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Uncut gems based on true events12/29/2023 The film smartly places the highest stakes on Howard, gambling everything on dicey odds on a basketball game, all while placing the audience in a strange position – at once immersed in his emotional viewpoint, and seeing the camera observe him from the eye level of the loan sharks forced to watch the game with him. The most memorable set piece in Uncut Gems simply sees a risky bet unfold. The Safdies and their frequent collaborator Ronald Bronstein (who writes and/or edits all their features since Daddy Longlegs) work hard to make the audience understand the necessity and compulsion driving these actions, partly by exploring the risks of addiction in the script. Perhaps Connie is just addicted to being the smartest guy in the room, revelling in his ability to bend others to his will. Good Time perhaps shows notable exception, as protagonist Connie Nikas (a grimy, frantic Robert Pattinson) hustles or hurts everybody, but always for the sake of his brother. Heaven Knows What, based on the true story of its lead actress, grapples with heroin addiction, and the various cycles that spring from it. In Uncut Gems it’s gambling in The Pleasure of Being Robbed it’s kleptomania. Though capable of committing monstrous acts, these characters aren’t monsters – the acts performed are often rooted in a form of addiction. In the case of Howard Ratner, the central figure in the filmmakers’ latest film Uncut Gems, the man is cheating failure and/or death by staying on the move, constantly taking bigger risks both to save himself, and to satisfy a compulsion that he simply can’t shake. ![]() ![]() Whether it’s Good Time’s bank robber scrambling to accrue the bail money to get his brother out of prison, or the lead of Heaven Knows What simply trying to get through the next day, in one way or another, the filmmakers’ last four features have been focused on the preciousness and precariousness of living on borrowed time, each character clawing to hold on to something so specific, often at the expense of everyone around them. ![]() To be a protagonist in a film by the Safdie brothers is to consistently struggle to keep your head above water, as your greatest weaknesses continually threaten to drag you into the depths.
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