Continuing the string of films that show the darker side of Japan, especially under US occupation, here’s one by Shōhei Imamura. The title sounds ridiculous but makes complete sense given the context and even earns its comedic tone. At its heart is a rather old-fashioned love story between a girl and a bad boy but the incisive message about cultural imperialism elevates it above the usual fare. It’s rather cleverer and more multifaceted than it initially appears even if the moralizing is a tad obvious.
I consider the Knives Out series to be the best detective films currently being made so I’m always down for more of them. This one is especially delightful for me as it pits the atheistic and rational Benoit Blanc against the mystery of religion. It does take a while to get going as a dead body doesn’t even show up until maybe an hour in. I think it falls short of the cleverness of the first film in how the murder was carried out but the motivations of the characters, the religious theme and how it ties in with current events all make up for it.
As I noted earlier, Alex Garland’s work gives me mixed feelings yet here I am back again watching his latest. He does share directorial credit here with Ray Mendoza who helped advise Garland in the making of Civil War and more importantly was a participant in the real-life battle that this film is based on. The result is a stunningly authentic recreation of the incident and probably the single best portrayal of what modern urban warfare is like on film. True, it has no wider ambitions and says nothing about why the US is even in Iraq, but it doesn’t need to as what it does is perfectly fine and even much needed. The question is, why didn’t Garland aspire to this level of realism in his earlier film?
This Chilean film by a new director Felipe Gálvez Haberle is instantly recognizable as a Western. It has rugged characters riding horses across vast landscapes, gunfights and especially the killing of natives. This is no action movie however as the action is all one-sided. The cowboys here are literally committing genocide against defenseless Indians on behalf of their wealthy rancher employer, based on historically real events. It’s brutally blunt both in its messaging and in its imagery but it certainly succeeds in its goal of bringing more attention to an atrocity that most of the world is probably unaware of.
We liked Asura so much we decided to give this earlier series that Hirokazu Kore-eda also made for Netflix a shot and its focus on food would only be a plus for my wife. However it becomes evident quickly that this is not at all in Kore-eda’s usual style. Instead it’s a sweetly wholesome story without an ounce of darkness in it and barely any conflict at all. I suspected that this was adapted from a manga and indeed it was so. It’s prettily made and serves as a neat pocket tour of the customs surrounding the geisha of Kyoto but it’s too superficial to engage with seriously.
Jia Zhangke’s work hasn’t felt relevant for some time and a new film that recycles footage from his previous work seems even more dubious. This is something Jia can accomplish only because his wife Zhao Tao appears in all of his films so he can edit the old footage into a new story. Yet it surprisingly does work. I don’t care at all for the main story about the couple, but what entranced me is that it’s really also the story of the vast changes China has gone through over the past two decades or so. Returning to the city of Datong in Shanxi province which is Jia’s own hometown in the final sequence is a more powerful statement than what happens to the characters.
As many have observed, it is immediately obvious that this film was inspired by the work of Terence Malick. The quiet, still shots, the way it highlights the majesty of the nature, even its understated story about the life of an ordinary man are all reminiscent of the grandmaster. That’s admirable and this is fine work. Even so, it never manages to reach the sublime heights that Malick achieved at his best. The dialogue is flat at times and the third-person narration does too much work instead of trusting in the power of images alone to convey what is needed. This appears to only be director Clint Bentley’s second feature film so he’s someone worth watching out for.
