Post-release: History Of Violence - Page 2

Audience's laughter was terrible. They had to laugh to get trough the violence. When the movie ended, they went "Ahahaha. Oh so it's over?" Because there was no shitty spoon fed ending, just the silence and the two characters looking at each other. I thought it was great, though some of the mobsters were goofy. I felt the one clad in black in the initial hold up was scary at least. I found it fascinating that the main character, the one the audience was supposed to sympathize with, was a fucking psycho. He fucks up a mobster and goes into the desert for 3 years to create a facade, not because of guilt, but because he needs to protect himself. He creates Tom, and goes elsewhere. He believes this facade and falls in love, has kids, etc. Events transpire and at the end of the film he realizes that Tom really is only a facade, sitting at the table and wondering what the fuck he's supposed to do now. How can he continue loving his wife and kids, acting normal, when what he really is has been put into the open with all his family to see. All along there was Joey, his real self lurking beneath his eyes. It's funny how he mentions killing Joey, like it was a split personality. Tom may have done all this in defense, but as the reporter said he went beyond what a normal person would do. He shot those fuckers with cold effeciancy. He could've shot the crawling thug in the shoulder, but he shot him right in the head. The movie asks the question... "Can a man truly leave his past behind." That's something fuckface teenagers in the audience...well...couldn't be bothered to comprehend.

Dev and I have both been lagging on this one. But here's one of the two:

http://www.chud.com/index.php?type=reviews&id=4541

(And I'm not really ragging on SHIVERS. But between them...no comparison.)

excellent review, dude. seriously. like totally. heh

Any word on an Extra-Wide release? even hitting more theaters it still didn't make it to smalltown WV (sometimes the local theater shocks me and shows a decent indie or 2). Was really looking forward to seeing this ASAP. Especially since the trailer was all over TV.

I saw this movie with 7 other friends last night. Everyone of us had a different reaction to the movie. There was a range of opinions from one friend who hated the movie and thought the violence was disgusting to one other friend who was convinced that Tom Stall was the next best thing to Dirty Harry but deserved the misery in the destruction of his family and small town life. It was a fantastic discussion afterwards.

A terrific movie and is worth the full price of a movie admission. I can't remember the last time I laughed, cringed, felt suckered-punched, felt embarrassed, and suspended disbelief all in one movie. And the fact that the movie was only around 90 minutes long but didn't feel like 90 minutes long just confirms how well-made this movie is.

One of my favourite parts of the movie is when William Hurt and Viggo Mortensen greet each other. I was very moved by that scene, which stands out even more with what comes right afterwards.

Well said.

Also well said.

I feel horrible because I just knew I was going to read this thread with some of the best tastemakers/friends here loving or really liking this film, and I happened to be greatly disappointed by it.

I fully acknowledge that there was some layered thematic meat happening here, but it seems to me that it was all from the strength of the individual performances rather than anything in the script or anything that Cronenberg created. For me, that was undercut by the characters being archetypal to the point of nigh parody. Finally, I was also bothered by the fact that Tom/Joey wasn't just a killer, but the best one who's ever lived, apparently.

Looking back, performances aside, there wasn't enough to distinguish this from a late 80's-era Chuck Norris or Van Damme film for me. Same morals. Same plot. Much better actors and acting. Not enough for me.

I'll admit, though I enjoyed it, you make some excellent points - one's that have cropped up in my mind since having seen the film.

The story is very pulpy and a lot of it is almost cliche. I mean, a gangster with a scarred, spooky eye? That's straight out of a dime-store crime novel. Same thing about Joey being a nigh-superhuman assassin and Joey's brother living in a fricken castle. A lot of this movie is kinda silly.

But I kind of love it even more because of it. It's a B-movie script with art-house ideas and some terriffic performances. Nothing wrong with that.

I with this about 100%. It does have a generic action film plot but it's melded with an interesting character study, and not just Viggo's character. The film reminds me a bit of IN THE BEDROOM which I've always thought of as an artsy version of DEATH WISH.

Compared to DEATH WISH 3, DEATH WISH is an artsy version of DEATH WISH.

