poro

Jaw-droppingly intimate and sensitive. Be prepared to be wrecked - the whole theater was shaking with sobs at points.

Beautifully and specifically queer. I've never on screen seen gay sex that felt this much like gay sex. The texture of it. There's a brief, funny, inter-micro-generation terminology convo that if you are LGBTQ of a certain age, you've had. There are two coming out conversations with lines that I swear are plagiarized from my life. There's a delightful subversion, in an early scene, of cruising, that achieves a cocktail of funny and sweet and sad that returns throughout the film (most notably in a moment where a 48-year-old Adam climbs into bed with his parents wearing a 12-year-old's pajamas). The exploration of how things can be so much better than 1987 but still not fine, and the ways the not-okayness of 1987 is still with us, especially in the psyches of folks that were there… so relatable and such a rare and subtle theme.

There is a final twist that, while devastating, does some real damage to Adam's character and, in my opinion, the emotional impact of the movie. Investing incredibly deeply in a fantasy of a relationship with a neighbor that didn’t happen is creepy where imagining you can talk to your dead parents again is sweet and sad. We know early on that the interactions with Adam’s parents aren’t a part of conventional reality and that doesn’t diminish any of their emotional impact, but the romantic relationship being unreal cheapens it.

This last emotional gutting felt unnecessary and unearned to me: it makes me hesitant to recommend the movie, despite how much it affected me, despite the impeccable execution. A friend who saw the movie with me and didn’t personally relate to as many of the queer culture touchpoints felt emotionally manipulated, and I get that. But aside from the last few minutes, my experience of the movie was near-perfect.

This is somewhat reminiscent of the 2014 Godzilla film in the sense that it's trying to be a drama first and a spectacle second. Don't worry, you'll get more of the titular monster here compared to that film, but those who are just looking for destruction are bound to walk out disappointed. In theory this should be right up my alley for that exact reason, but despite being a relatively small Japanese production, the end result I found oddly commercial. Take the character drama, which thankfully is handled more interestingly than the Gareth Edwards film. It puts in just enough work as an analysis of post-war trauma in Japan (I like that they play up the angle of Godzilla as a metaphor for this, wish they'd pushed that a little further) and they put more effort into making us engage with the characters than a movie like this usually would. However, there's still something very calculated and safe about it. In particular, the dynamic between our main 'family' is very obvious because it uses many predictable tropes that play out exactly as expected. For example, our tortured protagonist doesn't quite view the little kid he's living with as his daughter yet (I wonder where that'll go). Moreover, there are plenty of cheesy calls, which during its worst moments lead to scenes that are straight up manipulative. Without going into spoilers, this movie has one of the most annoying final scenes I've seen in a long time, completely backtracking on a major emotional beat of the movie. It honestly felt like the movie pulling a middle finger at its audience. What doesn't help either is that the dialogue, acting and filmmaking aren't the best. Subtleties are spelled out through exposition, every emotion is underscored with generic string sections, the actors are overdoing it at points (even for Japanese standards, trust me). Long story short, the choices all feels very ... Hollywood. I'm not expecting Grave of the Fireflies here, but why focus half of your movie on this aspect when it isn't anything special. The action bits I found slightly better. This movie generally has decent direction, with some design/effects work I'd genuinely call excellent. The fact that they made this with less than 1/10th of the budget of Godzilla vs Kong is really funny to me. Still, the sequences with Godzilla aren't visionary enough where they'll leave a mark on my brain, which is something you really need when you're working in the big monster/disaster genre. Going back to the 2014 film, that movie has a very distinct atmosphere with a very memorable finale. The camera placement and overall presentation here are much more on the functional side. Entertaining enough, but also very reliant on convenience and cheesy, ridiculous moments. For instance, I dare anyone not to laugh at the news crew standing on the roof when Godzilla attacks the city. It's so stupid, but played completely straight. Overall, while I expect a lot of people who think they're cultured for liking Hollywood movies that aren't made by Hollywood will like this, I thought it was the usual middle of the road same old, same old.

5/10

This is a very weird movie, but not by its content. Hard to tell whether it was worth watching.

Visually it's nice, extremely clean and ordered. But 90% of what happens has absolutely no interest. Family picnic. Wife showing the garden to her mother. Some random conversations. Dictation of work letters. Administrative work. It is very boring, soporific even.

The only interest comes from knowing who those people are and the whole context, and the contrast with the banality of their lives, with the clinical simplicity of administrative decisions.

The whole camp is hidden behind a wall. There is just a background noise, far away, muffled, some cries, some gunshots. And the chimneys smoke.

