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penismightier posted:It's not so much the wife's relevance to the plot or weight of screentime, it's the fact that she's given no inner life and no independent thoughts or actions. Notice the way she's always framed at Malcolm's side, and the way she practically only speaks when spoken to. She's never given a moment alone. That kind of stuff isn't representative of a world where women don't have much of an impact but is symptomatic of a film which is disinterested in their perspective. I certainly agree that Russell's character didn't matter, but I think "inert presence" defines all three of the main humans.
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Jul 17, 2014 21:31
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Saw the movie today, as it's just been released in the UK and have to say I loved every second of it. The was so pumped coming out the only though in my head was "I have to get as many people as possible to watch this movie!".
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Jul 17, 2014 21:32
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Xeremides posted:When we're down to the wire, we revert to those evil patriarchal devil gender roles that not only ensured humanity survived, but thrived. Besides the biotruths/tactical realism combo attack of cruddy logic, you don't really understand what those words mean. There was/is no patriarchy in egalitarian societies, because patriarchy is a kind of hierarchy, which egalitarian groups necessarily do not have. Gender and sex differences are a totally separate (not to say unrelated) thing, and connecting them to the greater marginal reproductive value of females to males is speculative at best and absurd at worst. No breeding population big enough to be viable has few enough women that any one of them is reproductively vital. None of which has the least bit to do with why women aren't more prominent characters in this fictional movie.
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Jul 17, 2014 21:34
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No Wave posted:I certainly agree that Russell's character didn't matter, but I think "inert presence" defines all three of the main humans. That's very true, but with Malcolm and his son at least there's the pretense of trying. How long did she spend administering those meds, and we didn't see any of it? There's a lot of drama in what that experience was like at such a delicate moment in the two camps relations, ya know. That's just one example but there's a consistent pattern of dismissing her role in the events.
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Jul 17, 2014 21:35
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No Wave posted:...I think "inert presence" defines all three of the main humans. I took this at letting the audience see ourselves in them, and asking us to put ourselves in their shoes facing their tough choices. Personally I related to Ellie (Russell's character) as much, if not more, than any of them.
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Jul 17, 2014 21:35
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penismightier posted:That's very true, but with Malcolm and his son at least there's the pretense of trying. How long did she spend administering those meds, and we didn't see any of it? Lord Krangdar posted:I took this at letting the audience see ourselves in them, and asking us to put ourselves in their shoes facing their tough choices. Personally I related to Ellie (Russell's character) as much, if not more, than any of them.
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Jul 17, 2014 21:39
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DeimosRising posted:Besides the biotruths/tactical realism combo attack of cruddy logic, you don't really understand what those words mean. There was/is no patriarchy in egalitarian societies, because patriarchy is a kind of hierarchy, which egalitarian groups necessarily do not have. Gender and sex differences are a totally separate (not to say unrelated) thing, and connecting them to the greater marginal reproductive value of females to males is speculative at best and absurd at worst. No breeding population big enough to be viable has few enough women that any one of them is reproductively vital. None of which has the least bit to do with why women aren't more prominent characters in this fictional movie. Yeah, I was using every word in their most literal sense and definitely not stringing along a series of words for comedic effect. That said, gender roles absolutely do influence our expectations of people in certain situations. In a crisis, we expect men to step up and fight and to protect women and children. It doesn't matter if it's because they're physically weaker, more essential to the survival of your tribe (which is arguably what became of the humans in the film), unable to defend themselves, too important to die or whatever. Be it genetic instinct or social expectation, it's what we do, and it's exactly what they did in the film. Again, Malcolm's first instinct was to leave his kid and girlfriend behind in order to protect them. Oldman had all of the civilians locked in within the confines of the skyscraper or whatever it was, and all of the fighting men at the front to defend everyone else. This is how all the males in the film react to danger, man or ape. Within the narrative, the apes obviously do the same, and keep their women at bay for the duration of the movie, save for Caesar's wife. It's only once the action is done and victory is theirs that they bother