re: "why'd i think i could lie to you and get away with it?" what other lies do you think jud slipped in there 👀 and do you think blanc caught all of them?
iiii think obviously us as the viewers are meant to worry blanc realized jud did kill wicks for a second while it's really about the flask, and i do think jud knew it was likely gonna be about the flask bc he isnt stupid so he knows he fucked up by stealing it
but i also think the most pressing question isn't any of that, i think what jud is waiting for anyone to ask him is why did you kill that man in the ring? and nobody fucking does, blanc least of all bc he is adamant that it actually doesn't matter.
there are probably several other lies by omission (some likely not even conscious) jud snuck into his very subjective recount of those nine months but i think he wouldn't care about those and clearly neither did blanc.
deep down what jud wants is for someone to rip into him for the boxing ring event and i know this because every single thing that happens in that movie is bc he never got closure after killing that man - he neither found a way to get punished or to be forgiven so he became a priest about it.
and blanc knows this. his refusal to entertain jud's "original sin" is intentional, he's downplaying the severity and relevance bc not only does he think it doesn't matter/hinders the case, but he wants jud to know he doesn't care/mind either way. and jud is compelled by this new approach of someone who knows about this big unforgivable mistake and does not seem to care. it does him a lot of good to see his biggest source of grief and guilt be treated this way.
but he also brings it up enough times, and during such crucial moments, that i know he wants to be asked. why'd you do it. what happened to you that led you to that moment. he wants to be put on trial about it so badly and is terrified of the prospect at the same time.
he's basically been bargaining with god about his eternal soul's (after)life sentence ever since... i was gonna say ever since it happened, but that doesn't even ring true? he found jesus years later. he found this path after stumbling into adulthood homeless and alone and completely failed and neglected by every other system that could've helped him or at the very least judged him properly for what he did (by his own logic).
and someone like thee detective blanc ripping into the "boxing thing" and dissecting it like a case would probably make jud feel both utter relief and like he's awake during surgery. and blanc denying him this was kinda crazy of him if i'm honest. talk about an indifferent god.
but yeah in my opinion the biggest "why'd you do it" of the movie, the most obvious visible elephant in the room that NEVER gets addressed is why he killed the man in the ring.
and i think the movie carefully avoids addressing this both bc it creates an interesting tension beneath the surface of everything that happens with wicks, but also because jud as a character has to be held in a permanent stasis between rage-empathy guilt-forgiveness victim-perpetrator faith-reason etc. for him to want to stick to priesthood as his life's purpose so vehemently.
so yeah tl;dr "why'd you do it" and "why'd i think i could lie to you and get away with it" is textually a red herring, straightforwardly about the flask, and sub/metatextually abt jud's ability to twist any story including the one we're actively watching (and blanc's ability to see through all of this). but it's also a brain-tickling echo of the question about jud's tragic origin story that never gets asked and that this entire whodunnit fairytale hinges on never being answered.
pixelskylines
areudirty
jimmyeatworldofficial
kianamaiart
origamiaround
