That car was more than meets the eye (and it’s not a Transformer)

With zero knowledge on Repo Man, I started the film not knowing what to expect, then that opening scene happened and I even knew less of what to expect. Though I think that was something positive for the film given that it kept the audience hooked. Though when we’re introduced to Otto, the attention shifts and he gets the spotlight. While the alien aspects were undeniably interesting, Otto’s character was also someone interesting; he is not someone we see a lot in modern days. The way he treats people and his work seem inhuman or just plain rude and something that not a lot of us are used to. He also seems clueless in a lot of things, probably because of how he treats others and himself, but also still knows how to work his repo man job properly enough. The dynamic between Otto and Bud was also something that I would have hoped was touched on more, but only because the movie did a good job establishing that in the first place. Away from the usual father figure we see in films, Bud never even starts to become a positive figure to Otto’s life other than teaching him how to do his job. As a side note that is almost totally unrelated, seeing Otto and Bud reminded me of the mentor-mentee relationship in the first Return of the Living Dead; the films are highly different though but some aspects regarding 80s culture was there. Jumping from that point regarding the 80s, there were numerous elements in the film that I could relate to the 80s especially because of the plethora of iconic 80s films we have been exposed to.

Despite those similarities, Repo Man was still able to differentiate itself through non-ideal characters like Otto and Bud and weird elements such as the alien that we are not given full explanations about. The conclusion involving Otto and his “transcendence” was something that I did not expect at all; the alien car seemed unrelated to Otto but was something that gained the attention of the government, the scientists, the religious (in the form the televangelist), and even the audience. None seemed to understand the car though other than Miller, Otto’s and Bud’s weird mechanic co-worker; perhaps in seeing and taking Repo Man in, we have to be like Miller and have a different perspective to better appreciate what is in front of us. If we can’t appreciate such things, then perhaps they can be taken from us similar to how Otto and his repo man job does so.

These are somewhat stretches though in analyzing the film. Minor details also attracted the attention of the audience. For one, the consumer goods we encounter in the film are brand-less, generic items with text-only packaging designs; I still have no assumptions on why this is such. Minor characters too are interesting; Otto’s punk friends for example offer interesting perspectives as proprietors of disorder though late into the film, we see one of them longing for a decent life with his partner only to be rejected and hence left back to the life of chaos. These relatively minor details contributed to making Repo Man a memorable film that differentiates itself from other 80s movies. I will definitely look into more Alex Cox films after seeing this one!

The Endless, The Endless

The Endless started off relatively slow for me, though it might be biased for me to say that because of the busy week I had back when we watched it. Despite that slow start though, the movie was able to hook me through its really good-looking cinematography and more importantly the bizarre and unique plot.

Despite the open arms welcoming Justin and Aaron in their return to their old “cult,” Justin’s ambivalence toward the camp’s positive attributes was rubbing off on me as a viewer. Though the tug of war scene with the deity was the scene that seemingly became a turning point for the movie. At this point, I was only sure that the “cult” or camp was more than it seemed though I am not sure about whether the deity we saw was one that was “good” or “bad.” Knowing that the camp was happy, at least from an external perspective, I found myself contemplating that the deity might possibly be a fair and good-natured one; though late into the film we see Justin’s encounters with the deity being horrifying and generally provoking.
While the deity became apparent and undeniable to both the characters and the audience, its mysterious characteristic kept me hooked to the movie. Though while the deity was something highly interesting for me, the time loops and time domes were definitely the most interesting for me. At the time I was watching them, it was a bit confusing. I wondered why the stranded people in the time domes were not meeting up with each other only to realize that they truly are stranded in their own domes. Some of the domes had longer time spans while others had seconds as their loops. One of the time domes that had more significance was that of Mike’s and Chris’ loop. Apparently their whole one week loop was the plot of another of Benson’s and Moorhead’s film; Resolution never mentioned a time loop but it did explore the deity from a different perspective. My interest in The Endless pushed me to look into Resolution and I found myself enjoying The Endless more; the main takeaway I had with watching Resolution though was that my appreciation for The Endless and its “cinematic universe.”
The time loops that were touched on had me reflecting a lot about my life and the movies I watch. Re-watching 8 Mile countless times, I found myself comparing Eminem’s journey in the film as a time loop and I as a deity (no blasphemy or anything intended lol). The film was made well enough that it evoked a new perspective for me when watching movies and perhaps a larger appreciation for life itself. Life itself is not a cycle and allows us freedom to both suffer and enjoy; this is something explored in the movie with the stranded characters being desperate to die. Some of them were hopeful while some were hopeless. The conflict that the camp leader had with keeping Justin and Aaron in the loop was something that attracted my sympathy due to their desire to increase the group count, a change in their boring, repeating cycle versus letting them go and free of the suffering they have been experiencing. If I were a member of the camp, I also might have had a difficult time deciding because of my desire for something new but at the same time my good intentions for others.
After viewing and reflecting on The Endless, I think it’s safe for me to say that this film is one of those films that I don’t think I can forget about anytime soon. I have always been hooked to time loops in films like Edge of Tomorrow and Source Code, but this deity-inspired take on it was something fresher for my mind.
The Endless started off relatively slow for me, though it might be biased for me to say that because of the busy week I had back when we watched it… (jk)

