I love Amy Schumer (mostly for her standup specials), I love Bill Hader (who works very well in this as a romantic lead!), and the secondary cast is really on point. LeBron James is shockingly, one of the funniest characters in this whole movie. I liked the characters, I wanted them to win the romance, but more importantly I wanted to see Amy Schumer’s character grow enough as a person to be healthy and have happiness.
Something I applaud here is how the romance wasn’t easy, but not 100% because of stupid contrived situations (although it was not totally free of those). It seemed like the relationship was presented as hard because they were both damaged people, but fundamentally also seemed likable and good. It made the end have the emotional impact I was looking for, even if some of it tied up too neatly for me. Overall, worth it.
I saw a former male classmate diss Amy Schumer in her own movie because he found her humor too crude. I would not have an issue with his view on this, since not everyone’s humor is the same. BUT, don’t say you dislike a comedian due to crude humor and then have every single Kevin Smith movie listed as a favorite on your FB page. He’s still welcome to his opinion but I smell the hypocrisy.
Judd Apatow has frequently flirted with the idea of mortality in his comedies, whether it’s the impending midlife crisis of a couple in This is 40, or the gallows humour found in cancer comedy Funny People. Yet, few have come as close to the topic as The King of Staten Island, whose protagonist nearly commits suicide in the very first scene. It’s a difficult balance to strike, but Apatow manages to weave between comedy and drama effortlessly, helped in large part by a cracking breakthrough performance from Pete Davidson.
In a story that is partly based on Davidson’s own life, he plays Scott Carlin, a 24-year-old serial stoner who still lives with his mother (an underused Marisa Tomei), and has distant dreams of being a tattoo artist. Though he shrugs it off, it’s clear that the tragic death of his father (who died on duty as a fireman), has had a damaging impact on both his maturity and his personal relationships, whether it’s his long-suffering almost girlfriend (Bel Powley doing an impressive New York accent), or a sister whose promising future casts a shadow over his own (Maude Apatow).
Like its lead character, the opening section is replete with funny interludes, but doesn’t have much in the way of structure, with Apatow happy to let the film drift as Davidson and his friends improvise. Happily, before this gets old (apart from Ricky Velez, the friends are quite weakly sketched), the film really gets a jolt of life when Scott’s mom starts dating fireman Ray (Bill Burr) the father of a boy who Scott gives an illegal tattoo, and the two immediately clash. This in turn leads to some of the film’s best scenes – an explosive argument at a baseball game, a fight scene involving a pool – with Apatow perfectly playing on their differences for comedy.
From40 Year Old Virgin to his last film Trainwreck, Apatow’s films have been a great way of showcasing new comedic talent, and this is no different. Davidson has long been a feature player on Saturday Night Live, but his casting in the lead role here was a masterstroke – he perfectly plays his character’s agitation and easy irritability in the face of inconvenience (likely drawing from personal experiences), while also conveying a sweetness and charisma that wins you over in spite of the character’s flaws. While rooted in darkness, his performance also displays his knack for deadpan comic delivery and exasperated facial expressions – just look at his face as a girl drones on about why she doesn’t get tattoos. As Ray, Burr also does a commendable job of making a potential source of villainy into an empathetic character you come to understand as the film progresses. The story peers into his backstory in interesting ways, with Steve Buscemi popping up in a short but meaningful cameo as his boss.
The decision to pit these two against each other for most of the film is one that pays off massively - although it takes a predictable route, the resulting moments of reflection and self-discovery feel believable and well-earned. The film may be an exploration of the impact of death has on people’s lives, but it’s also a touching celebration about life and making amends with the past.
Featuring a striking debut performance from Davidson, this is a heartfelt, personal film that deftly balances its comedy with its affecting drama.
FRIENDS! I’ve started writing for another film website (I’m not a traitor, I swear). I will still work on pieces for this blog, but it won’t be my only outlet. Below is my Trainwreck review, originally published on FilmTakeout.com.
