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by Troler
Free Software fundamentally misses the point. It fails on a practical, ideological, economic, and political level. Let’s examine precisely how (in a slightly different order for the purposes of presentation).
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"I like you"
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"That's very sweet of you <...>, I like you too"
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"I mean, I don't like many people"
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Seldom do I eat the same food twice, reread a book or even rewatch a movie. Barely do I ever want to rewatch the movie as I am watching it. You did not misread, not after the ending, but during the actual viewing. If you somehow didn't read the title, the movie in question is Robert Mulligan's Summer of '42.
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I came across it when I was reading Quentin Tarantino's review of 40s nostalgia pieces. What piqued my attention was the radiating love and affection for the picture and his knack for collecting film prints ("if you haven’t seen Summer of ‘42 projected in an I.B. Technicolor 35mm film print, you haven’t seen Summer of ‘42). I set down at the middle of the night and saw something I cannot unsee. Neither did the audience in 1971, since this slice-of-romance film about horny teenagers beat Dirty Harry and even Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange in the box office. To say it was impactful is an understatement.
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What was it that caught the attention of the viewers? Well, it was sex of course! Imagine this, the Sexual Revolution has swept the United States, arguing that all this restriction on sex is making people grow into perverts. The tidal shift of demographics, as brought by the Baby Boom, resulted in American cinema unshackling itself. This change is known as New Hollywood. In 1971 Robert Milligan was one of these crazy New Hollywood men. At a budget of a million (lead actress Jennifer O'Neill says it was 8 million) created relatively simple movie. Simple, yet effective. To a point where it deeply touched Kubrick ("climax of the film is quite simply one of the most devastating sequences I’ve ever witnessed (apparently Kubrick felt the same)". Do not take Tarantino's word for it, watch what Wendy is watching in The Shining
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The story follows a group of 3 ragtags Oscy (Jerry Houser), Benjie (Oliver Conant) and Hermie (Gary Grimes). All of them are a trio of lusting adolescents. They are at a stage where they want to have sex yet paternalism laws do not allow them to. Naturally that gives the same results as boiling water with the lid shut down. A good bit of the half of the movie is about teenagers being stupid bunch of horny bastards. There Hermie falls deep in love with Dorothy (Jennifer O'Neill). Hermie is 15 and Dorothy is in her 20s (the actor was 22). There is this Licorice Pizza scenario. The movie corrupts the audience into believing the relationship between a teenager and a woman is okay. WW2 is in the background: you have soldiers strolling the town, Dorothy sending her husband to France, radio broadcaster talking about the war. It is in the background... until it is not. The movie is set during 1942, it is a nostalgia piece after all. The Dorothy observed is meeting this 15 year old, while her husband is out fighting Nazis. At one point she buys flowers, keep that in your mind, it will be relevant later. For a good part of the film, the focus is on the "Terrible" trio and their quest to get laid.
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Since the budget of the film was not that high (a million), it resulted in quite simple camera arrangement. Most shots were done out-doors, resulting in less expenses on props. Since the emphasis is on the characters, the shots are done using wide lens. The movie actually becomes quite a bit darker as it progresses. I mean, literally darker. First scenes are bright, moving with life of the beach-goers. Later on you have the shabby "Terrible trio" hut, movie theater, sex during midnight. As mentioned before, it being a movie from 1971, sex in movies was still taboo. Robert Mulligan is corrupting the audience by having a scene where teenagers actually fuck during the middle of the night. None of it is displayed on the screen. It was distributed by Warner Bros. in 1971 after all.
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The music composed by Michel Legrand is nearly non-existent. It starts in the beginning, with the showcase of the important places throughout the movie and resumes only at the end. Upon the rewatch, the beginning slide-show made me tear up.
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The love between Hermie (Herman) and Dorothy (Dorothy) was, by the words of the screen writer Herman Raucher, "had effected a strange relationship". Herman, in a way is a romantic, similar to Steven Spielberg. For him love is more than just putting his sausage into girl's scissors, as did Oscar, who in character, was closer to Luc Besson with his pussy-curse. Naturally having Dorothy's husband was murdered in France, meant "she was alone on an island and drinkin’ and playing their favorite song and in walks this kid and <...> She just thought I (Herman) was him". Powered by mourning, she danced, danced with Hermie (Herman) to their favorite song and went to bed with a 15 year old kid. It was Dorothy's way of curing herself from the trauma. She was alone on island with no-one except that strange Hermie (Herman). The flowers she bought few days ago were thrown out. The vase was left empty. Not even water was present in it.
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30 years later, after the film was released, the writer received "numerous letters from women claiming to be Dorothy". One of them stood out, it had Dorothy's handwriting. The letter mentioned, she had remarried and was living in Canton, Ohio. She was intrigued what effect did she have on Herman. The letter was ended with these words: "The ghosts of that night 30 years ago are better left undisturbed."
