Gertrud

Gertrud, 1964
Dir: Carl Theodor Dreyer

So I've now seen all of the features that Dreyer did after he made The Passion of Jean of Arc (1928), and this probably affected me the most besides that one. Vampyr (1932) is sort of in it's own little world, a moody, atmospheric slice of horror that you couldn't really really group with other Dreyer except maybe in a visual way. Day of Wrath (1943) and Ordet (1955) are both chiefly invested in Dreyer's humanistic interests, but are too hung up in their religious trappings (witch hunts in the former, conflict of faith and "miracles" in the latter) to really get all the way through to me. Dreyer let's all that stuff fall away and deals with the most complex of human emotions: love. While the film doesn't fall victim to easy pleasures of sentimentality, it can wear on you in its earnestness. There are certainly worse things that a film can be though.


The love life of Gertrud (Nina Pens Rode) is basically all we have to deal with in the film, but that can be asking a lot at points. She is married to a politician, Gustav Kanning (Bendt Rothe) but is no longer in love with him (and she even hints that she may never have been in love with him). She has instead fallen for the charms of famous young musician Erland Jansson (Baard Owe), who feigns love but is actually, in terms of relationships, just a typical young man. The wild card is Gabriel (Ebbe Rode), a past love of Gertrud's who's comes back to Denmark to receive an award for his poetry, but it is most definitely more about seeing Gertrud again (and getting her to see the pain of his lonely life).


There is no real big deviation in Dreyer's style from previous films, and in keeping with it, he basically does nothing to hide the fact that the film is based on a play. In the case of this film, that's not necessarily a bad thing unless you have no attention span. The monumentally epic takes, a trademark in his sound films, adds to austere atmosphere. You would think that this would be a detriment to a film about love, but you may have already guessed that no one is going to go away happy. And of course, the lighting, as always, is amazing.



The films overall thesis is moving, and many of its most poignant moments are discomforting in their elongation. Watching a wretchedly depressed man break down in rejection is practically unbearable, and that the rejection itself is far from malicious makes it that much more difficult. It's a bit over the top, but if anyone can get away with it, it's Dreyer. But in the end, at least for me, things need to be pushed at a more that glacial pace and I got tired of the endless chat that the lovers subjected themselves to. It's a nice character-driven film, and as a swan-song, it might even be Dreyer's most "Dreyer-like" film, if that even makes any sense, but not enough for the personal canon. Certainly not for casual viewers, that's for sure, but remarkable in its own way.

Last Year in Marienbad

L'année dernière à Marienbad (Last Year in Marienbad), 1961
Dir: Alain Resnais

After watching this all the way through while trying take it seriously, I must admit that I failed miserably. It's not that this film made me angry (though it pushed my limits a lot), it's just that nothing in this film captivated me in any way. For a movie that is only about two people being in love, you can't really care can you? The only interaction between them is just "remembering" and frankly it's either way over my head or its main points are driving at things I could care less about.


So there's this guy (Giorgio Albertazzi), and he's 100% positive that he met and fell in love with a woman (Delphine Seyrig) at some chateau the year before (possibly not the one they meet at again in the film, or is that a memory as well?). The woman is 100% sure that the dude is a creep and a stalker who has never met her, until she isn't (or is that even her?) Her (possible) husband (Sacha Pitoëff) is semi-interested in her well-being, but mostly likes to house people in Nim (which is probably some grand gesture about memory and dreams).


In Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959) we actually get interaction and, at the very least, we begin to understand the characters and their motivations. Here, we don't and because of this there is absolutely no room to care. If you want to say that anything is truly frustrating about this, it's that Resnais nails the mood and look of a film that should be interesting, but breaks it apart so that it isn't. Maybe I just get really turned off by metafiction (which granted works a lot better in film than literature, but still...). I wouldn't be surprised if some interpretations led to some grand realization about life. It is a puzzle I guess, and Resnais deliberately only gives us some of the pieces. The film has all of the answers or it has none of them (look at the photo below: the people have shadows but the trees don't), but either way, it's just not a film for me.

A Brighter Summer Day

牯嶺街少年殺人事件 (A Brighter Summer Day), 1991
Dir: Edward Yang

You can watch film after film after film, and even at points become fed up with how mundane everything you watch is, but then you watch something that makes you want create something just as great and poignant, that hints at something deeper than just the story you are presenting. A Brighter Summer Day is one of those films. A film about community, family and a failure to connect on many levels, it resonates clearly in every aspect of its production. That the film has fallen into obscurity is ridiculous, and makes the experience of watching the film all the more powerful.


