The first 20 minutes of Zeitgeist: Addendum was a fairly interesting exposition of basic facts of contemporary economics: how money is related to debt. The rest of the film was at worst embarrassing and at best a series of obvious political statements ("we have to save this planet..."). The utopia conjured up by xx:s monotonous voice was a mix of technological engineering - that claims the obsoleteness of politics - and shallow mysticism ("we are all part of eveything"). The anti-religious message of the film was so embarrassing I had to bury my eyes in my hands for a moment. The film ends with a few glossy images ripped off The Matrix and bad ads (a businessman drops his suitcase and joins the Movement).
And then I have said nothing about the utopian possibilities inherent in maglev trains; trains propulsed by magnetism (the technological development of which the Movement people are involved) that will take you from Los Angeles to New York during a lunch break. As a documentary, the film is a total failure. Not only is it carelessly dropping a subject only to delve into the next, but it leans heavily on the dear old technique of treating the viewer as a full-blown idiot; when the word "sheep" is uttered in the film, let's show a sheep. Zeitgeist: Addendum provoked me in one single way: this movie is a mess.
onsdag 30 juni 2010
tisdag 29 juni 2010
Oleanna
Oleanna is based on a play written by David Mamet. The play premiered in 1992 and the film was released in 1994.
Oleanna might be flawed with shaky & stagey acting and heavy-handed dialogue, but besides that, it's a damn interesting film. An undergrad student sits with her professor in his office. The student asks questions. She claims not to have understood anything, not the course, not the professor's book; she is concerned about the grade she got/will get. The professor tries to explain. He is constantly interrupted by telephone calls. The discussion becomes more & more animated. They enter into a debate about the university as institution. That segment of the film ends with the professor's physical attempt to make the studen listen. In the next scene, we see them again, but now they are accusor/the accused. On behalf of an unnamed "group", she has initiated an investigation of possible sexual harrassment. His tenure position is then threatened.
I'm a little surprised to see that some reviewers understood this as being a film that wages a war against feminism. They would see the Professor as being a representative of Mamet's own views (that Oleanna is weak and "of questionable sexuality") and hold Oleanna to be an embodiment of Mamet's feminist ghosts. But I don't buy that. The Professor is depicted as self-indulgent, pompous and lacking insight into the power he holds. It does not seem to me that Mamet is interested in showing why Oleanna's accusation is outrageous, but rather, he shows the background of power dynamics locked at a standstill.
Mamet focuses on speech, and how speech is productive or non-productive. The two main characters, the Professor and the students, both become intermingled in institutional power. John is the man who gives grades and holds lectures - Carol is the person who files a seemingly off-target charge against John, supported by a "group". This seems not to be so much a film about sexual harrassment and feminism but rather a very cynical film about power struggles in which it is always unclear for whom a person is talking and what issues are at stake. The characters constantly complain that they don't "understand" - but it is always clear what understanding would be here.
Oleanna is also about our reactions; whose words are we to take seriously? What does the role of class, gender and position mean here? A bad interpretation of this is that we are asked to take "sides" and that this will depend on our gender etc:
"The most illuminating value of "Oleanna" is that it demonstrates so clearly how men and women can view the same events through entirely different prisms. With all the best will in the world, despite a real effort, I cannot see the professor as guilty. I see the student as a monstrous creature who masks her own inadequacies with a manufactured ideological attack; she is failing the course not because she is a bad student but because her teacher is a sexist pig."
Says Robert Ebert, critic. And I, with all the best will in the world, can't see how he sees only "a manufactured ideological attack".
Mamet's film is no masterpiece - not in the slightest - but the questions he raises here are important.
Oleanna might be flawed with shaky & stagey acting and heavy-handed dialogue, but besides that, it's a damn interesting film. An undergrad student sits with her professor in his office. The student asks questions. She claims not to have understood anything, not the course, not the professor's book; she is concerned about the grade she got/will get. The professor tries to explain. He is constantly interrupted by telephone calls. The discussion becomes more & more animated. They enter into a debate about the university as institution. That segment of the film ends with the professor's physical attempt to make the studen listen. In the next scene, we see them again, but now they are accusor/the accused. On behalf of an unnamed "group", she has initiated an investigation of possible sexual harrassment. His tenure position is then threatened.