to mention their women again, and its to move them from the safety of the forest down to their new base. Throughout the movie, we are seeing the humans mirrored in apes and the apes mirrored in humans. The point being we're not so different. As I previously said, and you ignored, this is a film about conflict, and both in the movie and in reality, you'll find a poo poo ton of men in the middle of it, and women and children in the rear. It's an absolutely valid reason for women not to be prominent characters, because they're being kept away from the action, and the movie takes place primarily in the thick of things. Be it in enemy territory, be it during the assault on the human city or when Caesar and friends cautiously watched the humans work in the dam to ensure they didn't gently caress them over, the point is to have your warriors on the forefront and everyone else away from it all. In that situation, youre warriors are every able-bodied male, and everyone else consists of the women, children and elderly. Within the confines of the story, it makes perfect sense. Xeremides fucked around with this message at 21:55 on Jul 17, 2014 |
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Jul 17, 2014 21:53
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No Wave posted:Fair. Wasn't as confusing as Mr. Gun no longer being necessary for fixing the dam, but we certainly saw a lot of him... I was disappointed that there was no real scene between the only two female characters. I did like that it was Malcom's wife's idea to help Caesar's wife though. It would have been worse if Malcolm had just been like "Hey my woman is a doctor, she can help your woman"
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Jul 17, 2014 21:55
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Snak posted:I was disappointed that there was no real scene between the only two female characters. I did like that it was Malcom's wife's idea to help Caesar's wife though. It would have been worse if Malcolm had just been like "Hey my woman is a doctor, she can help your woman" No Wave fucked around with this message at 22:02 on Jul 17, 2014 |
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Jul 17, 2014 22:00
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Lord Krangdar posted:I don't want anyone to prove that. I want posters to stop pretending to speak for entire groups of people. A diverse cast improves a film and is more enjoyable to watch. Like I said before, I liked this film. I just think having more women in the movie or at least fleshing out the female characters that it did have would have made a good movie even better. Maybe we will get to see that in the next film. Erethizon_dorsatum fucked around with this message at 23:00 on Jul 17, 2014 |
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Jul 17, 2014 22:55
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Russel's doesn't really bother me. Her role is fully utilitarian. She is there to flesh out Malcolm and serve some plot beats. But honestly, I wished I could see a bit more character from Caesar's wife. It's fine that she's not an active character. That feeds into a large Hollywood issue, but the burden of that issue should not be placed solely on this film. But she was really lacking in any character and that rubbed me the wrong way. Russel's character being so boring just sort of accentuated that one sore point. Like literally, if there was one scene where she made a joke or busted Caesar's balls or said something wise or showed any character, I'd be happier.
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Jul 17, 2014 22:55
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Erethizon_dorsatum posted:A diverse cast improves a film and is more enjoyable to watch.
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Jul 17, 2014 23:29
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Timeless Appeal posted:Russel's doesn't really bother me. Her role is fully utilitarian. She is there to flesh out Malcolm and serve some plot beats. But honestly, I wished I could see a bit more character from Caesar's wife. It's fine that she's not an active character. That feeds into a large Hollywood issue, but the burden of that issue should not be placed solely on this film. But she was really lacking in any character and that rubbed me the wrong way. Russel's character being so boring just sort of accentuated that one sore point. I see where you are getting at. The only two things Caesar's (unnamed as far as I remember) wife contributes to the plot is being sick and comforting Caesar with their son. Both lead to stregthening or developing Caesar's character by having him trust humans more after his wife is cured and to give some humanity to him by showing his family side. That's it, a female character contributes more to a male's character than being her own character.
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Jul 17, 2014 23:48
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The film is about sexist characters. Like There Will Be Blood, the absence of women is pointed and underlined.
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Jul 18, 2014 00:05
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:The film is about sexist characters. Like There Will Be Blood, the absence of women is pointed and underlined.
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Jul 18, 2014 01:46
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Can I just say that I loved the idea of the kid trying to push peace by teaching the orangutan to read loving Black Hole. That's some dark poo poo man.
