Rebecca (1940)

Rebecca is considered a classic film and after having seen it, I can see why, even though some aspects of the film feel a bit dated. A widowed man meets a young girl during his vacation in France. He charms her and they fall in love with each other. The man is extremely rich but the girl isn't. He takes her to his home, an enormous manor house. The place is haunted by the late Mrs. The new wife, who wants to please her husband and restore everything to what it once was, finds herself more and more alienated: who was this Rebecca and how did she die? I cannot call myself a Hitchcock connoisseur, in fact, I haven't seen all that many Hitchcock films. This one was a positive surprise: an elegant film about repressed memories and obsession. Hitchcock made a horror movie without any supernatural elements; it is just the kind of movie when we really get a sense for places as occupied by those who are no longer alive, without the slightest reference to any kinds of undead creatures. All Hitchcock has to do is take us on a tour in a house, every little squeak and patch of light immersed in repression and strangeness. Rebecca is an extremely entertaining movie, perhaps because all of the visual details seem to bear so much significance, every small frame a heap of meaning, explicit and hidden. So much is going on at the same time, but the story is focused and developed in a disciplined way. While the story may seem perfectly harmless, the entire film is boiling with a strange kind of menacing energy. - - The character that fascinated me the most was the obsessive, stern-faced housekeeper, clearly enthralled by the late Mrs - and obviously in the business of destroying the happiness of the new Mrs. During this time, the rules about what could and couldn't be shown in Hollywood films were strict. Was this a conscious way of trying to break these codes and hint at a forbidden type of desire? Unsurprisingly, this film present THE typical image of lesbians: obsessive, perverted - and they HAVE TO DIE!

Dogtooth (2009)

Having read a number of reviews of Dogtooth (dir.: Giorgos Lanthimos), I was so curious that I bought the dvd version. It is a strange little film, a neighbor of gloomy pieces such as Haneke's The Seventh Continent or Lucile Hadzihalilovic' Innocence. Three children are imprisoned by their parents in a lavish house. They have never been outside, and the parents feed them strange ideas and fantasies. Even language is manipulated in the parents' home-brewed tutoring. Once in a while, a woman arrives in the house to service the eldest son sexually and at first she obligingly goes along with it. Of course, there is tension in this isolated and perverted universe. I am not sure whether Dogtooth is to be read as an allegory or as a more literal, Fritzl-like story. Of course, one of the many things that make this film uncomfortable to watch is the child-like prisoners - infantilized by their parents, captivated in an eternal, nightmarish childhood. In this film, even playfulness take on a hellish dimension, as the activity we see is as far as one can get from the free activity we tend to associate with play. On a more negative note, Dogtooth has the same kinds of problems that some Haneke movies are, in my view, riddled with. I have a hard time articulating what this is: maybe something to the effect of a suffocating perspective, from which all we can see is human misery, portrayed in a clinical way. Perhaps I even hava a difficult time figuring out how this movie was labeled 'black comedy' - or wait, there were in fact some scenes that made this intelligible (as the mother telling the children that she was about to give birth to twins - and a dog). In far too many scenes, I felt that the only point was to make me squint. Another way to make this point is that I, at least during a couple of scenes, seriously had to ask myself what the point of the film was, and that I could not really provide an answer for this. Is it a film about parenting and paranoic fear of 'the outside world' and all the harm it can do to a kid? Is it a political film? A film about brainwashing and reality? Or an extreme form of obedience/servility? Probably all of this at the same time. It will be hard to listen to stories about parents 'protecting' their children without thinking about this film. Don't get me wrong. I was gripped by Dogtooth; my questions concern in what way I was engaged by the miserable story. It is the kind of movie when it is hard to look and yet as hard to look away. Relevant here is also the aesthetic form of the film: superbly icy, sterile cinematography, focusing on the eerie white interiors of the home along with the domesticized greens and blues of the garden. Composition are often skewed, so that a leg or a head is missing. It is indeed an eerie film. 

Metropia (2009)

On the level of narrative and character development, Metropia (dir. Tarik Saleh) was a thin affair. The story is a simple one. The oil reserves are drained; Europe is now connected via a metro line spreading all over the continent. Festung Europa is strengthened and in the most popular game show, a lucky bastard is awarded asylum in Europe. A multinational company has developed a shampoo that contains surveillance antennae. The usual dystopian vision: ordinary Joe gradually understands that he is being monitored by Big Brother, and in dealing with this situation, he has to re-evaluate his entire life. What sets the film apart from the thousand other Orwellian sketches is the film's eerie animations - yes, this is an animated film. The film provides funereal images of an unsettling cityscape, bathing in darkness and gloom. Many scenes take place in the metro system and it is in these scenes that the film manages to engage me despite its overall flaws.

