SHERDOG MOVIE CLUB: Week 68 Discussion - Triangle

Lol plus one Sally corpse for every time that fucker yelled for Heather in the first half hour.
 
shadow_priest_x said:
LOL, yes. And I literally laughed out loud at that.
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Alright, I got through it, and you were right - it did get better. But I think ultimately it was quite thin and that there isn't much other than the central mystery that makes it compelling. The rest is just bearable (keep in mind that I don't really watch horror though, and I suspect this might be par for the genre).

As for the central mystery: I'm a little concerned that it only exists for its own sake, so to speak, but I'm interested in what you guys have had to say about it so far.

My biggest question at the outset is: what happened to future Jess? There seemed to be a renegade Jess that was in full kill-switch mode who must have been a few iterations ahead of main protagonist Jess. This was also the same Jess who got clipped the in the head by herself later, and then went on a stabbery. Cool Jess, in other words. It seemed like main Jess was continuing an inevitable cycle (despite her conviction that she was doing otherwise) but Stabby Jess doesn't seem to fit into main Jess' cycle the way we see it play out.

I also want to point out that @shadow_priest_x has finally acknowledged the asset of attractiveness in a leading female, though conspicuously it took poverty-Rachel McAdams to bring it out of him.
 
Caveat said:
star-wars-darth-vader-kylo-ren-out-here-throwing-lightsabers-1a.gif
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LOL!

Caveat said:
Alright, I got through it, and you were right - it did get better. But I think ultimately it was quite thin and that there isn't much other than the central mystery that makes it compelling. The rest is just bearable (keep in mind that I don't really watch horror though, and I suspect this might be par for the genre).
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Well sure, the central mystery is what it's all about but I thought it was enough to make for a very interesting film.

I will agree though that the movie feels quite . . . slight. I guess I could also say thin, but I feel like there IS substance there. It's kind of funny, Primer feels like a much more substantial film despite being somewhat similar in concept, and yet I feel like there's a lot more meat on the bone with that one.

Remind me, did you like Primer?

Caveat said:
My biggest question at the outset is: what happened to future Jess? There seemed to be a renegade Jess that was in full kill-switch mode who must have been a few iterations ahead of main protagonist Jess. This was also the same Jess who got clipped the in the head by herself later, and then went on a stabbery. Cool Jess, in other words. It seemed like main Jess was continuing an inevitable cycle (despite her conviction that she was doing otherwise) but Stabby Jess doesn't seem to fit into main Jess' cycle the way we see it play out.
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You know, I actually wondered that too. I can't remember. Did Main Jess not kill her? I actually can't remember now. I probably need to watch this again, as these kinds of movies ALWAYS require at least a couple of watches.

Caveat said:
I also want to point out that @shadow_priest_x has finally acknowledged the asset of attractiveness in a leading female, though conspicuously it took poverty-Rachel McAdams to bring it out of him.
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I don't think I've ever denied the asset of attractiveness in female performers. . .
 
Last thing I want to point out since I haven't really made a novel point yet: there's a part near the beginning where Jess mentions that her son likes things to be the exact same way over and over, or else he gets upset. Frustrated Jess smacks her son and then gets treated to the joy of a murderous eternal time loop.

Someone up there has a sense of humour.
 
Where I stopped short in my first post to go on about the plotholes of the film, my sentiments have basically been told through @shadow_priest_x hang-ups with the film. I too don't get why Jess follows through with the same actions that she knows failed the first time (ya know, because she herself caused them to fail), but Timecrimes also fell into this trap. It just seems there's no perfect way to write a story with this kind of time loop that makes the protagonist turn into the bad guy and fight him/herself. It's a neat, yet flawed idea. You have to make yourself believe that the character can't remember some things while remembering others, but that's just a little too much plot convenience for me to swallow easily.

