The tension/discomfort is the point

Rating: Null/10 (16 September 2017)

**possible spoilers since we are talking about the movie** The general wide release reaction is the point--people "hate" the film because they hate being shown things they have ignored since time began. We love to see ourselves as "good," but our actions don't line up with that narrative. Mother and her house are how we position ourselves, as the protagonist, even though we are actually the guests, exploring, barging in, taking without giving back. The audience response rejecting the message of the film, and the difficult medicine of its third act, is that, while we shield ourselves from carnage and suffering, war, animal agriculture, poverty, etc. and live like we aren't complicit, we surely are as long as we continue to turn away. Aronofsky makes a film that is accepted more by critics/cinephiles and, as he described it, like a cruise missile sends it out into sheltered mainstream with big stars/carrots, to educate, to hold a mirror to us. Judging from the bewildered theater I saw the film in, he blew some minds.