2009 Films IX-XVI
I should, of course, be at the cinema today, watching three films. But I'm too behind to do so. Sigh. And a fortnight behind in writing them up.
IX: Slumdog Millionaire (Danny Boyle and Loveleen Tandan, 2008)
Who'd've thunk that him out of Skins would be a movie star - Nicholas Hoult, yeah, on the back of earlier films, and Mitch Hewer on grands of talent (although I've missed Britannia High). After all, his character was a token one, discovering his religion every so often to a) angst over a gay best friend or b) angst over losing his virginity. Too often he faded into the background. Here he is the competitor on India's version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, whose life has enabled him to answer the questions accurately - and indeed to know that the key question will be one about musketeers.I was reminded a little of The Kite Runner in the survival; on wits of young boys - but this film is more feel good than that one, and consequentially less emotional. The story of his best friend, the counterpoint, is less feel good - the gangster who finds a conscience - and actually less believable.
Enjoyable and slick - and wait for the Bollywood song and dance credits.
X: Vals Im Bashir (Waltzing with Bashir; Ari Folman, 2008)
Animated documentary - making use of a lot of rotoscoping - in which Folman tries to recall the events of the Lebanon War in the early 1980s and what precisely happened. There was clearly something bad, but he has lost most of his memories of it - and a friend has a recurring nightmare.
For the final minute - when we get the truth, or at the very most a truth - the materials break back from animation into news footage of the time, which suggests an ontological shift, from possibly faulty memory to authentic reality, or perhaps suggests a nervousness about aestheticising genocide. It is uncomfortable to say the least - although that is how it should be. Graphic novels have dealt with politics before - Art Spielgelman and Joe Sacco spring to mind - but this is none the less brave for trying to tell a story that some would rather forget.
XXI: The Quiet Man (John Ford, 1952)
Odd departure for John Ford and recurring star John Wayne - a romantic comedy set in Oirland: Sean Thornton (Wayne) returns to his birthplace to purchase his old homestead and takes a wife, Mary Kate Danaher (Maureen O'Hara), to the annoyance of her brother and local squire (Victor McLaglen), who wants the land and a skivvy. But you don't stand up against Big John Wayne.
It's all as green as a shamrock and O'Hara is feisty as anything - and no one really seems to consider that she has a say in the matter, which makes the wooing and the marriage troublesome to say the least. I'm not entirely clear when the film is meant to be set - a then-recent past I guess. But aside from the trains, it feels as if it could be any point in the last two centuries. Jolly good fun - and part of the Top 100
XII: Ugetsu monogatari (Mizoguchi Kenji, 1953)
Another of the Top 100 films, a sort of Japanese civil war fantasy. Two couples are disturbed by the encroaching civil war - one is a potter who wants to make his fortune, the other is wanting to be a samurai. The film tells their story, and their attempts to stay free. It's very pretty, with moments of magic.
XIII: Solaris (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1972)
Strange things are happening out at the planet Solaris, and psychologist Kris Kelvin (Donatas Banionis) is sent to investigate. Before you can say "frozen Christ?", he is being haunted by his dead wife, Hari (Natalya Bondarchuk), a product of the planet's impact on the cosmonauts.
As is typical with Tarkovsky, he is much more interested in still lives, middle aged men shuffling around in long coats, mothers that are strikingly similar to mothers in appearance, dachas in the rain and candles than in telling a story. A third of the way through, a character drives wordlessly through Tokyo, for no readily definable reason, aside from he's there. But there's space for philosophising, and there's plenty of fistfights to be had about what on earth the ending means - and whether any of the film is actually real. Both gripping and alienating at the same time.
XIII: Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Don Siegel, 1956)
Rewatch for work of the first variation on a doctor being called back to investigate a few cases of Capgras syndrome, only to find the world is being invaded by pod people. It's crying out for metaphor - Peter Biskind goes with the Red paranoia story, I've always felt it to be more satirical - and clearly there's a fear of conformity in the period which would be as defined by having to be American as Soviet. Stand out line is "I never knew fear until I kissed Becky," and the ending is pleasingly open (as is that of much sf of the period). I've only seen - and must rewatch - the Kaufmann remake from the 1970s. The Ferrara one is tempting but as to the one from 2007 - how would you tell that Nicole Kidman is a pod person?
A spoiler on this, I fear:
XIV: The Lady Eve (Preston Sturges, 1941)
Curious screwball comedy in which anthropologist and brewery heir Charles Pike (Henry Fonda) falls under the spell of con artists Jean Harrington (Barbara Stanwyck) and Colonel Harrington (Charles Coburn); the Colonel wants to fleece him, but Jean falls in love. When the cons are exposed, it is Jean who is pissed at Pike, and seeks revenge by posing as an English lady. Oh, and eventually they end up married.