Trainwreck
Overall Score: 95%
A rom-com that is anything but a trainwreck.
Currently, this is Amy Schumer’s world and we are all just living in it. Star, writer, director, and producer of the wildly popular Inside Amy Schumer, she is currently owning Hollywood with her unabashedly feminist point of view. Unafraid to talk about her body, her sexual escapades, and the way women behave makes her refreshing in a world of reality tv gone mad. Schumer is now taking her writing and acting to the big screen inTrainwreck. THANK GOODNESS.
Surprise, surprise – the lead character’s name is Amy. From a young age, Amy has been told by her wandering father (played brilliantly by Colin Quinn) that “monogamy isn’t realistic”. Being a daddy’s girl, she takes this to heart and lives a life that is free from romantic ties. Things become a bit more complicated when she meets a sports doctor Aaron (the incredibly charming Bill Hader) who happens to be BFFs with LeBron James.
While the film follows many of the common romantic comedy plot structures, Schumer is able to breathe life into an increasingly stale genre. Surprising characters pop up throughout the film that make it enjoyable from beginning to end. Where else are we going to see a closeted John Cena or a tan Tilda Swinton? The answer is nowhere. There are so many laugh out loud moments that my sides hurt by the end of the movie. But what is even more surprising are the touching moments littered throughout the film. Amy’s relationship with her sister Kim (Brie Larson) and father play a significant part of the story and I found myself with tears in my eyes a few times.
Bill Hader and Amy Schumer have wonderful chemistry with each other. Hader plays Aaron so sincerely; he’s just a nice guy who hasn’t had the best luck with women. He’s smart and kind and it’s easy to see how any girl could fall for him. Naturally, baggage is a part of any relationship and seeing Aaron and Amy work through their own issues gently prods the audience to examine their own. The film easily moves between humor and romance without feeling forced. Even when the typical rom-com montage happens, Amy’s constant snarky narration helps to keep the film from becoming too sappy.
The best part of the film for me personally was LeBron James playing LeBron James. Now, I’m not a sports person, especially not basketball. But Trainwreck made me a fan of this tall, beautiful, funny man. I love when people play caricature versions of themselves and this is maybe a new favorite performance. As a Downton Abbey obsessed, romantic advice giving BFF, James steals every scene he is in. His deadpan style matches Amy’s quirkiness perfectly and the scenes of them together are my favorite.
At the helm of Amy’s sharp, hysterical, and surprisingly poignant writing is Judd Apatow, director of comedies like The 40 Year Old Virgin andKnocked Up. This is my new dream team. Both seem to have a love of dirty jokes – these are endless. But the beauty of this team is that both members want to convey an actual message through the comedy. Apatow has matured in his directing and it is noticeable here. With age comes some understanding and Apatow is no exception. Trainwreck is not just about making us laugh, although you will do plenty of that. It’s about learning to love the broken people in our lives, including (and maybe especially) ourselves. The important thing is that we have to try. Never working on ourselves to be better is easier, but it’s no way to live.”
Directed By: Judd Apatow
Written By: Amy Schumer
Starring: Amy Schumer, Bill Hader, Colin Quinn, Brie Larson, LeBron James
Book review by Emily Simpson Artwork by by Gordon Magnin and G. Paul Burnett
November 15th, 2016, 6:00pm
One week ago, we battened down the hatches for a last electoral squall of nerves and tequila before bidding a final fuck-you to the gnarliest campaign season in American history. It was almost over, thank god.
Hillary Rodham Clinton, for whatever establishment rhetoric she personifies, was about to fulfill her destiny as the first woman leader of the most powerful, influential country on Earth. She was going to tip the Supreme Court into more equality-bound waters for theoretical decades to come. Some polling experts even predicted the momentum could nudge half of the legislative branch in a similar direction. Generations of little girls were going to grow up with concrete knowledge of the possible where their forebears had only dreams. At the very least, any American with an ounce of common sense had to be appalled by the alt-right’s influence over the conservative ballot option, right?