At its core, the film is about Xao S'ir, a teenage kid who is trying to get along in Taipei, Taiwan in 1960. But in building the sense of community that dominates the film, the overall feeling of uncertainty that permeates with every character belies the sense of unease that was Taiwan after the departure of the Kuomintang and the Republic of China to the island, especially under the iron fist of Chang Kai-shek. Parents try to teach their kids values for posterity when they themselves have no idea what the future holds, and the same kids fall in to street gangs to try to build a sense of security for themselves. That's what the first half of this film is about: the world that Xao S'ir is growing up in. Xao S'ir seems to be a fringe member of the Little Park Boys, and only at times feels like he is interested in being part of the mayhem. They are always bumping heads with other gangs over turf and girls, and the leadership is being tested because their leader, Honey, is on the lam after killing another street tough. Two lieutenants, Deuce and Sly, begin to jockey for the top. To make things worse for Xao S'ir, he gets on Sly's bad side (over a girl), who then begins a run of passive aggressive bullying. Honey's fate is crucial to that of Xao S'ir's, who becomes friendly with his girlfriend Ming, and their relationship starts to weigh on him. Xao S'ir's inability to communicate his dilemma begins to show in his overall attitude, and he eventually gets expelled from school, and decides to take actions into his own hands.


Tawain in 1960 is like bizarro China meets the USA. All the kids are into rock'n'roll and gangs, and the parents are worried about the culture change, but everything is totally exaggerated because although they love American culture, no one really gets its and barely any of the kids speak English. There is a romantic, melancholy tone that Yang build up through the film attached to all of this, and it is one of its biggest strengths. Given that the director's cut is almost 4 hours long, you definitely need those things, but once you are in to the film, you really forget about everything else, which is the greatest compliment I can give it.


Yang is sort of like a modern day Ozu, who clearly influenced his style. Lots of long, master shots that don't cut in close; lingering portraits also in long shot that make you study a character fully; deliberate tracking shots, and no camera shake. The gang chases and beatings are some of the most frightening things I've ever seen because he doesn't cut away and because of the lighting, which is as elaborate as it is simple (kind of like Yang's overall style). He also uses ellipsis to great effect. His still, long takes allow for masterful mis-en-scene, which is impossible to miss. In the end though, it's a film that's about everything because it has everything. While telling its story, it lingers in the details, and sometimes that's where you find answers. The answers of this film aren't necessarily obvious, if there are any. Maybe it's just the truth you get from listening to a song, and really feeling it.

The Fighter

The Fighter, 2010
Dir: David O. Russell

I know there is a certain amount of predictability to the fight genre that makes it so appealing to so many. Maybe I'm being unreasonable to want something different, but I think David O. Russell presented this as something different but still made a regular Hollywood movie. Or was it a David O. Russell film that he "eased" up a bit on, that he compromised with Whalberg to make a commercially viable film? Personally I really didn't care for Russell run amok in I (Heart) Huckabees (2004), and thought this felt more like Three Kings (1999), which is a good thing. I'm guessing it might have had something to do with him having nothing to do with the script.

I might not be giving Russell enough credit though because I thought there was some really funny incidental comedy bits in this, those moments that weren't deliberately meant to be funny. There were plenty of those in this film that got the crowd guffawing but that was typical stuff. I mean, I don't even think I can remember what they are. That's how seemingly unimportant the moments were. It may have to do with the idiosyncratic Method (particularly Christian Bale) acting taking place throughout, but it also says something that Russell was able to capture them.

The dedication to 90s visual graphics and the strange video grain notorious to that time actually made me think about Tim and Eric in a strange way. All of this was involved with the HBO broadcasts of the fight and the "Crack House" documentary, which certainly gave the film a different vibe from other "Bahston" films that have come out in recent times. The boxing wasn't too gratuitous, and there weren't any lame motivational speeches either. Whalberg had his "It's my life/It's now or never" Bon Jovi moment, but it could have been way worse. The Micky Ward story has the Arturo Gotti trilogy (where Ward lost the last two fights), but it wasn't told here. I think that could have given the ending a bittersweet taste, but who cares about that, right? Cue WE ARE THE MUTHAFUNKIN CHAMPIONS.

True Grit

True Grit, 2010
Dir: Coen Bros.

I think the Coen Brothers natural proclivity for quirky characters and dialogue really hurts them in a Western because it basically reveals the whole thing to be paper thin at best. All the characters do their thing and that's it. Considering how they bucked the trend in A Serious Man (2009), I had some higher hopes for this. The set-up is pretty Western standard, which is fine, and there are some fun scenes, but only one character reveals himself to be more than meets the eye (possibly?). As I've said about Westerns before, plot and story are pretty irrelevant, and good, complex characters are everything.

