Movies Make Me Happy

I was supposed to spend yesterday going through research materials and laying out the structure for the screenplay I have to hand in on Monday. Instead I went on a movie marathon and was happy. All this work is putting a dent in my filmgoing habits, dammit. And it's not even work that makes me feel good. It's just... getting in the way of more important things.

Trouble Every Day
Enjoyed this far more than I thought I originally would. It's a beautifully crafted movie, and it's wonderfully refreshing to see something where every single gesture, shot, musical choice, etc. is a conscious decision that propels the film forward. I know that should be the case, but too often they are reduced to a pitifully obvious metaphor. Um, I'm getting confused by my own writing here. Let's see...

Metaphor in Wimbledon: the meteor seen on the news and in various scenes represent the relationship between Kirsten Dunst and Paul Bettany. Like, duh. A deaf, dumb and blind person could've seen that coming a mile away. And when they break up, guess what, it disappears from the sky. No. Fucking. Way.

Metaphor in Trouble Every Day: A simple, unassuming shot of a river, glistening red in the setting sun. A simple score underneath. Nothing forceful to bludgeon you into feeling something or getting anything out of it. Yet the red on the surface of the water resembles blood, a river of blood, with unfathomable depths. There's a metaphor for you. Crude, yes, but it doesn't hit you over the head.

It unfolds so very slowly and deliberately, you either hate the director for doing it, or you admire her balls for piecing out her information, making you draw the connections between the characters at a snail's pace, each revelation adding something new to their relationships. Audaciously, the plot only begins to be mentioned 45 minutes into the film.

Since the plot involves cannibalism, even scenes of intimacy, where a character kisses another character's arm, are framed in such a way and have an unsettling sound design so as to create the feel that he's, well, eating her arm somehow. Many shots are framed to make a person's neck the focal point, putting the audience in the POV of the attacker. Yet these are scenes in which no one is attacked. Lovely.

Speaking of sound design, it makes me happy that a horror film doesn't need to resort to the huge audio spikes (a.k.a. dirty tricks) to scare the audience. It scares the most when there is, in fact, no music at all. Well, at least it made me very very uncomfortable. Which perversely enough, makes me very happy.

Sex = Violence = Death. Isn't an orgasm also called la petit morte, the little death, in French? How apt.

Oh, and it has Vincent Gallo, of The Brown Bunny fame (or is it infamy?).

Enough babbling. Read a much more coherent review here.

2046
Oh Wong Kar Wai. I don't know what to say. It didn't blow me away as much as I hoped it would. But that's no fault of yours. After In The Mood For Love, it would be a miracle to make anything better. But still, in a Wong Kar Wai film, you can expect:

Gorgeous, breathtakingly, achingly beautiful cinematography.
Empty characters seeking to fill the void in their lives with something, someone, anything, anyone.
A hauntingly apt score.
Sadness, all-permeating sadness, melancholy and loss.
Countless references to his own previous films and those of others.
Impeccable performances.

My favorite shot in the film:
In super slow-motion, Faye Wong smokes a cigarette on frame right in her room while the camera cranes up, also in super-slow-speed. At that speed, it's like it barely moves. The room is lit amazingly, and it almost looks black and white, very very noir. It reached into me and grabbed my heart and twisted, and was one of those applaud-out-loud moments at the movies. What can I say?

Perhaps there's a tad too much slow motion employed throughout. But what do I know? Wasn't as crazy as most of his other films in terms of framing and camera movement. But still pretty fuckin' amazing-looking.

The Motorcycle Diaries
Thought this would be really fucking great, but it was OK. Gorgeous, gorgeous places. Machu Picchu looks amazing. I would die happy if I ever got to go there.

Gael Garcia Bernal is reliable as always.

Liked how when they went into the more serious section, they changed the style a little into a more documentary-style way of shooting it - handheld and all. Probably just picked some natives off the street too. Very guerilla-style. I like.

Perhaps a little trite, no? I thought Y Tu Mama Tambien did the whole social commentary thing a lot better. Another review here from The Onion.

Liked the use of static shots where the subjects stared right at the camera. It wasn't a still photo, they were merely keeping as still as they could. It was used to reflect their revolutionary potential or something along those lines, something that Che Guevera saw in them. Even though I felt it might have been cribbed from 25th Hour, I still liked it. And even then, who knows if Spike Lee hadn't stolen it from somewhere else?

The best thing about film is that even when you steal something, you can always call it an homage.

Finally, a note from Premiere magazine about the harsh realities of retro-pop culture icons like Che Guevera:

One of the more peculiar manifestations of counterculture retro fashion in recent years has been the resurrection of Dr. Ernesto “Che” Guevara as a poster/T-shirt boy for... well, what, exactly? Just as almost none of the yo-yos running around wearing Von Dutch T-shirts and trucker hats are aware that real-life hot-rod artist Von Dutch was reported to have been a virulent racist, and that they might as well pay him homage by wearing Klan hoods, so it is that many of the hipster waifs and the facial-hair–challenged wastrels who love them have little clue as to who Che was, what he stood for, how many deaths he was responsible for — that sort of thing.

And there you have it. May no one I know ever buy a Von Dutch T-shirt.