So very angreeeeee

The delectible A-Bomb and myself saw “Never Let Me Go” on the weekend, and I hated it. I think it was as fundamentally loathsome a piece of cinema as I’ve ever encountered. And the more I think about it, the more I hate it. Be warned – there are mild spoilers in this rant, so if you’re planning on seeing it (I’d advise you not to) you may want to stop reading and go sky-diving or something instead. I hear sky-diving is pretty awesome.

Since I walked out of the cinema, I’ve been trying to figure out what about the film made it so singularly fucking detestable to me. It was nicely shot, pretty well acted for the most part. It was depressing, but I usually love depressing stories. Stuff like Requiem for a Dream or The Proposition or Nineteen Eighty-Four totally float my boat. So why, on a scale of one to ten, (ten being this website, one being  locked up with The Tossed Salad Man) would I give this film less than zero?

Two reasons:

1)      I didn’t get the point of it. I understand it’s about mortality and the inevitability of death and how fate, by its very nature is inescapable. I get that. But fuck me. I need to pay for the privilege of being told this? I know I’m going to die. I firmly believe this is the only chance at life I get. I AM AWARE. Why would you make a film that essentially says “LALALA, you are fucked, accept your fate, lol”? Why do I need a pack of miserable British people with bad teeth to tell me this? And if this is the subtext of the film, then…

2)      WHY DIDN’T THEY RESIST? There is no fate but what we make. None of us are limited to lives of drudgery or acceptance or meek and blind obedience. Even if the odds are a million to one (like, say a complete nobody getting plucked out of the slush-pile and landing an ‘I’m getting the next round’ three-book deal with a huge publisher) , there is still a chance.  Take it. Better to die on your feet than live on your knees. Better to exit with a roar than a whimper.

The characters in this film were so goddamn weak. Kathy and Tommy had what many would argue is the greatest reason in the world to stay alive – LOVE. Do they run? Do they fight to keep it? Heavens forbid, how uncouth. We’re British dontchewnoe. We’ll just march meekly as lambs to the slaughter, shall we?

Which may have been the point of the film. These kids had been conditioned since birth to accept what they were and what their fate would be. In which case, I ask again, WHAT WAS THE POINT OF THIS FILM?

Fuck this film. Fuck this message. You find real love, you fight until your dying breath to hold onto it. And anyone who tells you different needs a punch in the throat.

I’m off to listen to some Pantera.  >_<

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