Hanna, what did you think of Daddy A Bedtime Story, and do you have anything similar to rec? I had some ethical issues with it that are not uncommon in films from the 70s but still really liked it, and thought it was so... genuine and personal. It was like reading confessional poetry, but in film format.
probably the same as yours lol when i watched it i began writing some thoughts because how can you watch this and not have your brain running wildly, but mostly thinking this that you said, of how personal it is. it’s a hard watch in a lot of ways, but at the same time not so much because of how niki decided to tell and show us this story. a lot of the issues one might have are essentially what you said, it’s a movie made in the 70s and very much a reflection of this period and i think you should view it as such. even reading about the movie, the reception and the background of niki & peter whitehead gives you a picture of the times: some people had breakdowns, others focused on the nude women. whitehead himself seemed to have seen it mostly as a way of niki to showcase her sexual fantasies. some of what i wrote as soon as i finished watching it:
i knew this would be upsetting because of course, and the movie wants to be upsetting but i guess i wasn't ready for the wave of deep sadness i would feel throughout. sad sad sad sad almost to the point of tears. niki's voice is the voice you hear, she speaks directly to daddy, who only looks (and looks and looks). he's dead. she has killed him, as she vowed to do. and yet... it is dark and it is twisted but i couldn't in any way watch this as a wacko 70s experimental film like some might (or worse). it's just completely soaked in sadness. there's a lot more too, but for /me/ viewing them this tends to be the overarching emotion. but then aren't all of these experiments on trauma? it might be difficult to look past the labels put into these movies, this is experimental and avant gard because dealing with a taboo subject makes it so. it is also exploitative. a movie that makes this traumatic experience more explicit is a horror or simply added to the exploitation bin. this makes so that people might watch these movies expecting one thing or making up in their minds what the content is gonna be: gross, exploitative, wrong. it is a bit of that, but not just.. maybe i'm not making much sense, i think i'm just trying to say that it might be hard to look past the labels added to these films and that is understandable. but for me it is easy and that's why they break my heart, every single time. lynn in daddy's deadly darling, molly in the witch who came from the sea, and so many others. when they work (or maybe work isn't the right word...) it's because they are given their space, as niki has here. it is her movie, it's her writing, it's her art. it's her experience and it's what she wanted and felt she needed to do at that point in the 70s. my sadness isn't patronizing and it isn't meant to be an avaliation of the movie. i just see niki here and so much comes to mind. so many artists, so many women, so many girls. she stands up and she looks and she talks and she does everything she hoped to do, all those years. i hope it meant something.
as for similar movies, when it comes to the subject i kinda gave what i have to you when you made a post on your blog once. i had a private list of movies and it was mainly because of the characters’ trauma than the way the movie deals w/ it but i ended up deleting it. and as this movie was, this is very personal too so i think maybe that’s why i ended up giving up. but for more confessional type of movies i’d say look for experimental movies like hatsukoi. glad you liked it.
