moments of Walt and Jesse being incompetent, ppl who actually were competent berating/clowning them for being fools

The moral case against them was made p comprehensibly as well but the things they do are “filmed” to appear “cool” or “dramatically compelling” which can disconcert those who have never encountered fiction before

xp there is maybe a good point in there somewhere, but 0/10 on the execution. it is making people furious on twitter and maybe that was the point.

Needs more John Ford tbh

A+ trolling effort by whoever put that "aggressively bland" infographic together.

A recent movie that struck me as firmly belonging in this thread is The Northman.

I shouldn't bother but

1. The Eastwood characters in the spaghetti westerns are not trying to "bring order to communities," they are trying to enrich themselves personally

2. Those characters with "well-paying office jobs" are not "upper class"

‘Aggressively bland” immediately refuted by pic of Rowdy Roddy Piper in shades. Try better.

If not already mentioned, Dustin Hoffman's character in Straw Dogs

otm, the house is the villain

If we're doing TV shows, I always thought Philip & Elizabeth in The Americans were the bad guys and spent six seasons waiting for them to get their comeuppance.

A recent movie that struck me as firmly belonging in this thread is The Northman.

― beard papa, Wednesday, July 20, 2022 6:16 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

lol what? this movie went out of its way to make it REALLY obvious that the main character's motives were overly simplistic and did not map to reality