Ready or Not (Matt Bettinelli-Olpin & Tyler Gillett, 2019)

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knives
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2008 6:49 pm

Ready or Not (Matt Bettinelli-Olpin & Tyler Gillett, 2019)

#1 Post by knives » Sat Jan 18, 2020 8:28 pm

Are non-mods not able to make threads in this sub-forum any longer?

Anyway this post is about Ready or Not, a film that managed to punch all of my buttons in the right way to right degree. I even rewatched it a few days later because I couldn't believe it was as good as I initially thought. Turns out I was right, but in the wrong direction. This quiet little horror comedy built on sickly irony after sickly irony is built for me to spill hyperbole on. So instead of an easily forgotten modern horror flick for our list like I was expecting you have the option to read my crazy ramblings. It's probably telling how deeply Blumhouse has invaded the horror genre that I was shocked this wasn't an example.

The main theme seems simple enough. Climbing up the social ladder is basically impossible and even through the fastest way of accomplishment, sex, the personal cost is basically too much. That same insularity is a form of death for the rich though through fucked-upitude. It's probably no surprise that the zealot of the family is also the one who has suffered the greatest tragedy. In all the bizzare comedy Radio Silence has managed to present the most complex take on the 1% in cinema so far. It highlights how there are rules to American society on how to properly go from poor to rich and not following those rules is seen like a deadly virus to the social circles (because society is more important than money) going to eradicate them. A character claims children don't deserve the plague a bad match will bring down, but the children come in at right that moment to remind us how acculturation brings that guilt early.

So much of that has to do with the performances which are amazing. If Samara Weaving and her jazz hands don't win an oscar some day a grave crime has been committed on a cosmic level. This is a tonally complex piece and she carries us through the drama and comedy with a tired frustration that perfectly encapsulates everything the movie wants and needs.

On the rewatch the film also provided a lot of nice details that become more hilarious and meaningful. For example the opening sequence (it was the '80s) highlights perfectly Alex's and Daniel's character that everything about them feels like it spills out from there. The moral care of the film also becomes more stark. There's essentially two fates characters can meet here. Both are unpleasant, but one has a statement you are evil attached to it and the other could happen to anyone. It's clear from first blush why one character meets the later end, but a second does as well. The reasons for that have to do with how the characters are connected to each other. The female characters are largely comments on Grace and the men on Alex. This is incredibly blatant when Daniel draws a connection between the biography of his wife and Grace. The difference between the two is how they have reacted to their circumstances in the face of the economic hierarchy. Grace has learned the value of community and that is what she prizes in this family over their wealth while the wife does not to say the least. The best part about this is how it is not hovered over, but introduced clearly enough to allow it to marinate the rest of the film.

The most potent of these pairings is with Andie MacDowell's matriarch. By the sick mind of the family this is the ideal way to climb the social ladder. She likewise seems like a good person being empathetic to Grace and the needs of her family (as well as being the only character is not a complete blue blooded idiot). She's adjusted to wealth be being feminine and caring. We don't see her engaging in masculine acts like Grace's smoking. She's alright and deserves our sympathy even as she is also incredibly evil (as shown in the opening scene). MacDowell provides the complex note of why things feel normal for these people.

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therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: The Films of 2019

#2 Post by therewillbeblus » Tue Jan 21, 2020 9:49 pm

I watched Ready or Not on knives’ advice (maybe we’ll get that thread split) and while I can’t say I loved it nearly as much as him the dissection of classism is certainly more complex than the surface of the content suggests:
knives wrote:
Sat Jan 18, 2020 8:28 pm
It highlights how there are rules to American society on how to properly go from poor to rich and not following those rules is seen like a deadly virus to the social circles (because society is more important than money) going to eradicate them.
This isn’t a new idea of society and belongingness through history and roots as trumping financial acquisition, but the allegory of the rules of the game being an actual game is fun and what’s significant is that it’s taken so seriously and how it’s taken seriously: by people who don’t know how to lose, and who cheat and act against their own principles/breaking said rules themselves for the sake of preserving their status (‘me, my and mine’). The attention to their own hypocrisy is more hilarious in these subtler ways than in the more obvious comedic setpieces, though they go hand in hand with a pass of taking responsibility for the 1% who essentially get to play by their own rules and also keep making up those rules as they go- anything to avoid dysphoria. Adults playing Calvinball. Of course the joke becomes that these roots not only doesn’t prepare them for real life skills but also that god or whatever objective rules govern our world don’t play by their rules, revealing the socially constructed bullshit that makes this self-serious solipsism.
knives wrote:
Sat Jan 18, 2020 8:28 pm
The most potent of these pairings is with Andie MacDowell's matriarch. By the sick mind of the family this is the ideal way to climb the social ladder. She likewise seems like a good person being empathetic to Grace and the needs of her family (as well as being the only character is not a complete blue blooded idiot). She's adjusted to wealth be being feminine and caring. We don't see her engaging in masculine acts like Grace's smoking. She's alright and deserves our sympathy even as she is also incredibly evil (as shown in the opening scene). MacDowell provides the complex note of why things feel normal for these people.
MacDowell smokes in one of the first scenes, at the wedding between her and Grace - but I actually think that services your point or one close to it. Grace lies and says she doesn’t smoke, while MacDowell confidently is herself- which evokes conflict in her essence as a self-actualized individual against her conformity to classist hiveminded ideologies and practices, the necessity of the defense mechanism of rationalization to cover as much cognitive dissonance as possible to allow her to be ‘good’ at least in part and deserving of that sympathy not necessarily from us but from, and for, herself.