Dead ringers (1988)

Dead ringers is very much a David Cronenberg film. Two twins pursue the same woman, who cannot separate the one from the other. Gradually, the twins' identities start to blur. Of course, I mean: of course, the twins are gynecologists. As this is a Cronenberg film, the gruesome perversity of corporeality must be explored. But Dead ringers is a much less raunchy affair than earlier films such as Videodrome or The Fly. Cronenberg's style here, and in many other films, is based on a drab scenery, quite dry dialogue, and then - the sudden rupture of strangeness. Often, this works. At time, Dead ringers is, however, too monotonous for its own best and I mean monotonous not as in slow but as in the film becoming empty, so that this viewer starts to scream inside: yes, yes, I've seen this scene a thousand times, we know that these guys' inner lives are falling apart! What I like about the film relates only secondarily to the story. I adore Cronenberg's fondness for what first appears like icy, clinical elegance (look at Jeremy Irons' fabulously bloodless appearance as both of the twins in the beginning of the film!) - and then this whole world is torn to pieces, it gradually transmutes into something completely different, very un-clinical. Dead ringers is a quiet and subdued film with a grisly content. Put it on at 3:00 am on a Tuesday night and you will have a blast!

The Legend of Paul and Paula (1973)

I know extremely little about films produced in DDR. The Legend of Paul and Paula (dir. Heiner Carow) was apparently a popular movie in its day. I am surprised by this, as I found the film quite bizarre, almost on a par with Fassbinder's Satan's brew! It is more the style than the story that made this film quite a universe of its own. The camera is often hand held and scenes tend to wind up in a way you least expect. A strange technique is used to cut strange elements into a familiar setting. Paul and Paula are in love but they can't be together. Or are they really in love? Well, maybe they are, in their own, eccentric way. Class differences - check, funny images of work - check. The film follows the path of romantic tragedy, a couple who do not end up in each other's arms, but the way the film carries out this little plot is way out of step with conventional norms of romantic stories. The legend of Paul and Paula is hysteric, grotesque at times - erratically playful with style. Oh - and if you decide to watch this film, don't forget to check out the settings: very un-glossy urban scenery. And also: the ending, the ending! If the romantic comedies of the present Hollywood type would end this way, I wouldn't hesitate to watch one or two. Even though this was by no means a masterpiece, it was a funny, strangle little film that made me curious about the cinema of the GDR.

Route Irish (2010)

My friend talked about Route Irish (dir. Ken Loach) and I was eager to see it because of her enthusiastic description. Maybe I was in a bad mood while watching the film, but I was disappointed, having expected a film exploring the traumas of mercenaries. Of course, it did do that, to some extent, but for the most part, Route Irish treads the path of conventional thriller.  The main character, a tough guy, worked in Iraq as a private security contractor. What I wished for was a critical investigation of the business of these firms, providing 'services' to war-stricken countries. Even though that dimension existed, there were for example a few sour lines about firms providing both security and development projects, this was overshadowed by the main plot, which was about the frantic attempt of the main character to get clear about how his friend died. The official explanations turn out to be a cover-up of more gruesome circumstances. Ken Loch has directed many fine movies, but this was not one of them, despite of the fact that it dealt with a serious and important topic (and despite its raw depiction of Liverpool). What the film lacked was an original approach to the theme; the development of the story felt clunky and uninspired, the characters going through their characters rather one-dimensionally, fixating on one tone of voice. Cliches abounded (mostly about the state of mind of a troubled macho man), and from the get-go, I pretty much knew what to expect - which had the effect that I was alienated from the topic, I simply did not care much about it, and instead, started to observe all the clumsy attempts at showing one man's desire to attain justice and truth. In some scenes, the reality of war and the impact war has on people not directly involved in it, became apparent, but this was more an exception - because of the fairly stereotypical depiction of honest-but-tragic men and slimey villains. Route Irish has its heart in the right place, and it is justified in its critique of commercialized warfare - but as a film, it is, in my opinion, an artistic failure. Route Irish is not The Hurt Locker.

Wise blood (1979)

John Huston is an eccentric director and Wise blood, based on a novel by Flannery O'connor is a loony film. I watched the film before reading the book, which I am happy about now, taking account of Huston's very personal relation to a story. The main character, Hazel, is elusive, remains elusive. He is an angry man and it is his anger that drives him but I am never sure where he is going next. This makes everything in the movie unexpected. Things just happen and something new waits around the corner. It is a strange, strange world. Everybody thinks Hazel is a preacher, because of his hat, and he ends up becoming a sort of a preacher, building a church of his own, a church without Christ, a church where the blind remain blind and the dead stay that way. On his erratic journey Hazel bumps into a string of misfits: a sham preacher and his daughter, who lusts for Hazel. Then there is Emery, a loney guy who wants somebody to be his friend in the cold-hearted town. And there is the businessman who wants to make a dollar or two out of Hazel's evangelical performances on top of a scruffy car. Some reviewers have celebrated Wise blood as a deep film about religious redemption. For my own part, I had difficulties in relating to the 'spiritual' change in the main character. Personally, I enjoyed the film as a sad piece about loneliness and the weird ways in which we try to reach out to each other. The positively frantic acting of the main characters is brilliant, perfectly in synch with the offbeat, eerie atmosphere of the film. My impression of Wise blood can be summed up this way: I loved it for being weirdly comic, but I couldn't make much of the story. Do you like southern gothic? Watch this.   

