The Filmaminute Blog

Dolls (2002, Takeshi Kitano)

2010-12-05T12:18:00.000-08:00

On Friday I watched Takeshi Kitano's Dolls for the second time. I had really liked it the first time and wanted to give it a rewatch to check how much. I'm certain now of it's greatness.
Although Kitano is a pretty famous director this isn't one of his best known films. The only other film I had seen by him was Zatoichi which is also very good although it doesn't touch Dolls. I admit that a few of his other more famous films (Hana-bi for example) don't look like they'd really appeal to me, but I won't write them off before seeing them.
Dolls is a fantastic film, one of the best contemporary Japanese films I've seen. The film uses Japanese Bunraku puppet theatre as a framing device, alluding to and mirroing the actions in the film.The main plot concerns a man who has abandoned his fiance in order to marry the daughter of his boss and help him move up the social ladder. This causes her to attempt suicide and to lose her mind, whereupon the man leaves his wedding and dedicates himself to looking after her, eventually tying himself to her with a red rope. The bulk of the film follows them as they go on a seemingly aimless journey across Japan, tied together.

Along the way, two other stories are threaded into the narrative which explore similar themes of devotion.
One involves an aging Yakuza boss who returns to the park where he and his girlfriend used to meet and where she had promised to wait for him every day until he returned to her. Another is about a young man who is obsessed with a pop star and makes an alarming decision when she is involved in a car accident.
These other stories are great and make perfect sidelines to the main plot, however it is this central thread which is the films real power. The image of the young couple bound together with the red cord is unforgettable and is undoubtably the focal point of the film.

Speaking of images, I must confess that visually this is one of the greatest films I've ever seen. The film is filled with gorgeous colours and images that are beautiful to behold. In the early section of the film we are treated to vivid images such as a bright yellow car, a pink butterfly, cherub ornaments, a miniature toy ball hovering next to the moon and of course the Bunraku dolls themselves. As it progresses the couple travel through beautiful seasonal landscapes such as an autumn forest and a snowy mountain and in the story of the pop star we are treated to a beautiful field of a red flowers.
However, despite all the visual brilliance, Dolls never feels like a case of style over substance in the way that Terrence Malick's Days of Heaven did for me. The film's narratives are quite simplistic on the surface but they combine to create a beautiful portrait of devotion which always feels completely real despite the stylised nature of the film. Indeed, this film should not be taken completely literally as many elements of it are obviously surreal and metaphorical. Because of this I can't say I quite understood the significance of the final minutes of the film but it really doesn't matter as it doesn't need to be completely dissected, it's an experience. See it!

Porco Rosso (1992, Hayao Miyasaki)

2010-12-02T20:05:00.000-08:00

A warning now, this review/musing may seem a bit weird as a portion of it is gonna be based around a strange emotional concept I came up with at 2:30 in the morning. Ok, with that out of the way I'll begin.

I first saw Porco Rosso a few years ago in London as part of a children's film festival where I also saw Hayao Miyasaki's other masterpiece, My Neighbor Totoro for the first time. This being a festival for younger viewers, the film's were presented in Disney dubbed versions. At that time I had yet to properly turn against dubbing of Ghibli films so it didn't bother me too much. Suprisingly though, the English dub of Porco Rosso is actually pretty good and probably the only one I'd consider still listening to (can't say the same for Totoro unfortunately). I liked the film very much and shortly after this a whole wave of previously unavailable Ghibli films became available on DVD, inlcuding Porco Rosso. I have loved the film more and more on repeated viewings and I would now rank it as my favourite Ghibli film (although there's a still a few notable titles I have yet to see, most notably Princess Mononoke).
The basic plot of the film is a exciting, humorous adventure story following the titular Porco, a former World War I fighter pilot who has been inexplicably turned to into a half-human, half-pig. He now makes his living as a bounty hunter, taking on vicious sea-plane pirates in the Adriatic Sea, and spends his free time meeting with his childhood friend Gina at the hotel she now runs. Trouble arrives in the form of a cocky American pilot named Donald Curtis who forms an alliance with the pirates and tries to take Porco down. In the course of the film there is a visit to a repair house in Milan, A mezmerizing flashback sequence and a funny final showdown.
But as well as the action and adventure there is also a beautiful emotional undercurrent to the film. It perfectly captures the time and the place when it is set (or at least a fantasy version of it) and you almost forget you are watching drawings it's so absorbing. Like another favourite of mine, Once Upon A Time in America, it does a fantastic job of conveying time even though there are only minimal flashbacks in the film. One of the film's best scenes has Gina watching Porco give her an air display in his plane during which she recalls flying in Porco's plane when they were children. A huge part of this emotion is helped (as with Once Upon A Time) by a tremendous score from Joe Hisaishi which creates incredibly powerful feelings of both time and love.

