O Capitan, My Capitan!: Dersu Uzala

Dersu Uzala (1975) - Kurosawa


I'll keep it short. Dersu Uzala is a tender story of budding friendship btwn a captain of military land surveyor team and a Goldi hunter with the stunning Siberian forests as a backdrop. It's also about changing times and somber observation of disappearing way of life. Even though settings and actors are foreign, you can tell right away it's a Kurosawa film- the mastery of exterior shots and movements are unmistakable AK. It's much more personable Dances with Wolves/Kaspar Hauser for grown-ups. It's mature, guileless, direct and teeming with mutual respect. AK fan or not, one can't deny that he is a master storyteller. There is a real feeling of joy seeing the cheerful reunion of Dersu and his capitan. I really loved this film.

The show at Film Forum was sold out even though it was a weeknight. A lot of AK love going on here in NY. Even though the 35mm film print was scratched and discolored, I was glad to see it on the big screen with my good friend Ben.

doodling at work #2

Just read this short story. Couldn't get the image out of my head, so had to put it down on paper.

It's one of 57 short stories from the book Varieties of Disturbance: Stories. I love it so far.

doodling at work #1

Doodling at work. More to come.

Contrasts: Chocolat

Chocolat (1988) - Denis

...amidst bronzed and black African faces the white skin color evokes something akin to death...

Watching this again since the first time about 15 years ago, I realized how Mireille Perrier (Boy Meets Girl, Un Monde Sans Pitié) looks very much like Claire Denis, as she plays a woman reminiscing about her childhood in French colonial Cameroon, mirroring the director's own background.

France, an aptly named (for a film about French colonial Africa) young girl, lives an idyllic life in northern Cameroon with her parents (the Dalens) and black servants in her perfect sheltered life in a racist country. Everything gets shaken a little when Luc (Jean-Claude Adelin), a former missionary turned laborer gets brought in along with the local black workers. France's parents, Aimée (Giulia Boschi) and Marc can't get a handle on enigmatic Luc. He is kind of an instigator using his white man gone native shtick against clueless whites and obedient blacks alike. Tension rises and the forbidden passion surfaces when a good servant Protée (Isaach De Bankolé) gets pushed by Luc's antics.

Chocolat is a very subtle predecessor to Denis's White Material last year. You can see her progression as a filmmaker in those twenty years- loose structure, striking cinematography and visual poetry. What's not changed is her ability to capture those brilliant moments of alienation/contrasts, sexual tension and lurking-right-underneath-the-surface violence like no other.

Complicated Hero, Complicated Villain: Beowulf & Grendel

Beowulf & Grendel (2005) - Gunnarsson

Little troll

Journey

The hero emerges

Grendel in his back yard

"He won't fight. Because you've done anything against him."

Selma the witch

Baptism

Angry Grendel

Angelina Jolie?

Beowulf makes amends

This is one of the cases where the location makes half of the film. Shot entirely in Iceland, this film, based on the epic poem Beowulf, gets its weight and poetry from wherever the camera points.

Our hero Beowulf (Gerard Butler) is sent from Geatland to aide the distressed Daneland king Hrothgar (Stellan Skarsgård, Breaking the Waves, Insomnia). Every night, Grendel the troll is wrecking havoc and Hrothgar is driven mad. But the troll is not out for just anyone's blood. He just wants Danes to suffer for their misdeeds. Beowulf & Grendel is a great example of epic done right (with no trace of CGI). Well balanced btwn its machismo and sense of honor & justice, there is hardly any false note in it. Redhead Sarah Polley (The Sweet Hereafter, Dawn of the Dead) as Selma the witch is a little distracting and its sarcastic portrayal of Christianity is funny. I came to appreciate this movie a lot more the second time around.

Wild Goose Chase: Fly Away Home

Fly Away Home (1996) - Ballard




After a car accident, Amy, a thirteen year old girl, comes back to live with her eccentric father in Ontario, Canada. She finds herself inheriting a dozen goose eggs after a logging company rummages through the forest nearby. The eggs hatch and chicks follow her around 24/7. Their instincts to fly will take over soon and unless Amy teaches them how, they will get lost or worse, die off.

Carroll Ballard (Never Cry Wolf), with DP Caleb Deschanel, captures some beautiful images from the sky. Fly Away Home is definitely a children's film- a very well made one at that. It's a live action version of Hayao Miyazaki film. Jeff Daniels does his usual Kurt Russell/Jeff Bridges hybrid as a sympathetic single dad. Anna Paquin is adorable.

I happen to be very attractive

Ladies and gentleman. Please may I have your attention. I'm pretty sure many of you know me already. I'm out here every night. I've been out of job for two years now. I've been looking for work all day. Things are tough these days. Excuse me ma'am.
I'm hungry and tired. If you have any change, I'd appreciate any help. If you have any food to give me, please put your money back in your pocket, I'd take any food in your bags. And if you don't have anything to give me today but if you happen to be really attractive, give me a big hug and we will call it even until next time. All right, I'm coming through that way. Excuse me. Coming through!

