Spring Breakers

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🎙️ EPISODE 448: 04.19.22 W冢h †hê VïÐêð Vêr§ïðñ BELOW This film lived in my subconscious before I ever saw a frame of it. During the many "sound collages" of the live podcast/internet radio program, The Best Show with Tom Scharpling, a sample of somebody (who turned out to be James Franco from this movie) mysteriously and ominously whisper-uttering the phrase "spring break" over and over. It's somehow completely hilarious and totally frightening at the same time. This movie begs the viewer to choose a side. To love it or hate it. Is it exploitative?

Yes. OK, sure, then why is that so? Is it trying to prove any larger point, or does it exist simply as a statement, a testament to American nihilism? The characters are not deep. The ones with a stronger moral center tap out before the others, but the only lesson the ones who remain learn is that it's easy to defeat Gucci Mane and his crew in a violent gun fight at his secluded Floridian mansion.

After sitting with it for awhile, basking in it the aftermath of its neon glow, I believe it to be a stroke of genius. It feels like an artifact that wasn't meant for critical consumption. And in that sense, it's perfect. In a certain strand of saturated light, it's the perfect American Movie. Everything which it is and seeks to be is encompassed in its every frame: blown-out, loud, unforgiving; in Korine's own words: more like a feeling than a film.

There's no redeeming qualities or lessons learned (like in stilted poetics of The Beach Bum), yet... the ending is still happy. Even the central conflict with rapper-turned-actor Gucci feels completely manufactured and random. It could have been anything, or nothing at all. The vibe prevails either way.

In Harmony Korine's Florida, "the world is perfect, like it's never gonna end." It's a place you might never want to visit, but you'll always want to watch.

ｐａｒｔ ｏｆ ｔｈｅ ＲＡＮＫＩＮＧ • ＨＡＲＭＯＮＹ • ＫＯＲＩＮＥ ｓｅｒｉｅｓ

CHRONOLOGICALLY
⫷ EPISODE 447 - (YOU ARE HERE) - EPISODE 449 ⫸

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Spring Breakers is a 2013 American crime film written and directed by Harmony Korine and starring James Franco, Vanessa Hudgens, Selena Gomez, Ashley Benson, and Rachel Korine. Gomez, Hudgens, Benson, and Korine portray four college-aged girls on their spring break in Florida where they meet an eccentric local drug dealer (Franco) who helps them in a time of desperation, and their eventual descent into a world of drugs, crime, and violence. It was released on September 4, 2012.