And as we all remember, NOT WITHOUT MY DAUGHTER was the feminist version of COMMANDO.

I'm glad the audience reactions were not just in my theater, because I actually beat the shit out of an audience member afterwards. It was the worst theater experience I've ever had.

There was a row of clowns at the top row during my screening, making lewd, inappropriate remarks during the more uncomfortable scenes. I complained to theater management after telling them to "shut the fuck up" and then "shut the fuck up right now". After one of them said out loud that, "This shit was boring" I screamed out, "Shut the fuck up or fucking leave." He told me to come up and make him. Needless to say, my many visits to management did nothing but keep me from a large chunk of the film.

Afterwards, I found out it was three Hasidic Jews making these comments, and they were actually playing a shoot-em-up game in the lobby, which I thought was remarkably tasteless after that movie. I asked them if they were the ones making comments during the movie. They told me to fuck off and to kiss their ass and I told them never to come back to that theater again. They told me they'd be back tomorrow, so I told one of them to get to the parking lot.

It was a mano e mano, no weapons, and I took him down to the ground before smashing his face into the concrete as his friends watched on. I told him to never come back and I threw him into his car door.

Nobody fucks with Cronenberg, Gotta go see it again now.

How many times did Eye of the Tiger play in your head?

Hey fabfunk, are you by chance originally from Philly? Are ya...Joey?

Who's this Joey guy?

Yeah, sure, whatever you say... Joey.

Excuse me sir, I've clearly stated my name is TOM. Dumbass.

Tom, Joey, I don't much care. Somebody better poor me a cup of that small town coffee that's this city is known for. Make it quick, my eye is starting to leak a little. I guess it's not used to this country air.

I mentioned this film reminded me of IN THE BEDROOM but I now I think it shares more in common with UNBREAKABLE. I always liked how that film took a real standard Super Hero storyline and made it feel much more realistic. HISTORY did the exact the same thing for me but with an action hero-like main character instead of someone who has any real powers.

I was gonna say this before, how the film felt much like a cross between M. Night and Seagal, seriously. Thats not a knock against the film in any way, it really felt like a professionally made action film, without all the crappy acting/silly situations.

I don't see it as a knock at all either. That aspect is one of the things that makes the film so unique. I also find it intersting how the violence in the movie starts off as downright upsetting (the little girl in the motel) and slowly becomes more and more acceptable as the movie progresses, to the point at the end where you're hoping for Tom/Joey to finally get rid of the last obstacle in his way of living something close to a normal life.

Fabfunk, would you mind telling me exactly why them being hasidic jews had any relevance to your deeply depressing story?

I'm in two minds about this one. Its a fantastic film, well made and well acted im just not sure if i actually like it. Its been said already by someone in this thread that the charaters come alive more with each act of violence which I think was a great way to show a change in personality. The acts of violence felt very real and the whole film was full of little bits that firmly grounded it in reality.

However William Hurt and Ed Harris both felt a bit over the top for me, again its been said but they were very pulpy villians. And Hurt's charater at the end (however well done) really took me out of the film for a minute. I mean we are expected to belive he has risen to power (presumibaly by being smart) yet when he hears a fight going on in the house and knowing how good his brother is at killing people he fumbles around with his keys at the door? Sorry i didnt buy that bit.

All in all I'm glad I saw it but I wouldnt want to watch it again, it felt to much like an endurance and less like a film for me.

Well, to be honest, it was totally unexpected. And on Rosh Hashana, no less.

I mean, when we all think someone's being loud and obnoxious in the movie theater, do any of us expect it to be white-shirted, yarmulke-wearing Hasidic Jews?

I was once beat up a by a group of Hasidic Jews.

Word to the wise, if a Jewish girl invites you to her house for a family gathering do not go into a rant about how much you thought YENTL sucked. You'll be spitting out teeth for a week.

Well said, Micah. I felt this coming from the film as well. What bugged me more than anything was the 3rd act. It felt out of place and unnecessary. Richie was mentioned once prior to the trip to Philly and then he calls and all of sudden it's goddamn Ong-Bak. Every character, Viggo and Bello aside, felt cookie-cutterish and cartoony.