Velvet Goldmine: Velvet Thunder

First things first, all throughout watching Velvet Goldmine, I felt like I was gonna belt out Nazareth’s Where Are You Now (1983) although it’s a different genre. In simple terms, the film reminded of my dad’s playlist which he would play every Sunday much to my and my siblings’ annoyance but that’s just my surface feeling of the movie. This movie is so much more.

The film follows Arthur Stuart, a journalist tasked to find Brian Slade and to know what happened to him 10 years after faking his own death. There are a lot of reasons as to why a star would fake his own murder. The most obvious would be to save face and reputation, and still earn loads of money. Posthumous recognition is a thing, and it makes sales of one’s works skyrocket. It just makes it the best way out. It gives one time to rest while still reaping the fruits of former labor. Such truth makes this particular plot likable to artists wanting a break, or to producers needing money. Or so it was in the pilot episode of a series that I watched. Point is, such scheme makes absolute sense. As long as the public does not know of it, though, because that will surely cause a backlash from the public.

Aside from the music during the time in which the film is set, the film also explores the sexuality of its main character, Brian Slade, who’s an admitted bisexual. Brian put his sexuality in simple terms: “I like boys as much as I like girls.” And liked boys, he did. Despite being initially married to Mandy Slade, Brian gives those looks to Curt Wild. ANd these are the looks that tell just shout hearts all over.

And when Curt and Brian kiss passionately, cameras flash all over and I can only imagine them being cover of tabloids. Just like how it usually is. Despite being openly bisexual, seeing two famous people passionately kiss can still make the cover of the tabloids and, in their case, Brian was married.

But with the rise of their careers also come their fall. Bouts of anger and being emotionally done can be seen from Curt Wild and Brian Slade. Brian can be heard on a phone call that he doesn’t want to continue the Maxwell Demon tour anymore. And the faked murder. And then Brian and Mandy’s last time to speak to each other. And Brian’s persona in this scene was just that of a very insensitive man. Mandy was in shambles.

Just when Arthur felt like he was nearing a breakthrough, unconvering Brian Slade’s true identity, he is informed by his boss that the story has been dropped and that he has been assigned to the Stone show. Very anti-climactic for Arthur. But he sets out to continue anyway. He wasn’t doing it for his work anymore. He was far too engrossed in their lives already. The film ends with Arthur finding Curt Wild. The two talk for a while with Curt ended up giving Arthur a pin that once belonged to a person named “Oscar Wild.” And Curt just leaves Arthur.

Truth be told, this movie is probably one of my least favorite among all the films shown in class but that’s just me not being fond of musicals. I couldn’t say hate because Schizopolis is somewhere there in that part of the spectrum. But I like how Curt puts into words what happened to their lives: “We wanted to change the world. We ended up changing ourselves.” And change they did.

My Own Private Idaho: Crossroads of Lives

Watching Keanu Reeves in My Own Private Idaho seems weird when all I’ve really watched him in is John Wick. (Nope, I’ve never watched The Matrix series.) Seeing him in a queer role makes the strangest sight for me.