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Tell me @BlenderDumbass , are you willing to do a psycho-sexual analysis on one horny teenager and a miserable widow?
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Fin.
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The somber tale of Summer of '42
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/18/Summer_of_%2742_POSTER.jpg)
Troler
👁 16 💬 109
Sex and love are hard to miss on present block-busters. Even topics such as love between a child and an adult are discussed. In early 1970s and before it was hard to find films delving into such topics. A nostalgia film of that. The movie may start out light-hearted, it went deep so to make the illustrious Kubrick cry.
#Summerof42 #1942 #JenniferO'Neill #GaryGrimes #JerryHouser #RobertMulligan #HermanRaucher #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Alita: Battle Angel is Robert Rodriguez's Pearl Harbor
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/e/ee/Alita_Battle_Angel_%282019_poster%29.png)
Blender Dumbass
👁 14 ❤ 2 💬 2
In my review of Michael Bay's Bad Boys II I brought up an interesting theory people have about the film. The amount of Bayhem! it holds in could be a direct response to the out-of-the-comfort-zone feel Bay must have had experienced making Pearl Harbor. Basically, the film was so different from what Bay usually does, he had to crank the next movie's Bayhem! up to 11, to make it feel right again. After Robert Rodriguez directed Alita: Battle Angel with an estimated budget of about $200 million, he had to come back to his comfort-zone too. And 3 months later ( that same year in 2019 ) he released Red 11. A micro-budgeted horror film made on almost exactly $7,000.
#alita #alitabattleangel #robertrodriguez #jamescameron #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Objects in the Rear View Mirror May Appear Closer Than They Are 1994 makes me want a 2 hour long Michael Bay musical
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/65/Meat_Loaf_Objects_video.jpg/250px-Meat_Loaf_Objects_video.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 16 ❤ 4 🔄 2 💬 11
In 1994, just before Bad Boys Michael Bay directed a music video for a song "Objects in the Rear View Mirror May Appear Closer Than They Are" by Meat Loaf ( Michael Lee Aday ), which shows striking resemblance to his 2001 film Pearl Harbor and has some interesting choices that echo throughout his career. Choices that beg for a psycho-sexual analysis.
#meatloaf #music #video #musicvideo #michaelbay #review #movies #film #rock #metal #cinemastodon
Vicious 2025 is a cool little therapy movie
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/f3/Vicious_film_poster.jpg/250px-Vicious_film_poster.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
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A lot of horror films are therapeutic in nature. They let you see and examine some dark things about yourself or the world. And that is a good thing. For example, some people were "cured" from suicidal thoughts by watching the Saw franchise. A running theme in those films, is that Saw would choose some rather depressed, suicidal individuals for the "games". Where they need to do some utterly bad shit crazy things to themselves, to survive. That puts the whole suicide thing into perspective. Making you really understand how pointless it is, as a solution. The 2025 film Vicious written and directed by Bryan Bertino and starring Dakota Fanning is also a therapy horror film.
#vicious #dakotafanning #horror #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
One Battle After Another 2025 is PTA doing a Machete remake
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/5/5d/One_Battle_After_Another.jpg/250px-One_Battle_After_Another.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 47 ❤ 1 💬 7
In my review of Robert Rodriguez's film Machete Kills I speculated that Quentin Tarantino introduced a small reference to Grindhouse movies in Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood to fulfill a rather outlandish promise from the fake trailer of Machete 3 in the beginning of Machete Kills. That there would be a Grindhouse movie with Leonardo DiCaprio. I think Paul Thomas Anderson just beat Tarantino in this regard. His 2025 film One Battle After Another ( starring DiCaprio ) is a straight up remake of the first Machete.
#OneBattleAfterAnother #PaulThomasAnderson #LeonardoDiCaprio #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
So Did Avatar 3 Use AI?
![[thumbnail]](/pictures/thumbs/avatar_ai.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 44 ❤ 3 🔄 1 💬 2
While James Cameron has denied that Avatar 3: Fire and Ash used any generative AI. On January 24, 2026 Joe Letteri ( the visual effect supervisor from Weta Digital ) sat with the Corridor Crew for their weekly show of VFX Artists React where he said that the facial animation for the hero characters for both Avatar 2 and 3 involved a neural network. A neural network? Isn't that a fancy way to say "AI"?