I guess that's screwball for you - turning on a six pence, and reversing the trajectory. The logic isn't the strong point. Bizarrely, little is made of her running screaming from his cabin having seen the size of his cobra. But the Genesis Eve is clearly being winked out - women, you can't trust 'em.
XV: De´tective (Jean-Luc Godard, 1985)
Frankly baffling deconstruction of the detective thriller - there has been a murder of someone called Prince in a hotel a couple of years back, a couple are breaking up, a boxer trains, a promoter has stolen money. All elements of a thriller that could have been made at any point since the 1940s - but apparently it would have been boring to do that so Godard sticks together fragments of half a dozen different thrillers. Not my cup of tea.
XVI: Solaris (Steven Soderbergh, 2002)
Strange things are happening out at the planet Solaris, and psychologist Chris Kelvin (George Clooney) is sent to investigate. Before you can say "frozen Christ?", he is being haunted by his dead wife, Rheya (Natascha McElhone), a product of the planet's impact on the astronauts.
As is typical with Soderbergh, he is much more interested in colour schemes, flashbacks and clever cinematography than in telling a story. I like Soderbergh's experiments, but I'd previously resisted this - and that's a shame. It looks stunning - and sacrifices much of the time spent on Earth before getting to Solaris, to allow for later flashbacks. Kelvin is here doing the old Vertigo thing of recreating the dead beloved, against her will, and is happy to engage in arguments about predestination and freewill - and therefore how far Rheya is preprogrammed. Rheya is created in his image - but it is telling that the flashbacks are as much hers as his. The ending, if anything, is more ambiguous than Tarkovsky's, and has a strange kind of guilt-induce wish-fulfilment.
XVI: Stalker (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1979)
I almost feel as if my brain has stopped working. There has been some kind of disaster, and people want to get into an isolated area known as the Zone, where there is a room in which wishes are granted. The main character is a Stalker (Alexander Kaidanovsky) who leads a Writer (Anatoli Solonitsyn) and Professor (Nikolai Grinkoand) into the Zone where Weird Stuff happens. I kept on thinking of The Wizard of Oz for some reason, and it feels like a movie that offers more than it delivers. Not a film for those who like their endings neat.
Projected total: 127.
Totals: 16 - Cinema: 4; DVD: 12; Television: 0
IX: Slumdog Millionaire (Danny Boyle and Loveleen Tandan, 2008)
Who'd've thunk that him out of Skins would be a movie star - Nicholas Hoult, yeah, on the back of earlier films, and Mitch Hewer on grands of talent (although I've missed Britannia High). After all, his character was a token one, discovering his religion every so often to a) angst over a gay best friend or b) angst over losing his virginity. Too often he faded into the background. Here he is the competitor on India's version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, whose life has enabled him to answer the questions accurately - and indeed to know that the key question will be one about musketeers.I was reminded a little of The Kite Runner in the survival; on wits of young boys - but this film is more feel good than that one, and consequentially less emotional. The story of his best friend, the counterpoint, is less feel good - the gangster who finds a conscience - and actually less believable.
Enjoyable and slick - and wait for the Bollywood song and dance credits.
X: Vals Im Bashir (Waltzing with Bashir; Ari Folman, 2008)
Animated documentary - making use of a lot of rotoscoping - in which Folman tries to recall the events of the Lebanon War in the early 1980s and what precisely happened. There was clearly something bad, but he has lost most of his memories of it - and a friend has a recurring nightmare.
For the final minute - when we get the truth, or at the very most a truth - the materials break back from animation into news footage of the time, which suggests an ontological shift, from possibly faulty memory to authentic reality, or perhaps suggests a nervousness about aestheticising genocide. It is uncomfortable to say the least - although that is how it should be. Graphic novels have dealt with politics before - Art Spielgelman and Joe Sacco spring to mind - but this is none the less brave for trying to tell a story that some would rather forget.
XXI: The Quiet Man (John Ford, 1952)
Odd departure for John Ford and recurring star John Wayne - a romantic comedy set in Oirland: Sean Thornton (Wayne) returns to his birthplace to purchase his old homestead and takes a wife, Mary Kate Danaher (Maureen O'Hara), to the annoyance of her brother and local squire (Victor McLaglen), who wants the land and a skivvy. But you don't stand up against Big John Wayne.
