Log: week 15 / 2024
A stage play put to film. Now, I'm a sucker for soundtracks and sound design, but when they first put sound on film, it resulted in a major setback. Rather than focus on the cinematic elements, films were dragged down by an endless barrage of boring conversations. Point in case: Dinner at Eight. It's a standard farce, the kind of play where everything happens in one or two rooms and various characters keep entering through doors. The conversations are boring, the performances are middling and the runtime is excessive. This is the exact opposite of what I want to see in a film, the only thing saving it from utter direness is the light tone.Read all
A dreamy drama with a solid underlying romance. The cinematography is lush, the score is pitch-perfect and the lead performances are strong. Add to that a lovely setting, an economic runtime, and a moving finale and you have a prime Japanese drama. The romance is on point too, but not quite as accessible, and hardened romantics may have some trouble with the outcome here. But this is exactly the kind of drama I love to see coming out of Japan, I clearly need to see more of Agashi's work because her direction elevates this film well beyond the usual fodder.
I've long since lost track of how the Marvel films are connected, so I'm not sure if this is a sequel to Captain Marvel or just some stand-alone thing, but after pandering to the black and Asian communities in the US, this is Marvel's attempt to reign in the Indian fans. You'll have to ask them whether it was successful. Who says India says Bollywood, and yes, there is a song and dance scene here. Yay for that. The plot is bland, the performances are pretty bad, and having another kid in the lead didn't improve things. The only good thing about The Marvels is that is clocked in well under two hours, making it a little less painful than some of Marvel's other stinkers.Read all
A solid Medem, but not quite as lovely as I remembered it to be. I was somewhat hopeful after a positive revisit of The Lovers of the Arctic Circle, but Sex and Lucia has a stronger focus on narrative, and that's not really what I'm looking for. That's not to say Medem didn't pay any attention to the styling, it's just not quite as gripping. The performances are strong and the setup of the story is pretty interesting, but it's not enough to fill the 127-minute runtime. It somewhat lost me in the middle part and while the finale was good, it wasn't so good it could make me forget the small lull before. A fine film for sure, but it lacks that little extra.Read all
Italian neorealism, but make it jolly. It's a strange combination, but one that isn't quite as bad as I'd feared originally. I'm still not won over by this niche, but at least Miracle in Milan isn't as dreary as many of its peers. Apart from that, there still wasn't much here for me I'm afraid. The minimal dialogue is a plus, the continuous presence of music not so much. The performances are overstated and the plot wasn't all that interesting, the cinematography was slightly better than usual, but not good enough to wow me. So yeah, this was an interesting experiment from De Sica, but the result isn't all that impressive.Read all
A very cool discovery. I really loved Kensaku Watanabe's Loved Gun but never got around to watching any of his other films (not that they're widely/easily available or anything). After watching The Story of Pupu, I think I need to make a bigger effort, because this film is quite something else. The plot and characters are pretty nonsensical, so it's probably no surprise Watanabe was able to cast Seijun Suzuki for a smaller part (he also returned the favor with Pistol Opera). The characters are fun and anarchistic, the styling is pleasant and the plot is hilarious. It's a joyous, short, and wacky little film, the kind you'll only find in Japan.Read all
A stylish film, but not quite as good as I remembered it to be. At times, this felt like a poor man's Kar-Wai Wong: all the elements were there, but the passion was lacking. That's not to say Everlasting Regret is fundamentally flawed, it just lacks that extra layer of polish that makes a film stand out from the crowd. It's a solid enough premise, but the direction needed to be a bit more refined. The moody cinematography and oldskool music are nice, but can't compete with the better films in the genre. Neither can Tony Leung and Sammi Cheng, despite their efforts. It's a pleasant film, worth a try if you haven't seen it yet, but it's not good enough to be a personal favorite.Read all
Tricky. I haven't seen the original Japanese series yet, but I figured I might go with this one first. Shogun Assassin is an edit of the first two Lone Wolf films, apparently botching up Japanese films is something Americans used to adore. There are some interesting scenes here, but I'm pretty certain I'm going to like the original films a lot better. There are some nicely stylized action scenes, but they're ruined by terrible dubbing and some nonsensical editing. The story is quite fragmented as if you're watching a compilation video rather than an actual film. Maybe seeing the original films will change my mind about this "experiment", but for now, I'm not impressed with Houston's work.Read all
Not your typical biography, but what did you expect with Dai Yilin in the director's chair? This is another one of his budget fantasy spectacles. Short, fast-paced, loaded with lore, and heavily reliant on functional CG. It's a good thing then that the art direction in his films is always well above average. I'm not sure I've seen anything from the Meng Po story before, but the more you watch them, the more you'll find that these stories are all very much alike (it's not that much different from Greek mythology either). It's a good thing then that the focus lies on flashy, fast-paced action scenes, not so much on the plot and characters. I had good fun, but that's because I love this kind of thing.Read all
Another generic Western, one that isn't even all that liked by core Western fans. But it did gather some critical acclaim and it appears that that is something pretty tough to get rid of. And so here we are, almost 80 years after its original release. The only conclusion I have is that films like this aren't going to make me like the genre any better. The performances are terrible, the dialogues are so bad they're almost funny (and that's coming from someone who rarely cares about dialogues. The setting isn't for me either, and the runtime is excessive. There's really nothing at all I liked, apart from the fact that I was able to skip the overture.Read all
Not a bad film, but it lacked focus. We get four characters, each with their little tragic background story, who come together and cross each other's paths. It's not the most original setup, but when done well it usually makes for good cinema. That's sadly not the case with Upperdog. The performances are decent, but the presentation is rather dim and there's no real urgency. The stories start to meander and even though I didn't mind the open ending, I don't think it added anything of value either. The film is relatively short and the drama is decent, but there's too little to set it apart.Read all
Middle-Eastern cinema seems to like mixing drama and documentaries. Chronicle of a Disappearance is a film by Elia Suleiman, a director who spent a long time in the USA but returned to Israel and Palestine to see how the identity of the Arab people in Israel was slowly eroding. In the end, I didn't get a whole lot from this film. I'm not particularly interested in the Middle-Eastern region, and save some funny moments (like the tourist taking a pic of the two guys in front of their store) many of the scenes and sketches fell flat. Not to say it's a bad film, it's just not for me.Read all
A basic romcom. They made no effort whatsoever to set this film apart from its peers. They merely slapped two familiar (and popular) faces on the lead roles, dumped them on the poster, and called it a day. And guess what, it worked. If you ever wonder why some cinema is so lazy, it is because stuff like this sells tickets. So yeah, two people, who clearly belong together, and you're just watching the push and pull until the film finally settles down into a predictable finale. The comedy is pretty bland, and the chemistry between the leads is minimal, but the setting is pleasant enough and the pacing is decent. Far from best in class, but not the worst of its kind either.Read all