Jim Jarmusch plays with the zombie subgenre. It is one of his least interesting films. But some stuff works. References to horror movies are fun, as well as the parody of his own films. It's like a slow motion version of horror cinema, as it had been shot in a friends party. There are surprising flaws in a script that it is not, per se, a great writting. Some characters and scenes really don't add anything to the story.
The end of the world is inevitable. As inevitable is the end of a kind of cinema that is already anachronistic.
[Netflix] This is Scorsese. Impeccable cinema. A way of telling a story that is entertaining and shocking. It is one of those movies that remains images in our memory. One of the best mob movies ever made. Great dialogues: "No one goes to jail if they don't want to go." Great editing. Perfect actings. This is Cinema. Great Cinema.
[Amazon] The John Wick saga goes to the extreme. It is difficult to find an argument among so many action scenes. There are more kicks than words. That's fine. Some locations (the glass building) are spectacular. Some fight sequences are astonishing. Other action sequences (Morocco) are video game fireworks.
[MUBI] Cuba. Dreams are always sought beyond. Jennifer wants to be an athlete. Doubts. Her brother goes to Chile, beyond, where dreams are sought. This is a story about how to find the path. The relationship between mother and daughter is interesting. That tenderness. Those words of comfort. A real concretion is missing in what this documentary wants to tell us. Life is lacking in the portrait of life.
[Filmin] Another story of coming-of-age starring two children over 24 hours. There is something of "The Florida project" (here Pullman apartments) in this story. The best is the different portrait of Mallorca, far from the beaches and tourism. The worst is the choice of actors (adults and children) who don't convey anything. This is a kind of amateur movie. But for inability, not for low budget.
[Netflix] Shiv'ah. Mourning in Judaism. This movie is some kind of Shiv'ah. The mourning for the survivors of Treblinka. The coming-of-age of a virtuous Polish violinist who avoids the Nazi barbarism. There are exciting moments in the childhood flashbacks. The present, a kind of detective investigation, is less convincing. The film remains as a failed effort to tell a thousand times told story in a different way.
[MUBI] Cinema is not what it was. Billy Wilder revisits, again, the old Hollywood. Is this a revenge to modern Hollywood that didn't let him make movies in his last years? "The legend must go on". Fedora is another withered star, like Norma Desmond. Beautiful film, perhaps not as brilliant as others from the director. There is nostalgia in this critical, melancholic vision of the glamour in movies.
[Filmin] A story about workaholics. Olivier Gourmet plays a minimalist character. The movie is also minimalist. Maybe too much. It needs more consistency is. The third act unbalances the achievements of the first part. Silence. Looks that are more expressive than words. We are all guilty. Or not?
A fisherman without a boat. A fishing boat for tourists. Brexit. Class conflicts. Outstanding B/W. Deep close-ups. Off-sync dialogues. There is an anachronistic tone that is both surprising and fascinating. "I'm talkin 'about fishing, not fucking hospitality". An excellent editing job. Intriguing use of sound. An experimental exploration of handmade cinema.
Al Capone with diapers and a carrot in his mouth. Is this a comedy? Not at all. Josh Trank has made a weird, crazy, sometimes chaotic movie. But isn't that the mind of a mentally ill person like Al Capone was in his late years? Tom Hardy looks like Marlon Brando in "Apocalypse Now". His work is between caricature and genius. Shit. Blood. Saliva. Paranoia. Ingredients for a singular film.
[Filmin] Barcelona. Boy meets boy. It starts as a regular "brief encounter" story. With more suggestive dialogues than usual. The temporary twist makes the narration surprising. And the themes about relationship, fleeting love or that end of the world that never comes, end up being deeper.
[MUBI] The hunt for man. Masks that show the inexpression of... a nightmare, perhaps. "The sleep of reasons produces monsters". Goya inspires Glazer. A rope that falls into the void. A man who hangs on it. 86 seconds of suspense. And the tense music of Mica Levi.
[Filmin, 4K Restoration] Cows. Poverty. Land. "Don't read Genesis; read Revelation." Rain. Communism. Mud. "The rain destroys everything." Tango. The dance of the poor is tango. "My father is the sea, my mother is the land, my name is Tango". Long takes. Time stopped. Bells. "Futaki woke up to the sound of the bells." Despair. Cinema. Masterpiece.
[Filmin] A "brief encounter" film that talks about personal relationships. Small film with good B/W cinematography. Indoor shooting. Storm outside. Unbalanced script and almost amateur performances. It promises more than it gives.
