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Reviews
Hvítur, hvítur dagur (2019)
nordic cinema at its best
A modern take on a timeless human tragedy, against the stunning and unforgiving Icelandic landscape. A husband grieves the loss of his wife. His suspicion of her unfaithfulness gets his pain and anger compounded and he explodes in a spectacular fashion, the measured policeman seems ready to kill the 'suspect' lover of his wife and he even upsets his favourite person in the world, his grand daughter, Salka. But this loss of control seems to free him and the film ends with a happy vision of his wife.
Poirot: Murder on the Orient Express (2010)
Is the idea of justice still relevant in the atomised world we live in?
I just re watched the Murder on the Orient Express and was left deeply affected, more so than the first time around. I watched previous films based on the book , I liked them to various degrees but none came close to this one. It reminded me of the Decalogue by Kieslowski (1988), Thou Shall not Kill . The film has a severity and simplicity meant to emphasise the main questions: what is Justice, specifically human justice and what role religion( Catholic religion) still plays in the world today. In a world so fragmented by hatred,where truth seems impossible to grasp anymore is there a common notion of justice that most of us can understand?The answer eludes me but I shan't forget David Suchet's face in the last minutes f the film. He didn't know either, and his grasp of the rosary beads didn't bring any light in his troubled soul
Jodaeiye Nader az Simin (2011)
a masterpiece
Watching this wonderfully simple and subtle film I realized that cinema as an art is alive and well in the world and all you need is to know where to look for it. It is the story of a couple,Nader and Simin, who want a divorce. They do not hate each other, they just want different things from life, amongst them, the most important one : where to raise their daughter.Simin wants to emigrate, probably to the West(we find out at the end that she is an English teacher)whereas Nader wants to stay in Iran and care for his ailing father. The facts are simple enough and the film takes on the task to peel this onion and show us the layers of the story. Nader is an intransigent and moral human being who doesn't want to leave his father and his country(the Alzheimer stricken father is such a symbol for a country that lost its way and identity). He cant't relinquish the past in order to build the future(the daughter,)he wants to reconcile them. Simin, on the other hand is portrayed as more materialistic( she counts the money)and superficial(she wants to leave everything behind and start anew. In the end Nader is forced to realize that he doesn't live in a Greek tragedy,that life is full of compromise,that you need the support of the others that truth is not absolute and being a hero seems impossible in the modern world. Simin, on the other hand reveals her humanity, her love of her husband and daughter but she ignores Razeh's plea,either from selfishness or disdain for her superstitious type of religion. The child is the one to chose in the end what kind of future to have, what country to live in, what kind of human being she wants to be.Whichever way she goes I feel that she understands better than her parents that we,human beings,have to struggle to remain pure but cannot do so at the expense of our compassion and humanity.
Melancholia (2011)
We are alone with the sky full of stars
As Lars Von Trier said in an interview, we are brought in the world knowing that we are going to die.I think he is trying to see what we make of this knowledge, especially in this age when religion ran its course and only science seems to have any authority about the sky above us.
The main characters,Justine and her sister Claire,John,the scientist, Leo, the child, are all aware of the huge blue planet hovering towards the Earth. Justine, fragile and depressed, cannot play by the rules of everyday life. She doesn't see any point in worrying about her table manners when she knows the world will come to an end. Claire, tries not to look at the sky and wants to fill every moment left with beauty and kindness.
John, the scientist, seems to be shielded by his scientific certainty; he seems the most normal and adjusted and in the end he is the most unprepared. Justine finds her strength in her love for little Leo and her sister,Claire and builds for them' the magic cave'. It seems that in the end, love is the only answer.
The film is powerful, the image is stunning. It left me curiously uplifted.We know the truth, but we do have the choice to make the most of what we were given
Match Point (2005)
luck and the empty sky above
It is about Crime and Punishment, in the end!Dostoievski allowed Raskolnikov to be saved and redeemed, even though his crime had been sordid.There was a Sonia and the belief that paying one's due was all it took to put the world back in harmony.No such luck for 21st Century London dwellers.It is just about luck now, there is no God watching over us, everything goes. Even Camus's :"how can one be a saint without God" seems passé.All that beauty, all the lifestyle but nothing to save us or to give meaning to our lives. Malraux said that 21St Century will be religious or won't be at all.In the middle of all the religious wars that we have been witnessing, Woody Allen 's message is that in fact,people don't really believe in anything anymore(either God or romantic Love) and all that is left is luck and "a comfortable life".He is saying that all those great novelists and philosphers got it wrong.We are what we are and nothing transcends us. Maybe his British English is not impeccable,maybe some things are deja vues; but Woody Allen is asking the right questions.And he has always had even if some of his films seemed too self-centered.But that's all we have left, the Self, haven't we?
Lost in Translation (2003)
One of the most beautiful films in the past years
This movie was such a nice surprise,so captivating and true. It is all made of tones and shades, the harsh colors are saved for the alienating universe we live in.Japan seems strange, in search of an identity, caught between the past and the inexorable future The story is touching and simple as only perfect things are; it is sad because beauty in life doesn't really last and it is an"almost"story since nothing really happens.But then, there are so many types of nothing.It could be french(Lelouch's"A man and a woman")but it is much better than that because it is not pretentious at all. What a wonderful director Sofia Coppola is and how well she captured the transient nature of it all.
Eyes Wide Shut (1999)
A movie about self discovery
This wonderful movie of self-discovery has been largely misunderstood or ignored. The mythical and the sacred dimension seem to be elusive in this postindustrial universe. We know the password but the dream seems unconvincing vis-s vis the clinic reality of the neon lights. The only refuge could be the home, viewed as an island of warmth and safety. It could be an irony at the American obsessive concentration on home and family as a shield against living A self-indulgent world in which Leopold Bloom and Ulysses could lose their way forever. The only" hope" seems to be the refuge in the family life and in shutting one's eyes to the inner self and to any attempt at understanding.