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Jul 18, 2014 02:07
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One thing I liked that hasn't been said anywhere, I don't think: At first you see "doctor apes" with tiny banana masks, and you chuckle to yourself "Lol, monkeys and bananas". Then you realize that a decent amount of these apes were originally test subjects, who regularly experienced medicine done to them by people with masks on. Forgive the pun, but I found it interesting that in the Ape society depicted, they are aping parts of humanity without understanding why.
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Jul 18, 2014 02:51
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MisterBibs posted:I found it interesting that in the Ape society depicted, they are aping parts of humanity without understanding why.  Still, interesting observation about the ape masks. I wasn't even totally sure what those masks were made of.
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Jul 18, 2014 02:57
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Timeless Appeal posted:I don't see that. Can you elaborate? I actually think complaints about Felicity are way overblown. She has as much - minimal - characterization as anyone else, and you learn a lot about her through it. The writers didn't need for her to be an adoptive parent to Smit-McPhee, and a hippie with a tragic backstory, etc. Nonetheless when the big keyword of the film is 'FAMILY' and 25% of Caesar's family is mostly silent, mostly offscreen, and otherwise trying not to die in childbirth, that says a lot about what these guys are fighting for. The main thing I appreciate is that they don't sugarcoat the primitive lifestyle, like in Avatar. There, the only real downside of life in the jungle is arranged marriage. Here you have Blue Eyes sporting some nasty scars, and the whole dying-in-childbirth thing. Ape society is sexist, and has a kind of caste system going on with the gorillas and whatnot. The observation about the surgical masks is brilliant. These apes are human-smart, but the point is that human-smart is still pretty stupid.
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Jul 18, 2014 04:29
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Something someone said in a Facebook comment on this Jacobin article. https://www.jacobinmag.com/2014/07/no-war-but-ape-war/ "Pierre Boule who wrote the novel and screenplay also wrote the Bridge over the River Kwai. He was among those Europeans who were made to work for the Japanese building bridges, after being taken prisoner of war.The strength of the image of the Ape on horseback is that it echoes the experience of the Europeans on seeing Japanese officers on horseback, that is, in authority over them. Wartime propaganda against Japanese commonly portrayed the Japanese as apes, and Boule simply makes the metaphor literal."
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Jul 18, 2014 21:09
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MisterBibs posted:One thing I liked that hasn't been said anywhere, I don't think: This is actually a central tenet of the Planet of the Apes lore. In the first movie Ape society is based off of human society. Doctor Zaius is one of the last apes who understands this and is attempting to suppress this truth. This is why apes are forbidden to visit certain places of former human habitation like "The Forbidden Zone". Basically the apes' entire society revolves around this idea that everything ape is pure, and everything human is other and ultimately destructive. (this is represented in the later movies where the last surviving humans literally worship a nuclear missile.) The Ape society doesn't worship a god, and it's foundations are based on dogmatic ideology. In such a society if everything human is degenerate but ape society is actually learned from humans, this means the very foundations of society are faulty. This is why a talking walking human who so closely resembles apes in his mannerisms and values is, to use the new vogue term, problematic. The Walking Dad fucked around with this message at 21:20 on Jul 18, 2014 |
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Jul 18, 2014 21:17
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"Why is it that a sophisticated animal like the chimp does not utilize inferior creatures? He could straddle a goat and ride off into the sunset." -Werner Herzog
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Jul 18, 2014 21:47
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Plague Inc has a new planet of the apes themed virus. Main new gimmick is having to hunt down all the genesys labs and at the same time upgrading all the ape abilities so they can fight the humans more effectively. You can also form ape colonies which allow you get DNA upgrade points over time. 
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Jul 19, 2014 18:54
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I get why everyone seems to agree that, ideologically, Caesar=Malcolm and Koba=Dreyfus but I find it more interesting that Caesar and Dreyfus are the leaders, and Koba and Malcolm are the dissidents. While the apes simply have to deal with the one vicious rear end in a top hat among their ranks, humans are led by one. Humans have a handful of ape-loving hippies to deal with in a world ravaged by an ape-related catastrophe, whereas apes are led by a human-sympathizer and exist in a society somewhat designed to mimic humanity's. Malcolm and Koba both regularly trespass onto "enemy" territory to further their own agendas and eventually attempt/threaten to kill their leaders. Malcolm is a liberal in a red state and Koba is a conservative in a blue state. I don't really know where else to go with this. But also, more importantly, holy gently caress was that Judy Greer playing Caesar's wife??? What a weird career that woman has.