There is some debate over whether this is grim or actually pretty light, and honestly, I don't even think the Coens know. Maybe that's the whole point. How funny everything is can get lost in the language, but I think I laughed a few times. In terms of "villains", was Josh Brolin supposed to be laughed at 'cause he actually turned out to be pretty stupid? For a character supposedly known for his deviousness, he turned out to be something a lot less than that. In a different situation it might have been a good thing, but here it's decidedly underwhelming. Everyone else in Barry Pepper's gang has no chance to stand out, and the one guy that did made fucking animal noises.

The three main characters we have to follow offer some good acting, if not a whole lot of character depth (Bridges' ramblings about his ex-wives seems to be the epitome of irrelevant. Is that why you drink, or what? Does it reveal anymore than kicking Indians? Or is that just a funny "that's just how things were" moment). I was actually kind of impressed by Hailee Stanfield as Mattie Ross, but it's hard for a kid to externalize all the emotion a great character has. She only reveals herself to be a kid a few times ("Do we really need him, Marshall?") but it's never really enough to make her something more than just her dialogue suggests. On the other hand, I thought Matt Damon's La Boeuf was great probably because I didn't know what the hell his deal was. He's quick to to defend the honor of himself and the Texas Rangers but it belied a sensitive, uncertain side, and he might have been a closet pedo. I mean, the "sneaking a kiss" line at the beginning could have been a throw away, but then the unnecessary, over-the-top spanking and then some of the looks he gives Mattie sort of sealed it for me. Of course, it's all very ambiguous, but that's why I thought he was a good character.

Roger Deakins is a pretty good cinematographer but I don't know why everyone is flipping out over this. I thought the only really nice canvasy, Western shots were done in traveling montage rendering them pretty pointless. And the whole whole scary snakes ending. What was that? And the epilogue made it out like the whole movie was about how time passes us by, which is not the impression I got at all.

There are better Westerns. Just check earlier in this blog.

Tron: Legacy

Tron: Legacy

Dir: Joseph Kosinski

Woah. Watching this on the gigundo IMAX screen in 3D was a trip, and one hell of an experience. And if it were all about insane, state-of-the-art visuals and electronica scores by Daft Punk, it would be perfect. But as a movie, it's pretty unoriginal in it's execution, and down right predictable. It's The Matrix (1999) by Disney, so a lite version. In fact, the similarities are staggering, not even to mention the same puedo-religious bullshit that's pretty much both their philosophies ("The One"= "The Son of the Maker" in the same messianic vein). This badassery accounts for a lot of dues-ex-machina "wtf" moments, particularly the fact that Sam just comes into "The Grid" and can kick ass, sans training montages, which at least Neo had to do. Even better, during the climax, there is an ultimate "need-to-wrap-this-up" moment, involving none other than TRON ("I fight for the Users!" Oh right. Glad that happened in half a second...), which could take the cake for many an illogical plot device in all the best/worst movies you've ever seen. Also, if you are interested in characters and/or character development, this has very little of it, except that maybe Jeff Bridges' Kevin Flynn is not only a tech genius but also a hippy-zen master, which was funny for maybe a line or so ("You're really killing my zen thing, man!"). But I'm guessing the target audience of this really doesn't give a shit about any of that. So in conclusion, as an experience this is first rate; as a movie, not so much. But you may have guessed as much just from the trailer.

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, 2010
Dir: Michael Apted

You really have to have some strong children actors to pull off a movie that revolves around them, and unfortunately, that actors that play Edmund and Lucy are lacking (s0 no real progression from Caspian), even if they try hard enough. The big surprise for me had to be Will Poulter, who plays Eustace as a great British brat, and the writers even give him some witty one-liners which could zing straight out of the BBC. Definitely the bright spot of the film. Dawn Treader's main failing as a story has to be its silly religious undertones (like all Narnia books) and the references in this movie were the most heavy handed in franchise yet. So, I guess I can look forward to The Silver Chair in two years time and give you another half-hearted review, and that will be followed up by The Horse and his Boy, which is probably the best book in the series for its lack of religious nonsense (or so I remember). I like The Magician's Nephew too, obviously not because it's a Genesis metaphor, but because it's the most supremely weird book in the series. The Last Battle kind of blows (though Susan not getting into Heaven always made me laugh). So there's my thought on the film and possible future releases. Personally, I think the BBC with their dwarfs in mouse suits did a better job at capturing the spirit of the book, but that's probably besides the point.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1
Dir: David Yates

A lot of noise about how this is "the best one yet," but it's really pretty similar to HP6. Which is absolutely fine. I had a good time. There are some interesting added moments I suppose, but the comedy bits are hit or miss, and these really could have been used more. Considering that they broke up the book, I was expecting a bit more of these interesting "movie-only" scenes. The acting hierarchy is pretty much the same as well. Of course, there's also the whole "Three Brothers" sequence, which I'm glad they added, but I'm not sure if that particular style of animation was the right choice. Oh well, enough nitpicking for now. If you've already seen the trailer, you've got a pretty good idea of what you're getting into.

