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Post by Primemovermithrax Pejorative on Sept 16, 2017 4:57:21 GMT
really? i never felt that way about his kids. You dont think they were portrayed negatively? The older kid was cursing him out..the middle kid (Toby?) was smashing the daughter's toy..the daughter was never shown being affectionate to him unless I missed. I think they were shown as more her kids than his. How embarrassing when he is in the street and all the neighbors are watching. |
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Post by ShadowSouL on Sept 16, 2017 5:34:02 GMT
"true, but I felt very little time passed between "dont go" and "I am moving on". to me it was a few days i between. But maybe I am wrong and it was a few weeks or months?
I agree good movies should make us think. And I do think this was a great movie. Its just it looked a bit out of character for the dad to give up his kids this quickly. But maybe more time had passed…."
I totally get what you're saying. I mean, there's only so much time you can show elapse in a two- to three-hour movie, but I get it.
Slightly off-topic but still on-topic, as somebody who still has both his parents around and who has fond childhood memories (warts and all, nevertheless), I do feel for the family in the movie, and I can imagine a movie family like that, or in any other film or television show, can be hard to watch for people who have actually experienced that.
But even people who haven't can empathize and/or sympathize.
But the situation in the movie itself lends itself to empathy/sympathy, whether by intentional design of the movie itself, or viewers bringing their personal experiences and emotions to the movie, or both.
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Post by joekiddlouischama on Sept 17, 2017 8:59:29 GMT
As Steve McQueen proved by his words, this movie was too unmanly for him. While Roy Neary "abandoning" his kids was kind of reflective of Steven Spielberg's earlier perspective (or lack thereof), that in itself does not make the movie not good. Good movies challenge our pre- and post-conceived notions, whether or not they are legitimate, and especially make us uncomfortable. Unlike Spielberg's "sequel" to Close Encounters of the Third Kind -- E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, which is a cotton-candy confection of a movie -- Close Encounters doesn't wrap everything up neatly in a pretty, bow-tied package that makes us all warm and fuzzy inside. It challenges us with discomfort, making us question whether we agree with what transpired and whether it is right or wrong, acceptable or not acceptable -- it really makes us think and question, all signs of a great, fantastic movie, especially one loaded with visual effects and dealing with this particular subject matter. By the way, I would consider E.T. a children's movie -- basically about a boy and his alien -- and Close Encounters, while suitable for viewing by children and families, an "adult" movie, especially in terms of the thematic material, as evidenced by the very nature of this discussion thread itself. Going back to the deadbeat dad thing, Roy Neary actually wanted his family to be part of his quest, but his wife would have none of that and took the kids with her. The kids themselves were not fully on either parent's side -- they really were literally caught in the middle. But Roy didn't just haplessly let them go; he tried to stop them from leaving, but eventually he lost out and moved on with his life. He went on to bigger if not necessarily better things, following his first best destiny, at least from his point of view. I would never want to see a sequel made to this movie; it's one of those movies that absolutely does not need a sequel and would be soiled by a sequel. Also, I wouldn't want Spielberg to remake this movie, especially with the perspective and life experience he has gained over the years, because it would be a completely different movie. It would be like George Lucas constantly re-editing and retooling the original trilogy over and over again (Han Solo shoots/doesn't shoot first), which he would still be doing to this day if he hadn't sold Lucasfilm to Disney. Or Gene Roddenberry trying to turn Star Trek into something it wasn't (The Motion Picture), which he did again with The Next Generation until Rick Berman and Michael Piller righted the ship in the third season. Although I strongly believe there should never be a sequel, I've wondered every now and then, where is Roy Neary in his life and evolution now, 40 years later and in his seventies, if time and age even have any meaning anymore for him? And also, where are his wife and kids? What became of them over the last four decades? I certainly agree that E.T. is a children's movie, albeit one that potentially carries some adult implications in terms of how adults respond to an alien figure (real and metaphorical) compared to the child's response. Close Encounters leaves more matters unresolved. I question, though, whether some of the unresolved questions are a matter of genuine ambiguity on the film's part or thin and loose writing, where certain plot points simply do not add up yet Spielberg did not care because he was using B-movie science-fiction tropes to serve the purpose of spectacle. Whereas I feel that E.T. (which I viewed in the theater in June 2013; I had seen it once or twice on television/VHS as a child) is realistically intimate, Close Encounters struck me as somewhat cartoonish in its handling of human relations—not necessarily in a bad way, but as a stylistic choice that Spielberg decided to make: a staccato homage to, or replication of, the low-budget, low-brow science-fiction movies and TV shows that he had surely digested as a kid growing up in the fifties and sixties. Either way, by the end of the film, I could not have cared less about whether Roy left his children—they had become irrelevant to me, and the film's character explorations, while intriguing earlier on an intellectual or allegorical level, had long since ceased. Yet as evidenced by this thread, some viewers are invested in the plight of Roy's children and his ultimate decision, meaning that my response was hardly universal. I plan on seeing Close Encounters again in the theater on Tuesday, between theatrical viewings of E.T. on Sunday and Wednesday—which should all make for some great opportunities to compare and contrast and just to take another look at everything. |
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Post by ShadowSouL on Sept 22, 2017 4:53:49 GMT
"Yet as evidenced by this thread, some viewers are invested in the plight of Roy's children and his ultimate decision, meaning that my response was hardly universal."
But by no means invalid.
Good points all around.
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