[Filmin] The eighties produces creatures like this one. An audiovisual proposal that refers to popular cinema with a sense of humor. Homage or appropriation of the icons of an era? The look is creative, the background is less deep than it is intended. Or perhaps it's not. The worst thing about making a kitsch product is adorning it with "cultural" elements. Troma understood better what to do.
[Filmin] A documentary for fans of the character. Charles Aznavour described through the images recorded by himself. There is a lot of music and many trips. There is a lot of self-satisfying image. Despite a good editing job, the feeling is that we haven't met the person, only the artist.
[Filmin] A tribute from the son to his father, a film director, and from the grandson to his grandfather, a poet. Thoughts of the man and the artist about cinema and spirituality. "A poet, if he really is, cannot be a believer." Tarkovsky in his own words. Maybe we don't find anything new. But at least it is an exciting vision of a cinema that is no longer made.
[Filmin] Exercise of self-fiction. The film does not achieve all its objectives, in part due to a structure that claims to be complex but it is finally random: the tribute to cinema, the sentimental story, the politics ... come together in a kind of audiovisual collage that dies for your own lack of definition.
[Filmin] The director recovers images of her childhood recorded mainly by her father to find meaning in her loneliness. The absent father (we don't see film, because he is always behind the camera). Interesting work of thinking about how the image can offer a vision of apparent happiness, but it hides a much more complex second reading, if we focus in a gesture, a look...
[Filmin] A documentary that is not a documentary, or maybe yes. An exquisite editing work. An intelligent use of sound. A reality with a fictional narrative built on archival images. Or not. A singular and original film.
[Filmin] Documentary film about the reconstruction of a popular market in Barcelona. It wants to think about the traditional neighborhoods and the threat of predatory tourism. But it is too reminiscent of the excellent "En construcción" (José Luis Guerín, 2001), without being so smart. This is a repetitive and sometimes boring exercise.
[Filmin] The Mumblecore movement arrives in Spain a little late. The director acknowledges the inspiration for "Hannah takes the stairs" (Joe Swanberg, 2007). Improvisation is a bit false, naturalness is unnatural, the director's own interventions do not make much sense. Haneke, Varda. Film masters references that doesn't help it to be more personal.
[Filmin] Rural thriller shot in Galicia. Black and white photography is great, and it causes tension and suspense. The director doesn't give much information about the crime. He is more interested in the consequences. However, it would need more narrative depth to be more than just a technical tour de force.
[Filmin] When introducing her characters, the director says she wanted to "examine the digital generation's view on relationships." The problem is that the result is as frustrating as the relationship between the characters. In the end it all comes down to lack of communication. The worst is that, in the end, the audience have clearer than the protagonists themselves what this empty journey has consisted of.
[Filmin] Fable that shows a kind face of Brussels and its night owl characters. Bas Devos' personal style, with its silences and slow tempo, is undoubtedly "sui generis". Personally, I'm not a big fan of his style, but at least he has his own language. This immigrant woman lost at night is the ghost of the title, a character who wanders through a city that still maintains a certain beauty.
[Filmin] Outstanding mise en escène. Every image in this movie is exciting. A tale of mourning and death. But also on Earth, where the ancestors are buried. "The dead bury their dead." Beautiful, poetic, moving ... From a small country, Lesotho, a great filmmaker comes to us.
[Filmin] "The family you have on your mind is not really your family. It is your perception of them." Ivana director, actress, character ... The naturalness of the presence of friends and family in front of the camera is surprising. It is an irregular story, chaotic at certain times. The central part is boring. It's funny the political-geographical vision of Serbia and Romania. Rest in peace, Anca Pop.
[Filmin] The director seems like a gifted disciple of Guy Maddin, indeed. At times it is close to the Monthy Python (The Dominion School of Nationhood). You can enjoy the creativity, but it works better as a copy than an original interpretation of the apparently absurd history of Canada.
[Filmin] Searching for a mother as a need to find support to reach maturity. Ola is an abandoned teenager who cannot resist being an orphan. There is a certain tendency to melodrama, but the look is cold, fleeing from the easy emotion. The director comes from the documentary genre, which you can see in the realistic use of the camera. The film gains interest as the story progresses. Hard and painful.
[Filmin] The dream of Europe turns into a nightmare. Religious allegory is unnecessary. This Latvian butcher trapped in Brussels becomes a slave. According to its director, it is a true story. A movie that has the narrative of the best Ken Loach films. The frightening realism of an artificial Europe.