My Own Private Idaho is a film that features Mike Waters, someone who suffers from narcolepsy, who earns a living as a male prostitute (or as Wikipedia better calls him, a “hustler”). The film’s turning point comes when Mike decides to look for his mom.

Mike’s friend, Scott Favor, is also a hustler but, unlike Mike, comes from an influential family in their town. Scott Favor is their mayor’s son and is set to inherit his father’s fortune by the time he turns 21. It doesn’t take a genius to observe that Scott looks so out of place from his company even at the start of the film. While everyone else were looking like rags, Scott was wearing a suit, showing the difference in socioeconomic status between him and the other main characters in the film. There was really no sense for Scott to try and earn a living by being a hustler given his family background. But Scott probably just wanted to enjoy his youth and get away from all the norms and reputation he had to follow and put up.

Scott and Mike live two very different lives which are only intertwined by the fact that they were both hustlers at the same time at one point. Scott comes from a rich family who probably had the good life disregarding the chaos of politics whereas Mike’s parentage is probably the most confusing I had next to Predestination (2014). Both were yearning for the normalcy in life. And understandable enough. Both have complicated relationships with their father. Scott and his unruly behavior is seen by his father as some kind of punishment for something he had probably done in the past. Mike, on the other hand, is on an even more complicated status as his father and brother are the same person. At this point, I feel sorry for Mike. He’s got narcolepsy, a complicated lineage, and is living in poverty.

The search for Mike’s mother was more eventful for Scott than Mike. It was on the course of their search that Mike admits to Scott that he sees him as more than just a friend. This is where Scott tells Mike that “he only has sex with men for money.” When they get to Italy, they are told that Mike’s mother had left for America a long time ago by an Italian woman named Carmella. She had known Mike’s mother being taught English by her. And Mike is once again having a bad time in his life. Things couldn’t go worse for Mike is what I’d like to think but, after being rejected by Scott and failing to find his mom, Scott finds his love life in Carmella and leaves Mike alone in a foreign land. Mike tries to be a hustler in Italy only to have narcoleptic attacks.

Newly reformed Scott turns away from friends. Would he still have said the same thing to Bob had he known Bob was gonna die soon? Probably not. The film once again highlights the difference between Mike’s and Scott’s lives during the funerals. Scott attends a solemn funeral for the mayor – his deceased father – whereas his former company conducts a rowdy and noisy funeral for Bob a few meters away.

And that’s probably how Scott’s and Mike’s lives crossed only once.

Language, love, and loneliness

My Own Private Idaho (dir. Gus Van Sant, 1991) is unlike any Shakespearean film adaptation I’ve seen. As a queer film, on the other hand, it tackles love in the tragic style that I’ve encountered in other queer films like Brokeback Mountain (2005). Watching the events unfold left me with a deep feeling of sadness and empathy for Mike Waters, the narcoleptic protagonist.

I’m unfamiliar with Henry IV but I’ve watched a few film adaptations of Shakespeare’s plays, and from what I’ve seen, directors or producers either stick with the original text, or transform the text according to the language of the film’s milieu, such as in Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet (1996). To my surprise, My Own Private Idaho switches between both. The effect was somewhat jarring to me at first, mainly because I though it added some friction between the transitions, but it grew on me as I realized it helped build the personality of some characters. Shakespearean language oddly seemed to suit them, and it fascinated me and made me listen closer to what they were really trying to say.

Of course, this type of screenplay can be risky as it could be difficult to follow for some viewers, but I appreciated the effort that went in maintaining the characters’ voices and identities, as well as the layers that were incorporated in the dialogue. The contrast between the use of Shakespearean language and modern language added a layer to the different relationships the characters had for each other. Modern language was used between the two male leads, Mike (played by River Phoenix) and Scott Favor (played by Keanu Reeves), who were peers who shared a bond with each other that was revealed to be of the romantic kind (or at least a one-sided romantic kind) as the film progressed. I’ve only ever seen Keanu Reeves in the John Wick franchise, and seeing him play Scott Favor, a fortunate young man who initially rebels against his inheritance by slumming with street hustlers, was a pleasure to watch. Meanwhile, Shakespearean language was used by Bob Pigeon, a sort of father figure to Scott Favor, at least. There was quite of a buildup regarding Bob Pigeon’s character, but what struck me the most was how Scott said that Bob was more of a father to him than his real father was. This type of switching between Shakespearean and modern language contributed to the overall tone of the movie, which explores the different levels of trust we have in the people we surround ourselves with.