Well coincidentally, everyone in the train that day happened to be very attractive. And they all decided to give this homeless guy a hug. That night his stomach was empty but his heart was full.

Cry Wolf: La Fille du RER

La Fille du RER/The Girl on the Train (2009) - Téchiné

The film is based on a true event about a girl who cried wolf an anti-semitic attack in France. But instead of some overblown harrowing courtroom drama, The Girl on the Train is a typical Téchiné character study that is nuanced and subtle. Émilie Dequenne (from The Dardenne bros Palm d'Or winner Rosetta, now all grown up) plays Jeanne, an unemployed post-teenage girl living with her mom who runs a daycare from her home in Paris suburb. After an emotional break up with her new boyfriend, Jeanne decides to cut herself up, draw swastikas on her stomach and file a false report. But that doesn't occur until the midway of the film.

It's the first movie I've seen where Téchiné directly weaves topical theme in to his narrative even though the changing face of French society has always been present in many of his modern-day set films. Any violent attack against specific religion, race, culture is a heavy subject and can't be dealt lightly. And I can see Téchiné trying to show Jeanne's reason for her action by building her character up slowly to where it all plays out. Jeanne is a typical pretty young French redhead rollerblading everywhere with her head forever attached to her music player; all in all, pretty ordinary. She is not portrayed as some dumb girl who feigns an attack because she wanted attention, nor are her actions treated with sentimentality.

There are many really great scenes with Jeanne and Franck (Nicolas Duvauchelle) as they rollerblade around the streets and a 13 year old Jew boy on the eve of his Bah Mitzvah sharing a tiny hut over night with half naked Jeanne. But even with Catherine Denueve, Dominic Blanc and Duvauchelle playing strong supporting roles, The Girl with the Train is hard film to like since it doesn't give the audience any easy answers. It's way too subtle and at the same time all too human.

American Gothic: Northfork

Northfork (2003) - Polish
Twin brother filmmakers (Michael directs, Mark acts/produces)' third and last American Dream trilogy (Twin Falls Idaho and Jackpot prior) is a thing of a beauty. Northfork, a small town of the high plains of Montana is about to be flooded with the construction of a new dam in the 50s. Six men in long black coats and fedoras are assigned to remove the remaining households to a 'higher ground': symbolism and metaphor abound (they are rather door-to-door bible salesmen like). Under the care of a grizzled priest (Nick Nolte), an abandoned sick boy believes he is an angel.

With Nolte and James Woods as two main actors whose craggy, beaten faces I consider very American, the Polish brothers create a strange, somber American Gothic that is both fantastical and personal. Only comparable film with a similar theme I can think of is Tarsem's The Fall. But the bros accomplishes something really magical and different with very little. With every frame work of art, the look of the film is stunning:

Hypnotherapy: Man is Not a Bird

Covek nije tica/Man is Not a Bird (1965) - Makavejev
Hypnosis session:
Snakes!

Now you are a bird!

That's entertainment!

Milena Bravic

Dusan Makavejev (WR: Mysteries of Organism, Sweet Movie)'s debut feature starts with a hypnotist explaining that there is no such thing as magic. Man is Not a Bird is a multi-layered snapshot of Communist Yugoslavia under Tito. It follows Rudinovic, an old stoic engineer as he arrives in a small mining town, Bor, full of rowdy workers and smokestacks. There he begins a short affair with a young hairdresser (scrumptious Milena Dravic). There isn't much of a plot, as the focus on characters jump around with scenes inside the busy factory, bustling outdoor market, circus, hypnosis show, etc.

Is the hypnosis session a stand in for life under Tito? If it is, Makavejev is not judgmental. However frivolous the workers lives in Bor seem to be, they are handled with warmth and good natured humor. There is a tension btwn seasoned, famed engineer Rudinovic (he likes Mozart) and young, slacking workers. Makavejev seems to tell us, when you lose in love or otherwise, I don't care who you are, you are pretty much the same as the rest of us. We make do with whatever we have. Man is not a bird.

Thanks Ben for lending me this.

Ticking (fake) Time Bomb: The Hurt Locker

The Hurt Locker (2008?) - Bigelow

It's a gripping ticking-time-bomb thriller, literally. Dryly and effectively directed by the great actioner Kathryn Bigelow (Point Break, Strange Days). Her whole approach to the Hurt Locker is a simple one- "make the most unglamorous war movie ever: let's waste Guy Pearce and Ralph Fiennes to show that I'm serious about it". The problem with that is, she tries so hard to avoid cliché, it comes across as insincere and fake and just as painful to watch.

Staff Sgt. James (Jeremy Renner), with his easy going leatherneck charm is an adrenalin junkie EOD (Explosive Ordinance Disposal) man. The whole situation is irremediable over there in Iraq. Peeps like S Sgt. James get by by macho one-upping one another in a dangerous world they can barely understand. It's a sad movie.