I'm a little surprised to see that some reviewers understood this as being a film that wages a war against feminism. They would see the Professor as being a representative of Mamet's own views (that Oleanna is weak and "of questionable sexuality") and hold Oleanna to be an embodiment of Mamet's feminist ghosts. But I don't buy that. The Professor is depicted as self-indulgent, pompous and lacking insight into the power he holds. It does not seem to me that Mamet is interested in showing why Oleanna's accusation is outrageous, but rather, he shows the background of power dynamics locked at a standstill.
Mamet focuses on speech, and how speech is productive or non-productive. The two main characters, the Professor and the students, both become intermingled in institutional power. John is the man who gives grades and holds lectures - Carol is the person who files a seemingly off-target charge against John, supported by a "group". This seems not to be so much a film about sexual harrassment and feminism but rather a very cynical film about power struggles in which it is always unclear for whom a person is talking and what issues are at stake. The characters constantly complain that they don't "understand" - but it is always clear what understanding would be here.
Oleanna is also about our reactions; whose words are we to take seriously? What does the role of class, gender and position mean here? A bad interpretation of this is that we are asked to take "sides" and that this will depend on our gender etc:
"The most illuminating value of "Oleanna" is that it demonstrates so clearly how men and women can view the same events through entirely different prisms. With all the best will in the world, despite a real effort, I cannot see the professor as guilty. I see the student as a monstrous creature who masks her own inadequacies with a manufactured ideological attack; she is failing the course not because she is a bad student but because her teacher is a sexist pig."
Says Robert Ebert, critic. And I, with all the best will in the world, can't see how he sees only "a manufactured ideological attack".
Mamet's film is no masterpiece - not in the slightest - but the questions he raises here are important.
måndag 28 juni 2010
Address unknown (2001)
Kim Ki Duk's films are, I think, too interesting to be dismessed because of "gratuitous violence". But honestly, I'm not sure what his films do with me & whether I should watch them at all. You stare into the darkness & something stares back at you (a passage from Nietzsche that can be quoted in almost any context and still make sense). I am tempted to blurt the win-win relativist's "Well, it depends..." If not that, I'd be as tempted to say, "Sure, Address unknown was disturbing, but..." You haven't really said a lot about your reaction to a film by calling it "disturbing". The insertion of a "but" will always make sense.
Address unknown is a political film. Ki Duk grapples with US colonialism; commercial, and military. The film presents a village in which an American military base is settled. The year is 1970 and the Korea war still haunt the villagers' memories. The film dwells on a series of events that will eventually lead to bloody tragedy: a group of target practicing war veterans, an ex-veteran who is now engaged in killing dogs for their meat, a dog-loving girl is promised an eye operation by an American soldier, a boy who likes to watch. And there are several strands I haven't mentioned. From there, everything goes to hell.
The film captures an almost de-humanized world. Most people walk and talk as though they were human, but the film doesn't quite allow them to become anything beyond expressions of a sense of primordial fear and terror. There are almost no cracks in this world. It is totalitarian and the style of the film is very seamless in that way, too - very austere, very quiet, very short scenes intertwined with longer ones. That makes the film dangerously fascinating. A few days after the film, I still have a bad taste in my mouth.
The film explores several themes. One of them, obviously, is war & a militarized post-war dystopia. Another theme is watching & seeing. We are exposed to damaged eyes, restored eyes, secret peeping - as our own witnessing of the events become increasingly unbearable. A third theme is dogs. A fourth theme is the role of American culture (or dicks) in Korea.