Among what is banal but extremely shocking by the context:
- The mother complaining she could not get her neighbour's curtains.
- The commander getting a new post, but her wife complaining about losing her garden
- The sales pitch of the new generation crematorium
- Being so happy that the plan is named after him that he calls his wife in the middle of the night
- Ashes used as fertilizer in the garden

The only small moments that acknowledge the violence are:
- the wife, upset, threatening the maid that she could have her incinerated just like that
- the commander having a young girl sent to his office
- in the commanders meeting, the word "extermination" is said once, but all the rest is just logistics and quotas

At the end, a cutscene shows people cleaning the camp, and it takes a while to realize they are cleaning the current day Auschwitz museum, I guess showing the continuity of mundane tasks in all circumstances.

So in the end, this is definitely a work of art that succeeds in what it's trying to achieve. However the boringness is what makes it special, and you can't avoid the fact that it is mostly boring. Not to watch when sleepy or tired.

Despite the fact that 'The Eternal Memory' is well-made and sheds light on a topic that affects many people around the world, I didn't find it to be particularly engaging. On the one hand, this is due to the fact that I personally have already had to deal with Alzheimer's cases in my family, so this documentary didn't really tell me anything new. On the other hand, it would certainly have helped if I had been familiar with the work of the Chilean journalist Augusto Góngora, whose Alzheimer's disease is the subject of this film, and his wife, actress Paulina Urrutia, beforehand. If you've followed their careers in the past, 'The Eternal Memory' will likely have a completely different impact. Nevertheless, I was at least somewhat moved by the movie overall - if only because it is a very familiar topic.

This is fascinating, I loved every second of it. Such a brilliantly written script and Cate Blanchett’s performance deserves every possible accolade, Lydia Tár is one of the best characters I’ve seen in a long time. The way the film tackles pretension, artistic ego and achievement as a veil for perceived integrity, and the abuse of power that results from it really spoke to me. Should artists be held accountable or not? Should we seperate art and artist? What is the effect of cancel culture on art? These are questions I’m currently asking myself, as one of my own favorite artists made anti semetic remarks and alligned himself with highly questionable social movements just a few weeks ago, tanking his own career. I used to be firmly in the camp of seperating the two, but this movie made me reconsider that, which is quite an achievement. An achievement made all the more impressive by the fact that there’s no spoonfeeding going on here. The main character isn’t judged in an obvious way and Todd Field clearly wants you to draw your own conclusions.

Now, the script is super intricate, there’s a lot of technical mumbo jumbo in it. Having a background in music (and music theory) myself, I can honestly say that a lot of that stuff went over my head. I got the impression that parts of it were meant to be satirical, but still: you don’t need to feel stupid if you don’t have a perfect grasp on what all of that means, because it’s not the crux of the story. Your focus should be drawn to the journey of our main character, which is intriguing by itself. It starts out as a drama, but then incorporates elements of psychological thrillers as the film progresses. After the movie finished, I immediately wanted to go back and dissect how we’d gotten to the point where we end up.

The filmmaking is very Fincher-y: it’s cold, impersonal, distant, and it has some of the best one takes you’re going to see this year. It’s confidently slow paced, subtle and the director likes to linger on certain shots for a long time, which will inevitably lead to some of the general audience calling it '''''boring''''', even though it obviously isn’t. In fact, I can even see it winning Oscars in a few technical categories, it’s that exceptional.

9/10

[Sheffield '23] Filmed with a magical texture that uses smoke as the main element, taking advantage of the intimacy provided by the semi-darkness of Võru's saunas, the stories and reflections of the protagonists describe a society that still has difficulties assuming the identities of gender and the female gaze. Between funny comments and terrible experiences, an absurd and violent masculinity is described. But in its close look, these conversations end up being repetitive, perhaps excessively selected to show a homogeneous message of subjugation that ends up feeling too forced.

A psychological thriller that reflects on the obsession with violence without having to show it, creating an atmosphere of tension and restlessness to build one of the most disturbing characters of this year. From the soundtrack with baroque sounds mixed with electric guitars, or the sequence shot of the court with a camera that seems like a ghostly presence, the director maintains an unhealthy feeling throughout the entire film. There is a good use of technology to reflect the online space that allows the presence of the worst nightmares, and a suspense that leads to an unpredictable ending.