Explanation... I went to the film with the wrong people at the wrong theatre. The surround kept quitting out during the film which caused me to start ignoring dialogue and pay attention to the speakers. And then I was with an acquaintance who just plain doesn't go to movies very often. He was loud, he was the laughing "Ohh! Damn! Shit!" audience member, and that also took me out of the film.

But to his defense, he wasn't doing that during the violence. He was reacting to the awful characters surrounding Viggo and Bello. The son was something from the O.C. Very poorly written and poorly played. His bully was practically this guy:



it was a joke and my friend found it hilarious. I couldn't really blame him. What's going to happen next? Is Tom's son going to steal the popular girl while tutoring her, take her to prom and have to face him? Are they going to drag race? It was rather stupid.

To legitimize the 3rd act, I felt that the film necessitated more backstory. If Viggo finally admitting to be Joey while on the ground with Ed Harris was meant to be a revelation, it should have been later in the film. Not for a twist's sake, but for Tom's sake. Show him a little more attached to his new life and the lie that made it possible. If we were supposed to basically say, "There is no way they have the wrong guy" or "How did he forget about that life?", I felt some backstory was in order. Or at least would've been more satisfying. And since we were let in on Viggo's lie an hour into the film, I wanted from his character's POV to be shown/told why he had to leave his previous life behind.

But all in all, I felt this film should have been more. I cannot say my viewing experience wasn't distracting, which leads me to the concession that I will be seeing this film again. Probably by myself, and probably during a time of day which would lessen the likelihood of a plethora of fellow audience members.

Tom's proclamation of "I should have killed you back in Philly" came at the right moment. At the time it looked like Tom was about to be killed and if anything was going to snap him out of his current way of life that was to be it, especially since he'd had an incident with the Ed Harris character long ago. Doing it at that point also insured all of the great scenes between Mortensen and Bello both at the hospital and at their house. I can see where some might want to know more about why Joey decided to become Tom but sometimes I prefer when a film doesn't explain everything and lets the audience ponder that type of question.

One thing I wish Cronenberg had done is make Tom's violent actions less justifiable. Ed Harris and William Hurt's characters were such and immediate threat to Tom and his family that it's perfectly understandable why Tom would fight back with violence. Despite what were told about Joey's crazy past, we never see it in Tom, other than his superhuman fighting skills (that he learned in the mob??) and the disturbing near-rape sex scene on the stairs with Bello. I think the movie went too easy on him.

What I would have liked to have seen happen with the story instead of the return to Philly is show how far Tom would go preserve his new life and identity, even at the expense of innocent people. That would have really be fucking with the audience.

A minor nitpick: Did Harris' character really show up parked in front of Tom's house the very same night he killed the guys in the diner? I find it hard to believe that mobsters from Philly would be able to pick up on a local news story from the midwest and recognize Joey and be at his house that night...

I don't think it was the same night, but a day or two later. And I also thought there was some implication that the story got national media attention, but I might be remembering that wrong

Maybe I'm wrong, but I thought we saw Edie visit Tom in the hospital that night (because it's obviously the first she's seen him since the incident), leave the hospital with all the well-wishers and media outside, drive home and find a reporter in their yard, and then after they go inside someone looks out the window later and sees Ed Harris' car parked across the street.

My only complaints with the film stem from these questions about time. It's edited so tightly that there's no room in some places to explicitly differentiate days.

e.g, Edie picks up Tom; they have cheerleader sex. Cut to son and girl smoking out on street, killers drive by, go to diner where Tom is working. Obviously there's a day between cheerleader sex and the kids smoking on the street, but it's so tight that there's room to question. Same with Fogerty arriving.

Yeah, I do agree that there a few times where it seemed like they were attempting to make the movie as lean as possible at the expense of a 100% clear chronology. The scenes leading up to the confrontation in the diner stuck out to me, in particular. I didn't pick up on the thing with Fogerty arriving so quickly, or at least it didn't jump out at me as much, but I can see how it is a little difficult to believe. I don't mind that so much, though, because they had to get there quickly and move the plot along, and I think it's pretty easy to suspend disbelief. but I do think think they should have edited those scenes before the shooting in the diner differently, so the flow wouldn't seem weird. Those are pretty minor complaints though, and I honestly had forgotten about them until reading this thread.

yeah, I see what you mean. Some things can go without being spelled out for people. So in response to that I would say that I craved more information, backstory, and detail. They aren't necessary I admit, I simply felt I would've enjoyed it more with some added exposition.