Address unknown is a political film. Ki Duk grapples with US colonialism; commercial, and military. The film presents a village in which an American military base is settled. The year is 1970 and the Korea war still haunt the villagers' memories. The film dwells on a series of events that will eventually lead to bloody tragedy: a group of target practicing war veterans, an ex-veteran who is now engaged in killing dogs for their meat, a dog-loving girl is promised an eye operation by an American soldier, a boy who likes to watch. And there are several strands I haven't mentioned. From there, everything goes to hell.
The film captures an almost de-humanized world. Most people walk and talk as though they were human, but the film doesn't quite allow them to become anything beyond expressions of a sense of primordial fear and terror. There are almost no cracks in this world. It is totalitarian and the style of the film is very seamless in that way, too - very austere, very quiet, very short scenes intertwined with longer ones. That makes the film dangerously fascinating. A few days after the film, I still have a bad taste in my mouth.
The film explores several themes. One of them, obviously, is war & a militarized post-war dystopia. Another theme is watching & seeing. We are exposed to damaged eyes, restored eyes, secret peeping - as our own witnessing of the events become increasingly unbearable. A third theme is dogs. A fourth theme is the role of American culture (or dicks) in Korea.
lördag 26 juni 2010
Birdy (1984)
I expected Birdy to be the kind of movie I used to watch as a kid on late nights in front of the VCR; nostalgic & low-key movies about coming-of-age and how political & personal innocence went to hell for a boy or a girl in Mississippi at the time of the Vietnam war. It had some resemblance with that, true, but this is actually a film that challenges the notion that there is a state of the world we have to accept if we are to be eligible as full-blown "grown-ups". Al (a young Nicolas Cage) is a boy who takes an interest in the things that young boys are expected to take an interest in; fast cars, adventures, girls. He meets a strange young man who has a passion for birds. They become friends. Close friends. The story is told in flashbacks. Al was injured in the Vietnam war. Birdy, his friend, is locked up in a mental institution. That is where Al finds him, perching in bird-like position, refusing or unable to talk, becoming-bird.
That my thoughts were driven towards Deleuze & his conception of the subversive schizoid, human and animal and anything else at the same time, might actually not be such an over-interpretation as it first may seem. A psycho-analytic reading of Birdy - or a schizoanalytic one - is actually quite tempting in this case. Birdy is not going along with conventional life. He slips out of bourgeois fantasies about heterosexual love and family life. His parents and friends disapprove of the changes he undergoes.
Birdy is, in some sense, a film that shows compulsory heterosexuality in a light that is far from flattering. Birdy sits in his room, fiddling with his birds. His mom clamps into the room and tells him that a girl wants him to be her partner on the school ball. Defiantly, he says yes. He dances with her without much enthusiasm only to escape from the whole thing, greeting his janitor father who cleans a hallway ("those boys can't hold liquor"). The next frame is the classical, obligatory All-American mist & cars & romantic darkness. Doris and Birdy sit in a car. Doris knows that Birdy is not really interested in her, and she wants to thank him. Throwing off her bra, she suggests he can to her, "whatever he wants". But he doesn't.
The major theme of Birdy is fantasy and how that is related to escape. Birdy is not repressing his (almost erotic) fascination with birds. To the horror of the close ones, he lives his fantasy instead of, as they would have it, snapping out of the fantasy world. The beautiful thing with Birdy is that it allows for a very different image of what it may mean to be at odds with normal, suburban life. At first, I was worried that the bird allegory would lean too heavily on the F-word. And maybe it did, and maybe I should say that is too cheap. But for some reason, I won't. There was too much going on here for there to be a simple, propulsive idea of "freedom". Freedom from what, to what? The answers within the films are not easy
That this is a film that proves to be subversive even to the 21st century audience is suggested by a very strange reaction on film boards. When somebody asks why this film is labeled "gay interest", people responded very aggressively; "Al & Birdy were not gay! They were close friends! Brothers!" One of the things that make Birdy a special film is that it does nothing to live up to the ideas of what male friendship/love is supposed to be like.
Birdy is not a flawless film, but the more I think about it, the more I like it. But there is one feature of this movie that is absolutely unacceptable. The music. P-E-T-E-R G-A-B-R-I-E-L.
