Leave the World Behind

[Drunk Monk]

Leave the World Behind. December 8

At 2 hours 18 mins, this could’ve been tighter. It has a lot of tension building with a soundtrack that borders between anxiety triggers and annoying, with lots of odd angles to accentuate that discombobulation, and some edgy taut scenes, so I get the length. But it still felt a tad longer than it needed to be, and I had to write that off to its own self absorption. 

Nevertheless, there’s a solid tone of apprehension throughout, which works for what this film tries to achieve. The cast is solid - Roberts, Ali, Hawke & Bacon all serve their roles well. And the overall ‘wtf is going on?’ vibe underpins the whole tale. It never quite got under my skin as deep as it wants to, but almost. There’s some palpable moments of suspense, almost horror.

This was produced by the Obamas, which given its messages, upped the intrigue. It gets preachy at points - there are moments of dialogue that fall into that rant/lecture zone in that nobody would ever say something like and a kudos for the cast for getting away with most of it. Issues of division, cyber fragility, and overall e-addiction tease some hard philosophical questions.

I found myself more engaged than anticipated, mostly for its moments of surreality, and I was invested in solving the mystery SPOILER ALERT that mystery is never unraveled - that wasn’t the point at all here END SPOILER. The ending is absurd but it worked well for me and hammered home one of the main points of the movie’s agenda, but I’m only realizing this now as I write this. At the time, it was so abrupt that it stunned me. I liked it and found it distressingly resonate, but I can see where many won’t.

Ultimately I was captivated by its creepy suspense enough to be entertained. It had some fine seethingly dark scenes.

Not sure if I’ll D00M recommend this. I’d say if the trailer intrigues you, give it a peep. If not, this is skippable.

[Greg]

I'm on the fence.....

[Drunk Monk]

Give it a go I say. I’d be interested in your opinion on it. 

In retrospect, I liked it more than it may seem after my immediate post above. It had some thought provoking moments and some well constructed scenes. And I liked the message of its abrupt ending. My only advice (and perhaps this is a bit of a spoiler because it hit me harder not knowing it was coming) is that if you need answers (and Greg, you often do to a fault here as most of your criticisms are questions about unanswered plot points) you won’t get them.

Yea the more I think about it, the more I think you should watch. I can already hear your scream of frustration with how it resolves. But the more I ruminate over the ending, the more I like it. It’s so meta…

[Greg]

You just want me to suffer which is unsurprising.

[Drunk Monk]

It’s a fair cop

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

You just want me to suffer which is unsurprising.

[Greg]

Fingers crossed this is the year!

[Drunk Monk]

It’s even relevant to Leave the World Behind.

Now I really want everyone in D00M to watch this, just for the potential consequent entertaining conversation.

[Drunk Monk]

Worth watching now just to see why Elon's panties are in a bunch over it.

[Greg]

I don't know if spite watching the movie to anger Elon is the sell you think it is.