Here's where I might start sounding a bit pseudo-intellectual and crazy. I think the amazing thing that this film does for me is that it manages to create a feeling that goes even beyond the film itself. Whenever I listen to a certain piece of music from the soundtrack I start remembering elements of the film that may not be specific scenes or plot details but are netherless constructed from elements of the story such as the dialogue, plot, images and of course the music. The power of the film allows it to project an entire feeling and state outside of itself which is for me, a phenomenal thing for any art to achieve. For instance the word "Adriatic" has now become synonymous with the film for me and carries an entire emotional presence with it.
This film is for me a true masterpiece and I'm hoping the reasons stated above illustrate why. However, I am sure that for some this writing may seem to over exaggerate the film's impact and I want to stress that this is a personal reaction. This film has usually been considered one of the less notable works in the Miyasaki canon and in case I've made it sound like some emotional powerhouse I'd like to re-iterate that it is in many ways one of the most light-hearted and comedy-tinged films in the Ghibli catalogue. It's me personally who sees it as something more than that.

Jason Fuckberg and Aaron Shitzer

2010-12-02T14:29:00.000-08:00

Apologies for the slightly immature title of this post but the two shitheads I'm talking about don't deserve any kind of intelligence. I'm sure you've heard of these horrible people and their crimes against cinema (and humanity) so I'm not going to go into huge detail into how they violently rape cinema every couple of years. I must confess that up until two nights ago I had not been witness to much of their disgusting "films", but I pretty much got the idea of what they were like from reviews and assorted clips I'd seen. Well two nights ago I saw the last half hour or so of a certain Meet The Spartans. I decided to watch just to see how truly terrible it was and I was not disappointed (or rather I was). THIS FILM IS FUCKING HORRIBLE! The most ghastly, unfunny piece of filth I've ever laid eyes on. Cheap, horrible non-gags that pretty much define stupidity.

But to my mind the worst thing about these terrible films is not the quality. It's the philosophy behind them. Hold on a minute I hear you say, your talking about philosophy in a rant against those parody movie guys? Why, yes I am. But not within the actual films, I'm talking about the philosophy behind the production of this plague. IT IS PURE EVIL. These motherfuckers have hit upon a strategy: take whatever big films came out in the last 12 months, get some people to dress up like characters from said films, write down some awful gags for them to say, get together a crew shoot it and throw it in the cinemas. Then they get to fuck off and relax with their money for a year until it's time to make the next one. It's a despicable, vile and lazy excuse for filmmaking and in the words of Mark Kermode, as long as you keep paying for them, they'll keep making them. They aren't films, they are pure profit in every way. And when there's no business going on, THEY'LL STOP! And we'll rejoice!
They are worse than Michael Bay, Roland Emmerich and their ilk because at least those people try! As shit as their films are at least they fucking try! (to an extent anyway). They are the absolute worst thing that's happening in the film industry at the moment. They are parasites and need to be WIPED OUT!
Well thanks for reading my rant. I'll calm down now.

Brick (2005, Rian Johnson)

2010-12-02T13:48:00.000-08:00

Rian Johnson's Brick is one of my favourite films of the 2000's and one of my favourite films of all time. It's kind of hard to explain exactly why this is, as from what I've seen this is not a film that most cinephiles would consider any sort of masterpiece. Most people seem to either think it was pretty good or pretty rubbish, you don't see anyone raving about it. Yet, this makes Brick like my own special thing and if I'm the only one that fucking loves it then so be it!

In all truth I can see how the film would be disregarded. It doesn't seem to be trying to make any big statement or dazzle us with amazing artistry, so it must seem like a rather gimmicky little indie film that can be thrown away after one viewing. I've watched it multiple times now, and I love it more each time. Yes, the film doesn't make any apparent statement, but why does it need to? I think it's artistry comes from just how damn absorbing it is. The film draws me into it's peculiar world like very few films have. It creates a haunting, mysterious world that I am transported to each time I watch it and the wide open spaces and deserted locations make for some of the most brilliant atmosphere I've ever seen.
I admit the plot is quite bewildering and I also admit to only properly understanding it on my most recent viewing, but somehow my confusion never affected previous viewings of the film as it was the aforementioned atmophere that kept me drawn in. I would also argue that the film is most effective when the plot is kept to a minimum and this is maybe why the film slightly falters in the final act (although not nearly enough to damage it for me).

