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Madres paralelas (2021)
Apply the Almodovar effect
Take an age old theme of children swapped at birth, a pinch of lesbianism and a shovel full of politics (both historic and current) then apply the Almodovar affect to blend them all together and voila, you have Parallel Mothers.
I'm a great fan of almodovar, absolutely love Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, High Heels, Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!, Volver and others and respect pretty much everything else, but this? This looks lazy and self indulgent. It has all the technical features, the sets, colours, cinematograpghy and the incandescent Penelope Cruz. Unfortunately it just skips through character development and relationships.
In the end, none of the personal relationships matter a damn to anyone. It's as if he absent mindedly dropped them to get on with his real interest and that was to make some simplistic points about the civil war. I'm not Spanish but I'm pretty sure that the civil war was a lot more complicated than that and the conflict still lives on at some level.
It seems that Almodovar has succumbed to the obsession of our times, ie, to preach, even at the cost of the story, character or nuance.
Cunk on Earth (2022)
As puerile as it gets
How on earth did something as appallingly unfunny as this get past so many people at the BBC and Netflix? Were they so absorbed in more important things that they just waved it through or had they already accepted that comedy, in this censorious age, is dead anyway. So long as it doesn't offend or make anyone feel unsafe, right?
I love mockumentaries. In fact I only just watched People Like Us again, still very funny thirty or so years later. Cunk didn't last even thirty minutes. My jaw dropped when she asked what brand meat Neantherthals were. What?? There's a million funny mock questions you could ask about Neanderthals and she asks one which is not only not funny but makes no sense at any level.
I worry that there is something is seriously wrong with the state of comedy today when something like this gets rave reviews.
The Banshees of Inisherin (2022)
OK, so it's an allegory
I walked away from this film thinking 1) what a weird and frustrating story and 2) I guess it's an allegory on the centuries of Irish internecine troubles.
I'm guessing it's an allegory because the film never really drew me in that way. I never cared about either of the main protagonists, just disturbed by their actions, by the finger cutting and the stalking both of which seemed absurd. Some critics have pointed to absurdist drama like Waiting for Godot as a reference but I don't think that works. Godot speaks to universal themes and there are no big themes in this film, just a miserable island full of miserable people (despite the few mildly comic moments) behaving irrationally and self destructing.
If it's supposed to be an allegory on the centuries of bloody conflict in Ireland then I think the film is being very patronising. Conflicts don't arise out of nothing and they're usually not irrational however horrible they may be. For the allegory to work we don't need a lesson in Irish history but we do need to be taken on the journey from friendship to bloody conflict and care about the damage and hurt. In this case, far from caring I was left frustrated, wondering what on earth the characters were doing! And all I could come up with was that they were probably just being used to make an allegory.
Regarding production values and scenery, yes they're great as many people have noted but these days, so what? There's more than enough money and technology for that. What is much harder to find in a serious film is good writing and a story that wil make you see the world at least a little differently than when you walked into the cinema.
I, Tonya (2017)
Used till the end
I know nothing about the Tonya Harding story beyond the tabloid headlines which inevitably go along the lines of black hats and white hats. So I was hoping to see a story that shows some nuance and context. Instead we get caricature and mockery. And if it is indeed true that Tonya was used by those closest to her then it is some irony that this movie lands the final blow.
Patrola na cesti (2016)
Beautiful, touching, dramatic
I first saw this about a year ago and must have watched it four or five times since. I was mainly captured by the delicately nuanced characterisation. Like all great dramas there are no good guys and bad guys, white hats and black hats. Frane, the black sheep of the family, drug dealer and petty criminal but who loves his wife and especially his daughter. The 'good son' Josip, reliable, dependable, generous, brave in battle, but lonely and who secretly covets his brother's wife, betrays his brother to the police in the hope of winning her.
The dialogue is as spare as the barren landscape where the action takes place. The music is haunting, and despite this being a police drama, there is little 'action' in the usual sense - although there is a lot of drama. Ultimately, this is about the multitude of needs and emotions bubbling away in all of us, how they come to the surface, how we deal with them and how they affect those around us. But there is no moralising or intrusion. The direction is light, almost as if we are a fly on the wall, watching real events take their course. A beautiful piece of work.
Okkupert (2015)
Little more than a (woke) soapie
This is very much like a soapie in the sense that characters and situations are pulled every which way just to keep the thing going. While it has much better production values than your average soapie it is far less engaging. There is little here to get involved in - the plot is ridiculous (and gets worse as the series progresses) and the acting is wooden. There is not a single character that you would care for. The main amusement comes from ticking off woke issues as they cover them, every one of them in excruciatingly heavy handed ways.
Regarding credibility of the storyline, I'm reminded of Aristotle's idea that in drama it is better to show something that is untrue but plausible than something that is true but which appears implausible. In the case of Occupied the writers seem to have gone for something that is both untrue and implausible.
Abre los ojos (1997)
Pretentious
Pretentious, self indulgent film making at its worst. A lot of people seem to be confusing complexity with interest. Solving a Rubik's cube is complex but ultimately not very interesting. Actually, now that I think about it I'd rather learn how a Rubuk's cube works than how this plot works.
I watched the film with my very smart, film loving, lawyer wife. Neither of us could figure out the plot - we were confused. After finding a plot outline on IMDb we were no longer confused but we were cross. Is that it??
It's curious that so many people devote almost as much space to criticising Vanilla Sky as they do praising this film; the main point being that they don't like Hollywood. Congratulations.
I gave it a 3/10 but only because we got to see the glorious Penelope naked a couple of times.
Public Enemies (2009)
If you're a Michael Mann fan keep away.
For years I've shouted the praises of Michael Mann. I don't know how many times I've seen Heat and pressed other people to watch it. Collateral & The Insider were also fabulous. As far as I was concerned if the box had Michael Mann written on it that's as much as I needed to know. Until Public Enemies. To call it a turkey would be to go to far but it falls so far below the expected standard it may as well be. The reasons have been well covered by other reviewers: poor character development, themes picked up and tossed away, too little story and too much shoot 'em up, etc. If you want to see a good B grade movie go for it. If you're a bit more serious about your movies or you're a Michael Mann fan keep away.