King Richard (Reinaldo Marcus Green, November 19,2021) Movie • Page 2

The mom might be, but they’re definitely not “real” Witnesses; they take the parts they want and then do what they want as well. Since they’re not baptized they’re not ever officially dealt with like a real member would be.

 

The dad kept mentioning Kingdom Hall and it was giving me flashbacks. I definitely wasn't expecting it.

 

Haha, me too, are you a former member as well? I think the dad just allowed it, don’t think he ever officially converted.

 

My grandparents on my mother's side were Witnesses but we weren't. It didn't stop them from trying to convert us every time we were over their house though.

 

One of my friends growing up was JW and his dad used to try and convert us all the time. It was weird.

 

it’s a cult, no?

 

Yes. It is a really sad thing. My grandparents converted when my mother was growing up and almost all of their six kids ended up with a really strained relationship for a long time. They technically aren't supposed to socialize with non-Witnesses but my grandparents broke that rule.

 

Oh I can imagine haha

 

Yepppp

 

it always seemed slightly between mormonism and scientology in levels of cult to me. definitely sad.

 

Our family had to take our grandfather across three states to find a surgeon that would do heart surgery without a blood transfusion, because that is against their religion. Others have endangered or negligently let their kids die for similar reasons.

 

Now back on hbo max so I have a chance to see it.

This was fine. Smith was fantastic.

I couldn’t care less about sports so I had no idea of Venus would win at the end, I just knew she would become famous at some point but no clue when or how she won and such.

I like that the movie shifts towards giving Venus a voice and ownership around the last hour of the movie. I saw a lot of rumblings about the movie about it’s all about Richard, but the movie clearly shifts it’s focus and literally ends with people saying Venus did it and everyone chanting Venus. I thought it was handled really well and knowing the sisters were exec producers it feels super natural that they honor their father and show his part and then as anyone growing up, start to become more on their own and outgrowing the foundation laid by their parents.

and yea, JW is a cult. It obviously not a huge part of the film but it bugged me a little. But whatever, that’s clearly part of what really happened and how they were raised.

hearing Welcome to Paradise was a real surprise, but a welcome one.

 

I was personally really surprised at the criticism of this centering on Richard and not Venus & Serena given that they were involved in making the movie and clearly wanted to tell their story in this way. Just seemed like a lot of people out there forgetting that people should be allowed to tell their own stories in whatever way they think is best.

 

To be honest, last fall I had the same thought at first. Like, why focus on the dad of two famous women? It wasn’t a major thing or made me not want to see it, but I did think it without any context. But when I learned that the sisters were exec producers it didn’t bother me at all. And now seeing it, it totally makes sense as the story they were telling and even grapples with how he made himself the focus inadvertently and then it shifts towards Venus being the focus more. Again, really well handled to me.

 

Yeah I mean it's definitely mostly coming from a place of people firing off tweets without knowing how involved in the movie they were. I'm sure some of it is probably in spite of that fact though.

 

I think this feels like a classic coming-of-age story and I personally really enjoyed it. Honestly, a lot of the movies this year didn't captivate me in an emotional sense and this one did. It's a movie that doesn't pull any tricks and that's completely fine with me--sometimes good acting and a heartwarming story is enough

 

This was real bad. What is it about sports biopics that they so often fail to say *anything* interesting about either the specific athletes or the sport itself? There is a particular kind of irony in these movies that try to beat you over the head with the “overcoming adversity” theme while doing nothing to show us what that is actually like in the moment. Richard is vindicated at every single turn because in 2022 we can look back and know that he was vindicated overall. Structuring the movie that way kills any sort of dramatic tension, and does a disservice to what it probably actually felt like for him to do such controversial things like not allowing his daughters to play in the junior leagues, or butting heads with the coaches in the ways that he did, or being so overly confident when dealing with the press, when he didn’t truly have any sort of actual sense of whether it would pay off how he wanted or not.

 

lmao

 

first i’m hearing about him tonight tbqh

 

You come at the King Richard, you best not miss

 

B-

 

Lol

 

This world is upside-down I stg