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The Subtle Art of Not Giving a #@%! (2023)
This movie was (propably) not approved by Manson's writing team
Reading The Subtle Art of Not Giving a #@% as a 25-year-old self-help junkie and a fan of counterculture I found the book amazing. It was self-help disguised as something better than personal development. It was beyond that. Rooting in ancient Buddhist philosophies, fueled with great present-day stories like the one about Metallica (that thing just hits me every time).
Fast-forward seven years. It's cold Saturday night. Snows. I've had a long day at work and coming home I browse new rentals eventually finding this piece. No need to check the trailer, I know it's going to be a good trip.
Boy was I wrong. It's a sad video essay about Mark's trauma caused by his drug use which eventually led to his parents' divorce. He discusses the concept of entitlement and fake reality portrayed on social media - but then shows his own travel photos narrated with stories about douchebags (including himself) with a tone that displays nothing but entitlement. The delivery of these stories is so dull that not even the great graphics help with the boredom those one-dimensional and scattered diary entries cause in the viewer. It's a tone of a person who feels their experiences and observations to be inherently interesting, without putting effort into crafting their public speaking or storytelling. Awkward laughter after talking proudly about ones encounters with women while simultaneously realizing that no one really gives a #@%!
Manson has stated earlier that behind his blog and books is a huge team of researchers. That's why the posts are always spot on with many interesting details. I believe like they weren't involved with this film, and I feel slightly betrayed.
In the theme of the documentary, accepting that your life is going to suck, I finished almost the whole film trying to observe if it's the film or me that sucks. I received the results, and I can tell you it wasn't me.
On the other hand, Mark shows in a sad way that what he preaches is true - he's not special.
No Safe Spaces (2019)
Important topic thrown under a bus
I would love to agree with the two main characters. They are well-spoken and clearly smart people, but this document's inner conflicts are painful to witness.
The imporant messages brodcasted here are:
Playing a vctrim don't do any good to nobody, and that people speaking their own truth are not hateful or aggressive.
Message is important, and so is the topic of free speech. Despite this, what we see is mostly clips of people being hateful, aggressive, and victimized. Bret Weinstein is painted as largel-than-life victim of these hateful and ignorant young people who are trying to carry out their own message.
Prager's own Cinderella story as a conductor plays for the same team. Rising from the victimhood of people "who just dont understand that this is for them" he finally gets to conduct for a sellout hall. Such a tearjerker.
Then again we have the third message, which circles around the importance of listening. What we see in this type of documentarties (including the directors newer film "What Is a Woman?) is filmmakers going against people who do not stand a change. They choose to portray only peole who play in to their own agenda. Straw man is build.
What we need to see is examiniation of both sides in the same light. Smartest and most educated spokesmen from left and right. More importanly, we need to see these people living according to their own message.