History of Violence

Film scene of man's head being viewed from below, with blurred pistol being held on the foreground. Behind him there is a woman and dark clouds

2017-07

Watching the film History of Violence (2005). I remember seeing this before, but don’t remember anything about the plot yet. Wouldn’t have picked this up if I knew it wasn’t a new one, but it’s probably short enough to watch again.

I think this film at least looks the kind of straightforward American film that’s easy to watch. One thing about those artistic movie festival debut films is that they seem to have the urge to break rules just for the sake of breaking them. So they will have an ambigious ending. They will have weird slice-of-life elements. There will be awkward dialog because talk in real life is awkward. They will try to establish some grand parallel, but not force it on the viewer, leaving him to “decide for himself” in the end.

That stuff is fine, it really is. But some of those films seem to try so much that I wonder if they get high ratings only because the critics award their points by a checklist of such “modern” film virtues, not really considering the film as a whole as the normal viewer will. Well, I mostly watch films to find interesting stuff, so I’m probably closer to the critics than the average viewer, but if I were to create something artistic, I wouldn’t forget the importance of the whole.

This father-mother couple is so bland I want them killed.

Well now the dad is getting more intersting. Funny how they killed off those two introduction guys. It didn’t kill the suspense, but transfered it to the dad MC and now it’s a great mystery where we may not know the MC as we thought we did. And again the mob guys get killed, seemingly disarming the threat, but really just moving it on to the MC’s condition.

This is a good rewatch. I only remember the scenes as they come, nothing ahead.

Two big bad guys putting their foreheads together as sign of trust, friendship or whatever it is that the mafia guys think important. Turning into a hug. Even getting cheek kisses from the big boss.

That last scene was so good. Joining the family dinner, as a different man or not? The daughter brings the plate and utensils. The son offers the food. And lastly the wife gives the look. A great movie. Glad I watched it again. This is the kind of ending a film is supposed to have, none of that ambiguous Palme d’Or shit.