That my thoughts were driven towards Deleuze & his conception of the subversive schizoid, human and animal and anything else at the same time, might actually not be such an over-interpretation as it first may seem. A psycho-analytic reading of Birdy - or a schizoanalytic one - is actually quite tempting in this case. Birdy is not going along with conventional life. He slips out of bourgeois fantasies about heterosexual love and family life. His parents and friends disapprove of the changes he undergoes.
Birdy is, in some sense, a film that shows compulsory heterosexuality in a light that is far from flattering. Birdy sits in his room, fiddling with his birds. His mom clamps into the room and tells him that a girl wants him to be her partner on the school ball. Defiantly, he says yes. He dances with her without much enthusiasm only to escape from the whole thing, greeting his janitor father who cleans a hallway ("those boys can't hold liquor"). The next frame is the classical, obligatory All-American mist & cars & romantic darkness. Doris and Birdy sit in a car. Doris knows that Birdy is not really interested in her, and she wants to thank him. Throwing off her bra, she suggests he can to her, "whatever he wants". But he doesn't.
The major theme of Birdy is fantasy and how that is related to escape. Birdy is not repressing his (almost erotic) fascination with birds. To the horror of the close ones, he lives his fantasy instead of, as they would have it, snapping out of the fantasy world. The beautiful thing with Birdy is that it allows for a very different image of what it may mean to be at odds with normal, suburban life. At first, I was worried that the bird allegory would lean too heavily on the F-word. And maybe it did, and maybe I should say that is too cheap. But for some reason, I won't. There was too much going on here for there to be a simple, propulsive idea of "freedom". Freedom from what, to what? The answers within the films are not easy
That this is a film that proves to be subversive even to the 21st century audience is suggested by a very strange reaction on film boards. When somebody asks why this film is labeled "gay interest", people responded very aggressively; "Al & Birdy were not gay! They were close friends! Brothers!" One of the things that make Birdy a special film is that it does nothing to live up to the ideas of what male friendship/love is supposed to be like.
Birdy is not a flawless film, but the more I think about it, the more I like it. But there is one feature of this movie that is absolutely unacceptable. The music. P-E-T-E-R G-A-B-R-I-E-L.
Dodes'ka-den (1970)
Dodes'ka-den might not be Kurasawa's most famous film. The story features no samurais and it isn't the blueprint for an American Western movie either. Kurasawa is a good observer of modern Japan. The film is set in the slum. A young man ("the train fool") impersonates a train. A woman cheats on her husband. A poor man tells stories about luxury to his son while making him beg for food from the local restaurants. Two buddies indulge in after-work drinking binges to the nuissance of their wives. Dodes'ka-den was kurasawa's first color movie. And colors are actually one important element of what makes this film stand out. Depicting a landscape consisting of garbage and ash heap using vivid colors & naivistic drawings lends the film a flavor of cruel fairy-tale. This is, largely, a film about escapism & imagination. One might complain that some scenes (the one-dimensional drunken patriarch) are too schematic. But it is a rather likeable film all the same; just look how it takes time to ruminate on repetition, everyday routines & actions (the train impersonation, pouring of drinks, gossip).
torsdag 24 juni 2010
The Isle (2000)
When starting to watch a Kim Ki-Duk film, it is very hard to predict what kind of movie one will see. Is it a drama film, a gruesome thriller, or a subversive horror movie? The same goes for The Isle. I suppose this movie is the horror movie Tarkovsky never made. Long shots / long takes / the tranquility of nature. Honestly - I am not sure what to say about The Isle. The contrast(s) achieved through very disturbing images set within a languid pace & a peaceful landscape is quite overwhelming in a sense that is hard to shrug off. The strange thing about it is that there are images of brutal physical cruelty that are filmed with a slightly evasive camera: we see something, but the camera does not linger, it pans away from the central action to focus on a patch of wooden floor or water. When the camera does linger, the effect is harsh, bordering on the unwatchable. Do I have one single conception about what Kim Ki-Duk is trying to tell us with this method? No. It does not seem like a metaphor for anything (becoming-dead-fish? the evil nature of females?), and if it were to be interpreted on that level - I would soon lose interest.