As for how the loop started, we know it's been going on before the movie's beginning as evidenced by the many lockets, letters, dead birds, and Sallys, so we wonder what was the true first go around, and how did it play out? Well, I agree with @MusterX that this purgatory like state that Jess is in is an infinite loop, and rather thinking of the loop as a circle, think of it like a triangle. The three Jesses are forever caught in a loop that constantly repeats, and they keep setting each other off for an eternity, so that means there is no end, which means there was no beginning. I can't really explain it, but it makes sense to me. I don't think that Jess will continually adjust the loop to further create new scenarios. I think what we saw from beginning to end of the movie is the real complete loop, and she is doomed to repeat it forever. With this line of thinking, it's almost as if Jess really has no control over her actions because a godly presence has cast this fate on her, so perhaps this is why she keeps falling into her own failures.
 
Caveat said:
Last thing I want to point out since I haven't really made a novel point yet: there's a part near the beginning where Jess mentions that her son likes things to be the exact same way over and over, or else he gets upset. Frustrated Jess smacks her son and then gets treated to the joy of a murderous eternal time loop.

Someone up there has a sense of humour.
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Huh. . . Interesting observation.

I didn't connect those dots.
 
It could also be the case that Stabby Jess is the only true Sisyphean in the Existential sense.

"One must imagine Sisyphus happy."

giphy.gif


(I mean, really imagine.)
 
the muntjac said:
As for how the loop started, we know it's been going on before the movie's beginning as evidenced by the many lockets, letters, dead birds, and Sallys, so we wonder what was the true first go around, and how did it play out? Well, I agree with @MusterX that this purgatory like state that Jess is in is an infinite loop, and rather thinking of the loop as a circle, think of it like a triangle. The three Jesses are forever caught in a loop that constantly repeats, and they keep setting each other off for an eternity, so that means there is no end, which means there was no beginning. I can't really explain it, but it makes sense to me. I don't think that Jess will continually adjust the loop to further create new scenarios. I think what we saw from beginning to end of the movie is the real complete loop, and she is doomed to repeat it forever. With this line of thinking, it's almost as if Jess really has no control over her actions because a godly presence has cast this fate on her, so perhaps this is why she keeps falling into her own failures.
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Even if we disregard the evidence of the lockets and Sallys, and assume that there never was a time when the first locket was dropped and the first Sally was killed, in order for there to be no beginning either:

1. Jess never lived in the flesh, was a real person, had a son, had a regular life etc. She has just for all time been this tormented spirit.

or

2. Jess was somehow BOTH a regular person leading a regular life while SIMULTANEOUSLY stuck in this infinite/no beginning/no ending loop.

The first option I don't think is true to the narrative spirit of the film. And the second just leads us down a road of absurdism.
 
shadow_priest_x said:
Even if we disregard the evidence of the lockets and Sallys, and assume that there never was a time when the first locket was dropped and the first Sally was killed, in order for there to be no beginning either:

1. Jess never lived in the flesh, was a real person, had a son, had a regular life etc. She has just for all time been this tormented spirit.

or

2. Jess was somehow BOTH a regular person leading a regular life while SIMULTANEOUSLY stuck in this infinite/no beginning/no ending loop.

The first option I don't think is true to the narrative spirit of the film. And the second just leads us down a road of absurdism.
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The best I can see it is that not only do the Jesses have a cause and effect with each other, their realities also coexist at the same time, sort of like overlapping. It then becomes like a "which came first? Chicken or egg?" scenario where we don't really know whose reality came first to kick off the other ones. I don't know, man. I know it's not the most satisfying explanation, but it's all I got. I think we agree that while the mystery time loop angle is fun and all, it does have some flaws, which does hold the movie down some.
 
the muntjac said:
The best I can see it is that not only do the Jesses have a cause and effect with each other, their realities also coexist at the same time, sort of like overlapping. It then becomes like a "which came first? Chicken or egg?" scenario where we don't really know whose reality came first to kick off the other ones. I don't know, man. I know it's not the most satisfying explanation, but it's all I got. I think we agree that while the mystery time loop angle is fun and all, it does have some flaws, which does hold the movie down some.
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Indeed.

