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Reviews
La otra conquista (1998)
Clash of cultures
Anyone who has paid attention to their history teacher back in school will remember hearing about the Spanish conquest of America and how they converted the natives to Catholicism. Never once did I hear the story from the Aztec's point of view, until I saw Salvador Carrasco's opera prima "The Other Conquest" (La otra conquista). In it, Carrasco (who wrote, directed and edited the film) tells us the story of Topiltzin, an Aztec, who like many others, was captured, tortured, forced to convert and even change his name to a Christian name, Tomás. As the story progresses, the intensity of this film deepens, and so does Topiltizin's suffering. He struggles to accept the new teachings from Friar Diego while at the same time remaining true to his beliefs.
"The Other Conquest" looks like a big budget movie but it hardly is, and that is due partly to the beautiful locations (filmed entirely on location), the amazing production design, and the incredible acting from first timer Delgado (Topiltzin).
It took Carrasco 7 long years to be able to finish a film on such a controversial subject matter but his persistence and courage are admirable and should be an example to anyone who wishes to make films. It a beautifully crafted film that aims, not to please its audience but rather to show the truth, no matter how ugly it may be, of how two cultures clashed and, form that collision created a new one.
El espíritu de la colmena (1973)
A Spanish masterpiece
Victor Erice's "The Spirit of the Beehive" (El espiritu de la colmena) is the story of Ana, a 5 year old girl, who after watching the age inappropriate movie Frankenstein in a mobile cinema, starts wondering what is real and what is not, what is death (the scene where they stand next to tracks as the train passes is a wonderful example of it). We are witnesses to the process we all have gone through when we were around the same age, being curious about everything that happens around us, wondering why they happen, trying to find out what it all means, and who we are.
We see a family that has communication issues -the parents hardly interact with each other or with their daughters- living in a house that resembles the inside of a beehive (amazing cinematography also makes the light work in such way that is seems as if they are living inside one), many beautiful shots of the countryside make the audience feel they are looking at paintings, presenting us a fantasy and secluded world against the gray backdrop of Spain during the Civil War.
Victor Erice gives us a story that is both haunting and mesmerizing. There is an absence of unnecessary dialogs, that the viewers play close attention to everything that is uttered by the characters, sometimes having to participate to give them meaning, there is also a lack of camera movement, putting instead more emphasis on still shots of the action,and specially close-ups of Ana's face (AMAZING acting by young Ana Torrente) as she struggles to find out who she is and what is happening in the world. Many scenes in The Spirit of the Beehive manage to stay with the viewers for a long time including the scene at the tracks, another where Isabel tries to strangle her cat and then paints her lips with blood and finally the final scene when Ana, after "meeting" Frankenstein (who know whether it is in a dream or her imagination), leaves her bed, opens the window and repeats "Soy Ana, soy Ana, soy Ana" thus finding her identity and what life is, making this the best childhood movie I've seen.
Idi i smotri (1985)
The most realistic WWII film ever
"Come and See"(Idi i Smotri) is a magnificent film by Russian filmmaker Klimov made during the Cold War. It tells the story of a young Byelorussian lad called Florya who decides to join the rebels fighting against the Nazis during WWII. The day he arrives to the camp, situated in the middle of a forest, it is bombed and he, along a girl named Glasha miraculously manage to survive. Right after the bombing, Klimov (who uses Eisenstein like cuts in this scene) sucks the audience into the story, taking them inside Florya's head, hearing, experiencing his suffering and his descent into madness.
It is not a movie for the weak of heart. We see Florya experience in a couple of days what most people never go through in their whole lives: surviving a bombing, being shot at, seeing an entire town burned alive, seeing a woman who looks like Glasha raped (the most shocking image of the whole film, I literally had to look away) and finding his own family dead. That is made evident by his face at the end of the film where he looks more like a 60 year old than the young man he was at the beginning. That final scene where he finally shots the picture of Hitler with the rifle he has been carrying around for the entire movie while Mozart's Requiem plays and we see Hitler's life depicted in images going backwards until his birth is one of the best scenes in film history.
What also makes this movie great and different from WWII movies is that the 5 senses are at play, including that of smell, which is present when Florya and Glasha drag through the mud when escaping Florya's village. The techniques shown here have been reproduced many times in Hollywood WWII movies like Saving Private Ryan and makes, between other things, "Come and See" is a must see film for anyone who enjoys war movies, but remember, be ready to be tortured for the 2 and a half hours the film lasts, even more, you won't be able to sleep that same night, I know I didn't.
Yuki yukite, shingun (1987)
Okuzai's mission for truth
"Emperor's Naked Army Marches On" (yuki yuki shingun) is a documentary that tells the story of Okuzai, a former WWII hostage, who is haunted by the memory of the execution of two fellow Japanese soldiers weeks after the war had ended and sets out to find out the truth on who executed them and their reasons for doing so. The movie starts slow but soon we see how far he goes to try and get the suspects to tell him the truth, resorting to lying and physical violence. The protagonist simply doesn't care how he does it, whether he ends up in jail or if everyone dislikes him, as long as he gets answers, showing that he believes that violence is the means to an end.