Black Girl

La noire de...(Black Girl), 1966
Dir: Ousmane Sembene

I saw this like two weeks ago, and as you've might have guessed, the holiday and laziness have sort pushed off writing reviews of anything. But I was also put off by some Harvard dill-holes stroking each others dicks as I was leaving the theater. Seriously: shut-up. Just 'cause you're talking loud enough for everyone to hear your pompous opinion doesn't make it valid. It makes you a fucking loudmouth, and probably one of the very people that this film is trying to make the viewer aware of. Anyway, it has given me time to think about about this, as it is the only film of recent viewing which is actually worth thinking about. In hindsight, it may seem like an obvious statement for a black African director to make a film about race relations, but the racism that is explored is specifically about obviousness, and the lack of awareness that some people have with it in this (relatively) modern age.


The French New Wave comparisons are probably a little over blown, but you can tell where people are coming from (language being the most glaring one). The structure of the film is broken up into three parts (present-past-present) and in doing so tries to elaborate on the difficulty that Diouana (Mbissine Thérèse Diop) has once she leaves Sengal with the French family that she works for the south of France. She has an idea about what her job is (which is to be a nanny for the children), but once back in France, the family (particularly "Madame") sees fit to stick her with a bunch of other remedial task, and makes a show of using her in front of guests. She becomes bitter and apathetic very quickly in her voice-over monologues (another New Wave device that might have been handled a little better).


When it shifts back to Dakar, before the the move, it centers on Diouana's search for work and a relationship that will be cut short when she decides to leave with her newly found employers. The scene in the bedroom with the frustrated guy is very Breathless (1959), just to throw out another comparison (though I'm sure I'm not the first to do so). It really is the most interesting part of the film, very restless and almost optimistic, as compared to the bracketed sequences in the Riviera, which are apathetic and, to a point, angry. That is the whole point of the film as I see it though. This family thinks that they are helping Diouana, giving her a chance. But in France they cage her, and "put her in her place," seemingly without even realizing it. It is a racism that is barely talked about but is probably the kind that is still most prevalent today: the ennui, the complete intellectual stalemate of being a society boring enough to be racist.


The ending is the most demonstrative thing that I could have expected, and the film loses any of the nice subtlety that it had. Diouana's apathy and anger turn into depression pretty quickly and then everything snowballs in her mind. Luckily, the very end has a redeeming scene where the "Monsieur" is forced to walk through the slums of Dakar looking for Diouana's family, and is followed, to his unease, by a little boy with a native wooden mask on. It hits the spot pretty good. The overall tragedy of Diouana is really about the African, where colonialism put him and how, even in "setting" them free, they are still seen as lesser souls in the eyes of modernity.

Shadows

Shadows, 1959
Dir: John Cassavetes

This is really good except for the production value. I mean, some thesis films are made better than this. But, I guess that is sort of the DIY tone Cassavetes was going for, and considering this is the birth of American independent cinema, you have it give it that. That most of the film works is because of the "restless 50s" New York atmosphere. I guess you could call it "Beat" or whatever, but at least there's no poetry readings. One of the characters even scoffs at the Beat scene, and even Jazz, though he pretty much is a Beat, not to mention a proto-hipster, and the entire soundtrack is a jazz sax solo.


The film follows three siblings. Hugh (Hugh Hurd), the oldest, is having a hard time coming to grips with the fact that his singing career might be dying, and he is embarrassed to be a show host, such as introducing "girly lines." Ben (Ben Carruthers) is the misfit, wanders around the city with his buddies hitting on girls and what-not, basically being directionless. Lelia (Lelia Goldoni), the youngest, is only 20 and is keen to be seen as seen sharp and educated, but also passionate and spontaneous. Hugh is full black, while his two younger siblings are mulatto, with Lelia being especially light-skinned, and can pretty much get away with "passing."


