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i see a lot of posts making fun of people who log a movie on letterboxd in a theater the second it’s over. i am perhaps the first person guilty of doing this at a strip club.

i am at the screening of this at LA strip club “crazy girls”. is it a great movie? hard to say. but it is the first example of truly pure cinema i’ve seen from the 2020s that invoked the work of phil solomon and stan brakhage. also, a little bit of terrence malick. 

there is a rare kind of artist that masters the medium so early on that they get bored of it and try to turn it into something different. this is not to say that they are the best at said medium but they certainly have the capability to be if they wished. harmony korine is one of those artists.

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Demonic Synthwave GTA: Vice City Cutscenes To Study To.

Feels weird to have a lukewarm reaction to this considering I watched it at the midnight premiere in Toronto with a packed, interactive crowd and Harmony Korine on stage in a demon mask declaring himself the "new Drake." But there's a reason the glowing reviews and hate-filled ones sound identical, and that's because Korine's only real instinct here is shallow genre incantation and BASED VIBES surface provocations that suit the name of his new production company, both of which have been smuggled into a movie mostly about how much of a Cool Dad he is. He plays video games and watches TikToks!

Now he's smart enough to know what he's doing…

Review by Will Sloan

Pregamed this by eating a very special brownie, which felt great for a while, but definitely had me pretty drowsy by the end.

One thing that’s undeniable is that there are lots of colors to look at. The story, about a hit man who is also a family man, is a clear metaphor for Korine’s own concern about remaining cutting-edge at 50. Is this “the future of movies” or “something beyond movies,” as Harmony himself has said? No. It’s an example of what’s called an “experimental film,” which is something they’ve been making for a while. Check out Dog Star Man.

Whatever the case was in Venice, this was warmly received by the Midnight Madness audience. If there were any walkouts, I didn’t see them.

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VENEZIA 80 — FILM #10

big booty bitches twerking on infrared cam literallyyyyyyy peak cinema 😭😭😭😭😭😭 ur sooooooooo real for this @harmonykorine 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

10

70

Korine in prankster mode, but with a sincere wholesome streak that clashes with the EDGLRD producer label. You can tell, putting aside the gags and stunts, that Harmony is happy and content as a family man. A weirdly tender film comprised of adolescent images and depraved ideas. Imagine Song to Song if it was chopped and screwed by a 15 year old boy who reached Prestige Master in Call of Duty: Black Ops 2. Wasn't expecting such an affecting non-performance from Travis Scott.

Review by davidehrlich ★★

Harmony Korine has been openly bored with movies as we know them since the first time that he directed one. Real ’90s kids when he went on “Late Show with David Letterman” to promote “Gummo,” and insisted to the befuddled host that “things need to change. We can make films differently.” Korine may not have been wrong on either score back in 1997, but he’s a hell of a lot more right today. We live in a time when Hollywood offerings have become more stale than ever, and traditional cinema is beset on all sides by new technologies, novel coronaviruses, and — in Korine’s case — even some of the same artists who’ve helped to push the medium forward…

5

Harmony Korine has completely fucking lost the plot.

10

harmony korine could make a film about elderly people having sex with trash cans and I’d still rate it 5/5

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harmony korine was asked at the q&a what was exciting him in the world of media and without skipping a beat he said "pokemon go"

1

oh right the two genders: stripper and assassin

7

look I don’t know what to write. I gonna be rewatching it for the rest of my life. It’s just…magnificent and so unique. There’s nothing like it. It’s one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen and I know Harmony says he isn’t sure it’s a movie but like…idk man. And look I see the video game influence for sure…a lot of the movie feels almost like…a mixtape of video game cut scenes or a “wave”-ed play through of some third person shooter from an alternate dimension. Sometimes it feels like we’re seeing like alt scenes/death sequences. It’s like Grand Theft Auto on Acid (I’m sorry. It just kind is lol). It has so many like uncanny valley NPC moments as…

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they need to make a 'you are not immune to propaganda' t-shirt except it's 'you are not immune to vaporwave aesthetics', or even better, 'you are not immune to movies about assassins' -- i'm guilty on both charges.

harmony korine seems like a goofy provocateur, but he sure can direct a hell of a picture, and i don't think this is a put-on or a prank, it's a very earnest film about ethics, aging, family, love, all those wholesome things -- the creamsicle glow of these images is something i find so dreamy and comforting, like the floating rainbow spots on your eyes after you stare too long into the sun. that plus the elliptical narration makes AGGRO DR1FT reminiscent…