I hate to post this, but at least there's a couple of people who felt the same way. I was disappointed. It's a shame, because I really wanted to like it. It was maybe my most anticipated film of the year. In the end, I had pretty much the same complaints as Micah and also felt the third act let down the film. There's big chunks of the film that I liked, but by the end I felt left down and like I hadn't seen something special made by one of my favorite directors. It just felt sort of bland and bloated with unfufilled promise.

I really don't understand the love for William Hurt in this. He was hammy and too over the top for a film that had been this restrained. To me, he was as awful and distracting as Tim Robbins was in War of the Worlds. As someone else pointed out, he was like A Steven Segal villian.

I also didn't feel that a lot of the humor worked. It mainly felt forced and/or sort of cheesy. far too easy for a film striving for upper caliber.

I appreciate the layers to the film at least and the fact that everyone is coming away with something different. I personally think that there's too much being put on the idea of what an American man is supposed to be and his relationship between violence and acceptance and/or success in society. I see the correlation with Tom's celebrity after the first incident and how his son changed over the film, but I just don't think it was the main theme. Not sure I even think there was a main theme, as opposed to many different thoughts, but I'm still digesting it all.

I also liked that Cronenberg put in the uncomfortable sex scenes. It cracked me up listening to the audience get offended. I think I prefer Cronenberg when he's not attempting mainstream, but at least some of his calling cards are left behind.

Gotta agree with Sacriligous, Micah, and Hewlett. Was disappointed in this film for the same reason as they were. There is no real cost to Tom/Joey besides some family arguments that are pretty much wrapped up at the end of the film. All the violence he and his son commit are the result of unprovoked assaults by despicable villains, "the bad men." We are told that Joey used to be one, but are not shown anything that would shake our belief that he is a good man now. I totally understand the rah-rah from audience members, because all the violence shown comes across as both perfectly justifiable and looks pretty damn cool as well.

I also thought Hurt was terrible and was badly miscast. Both he and Viggo's faltering, come-and-go attempts at ethnic Philly accents were bad, bad, bad. No scariness or threat at all. The lines Hurt was given creaked terribly as well: "I could have become boss when the old man croaked ...", "looks like you're still pretty good with the killing" ... wha??

I will give props here to the one scene I did like, which Viggo hit out of the park: right after some villains are killed, the look on Viggo's face when he goes to hug his son is utterly ferocious. Hard to tell if he's going to beat his son or hug him --- the only scene where you see a scary glimpse of Joey, the "crazy" killler. There should have been a lot more moments like this.

From the reviews I expected a different film. I also expected a different Hurt, but I always guess the wrong one. One is John, one is William, but I never remember.

It was well-made. Harris, Mortensen, and the Hurt were very good, and my main enjoyment. Harris saying "Joey" too much is what he was born to do. I agree about the third act making it more like a Seagal film than anything else.

Loved everything that took place in the small town. The trip to Philly and especially William Hurt came within an inch of ruining the movie for me. One happy surprise was that I've only seen one small advertisement for the film, so I thought Ed Harris was the main villain, not Hurt, so I was shocked by what happened on Viggo's lawn. I thought Viggo, Harris and Maria Bello were all fantastic. The ending was well done.

Hardly. The family is utterly changed forever. Tom rejoins them at the table (and it is Tom, not Joey) but there's no sense that everything is wrapped up. Quite the opposite. The movie leaves them at just the right point - we have no idea how they'll cope with what has happened.

Much like A.I., to say this has a "happy ending" is to ignore most of what the film is about.

The third act journey to Philly is absolutely essential to Tom/Joey's arc. It's not just a physical journey to a geographic place, it's a metaphorical journey into Joey's past. He tries to make peace with his past, and when that is impossible - when the repercussions of his violence come back for him - then he is forced to destroy that past, in the form of his brother.