The film never really harps on about the race thing, though of course the main dilemma involves Lelia's ability to naively pass and then be found out, and then the two brothers reactions (or lack there of) to help her cope. Cassavetes isn't just interested in one thing though; we see this in three different parties in the film: a crazy "beat" party where Ben is looking bored, a "literary" party where Lelia "comes of age," and then the party at their apartment where there are mostly black people talkin' about black people problems, Hugh at the forefront. The way it bounces around and never really settles on anyone makes it way ahead of its time, and good.


If the acting has a problem, its that the improvisational style (which Cassavetes insisted on) seems a bit stunted at times; like all these kids and amateur actors know darn well that they are being filmed and that they had better throw some slang and jargon in. This experimental acting style is supposed to flow with the structure of the the film (like jazz I guess). Ben, of course, is the most interesting character to me. At the end he hasn't progressed one bit, though after having some drinks and getting into a fight with his buddies, he vows never to do it again. One of them (the buddies) sort sums up one Ben's arc (or "straight line" maybe) as they nurse their wounds, "We went out on the town and had a ball. If you get beat up, you get beat up. We still had a ball." That's sort of what the film is: mostly a mess but still effective. Defintely a sign of things to come for Cassavetes.

Kuroneko

藪の中の黒猫 (Kuroneko), 1968
Dir: Kaneto Shindo

I'll describe the strange way (actually not so strange, but whatever) in which I came to see this, because if I knew exactly what it was before going to see it, I might not have gone (that being said, I'm still kind of glad I did). Again, there wasn't much going on at the theaters (normal or artsy-fartsy) that I was really interested in going to see (or at least that I thought I wanted to see. I can psyche myself out of going to see anything). However, the last listing for Kendall was this, and I noticed it was from 1968, so obviously I was like, "Japanese classic. That's worth it." What I didn't know when I sat down in the theater is that it was directed by Shindo, who also directed Onibaba (1964), and that it is basically the same type of film, except this time instead of hanging out in reed beds, Shindo heads to a bamboo forest.

Not only does he change location, but he moves on from a woman just pretending to be a demon to actual fucking demons. This is the big leagues. And not just any demons, but evil cat demons who have sworn an oath to the God of Evil to drink the blood of all samurai in revenge for what happened to them (Revenge fantasy?!? Calling Tarantino...). Don’t get me wrong, ghost cats seem like they could be interesting (I guess?) but the mythology and folklore elements are all sort of lost on me due to the silly (if not simplistic) morality complex and just the fact that Shindo just seems to tell the same story over and over again. It would be reductive to call this a rehash of Onibaba but the similarities are staggering.

I’ll give Shindo some credit because he really does manage to make all his movies look really good. It’s kind of fitting then, I guess, that this film is at its best when Shindo decides to focus less on exposition or any dialogue for that matter, and tries to make the film one extended montage. For at least 15 minutes or so, he manages to collide a series of images which repeat the routine of the daughter-in-law, played by Kiwako Taichi. We see her confront samurais, lead them through a forest, and then seduce them once they arrive at the demons secluded place before ripping out their throats in demon mode. It’s a bit repetitive and probably exhausting for the viewer looking for some “J-horror” but represents Shindo at his sharpest. He manages to repeat this exercise but still produce new images. Sure, from a pure narrative standpoint, it’s easy to “get,” but it is one of the few times he is not chiefly concerned with progressing the story. It’s the film’s most self-consciously artistic sequence, and also one of its best.

I’m not saying that the content here is completely boring, in fact, towards the end it actually becomes a little poignant. The encounters the hero has with the ghost version of his wife is heartbreaking despite the fact that it shouldn’t be. It’s weird, I get the impression that Shindo wanted to tell a story about losing loved ones and, based on sequences like the one I mentioned, he would have nailed it. Unfortunately, there’s an excess of the folklore stuff, which really just reinforces the silliest and most negative stereotypes of the genre. The whole bit at the end with the giant cat arm is redonkulous (though I'm sure those looking for standard, exaggerated horror stuff might like it. They might also be into the aerial ghoul dances and the smaurai/ghost duels). It’s really a shame too since it comes off the heels of by far the most emotionally resonant stretch in the entire movie. Oh well, some good stuff here. I think cinema fans and just plain old horror fans could both enjoy this.

Hiroshima Mon Amour

Hiroshima Mon Amour, 1959
Dir: Alain Resnais

There are some big ups and big downs in this film. The fact that it was initially supposed to be a documentary about Hiroshima is pretty apparent. The beginning is kind of unbearable; my mind couldn't latch on to anything, even with all the images of mutilated Hiroshima residents. Then the "story" starts, of a French actress (Emmanuelle Riva) in town who has a one night stand with a Japanese man (Eiji Okada), and then they talk a whole bunch. She says "no" a lot, and he says "I want you to stay in Hiroshima." Oh yeah, like more than 3 times.


