It would probably be unwise to take Hayao Miyazaki at his word that this will be his final film and I’m not terribly fond of the quality of his later ones anyhow. Still, it would only be fair to watch at least one of his films properly in the cinema and so here we are. This one does finally feature a boy as the protagonist and apparently that’s because it’s semi-autobiographical. It also starts strongly with a firm grounding in reality but eventually veers off into the most fantastical and dream-like of Miyazaki’s worlds yet. There are all kinds of possible interpretations but none are terribly solid or boldly stated enough and so this is again mostly an exercise in pure imagination.

David Fincher’s latest thriller is streaming on Netflix and while it’s as slick as his other films, it hasn’t made much of a splash and feels a little pointless. As its tagline suggests, it amounts to being competence porn and while it does start with the protagonist making a mistake, it only goes to show that even the most skilled and well prepared of professionals are subject to the vagaries of random chance. It’s a very satisfying procedural to watch as it shows every detail of the work of a professional hitman. But it’s not saying anything that is interesting and its subtext, that in the end, it’s the rich, white dudes who get to life, makes for a sour conclusion however true to life it may be.

My wife insisted that we catch this in the cinemas and indeed it seemed like a good idea to support an artsy Malaysian film that’s enough good to win plaudits internationally. Indeed I really like how this is mostly set in Pudu, Kuala Lumpur and seemed to feature the lack of official identity documents in Malaysia as its driving theme. It’s the feature film debut of Lay Jin Ong who also wrote the script. However he was also a producer for Shuttle Life, film that I excoriated some time ago. This is far better than Shuttle Life but it falls into the same trap of being too old-fashioned where it counts and operates according to the principle that misery equals high art. Worst of all, it pulls a bait and switch in that it’s actually not at all about migrants in Malaysia nor the lack of identity papers.

This is only the second Senegalese film to be featured here but it’s an old one, contemporaneous with the French New Wave in fact and so shows its influence. However it’s also distinctly African in its sensibilities which at times can make it difficult to decipher. Confusing as it is sometimes, I’m very pleased that it actually does have a plot and even if I can’t understand everything, I found the parts that I could understand absolutely hilarious and entertaining. At the same time, it offers a very satisfying portrait of what Senegal was like in that era, from the poorest to the very richest echelons of society. Just a fantastic film all around.

We’re no strangers to films that are heavy on symbolism but there’s just too much in this one that we can’t decipher. Victor Erice isn’t a director we’ve seen before and this seems to be pretty much his only film of note. The fact that this is considered one of the masterpieces of Spanish cinema was enough to get it added onto my watch list but even knowing that this was made during a time of heavy censorship in Francoist Spain wasn’t enough to make much sense of it. The individual scenes are mesmerizing and I can see how there is so much intentionality behind them. Yet without the necessary cultural references, I’m reduced to making only the vaguest of guesses as to what it is trying to say and that’s no fun at all.

I keep meaning to go back to Sergio Leone’s films but some of them are very long, making them difficult to fit into a watching schedule. This Western stars Charles Bronson as the protagonist and I believe that this was their only collaboration. It’s certainly a more complex film and the intent seems to be to obfuscate the plot and the exact role of each character. It’s a lavish production that oozes with style and achieves its remarkable length by being not afraid to let the camera linger interminably on every expression of the faces of the characters. It’s nothing special in terms of story or theme, but it does successfully frame the Western genre as a larger than life epic of mythic proportions and that is enough to qualify it as a great cinematic work.

This time we’re going all the way back to the very first feature film by Lars von Trier. I may not enjoy every one of Trier’s films but I can’t deny that they’re each so unique. The concept of a detective who dives so deep into the mind of the serial killer he is hunting that he becomes lost isn’t novel by now and I’m even getting some Max Payne vibes from the main character. The execution and aesthetics are something else however with practically every shot being shocking or just plain weird. Plus it even offers a justification for the world seeming to be the way it is! I wouldn’t read too much into what it means but it is rather satisfying to watch.