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Watched Jan 02, 2023
Box office failure and mixed reviews, eff that noise. Who cares? I live for these kinds of incredibly ambitious, wild and unruly, messy, divisive, fuck-the-rules, personal statements on film. Is it perfect? Absolutely not, and that’s part of what makes it great and truly special. Does it overreach? 100%. I’ll take that any day over a safe, “nothing that hasn’t been approved by test audiences” product that we usually get.
Also? I don’t buy for one single second that anyone thought this would make the “break even” amount of $250 million. I mean, a prostitute literally pees on a guy’s face in the first 10 minutes. It wasn’t going to be a box office smash hit. But I’m glad Damien Chezelle pulled this off, I’m glad the studio backed him, and I hope his next (almost certainly more toned down and inexpensive) feature is awesome too.
You can keep your blue people, this is my kind of 3-hour, 10-minute movie!