Victor is a sleazeball, and that’s the way he likes it.
Dementia has taken her current mind into the past, so much so that she rarely recognizes her son when he comes to visit, mistaking him for a revolving cadre of old acquaintances. The money he makes is chiefly used to pay for the expensive boarding of his deteriorating mother in a mental facility. Victor uses this bond to extract money from his benefactors, and for many years it’s been working quite well. Victor is a soulless billiard ball, seeking out fleeting moments of intimacy through meaningless sex and a long con of detestable acts - Victor will purposely choke in public spaces so that strangers can save his life, cradling him in their arms afterward and forming a lifelong bond that tethers them to his continued wellbeing.
Choke centers around Victor Mancini, played with aloof integrity by Sam Rockwell. One sees a world of relentless disgust, showcased with no filter. The photography is vibrant and life-like, lacking the silver screen sheen that separates the viewer from the subject, allowing the audience to see themselves in the frame. In contrast, Choke is a very bare-bones straightforward film. For all its dirtiness it was ultra-polished, every frame scrubbed from bottom to top to fit the director’s vision and Hollywood’s unyielding standards. Viewers learned about soap and dynamite, insurance math and corporate branding, defeatism, and space monkeys. The film was dangerous and enlightening, illuminating a seething emptiness and shallow sense of self that permeated through semi-professional drones of the time. Brad Pitt was the lithe, muscular lead, followed around by a hangdog Edward Norton, with Helena Bonham Carter thrown in to stir the pot. With a huge budget and an auteur at the helm in David Fincher, Fight Club boasted stunning visuals, camera tricks, CGI, star power, muted colors, and a ballsy, nihilistic approach to masculinity and consumerism in 1990s America. Fight Club was a phenomenon, though largely unappreciated upon its initial release as the satire it was intended to be.
0 kommentar(er)