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Jul 19, 2014 19:51
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Beyond sane knolls posted:I get why everyone seems to agree that, ideologically, Caesar=Malcolm and Koba=Dreyfus but I find it more interesting that Caesar and Dreyfus are the leaders, and Koba and Malcolm are the dissidents. While the apes simply have to deal with the one vicious rear end in a top hat among their ranks, humans are led by one. Humans have a handful of ape-loving hippies to deal with in a world ravaged by an ape-related catastrophe, whereas apes are led by a human-sympathizer and exist in a society somewhat designed to mimic humanity's. Malcolm and Koba both regularly trespass onto "enemy" territory to further their own agendas and eventually attempt/threaten to kill their leaders. Malcolm is a liberal in a red state and Koba is a conservative in a blue state. I don't really know where else to go with this. That's one thing I like about this film. While there are parallels in the characters, none of them are really cookie-cutter. Each character has their own motivations and personalities, even if they aren't played up. Another example is that both Dreyfus and Ellie have lost children, but the way it has influenced them is slightly different. One aspect that it's easy to forget is that Dreyfus and Malcolm's relationship is really similar to Caesar and Koba's. In the scene after Caesar tells them not to come back, Dreyfus and Malcolm's conversation makes it seem like they, the two of them, literally founded this community. In that scene, they seem to have a close personal bond that doesn't really come through in any of the other scenes. It's possible I misread it, so I'm going to pay more attention to this aspect on my next viewing. It definitely supports your reading of Koba and Malcolm as both being traitor-dissidents.
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Jul 19, 2014 20:28
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It's sort of weird that the "villain" is a bonobo who's more violent than the chimps, and also none of the bonobos ever have an orgy or anything. Really missing the chance to get a fourth caste into that ape society, but I guess extensive ape-fuckery is probably beyond the pg-13 pale.
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Jul 19, 2014 20:31
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DeimosRising posted:It's sort of weird that the "villain" is a bonobo who's more violent than the chimps, and also none of the bonobos ever have an orgy or anything. I'm almost confident that it was intentionally 'weird'. Koba should be the kind that makes love and not war, but he's so broken by testing that he's well past that. etalian posted:Plague Inc has a new planet of the apes themed virus. Man, did they have to make it so that it costs (rather than refunds) random evolutions? It's such a fun scenario, but drat if I can't even get to the infect-everyone point... MisterBibs fucked around with this message at 20:39 on Jul 19, 2014 |
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Jul 19, 2014 20:34
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Beyond sane knolls posted:I get why everyone seems to agree that, ideologically, Caesar=Malcolm and Koba=Dreyfus but I find it more interesting that Caesar and Dreyfus are the leaders, and Koba and Malcolm are the dissidents. The film expands on this by making Malcolm the rightful leader of the human side. Who steps out when the apes first arrive on horseback? The film implies all along that, if Malcolm were in charge, everything would have been perfect - since he and Caesar are natural allies. However, it's not actually that simple. That would still lead us to the end of the film, where liberalism fails completely. Caesar and Malcolm do not account for the "stupid, brutish" lower-class people, and they're ultimately elitist. Returning to the Star Wars prequels: Palpatine: Remember back to your early teachings. "All who gain power are afraid to lose it." Even the Jedi. Anakin Skywalker: The Jedi use their power for good. Palpatine: Good is a point of view, Anakin. The Sith and the Jedi are similar in almost every way, including their quest for greater power. This is exactly the message at the end of the film: Apes only respect power, and weakness needs to be cast out. The good guys are no different in this respect. Caesar returns to the house in the first film, but it's important to remember that this house is paid for with corporate profits. Some people consider it a plot hole that there are hundreds of apes in San Francisco, but it's pretty clear that they are being shipped in specifically for burgeoning companies like Gen-Sys, with the animal control people working alongside them to form a straight-up prison-industrial complex. The fantasy of the liberal good guys is of restoring power to this system, but without the exploitation. This is hopelessly naive: the system was based entirely in exploitation. This whole second film is about the failure to conceive of an alternate system. I think the final part, where Malcolm picks up the gun in an exact mirror of Koba, is key. It's a gradual transition, but Malcolm's true ally is ultimately Koba, though he does not realize it. That's the option that none of the characters can fathom.
