Films/DVD Asylum

I think you will warm to it with repeat viewing, as many a Coens film reveals more each time you see it

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This Post Has Been Edited by the Author

In Reply to: RE: well made why did I not like it much? posted by tunenut on December 30, 2013 at 10:04:14

I don't think the Davis character was meant to be a reprehensible human being. Like many artists trying to live their American dream at that time he was mostly letting fate guide him, and then didn't react well when his inability to make good decisions put him in a situation where he reacted emotionally.

To my thinking, this had all the elements of sheer Coen masterpiece--a symbol of hope, the cat--which was lost and found and did and didn't belong to the protagonist at different times. It reminded me of the box Barton Fink carried around with him. An art form that must be cherished but was always manifest in the wrong place at the wrong time or was it the right place at the wrong time? Again, it reminded me of Barton Fink's art form, "of and by and for the common man"...

SPOILER...
He was just doomed to become a sidenote of history right to the end, while Dylan was making his breakthrough performance at the Gaslamp, Davis was getting his ass kicked in the alley out behind the building. All because he had found out the day before that the lady he loved was sleeping with the proprietor. A realization he just didn't know how to deal with, so he lashed out at the wrong person. Story of his life. Not reprehensible, just an anti-hero with a guitar.

I need to watch this a few more times myself. It's a deceptively simple movie, but there's a lot under the surface and it's very deftly produced.
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We must be the change we wish to see in the world. -Gandhi

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