A Ghost Story could be described the same way that most people would describe an encounter with a ghost (did I say crazy people, I meant crazy people). It’s cold and soothing at first, numbing to the world around you. But then the existential terror of the moment slowly sinks in and everything suddenly goes white. All existence expands in front of you, the cosmos both collapse and unfold...David Lowery is all about taking ludicrous premises and inserting an ache into them that can’t help but soon blow your mind. Ain’t Them Bodies Saints was a typical man on the run story, but with the ache, it became a movie about love and what happens when new love arises in the ashes of the old. Pete’s Dragon was a kids movie that started out with a traumatizing but beautiful moment of intelligence, a slice of pure gold on film, and A Ghost Story, which I’m not going to tell you anything about, especially the story, is another mind blowing ache. Another film that unfolds like nothing you can imagine and crushes you with your own existential thoughts. Your own existential terrors. A Ghost Story is an aching experience, one that you can’t forget, won’t forget, shouldn’t forget, and wouldn’t forget. It’s the type of adrenaline shot to the arm that...it makes you feel like living. What Lowery is playing around with this time is time, and he’s a lot better with it than Christopher Nolan, because rather than trying to take time apart like a watch (as entertaining as that actually is) Lowery embraces the messy nature of time. The ever expanding, ever compressing, meaninglessness in all of it. The feeling that comes from being around long enough that time doesn’t exist, that time holds no bounds. The figments, the importance, everything that it means to be human. There’s no other way around it. Lowery lets time become a diegetic player in scenes, allowing scenes to drag on incredibly long, something that some directors wouldn’t have the ability to nuance to the point of addicting perfection. A scene with Rooney Mara (WHO HOLY SHIT, between Song to Song and this, is having a year of performances so nuanced that it damn near fractures your ability to perceive the idea of an actress) goes on forever, and yet with each aching, pulse pounding moment breaks the audience into the mind space of watching the nuance and the horror that the time presents us with. This isn’t just good filmmaking, this is an uncanny ability to transcend who we are and how we think of our place in this world and David Lowery burning the whole thing to the ground into a symphonic hodge podge of glory. And if that all sounds crazy, if that all sounds like gibberish in the face of something that should logically be broken down, ok...fine. It’s all gibberish. It’s all too arty. It’s all too much...but you’re missing out. There’s no way past that. You’re missing out on one of the best experiences of the year. A film that can’t help but make you think of yourself, your time in this world, your entire being and those around you differently, and there’s nothing better than when a movie gives you that. A Ghost Story made my day. It made my week. It made my year. A Ghost Story is a stone cold shot to the heart, that I implore you not to miss.
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December 2017
CategoriesAuthorHello welcome to FilmAnalyst. My name is Stephen Tronicek, and I really like movies. This is a way to get my opinions out to people. Thank you for visiting. |