Barely "a movie", yet so much more than a movie. My Dinner With Andre is the greatest podcast episode you've ever listened to, or the greatest book you've ever read, but in the format of a film. You may ask yourself, why would I want to watch a 2 hour film that is literally just two men having a conversation over dinner? Well, because the conversation they are having is perhaps the most profound one I've ever heard, and perhaps the precise type of conversation in which no higher tier of profundity is even possible. This is basically an existential instruction manual - at the very least, designed to remind you to rethink things, in the same manner that a psychedelic experience would.
The most powerful part of this film is in the manner that it is one of few pieces of media that has the power to make time seem much less relevant than it does on a day to day basis. Though this was made over 40 years ago, it feels as if it were written for us, today. The themes and ideas discussed transcend the concept of time and era, thus making the movie itself timeless in some form. While I say that, it also feels mind-blowingly relevant in regards to where we are currently heading as a society, including the progressions of technology, and how it's effecting us, etc. Every lick of the conversation conjures wonder, intrigue, and naturally, universal reflection.
It was a bold move for the filmmaker(s) to carry on producing such a "minimal" film with such maximal concepts. The team must have had the same level of confidence that lead Andre Gregory portrays in the film to know that this would be something worth making. I see now that the film was also written by its two leads Andre Gregory and Wallace Shawn, making this whole thing all the more real and intense. This has put Andre Gregory on the map for me, as an instant legend.
"It's inconceivable" how effective this little slice of philosophical offering manages to be. It really feels like it transcends the expectations of what one generally attains from consuming a film, or any single piece of media, for that matter. I absolutely cannot imagine how most of the world swallowed this epic pill in 1981, before the internet, before the access, before everything that defines our world now. I have a feeling this is something I will be returning to more than once throughout the remainder of my life. This has entered the category of a small handful of films that were so profound that I started bawling either just before the closing credits hit, or in the moment that they hit. I can't even call it a masterpiece because that word doesn't feel right... that word correlates with a piece of art, but this isn't just a piece of art; it's more than that.
The most powerful part of this film is in the manner that it is one of few pieces of media that has the power to make time seem much less relevant than it does on a day to day basis. Though this was made over 40 years ago, it feels as if it were written for us, today. The themes and ideas discussed transcend the concept of time and era, thus making the movie itself timeless in some form. While I say that, it also feels mind-blowingly relevant in regards to where we are currently heading as a society, including the progressions of technology, and how it's effecting us, etc. Every lick of the conversation conjures wonder, intrigue, and naturally, universal reflection.
It was a bold move for the filmmaker(s) to carry on producing such a "minimal" film with such maximal concepts. The team must have had the same level of confidence that lead Andre Gregory portrays in the film to know that this would be something worth making. I see now that the film was also written by its two leads Andre Gregory and Wallace Shawn, making this whole thing all the more real and intense. This has put Andre Gregory on the map for me, as an instant legend.
"It's inconceivable" how effective this little slice of philosophical offering manages to be. It really feels like it transcends the expectations of what one generally attains from consuming a film, or any single piece of media, for that matter. I absolutely cannot imagine how most of the world swallowed this epic pill in 1981, before the internet, before the access, before everything that defines our world now. I have a feeling this is something I will be returning to more than once throughout the remainder of my life. This has entered the category of a small handful of films that were so profound that I started bawling either just before the closing credits hit, or in the moment that they hit. I can't even call it a masterpiece because that word doesn't feel right... that word correlates with a piece of art, but this isn't just a piece of art; it's more than that.