Indignation (2016)

I would like to applaud the person who wrote the summary for Indignation since it peaked my curiosity and got me to watch the film. However, after the end credits rolled I went back and reread it only to feel somewhat shortchanged. Here it is:"In 1951, Marcus, a working-class Jewish student from New Jersey, attends a small Ohio college, where he struggles with sexual repression and cultural disaffection, amid the ongoing Korean War."Let's begin with the sexual repression angle. There is almost none. The greatest form of repression comes from within the main character, Marcus. He is sexually inexperienced and therefore doesn't know how to deal with the forward ways of a fellow classmate named Olivia. That's all it is. Nobody tells him he can't go on dates. Even his parents encourage him to do so, albeit in a smothering sort of way. He is later told that he can no longer see Olivia but not because of "you are jewish she isn't" or "not before you are married" arguments. The reason is laughable but we'll get back to that in a moment. The only possible manifestation of sexual repression that could occur but doesn't is regarding the theatrical roommate who is referred to as "queer" although this is never confirmed since he is after all only a secondary character and we need time for...Cultural disaffection? Where? The exchange with the college dean? It takes up a great big chunk of screen time only to go in circles, never land any lasting point of contention on Marcus's behalf and ends with what I considered to be a joke. How about the atheist amongst jews and christians aspect? Nope, that's never tackled either. In fact, Marcus even goes and joins the jewish fraternity, a lazy plot device to get him kicked out of college later.As for the Korean War, it might be the most important part of the narrative but in a roundabout sort of way the likes I have never seen before. Crudely summed up it goes something like this: Young men die in the war; Marcus's father is upset by this and at his son's departure for college; Marcus's father become erratic and temperamental (this is delivered to us secondhand so we don't even feel invested in this part of the story); Marcus's mother wants to divorce him; she agrees not to BUT, and this is where we enter soap opera territory, only if Marcus stops seeing Olivia because she cut her wrist; Olivia leaves suddenly; Marcus is in distress over this and drops the F bomb in front of the dean; Marcus doesn't attend a mandatory chapel session once and gets kicked out of college; he goes to war and dies. Still with me? If these events seem like they don't connect naturally to one another it's because they don't. The Korean war is used as a means to an end rather than as having any meaningful impact on the characters throughout the film.For the entire duration of my viewing I was waiting desperately for it to pick up a proper pace, to deal with something more than just the outré reaction of getting a bj on a first date in a car but, sadly, it it never delivered. I will give it this: the title is apt though not for the movie itself but rather for the lingering sensation one gets as the screen fades to black.

all good the ending complete garbage OK they want more its crap its so dark and it,.... this move is so bad so bad and so bad so i will keep on and on till i get to five lines there are some movies who doesn't deserve five lines i wonder nobody comments anymore or bothers i just look up the basics of movie wikipedia has better ..ok got my five lines

The young man, Marcus Messner, was fortunate to attend college instead of being drafted by the military because of the Korean war. Marcus had huge potential for his academic journey due to his ambitious reason to leave his small town and begin his higher education.After arriving at the college, he slowly begins to experience cultural shock. One experience after another, Marcus begins to become unease and his studies are no longer a top priority. A young beautiful woman, Olivia Hutton, distorts his thinking after she relieves Marcus from some sexual tension.Marcus' encounter with the college dean is an amazing scene. The young man displays principles he believes in and not any organized religion. The dean begins to provoke Marcus indirectly about being an atheist. As Marcus tries to retreat from the dean's office, Marcus continued to slice through the dean's attempt to make him fold. The dean would not let Marcus leave gently.Ultimately, Marcus failed to "fit in" and throughout the movie his reason and choices determine his unprecedented outcome, which is not college. Sprinkle some random chance on Marcus' particular situation that resulted from his experience at the college, the young boy's destiny was far from his expectations after his initial small hometown escape.

I've not read the Philip Roth novel on which "Indignation" is based, but I have read other Roth novels, and I must say that watching this film pretty accurately captured the claustrophobic tone of the Roth with which I'm familiar.Logan Lerman plays a sheltered Jewish boy who experiences his first taste of a larger world when he gets a scholarship to a strict religious college. We're stuck in this kid's head for the entire film, and it's not a pleasant place to be. He's uptight, prudish, and overly-critical, holding himself and others to strict moral codes that have never been tested. He butts heads with the college dean, played by Tracy Letts, who bullies him and makes assumptions about him, but who also exposes some of his very real flaws. It's not a great film, but it is a conversation starter. It's about what happens when a young person realizes that the world doesn't necessarily always work the way he wants it to and being unable to cope with that reality. One of the things I liked best about it is how the movie upends our initial assumptions about the main character. We assume we are meant to sympathize with him and be on his side against the injustice he expects from being Jewish in a Christian school, but instead we realize that he's his own worst enemy and that the greatest threat comes from his own unbending rigidity.Grade: B+