A beautiful love story that reflects on memory from the illness that leads to oblivion. This kind of approach to a patient raises certain doubts about how appropriate they may be and the degree of intrusion involved in placing a camera in front of the psychological degradation of the protagonist. But accepting that it is a respectful look that tries to be honest, it achieves a very outstanding dose of emotion. Although it loses some balance when it remains halfway in the confrontation between individual memory and the collective memory of a country, which also faces oblivion.

Sidney Flanigan is absolutely brilliant in this playing a troubled teen with a secret to keep. It's hyper-real at times. We can feel her pain. Some utterly heartbreaking scenes including one single take piece of quality cinema.

It's downbeat, sombre, melancholic and moody. And those are it's best qualities. The viewer is reminded of British cinema in the vein of Andrea Arnold and perhaps Cristian Mungiu's '4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days'. It's not over scripted, and it has a lovely washed out colour palette to ram home the "realness". Eliza Hittman is an extremely talented film-maker - Beach Rats was good, this is even better.

8.2/10

[6.9/10] The Innocents is a number of good scares in search of a better movie. Director Jack Clayton and his crew construct plenty of sequences that chill the spine, shots that make your skin crawl, and moments to make the hair on the back of your neck stand up. But the production is rife with overwrought performances, laughable dialogue, and a story that veers between lackadaisical to nonsensical, with occasional detours of being downright dull.

It’s the sort of film that would work better if all the lines were replaced with subtitles, or really just omitted altogether. Clayton and company do well at setting a mood, one where nothing is explicitly wrong, but it feels like some spectre might be lurking just around the corner. But all of that goes to pot once the governess or the housekeeper or the titular young brother in sister have some overblown reaction to it all that punctures the creepy atmosphere and devolves into rank melodrama.

Some of that is just the gulf of time proving itself impassable for someone born decades after this movie’s release. Deborah Kerr’s frantic, overly mannered delivery verges on the comical in places. It’s the sort of thing I can intellectually accept as a choice and the style of the time, but which simply can’t move me amid the rampant artifice of it all, and which undermines the other unsettling horror elements that make up the film.

Granted, Kerr and her fellow cast members are saddled with some truly ridiculous lines of dialogue. The feature is marbled with emotional exposition and flat declarations of what did or didn’t happen. When Clayton allows the film’s imagery and sound to take over, there’s an elegant, understated terror to the whole ordeal. But when any of the film’s central figures tries to comment on the proceedings, to describe their own state of mind, the whole thing falls apart into purple prose and unnatural speeches that, in my heart of hearts, I want to ascribe to William Archibald rather than Truman Capote.

Still, the performances are no great shakes. Kerr quivers and mawps and speaks ever so delicately about this and that. The Innocents largely rests on her shoulders, and her exaggerated reactions to everything, whether in delighted rapture or petrifying terror, render many, if not most, of the film’s high drama moments thoroughly unavailing. The same goes for the kids, who acquit themselves well enough for child actors (particularly Martin Stephens in the film’s last reel), but who more often come off as annoying or silly when the movie seems to be trying for creepy.

By the same token, in between its big scares, The Innocents is positively languid. The film plays understandably coy about what’s really going on with all the unnerving happenings around the country estate where Miss Giddens has been sent to look after her benefactor’s young niece and nephew. But it drags its feet between reveals, reducing itself to long, speculative exposition dumps, describing things the viewer’s already witnessed firsthand, and dull, elongated stretches.

And even when the film wants to put its cards on the table and try to convince the audience that the children are possessed by their deceased former governess and vallet, the reasons behind Miss Gibbons’s plans and rules for how to address it make little sense. Having decided that Miles and Flora are being controlled from beyond the grave, she decides that she simply needs to get them to admit that’s what’s happening or ferry them away from the manor and it’ll all go away. Maybe there’s some late 1800s ghost lore that just doesn't track with our modern mythos, and I’m willing to take the movie’s rules as a find them, but it still scans as an odd approach to a suspected haunting.

Granted, one of the films strengths is its ambiguity over whether the spooks and spine-tingling images we see through Miss Giddens’ eyes are real or the product of mental instability and delusion. For a production from a much more chaste era, The Innocents adds a psychological layer to its horror by lacing the film with the strain of repressed or abusive sexuality. On the one hand, it’s possible to read the film as a metaphor for child abuse, with Miss Giddens and Mrs. Grose trying to address (or sweep under the rug) horrors visited upon the children by their former caretakers, with our protagonist seeing an admission of what happened as the first step toward treatment and healing.

