people seriously pretending EEAAO is overrated suddenly bc it swept awards? it swept awards largely because it is very very very good. I cried like someone who's just had a religious revelation BOTH times I watched it bc it touched something raw and real and beautiful but it was also just very, very funny. everyone's performance kills and the concept is creative and interesting and doesn't distract from the emotional core. you guys are just contrarian.
oh my god I just saw like 20 people solemnly agreeing that it "looked nice but was written for children" because it. because it. has. immature jokes about hot dog fingers and butt plugs and because the ultimate message is "be kind".
written for children
as if it isn't extremely written for adults dealing with adult problems that are keeping them from finding space in their life for joy and whimsy and silliness.
it is about a woman doing her taxes!!!!! it's about being weighed down by age and responsibility and the sense of the turns you missed in your life and being so exhausted from Being A Grown-up that you burn all the most important relationships in your life!!! it's about being a mother and a wife and a businesswoman and a human person!!!!! it's about trying and failing to hold it together in the face of your own well worn traumas and cycles of abuse for decades! it's incredibly specific to an adult audience!
the message of the film isn't even "be kind" as much as it's "be silly. fuck around. laugh it off. find joy in being ridiculous. fuck cynicism."
like I just. the amount of contrarianism you have to be huffing to fuck up your sense of media literacy this bad. there is a lot of childish humour and absurdity and silliness in the film because the thesis statement of the film is that silliness is profound and important. the message isn't "be kind" it's "find joy." literally it's so on the nose the character Evelyn is reaching for is Literally Called Joy.
like how do you watch a film where the triumph over nothingness is symbolised by sticking googly eyes on everything and think "oh, the reason this film is full of absurdities that seem immature is clearly an unconscious failure of the film to be mature or deep" rather than "oh the way this film is constructed is Specifically About This Explicit Theme that the whole film has been repeatedly reifying, that both stoic responsibility and chaotic nihilism are paths to self destruction and the real hard important work is allowing yourself to be earnestly naive, vulnerable and silly."
I do not understand. how multiple people seem to have decided the theme of the film was "be kind to one another" and not "engage authentically with the absurdity and joy of the world because nothing matters except what you make matter!!!!" Simone de Beauvoir did not die for this!!!!!!! kill both the sensible man and the nihilist and revel in the absurd!!!!!!!!!!