It's all as green as a shamrock and O'Hara is feisty as anything - and no one really seems to consider that she has a say in the matter, which makes the wooing and the marriage troublesome to say the least. I'm not entirely clear when the film is meant to be set - a then-recent past I guess. But aside from the trains, it feels as if it could be any point in the last two centuries. Jolly good fun - and part of the Top 100
XII: Ugetsu monogatari (Mizoguchi Kenji, 1953)
Another of the Top 100 films, a sort of Japanese civil war fantasy. Two couples are disturbed by the encroaching civil war - one is a potter who wants to make his fortune, the other is wanting to be a samurai. The film tells their story, and their attempts to stay free. It's very pretty, with moments of magic.
XIII: Solaris (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1972)
Strange things are happening out at the planet Solaris, and psychologist Kris Kelvin (Donatas Banionis) is sent to investigate. Before you can say "frozen Christ?", he is being haunted by his dead wife, Hari (Natalya Bondarchuk), a product of the planet's impact on the cosmonauts.
As is typical with Tarkovsky, he is much more interested in still lives, middle aged men shuffling around in long coats, mothers that are strikingly similar to mothers in appearance, dachas in the rain and candles than in telling a story. A third of the way through, a character drives wordlessly through Tokyo, for no readily definable reason, aside from he's there. But there's space for philosophising, and there's plenty of fistfights to be had about what on earth the ending means - and whether any of the film is actually real. Both gripping and alienating at the same time.
XIII: Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Don Siegel, 1956)
Rewatch for work of the first variation on a doctor being called back to investigate a few cases of Capgras syndrome, only to find the world is being invaded by pod people. It's crying out for metaphor - Peter Biskind goes with the Red paranoia story, I've always felt it to be more satirical - and clearly there's a fear of conformity in the period which would be as defined by having to be American as Soviet. Stand out line is "I never knew fear until I kissed Becky," and the ending is pleasingly open (as is that of much sf of the period). I've only seen - and must rewatch - the Kaufmann remake from the 1970s. The Ferrara one is tempting but as to the one from 2007 - how would you tell that Nicole Kidman is a pod person?
A spoiler on this, I fear:
XIV: The Lady Eve (Preston Sturges, 1941)
Curious screwball comedy in which anthropologist and brewery heir Charles Pike (Henry Fonda) falls under the spell of con artists Jean Harrington (Barbara Stanwyck) and Colonel Harrington (Charles Coburn); the Colonel wants to fleece him, but Jean falls in love. When the cons are exposed, it is Jean who is pissed at Pike, and seeks revenge by posing as an English lady. Oh, and eventually they end up married.
I guess that's screwball for you - turning on a six pence, and reversing the trajectory. The logic isn't the strong point. Bizarrely, little is made of her running screaming from his cabin having seen the size of his cobra. But the Genesis Eve is clearly being winked out - women, you can't trust 'em.
XV: De´tective (Jean-Luc Godard, 1985)
Frankly baffling deconstruction of the detective thriller - there has been a murder of someone called Prince in a hotel a couple of years back, a couple are breaking up, a boxer trains, a promoter has stolen money. All elements of a thriller that could have been made at any point since the 1940s - but apparently it would have been boring to do that so Godard sticks together fragments of half a dozen different thrillers. Not my cup of tea.
XVI: Solaris (Steven Soderbergh, 2002)
Strange things are happening out at the planet Solaris, and psychologist Chris Kelvin (George Clooney) is sent to investigate. Before you can say "frozen Christ?", he is being haunted by his dead wife, Rheya (Natascha McElhone), a product of the planet's impact on the astronauts.
As is typical with Soderbergh, he is much more interested in colour schemes, flashbacks and clever cinematography than in telling a story. I like Soderbergh's experiments, but I'd previously resisted this - and that's a shame. It looks stunning - and sacrifices much of the time spent on Earth before getting to Solaris, to allow for later flashbacks. Kelvin is here doing the old Vertigo thing of recreating the dead beloved, against her will, and is happy to engage in arguments about predestination and freewill - and therefore how far Rheya is preprogrammed. Rheya is created in his image - but it is telling that the flashbacks are as much hers as his. The ending, if anything, is more ambiguous than Tarkovsky's, and has a strange kind of guilt-induce wish-fulfilment.
XVI: Stalker (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1979)
I almost feel as if my brain has stopped working. There has been some kind of disaster, and people want to get into an isolated area known as the Zone, where there is a room in which wishes are granted. The main character is a Stalker (Alexander Kaidanovsky) who leads a Writer (Anatoli Solonitsyn) and Professor (Nikolai Grinkoand) into the Zone where Weird Stuff happens. I kept on thinking of The Wizard of Oz for some reason, and it feels like a movie that offers more than it delivers. Not a film for those who like their endings neat.
Projected total: 127.
Totals: 16 - Cinema: 4; DVD: 12; Television: 0