BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – Sophomore Cinema and Media Studies power couple Rumi Saito and Kyle Reynolds are having difficulty selecting a dogshit film they will spend most of the runtime pretending to love and understand no matter how terrible it is, annoyed roommates confirm.
“Tonight’s choice is difficult: ‘Citizen Kane’ or ‘American Beauty.’ I can’t decide which movie about men with mental health issues we should lose interest in halfway through. How do you choose between a post-mortem therapy session treasure hunt or the story of a creepy dad who’s trying to bang teenage girls played by a guy that was trying to bang teenage boys? They’re both such… poetically tragic portrayals of Western masculinity’s collapse, I think,” said Saito while trying to look like she gave a shit. “Most of my peers are content watching the same mindless drivel cranked out for the MCU, but I’d honestly rather dissect classic films like ‘The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie’ because the performances in that movie are far more powerful than any superhero.”
Reynolds expressed similar devotion to the power of cinematic storytelling.
“I get physically ill seeing realistic depictions of interpersonal conflict, so I’m struggling to pick which movie will fuel my simmering existential terror tonight,” Reynolds explained while gathering up popcorn, soda, and prescriptions. “Last week, we viewed Paul Thomas Anderson’s ‘There Will Be Blood,’ and watching it felt like I was being yelled at by my dad from his hospital bed all over again. The anxiety sweats and stomach ache I endured made it a masterpiece because you have to suffer debilitating amounts of intestinal pain to understand art.”
Indiana University Media Studies professor Dr. Cordett Nelson has yet to decide if Saito and Reynolds are art-savvy critics with a meta-understanding of film or if they chose the arts to score cheap drugs and bullshit their course work.
“I’m pretty sure they’re like most art students: full-of-shit-trust-fund-jackoffs, but I’ve never stopped thinking about their presentation on the futuristic—yet accurate—portrayal of lactose intolerance in ‘A Clockwork Orange,’” Dr. Nelson revealed while pretending to care about the essays he was grading. “They made me realize I had never seen someone be allergic to milk before I saw the film. Maybe they’re onto something.”
The couple was unavailable for further comment as they were snorting lines of Adderall to help them finish a class presentation establishing the neo-Marxist tenets of Minions movies.