City of Remembrance: 24 City

24 City (2008) - Jia

A nostalgic docudrama about changing times in Chengdu. I see this as a natural progression of Jia Zhang-ke (Platform, Unknown Pleasures) who is suited for being a documentary filmmaker as Wes Anderson is for cartoons. He blends interviews with real former factory workers and known actors playing them (Joan Chen and Zhao Tao) with the backdrop of the last days of state owned aeronautics factory. As in other Jia films, the main attraction here is its cinematography. Yu Lik-Wai's measured, slow tracking, panning and crane shots are beautiful without being romantic (it doesn't come across as phony as Olmi's I Fidanzati which was just a glorified Calvin Klein commercial). In a way, it's obviously not a true documentary since every shot is staged carefully and one can argue that Jia is just scratching the surface of the history. Featuring known actors also takes a bit out of its emotional impact. What is totally objective though? Jia lets all the judgments slip by. 24 City is a quiet observation of time passing done masterfully, if not too slickly.

Trailer

Imaginarium of Terry Gilliam: Imaginarium of Dr. Panasus

The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus (2009) - Gilliam

The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus is a messy, unnecessarily elaborate and candy colored fantasy that only Terry Gilliam could conjure up. Thankfully, it works! It concerns a traveling troup which includes Dr. Parnassus (Christopher Plummer), his soon to be 16 year old, scrumptious daughter Valentina (Lily Cole), his sidekick Anton (Andrew Garfield), who's secretly in love with Val and a midget Percy (Vern Troyer). Even though Dr. Parnassus can make your dreams come true, it's a hard sell with a shabby setup at the back of the supermarket parking lot. One night, they stumble on Tony (Heath Ledger) under the bridge with a noose around his neck. When he comes back to life, he doesn't remember his shady past. For young Valentina who wants a normal life, Tony gives her a glimpse of hope. But it's not a love story. It's more of Dr. Parnassus show. He made a deal with the devil (enigmatic Tom Waits in his usual bowler hat) for eternal life and the wager was his daughter. And so on and so on. The characters are paper thin and so as the premise but the fantasy must go on...

Dr. Parnassus plays out like a Gilliam's greatest hits, featuring all his old elements that made his films enjoyable- idealized gamine (bordering pedophilia), moneyed up python-esque animation sequences and backdrops, zany homeless people, and characters running around yapping nonsense the whole time in one corner of the frame. It's a big circus. And the every school-girl's-wet-dream aspect (Ledger, Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell taking turns playing Tony in Imaginarium) is a total overkill. It also seems Gilliam had a hard time deciding how to end the film. But I have to say the overall visual craziness and mad energy held my attention. If you want a satisfying story, keep away. But it's Gilliam's best since Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

Sarang Haeyo: Moon

Moon (2009) - Jones

An accomplished debut Sci-fi from Duncan Jones. Sam Rockwell is Sam Bell, a lone mining operation worker on the moon. In two weeks, after 3 years of the solitary job with his only companion Gerty (a less mean version of Hal2000, voiced by Kevin Spacey) in a space camp called Sarang (which means 'love' in Korean- I guess in the future, the moon is owned by evil Koreans with Hello-Kitty aesthetics), he will be going home to his wife and daughter. After having visions of a strange girl on the routine checkup on the mining machine, Sam crashes his Lunar vehicle, only to wake up in the infirmary inside the base. Apparently he has some memory loss. And even though he is physically fine, he is confined to the base by the Lunar Industries company heads via recorded message and by Gerty. Somewhat rebel headed and going stir crazy, Sam ventures outside and finds the crashed vehicle and himself(?) and brings his döppelganger back to the base. This is where Moon gets interesting.

The look of Moon owes a lot to classical Sci-fi of 70's and 80's- a slightly update version but it still retains its beautiful retro authenticity without going CG crazy. Unlike The Clone Returns Home, which came out around the same time or its spiritual mother Solaris, Moon is less perceptive to the characters search for identity and spirituality but Rockwell's dual performance makes up for it. His comic timing is impeccable and gives the character(s) his down-to-earth, regular joe humanism. The most heartbreaking scene is when dying Sam #1 talks to his grown up daughter and finds out he is also a clone. First stunned, Sam #1 comes back to the base as a broken man while unfazed Sam #2 who knows himself a clone, plans for returning home with the first one in tow.

It seems like a logical step for a child of David Bowie making a Sci-fi movie called Moon. It's a quite unique movie and I liked it a lot. I am looking forward to Jones's future projects.

If you love somebody, set them free: Fox and the Child

Fox and the Child (2007) - Jaquet
In pictures:














This film brought out a little girl inside of me. The location is stunning (the French Alps). The furry friend of the girl is very cute. The moral of the story is: Foxes don't make good house pets. Wild animals can't be tamed.