I will admit that this film has plenty of power, with beautiful and incredibly profound scenes but it's overshadowed by the fact that the whole thing is one big monologue. Both characters feel such compassion and their feelings are so complex and confusing, and yet they know exactly how to explain it. It's like they're both poets but the novelty wears thin after the first few minutes. I actually think this reminds me a lot of something Wong Kar-Wai would do. With the exception of the tedious and overlong dialogue, it's very much done in a similar tone of pacing. I really enjoyed the visuals though. Some of it is rather stagey, but it actually works. And the slow tracking shots in and out of subjects with the voice-over actually kind of reminded me of Terrence Malick (so maybe he was a Resnais fan).


The performances, in my opinion, really aren't that fantastic. There's a lot of over-acting, and Riva's flashback freak-outs are really annoying. All that being said, this is probably something that I will want to go back to eventually, 'cause like I said there are some great moments in it and it seems like a film that I might change my mind about at some point.

Inside Job

Inside Job, 2010
Dir: Charles Ferguson

The best part about this doc is definitely the interviews with financial industry advocates, whether they start to stumble over their own hypocrisies, or they just get arrogantly indignant. It has a hard time staying objective ("You can't be serious..."), but I suppose it's kind of hard to with this subject. It goes after the entire financial industry culture of amorlism, prostitutes and drugs (stuff everyone already knows about), to the moralistic posers in Washington that support them using garbled language, and then even college business professors who teach reckless economics (which is really interesting). Learning exactly how the financial industry ballooned over the last 30 years was pretty enlightening too. They have nothing to sell you but the hope that you might profit from their "expertise," but they only deepen their own pockets at your expense.

A Film Unfnished

A Film Unfinished, 2010
Dir: Yael Hersonski

I've been going to documentaries lately 'cause I'm kind of avoiding going to see some of the fiction films coming out (so maybe I should see The Social Network (2010) asap; true story I hear). They just all look kind of awful. I only read a blurb about this film (not a review) and decided it seemed kind of interesting. And in the end, it is kind of interesting, but pretty annoying as well. The footage being looked at in the doc of the unfinished film, "Das Ghetto," was a film made by the SS in 1942 to portray life in the Jewish ghetto of Warsaw. A lot of the film has to do with the differences of rich Jews (those who cooperate) and poor, starving Jews (those who don't obviously). And for many years these film were taken as fact, for some strange reason. Anyone one who knew anything about the Nazi propaganda machine knows that they were obsessed with cinema (Geobbels doing) and the way they could use it (the flight of Fritz Lang and many other frightened Weimar directors; or even the accumulation of star writer Thea von Harbou and star actor Emil Jennings to use for their own ends). That the Nazi's could use propaganda scenes for their own insidious version of the future doesn't seem that enlightening, or "eye-opening." I suppose the reasons that I found the film most frustrating is how the film was constructed. Hersonski has her own voice-over going a lot of the time, and I'm just not into it. Also, they have voice actors come in and read diaries and what not of people in the the ghetto or involved with it (like SS officers) over the footage. And lastly, they show people who survived the ghetto watching the clips and giving their own quips about what happened. This sentimental slant kind of ruins the power of the images that are being seen. I know what they are, and I know they are awful. Let the images speak for themselves. So in the end, I kind of just wish I could be given the footage of the unfinished film and watch that, because a lot of it is pretty powerful stuff.

