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RMHolt77
Reviews
Mistérios de Lisboa (2011)
A labyrinth of love and desire
MYSTERIES OF LISBON is a staggeringly immense epic, weaving together multiple narratives of operatic passion and desire into a broader memory-narrative patchwork. The late Raul Ruiz draws upon great predecessors to set the visual tone (there's plenty of Visconti's THE LEOPARD and Kubrick's BARRY LYNDON here), but then toys with the aesthetic by adding playfully surreal touches, so that the events seem perched on the edge of a dream. By design, it's all a bit messy, one narrative tumbling into the other, but Ruiz displays such complete mastery of the medium that MYSTERIES OF LISBON remains gripping, even over the course of its four-hour running time.
The word "masterpiece" is fairly overused, and as a result, devalued, but MYSTERIES OF LISBON is the real thing.
Dante's Inferno (2007)
A wonderfully fun, unique spin on a literary masterpiece
If you haven't read Dante's INFERNO (part 1 of THE DIVINE COMEDY), you should. And once you have, you should check on this delightfully innovative spin on that classic tale.
This isn't the INFERNO as Dante wrote it. Dante has been completely modernized; Hell resembles Los Angeles, the punishments aren't quite what you remember, and the people populating Hell are now familiar faces (Ronald Reagan, Strom Thurmond, Condoleeza Rice). There's also a good dose of Monty Python and Mike Judge in the black humor that drenches every scene.
And while the take has its own novelty, what really elevates the film from good to great is the consistently enjoyable animation. The use of hand-operated paper cut-out puppets is wonderful. The care that has gone into crafting the sets and characters themselves is quite impressive indeed.
Highly recommended.
Hannibal (2001)
The Best of the Lecter Trilogy
In many circles today, it's almost heresy to dare to claim that Ridley Scott's HANNIBAL is anything but inferior to SILENCE OF THE LAMBS. I've always disagreed. Ridley Scott's HANNIBAL is by far the most unique and grand of the Lecter films, becoming a superb work that combines Grand Guignol with a beauty-and-the-beast storyline.
What this film truly is is a very different kind of sequel, like BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN was to FRANKENSTEIN. This film has no intention of really imitating its predecessor - but rather to go in a whole other direction and along the way chuckle a bit at the success of its predecessor.
Ridley Scott's direction is at the top of his game here. The movie flows with an elegance that is perfectly fitting the central figure, Hannibal, and his lifestyle. The cinematography is beautiful, and Hans Zimmer's score is lyric and gripping.
Anthony Hopkins returns to recreate the role he made famous in SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, and is, of course, phenomenal. In this film we see Hannibal Lecter's romantic side, and by all means, Hopkins does a terrific job with it. This is really Hannibal's film all the way, and he's not afraid to take center stage.
Julianne Moore, playing the role of Clarice Starling, does a serviceable job. Her performance is by no means as epic as Jodie Foster, but in a sense, Moore seems more fitting to the film than Foster would have. The rest of the cast is fairly well rounded out with veteran actors, and all do a fine job.
The single best moment in the film is Clarice and Lecter's last moment together - both are at their best. It's extremely romantic, and it works. It really works. While the ending author Thomas Harris gave it would have been more darkly appropriate, the ending Scott has given it definitely doesn't disappoint and nicely resolves on the theme of "impossible romance" that he sought to give the film.