October 27: Master

[kinetic_elaboration]

Stayed up late to watch Master, just finished it and now I really want to get to sleep. I liked it but I think I’d have to see it again and/or ruminate on it some more, probably both, to really say anything of worth about it.

The last third or so definitely didn’t go where I was expecting and I think that makes it harder for me to look at it as a whole and come up with some general thoughts.

It kept my attention, and I enjoyed the characters, and I thought it was consistently spooky and atmospheric, creepy and distressing in a way that gets under the skin without being reliant on jump scares or other big horror set pieces, which is in and of itself an achievement. It was very unnerving, I think.

A part of me wonders if maybe it was trying to do too many things at once because the witch-haunting story line was maybe a little underbaked? I say this tentatively. That just seemed like the least important thing at the end of the day, and similarly the end of Jasmine’s story seemed rather sudden. How much of what she experienced was supernatural? How much was in her head? How much was explained by misunderstanding? Does it matter?

Questions I’ll ask myself upon rewatching, I’m sure.

I thought it did a really good job of both skewering and actually interrogating higher ed institutional racism, from the white female professor speaking entirely in cringe-y buzzwords and hot takes, to the constant low-level irritants of racial microaggressions, to the bigger questions about legacy, belonging, progress, history, etc.

I saw a variety of influences, or possible influences, in it: Turn of the Screw (for the uncertainty around the supernatural), Hangsaman (the freshman experiencing alienation. Maybe a little The Shining, in the way the pictures were used at the end?

I thought Gail’s various discoveries in her house and Jasmine’s nightmares were legitimately very scary. I especially liked the hand touching Jasmin’s while she slept, and that vision of the black figure in outline in the hospital. Also the figure at the party who really seemed to be exactly the same as the one in the photo. (The others seemed like more analogies, but the first was literally the same, almost like a ghost?)

And finally, I did watch this movie in part because it was shot at VC, and I was excited to see all the familiar places. And I did I had fun! I was especially excited for the exterior shot of my own former dorm, where one of the side characters lived. It did draw me out of the story a little to know objectively what all of these places are (not Massachusetts lol), but it was worth it. My one biggest point of confusion is where was the dorm/Gail’s house shot? Because the building looks of a piece with the rest of the architecture but… I don’t know what this is. (Unlike the bridge building, which was also used, I’m pretty sure, I don’t think it’s something that was built after I graduated.) I guess it must have been somewhere else but I’m just curious as to why none of the campus buildings worked for that location. Maybe they needed something that sort of curled around itself and looked insular? But it was weird, for me specifically, not to know where to place it in relation to the rest of the buildings.

Anyway, it’s very late and I need to sleep. But I would definitely watch it again.