#avatar #jamescameron #fireandash #avatarfireandash #movies #review #film #cinemastodon #ai #art #mastoart #aiart #neualnetwork
The Taking of Pelham 123 ( 2009 ) is Tony Scott continuing to mess with Michael Bay
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/c/cf/Taking_of_Pelham_123_%282009_film%29.jpg/250px-Taking_of_Pelham_123_%282009_film%29.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
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Tony Scott's 2009 film The Taking of Pelham 123 is a remake of a 1998 TV movie with same name, which is a remake of a 1974 movie with the same name, which is an adaptation of a 1973 book, with the same name. Strangely enough, apart from Denzel Washington playing the hero and John Travolta playing the villain, the film also prominently shows John Turturro and Ramón Rodríguez which, the same year, also appeared in a Michael Bay film Transformens 2: Revenge of the Fallen.
#TheTakingofPelhamOneTwoThree #TonyScott #movies #review #film #cinemastodon
Broken Wings ( 2002 ) is satisfyingly depressing
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/7/7e/BrokenWINGS.jpg/250px-BrokenWINGS.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
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There is a feeling I'm chasing sometimes that only a few things can give me. A feeling of satisfying depression. Films like Michel Gondry's Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, or Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Away give me that feeling to some extent in some of the sequences. But Nir Bergman's 2002 film Broken Wings gives it all throughout.
#BrokenWings #film #movies #review #cinemastodon
Death Wish 2018 has a low rating due to politics
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/5/59/Death_wish_2017_poster.jpg/250px-Death_wish_2017_poster.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 15 💬 1
17% Rotten Tomatoes score. The movie got to be shit, right? Well when it comes to the Eli Roth's 2018 Death Wish ( the remake of the 1974 film with the same name ) you are not quite correct. In my estimate the film should be no less than 60%, based on its execution. Eli Roth is a good enough director to pull something like this off. And you can see that he is trying. The actors are also good. And the music by Ludwig Göransson is really fucking good. I mean this is the same guy who did the music for Tenet and Oppenheimer. He is really fucking good. Watching the movie, I saw that the movie is arguably a lot more watchable and a lot more satisfying than the 1974 original. What is different, is that the 1974 original was made in 1974. And since then the politics have changed.
#DeathWish #guns #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Déjà Vu 2006 is Tony Scott's Minority Report
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/cf/DejaVuBigPoster.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
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Tony Scott famously didn't care about the time travel plot of Déjà Vu which freaked out the writers of the film. As they said, he cared more about the action and surveillance aspects of the movie. He famously cared a lot about surveillance, as visible from his previous Jerry Bruckheimer collaboration Enemy of the State. And that means, that a sort of sci-fi surveillance movie, marks Déjà Vu as the closest thing Tony Scott did to Steven Spielberg's Minority Report.
#dejavu #tonyscott #DenzelWashington #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Invasion of Astro-Monster teletransported to Brahe
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/21/Invasion_of_Astro-Monster_Theatrical_Poster.jpg)
Troler
👁 8 ❤ 1 🔄 1 💬 4
Instead of an action roller-coaster, the film provides a Sci-Fi political story with a 3 headed Ghidorah. As is the case with previous installments, the costumes were repurposed, just changed to fit the slightly different aesthetic.
#Godzilla #Gojira #InvasionofAstroMonster #IshiroHonda #NickAdams #AkiraTakarada #AkiraIfukube #film #movies #review #cinemastodon
Hollow Man 2000 takes the horror trope of not seeing the monster to a whole new level
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/e/e1/Poster_Hollow_Man.jpg/250px-Poster_Hollow_Man.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 13 💬 1
Before Kevin Bacon played a much more complex man with a psychological sexual abnormality in 2004's The Woodsman, he played a man with a psychological sexual abnormality in 2000's Hollow Man. Where the fetish is voyeurism and the crime is ghostly rape. You kind of know it is a Paul Verhoeven movie from this description.
#hollowman #paulverhoeven #film #review #kevinbacon #movies #cinemastodon
Alien VS Predator 2004 is a Predator 2 sequel
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/f7/Avpmovie.jpg/250px-Avpmovie.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 16
In my Predator 2 review I observed that the merger of Alien and Predator franchises was not a Paul W. S. Anderson's ( the director of AVP ) fault, since even that movie already had a lot of Alien references in it, including a Xenomorph scull. So it was almost expected by this point that the next movie in the franchise would feature Xenomorphs.
#Alien #predator #AVP #film #review #horror #movies #cinemastodon
Le Dernier Combat 1983 doesn't need subtitles
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/3/35/Le_Dernier_Combat.jpg/250px-Le_Dernier_Combat.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 38 💬 2
French 1983 Luc Besson film Le Dernier Combat has 2 spoken words throughout its 1 and a half hour runtime. Both of those words are Bonjour, which I bet you already know the meaning of. The film is about a post-apocalypse future where humans lost the ability to talk. The one time two characters in the film have an exchange of Bonjours doesn't even require the understanding of the word to get the impact. It's about them finally being able to utter a word. It is not about them exchanging information.
#LeDernierCombat #LucBesson #Feminism #politics #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
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