Last week in class, we got to watch the iconic early 2000s cinematic masterpiece Rent. Though I had seen parts of the movie before, I had never actually finished it and I am glad that we watched it in class before going to watch La Boheme. Overall I think the movie was enjoyable but had a few flaws on the storyline side as well as cinematically.

First, Rent was lacking in character development. There were a lot of “main” important characters in the movie and there was a severe lack of them being seen as anything more than broke people protesting. Besides Mark and Adam being a filmmaker and songwriter, I was unsure of what the other characters did. I also think that the characters were very one dimensional and I had trouble being sympathetic to them until the end where a few of them unfortunately passed diseases due to AIDS weakening their immune systems. For example, since we had not seen Mark and Maureen as a couple, nor Maureen and Joanne as a couple, we could not relate to the Tango Maureen song since we had not met her yet and did not know her tendencies to be flirty to everyone.  Benny on the other hand was also very confusing because we only saw him as the bad guy, even though he was mentioned to be living with Mark and Roger at one point. In simpler words, I would have just liked a bit more context to each of the characters.

Some other issues I noticed were that Mimi, being the prima donna, did not have the most compelling story. I was more interested in Maureen (to the point of thinking she was the prima donna) and even in Angel. Also, being a feminist myself, I was kind of upset at how she chased Roger after him leaving her over and over. Finally, I also thought the conclusion of the story was very fast and it almost felt like the editors realized they were going over time and cut out a lot of scenes from the middle. It felt very sudden for Angel and Mimi’s death and Mark getting a job. It almost felt like a deus ex machina moment and everything was tied up with a nice bow on. I personally felt it was too rushed.

One good part about Rent for me was that it showed me what New York, specifically downtown and midtown looked like years before. I could definitely see Penny Arcade’s point about gentrification now and definitely can see where she was coming from.