I’ll be honest. I didn’t get through these in one sitting. I managed to make it through ‘Dancer in the Dark’ and ‘Requiem for a Dream’ with only a 20-30 minute break between, but I was NOT able to watch the next one until a couple days later. Partly because we had company come over, and were busy entertaining (or at least trying to entertain), but mostly because ‘Requiem’ was so upsetting I was too emotionally shaken up to continue on. I’d never heard of ‘Gods and Monsters’ before, had no idea what it was about, and didn’t trust Brad at this point enough not to have picked something even more terrible (though beautiful and brilliant) than ‘Requiem.’ After talking with Brad, however, I was able to sit down and give ‘Gods’ a go.
‘Dancer’ is probably most upsetting less for its story (though it is a genuinely tragic tale) than for the disjointed, discordance produced by the film’s juxtaposition of a deeply emotional indie-tragedy, and the lighthearted buoyancy of bubbly Bjork-pop musical numbers. I cried considerably during the musical number after the film’s first death, as the main character tries to deal with what’s going on, and then even more during the incarceration, where music and rhythm are completely absent, leaving the protagonist without any coping mechanism, and the audience without any escape from the bleak reality of her situation. By the films closing number, literally a counting of steps to the gallows I was mostly numb, though trembling slightly with anxiety for the scene to come. And finally, weeping openly once more at the last song—a purely vocal performance, without any of the elaborate musical number trappings.
‘Requiem’ was a film I’d only heard of in passing, and never in great detail. Mostly what I’d heard was that it was difficult to follow, and severely difficult to digest. I found both to be untrue; it was a very straight forward film quite easy to follow. The only indigestion it gave was from the unflinching reality of drug addiction, celebrity worship, and stigmatism of psychosis so omnipresent in our post-modern culture. I don’t remember crying at this one, but it did leave me feeling empty, hollow in a most upsetting way.
Oddly enough, of all the films—each of which I felt with some personal attachment—‘Gods’ was the one that affected me the most. I just wept through the last 5-10 minutes of the film uncontrollably. I don’t know if it’s the subject (an aging gay man, hoping for one last shadow of love and affection), the fact the protagonist also happens to be a director (a profession I’m keenly interested in persuing), or just the riveting performance. For whatever reason, this film left the deepest impact. Yet unlike the other two films, ‘Gods’ left me feeling optimistic rather than hollow and alone.