Oddly, even though this film does its best to provoke me into strong reactions - it is not entirely sucessful. That is because I am not sure to what I am supposed to react. I have a strong sense that lots of the violence showed here is placed within the story just because of the visual side of it. And what is Kim Ki-Duks relation to the visual?
Oddly, even though this film does its best to provoke me into strong reactions - it is not entirely sucessful. That is because I am not sure to what I am supposed to react. I have a strong sense that lots of the violence showed here is placed within the story just because of the visual side of it. And what is Kim Ki-Duks relation to the visual?
onsdag 23 juni 2010
Brief encounter (1945)
Brief encounter, directed by David Lean, is certainly not the most revolutionary film in the world; it is what one might call a subdued love story (or is it really a love story at all?). It's not melodrama exactly - it's too quiet and understated for that. The dialogue & style show an appropriate amount of restraint - in a very English manner the film keeps us at a certain distance, most of the storytelling taking place through voice-over. That is not unproblematic, but for all the problems about telling-not-showing, this is a good film that focuses on psychology, rather than story. The depiction of this unhappy story about a housewife's desire is interesting because it is open-ended; did Lean intend to craft a piece of social critique about the boring world of the house wife? - Very likely. How are we to describe Laura's feelings for the doctor, and what the heck was up with that guy anyway? It's a grown-up film about infidelity that opens up more questions than it provides answers for - what a relief. Not all scenes are believable but at some moments, the actors faces have a peculiar glow that makes this film feel relevant. Watching it is a lot like reading a Graham Greene novel. A very stylish film. I liked it.
måndag 21 juni 2010
Pierrot le fou (1965)
So - Pierrot le fou. Nothing in it surprises me. References to American culture - check. Blowing things up or shooting people (A GIRL AND A GUN!) - check. A man and a woman - check. Mort - check, check, check, check. Witty verfremdungseffekts - CHECK! Reminders to the viewer: this is a MOVIE - c-h-e-c-k.
A man and a woman (a dead body seen at the edge of a frame) and a few cars. Crime. Algerian gangsters. Philosophizing. "Don't call me Pierrot, my name is Ferdinand." Ferdinand & Marianne at play (vietnamese&american), on the beach, mulling over the essence of death and the essence of love. Falling out of love.
There were a couple of scenes which didn't irritate me as much as the rest. One of them was the scene in which Marianne & Ferdinand-I-am-called-Ferdinand sit in a car, talking pompously (as usual) while the streetlights are reflected on the windshield.
Arguably, this film is less sexist than, for example, Breathless. Godard toys with the notion of "a woman destroying a man" and the self-indulged intellectual - but also with images of unexpected violence that is not clearly gender-marked (the scene at the gas station).
My opinions on Godard might be too ardent. But really, I don't understand. What is supposed to be so great/subversive about this? Yes, there is innovation in how he uses off-screen dialogue, fragments, intertitles, self-mockery, chapters, colors, filters, pastiche, music - but all these things are employed in a shallow way, it seems to me. Godard makes some witty observations about film-as-experience, but I never feel deeply puzzled by his films, just, "awwright, he wants me to challenge the idea of fiction. Right-o." But Godard's "mastery of genres" leaves me cold.
Even though there are a few references to contemporary political events (mainly the Vietnam war) I fail to see how these references are to be understood (La Chinoise was more interesting, but only slightly so). The only thought that appears in my head while watching a Godard film is that gosh, this guy hates humanity. Sorry, but I can't for my life find anything interesting in that type of contempt.
söndag 20 juni 2010
Revue (2008)
A small boy is asked to recite a poem. In a dramatic voice, he recites a poem with a metaphoric message pointing towards the rottenness of capitalism. More questions are fired at the boy. What profession would he like to have? Would he like to study? Then: do you like to work? The boy stares in front of himself with a blank face and says nothing.
