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elfsLast night, Omaha and I watched the movie Kids, by Larry Clark. It was made in 1995 and is a day-in-the-life film of an amoral fifteen year-old boyfrom an impoverished family whose life goal is to deflower as many virgins as he can get his hand on. The film opens up with Telly (that's his name) seducing a young woman in her bedroom, pledging honesty and fidelity and care, and then walking out on her to his friend Caspar waiting on the street below, at which point the two start talking about her in the most disgusting, manipulative, abusive terms possible.
The opening shot is of Telly and his first victim of the day making out, and it's hard to emphasize just how effectively Clark has succeeded in making teen sexuality repulsive. Telly is gawky and gross, his victim awkward and uncomfortable. Without the lighting, the music, the emotion of trust and affection that exists in long-lasting relationships, the human sex act is somewhat repulsive.
(It makes me wonder how porn survives at all. But porn is different in that it relieves men of the some of the responsibility inherent in real relationships, and its portrayal of women, however crude, can be reassuring to men that yes, there exists a subset of women "like that." Too bad for most men they exist only on the screen. Too bad for most women that men will eternally hope for something different from what those women are able to give.)
After urinating in public and stealing a large bottle of fortified beer, Telly and Caspar end up at a friend's house where an entire crowd of young boys, from around eleven up until early 20's, are sharing marijuana and nitrous oxide. As they start talking shit about the women they've known and what they know about women, the camera turns to another crowd of young girls much closer in age (from around 15 to 18) in a girlish bedroom discussing what they like and don't like about sex, and how little boys really understand.
The camera concentrates on two young women, both of whom are shown in a flahback going for HIV testing the week prior. One woman has had multiple partners, the other, Jenny, has had one: Telly. And the one who's had sex with Telly learns that afternoon that she has HIV. There's only one place she could have gotten it from. Remember, this is in 1995, when having HIV was more or less a death sentence.
The rest of the film follows Telly on his attempt to seduce yet another victim, while Jenny tries to track down Telly, although she's not sure why. Along the way, we see Telly and Caspar steal, cheat, and lie. They buy pot for kids who aren't even through puberty. They get into a fight and nearly kill a man. Jenny makes her way through the city, desperately searching for Telly, and along the way meets people who see her only as a thing. Eventually, stoned on ketamine forced on her by "a friend," Jenny finds Telly at a stoner party.
This is ugly, squirm-in-your-seat viewing. It doesn't matter that the filmography and dialogue are some of the most amazing ever to hit the screen. The scenarios presented, of a childhood without limits, without morals, without guidance of any kind, is so despondent and vile that there were times I wanted to just get up and leave. But I sat through it all, wincing each and every time. The boys were manipulative and awful, the girls weak and poorly equipped to say "no" to every overture, even when they wanted to.
It made me despair for my sex. It made me hate the instincts within all boys. I'm supposed to go to the Rainforest Writer's retreat tomorrow. A lot of my work is about sex and relationships. I don't know if I'll have the stomach for any of it after that movie.
If you're in the mood for spinach cinema (the kind you watch because it's good for you, not necessarily because it's good cinema) (and I resent that phrase because well-cooked spinash is freakin' marvellous), Kids might just be worth the 90 minutes.
The opening shot is of Telly and his first victim of the day making out, and it's hard to emphasize just how effectively Clark has succeeded in making teen sexuality repulsive. Telly is gawky and gross, his victim awkward and uncomfortable. Without the lighting, the music, the emotion of trust and affection that exists in long-lasting relationships, the human sex act is somewhat repulsive.
(It makes me wonder how porn survives at all. But porn is different in that it relieves men of the some of the responsibility inherent in real relationships, and its portrayal of women, however crude, can be reassuring to men that yes, there exists a subset of women "like that." Too bad for most men they exist only on the screen. Too bad for most women that men will eternally hope for something different from what those women are able to give.)
After urinating in public and stealing a large bottle of fortified beer, Telly and Caspar end up at a friend's house where an entire crowd of young boys, from around eleven up until early 20's, are sharing marijuana and nitrous oxide. As they start talking shit about the women they've known and what they know about women, the camera turns to another crowd of young girls much closer in age (from around 15 to 18) in a girlish bedroom discussing what they like and don't like about sex, and how little boys really understand.
The camera concentrates on two young women, both of whom are shown in a flahback going for HIV testing the week prior. One woman has had multiple partners, the other, Jenny, has had one: Telly. And the one who's had sex with Telly learns that afternoon that she has HIV. There's only one place she could have gotten it from. Remember, this is in 1995, when having HIV was more or less a death sentence.
The rest of the film follows Telly on his attempt to seduce yet another victim, while Jenny tries to track down Telly, although she's not sure why. Along the way, we see Telly and Caspar steal, cheat, and lie. They buy pot for kids who aren't even through puberty. They get into a fight and nearly kill a man. Jenny makes her way through the city, desperately searching for Telly, and along the way meets people who see her only as a thing. Eventually, stoned on ketamine forced on her by "a friend," Jenny finds Telly at a stoner party.
This is ugly, squirm-in-your-seat viewing. It doesn't matter that the filmography and dialogue are some of the most amazing ever to hit the screen. The scenarios presented, of a childhood without limits, without morals, without guidance of any kind, is so despondent and vile that there were times I wanted to just get up and leave. But I sat through it all, wincing each and every time. The boys were manipulative and awful, the girls weak and poorly equipped to say "no" to every overture, even when they wanted to.
It made me despair for my sex. It made me hate the instincts within all boys. I'm supposed to go to the Rainforest Writer's retreat tomorrow. A lot of my work is about sex and relationships. I don't know if I'll have the stomach for any of it after that movie.
If you're in the mood for spinach cinema (the kind you watch because it's good for you, not necessarily because it's good cinema) (and I resent that phrase because well-cooked spinash is freakin' marvellous), Kids might just be worth the 90 minutes.
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no subject
Date: 2009-03-04 10:01 pm (UTC)I won't take my daughter to see it, though. I'm beginning to consider the Rapunzel solution, though...
(And raw spinach is an awesome salad green. Lovely flavor).
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Date: 2009-03-04 10:50 pm (UTC)Please write more, to improve the culture.
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Date: 2009-03-05 12:08 am (UTC)In 1995, I was just barely out of my teenage years. I saw "Kids", and spent the next four hours trying to figure out how the hell I could track Larry Clark down and kick him in the balls repeatedly. Because what he'd basically made was the snuff-film version of my own adolescence, designed for the specific purpose of scaring my parents into making dumb decisions. It was like he's made a documentary about only the worst parties I'd ever been to and only the worst people I'd ever met there.
God have mercy on the poor kids who were a few years younger than me (and thus still living at home) who's parents saw this thing.
And yes, as a piece of art, it's gorgeous: Clark's background as a professional photographer comes through on every frame. It's the most beautiful moral panic movie ever made.
And it gave the world Rosario Dawson, which almost redeems it. Almost.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-05 02:17 am (UTC)Unfortunately, Elf tended to watch it more from the POV of your parents, I would suspect.
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Date: 2009-03-05 02:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-03-05 06:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-03-05 04:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-03-05 04:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-03-05 04:31 pm (UTC)