Safe Spaces

There is a good story here. How a family pulls together during a trying time, despite their differences, conflicts and foibles to love and care for each other. There is nonsense here that I fear may be an all too real ultra sensitivity that pervades liberal campuses. While the traumatic difficulties that one may face in their youth may be regrettable, there is no way that the Jennifer Mann character will be able to function in real life if she thinks she can live in a bubble of protection from someone hurting her delicate sensitivities. In some ways this is a powerful contrasts. There is family where there is acceptable and strengthening of backbone and character by the sibling rivalries that persist. Without realizing it, perhaps this movie is a meaningful criticism of the politically correct culture that weakens our fiber and a call to family to strengthen it. Put the challenges Agatha and her story of escaping Nazi Germany, learning a new language and a new life, and facing death and the strength she showed in contrast with the "triggered" response of students seemingly can't deal with the simple realities of seeing another person feel bad to the point of threatening a professor's job. A normal human being would simply experience the class, discount the remarks that the professor made, perhaps utter a "meh" and go one with their own life. The contrast of Agatha to the youth of today is damning.

I was a little worried by the low score of this movie and the one positive review, but I always like Justin Long and the trailer looked good. The director and or actors obviously have some people who dislike them regardless of their output as this film is an expertly written and performed piece of film making that hits on many levels. If you're rating this a 1 like 20% of the voters then you didn't watch the movie and your vote is a personal vendetta of some kind.

Anyway, on to my thoughts on the film.

This was a really moving and entertaining look into the lives of a family we can all relate to around the last days of their loved Grandmother (Mother, Great Grand Mother).

The acting was exceptional, and for anyone who hasn't yet been through the passing of a loved one passing from old age and general body failure, this is exactly how it goes. The film dealt with and touched on so many details of it, it felt real, human and heart felt. My eyes welled up a little but I think I'm just tired, or there's some dust in the air, or something....... But it wasn't dealt with a some sad tear jerker of a movie, it was simply a slice of this family's life and the movie centered around well formed characters with well formed personality quirks and importantly some insights in to the difficulties of modern life.

I did really like Justin's predicament as an impassioned professor trying to engage his class in the good old 60s/70s movie way, and how that back fired because of the world we now live in. And there was humor through it all, it was always funny even when it was about the sadder moments, what a fantastically well balanced and enjoyable movie this is to slip out without any fanfare.

This movie is really a 9, but I thought if I put that in my rating you'd think I was one of the film crew hyping a rubbish movie. This movie is so not that, it's a masterfully written acted and edited work of modern film making that perfectly hits its mark for all of its 93 minute run time.

I'll be watching out for the directors next movie and it's great to see Justin is choosing his projects well. Also good to see Fran Drescher doing a great straight role. Wasn't expecting that. She was perfect. They all were.

For me, watching and enjoying a movie requires that I either (1) like some of main characters or (2) like the story or (3) find the cinematography interesting. Most good movies all three are satisfied.

For this movie I wasn't able to find any of those. While I generally like Justin Long, here as an Adjunct Professor teaching writing, in this movie I didn't like him at all. The dialog is generally uninspired and bland. And I had forgotten how annoying Fran Drescher's nasal delivery is.

I had moderately good hopes for this movie but I found it to be mostly a waste of time. Life is too short to watch too many mediocre movies.

I watched it at home on DVD from my public library.

This is a great comedy that reminds a little bit of standup comedy. The scenes would be hard to do in standup because they involve a setup with circumstances and other characters - but it resembles standup in that each scene and the dialogue almost completely make up the substance and humor of the film. You have a well-intentioned millennial named Josh played by Justin Long who despite his best efforts simply cannot avoid putting his foot in his mouth. A large part of the humor deals with overly-sensitive and politically correct people, who Josh simply cannot avoid enraging - this comes out through taboo topics like sexual abuse, overly protected children, sexual philandering, and death. It's just hilarious to watch each scene spiral out of control with Josh coming out with mud on his face looking like the aggressor or bad guy, even though his intentions are good. He tries so hard to deal with each situation but just falls on his face and can never say the right thing, even when nearly one else has no problem doing so. So this dynamic is the setup for comedy; a series of blunders. I can see it compared to Woody Allen, mainly in Josh's hasty dialogue and frantic, victim mentality. But it's a little different, probably more like Amy Schumer - this is a little more of satire with dark, awkward, and deadpan humor. Josh has no redeeming qualities to speak of whereas Woody Allen's early characters seemed to be more cunning and find a way out on top. You won't get much of a story but if you like this type of humor you will be laughing out loud.

This is not a comedy.

This is a rare and honest look at the Millennial / Gen Y & Gen X. It is disturbing to say the least, and shows modern liberal American society in all it's dark glory. It was hard for me to watch this film, because I actually wanted to hit (yep) some of the characters in the movie for their over sensitivity and detachment from reality.

In real life - as Gen X will hopefully soon learn - there are no safe spaces. The only coherent character in the film was of Justin Long - a decent human being being forced to the corner by literally everyone around him. It is shocking to see how the liberal academia are behaving now. and I feel this was a good representation of what is going in colleges and universities around USA at the moment (Berkeley, anyone?).

Gen Y & Gen X had it too good now for too long. Their entitlement and self importance is over shadowing any effective processes that can be achieved - if given the chance - at any college or university classroom. These kids are unchallenged because of too much emotional safety regulations some pompous academics decided to implement in schools all over America. I always considered myself to be a left-wing liberal before understanding that I am actually now being moved to the center-right by these people. Young Americans are being thrown into smaller and smaller social groups, branding everyone else as their enemy for some reason. Yes, social media and smartphones have a lot to be blamed for, but not just. It is their parents and sometime their grandparents who forgot somewhere along the way that kids need to be constantly challenged intellectually in order for them to develop a meaningful and proactive life choices. The safety net that the liberal left has flanged across America will come tumbling down one day in such a crashing noise that we will probably feel the tidal waves of it until the end of this century.

10 years ago, when I became vegan, I thought I was doing the right thing, in line with my generation. Now I feel that the liberal-left agenda has been pushed too far. Only time will tell where it leads us.

This film is disturbing mirror into current American social trends. It is recommended viewing, if you have the stomach for it.

Justin Long is one of my all time favourite actors, and I would basically watch any film he is in. I am grateful to the writer / director of this film, Daniel Schechter, for giving him the opportunity to shine in this role,