a review of 灼热的马鞍

#84 (March 25/31) Confession time: Although I've seen enough of this film via clips and other references to feel like I've watched it, I've never seen it all the way through. And I have to say that I feel like I've really deprived myself of something truly wonderful by not sitting down to watch it all these years. I think part of the reason I hadn't was because I was uncomfortable with the racism (and also sexism) that I had heard was depicted in the film. But now that I've seen it all in context, it feels like Brooks and his team were making a fairly progressive statement about racial harmony. In some ways, it feels like a strange parallel to the irrational Tea Party animus of the Obama years, as well as the clowning incompetence of the first 100 days of the Trump administration.