{"id":6120,"date":"2022-10-06T11:48:57","date_gmt":"2022-10-06T15:48:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/?p=6120"},"modified":"2023-03-26T20:07:57","modified_gmt":"2023-03-27T00:07:57","slug":"falling-in-love-at-the-end-of-the-world-in-wim-wenders-submergence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/falling-in-love-at-the-end-of-the-world-in-wim-wenders-submergence\/","title":{"rendered":"Falling in love at the end of the world, in Wim Wenders’ Submergence"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u2b50<\/span>\u2b50<\/span>\u2b50<\/span>\u2b50<\/span><\/p>\n\n\t\n<\/svg>\n<\/span>\n\n\n\t\n<\/svg>\n<\/span><\/span>\n\n\t\n<\/svg>\n<\/span>\n\n\n\t\n<\/svg>\n<\/span><\/span>\n\n\t\n<\/svg>\n<\/span>\n\n\n\t\n<\/svg>\n<\/span><\/span>\n\n\t\n<\/svg>\n<\/span>\n\n\n\t\n<\/svg>\n<\/span><\/span>\n\n\t\n<\/svg>\n<\/span>\n\n\n\t\n<\/svg>\n<\/span><\/span>Rating: 4 out of 5.<\/span><\/div>\n\n\n

Ladies, if your fella isn’t returning your calls, maybe he’s a secret agent on a tippy-top secret mission for queen and country. Fellas, if your girl isn’t liking your posts, maybe she has zero bars because she’s doing science stuff on the ocean floor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I went into Submergence<\/em> fully aware of the generally negative reviews, but I’m willing to watch anything by Wim Wenders, who directed at least two of my most beloved movies: Wings of Desire<\/em> and Until the End of the World<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I suppose I can see how many (most?) people would find Submergence<\/em> frustrating, but to me it is intriguing update to one of Wenders’ longest-running themes: falling in love, despite — or perhaps accelerated by — looming death. In Wings of Desire<\/em>, an immortal being contemplates earthly concerns like suicide and the legacy of Nazi Germany, and chooses mortal love. The characters in The End of Violence<\/em> and Until the End of the World<\/em> live under different kinds of technological swords of Damocles: drones in the former, and nuclear disaster in the latter. After all, it’s right there in the titles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Alicia<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In Submergence<\/em>, two beautiful people (Alicia Vikander and James McAvoy) meet cute and fall in love, but each is haunted by their own particular view of immanent environmental apocalypse: hers primarily scientific and his political. Lest the Anthropocene Extinction and potable water crisis be insufficient cause for existential anxiety, there is also an eerily prescient prediction of a virus not unlike COVID-19. Submergence<\/em> was released in 2017.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She is more optimistic than he about mitigating the disasters sure to come in the near future. Given how his mission goes drastically awry, with him a powerless prisoner while she remains actively in control, perhaps she is right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The one key Wenders ingredient that is lacking in Submergence<\/em> is his usual A+ primo taste in music. So many of his past movies have utterly superb soundtracks, particularly the sublime Until the End of the World<\/em>, the cd of which was effectively one of the best mixtapes of the 1990s, and famously outsold the movie. But the score for Submergence<\/em> is disappointingly generic and overbearing, and the only needledrops are the classical music that Danielle blasts through her bluetooth speaker.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ladies, if your fella isn’t returning your calls, maybe he’s a secret agent on a tippy-top secret mission for queen and country. Fellas, if your girl isn’t liking your posts, maybe she has zero bars because she’s doing science stuff on the ocean floor. I went into Submergence fully aware of the generally negative reviews, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6121,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,2],"tags":[1772,2035,2036,578,2034],"class_list":["post-6120","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-4-stars","category-movies","tag-1772","tag-alicia-vikander","tag-covid-19","tag-james-mcavoy","tag-wim-wenders"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/submergence-beach.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa9lhB-1AI","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2042,"url":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/christopher-nolans-fugue-state-inception\/","url_meta":{"origin":6120,"position":0},"title":"Christopher Nolan’s Fugue State: Inception","author":"Chad Ossman","date":"July 21, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"In his 1999 essay Celluloid Vs. Digital, Roger Ebert cites studies equating the experience of watching a movie to entering a fugue state: \"film creates reverie, video creates hypnosis.\" In other words, experiencing a film in the traditional manner, projected at 24 frames per second in a darkened theater, affects\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "4 Stars"","block_context":{"text":"4 Stars","link":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/category\/ratings\/4-stars\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Inception","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/inception-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/inception-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/inception-1.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/inception-1.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/inception-1.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":906,"url":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/vantage-point\/","url_meta":{"origin":6120,"position":1},"title":"The Rashomon effect in Pete Travis’ Vantage Point","author":"Chad Ossman","date":"July 6, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Vantage Point is an awesome technical achievement, and I don't mean that to damn it with faint praise. Director Pete Travis and writer Barry Levy demonstrate excellent plotting, spatial sense, editing, logistics, and continuity. As a thriller it moves forward relentlessly, and feels comprehensible, self-contained, and very satisfying. 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Harry (Anthony Edwards) and Julie's (Mare Winningham) hellacious night on Los Angeles' titular Miracle Mile suggests Before Sunrise crossed with Children of Men crossed with After Hours, but without the reprieve of a hopeful ending. Unless you\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "4 Stars"","block_context":{"text":"4 Stars","link":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/category\/ratings\/4-stars\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Miracle Mile","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/miracle-mile.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/miracle-mile.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/miracle-mile.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/miracle-mile.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/miracle-mile.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":129,"url":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/red-eye\/","url_meta":{"origin":6120,"position":4},"title":"Red Eye","author":"Chad Ossman","date":"January 26, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"I had heard Red Eye was a refreshingly unpretentious thriller that played on Americans' changed relationship with air travel in a post 9\/11 world. While technically true, it's actually a very disappointing runaround decidedly lacking in the most routine pleasures that come with thrillers. Where's the expected third-act twist? Is\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "2 Stars"","block_context":{"text":"2 Stars","link":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/category\/ratings\/2-stars\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Red Eye","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/01\/red-eye.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/01\/red-eye.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/01\/red-eye.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/01\/red-eye.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/01\/red-eye.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":8253,"url":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/damien-chazelles-babylon-is-not-very-loving-as-love-letters-go\/","url_meta":{"origin":6120,"position":5},"title":"Damien Chazelle’s Babylon is not very loving, as love letters go","author":"Chad Ossman","date":"March 26, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Like most filmmakers and movie buffs, Babylon director Damien Chazelle would appear to have mixed feelings about Hollywood.","rel":"","context":"In "1 Star"","block_context":{"text":"1 Star","link":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/category\/ratings\/1-star\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Babylon","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/babylon.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/babylon.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/babylon.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/babylon.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/babylon.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6120","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6120"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6120\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8291,"href":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6120\/revisions\/8291"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6121"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6120"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6120"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chadossman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6120"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}