ImmersiveAmbientModecolor: #b69f7f (color 2)
Video Format : 22 (720p) openh264 ( https://github.com/cisco/openh264) mp4a.40.2 | 44100Hz
Audio Format: Opus - Normalized audio
PokeTubeEncryptID: 7d5b9c9869885495d2e36a930f9541a3879e7f002aabe93dc3da1cc34559c2435119c33ccb5522916cc562c350224924
Proxy : eu-proxy.poketube.fun - refresh the page to change the proxy location
Date : 1714849790373 - unknown on Apple WebKit
Mystery text : SzJXVEduT1A0OGMgaSAgbG92ICB1IGV1LXByb3h5LnBva2V0dWJlLmZ1bg==
143 : true
371,875 Views ā¢ Jul 27, 2023 ā¢ Click to toggle off description
Watch the full Asteroid City podcast discussion with @LikeStoriesofOld on Nebula: nebula.tv/videos/watchcinemaofmeaning-the-explorinā¦
Editing by Ben from Canada: www.instagram.com/benchinapen
// WATCH MORE THOMAS FLIGHT
-Ad-Free Videos and Exclusive Content on Nebula: nebula.tv/thomasflight
-My Podcast Cinema of Meaning:
Ad-Free and early on Nebula: Nebula: nebula.tv/cinemaofmeaning
Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/4n6zZZQjiKsLNfyldNAi8b
iTunes: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/cinema-of-meaning/idā¦
-Rent or Buy My Experimental Documentary:
labyrinthion.com/
-Read My Newsletter:
thomasflight.substack.com/
// SUPPORT MY WORK
-Support my channel directly on Patreon: www.patreon.com/thomasflight
Patrons get access to a discord community, monthly podcast reviews of everything I watch, and more!
-Sign up for Nebula using my Link: nebula.tv/thomasflight
(using my link helps support my channel financially)
// FOLLOW ME
-Twitter: twitter.com/thomasflight
-Website: www.thomasflight.com/
-Letterboxd: letterboxd.com/thomasflight/
-TikTok: www.tiktok.com/@thomas.flight
// CONTACT ME
-sponsorship and Business inquiries: thomasflight@standard.tv
-Questions, feedback, other stuff: contact@thomasflight.com
(check out my FAQ as well: www.thomasflight.com/faq)
// GEAR I USE: thomasflight.com/gear
#ThomasFlight #VideoEssay
Views : 371,875
Genre: Film & Animation
Date of upload: Jul 27, 2023 ^^
Rating : 4.921 (315/15,699 LTDR)
RYD date created : 2024-05-02T20:44:43.424143Z
See in json
YouTube Comments - 691 Comments
Top Comments of this video!! :3
It occurs to me that Brian Cranston appearing in the colour section actually broke 2 separate 4th walls. Not only did it break the 4th wall between Asteroid City the play and Asteroid City's production, but it also broke the 4th wall between Asteroid City's production and Asteroid City the TV show about the creative process.
From the perspective of the actors playing the characters in the play it's already confusing because he doesn't exist in their world, but the world of their actors, but from the characters point of view themselves Brian Cranston as an entity is beyond incomprehensible.
They stare at him dumbfounded until he leaves the frame at which point they promptly reject his existence, unsteadily returning to the conversation they were scripted to have. It's almost Lovecraftian to think about. That you could peel back the layers of reality and discover that you were just a character played by an actor, only to then realise THAT actors 4th wall had also been violated.
766 |
I think that moment with the griddle is significant because Jones Hall actually burns his hand. We see Mercedes Ford break character and react honestly, because of course the actor is not supposed to actually burn his hand during the play. But the actor is experiencing very real grief over Conrad and does it.
I love this film so much. I think it's my new favorite Wes Anderson movie. I'm glad people are talking about it.
1.3K |
I've read an explanation of "I still don't understand the play" online:
The actor playing Augie Steenbeck is certain Conrad Earp, his lover, committed suicide (You can't wake up if you don't fall asleep) and looks for a reasoning inside his last play. The grief he channels when reading the script is his real life grief for Conrad.
It's like Augie's motivation and Jones Hall's motivation merged into one layer. It's the reason why the cut scene with Augie's wife consoling Augie behind the scenes is actually Conrad consoling Jones beyond the grave.
933 |
The part about their feelings, Tilda Swinton's character had that exact line: āI never had children, but sometimes I wonder if I wish I should have.ā She doesn't wish she should have, she wonders if she should wish. It's a very fascinating layer of conditionals.
69 |
I admit I wasn't sold on this movie when I first saw it--but it wormed its way into my consciousness. I can't stop thinking back to it. I think it was the line "It doesn't matter, just keep telling the story" that, to put it academically, rocked my shit.
417 |
I think a great visual analogy for the layers of narrative and meaning in this movie is the billboard you can see at 9:10 - a billboard featuring a picture of a billboard, both of which feature the same scenery that's behind the billboard itself.
401 |
I was surprised to see a general consensus about the movie having more potential and let people down... It instantly became my favorite Wes Anderson flick. Maybe that's because I watched it in a theater that really only exists in my town to show old/indie/small budget moves and the theater just has so much charm it can make anything fun. Maybe it's because I really enjoyed the setting. But I was surprised to find that not as many people liked it. It felt small and self contained, yet had so much to unpack. My partner and I were talking about it the whole drive home and still bring it up in conversation today.
1.5K |
I couldn't help but laugh when the editing of this video began mimicking the layers of the movie. The use of black and white for the commentary clips and then suddenly the use of color during the breaking moment of "I don't know if this video makes any sense," but it feels correct.
