KILLING THEM SOFTLY lasted just one week at the discount theatre in Brad Pitt's home town Springfield, Missouri. This is absolute proof of its exceptional excellence.
This is a perfect film. It is relentless without a shred of seductive illusion, illusionary seduction in it. There are no throwaway laugh lines either. It is a completely post modern look at our world. Ayn Rand would have loved it. Pitt's fingerprints are all over it, and he is so fine in it, but then so is everyone else. The violence is viewed in slow motion, a choreographed dance of shattering glass, bullets and blood, and bodies. No vicarious testosterone release at all. It is Tarantino, pared down, without the charm.
This movie is NOT an entertainment. It is a noir that is more than a noir film. Uncomfortable.
Pitt comes on the scene to handle an inside job of a stick up at the local mafia poker game by the manager of it. He had been beaten to teach him a lesson. But then another one gets the idea to copy cat it. Pitt decides the one who originated the first one has to die although he didn't do it. And then he says the crucial line, "It doesn't matter if he did it or didn't do it. What matters is that he appears to have done it." (And the foundation of our so called justice system comes crumbling down.) And there we have it. In Simulated Reality that's all that is required. Pitt is correct. People must take responsibility for their actions and for the following consequences. He has been called in by the mafia suit guy who welshes on the idea of killing anyone, just beat them up. Pitt maintains he must die as well as the ones who did the second hold up. He is the only one who seems capable of making a strategic decision and carrying it out. As we switch to the TV and the car radio of the 2008 election we get the same waffling by the candidates with their use of sound bite ready-mades full of empty meaning.
For those who have a memory when media is trying 24/7 to erase it from your heads, the 2008 election took in the derivatives's crash. If you don't understand this here is an explanation and review of the movie Margin Call HERE.
The campaign of 2008 ran on a FANTASY of Hope, Change, Unification, Community, a united America and a myriad of other idealistic ready-mades Americans have all grown to love and be familiar with. This is propaganda 101, Appeal to the Idols of the Marketplace, so warned against by that sage in the 1500's Francis Bacon.
.... it is a fantasy that is expected to be maintained. And as
we have learned from Stalin, the moment appearances are
ruptured, reality itself collapses: it is not just that one has to
agree with Stalin all the time, one also has to maintain the
illusion that free discourse is possible; otherwise the fantasy
that Stalin has been freely chosen to lead the people, that he
is the first servant as it were, is destroyed. And the whole
game comes crumbling down.
So while these small town poker players are gambling and having their money stolen the premier investment bankers in New York City have been gambling with their OWN AND OTHERS' assets and have vanished this money, threatening the collapse of the dollar and with it the US government. The US government interrupts the campaign and the opposing candidates go to DC to rubber stamp the transfusion of money - and we are talking trillions - to these defunct gamblers at the top of the food chain. And middle and small town America were looted to do it. Interesting parallel metaphor eh, as it cuts in and out of the ongoing shabby story of squalor.
This is a perfect film. It is relentless without a shred of seductive illusion, illusionary seduction in it. There are no throwaway laugh lines either. It is a completely post modern look at our world. Ayn Rand would have loved it. Pitt's fingerprints are all over it, and he is so fine in it, but then so is everyone else. The violence is viewed in slow motion, a choreographed dance of shattering glass, bullets and blood, and bodies. No vicarious testosterone release at all. It is Tarantino, pared down, without the charm.
This movie is NOT an entertainment. It is a noir that is more than a noir film. Uncomfortable.
Pitt comes on the scene to handle an inside job of a stick up at the local mafia poker game by the manager of it. He had been beaten to teach him a lesson. But then another one gets the idea to copy cat it. Pitt decides the one who originated the first one has to die although he didn't do it. And then he says the crucial line, "It doesn't matter if he did it or didn't do it. What matters is that he appears to have done it." (And the foundation of our so called justice system comes crumbling down.) And there we have it. In Simulated Reality that's all that is required. Pitt is correct. People must take responsibility for their actions and for the following consequences. He has been called in by the mafia suit guy who welshes on the idea of killing anyone, just beat them up. Pitt maintains he must die as well as the ones who did the second hold up. He is the only one who seems capable of making a strategic decision and carrying it out. As we switch to the TV and the car radio of the 2008 election we get the same waffling by the candidates with their use of sound bite ready-mades full of empty meaning. |
| Mr. President Hope and Change |
The campaign of 2008 ran on a FANTASY of Hope, Change, Unification, Community, a united America and a myriad of other idealistic ready-mades Americans have all grown to love and be familiar with. This is propaganda 101, Appeal to the Idols of the Marketplace, so warned against by that sage in the 1500's Francis Bacon.
.... it is a fantasy that is expected to be maintained. And as
we have learned from Stalin, the moment appearances are
ruptured, reality itself collapses: it is not just that one has to
agree with Stalin all the time, one also has to maintain the
illusion that free discourse is possible; otherwise the fantasy
that Stalin has been freely chosen to lead the people, that he
is the first servant as it were, is destroyed. And the whole
game comes crumbling down.
In defense of lost causes; On teaching or, to sir with love …
So while these small town poker players are gambling and having their money stolen the premier investment bankers in New York City have been gambling with their OWN AND OTHERS' assets and have vanished this money, threatening the collapse of the dollar and with it the US government. The US government interrupts the campaign and the opposing candidates go to DC to rubber stamp the transfusion of money - and we are talking trillions - to these defunct gamblers at the top of the food chain. And middle and small town America were looted to do it. Interesting parallel metaphor eh, as it cuts in and out of the ongoing shabby story of squalor.
