clint’s libertarian contradictions operate at extremes here, anti-god in schools but pro god over meds, anti-afghan war but pro-soldier vigilantism, anti-narrative but pro-destiny, contra eastwood stans it feels more like its own disaster artist than close-up but it has a compelling weirdness, primarily in how the awkwardness of self-portrayal offers a sensitive masculinity that undercuts the inherent bro-ishness of the enterprise, but given the context of the military its a sincerity that alarms almost moreso for how disarmingly sweet it…

this is a pynchon movie????? watched it at 5 am and am willing to say that like v and gravity's rainbow it prefers its critiques of capitalism and imperialism from the vantage point of wayward military personnel w/ the libidinal undercurrents of boardrooms and battlefields brought out by the rom com packaging

as a result it asks the right questions from the wrong pov (and the emma stone casting fiasco didn't help) but it’s such an unusually singular movie to…

An interview quote surfaced on twitter this morning* that Anderson intended Alma to be a specifically Jewish refugee, as hinted by the scene in which she reacts with disgust to one character profiting off of selling visas to Jews during wartime. It speaks to something I originally thought of as one the film's strengths, mainly that Anderson gave up his failed attempts at saying something big in TWWB or the Master and realized he's much better at floating signifiers an…