Category: Threes

Fluid Abstraction You may find this hard to see. It is a Japanese “new wave”, film. It has a story of course, but such things are largely irrelevant. I’ll give it because you may not see it. (In my comments, I assume most folks have seen the film.) A young man was abandoned as a… Continue reading Inferno of First Love (1968)

In There Jane Campion has a tenderness that is so attractive that if it did not come with warnings, I would build a romantic dreamworld around it. Because that is what we do with deep soft urges. Her films seem always to be about the edges, the danger, the costs. But they are motivated by… Continue reading In the Cut (2003)

Spatial War, Redhead Landscapes, Image and Word Woven Together Apart Australia is vital to my life in film. From an American perspective, New Zealand is normally clumped in there as well — something that annoys Kiwis to no end. At least in terms of film, they differ: more direct, honest, intimate. Unfortunately, you pretty much… Continue reading In My Father’s Den (2004)

Fluid, Woven Passion Sometimes you just like a movie. I admit I was prepared to like this. It features Chopin, and he is a large part of my musical world. His stuff really is magical, but only when flowing through a rich vessel. The things he wrote when he was with Sands are a touchstone… Continue reading Impromptu (1991)

Holy Most of the films in this collection are simply silly. One is at least artistic in the old, wan sense of visual oddity. There is one interesting one, though. Larry Clark’s “Impaled”. It is rather clever: young men seeking to get into the “business” are interviewed. All of them are sad losers and that… Continue reading Destricted (2006)

Damaged Film, Damaged Viewers Movies touch life in fewer and more unexpected places than you think. Most movies are about other movies or society’s dreams rather than the real world. So films that reference major historical events are interesting beasts. Possibly apart from Vietnam, no war-related event has been more trammelled by films than the… Continue reading Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS (1975)

10 Conversations about One Thing About half of all films today are of the type that directly tinker with the narrative in some way. Usually the game is intended to play with the role of the viewer, tricking him into being a co-creator of the story. Sometimes it is simpler, where the writer takes the… Continue reading Identity (2003)

Step by Step Watching Jackie movies is sometimes a real challenge, especially the English language ones. This barely qualifies as English, but is the best one. What he does with ordinary objects is absolutely amazing. There’s a classic ladder bit here. Ignore the plot — standard filler. Ted’s Evaluation — 3 of 3: Worth watching.… Continue reading First Strike (1996)

Conspiracy of the Simple I have my own theory about film. There is always an explicit acknowledgement that what you are seeing is a film, distinct from reality. Many films incorporate that recognition into their being; the simple ones are just films about films and filmmaking, but there are other sophisticated ways of self-reference. It… Continue reading JFK (1991)