Cinemascope
for my own referenceFriday, September 16, 2011
film list - 16th september 2011
damnation:
in the desolate landscapes of rural-industrial hngary - a love triangle between
a torch singer in a restaurant, her husband and a lonely man. above them the
rattle and hum of the perpetually moving coal cart
trolley. black and white long
tracking shots stare at cracks on the walls of the crumbling small town.
the last rites: almost
pornographic gaze at the dark beauty of the ship breaking yard at chittagong.
men's bodies are aestheticized as gorgeous labour, the ships themselves as they
die are beautiful corpses.
gandu: all
controversy, not that much content. a film about adolescent sexuality where a
young rap wannabe meets a rickshaw driver with a bruce lee obsession. the shaky
hard close up black and white grittiness was mostly style- but adolescent
visual obsessions work for a film about adolescence. example: the graphic
sexual scene where gandu loses his sexuality is the only scene in colour.
nadodigal: three friends
in a village kidnap a girl for the sake of someone else's love. the lovers fall
out of love. very pointless and not very entertaining regressive stuff. a big
hit i am told. whatever.
lan yu: a gay love
story set in beijing of the early 90s. the tiananmen square incident takes
place off screen. a young architecture student is taken under the wing of a
corrupt businessman. a melodrama tear jerker that reminded me of so many douglas sirk films. the tragic end was
unnecessary and completely ineffective.
35 shots of rum; claire denis'
drama about the relationship between a train driver on the verge of reiterment
and his daughter. they love alone ina building overlooking the train tracks and
have an extended family of neighbours. a movie about letting go.
not on the lips: alain resnais-
as far as he can possibly get from the esoteric time space madness of
'hiroshima mon amour'. a 'saloon comedy'- does such a term exist? a rich
businessman calls his american partner over for a dinner. unknown to him this
american happens to be the ex-husband of his wife. a comedy of errors set to music.
light hearted fun
the adventures or baron munchausen: terry gilliam
goes crazy with the irrational impulses in this 'hatim tai' like journey. there
is adventure at every turn. the baron and his companions meet giant heads
without bodies and vice versa, kings of the underworld and giant momsters as
they try and save the kingdom from the invading turks.
the decameron. : pasolini's
sexually liberated world of medieval naples. in the stories as young men make
love to a convent full of nuns, a young couple make love on a terrace, a young
man is cheated out of all he owns, sin and salvation are intertwined in sex and
death.
the trial of joan of arc: bresson's
modernist take on the story of joan of arc. the look is disconcertingly
contemporary. bodies are fragmented in gestures. her strength lies within her
ambiguous sexuality.
the magnificent ambersons. a film about
the fin de siècle. the ambersons and their mansion disintegrates with
transforming fortunes unable to break with traditions and sceptical of the new
world symbolized by the automobile. exquisite looking black and white noir and
that incredible take of the ball room sequence; or the joy of racing in the
snow.
a matter of life and death. a powell and
pressburger rmasterpience- a fantasy film about war and love. when david niven
does not die and instead finds himself in the arms of a girl he loves the
clerks administering the entrance of the after life are distraught and a court
case begins. the british are held accountable for the atrocities they have
committed on the world. but love saves the day and paves the path for anglo
american romances. unforgettable image: the escalator to the sky. and the
filing cabinet of the dead.
dont look now: the first
nicholas roeg film. this was a thriller horror film set in the labyrinthine
lanes of venice. as donald sutherland tries to restore a church, him and his
wife are haunted by the sudden visions in a red raincoat of his daughter when
she drowned. the cut-up juxtapositions of space and time here make for
unexpected images
walkabout: from the
opening city shots showing the main characters in offices, playgrounds and in
schools we cut suddenly to the landscape of the autralian outback. here after a
brutal suicide a girl and her brother are left to fend for the themselves
within the wild. as they encounter the aboriginal and the natural the violence
of the civilized is brought into relief. as the animal and the plant confront
the ghosts of the primitive and the history of colonialism, aborigines dance
mad in the carcass of a burnt car; an aboriginal boy performs a love sex death
dance. the cut-up slicing of the space/time is fantastic.
performance: the first nicholas roeg film, where a london gangster on the run from his old buddies finds shelter in a bohemian home lorded over by a retiring rock star- a pouting made up mick jagger. the time space collisions continue until the langour of the upstairs boudoir takes over and begins to blur boundaries between the various inhabitants of the space. people morph into one another, sexuality is polymorphic, identities are all performed- being a man, being strong, being.
cries and whispers: distressed grieving sisters in a bourgeois home. one of them is dying and is being cared for by her maid. steeped in a palpable sadness, as a the death brings out the repressed desires and guilt's tied up behind the cage of being a woman and of belonging to a certain class. a film about boredom and death.
the exterminating angel. another bunuel dinner party. while in the 'discreet charm' the dinner never begins; in 'the exterminating angel' it never ends. when the workers within a bourgeois home leave, listlessness begins to set over the guests of the a dinner party. while the world outside waits to come in, from within none can fid the energy to step out even though death and boredom threaten.
singham; surya tears
the screen apart with his growl. a lion appears in sudden bursts when he roars;
he cuts arcs through the sky when his strikes. as capital m- man surya is
classic. the girl whimpers and pouts and he
saves the day by beating evil
kidnappers into a pulp.
taurus. the last days
of lenin in washed grey green. a dacha where the ailing leader is being taken
care a caring wife and a amused group of helpers. to make the myth a person.
stalin alternating between caring and calculating comes and meets with him on a
garden terrace as lenin contemplates poison.
barsaat: nimmis first film. a ramanand sagar story set in the hills where nubile young girls with lal dupattas flow free before young men from the city come to corrupt them with their cynicism and quick love. prem nath plays the cynical friend who breaks nimmis heart, while raj kapoor the poet romantic who falls in love with reshma played by nargis. while one love story ends in happiness, the other in tragedy- with tears of blood
Labels: bangladesh, bengali films, bollywood, china, english, france, hollywood, hungary, russia, spain, sweden, tamil
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