What is love?
This is by far the most underrated movie I have ever seen! Let me tell you why in my short analysis (spoiler free btw).
In all honesty, after the first five minutes I genuinely wanted to turn it off, it was extremely graphic with nudity and I had no idea wtf I was looking at. But I am so grateful that I did not, because the story just kept getting better and better. By the time the credits rolled, my mouth was literally hanging wide open.
The movie shows some really strong parallels to Trainspotting. Remember how Wolf of Wall Street has an incredibly strong resemblence to Scarface, but simply replaced selling drugs with selling stocks? Well, this is what Don Jon does with Trainspotting: it replaced drug addiction with pornography addiction. I love this, because this makes that the message of the movie changes, and even improves it in my opinion. Where Trainspotting is a movie that is essentially about someone that learns to stand up for himself, Don Jon is a character study about a young man who slowly learns what it actually means to love someone.
In the beginning of the movie, the protagonist (Jon) seems perfectly content with his lifestyle, while the viewers are probably all strongly averted to all the red flags they see. This part of the movie is written like a comedy (probably to avoid it getting too heavy and/or to underline the absurdism of it all?), while it slowly switches into a more serious drama movie towards the end. This is because at the same time, Jon slowly starts to realise that he might have a problem with pornography and that something is going wrong in his love life.
What I like about the movie, is that it does not label pornography as inherently bad. Instead, it shows in a nuanced way how it can in some cases alter ones perception of sex, which will eventually lead to unfulfilling relationships. Interestingly enough, regarding this matter the movie briefly compares porn with romantic movies, as they too can shape someones views of romance for the worse. So the movie is not anti-porn, but instead it is about having realistic ideas of love and sex: both should include give and take, and not be about only one of them.
While Jon is obviously one of the biggest walking red flags I have ever seen, he is not necessarily depicted as the bad guy: both his and Barbara her character are given a lot of nuance. So have the parents and friends of Jon, but they are less relevant to the story.
Still the movie definitely is not without flaws. While I like the message a lot more than that of Trainspotting, I think the latter simply executed everything better. I think a big part of this is because that both films don't really take themselves seriously in the first half. This is however more fitting in the context of substance abuse than in that of porn addiction. Even if you ignore that, the writers went a bit too far on multiple occasions with the comedy if you ask me. Also, was the product placement for swiffer really necessary? That one was so bad that it almost became funny 😭
I can really encourage everyone to give this movie a try!
What is love?
This is by far the most underrated movie I have ever seen! Let me tell you why in my short analysis (spoiler free btw).
In all honesty, after the first five minutes I genuinely wanted to turn it off, it was extremely graphic with nudity and I had no idea wtf I was looking at. But I am so grateful that I did not, because the story just kept getting better and better. By the time the credits rolled, my mouth was literally hanging wide open.
The movie shows some really strong parallels to Trainspotting. Remember how Wolf of Wall Street has an incredibly strong resemblence to Scarface, but simply replaced selling drugs with selling stocks? Well, this is what Don Jon does with Trainspotting: it replaced drug addiction with pornography addiction. I love this, because this makes that the message of the movie changes, and even improves it in my opinion. Where Trainspotting is a movie that is essentially about someone that learns to stand up for himself, Don Jon is a character study about a young man who slowly learns what it actually means to love someone.
In the beginning of the movie, the protagonist (Jon) seems perfectly content with his lifestyle, while the viewers are probably all strongly averted to all the red flags they see. This part of the movie is written like a comedy (probably to avoid it getting too heavy and/or to underline the absurdism of it all?), while it slowly switches into a more serious drama movie towards the end. This is because at the same time, Jon slowly starts to realise that he might have a problem with pornography and that something is going wrong in his love life.
What I like about the movie, is that it does not label pornography as inherently bad. Instead, it shows in a nuanced way how it can in some cases alter ones perception of sex, which will eventually lead to unfulfilling relationships. Interestingly enough, regarding this matter the movie briefly compares porn with romantic movies, as they too can shape someones views of romance for the worse. So the movie is not anti-porn, but instead it is about having realistic ideas of love and sex: both should include give and take, and not be about only one of them.
While Jon is obviously one of the biggest walking red flags I have ever seen, he is not necessarily depicted as the bad guy: both his and Barbara her character are given a lot of nuance. So have the parents and friends of Jon, but they are less relevant to the story.
Still the movie definitely is not without flaws. While I like the message a lot more than that of Trainspotting, I think the latter simply executed everything better. I think a big part of this is because that both films don't really take themselves seriously in the first half. This is however more fitting in the context of substance abuse than in that of porn addiction. Even if you ignore that, the writers went a bit too far on multiple occasions with the comedy if you ask me. Also, was the product placement for swiffer really necessary? That one was so bad that it almost became funny 😭
I can really encourage everyone to give this movie a try!
