Okay, so it’s a new year, so let’s try this again.
Last night I went to go see ‘Vice’…but it was sold out. So I thought I’d watch ‘The Mule’…but it was sold out. So I ended up seeing ‘The Favourite’ instead and I can say right away that I was not disappointed…unless you count the super weird, smelly people that were sitting next to me…
When these two people sat down next to my roommate and I the first thing I noticed was that the older woman was wearing non-slip socks underneath her shoes, and one of them was clearly upside down. i could tell because they’re the same kind that we use at my job, which we don’t ACTUALLY use anymore because they don’t work on our new floors and I’ve been trying to get rid of them for over a year now, but my manager won’t let me just throw them away because HEAVEN FORBID we throw something away that serves no purpose. But I digress. The point is that the upside down grippy sock was the tip of the iceberg of how gross these people were.
Anyway, the movie was great. It’s split into seven…eight?…chapters, usually titled with the best piece of forthcoming dialogue. Which I would’ve enjoyed if I wasn’t sitting next to some of the smelliest people on the planet. Seriously, it was like being on set for that show Hoarders. I had to bring my hoodie up above my nose the entire time. I wonder if they ever noticed…
I also didn’t realize that Emma Stone was even in the film. I know I had seen a trailer for it at one point in my life, but for the life of me could not remember seeing Emma Stone in it. On the other hand, the smell from these two people sitting next to me was probable seeping into my neurons and rewiring my memories. That’s probably why now I don’t remember anything before graduating High School. But maybe that’s just because everything before leaving High School was awful…but pretty sure it was those smelly people.
As the movie progresses you come to find out that Emma Stone’s character’s family has fallen on hard times and lost their wealth. Now she plans on regaining her former noble standing by any means necessary, which happens to mean seducing the Queen of England. Usually this kind of scandalous political intrigue would be unbelievable enticing to watch, but just when the film began to be increasingly difficult to look away, I saw the younger man in the smelly duo lean forward while the older woman began to scratch his back. This guy looked like the 30-year-old-man form of the Pillsbury Dough Boy, so I assumed that this other lady was his mother, but when she started scratching his back I couldn’t help but look on in disgust. I know it’s not an explicitly romantic gesture, but it still unnerved me that this grown man was letting his mom scratch his back right in front of me. But what if they weren’t mother and son? What if they were actually romantically engaged? At this point I am so in the woods with these people that I can barely pay attention to the film.
Even when Emma Stone’s character is explicitly seducing the Queen, I couldn’t help but wonder what these two people next to me would be going home to. Do they live together? Is he caring for his ill mother? Are they hoarders? Do they have so much stuff accumulated in their home that they can barely move? Was this outing the first steps towards getting his mom and/or super weird lover out of the house for the first time in years? I NEED TO KNOW!!!!!
Oh yeah, The Favourite was great. Go see it, and you might be lucky enough to be sitting next to someone who has a story almost as interesting as the film.
SaltLakeFilmSnob 