Shape of Water EOY movies

[Joseph Tracy]

Well 3 of us went to see Shape of Water and eat good Mexican food in Great Barrington. The movie was stunning and the large audience cheered and there were tears evident. It was simply a great movie by a man with oppropriately obsessive and timely  themes, and film -making talent to burn.  Everything about it worked for me: the timing and movement between rest and tension, the reconstruction of period, the use of water and color, the use of architectural ornament, the characters and acting, the subtext references and use of TV  and movie clips, the dramatic tension and flawless credibility of plot details within a potentally over-fantastical story. The creature/god clearly stood for several more mundane objects of colonial interest but also stood on his own as a particular being in a particular place. The woman was not the object of mawkish manipulation in my estimate but was more a soaring every-person of compassion, guts, risk and the glorious transcendence of pleasure and attraction. 

Conversation at dinner was lively and enthusiastic, food tasty in a warm place allowing margaritas in midwinter. Money was blown and fun was had.

  For myself and my current attempts to write about a theme I am calling Beautiful Monsters it was a profound artistic  inspiration, even addressing some of the deeper proceses and personal issues that brought me to this theme. 
  
  -
Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l