Throughout the film, we are transported across different locations through not just title cards, but mostly because of Mike’s narcoleptic episodes and his quest to find his mother. I barely found a sense of permanence in the film, as even Mike’s own childhood memories were questioned and shaken. Although, I recognized that Scott is always by his side, until he falls in love with a girl that they met in Italy. This destroys Mike, as the only thing he can count on when he wakes up from his narcoleptic episodes is suddenly not there anymore. Not only does he have to deal with the constant threat of his surroundings, never knowing where he’ll end up next, but now he also has to deal with the threat of his crushing loneliness in a world that will never seem to be in his favor. He now has to carry his burden alone.

The way the film depicted this sense of sheer aloneness was greatly elevated through the use of sound and performance (or the lack of it, as in the one time Mike was screaming without using his voice), in odd songs and dialogues that do not seem to fit in the scope of the characters, therefore ending up being ignored or disregarded, like the weird musical number by Hans, which Scott promptly ended because of a lack of understanding and/or toleration.

All in all, I was deeply moved by My Own Private Idaho. It resonated with me because of its portrayal of feelings we’re all familiar with, even if the conditions are not similar. We’ve felt rejected and incredibly alone before, but we’ve also been carried in love and care when we needed it the most.

Trainspotting: Beats any meat injection iykwim

Truth be told before the movie was shown in class, I had watched a clip from Youtube just to satisfy my curiosity with regards to the film. Or maybe I was just trying to mitigate the surprise factor when the movie is shown in class – a clear indication that the last two films had gotten me “WTF?!”

The clip that I have watched is the scene with Renton inside a gut-wrenching CR, “the worst toilet in Scotland.” And it really is. Simply looking at that place is enough to get my stomach turn. It gets even worse with every body part that Renton dips into that…. I can’t even find the words to describe it accurately. It’s honestly the worst place to find yourself in even when you badly need a CR. If it is of any consolation, that scene was apparently shot using melted chocolate. And that shot is a good testament to the innovation of the filmmakers considering budget constraints and lack of special effects used in the film.

Renton’s character reminds of just some teenage angst. “But why would I want to do a thing like that? I chose not to choose life. I chose something else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who needs reasons when you’ve got heroin?” Renton’s life is simply #YOLO. Only in the bad light.

A big chunk of the movie is actually about Renton undergoing the process of “Relinquishing junk.” And one of my favorite scenes in the movie is when Renton was going through hallucinations. That one with the baby was actually quite disturbing and it’s very apt that Renton was screaming at the top of his lungs while the baby’s head was doing a 180-degree turn before falling onto Renton. Renton was screaming and squirming, and his bed was wet from all the sweat. Ewan McGregor’s acting in this scene is one of the best I have seen.

To make this “relinquishing junk” seem more of a bigger step than it already is, Renton moved and became a salesperson selling houses. He moved away from his friends – Spud, Sick Boy, missing HIV-positive Tommy, and a now-wanted Francis Begbie – and his schoolgirl love life Diane.

Sadly, despite not missing his friends in his new life, Begbie finds him in his new place. And Begbie, to no one’s surprise, hasn’t changed at all. Despite being a visitor in a friend’s house, he acts like he owns the place and “settled in no time at all.” At this point, I had no idea what was preventing Renton from selling such an a-hole to the police. Begbie was a fugitive and Renton was his only source of living. What a way to show your gratitude to someone you’re living off.

One particular part I love about the movie is when Renton was talking about the world was changing. He said, “Diane was right. The world is changing… Even men and women are changing. 1,000 years from now, there’ll be no guys and no girls, just wankers. Sounds great to me. You see, if you ask me, we’re heterosexual by default, not by decision. It’s just a question of who you fancy. It’s all about aesthetics and it’s fuck-all to do with morality.” And Begbie didn’t know that. What a sad life for a “macho” character.

