I almost never cover any Malaysian films here and that is because even the best of them are rather mediocre by international standards. Still, my wife wanted to watch this while it was showing in local cinemas as a small show of support. Tan Chui Mui is one of the most internationally prominent Malaysian directors these days, and she even wrote and stars in it herself. For my part, this definitely counts as an eccentric arthouse film and I’m fairly confident that I understand what the director was going for. Yet I do not like it at all and consider it a personal vanity project that was never intended to have wide appeal.

This Coen brothers film opens with a prologue set in the 19th century about a Jewish couple in Eastern Europe. It seemingly has nothing to do with the rest of the film. The brothers wanted something that felt like a traditional Yiddish folklore and not knowing of anything suitable, seems to have wrote one themselves. The audience is left confused as to what it means and this may well be the point as the film is about the protagonist experiencing a series of setbacks in his life and being unable to make any sense of it. This film draws heavily from Jewish culture and as such parts of it are inaccessible to me. I enjoyed its bleak humor and admire how this seems to be very much a personal project of the brother, being directly inspired by their own familial backgrounds, but this won’t be one of my favorites.

This is Maggie Gyllenhaal’s debut feature film as a director and it’s a very strong entry. She doesn’t appear in it herself but there is plenty of other female star power in this woman-centric film. I’m not a fan of its central plot device since it’s transparently there just so that the main character has something that she can be involved in. But I do love it as an exploration of some of less discussed aspects of of motherhood including the sensation of it being a prison.

After watching and liking Our Time so much, I said I’d have to look into director Carlos Reygadas’ older films and so we start with this, his very first feature film. I have no idea why it’s called Japón even after finishing it and in general I found this harder to parse than Our Time. On reflection, in addition to the obvious subject of suicide, I believe that the main point is the Christian motif of turning the other cheek to the point of self-sacrifice. I can’t say that I liked this as much but I can appreciate its visceral power which even the crudeness of its production values helps enhance.

You might think that a traditional Western played completely straight may not make for a very interesting film but it is! The plot is entirely conventional and ultimately predictable though the film keeps things interesting by having all of the characters be cautious about revealing their true motivations. Yet what really impresses me is how understated the action is, placing dramatic weight instead on the clash of personalities and integrity of the characters. This doesn’t seem to be a particularly well-known film and I don’t remember how it even got added to my list but it really is a film that deserves greater acknowledgement.

This Hong Kong film is partially based on a true event involving government workers clearing the shacks of homeless people in Sham Shui Po. For a while I was inclined to dislike it as it seemed like an overly sentimental take on a complex issue, falling into the trap of the recent spate of Hong Kong films that are well-intentioned but simplistic. Then I realized that the opinions of its main character might not be the film’s own opinion and indeed some of the other homeless people call him out for his stubbornness. Perhaps director Jun Li might personally be more sympathetic to those views than I’d like but at least he proves that he has thought through it carefully and that makes me feel a lot better about this film.

I was a little hesitant to watch this because on the surface it feels like it’s just another mountaineering documentary so why watch more of the same. What makes this particular project interesting to me is that it was conceived and led by a Nepali Nirmal Purja with a team of fellow Nepali climbers. As such it’s a deliberate attempt to move away from the old tradition of Westerners leading mountain expeditions and the Nepali sherpas being credited only as assistants. I also appreciated that this film, unlike so many others, actually goes into the difficulty of raising money in the pursuit of such an insane dream, on top of the physical and mental challenges of the climbing itself.