The characters are hugely memorable creations and are not weakened from being based on American high school stereotypes. Characters like The Pin, Tug, Laura and The Brain are some of the most interesting and enigmatic I've encountered in cinema. They are (like the rest of the film) impossibly stylised but if you accept that they (and the film) inhabit a stylised reality then you'll have no trouble accepting them (and the film, brackets ftw!). However, the film undoubtedly belongs to Joseph Gordon-Levitt and his stunning performance as Brendan. Along with his equally great performance in Mysterious Skin, Gordon-Levitt is proving himself one of the best young actors around at the moment. He perfectly captures this cold, tough character, almost completely emotionally blocked off from the violent world he enters. It is amazing that even within a stylised reality the film still manages to retain a gritty, genuine feel and he is one element of that.
But it's the atmosphere of the film I have to keep coming back to as that is ultimately what has made me watch this it over and over again. Little touches such as the slow tracking shot through an early party scene or the spinning shot of a bedroom ceiling add to it brilliantly. The film as a whole is visually excellent, using an array of visual motifs such as the blue bracelets of Brendan's dead girlfriend Emily and the scrawled drawing of the tunnel where she is murdered. Also used is a contrast between the brightly-lit Californian exteriors and darker interiors such as The Pin's Office. I have to also give special mention to the film's fabulous score, using a variety of instruments (including many invented ones) to make an odd but wonderful score that highlights the action (special mentions go to the brilliant Emily's Theme and Laura's Theme)

The film takes it's limited budget and pushes it to the extreme creating one of the most impressive indie films I've ever seen. So many indie films (including many I love) are content to be dialogue-based, not-much happening types of films so it's amazing how Brick took things in a totally different direction.
Ultimately, I may still not really have conveyed the reason this film is so special to me but I hoped I've conveyed the fact that it is special to me. It might never be chosen as a classic in the long run of cinema but It's impressed me like few other films have.

Mutual Appreciation (2005, Andrew Bujalski)

2010-12-02T11:42:00.000-08:00

Andrew Bujalski surpasses his great debut feature Funny Ha Ha and delivers one of the best indie films of the noughties. Like it’s predecessor, the film sticks to documentary-like realism, using no non-diegetic music (although it actually features a great diegetic music scene) and featuring semi-improvised dialogue. This lends the film a brilliant feel which lifts it above a “quirky indie flick” into a brilliant look at a guy trying to follow his dreams and survive in the twenty-something world of relationships. Just like Funny Ha Ha, the film is a glimpse rather than a fully-fledged narrative, with us observing the main character at a specific point in his life.
However this film differs slightly as it shares it’s focus out over three characters, Allan the lead, his friend Lawrence and Lawrence’s girlfriend, Ellie. This is probably a wise decision as Allan is never quite as likeable as Funny Ha Ha’s protagonist, Marnie. In fact the character I probably had the most sympathy with was Lawrence (played by Bujalski), who’s relationship with Ellie is disrupted by Allan. Bujalski gives a wonderfully awkward performance.
Again, the exchanges are kept on a polite level, never letting the characters descend completely into vicious arguments, which heightens the realism.
All in all, this is a excellent film which confirms Bujalski’s status as one of the most interesting modern independent directors.

Satantango (1994, Bela Tarr)

2010-12-02T11:14:00.000-08:00

In my opinion this is one of the greatest, most ambitious pieces of cinema ever made. The film goes so far beyond what what we’ve come to think of as a film that it becomes a true landmark piece of work. It’s really a shame that the film never made a wide enough impact when it was released and has drifted into obscurity status, but then again, it’s not plausible to think that a film like this would ever resonate with a huge number of people.
Indeed, Satantango could easily be written off as the most pretentious, indulgent arthouse film ever made. I mean, seven hours of some miserable bastards trudging through mud and getting drunk? Come on. Of course that isn’t everything that’s in the film, and even those sections can’t be simplified like that. Satantango completely justifies it’s length. When you watch it you have to completely forget all notions of how long a story should be told and in what way. The film invites you to enter it’s universe and actually live in the world for seven hours. Make no mistake, this is an EXPERIENCE.
The basic story of Satantango could easily have been condensed into a two hour film by another director, but to say it would be completely different is an understatement.This film gains everything from it’s pace. The first four hours are essentially set up. Even when the main action does occur in the final third, it is never treated as a huge pay off after a slow build up. The non-chronological chapters introduce us to the characters one after another, building slowly to the film’s centerpiece, Chapter 5, which sets off the action in the final third.
This section is immensely powerful and allows us to see how truly hateful the film’s community is. An essay I read on this film described the chapter’s main character, a little girl named Estike, as vile and a psychopath. I strongly disagree with that and find Estike to be one of the few characters in the film with any actual innocence. She is actually a tragic and pitiful character and most of her tragedy comes from the fact that she is a product of the fucked up environment that the villagers have created. The narration that closes the chapter is one of the most beautiful pieces of writing i’ve ever heard.
That in mind, Satantango is mostly known as a visual experience and it most certainly is. The opening and closing scenes of the film (which are made to come full circle by the ominous sound of bells) are indescribably haunting and every shot in the film is composed like a ballet. I long to see this film on the big screen and am praying that it one day gets another screening in London. Simply put, Satantango is one of the greatest and most unique films I’ve ever seen and probably the best film of the nineties. A true masterpiece.