Wild was a pick that was added by my wife and indeed it ticks many of her boxes: it stars Reese Witherspoon, an actress that she likes, it has vaguely feminist themes and it’s about hiking in the great outdoors. As an adaption of a popular memoir and a film directed by Jean-Marc Vallée following the incredible success of Dallas Buyers Club, it was always going to be a highly prominent release. After watching this however, it seems to me that Witherspoon is its real auteur more so than the director as it was made by her production company and indeed she worked hard to obtain the filming rights even before the book was officially published.
It was only after finishing this that I learned that it is actually considered part of director Alejandro González Iñárritu’s loose trilogy of films that he made at the beginning of his career. Oddly enough, we’ve now watched all three of the films but I’m pretty sure that we did so in reverse order. This one is more like Babel than 21 Grams however in that it is an anthology of three separate stories, all of which are set in Iñárritu’s native Mexico.
A while back, there was a discussion on Broken Forum about the films of Alfred Hitchcock. After the usual talk of ranking his best films, eventually someone mentioned how Marnie is possibly the most misogynistic film he’d ever watched. When I told my wife this, she became curious and so we added this to our list of films to watch. This one stars Tippi Hedren, who is most famous for The Birds, as the titular character and Sean Connery. I believe that this is the only Hitchcock film in which Connery appears.
Once again I must confess that not only is this the first time I’ve written about a Federico Fellini film in this blog, it’s also the first time I’ve ever watched a film by this grandmaster of cinema. At least La Strada makes for a great pick to start things off with. It received a mixed reception when it was released but over time its reputation improved until it is now widely considered one of the greatest films ever made. Moreover, Fellini himself came to see this as his most representative work though directing it was an exhausting experience for him.
Utopia came to my notice as one of the most highly regarded documentaries of 2014 but after realizing who its auteur is, I’m sure that it would have gained plenty of attention in any case. It was directed and written by John Pilger, who to many of us in Southeast Asia is probably most well known for Death of a Nation. This is the 1993 documentary about East Timor that is credited with helping to end Indonesian occupation of the territory and allowing it to gain independence.
Inside Out only started showing in Malaysian theaters a couple of days ago while it’s US premiere was back in June. Since blockbusters generally try pretty hard to have near-simultaneous releases worldwide, I think this is a good indication that our local distributors don’t expect this to be a big hit on our shores. Still, this gap means that there’s been plenty of time to build up anticipation since this film is being heralded as Pixar’s return to form after several years of lackluster projects.
My wife wanted to visit Kluang last week to attend a small arts event organized by local Chinese writers and artists. In particular, she wanted to listen in on a couple of talks, the first one featuring a trio of local writers and the second one by Tan Chui Mui. I hadn’t heard of her before this but she is apparently considered one of Malaysian’s greatest rising directorial talents, especially as a woman, by dint of winning a bunch of international film awards.