This is one of those films that I keep thinking about and can't stop running through the different layers. It is beautiful and complex.
168 |
Asteroid City is a beautiful analogue for how many neurodivergent people see the world. Speaking from my autistic experience, much of my life feels like I'm having to act in order to make connections with the people around me. And when everything is suddenly in complete chaos, all I desperately want to do is find out who I am - not the actor I've been conditioned to be, but who I naturally settle into being. And much of that personal narrative is explored through taking myself out of "the scene" (i.e. a conversation with a coworker) and hyper-analyzing my motivations behind or even beyond the moment. Seeing a bunch of actor-characters struggle to find the "right way" to receive information and act in kind, while simultaneously acknowledging this shared meta-reality with everyone else in the film, was such a unique, refreshing, and emotionally resonant experience that Asteroid City has quickly become one of my favorite movies in recent memory. A beautiful example of a movie that isn't made for everyone, but if you are in the target audience, it feels overwhelmingly like it was MADE FOR YOU.
73 |
Fun Fact: At one point, a radio off-screen plays Slim Whitman's "Indian Love Call", the song that killed all the alien invaders in Mars Attacks!.
61 |
This movie managed to make me feel like I was in a movie more successfully than any other experience Iāve had
82 |
My take on the āmessageā here is that there doesnāt always need to be a message. The visual artifice can sometimes be just thatā spectacle. Art and the message of art is driven just as much by the audience as it is the artist themselves. I walked away feeling almost hollowed by the message, centered around not just āfinding meaningā in art, life, etc., but also coming to terms with the fact that not everything has meaning in art, life, etc.
Iāve seen it 3 times now and each time I felt more and more sad. This is pinnacle Wes Anderson, imo.
119 |
I always took the meaning of the movie to be about loss and grief and "how do i move on" and getting tangled up and not remembering how you used to live, then something reminding you (margot robbie scene) about why you do what you do it all, and you just gotta keep doing it
28 |
I felt a lot of different things during the movie. Some parts are sad, some funny, some touching... but there's a strong resonnance beetween the confusion of the spectator, the confusion of the actors (of the play) and the confusion of the characters (in the play). (And there's maybe another layer, the actors of Wes's movie that are also a possible target of all this, are playing a movie and showing feelings while not understanding what is this all about)
Having all these layers muddle even more the distinction between the spectator and the movie and makes you part of the global experience in a stronger way. The fact that you feel what the characters feel and that you are (as spectator) as confused as the characters made everything even more relatable.
Things happen, we feel stuff. We don't always know why or how to respond, most of the time we just keep going. That's part of life.
70 |
If you watch closely on the balcony scene, Augie actually said "It's you, the wife who played my actress" which sounds wrong because it's supposed to be "It's you, the actress who played my wife". Glitches like this happens when the character is deep in their personal problem. Same thing happened when the narrator, played by Bryan Cranston, appeared in color in one of the scene where Midge's (Scarlett) method acting bit (the greasepaint on her cheek) is questioned for the second time by the cookie trooper mother, the first time is by Augie. Also the mother talks about Midge's second ex-husband in Utah when just in a couple previous scene, Midge tells Augie about it in one of the window scene.
I see the two separate worlds in the movie (the play and the movie set) as the repserentation of the human world and the heaven (or at least the dream world) because of how the director and the writer acts like gods who wrote and made the story and then just leave it be, even the director is sleeping while the play is till on going, not intervening in the play. It is only when Augie enter the dream world/heaven that he can consults with god (the director) about what is the meaning of it's heart broken life and then the director doesn't really gives him the exact answer that Augie wanted but instead tells him to keep on living and being himself because that's the meaning of life itself, it is lo live. Also it is in this dream/heaven world that Augie met his supposed dead wife.
Oh and one last thing, on the last scene, Augie overslept and missed everyone leaving the city because in the dream world/heaven, he missed his cue on the play by talking to the actress on the balcony scene. You can't wake up if you don't fall asleep.
56 |
The way you used your own meta framing device to support your explanation was very clever. You say āIām tired, and Iām not really sure my point is getting across,ā maybe because you actually feel that way, but also to demonstrate a difference but also a connection between the āyouā who is a confident narrator/YouTuber voice, itself unsure that it was getting the point across, and a āyouā that is more private and personal. Meanwhile, the point youāre trying to make is about how, in the film, the actors (Johansson/Schwartzman) inform their characters, who are also actors that inform their characters, all of whom are searching for the meanings in their lives and jobs.
39 |
People talking about Christopher nolan being complicated but wes anderson outdid it
357 |
Iāve seen Asteroid City 4 times, 3 in theaters and 1 at home. I still donāt feel as if I completely understand it, but I do very strongly feel that it is not only the best film of the year, but one of the greatest American motion pictures of all time. In the coming decades I hope to see Asteroid City rightly regarded as the astonishing creation it is.
49 |
I am an emotional man, and I am okay with that. I often cry during movies with really good scenes, but I usually feel it coming on. When Augie said he didnāt know the meaning of the play and the director told him it didnāt matter, just keep telling the story, I instantly began to cry and had to pause the movie. Iāve never been so simultaneously blindsided and affirmed and destroyed and reassembled.
35 |
@oscargill423
9 months ago
Something I'm beginning to love about Anderson is how his movies just casually put A-list actors within abstract masterpieces. It's somehow a completely different feeling to seeing them elsewhere.
450 |