Director Kazuo Hara goes to great lengths to tell the story and not be involved, turning the viewers and himself into a fly on the wall. This is made clear when he doesn't stop filming when a fearless Okuzai starts beating up an elderly man who has just had surgery. That scene is a perfect example of how real this movie feels, Hara does a great job of not showing us things they way we want them to be but rather the whole truth.
"Emperor's Naked Army Marches On" captured my whole and undivided attention from the beginning and I found myself cringing at Okuzai's violence, laughing at his attitude toward the police, shocked at his methods for uncovering the truth, and at times, even rooting for him to get answers for himself and for the murdered soldiers' families. But most importantly, Hara and Okuzai succeeded in showing the viewers another side to the WWII, which would still be a memory in the minds of the soldiers that were in New Guinea, hadn't it been for their persistence in finding the truth.
Dom za vesanje (1988)
An intimate look into Gypsy culture
In "Time of the Gypsies" (Dom za vasanje), Emir Kusturica creates a real yet magical world where gypsies defy and also fit stereotypes. "Black Cat, White Cat" he presented us with a more jovial and fun look into their culture. This movie starts that way, but as time passes, it turns from a comedy into a tragedy showing how the search for wealth and power, no matter what heir reasons, ends up by corrupting them.
In this coming of age tale, we follow Perhan, a young gypsy with telepathic powers whose ambition is as big as his misfortunes. Hoping for his disabled sister to get better care, he sets out on an adventure that brings him out of his secluded life in a gypsy camp in Bosnia and into Italy, where he starts to work for a "godfather" type figure, Ahmed, who only cares about earning as much money as possible having kids and cripples begging and stealing in the streets of Milan, and who keeps constantly betraying Perhan's trust. When Perhan, who thorough the movie turns more and more corrupt, becoming, in his own way, Ahmed's successor, finally reaches his boiling point. It is then that he loses what little innocence he had left and using his telepathic powers, which at the beginning seemed useless, he kills his mentor.
Music plays an important part in gypsy culture and that is shown in Time of the gypsies, where Bregovic's amazing score sets the mood, creating incredible moments such as when a band sings while Perhan leaves his family in Ahmed's truck and we see how, on the way to Italy, Ahmed buys kids and disabled people to go work for him or the music played during the scenes taking place at St. George's festival. These are the moments when Kusturica's work is at its best.
Fa yeung nin wah (2000)
In the mood for a great love story
As its title mentions, In the Mood for Love (fa yeung nin wa) is a love story. Set in the 60s in Hong Kong, it tells the story of a man and a woman, both who move into two apartments on the same floor of a building. Wong Kar Wai shows us how, as time passes (keep an eye on Mrs Chan's dresses), these characters encounter heartbreak (his wife cheats on him with Chan's husband) and love (they fall for each other) and heartbreak again.
When they find out about their partners' infidelity, Mr Chow (Tony Leung) and Mrs Chan (Maggie Cheung) vow "not be like them" (their spouses), a task that at the beginning seemed so easy, but as the time they spend together increases, the more they find themselves trying to repress their feelings for each other and keep their relationship on a platonic level. It isn't your typical romantic movie, where the characters meet, 15 minutes later they're in bed and in the end, after several break ups and make-ups, they end up together.
There are several ways the audience discovers the mutual attraction between these two flawed characters: First, by way of the beautiful and haunting score by Michael Galasso that accompanies Kar Wai's slow-mo and continuous shots of the characters glancing at each other or walking by, and even more when Nat King Cole sings "quizás, quizás, quizás", we are aware of the characters' emotions, longing for each other while trying to suppress those feelings. Secondly, although they hardly touch each other, Wong Kar Wai makes sure we see it, by doing close ups of the action, paying attention to every single detail, no matter how small, that could mean a lot to the story (first time Chow grabs her hand in the cab, she takes it away, but the second time around, she doesn't). It is a slow moving film, but the beautiful cinematography and direction mixed with great music and acting makes this a film that shows that not all great love stories end with a happily ever after.
Le fantôme de la liberté (1974)
Expect the unexpected
What would happen if the world were turned upside down? What if we were granted complete freedom to do anything we want? The answers to those questions are present in each of the 12 stories presented in this amazing film by surrealist master Luis Buñuel.
From the beginning, he plays with his audience, building up our expectations and when we think something might happen, he leaves us stunned and laughing, showing by way of absurdity and satire things we never would have thought possible because of the preconceptions we have demonstrating that we are not as free thinking and open as we thought we were. As he has done in several of his movies, Buñuel doesn't have a narrative thread through the movie choosing instead to connect each "tableau" to the next with the introduction of a random character that becomes one of the main ones in the following scene, creating a random series of events. Also present in "Le Fantome de la Liberté" is Buñuel's recurrent criticism of several things including the bourgeoisie (as done before in "The Secret Charm of Bourgeoisie"), the Church, police and moral beliefs, making quite clear to the viewers how much he dislikes them. This movie is a perfect example of freedom all around, from the scene where a man shoots people randomly and later is sentenced to life in jail but walks out free of the courthouse, to Buñuel himself who has the freedom of saying whatever he wants, however he wants it and in doing so, has given us a fresh perspective. Buñuel's camera work makes us feel that we are ghosts gliding through each moment of a very realistic dream thus achieving the surrealist's main goal of presenting a symbolic and rational dreamlike universe, making this movie a must see and one of Buñuel's finest works.