This remarkable film was originally made for television and essentially dramatizes the only surviving transcript of the 1942 Wannsee Conference. This was of course the famous conference in which Nazi officials settled on the implementation of the so-called final solution to the Jewish question. This film reenacts the meeting in almost real time, down to the smallest detail. You might think that a film that consists only of discussions in a meeting to be dreadfully boring, but it is amazing how much psychological depth can be discerned in here and the total commitment that the Nazi had to eradicating Jews never ceases to shock.
By its very premise, this at first seems to be the latest entry in the genre about artists who physically and mentally sacrifice for their art. Fortunately this film actually outgrows the initial premise and is a much better film for it. I was also very pleased to note that its very nuanced portrayal of the deaf community in that I don’t think it always shows them in the best light. I don’t think the heavy metal community is happy about the film however and in truth despite the title this has nothing to do with heavy metal at all.
I like to think that at this point I’m pretty on top of who’s good in cinema but I still keep getting caught by surprise. This film by Mexican director Carlos Reygadas is so superlatively good that I am aghast I have never watched any of his films before this. At three hours in length, this is a daunting film to take on but watching it is such a powerful sensory experience that I can’t help but wonder what it would be to like to see in a cinema hall. I do suspect that if I had followed the director’s career before this I may be less impressed as this is apparently derivative in some ways of his earlier work. But being hit with a distilled superdose of essentially Reygadas’ favorite themes and settings for the first time has just blown me away.
Most of the short, independent horror films we take a chance on turn out not so well but occasionally we do get something like this which makes it all worthwhile. This is the feature debut of its director Rose Glass and it works both as a horror film and as an aperçu into the mind of someone suffering from an all encompassing delusion. While there are plenty of seemingly supernatural phenomena, this film is unambiguous in showing that it is all in the mind of the main character but that actually adds to the horror.
This is a thriller that is highly regarded by some, but I really don’t know what to make of it. On the one hand, it’s such an 80s film, with its synth music, fashion styles, lazy tropes and all, that it’s hard to take seriously. Yet it takes such a cynical view of the police to the extent that I don’t think we’re supposed to be sympathetic to the main characters at all. Plus the plot takes some odd, unexpected tangents here and there. On balance I have to say that I was disappointed, as this was made by William Friedkin who established his reputation with The French Connection.
This is the first time we’ve watched a film by director Kaneto Shindo though if the quality of this one is any indication we should have done so much sooner. It seems that the director specifically wanted to make this as a film with no dialogue at all and indeed there isn’t any. The only spoken words in the film are songs and chants yet there is no difficulty in understanding this simple but emotionally resonant piece.
There are an awful lot of documentaries about photographers but I believe that this one, even though it is supposedly about Pete Souza, really has Barack Obama and his presidency at its center. As Obama’s official White House photographer for both of his terms, Souza was basically present at every key moment. Yet after the end of Obama’s presidency, Souza was so angered by what he saw Trump doing that he used those photographs to essentially troll Trump and thereby became a celebrity in his own right. There are some bits about Souza himself in it but mainly this is about reminding everyone of the essential humanity and empathy that should be in the office of the US president but is wholly absent from Trump’s White House.