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knives
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2008 6:49 pm

Re: The Films of 2019

#3 Post by knives » Tue Jan 21, 2020 10:51 pm

At least that doesn't sink my battleship. Cognitive dissonance seems the right frame to look at her with and by extension the whole family. In a lot of ways that makes Daniel's wife the only honest character. She seems to realize how messed up this is, but is fine as long as it is working for her.

I actually had a different reaction to the rules in that their bone headed adherence to them was another sign that they had gotten trapped in the decrepit maze of their collective thinking. It's pretty clear that if they had used modern weapons they would easily win. It's almost like a Poe story or Wuthering Heights.

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therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: The Films of 2019

#4 Post by therewillbeblus » Tue Jan 21, 2020 11:16 pm

knives wrote:
Tue Jan 21, 2020 10:51 pm
I actually had a different reaction to the rules in that their bone headed adherence to them was another sign that they had gotten trapped in the decrepit maze of their collective thinking. It's pretty clear that if they had used modern weapons they would easily win. It's almost like a Poe story or Wuthering Heights.
Well that’s another layer to the joke, they are torn between adherence to tradition, one kind of rule that signifies honor by way of having earned through blood (itself hilarious since they didn’t work for their heritage, though the amount of people who feel pride for being dealt a hand of cards as if it’s karmic ancestry is common amongst the elite in my experience), and on the other hand some of them want to bend the rule in favor of winning/holding on to what’s “theirs” signifying right, ownership, deserving based on status. So there exists a paradox even within this seemingly simple system of conservatism: what wins out when ideology and self-preservation of identity come into conflict, especially when the aunt believes in the classical mindset that this identity is nullified without said tradition. It actually says more about the rest of the family who are willing to be flexible about that key ingredient when push comes to shove, making their elitist proclamations deflate so the house of cards crumbles as is made transparent as a laughable facade. And yet the aunt’s rigidity is also insane because it may literally get them killed!

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knives
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Re: Ready or Not (Matt Bettinelli-Olpin & Tyler Gillett, 2019)

#5 Post by knives » Wed Jan 22, 2020 6:46 am

Also they just don't know how to use the tools they're given. Both funny and sad.

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therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Ready or Not (Matt Bettinelli-Olpin & Tyler Gillett, 2019)

#6 Post by therewillbeblus » Wed Jan 22, 2020 12:46 pm

Yeah, I think a scene that demonstrates this mix of pity and humor is
SpoilerShow
when Alex confronts Grace about whether she'll stay with him after this mayhem and her silence is taken rightfully so as rejection, after which he turns on her by letting his family know where she is. Of course all people, regardless of class, are susceptible to some degree of cognitive dissonance or reactive behavior as a result of social rejection or any surging emotional charge, but this seemed to highlight the idea of dominant groups as especially thin-skinned and incapable of experiencing dysphoria or threats to their egos (incapable isn't fair, but having less experience and thus less skilled do so than, say, a person of color or someone of lower socioeconomic status or any marginalized group who must endure some degree of social discomfort on a more consistent basis). To contrast this, Grace has a history of experiencing discomfort from what we know about her past, which has made her resilient, as exemplified to extreme measures by her ability to fight throughout the movie. She is also more self-actualized with a secure identity and able to be honest and reject Alex without sacrificing her morals, while he cannot and when faced with said rejection immediately sacrifices his, engaging in a fight/flight response not in a literal sense of self-preservation like his family but on a level of higher functioning- applying that idea of reptilian brain responses to something one is often able to work through on a more executive functioning cognitive-emotional plain, which can be chalked up to those lack of skills stunted by rigidity and social isolation of the elite dominant upbringing.

Also their own thin-skinned sensitivity and/or inability to cope with loss results in a pretty bloody metaphor when they all pop like balloons.

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