Up to this point, I still don’t know why the movie’s titled “Trainspotting” and I’m actually really tempted to just simply search for it on the internet. Maybe I will. Or maybe, when all this is done, I will watch T2 and find out.

your voice is a little… horse

Image result for sorry to bother you female ejaculation — nice shirt

Sorry to Bother You (2018) was definitely in my top 2 films watched in class. The humor present in it paired with the wonderful acting of almost all of the characters and the unexpected twists and overall interesting story of the movie was why I liked it so much. Not to mention the creative and exceptional way it was filmed and a few of the memorable visual effects really added to how the film was a well made one.

The movie revolved around the life of Cassius “Cash” Green whom, having financial issues, found himself working as a telemarketer for a company called RegalView. In RegalView, Cash discovers and learns how to use his white voice, which was a comically stereotypical voice of a white male, and utilizes it to his advantage as he makes sell after sell upon learning the skill.
We learn that something was bubbling in the company’s background as their employees weren’t being paid. Because of this, a Union is formed by Squeeze who recruits Cash and his friends to protest the unjust treatment of the company’s workers. Cash then finds himself getting promoted as a Power Caller and finds wealth in abundance but loses his friends in exchange. He also stumbles upon the radars of Mr. Steve Lift, who was nothing short of bat shit crazy, and offers him a $100,000,000 to become the false leader of a species he created called ‘equisapiens’ who were half man, half amazwhattheFisthatthing. Cash then turns on Lift and saves the day, yada yada, and in the end we see him become an equisapien as well.

Sorry to Bother You takes a jab at capitalism and the many different hindrances that are caused by the divide between the rich and the poor and those of ‘white males’ and people of color. Though I don’t agree with the usual notion of people who are against capitalism that it is as if somehow the root of all evil and it should be eradicated and broken down completely, I do agree that practices that are a detriment to humanity must be criticized and renewed. I feel this way because the free markets have allowed me and almost the entire world to type on their laptops and search through their smartphones, while having to be able to buy a piece of burger for 59 pesos in the fast food place next to their condominiums. Because of the free markets, I don’t have to grow my own rice and raise my own cattle and build my own bed, because I can buy it. A good in exchange for a good. Now, I’m not saying that it doesn’t bring out immoral and detrimental effects to our environment and our society, but I believe there should be a line drawn in criticizing it and not just resort to yelling out that capitalism sucks and we should get rid of it.

An aspect of the movie that I liked is how it treads upon that line where we see that the bosses have crossed when they were not paying their workers and when they were creating literal monsters out of humans for better output and more profit.
It also shows how the current system works and runs on competence (ideally) as Cassius gets promoted because of the reason that he was being able to make sale after sale. I believe this is something that causes the divide between the rich and the poor as well because not everyone’s skills are equal and more often than not, the most skilled are the highest paid. Not everyone can be Lebron James thus not everyone can be paid as high as he is getting paid. The problem is that those at the bottom are often dispossessed and can be led to be manipulated and taken advantage of those at the top- as what was happening in the movie which was represented by Squeeze and the other workers protesting.

When Cash exposed what Steve Lift was doing and it was acclaimed by the government as a remarkable achievement, I found it really funny but at the same time realized that it’s definitely a possibility and has probably already happened in real life (not with the inverted centaurs though.)

Character wise, I liked Cash the most with Steve Lift being a close second. Cash was someone who wanted to raise his status to cover his basic necessities and provide for his family and the people around him. It unfortunately changed who he was but he eventually came back around again. His perseverance is what I related to the most.

I liked Steve Lift mostly because of how funny his absurdity was to me. He reminded me of a friend who usually proposed the craziest ideas and always attempted to rationalize it stupidly. Though it is often a headache to deal with someone like that, it still calls for a lot of funny moments between us friends.