Well I guess that's where we're at. Ultimately, we just don't know, and the way the story is told we're just left to speculate.
 
the muntjac said:
Where I stopped short in my first post to go on about the plotholes of the film, my sentiments have basically been told through @shadow_priest_x hang-ups with the film. I too don't get why Jess follows through with the same actions that she knows failed the first time (ya know, because she herself caused them to fail), but Timecrimes also fell into this trap. It just seems there's no perfect way to write a story with this kind of time loop that makes the protagonist turn into the bad guy and fight him/herself. It's a neat, yet flawed idea. You have to make yourself believe that the character can't remember some things while remembering others, but that's just a little too much plot convenience for me to swallow easily.

As for how the loop started, we know it's been going on before the movie's beginning as evidenced by the many lockets, letters, dead birds, and Sallys, so we wonder what was the true first go around, and how did it play out? Well, I agree with @MusterX that this purgatory like state that Jess is in is an infinite loop, and rather thinking of the loop as a circle, think of it like a triangle. The three Jesses are forever caught in a loop that constantly repeats, and they keep setting each other off for an eternity, so that means there is no end, which means there was no beginning. I can't really explain it, but it makes sense to me. I don't think that Jess will continually adjust the loop to further create new scenarios. I think what we saw from beginning to end of the movie is the real complete loop, and she is doomed to repeat it forever. With this line of thinking, it's almost as if Jess really has no control over her actions because a godly presence has cast this fate on her, so perhaps this is why she keeps falling into her own failures.
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That's kinda the way I was looking at it, that maybe the loop has no real beginning or end, that it just sorta is, either way it doesn't really matter to me, at least not with this film. Her own self loathing may have caused the loop to continue until she could forgive herself. The point where she sees herself abuse her son then she kills herself with a hammer may be the point where she has to not do that, let her other self live, or forgive her other self. Its the act of her own self loathing that may have put her there to begin with and caused the loop to repeat over and over.
 
shadow_priest_x said:
Indeed.

Well I guess that's where we're at. Ultimately, we just don't know, and the way the story is told we're just left to speculate.
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I don't deny that the story doesn't completely resolve itself but look at this.

Budget: $12 million
Box Office: $1.5 million

That's just not right, and why I believe this film is a bit of a hidden gem. It became more popular in the years after its release than it did at the Box Office. It was almost completely ignored by movie goers.
 
Nice pick SMC. I liked this movie a lot. It was groundhogs day with murder and I never knew exactly where the story was going. Solid story and directing 9/10.
 
MusterX said:
I don't deny that the story doesn't completely resolve itself but look at this.

Budget: $12 million
Box Office: $1.5 million

That's just not right, and why I believe this film is a bit of a hidden gem. It became more popular in the years after its release than it did at the Box Office. It was almost completely ignored by movie goers.
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Yeah, I definitely think it should've done better than that financially.

I had never even heard of the movie, so I have to wonder how big of a theatrical release it even got. Did it get a real theatrical push or was it one of those situations where it had a very limited run before being pushed out on home video?

It definitely didn't go wide here in the US. Maybe in the UK it did.
 
shadow_priest_x said:
Yeah, I definitely think it should've done better than that financially.

I had never even heard of the movie, so I have to wonder how big of a theatrical release it even got. Did it get a real theatrical push or was it one of those situations where it had a very limited run before being pushed out on home video?

It definitely didn't go wide here in the US. Maybe in the UK it did.
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Its not a bad movie. In fact compared to most horror flicks, because its a weak genre, its quite good. The people in charge of giving this movie a push FAILED. They could have made their 12 million back almost without even trying, its a low budget. As I said though, in the years since its release more and more people have discovered it.
 
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