This is one amazing scene in Revue (2008), a compilation of Soviet propaganda movies. Most of the movies celebrate labor & technology. There are images of factories and machines, agriculture and railways. Interwoven with these themes are different forms of art; dancing, singing, poetry. The intimate connection between labor & art in this compilation of archive footage made me think of one point that some philosophers have made and been criticized for making: the development of community can be seen as a form of artistic work. Labor takes on a double meaning. Labor is not only the crafting of products but it is also the process of developing community. When watching Revue, the double meaning of work is very obvious: the images of hard labor (preferably manufacturing steel) and sophisticated technological innovations are supposed to be seen as the development of society, of a new Man. Community is thus understood as a form of (self-)production. This idea may have something to do with the idea that work is not only a concrete activity but also work as civilizing and domesticizing the world.
This is one amazing scene in Revue (2008), a compilation of Soviet propaganda movies. Most of the movies celebrate labor & technology. There are images of factories and machines, agriculture and railways. Interwoven with these themes are different forms of art; dancing, singing, poetry. The intimate connection between labor & art in this compilation of archive footage made me think of one point that some philosophers have made and been criticized for making: the development of community can be seen as a form of artistic work. Labor takes on a double meaning. Labor is not only the crafting of products but it is also the process of developing community. When watching Revue, the double meaning of work is very obvious: the images of hard labor (preferably manufacturing steel) and sophisticated technological innovations are supposed to be seen as the development of society, of a new Man. Community is thus understood as a form of (self-)production. This idea may have something to do with the idea that work is not only a concrete activity but also work as civilizing and domesticizing the world.
fredag 18 juni 2010
In the loop (2009)
If you liked the TV-series The thick of it, you'll probably appreciate In the loop, which is loosely based on that series. We're dealing with political satire that depicts the world of politics with a cynical, yet understanding, eye. This is not a film about a specific political issue - not even the war of Iraq which the politicians and bureaucrats portrayed in the film are making policies and statements about - but rather how bureaucracy and politics are linked within an endless loop of "policy-making" and committee-running. Actually, if you have seen the series or this film, the word "policy" is hard to say or see with a straight face. The style of In the loop is very similar to that of the series: a hectic cluster of scenes, hand-held camera, people rushing in & out of rooms, continuously firing off obscenities at each other.
The dark heart of the film is Malcolm Tucker, the PM:s Minister of Communication, whose armada of swearwords is seemingly endless. The story starts off when the Minister for International Development, Simon Foster, tells an interviewer that war is "unforseeable". The Minister, an insecure guy who hasn't grasped his place in the world (at one point, Malcolm calls him "a Nazi Julie Andrews" for having blurted out something about "climbing the mountain of conflict"), is sent off to Washington to gather information. Disaster, of course, ensues.
Arguably, this is not a film-film. It's more an extension of the series The thick of it. A harder question concerns what kind of humor the film trades in. How does it treat its cynism? Does my cynical stance become too comfortable? Well, I wouldn't say that. In the loop (and The thick of it) is a good satire of political language. In focusing on that, it stands out from other forms of satire.
In the loop is not a very original film. But it hell is funny one.
The dark heart of the film is Malcolm Tucker, the PM:s Minister of Communication, whose armada of swearwords is seemingly endless. The story starts off when the Minister for International Development, Simon Foster, tells an interviewer that war is "unforseeable". The Minister, an insecure guy who hasn't grasped his place in the world (at one point, Malcolm calls him "a Nazi Julie Andrews" for having blurted out something about "climbing the mountain of conflict"), is sent off to Washington to gather information. Disaster, of course, ensues.
Arguably, this is not a film-film. It's more an extension of the series The thick of it. A harder question concerns what kind of humor the film trades in. How does it treat its cynism? Does my cynical stance become too comfortable? Well, I wouldn't say that. In the loop (and The thick of it) is a good satire of political language. In focusing on that, it stands out from other forms of satire.
In the loop is not a very original film. But it hell is funny one.
Prenumerera på:
Inlägg (Atom)