Image result for sorry to bother you end scene horse

Overall, I’d give Sorry to Bother You a few more watches to further absorb and understand all of the meanings within the actions and dialogues the characters make. And well, also to enjoy the humor and pleasure of watching a well-done movie such as this one brings.

end

When it comes to fears, the fear of being stuck and unable to progress would be one of my worst ones. I believe we as humans are goal-seeking creatures and are made to go out into the world and have adventures. Our brain/bodies themselves reward us when we attain a goal, as the reason why we feel happy upon doing so.
Taking that away from me would be something that’d take the essence of life itself. Thus I won’t exchange it for anything, not for comfort nor for security.

The Endless explores the lives and the relationship of two brothers Justin and Aaron after living the consequences of staying and escaping in what Justin calls a UFO Death Cult. The brothers find it hard to cope up in the real world as their identities and mentality have been tainted by their experience and association with the cult. The brothers end up going back to the very thing they escaped, as Justin thought that it would be best for Aaron. Upon going back, weird things begin to happen and they eventually find out that there were entities in that place that trap them in time loops and kill them for their amusement, only to then revive them all again in the same era they left to live and experience death endlessly.

The movie evoked a sense of strong curiosity in me as to what the main characters were up against. When it was given that there was a cult involved, I thought, just as Justin did, that there would be kool aid drinks and irrationality would be the main opponent of the characters. But then the odd happenings like the two moons and the tug of war with the darkness and the creepy stalker dropping pictures of you from the sky took place and I realized that they were up against something more mysterious and powerful.

The horror aspect of the movie was already put into place at the very beginning with the quote from H.P. Lovecraft that states: “the oldest and strongest kind of fear is the fear of the unknown”, and I didn’t realize (credits to my ignorance) that that was what was exactly taking place in the movie. The movie didn’t have what typical horror movies have with their ghosts and spirits and their unnecessarily numerous jump scares (they had something worse: Smiling Dave), but nonetheless, the way the story was told and how it was filmed to how gloomy the weather was and add the weird characters and the VHS videos and creepy polaroid pictures and with almost every element in it, they were able to build this chilling atmosphere all throughout and it was something that made me like this movie a lot.

Image result for the endless smiling dave

The only thing that I found underwhelming was the ending of the movie. No way in hell that I’d risk myself doing something that stupid and put myself in a situation where I’d jeopardize my life by having the probability of being stuck in a time loop for all eternity, repeating my death every time 3 moons appear in the sky just to prove a point to my brother. But having said that, I don’t actually have a brother, so now I really don’t know.

Overall, I enjoyed The Endless but in a way wished that the ending was a bit different. It incorporated interesting ideas of science fiction with the aliens and the time loops and aspects of horror with its fear of the unknown theme and was ultimately able to create a new way to experience scary movies for me personally. One thing I learned though is that if I had a brother, I should see to it that we’re really close to each other and express our opinions freely so that he wouldn’t drag me in situations like the one in the movie.

Shin Godzilla: New God Incarnate

I have never been a fan of those monster films and stuff wherein people are attacked by some unknown monster or thing. Not even the Jurassic World (or Jurassic Park, although I am always amused by that clip of a T-Rex opening a door) can make me watch them. They all have the same plot anyway. Some kind of monster, usually unidentified, causes inconvenience and/or destruction, to civilians and people try to solve the problem by killing the said monster. Ultimately, though, when people try to find the root cause of the problem, they find out that the root cause of the problem isn’t some discovery but actually the people.

Shin Godzilla did not stray from the conventional plot of monster films but it hardly mattered. Watching the movie with friends actually had an impact as it kept me awake for the whole film. It was also the only Godzilla film I had watched from start to finish and that’s a lot for me.

For some reason, hearing “Shin Godzilla” wouldn’t make me think of how the film or how Godzilla in the film looked like. Calling it “shin” made me think of something Mecha. I thought that Godzilla was given some kind of modern (to futuristic) touch that Godzilla was going to be some kind of metal monster. Color me surprised though when I saw Godzilla’s transformation from looking like a Turtle Island (a 4-star monster with an Attack/Defense of 1300/2000 from Yu-Gi-Oh) to a T-Rex with the power of a Dragonite (the beam thing). Godzilla’s arms don’t do enough justice to its supposed transformation. It really seemed as if Godzilla’s arms’ length was sacrificed to give way for its extra long tail which I barely saw used. To be fair, not much of Godzilla’s power was seen because it was mostly causing destruction by merely walking around the city. Why are we faulting a monster for wanting to go sightseeing? Kidding though. Humans just want to be at the top of the food chain and anything that comes after is considered a monster.