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Jul 19, 2014 20:50
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:The film expands on this by making Malcolm the rightful leader of the human side. Who steps out when the apes first arrive on horseback? The film implies all along that, if Malcolm were in charge, everything would have been perfect - since he and Caesar are natural allies. However, it's not actually that simple. That would still lead us to the end of the film, where liberalism fails completely. Caesar and Malcolm do not account for the "stupid, brutish" lower-class people, and they're ultimately elitist.
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Jul 19, 2014 21:05
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Snak posted:I don't think ally is the word you're looking for there. Koba would never ally himself with a human. If you mean that they both recognize that their leader's judgement has been compromised to the point where there will be a better outcome if they shoot their own friend and leader, then yes. But in no sense could Malcolm and Koba be considered allies. No, ally is what I mean.
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Jul 19, 2014 21:19
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:No, ally is what I mean. Okay, then describe to me in which way they are allies.
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Jul 19, 2014 21:27
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Snak posted:Okay, then describe to me in which way they are allies. Virtue and terror go together like peanut butter and chocolate.
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Jul 19, 2014 22:01
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Liberals should shut up and realize Stalin did nothing wrong. - Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.
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Jul 19, 2014 22:16
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Mantis42 posted:Liberals should shut up and realize Stalin did nothing wrong. - Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. Wait, Stalin's in this movie? drat. I gotta see this now. How do they work that into the plot?
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Jul 19, 2014 22:22
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:Virtue and terror go together like peanut butter and chocolate. Yes but they still aren't allies by any definition of the word I'm familiar with.
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Jul 19, 2014 22:28
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Snak posted:Yes but they still aren't allies by any definition of the word I'm familiar with. SMG said "true ally", I assume in the sense that the ultimate way forward is a combination of both of their values, championing the lowest of the low and literally everyone in both camps. Koba wouldn't work with humans - but who says the humans can't be apes?
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Jul 19, 2014 22:54
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Hbomberguy posted:SMG said "true ally", I assume in the sense that the ultimate way forward is a combination of both of their values, championing the lowest of the low and literally everyone in both camps. Koba wouldn't work with humans - but who says the humans can't be apes? Koba won't work with anyone who disagrees with him. His philosophy is dogmatic hatred. There is no combining their values. You can equivocate for SMG all day, but Ally is simply not the correct word. It does not apply in a literal or broad philosophical sense. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes: Being Allies is not a Privilege
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Jul 19, 2014 22:59
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SMG didn't say 'they are allies', as if to imply the two were literally friends. They said "Malcolm's true ally is ultimately Koba", which is a very different thing entirely. You and I are ultimately allies in a greater struggle. That doesn't mean we are the bestest of friends right now, or will ever have to be.
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Jul 19, 2014 23:19
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Hbomberguy posted:SMG didn't say 'they are allies', as if to imply the two were literally friends. I get that. So what greater struggle are Koba and Malcolm ultimately allies in?
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Jul 19, 2014 23:26
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Snak posted:I get that. So what greater struggle are Koba and Malcolm ultimately allies in? Egalitarian struggle against oppression. It's not egalitarianism if Koba is excluded. Malcolm needs to love his neighbour. The trouble is that Malcolm finally picks up the rifle in support of the apes right at the point that Koba is killed, and the film consequently ends with him still on the side of Caesar. Koba is very perceptive: Caesar does love humans more than apes. More specifically, he considers humans a type of ape, and everyone superior to lower-class 'not-apes' like Koba.
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Jul 20, 2014 00:09
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