This film has incredible significance to me, as my first PTA film and as a young man. I was 16 and living for, at the time, a little over 2 months in a small town called Maple Ridge, British Columbia direct from a lifetime in Windsor, Ontario. I was maybe a few years in as a legitimately budding cinephile after years of loving movies, at least on a visceral and visual level. That was a very troubling and sad time though, as I had lost a wonderful girlfriend to a car wreck just a month or so before moving away from my friends and family. My first job there was at a place called Robitronics Video, seemingly one of the last mom and pop video shops in Canada. I put on a happy face and was hired on because of my enthusiasm for film, but since I wasn't old enough yet to work inside the store, I was hired on as a sign holder for outside the store. After my first shift, my amazing boss's son Mike (8 years older and also a film buff) threw me 20 bucks since I was just a high schooler with no money of my own. My first act with that 20 was to rent a couple movies called Man Bites Dog and Punch-Drunk Love (a perfect double bill, of course lol), since those were on my radar for quite some time, especially since I strangely grew fonder of Adam Sandler at that time. I won't make this lame ass tale longer, but I'll say that throughout PDL, I felt so entranced and in awe of it in a way I really never felt with a film before. I had fortunately seen a lot of great films in my young life, but this one hit my soul in an almost inexplicable way. By the end of that hour and a half sitting on the edge of my bed with my mouth open and in abject bewilderment and melancholy over what I just experienced, I ended up sobbing uncontrollably and unloading everything that I had a lot of trouble getting out because I thought it was the right thing to do. I felt so unburdened after that and was able to get along in the most wonderful way for the 6 years I lived there, before moving back to Windsor. The film truly did change my life, and made me appreciate cinema in a way that has exponentially grown at a rapid pace, and at 31, it's clips like this that make me love the art even more. Anyway, if you read all this, I appreciate your time. Long live cinema ❤
"i have love in my life that makes me stronger that anything you could imagine". I remeber this films the first time i saw was in my late grandparents appartment, where i used to come on weekends to stay after boarding school week studying abroad. My mother just died, my father was away in other country, and i had come back after the funeral to stay there and tv or something. I was staying there alone among all the stuff that was familiar to me from childhood. The newspaper and glasses where still on the table near the bed in the other room. Nothing was touched for years, and i was in the guest room on sleeping on the couch and this movie was on, and it made me fill with so much comfort. It was weird for my age, but it resonated with me so much, i rented it again the next weekend. After that was the begeiing of great era of american indipendent films, with clever wrting, witty dialogs, superb acting. This was the film that set it off diffeent kind of cinema for me and made PTA my favorite director. Little did i know that There Will Be Blood is comming to theater soon and my perspective on movies would change once again forever.
My favorite scene is the beat down after the car accident, when he finally channels that rage appropriately and for a good purpose. I found it super romantic.
This flicks about Superman. Barry's suit in Blue with a red tie. He learns how to FLY anywhere on Earth for the rest of his life. He breaks the handle of an "unbreakable" plunger and slams a car door shut so hard the camera shakes. His love interest is Leena Leonard, L.L. like Lois Lane. Pieces of his homeworld make him freak out like, like Kryptonite to Superman, which is why he's always uncomfortable around his sisters and goes nuts when they're present. Just mention his sisters and he'll beat up a bathroom. His favourite DJ is DJ JUSTICE because he "tells it like it is." Truth, Justice and the American Way. He has an arch-enemy with a 60's villain name, Mattress Man. The story of Superman starts with a crash from his pod to earth while this film opens with a car crash leaving him the harmonium, his fortress of solitude. Superman is from another planet. Barry has "seven sisters" which is the name of a distant star cluster known as Pleadies. Solar flares who up when Leena is around, Superman gets his power from the sun. And while he's mostly in blue. the end scene is her walking in in Red and hugging him from behind, looking like a cape.
@@ct6852 tough nut to crack! I can break down The Shining for you but Eyes Wide Shut ive only scratched the surface. I can tell you how MacReady is The Thing in The Thing, how’d that be?
I recently came across this film. And, it was dynamite! One of Sandlers best. Went in cold not knowing a thing about it. An excellent picture! PTA does it again. 👏
Punch-Drunk Love was the film that changed my outlook on Adam Sandler because before seeing this film I was in the group of people who wasn’t a big fan of his comedies outside of Happy Gilmore and Wedding Singer but the moment I watched this film my opinion went from hate to respect because Punch-Drunk Love is one of PTA’s greatest films and personal one of my favorite movies of all time.
I think it's probably Sandler's best acting...Uncut Gems is close...but I think the tightly wound intensity of Barry's character in PDL is much deeper and more nuanced than the character in UCG.
When you see how all his sisters talk to him and about him all the anger makes complete sense. It's like they won't allow him to actually be himself for more than six seconds.
In the original screenplay, Donowitz had a whole flashback sequence set in Boston in which he says goodbye to the neighborhood before shipping off, and he has a scene with an old woman from the neighborhood who gives him his baseball bat. The old woman was going to be played by Cloris Leachman, too! I can visualize it as much as I want, but I would have loved to see that scene in the film if Sandler wasn't doing Funny People.
Didn’t PTA get the idea for Adam doing this after watching sketch “The Denise Show” from SNL? I thought I heard that in an interview with him but can’t be sure.