For me, it worked beautifully and made the movie so much more interesting than if it had stayed in Millbrook as a "gunslinger defends the homestead" archetype.

The film is about Tom trying to reclaim his very soul from the things he did as Joey, and the fact that the way he must do that threaten to spread his violence to those he loves - not just in the threats from outside, but also in the change he triggers in his son.

Going to Philly is the natural conclusion of that theme, and the film ends with Tom returning with blood on his hands, and we're left to with the same decision as his wife and son - whether he can rebuild that life, and whether he deserves to.

I've been having this same argument over at Devin's board, Dan, and - perhaps it's just my skewed perspective - but I never really saw Tom in that film. I thought his every action, from the lies to the not going with Fogarty to going back to his family and putting them in danger by doing so - reeked of Joey.

I absolutely liked the CONCEPT of the third act in that he has to return "home," both figuratively and literally, in order to determine who he really is, Tom or Joey. But because that act wrapped up in such an action movie way, brought down further by Hurt's cartoonish performance, it sapped what hope I had left for the film.

I don't consider the ending happy, per se. Just way too pat. The family accepts him at that table the best they can, and he returns to the ROLE of Tom Stall. I just don't think he ever was the man. My (admittedly grim) take is that they've always been stuck with Joey and they always will be.

I know. I enjoyed reading that thread almost as much as I enjoyed the movie, and I'm not about to subject you to another to-and-fro on the subject.

I'll just say that the contradictions and things you see as failings on the movie's part are the exact same things that make me love it. For instance, I wouldn't automatically disagree with you that Tom never stopped being Joey. But, for me, that's just one of the endlessly intriguing and open-ended ambiguities that make the film special.

I didn't see the end as the family accepting Tom back into the fold. The daughter accepts him, but she's the only person who can't comprehend what's been going on with her father. The relationships with his wife and son are far from resolved, and it's one situation that Tom isn't going to be able to fix by killing a bunch of folks.

Well, there's a difference between all problems resolved and accepting. They clearly do not reject him, and their physical actions are ones of acceptance. You can argue that they're just going through the motions, but that's the only objective evidence we have to evaluate his relationship with family from that point onward (the physical acceptance of giving him a seat and plate at the table). Everything else is speculation.

That's why it's a great ending.

That's a fair point, but I think it's that speculation which makes the film all the more interesting. I and many others have compared, for better or worse, the 3rd act to something you'd see in a Seagal film. But in those films the hero would always be accepted by his family and everyone leaves the theater a happy camper. The fact that HISTORY doesn't go that route is one of the aspects that sets it apart from the rest of the crowd.

A fantastic film for sure. The use and lack of music was great. Fortunately I was able to watch the film without the annoying audience members so the silent moments reverberated and were powerful. It is nice to experience a film that is not packed with wall-to-wall sound.

I agree with others that the opening scenes were awkward and hard to get comfortable with and that was by design...Interesting that as their world falls more apart you start to feel more comfortable with the family.

Enjoying the violence doesn't quite seem right. The violence felt real and messy...not so much the enjoying of seeing the good guy whip the bad guy...but violence with no good answer. With each action Tom gets farther and farther from the man he wants to be.

The wife's reaction to Tom's past is great. Tom has made her life a lie and despite loving him she also hates him for what he is doing to her and the family. The most shocking and unsettling moment in the film is when Tom hits his son.

The third act was saved by the final scene.... the handing of the plate, the meatloaf...and finally looking into his wife's eyes... Tom is looking for the what he could see in her eyes before and leaving the audience wondering what he saw.

I would agree that the film is open to interpretation as I've been in lengthy debate with a few others about this and we have wildly divergent takes on the film that we're both supporting by what we thought we saw, and each thinks the other is crazy for not seeing it our respective ways.

My interpretation makes me disappointed in the film, but if I saw what you, Dan, and others have seen, I'd be enthralled with it, no doubt.

I can respect that. One of things I've liked about the discussion in regards to this film is that even those who didn't enjoy it seem to have a lot to say about its content. By in large it's not the usual "it sucked, end of argument" type conduct which is refreshing.