Last Train Home

归途列车 (Last Train Home), 2009
Dir: Lixin Fan

It is pretty remarkable how themes can reassert themselves in a particular people, especially negative ones that are known, have been talked about openly, and then still nothing is done to change it. The cinema of a region seems to be no different. There are so many people in Asia that individuality can be a complex thing, particularity in a place like China. Last Train Home, at first, doesn't seem to be about this struggle. It seems to be more a documentary only concerned with the grand sweep of the huge movement of people that takes place every Chinese New Year, when the nation's 130 million migrant workers go home for the only time that year. The first shot (if I remember correctly) is just of this giant moving mass of people in a train station, fighting, pushing, trying to get on to trains that really don't have enough room for all of them. Fan must have thought however that a more personal level was needed to connect with all audiences, and the introduction of one migrant working couple, on their way home to their rural home to celebrate, comes pretty early. Not everything is so cozy at home though because their two kids, especially the older daughter, has more of a bond with the grandmother who is with them all year long than the parents who only come home once a year. The parents at first seemed pretty boring, if not also tragically stuck in their economic plight. They only have one thing to say to their kids which is "Study hard. Stay in school." Although this is basically the only thing they say, it is overbearing for the daughter who feels trapped in school and is dying to go off to work like the rest of her friends, which is her parents' worst fear. So, of course, she does it. The family dynamic is blown apart at a second gathering, as the daughter, trying to assert her independence, claims that the parents never really cared for them and even says "fuck," after which the usually placid father erupts, smacking her in the face and throwing her to the ground screaming "We've tolerated you!" It gets pretty intense. After this the daughter moves to a bigger city and get a job waiting at night club, and the last we see of her is dancing away on her night off, getting lost in the strobe lights. The parents continue to work until the mother finally decides that she has to go home; the grandmother won't live forever and they can't let what happened to their daughter happen to their son. And that is kind of how the film ends, with the mother on her way back home, separated for the first time in her life from her husband. Like I said before, this is the film within the film, which shows "the largest human migration on earth." Fan capture's everything beautifully, and the results are sad, haunting, and yet pretty inevitable if you have watched even a small amount of Asian cinema. Life is still disappointing for many people in East Asia.

The Town

The Town, 2010
Dir: Ben Affleck

So it was beyond me to completely ignore this Beantown flick once the "great" reviews started coming out, and I couldn't just call my brother on the phone and yell, "I'm puttin' this whole town in my rear-view!" So you watch the film, and it's completely understandable why people are so impressed (though the great camerawork raves seem a bit bloated; it does get caught in that floaty, shaky, I-can't-see-what-the-fuck-is-happening nonsense that modern action films like to equate with a visceral experience). Affleck is putting a stamp on Hollywood with his own films that will let him continue to work as a director. The closest thing that I could think of while watching it was Michael Mann. Like Mann, Affleck likes to reveal character through action, but he also can't help but throw in some "actor's moments," and I wasn't that surprised that he wrote the most for himself. And in that respect, he's sort of like a less sentimental (or vomit-inducing) Clint Eastwood, which I'm sure the studios will try to mold him into. All of the action is cool, you know, and learning the mechanization of Boston bank robbing (even in movie terms) was interesting, but that's just trimming. The characters are poorly written, and there's nothing Rebecca Hall can do about the fact that her's is unidimensional. There's some good acting in it (Jeremy Renner, Blake Lively in a Marisa Tomei sort of role, Jon Hamm braking free from Don Draper), but this happens in spite of the script. Ben Affleck seems to know his way around with a camera now (the look of the film is pretty intentional), but given the Oscar, we'd expect he'd know his way around with a pen as well.

Trouble in Paradise

Trouble in Paradise, 1932
Dir: Ernst Lubitsch

If you think about all the ridiculously terrible rom-coms that come out of Hollywood now, you often wonder how the genre came to such prominence, and if it wasn't always filled with fluff. Well, films like The Killers (2010) and every other "criminal couple" movie owe a debt to Trouble in Paradise, though they'd never be able to hold a candle to it. Elliptical in structure and tied to witty romance with suggestive pre-code banter, this film could demolish anything today and definitely stands above all of the screwball comedies that it helped to inspire later in the decade.


Romancing both Miriam Hopkins and Kay Francis, Herbert Marshall is the epitome of handsome rakishness, playing a master jewel thief who schemes with his lover (Hopkins) to swindle perfume heiress Francis, falling in love with the sexually aggressive proprietress instead.


Lubitsch’s revered style is surprisingly fluid for a film of the early 30’s, and his collaboration with playwright Samson Raphaelson, his most frequent partner, is filled with the kind of innuendo that would be virtually impossible to get away within the coming code era. Luckily for us, that makes a lot of the comedy very fresh and almost seemingly modern. But most of all it's just funny, and never wacky. Lubitsch was far too sophisticated for that.

A Woman, a Gun and a Noodle Shop

三枪拍案惊奇 (A Woman, a Gun and a Noodle Shop), 2009
Dir: Zhang Yimou

This is a retelling of the Coen Bros. film Blood Simple (1985) in an Chinese desert saga (I think you know what I mean). And it's completely retarded. I'm mad that I paid to see this. Visual effects simply to have fucked-upped Asian-ness (even when he sets up some nice shots, Zhang does all this time lapse shit, like we couldn't figure out that "some time has passed"), ridiculous, over-the-top slapstick tied to black comedy that is pretty much insulting to anyone watching it. By that, I mean it insults your intelligence. Not one likable character, either. Blood Simple is alright I guess (though if I watch it again I might think less of it simply for inspiring this), but this is just bottom of the the barrel. Steer clear of this turd.

