Pssst, want to check out Meanwhile in our new look?
Information
- Year
- 2011
- Runtime
- 59 min.
- Director
- Hal Hartley
- Genre
- Drama
- Rating *
- 6.7
- Votes *
- 214
- Checks
- 81
- Favs
- 4
- Dislikes
- 2
- Favs/checks
- 4.9% (1:20)
- Favs/dislikes
- 2:1
Top comments
-
Siskoid
D.J. Mendel is a renaissance man without a rudder in Meanwhile, a one-hour wonder from Hal Hartley that truly encapsulates the notion of the jack of all trades who is master of none, much less master of his own destiny. Meanwhile seems to me an existential piece about what happens - both good and bad - while you sleep, while you spin your wheels, while you're not making your mind, or not looking in the right direction. Life goes on and you're not its main character. Indeed, Mendel's Joseph is hustling so he can BECOME a main character, but he's consistently stuck in supporting roles, helping everyone as a kind of subconscious drive despite his own ambitions. At the same time, there's certainly a sort of Messianic overlay on top of this (given the ending, perhaps, or I'm responding to American lit's other old saw, the failure of the American Dream), but if so, Joseph is a bumbling, everyday kind of Christ figure. Hartley fans will also enjoy this anti-epic for various Easter Eggs relating to the Hartleyverse. 7 months 1 week ago