Hello, this is Jake Winters with Eye on the Triangle with your weekly movie review. This week will be a review the Movie Brief interviews with hideous men. Brief Interviews is a movie that can easily make people question how they view relationships. Not only does it pose the question of what is the correct or most normal relationship, but it does so in a way that the audience cannot fully understand until the very last scene of the movie. One of the best things about brief interviews is that it isn’t afraid to tackle the hard question. What is love? How do I sow love to someone else? What is a good relationship? How does rape affect people? Can rape, even though it is a horrible and unimaginable act to say the least, positively affect a person’s life? These questions are all posed by the movie. They are tough but that is what makes it interesting to watch.

Brief interviews with hideous men is based on the collection of short stories that goes by the same name by the author david foster wallacre. There was also a theatre adaptation as well in 2000. This film is the third adaptation of this group of short stories and was released in 2009. It was directed by the actor and now director John Krasinski who is most notable for role as Jim in the tv show the Office. Krasinski also plays one of the roles in this film. For being the first film that he had directed it is hard to tell. The movie paces itself well and overall does have a since of style which means that the director has done their job.

Whether you are a male or a female can largely affect how you feel about this movie. I can’t really speak to how a female would feel about the film but I can say that from the subject matter presented the personal experience of having lived as a female is something that could drastically change how you perceive this film and its ideas. The main character is a female but the author of the original story and john krasinski are both male. Honestly this is probably for the best as it makes it so the author must stop to consider what he thought that a woman would be thinking in these situations. The original story never focused on the interviewer of the hideous men but the story is centered on her in the movie. This choice makes the interviews have a personal sway to them as with how these interviews are affecting our main character. One of the main questions that the audience can infer is asked of the men is what a woman wants. This parallels essentially what the main character is attempting to figure out. What do men want?

The main plot of the film is driven by questions. The most obvious representation of this is with the interviews. It becomes very obvious early on in the film that the interviews are meant to be an internal sort of narrative that the main character is having with herself. It becomes apparent when she interviews someone who we later find out to be one of her personal friends. The main character goes into these interviews all the time. They are a representation of how she is analyzing someone else’s ideas or actions. The use of these are a clever way for the director to allow the audience to see what the main character is thinking. The way in which people analyze each other is very indicative of not only how they view others but also what kind of things they are questioning about themselves. It is possible that this methos of presenting thoughts gives a more accurate representation of our characters internal conglict thatn direct narration would

Another great feature of the film is the commentators present throughout the film. They sound as though they are radio hosts discussing the subject matter of the film throughout. It is possible that the conversation was from some podcast as it seems as though the audio has been over laid on to the film. This commentary is another creative way in which the director inserts commentary on the question of what do women want. I really enjoy this section of the film it seems very much like a relaxed conversation between two friends. Much like a radio show does. It sort of reels in the outlandish aspects that are within the film.

The film does not only explore the partner relationship of love but also goes on to fatherly love. A black man describes the conditions in which his father worked and why he resents him for it. This scene is what distinguishes the film from being strictly about partner based relationships and more to about general love. Without it there would be no argument for the story just being about what love means to different people and how it has affected their personal and emotional love.

Brief interviews with hideous men is movie to watch if you want to think. It asks questions and doesn’t give direct answers. It is hard to say while watching whether it supports a feminist cause or is trying to view the exact opposite point of view of What do men want? I can’t say that this movie is my favorite movie but I really did come to like it by the end. It is easy to find some view in the film to disagree with which is what may put many people off of it. I think the movie that provokes question about how society functions are great. They start conversation and the ideas go beyond the movie screen.

Thank you for listening to this week’s edition of the movie review. Feel free to send any suggestions or comments to the radios email I am always glad to receive feedback or opinions. This is Jake Winters for Eye on the Triangle have a good night.