I'm Still Here

Some thoughts on Casey Affleck and Joaquin Phoenix' documentary. I haven't seen it yet, but I am utterly fascinated by it.

-I've never been a big fan of Joaquin Phoenix, more so of Casey Affleck. I think what they've done shows that they are very intelligent people and some of the most interesting people working in the movies today. It takes a lot of guts to do something like this and even if it turns out that the emperor has no clothes, the work Affleck and Phoenix put into this, is at least something to be respected. And it just is a very original way to make a movie

- Two years ago, Joaquin Phoenix announced the end of his acting career, to pursue a career as a rapper. He also appeared to have a complete meltdown. His good friend and brother-in-law Casey Affleck said he would make a documentary about this stage in Phoenix' life. Now the documentary has come out they admitted it was all a hoax and that it was all performance art, while simultaneously satirizing a bit the media's obsession with stars. I have not seen this documentary and I do believe that it's probably quite boring what is on the screen. I don't believe that that's the point. This is probably a rare movie where the reaction of the society on it and what point that makes about the society is more important then the movie itself. The movie is hardly important for the discussion, but without the there probably wouldn't be any discussion.

- To me it's slightly weird that so many people really believed that this was real, especially after Affleck announced he was going to make a documentary about it. If only because of common sense. Casey Affleck is married to Joaquin Phoenix' sister. The Phoenixes have already lost one sibling in River Phoenix due to a meltdown. Surely Summer Phoenix wouldn't agree with her husband exploiting her brother's meltdown. This fact, that the media were so eager to accept the fact that Phoenix really lost it is reason enough for this movie to exist. It really shows that the media is sometimes more interested in conflict then in the truth. This performance took two years. It was filmed in public places, a lot of people took part in it, some knowingly, some not and not a single media outlet in the whole world reporting about this was willing to dig really deep to find the truth. Or they tried, but failed which may even be worse.

- While most media and people really believed that Phoenix had a meltdown, almost everybody was making fun of or with Phoenix. When at the Oscars Natalie Portman and Ben Stiller (who were in on the joke) imitated Phoenix everybody was talking about what a great job they did. There was no one who mentioned that it is not really nice, to put it mildly, to make fun of a person's rough time. Especially not in front of his peers. Now it turns out that it was a hoax, some of this same journalists direct their anger at Phoenix for making them worried about him.