Still Walking (2008)

It is a rare gift for a director to have the ability to render the rhythm of ordinary life on film. Hirokazu Kore-eda clearly has this gift, and for this reason it is tempting to compare Still Walking with the films of Ozu. I think this is a fair parallell, as Kore-eda takes a similar interest in the dynamics of family life. Characteristic for these both directors is a complete lack of sentimentality. This is not the kind of film that turns family into ideology and nor does it approach the story from the perspective of dystopia. In Still Walking, we see people, some of whom know each other extremely well, being irritated by one another's ideosyncracies, which doesn't take away love and respect. The story of the film is centered around a reunion that marks the 15th anniversary of the death of the eldest brother. The film follows the family in ordinary rituals: eating, taking a walk, preparing dinner. Nothing very drastic happens, but there is always tension in the air. Kore-eda wants us to scrutinize the small things, gestures, an exchang of intentive glances, silences. As with Ozu's films, the camera is kept on a low level, staying close to the family. I have rarely seen a film that exudes such intimacy as Still Walking. Where other contemporary directors (Haneke for example) choose to see intimacy as something that almost always verges on violence and dread, Kore-eda's approach is gentler, without this implying that he settles with cozy and rosy images of the close relations of a family. Intimacy, here, can mean as different things as the coy discussions while preparing food as the mother of the family putting on the record that she listened to while in love with her husband as a young girl. Small moments mean a lot: a father that welcomes the appearance of his son at the house with a neutralized grunt, 'so you're here'. There is a lot of discomfort in the way the family members interact with each other, but we never see explosions or ruptures - this is the kind of movie that makes hints about things that people rarely talk about, but boils under the surface, the kind of emotions that are rarely verbalized in a direct way.

To a large extent, the film focuses on the relation between the oldest son, Ryota and his parents. Ryota has married a widow with a son, and his parents make a fuss about this, at first not really treating his wife and son as members of the family. Ryota is unemployed, "between jobs", and this is clearly treated as a  shameful matter as he makes up stories for his parents to hide this fact. His father is a retired doctor, and has strict ideas about what constitutes 'a worthwhile occupation'. Kore-eda manages to bring up big ideas and emotions and still let the story drift, unwind through the twists and turns of ordinary discussions. Kore-eda has a superb understanding for the strange bond between parents and children. A mark of what makes this film so great is that the locations actually come to look like a home, or the surrroundings of a home. This is not an easy task, as 'locations' in films tend to be reduced to a neutral prop. Here, the home is partially constituted by a sensitive attention to how the characters move in and out of rooms, how they sit down or stand up.

Still Walking is the best film I've seen in a long time.

Zero de conduite (1933)

Jean Vigo made a brave movie when he directed Zero for Conduct. In a defiant, jolly manner, the film follows a bunch of boisterous kids in a boarding school. They won't let themselves become robots in a disciplinarian system. The film, along with the kids, bustles with irreverent life. Vigo treats the children's revolt as a justified act of rebellion against a school that leaves much to be desired. Bad food is served and some of the teachers seem quite sub-par. It's a beautiful and quite experimental little film, that often tells the story through eerie long shots. Sometimes the perspective of the camera is weird, so we approach the world of the school from a strange point of view, which only adds to this carnivalistic universe in which anything is possible and roles are not fixed.

Prometheus (2012)

At one point in the middle of Prometheus (dir. Ridley Scott), I actually thought it would take the following route: humans go to weird planet to look for anchestors. They come upon a few monsters and a bunch of corpses. They board the ship again, disappointed. So much for looking into the Grand Origin of Humanity. End of story. Of course, it did not turn out like this. Prometheus is not the Nietzschean culture critique it should have been... or something. Nor did it develop a critique of shady corporate interests going on behind the backs of everyone. Prometheus opts for the pompous, the quasi-religious. The thin storyline was augmented with just as cheap effects. Yes, some scenes look good, but there is no point to anything. We've seen plenty of the twists in the film in earlier Alien films, so there was really not much to write home about here; one may even speak about recycling, and not in a good way. My most positive judgment about the film concerns the design of the settings: great job there. Plus it was fun to see the familiar landscapes of Isle of Skye in a film. Another fun aspect of the film is the choice of role model for the sentient robot David - Lawrence of Arabia as the prototype of humanity! Do we sense cosmig significance? Not really, we sense tacky. By any means, this is not 2001: A Space Odyssey.