But on the other, it’s possible to read the entire ordeal as a mental unraveling of Miss Giddens, spurred by her own presumably repressed upbringing as the daughter of a country parson. There’s a tension in the film, between the sort of morally upstanding, prim and proper of Miss Giddens herself, and the combination of the Uncle’s “I’m too busy chasing skirts in London to look after my wards” position and the tale of the lascivious valet and governess who carried on their illicit affair while the children were aware. It’s not a far leap to take that tension, extrapolate it to a shock that a pair of children’s innocence would be corrupted by exposure to such licentiousness, and have that send Miss Giddens into a hallucinatory frenzy.

Still, whether her encounters with spooks and spirits are real or imagined, they’re the best part of the film. The Innocents is at its best when it’s not trying to make sense of its jumbled up plot, but rather trafficking in sheer chill factor. Cinematographer Freddie Francis finds engaging ways to block and frame Miss Giddens, often putting her in the foreground while one of her young chargers, a disquieting phantom, or simply a shadow lurks eerily in the background. It tracks that Francis would go on to work with David Lynch, as there’s a shared, unsettling dimension to how the film is shot and posed.

At the same time, the sound design firmly aids in the creep factor. Whether it’s the simple, quiet echo of Miss Giddens’s footsteps as she ascends a tower staircase, or the disturbing tunes sung in the din of the house, or the combinations of whispers and hums in heightened moments that add to the sense of dysphoria, the reason not to mute this film and just enjoy its sterling visuals is the way those aural components of the movie heighten its terror.

That’s the rub of The Innocents. When it simply wants to scare you, it uses all the tools in its toolbox with a virtuoso’s precision, culminating in a final act set piece that brings its slow bubbling horror to a frothing boil. But when it wants to convey character, or deliver important details, or simply convey what its major personalities are thinking or feeling, it resorts to cartoonish approaches in dialogue and delivery that weaken the audience’s ability to feel for anyone trapped in that well-constructed nightmare. There’s enough craft, and enough going on under the hood, to make the film worth watching and appreciating, but not enough of core components like character or performance or writing to make it truly great.

The editing often appears abrupt, disregarding the raccord between two consecutive shots. However, instead of harming it, it imparts a remarkable touch of personality. This can be observed when Michel flirts with Patricia in his car. The editing introduces a new shot with each new flirtation, sacrificing visual continuity in a self-referential montage. In one of his attempts to steal cars, Michel disappears running from right to left in one shot, only to reappear from the left in the next, contrary to the recommendations of classical norms.

On the other hand, the realistic treatment of sound is sacrificed. Sound effects (such as gunshots) and the music used vary in volume and realism between shots. This is a consequence of the technical equipment employed.

It's worth noting that in some scenes, characters address the audience, as seen at the beginning of the film when Michel turns to the camera to address the audience (which is known as breaking the fourth wall): "If you don't like the beach, if you don't like the mountains...". And at the end, when he declares, "I'm fed up and tired," in a kind of public confession that marks the final outcome, leading to his death.

Moreover, the film frequently employs narrative elements that make explicit references to the plot. Typically, these are titles appearing on cinema posters introduced in close-ups clearly alluding to the film's resolution. On another occasion, as Michel and Patricia enter the cinema with a close-up of them kissing, the dialogue from the projected film is heard, containing explicit references to one of the key themes: the impossibility of love.

To conclude, something that not many people know is that Raoul Coutard, the director of photography, recounted that Jean-Luc Godard expressed the decision to depart from conventional practices during filming, opting for the use of natural light. In the film selection process, Coutard mentioned Ilford HPS as his preferred choice. Upon consulting Ilford in England, they were informed that HPS film was not available for cinema, only for photography. The factory produced 17.5-meter film strips for photography, with different perforations than those of cinema cameras.

Faced with this limitation, Godard decided to splice multiple 17.5-meter strips to form film reels, using the Cameflex camera with perforations more similar to Leica. Despite professional skepticism, this choice was implemented. Additionally, to enhance results with HPS, experiments were conducted with the photo developer phenidone. In collaboration with chemist Dubois from GTC laboratories, they successfully doubled the emulsion sensitivity.

However, a challenge arose when attempting to develop the film in a phenidone bath, as GTC laboratories faced technical limitations. The laboratory machines were set to process 3000 meters of film per hour, all using the same bath according to Kodak standards. Although Godard requested special treatment for his 1000 meters in 24 hours, the laboratories initially refused due to incompatibility with their standard procedures.