Aside from that horrible description of Godzilla, it also seemed as if it came from some volcanic activity. Godzilla’s surface looked like the surface of a volcano. The only indication that Godzilla was the product of some nuclear activity was when it glowed with some violet light. Nothing else.

Honestly, just by seeing the film, I wouldn’t think that the film was released just a few years ago. At first glance, I’d really think that the film was released sometime around the 90s. Maybe it comes with how the Japanese make their films.

One thing that really got me going in Godzilla was the indecisiveness of the people involved in decision-making. The government didn’t want to make a move until it knew everything (which was kind of impossible to achieve given their resource constraints). While it wasn’t totally a wrong decision, it wasn’t very ideal in the kind of situation that they were in. It came to a point that I was really annoyed at how they stuck to their strict process despite the urgency of the matter at hand.

I honestly loved the part wherein the humans tried to fire everything they had at the Godzilla but to no avail. I think it’s human instinct to solve everything violence and here comes a problem they couldn’t solve using such process. And they panic.

Godzilla is one of the few monster films I enjoyed and I’m probably not gonna watch one again anytime soon. Except for the one coming out later this year, Godzilla: King of the Monsters.

The impact of convenience

This film affirmed three of my views: 1) Retail is not a joke, 2) convenience stores are the setting for some of the most interesting stories, and 3) capitalism is detestable. As someone who frequents convenience stores and has incorporated these visits into my daily life, and as a daughter of two merchants who own a sari-sari store, I was greatly interested in the project of this movie and its commendable execution.

Simply put, this film depicted vignettes of experiences of employees that work or have worked in this one convenience store. They are divided by shots of time as told by a wall clock, but we do not know how many years pass between the terms of these employees or the duration between their individual stories. I found this type of narrative unique in that it does not require any change in location and it does not have a straightforward chronological flow, but it was still able to impart a cohesive message.

Even though this strategy could make processing the film difficult for those who want to connect these stories or decipher the common thread among them, I personally enjoyed just absorbing each unique perspective that each character had to offer, no matter how light or how profound. They all contribute to the film’s unique exploration of the nature of convenience stores: here is a place where people from all walks of life come in to acquire basic goods on the go, but from the perspective of the people who provide these goods to them. Thus, the film allows us to look into these employees’ lives as well. We see a young gay woman coping with heartbreak, a young man making music on his laptop, a man trying to learn English during slow work hours and unintentionally offending customers when he tries to apply what he learned, and a young adult who’s already broke and unfortunately also gets fired from her job at the convenience store because of a surprise inspection by a member of the head branch, among others. They all provide a plethora of nuances to the kind of life these type of part-time workers live and the impact of their encounters with customers.

I liked this way of storytelling because it reveals the other, perhaps darker side of convenient stores. Convenient stores are typically brightly lit and vibrant because of their 24/7 open hours and the array of products that they have, but their walls see everything in the range of human emotion, even those that are not as bright and vibrant as their location. These stores witness not just happiness and humor, but also feelings like (in this movie’s case) fear of the mysterious and/or the supernatural. Sadness and grief can also be evoked in this type of setting, as can be seen in the characters who experience dejection and desperation.

In that regard, I definitely did not see the ending of this film coming, but I wasn’t surprised, either. The ending goes to show that the stores that are regarded as convenient by costumers are in truth less than convenient and even detrimental to the workers of these stores themselves. In providing us convenience, they sacrifice their own dignity, and capitalism forces them to do so. The maintenance of these stores is often done by just one to two people, and they are expected to be consistent but receive minimal compensation for it. I was both angry and sad at the ending of the movie, because it reveals how convenience stores can be a microcosm for the larger economic practices that disadvantage and oppress workers, making them “futureless things,” as the movie suggests. Thus begs the question: how does convenience contribute to the future of humanity?