The early morning hours of November 9th were a fresh hell. Instead of the expected victory, we woke sentenced to four years of an anti-progress villain whose least-embattled job is a credit as a reality television host, and whose chief skill — despite aggressive posturing as the golden answer to morally bankrupt Washington — is a Machiavellian knack for murdering facts and burying them out in the yard.
This is reality. We’ve been reading news outlet after twitter feed after Facebook rant about it obsessively, trying to pinpoint some wrong turn or way out (looking at you, Electoral College). Of course, the Clinton campaign faltered perhaps irretrievably from fiascos like the DNC’s primary impartiality, and she was twice-haunted by the specter of a private email server. Still, I can’t help but wonder how her innate being — her femaleness, really — damned her from the beginning. And I do mean far before either presidential bid. This populist election was ultimately decided on cults of personality, and hers simply couldn’t do the trick. But why?
I read Sady Doyle’s recent Melville House title Trainwreck in the weeks leading up to the election, considering it a valuable exploration of the work yet to be done to reverse the centuries of cultivation behind deep American gender divides. Since November 9th, the book has become something more: a stark reveal of the impossibly disparate characteristics we continue to expect of women both in public and private spheres, a reminder that there are infinite ways to do “femaleness” wrong in a patriarchal society.
“The patriarchal code of conduct isn’t remotely so forgiving for women, who we largely trash and hold to impossible standards when they aren’t even hurting other people.”
Trainwreck sharply examines prominent, popular women of historical significance and in modern limelight, and the lengths the public goes to destroy them after building them up. Doyle highlights the traits of a “trainwreck" in varying ways, most of which are contingent on too-muchness. Sociopolitical progress aside, even in 2016 we insist upon making spectacles of women who are too emotional, too intellectual, too sexual, too needy, too ambitious, too unabashed. They are punished dearly, publicly, and in humiliating ways for their deviations from a male-oriented idea of femininity. Lindsay, Britney, Miley. Taylor, Nicki, Monica. You know the names, and you know the Perez Hilton drill that bores holes through their daily existence.
Trainwreck’s early example of Amy Winehouse tracks how the singer’s incredible, once-in-a-generation talent was not worth enough to the public to overcome the ravage of vitriolic press that rained down when photos of her engaging in sex acts were published without her consent, or when her drug habit spiraled out of control to the extent of near-death, and finally, tragically, actual death. Gossip outlets called her a crack-whore, a waste-away, and a slew of other demeaning names during a period of her life where she most needed help. Alternately, Doyle points out, we seem to forgive abject qualities in male public figures. Take for instance Keith Richards, whose “drug career has included accidentally snorting strychnine, setting himself on fire on multiple occasions … and taking to the media in 2013 to defend heroin as essentially useful to the creative process.” Or how Steven Tyler “once adopted a sixteen-year-old girl in order to have sex with her.” Amy was a trainwreck, Keith and Steven are rock icons.
Doyle makes it a point to note that “it’s not that men can’t be wrecked. …. [But] they usually have to work a lot harder for it: Chris Brown had to beat Rihanna within an inch of her life … Mel Gibson had to terrorize his girlfriend, and also utter every ethnic and sexist slur in the books, on more than one occasion, over a period of years, before we gave him up.” The patriarchal code of conduct isn’t remotely so forgiving for women, who we largely trash and hold to impossible standards when they aren’t even hurting other people.
