Lonely, like a shadow

Katheryn 2022-01-05 08:02:28

There are a lot of annual hits, but I just thought of the long-awaited "Good Girl". I remember it only because the name of the movie appeared in the film resumes of Jake Gyllenhaal and Jennifer Aniston.

It reminds me of a "The Waitress" a few years ago, which also took place in a small place and also talked about extramarital affairs in unhappy families (I'm afraid it's really too old. I haven't talked about love a few times, but I actually studied it. These problems arise, 囧).
It's just that, this movie doesn't have colorful and delicious pie to adjust the appetite, it is full of uncomfortable drama conflicts, low-key and plain story trends.

A long time ago, a friend sent a text message to me while traveling alone: ​​"I feel weird in my heart, is it sad? It's because loneliness is like a shadow." This sentence can really speak to my heart. Every time you have new experiences and ideas, no matter how much you want to say, you can only keep it in your heart, and then keep observing the people passing by on the road, and can't help but figure out what they are thinking and doing. For the night view of Wanjia's lights, I couldn't help but guess what was behind each cluster of lights. Isn't life like this? The accumulated tolerance, on the contrary, makes you lose the willingness to share, dismissively sink deeper and deeper in the confusion, paralyzing yourself in disguise.

In the movie, life in the small town is boring and shows no improvement, just like a bottomless pit eating, falling asleep, and waiting to die. Everyone has acquired a set of skills in order to cope with this kind of life that corrupts people into walking dead. Justine fights numbness through extramarital affairs with young boys; Holden’s indifference to his parents is through imagining that he is a novelist, rebellious and unruly like a character in the novel, and loves Justine, who understands her, to gain warmth; Phil is through Drugs and marijuana; Buda is jealous of Phil and fantasizes about having such a wife; Gwen is caring about other people's lives by chattering, and the female employee played by Zoe Danchels is scolding customers overtly and secretly. , Fudge customers with ghost makeup; the security guard at the reading meeting satisfies himself by monitoring and peeping at others stealing pleasure in the warehouse... Ironically, everyone is addicted to their own way of escape. Although they are complaining about life, they all Already afraid of change.
So Justine chose to inform Holden at the crossroads and returned to the supermarket and her husband; so she finally agreed to her husband's request to take drugs from time to time. Fortunately, Holden gave her a child, which gave her more hope that she would not continue to be dark in this mud. The birth of a child is a symbol of salvation and hope in many movies, such as this movie, such as "The Waitress", such as "21 Grams"...

Sometimes what makes us is not life, but our attitude towards life.

Therefore, Holden is a pitiful and respectable character. Maybe he is immature like a child, maybe he stole a huge sum of money and committed a crime, but he is also the only person in the movie who dared to make a change and did not succumb to the fate of being sent to a mental hospital. He has an attitude toward life, but unfortunately, he also has a family where his parents just stare at the TV and ignore him. His last suicide saved him from the indifference of his family and the betrayal of his lover, and he was free.

By general standards, this movie really looks very ordinary and tiny. The story is in a small place where birds don’t lay eggs, and it’s also about family ethics. It's no wonder that so few people rate movies on Time.com. If there weren't those audiences for the two starring actors, it is estimated that this movie would really be nothing but a dead end.

Fortunately, Aniston came to be the heroine. The sweet and sunny temperament of Rachel she brought from "Friends" can just dilute the depressive and boring atmosphere of the movie itself. The film was released in 2002, when she was the most glamorous in and out of the play: it seemed that she won the Emmy Award for Best Actress for the role of Rachel in Friends, both fame and fortune; with Brad Pitt's High-profile husband and wife relationship, praised as the happiest woman in the world. It can be seen that she wanted to broaden her path in taking such a play. Although her performance in the movie is not necessarily good, I really like the spark between the "Rachel" temperament and the movie atmosphere itself. Originally, what most of us love is her real personality like Rachel.
Jack? I was disappointed with his recent performance, so I had to look back and look at his work before Brokeback Mountain. I was pleasantly surprised to see that it turned out that he was able to express this fragile, lonely, distressed, and beloved image of a poor boy long ago. (The deep melancholy in the eyes, the slightly raised corners of the mouth, and the tender and tender voice are so fascinating~~~) It can be regarded as a drill before the explosion in Brokeback Mountain.

I haven't read the original work of "The Catcher in the Rye", but this movie seems to have a lot to do with it. When I was watching that day, a QQ message popped up saying that the author of "The Catcher in the Rye" had passed away today. I don't know if this is a coincidence.

View more about The Good Girl reviews

Extended Reading
  • Charlie 2022-04-21 09:02:51

    They have similar endings like the Catcher in the Rye except that one is biological death and the other is spiritual death. She still lives her life with nowhere to run..

  • Coralie 2022-03-25 09:01:14

    Even being QJ in life is occasionally enjoyable, a realistic film, and the ending is handled properly. (The sad little third is played by Jake, so I still feel distressed...)

The Good Girl quotes

  • Phil Last: I don't know what to say about Jesus... I'm stoned.

    Justine: Just let the other people do the talking.

  • Justine: Oh, who gives a shit! Who needs a fucken baby anyway, you wanna make your self useful around here, why dont you get that goddamn tv fixed?

    Phil Last: What the hell?

    Justine: It sounds like a helicopter is landing in here!