Teorema

Teorema, 1968
Dir: Pier Paolo Pasolini

This blog hasn't had one of these in a while, but I guess I've just been lucky in my picks. Well, this was pretty fucking unbearable. Just another Euro art film trashing "bourgeois" culture and being way too much for me. Somewhere along the way you realize that it is utterly and bombastically silly, so just strip away the 60s Italian sophisticated mystique and let yourself laugh.


At the beginning there's this sort of T.V. reporter/interview rant about bourgeois culture, and it raised my hackles big time. Then it turns into this weird, semi-silent movie where the main family goes about their lives, but you never hear anything they say. It's kind of enjoyable, actually. And then the "stranger" comes and ruins it. Played by Terence Stamp, the film never gives you any answers for why he's there, but all of a sudden everyone in the house is really horny. They all have this big "transformation" by his being there, and when he leaves, the whole household begins to fall apart. The sexually-awakened daughter goes into a coma, the wife who "was never interested in anything" becomes a huge tramp and starts to pick up guys on the street, the son goes all homo-artist, the maid becomes this divine force and can cure chicken pox and levitate, and most importantly (or annoyingly, depending how you look at it), the head of the household, a successful Milanese industrialist, begins to "question it all" while also starting to have some homo leanings as well. An then there's the desert motif. Good grief.


Stamp's character is supposed to be this angel, or maybe even God, and he's "opening up" the eyes of all the characters to real life. But he ruins their lives, so maybe he is the devil? Or maybe I just don't give two shits about any of this? Seriously, I was really only interested when people were making out/humping, and that's just 'cause it's sex. I do know this though: Atonioni did Italian bourgeois malaise a million times better than this.

Judge Priest

Judge Priest, 1934
Dir: John Ford

So apparently John Ford could do "courtroom comedies" just as well as he could do Westerns. Will Rodgers has a great deal to do with why this is so good, but Ford's sense of place had no equal at this point in Hollywood. Even more than Stars in My Crown (1950), Ford establishes a southern, Reconstruction-era Kentucky town that has this amazing sense of cinematic poetry, the kind that only Ford could create.


The film is built around a trial, but it isn't entirely confined to it (though all the scenes in the courthouse are really great). William Priest (Will Rodgers) has been the local judge for quite some time. His unorthodox, laid-back style isn’t exactly professional, but his personality has become woven into the fabric of the town. His nephew, Jerome (Tom Brown), has recently returned home from a "Yankee" law school and now has a job as an attorney. When the local barber and his pals are severely beaten up by the town’s “quiet” character, it is Jerome that takes his case. This, of course, creates a possible conflict of interest, which leads many to question Priest’s fairness as a judge. In the meantime, he also sets up his nephew with a girl who, according to his nephew’s mother, isn’t up to the family standards. Probably the really only uninteresting thing in the whole film is the "relationship" that the two youngsters have.


This is the first Ford film that I've seen with Stephen Fetchit in it, and it's really hard to talk about it without saying outright that it's "disgustingly racist." Fetchit plays a sterotypical "negro," talks in incoherent jigaboo (which Rodger's understands somehow; must be a southern thang), and is constantly chided for being lazy (even if it's mostly by Priest, who is teasing). It is racist. But there is something about the way that it is just out in the open in the film that helps it a lot, and along with Hattie McDaniels, who plays Aunt Dilsey, the maid/servant in the Priest household, helps the segregation/racism seep into the community. It's there, but there isn't anything malicious about it. If the film was about racism (which Stars in My Crown sort of turns into), it wouldn't be very good. This is cinema though, so obviously it's an alt-reality, and Ford was all about perpetuating Americana myths, but most likely Kentucky was probably kind of like this after the Civil War. Perhaps the circumstances are not that pleasant, but sometimes, real life isn’t either.


That’s not to say Ford was actually a forward-thinking genius or anything, but many directors would have never made Priest’s sidekick a remotely important character. It’s also worth mentioning that no one in the film comes off as being particularly smart (the Reverend at the end, maybe). Will Rodger’s whole persona is “dumb…but charming” but he never comes off as being a superior character. He's not stupid, he's just a Good Ol' Boy who doesn't have hateful bone in his body. Most of the characters are Good Ol' Boys actually, and the way the film ends is indicative of this, given the fact the the trial doesn't really end and southern pride trumps all. In fact, I think Ford’s characterization of all the characters is one of the most curious elements in the film. While it is, like many things Fordian, quite simple on the surface, it does ask for deep pondering.