Luck favored the production, as GTC laboratories had an unused machine, designated for tests, which allowed the development of the Ilford films in a bath designed by themselves, with the flexibility to manage time at their discretion. Coutard emphasized that the worldwide success of "À bout de souffle" is undoubtedly attributed to Godard's imagination, his decision-making at the right moment, and also to Godard's determination in splicing pieces of 17.5-meter Ilford film, miraculously securing the use of a machine at GTC laboratories.

The use of high-sensitivity film allows, consequently, shooting in natural indoor and outdoor settings with minimal additional lighting, resulting in a photograph with grain yet sharpness that resembles the tones of "american black" (noir films) often referred to. But it's not merely an "aesthetic touch"; it's about capturing these natural spaces as documentary images, as manifestations of life in its development (there are numerous outdoor shots where pedestrians look at the camera with curiousity), within an authentic, unaltered context that corresponds to recognizable places, identified by the viewer as part of their own life.

It notably shows the impulse of youth, but also the need to fit into a society that pushes towards the most superficial representations of personal satisfaction. The third act is downright disturbing, and the way the camera zooms in on Tara's face is more expressive than any explanatory dialogue. It is an intelligent film that knows how to set the pace and develop events in such a way that there is always a certain suspense due to what has happened or what is about to happen. Concern is built from the apparent normality.

I'm usually drawn to movies that challenge me to relate to a perspective that's different from my own, so this movie's theme and approach intrigued me right from the start. It's essentially a character study about a gay man who's trying to escape a life of loneliness and alienation explored through the relationship with his dead parents and a love interest played by Paul Mescal. All four of the performances are excellent, this will probably be the defining role of Andrew Scott's career and his performance being overlooked by the Academy doesn't sit well with me. There's so much authentic detail in his body language, manner of speech and eye movement that deserves to be recognized because it carries the entire film. I was really impressed by the scenes between him, Bell and Foy, illustrating that while times have changed for the better, his character is still an outsider to society. Those scenes probably won't work for everyone (you could call them out for being shallow as it's all a product of his imagination), but I was very moved by the eventual pay-off. The film's answer to its central question of alienation I found a little less satisfying, as it struck me as too obvious. The final shot and needle drop in particular spell things out too much, though the scene leading up to that moment pulls off a satisfying final twist. The technical aspects of the film are easily among its biggest selling points. It's a great vibe movie, one of the best I've seen in a while. The colour and lighting create a feeling of intimacy that sometimes leans in the direction of sensuality, while other times feeling more comforting or nostalgic. It's because of that approach that the film doesn't come off as dreary, the inherent sadness always feels understated. Aside from the aforementioned scene I think the music choices are all great (loved the use of Death of a Party by Blur), however the droning score was a little bland by comparison. It's the right kind of score given the kind of film that it is, but they could've done so much more with the textures. Still, this is a really good film that I expect to remembered as more people discover it. Its appeal might seem niche, but the emotion is universally relatable.

7.5/10

Due to my complete lack of prior knowledge on the matter, I found every revelation and change of perspective to be extremely captivating. I could have spoiled myself the turning point just by watching the trailer or paying too much attention to the posters.
However, I couldn’t help noticing several contrived plot points and characters’ behaviors that came across as unnatural, serving primarily to create artificial payoffs or simply to advance the narrative according to the agenda. Moreover, I found the ending somewhat lackluster, if not downright banal.

[RTVE Play] Fragments of love with 3D animated paintings. Unattainable loves, lost loves, loves recovered through a shop window, permanent loves and traveling loves. Alberto Mariego shows different kind of loving expressions, passionate, wrapped in colors (blue, red...), almost impossible definitions, but enveloping and hypnotic. Get love back before it's too late. Soko sings: "We might be dead tomorrow."

Feels like a combination of Silence and There Will Be Blood. It's one of those movies that's really good at immersion; the cinematography, sound effects and score are all so accomplished that you're immediately transported into its world. For as pretentious as this may sound: you will feel the Icelandic cold of this movie. There are so many vistas that have already burned themselves onto my memory. However, it's probably a good thing that the film managed to hold my attention through just the technical aspects, because the writing can be lackluster. Sometimes it's slow to a fault, for example the first hour really should've been cut down to the more essential bits as there's way too much indulgence here. It feels like it only gets going in the second half, because that's when the conflict and themes get introduced. You need some of the set-up from the first hour, but it feels too drawn out. The arc of the main character is also utterly predictable, effectively hitting the emotions it's trying to sell, but not in a particularly surprising way. Still, I liked what it was doing overall and it's the kind of film that deserves respect. It's undeniably a piece of quality filmmaking with subtlety, substance, style and good performances, but definitely not for everyone.

6.5/10