Perhaps the most classic and prototypical choice that Trainwreck examines: one-time princess of pop and Disney empire alum Britney Spears. When her …Baby One More Time album debuted in 1999, she was packaged to the public as an ultimate male desire - sexually appealing but chaste (she’d made vows to wait until marriage), conservative in value but unstuffy, smiley and obedient, unwaveringly trusting of authority, a vessel which her industry and the public would fill as they saw fit. Fan admiration lasted until it didn’t, and obsessive media coverage led to mental breakdowns. According to Doyle, “all the trust and obedience in the world couldn’t make her totally absent from her own life, or take her inner conflicts away.” Pretty soon, people were clamoring for up-skirt photos of Britney exiting vehicles, paparazzi were making entire year salaries on pictures of her eating Cheetos, and America watched with vigor as she spiraled into shaven-headed, umbrella-wielding disarray.
Britney’s inability to maintain the original image that made her famous landed her under her father’s conservatorship, where she remains to this day.
Improbably but inevitably, this brings us to Hillary Clinton. One of the most intelligent, driven people to ever work in American politics, she was not immune, Doyle asserts, to public condemnation unlike anything her male colleagues would ever suffer. Further, her own mental stamina and ability to remain steely in the face of Spearsian criticism of her personal life created its own enigma of judgement from which she could not escape. Arguably, Clinton holds the same political views as “Uncle Joe” Biden, whom at this point has become a millennial national treasure, yet her inability to fall into neat categories of patriarchy-defined femininity have made Clinton into one of the most polarizing figures in our government.
The apex chapter of Trainwreck focuses on the dichotomy between Hillary Clinton and Monica Lewinsky. Doyle is careful to frame both women by their literal qualities, to throw into perspective how the actual women differ from various portrayals. Rather than calling Monica a crazy, stupid slut, Doyle reminds us that Lewinsky was very bright (her very first job out of college being for the White House). She also recalls her age, a mere 21, and susceptibility to the sometimes misguided heartache of the first time falling in love. Hillary, by contrast, a force behind Bill’s presidential decisions, presented a reserved, stoic face to the public eye in light of the embarrassing allegations against her husband, for which she was labeled calculating, cold, and even accused of being a lesbian. Though they were polar opposites to the media - “the Betty and Veronica of sexism: the icy blonde and the overheated brunette, the prude and the slut, the shrewish wife and the trashy mistress, the sexless middle-aged young one, the frigid, man-hating intellectual and the needy, man-hungry ditz” - Doyle concludes that they had one thing in common: both were blamed for Bill Clinton’s cheating. Neither woman could win, with their opposing too-muchness.
By the end of Trainwreck we learn that we live in this world: a world that allows us to call David Foster Wallace a genius, but Sylvia Plath a mental patient. A place where we championed a queer kid like Lou Reed but pummeled a queer kid like Valerie Solanas. Too-muchness in men is celebrated as extraordinary, too-muchness in women is still deemed problematic.
In the era of president-elect Donald Trump, who refers to women primarily in terms of their aesthetic value in relation to himself, Sady Doyle proves it is more important than ever to be immersing ourselves in conversations about the labels we ascribe to the women who surround us, and whether or not those labels are deserved.
Today’s train wreck of a post features photographs taken on this date, March 1st, in 1906, showing the aftermath of a railroad accident at Emporium, Pennsylvania.
The accident, which occurred on the same day, occurred when a Pennsylvania Railroad locomotive tender backed into a box car carrying dynamite manufactured by the Emporium Powder Manufacturing Company. The March 3rd edition of the Philadelphia Inquirer noted that “there was no explosion for some unaccountable reason, and Emporium is still on the map”.
These photographs are part of Hagley Library’s DuPont Company Museum collection (Accession 1968.001). The materials in this collection were originally compiled by the DuPont Company Museum and document the history of the DuPont Company.
The collection has not been digitized in its entirety; the online collection is a curated selection of items. Among other subjects, the image depict the 1901 Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York; the construction of Coleman du Pont Road; production of Phenolin; game birds advertising series; Haskwell Works explosion aftermath, cartoons of employees; a female employee baseball league; and company plants at Old Hickory, Tennessee and Farmingdale, New Jersey. Click here to view the collection in our Digital Archive.
