Film Impressions

REVIEW: The Artist

VINTAGE STUFF

The greatest triumph of Michel Hazanavicius' The Artist is its ability to recreate a lost era with astonishing authenticity and equally, to make a thoroughly engaging silent film in the time of blockbusters with light and sound explosions galore. But is The Artist the best film of 2011? Not by a long shot. Simply because, while it may seem like a novelty to make a nearly soundless (there's plenty of background music, only no spoken dialogue, or almost none) black & white film in the 21st century, the story itself is as dog-eared as they come. 

REVIEW: Carnage

IT CUTS LIKE A KNIFE

Roman Polanski's Carnage, based on Yasmina Reza's play God of Carnage (she co-wrote the screenplay with the director), comes with the tagline, 'a comedy of no manners'. That's an apt description for a claustrophobic film about 'civilized' adults that's just 80 minutes long and entirely set in an upper class Brooklyn apartment complete with yellow tulips that come all the way from Holland, African artefacts and 18-year-old single malt whisky. The occasion isn't celebratory, though at least in the initial minutes some of the characters behave like they were in fact meeting socially and amicably over coffee and apple-pear cobbler.

REVIEW: The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

BRUTAL BLOOD FEST

Did you know that the literal translation of the title of Stieg Larsson's bestselling Swedish novel is in fact 'Men Who Hate Women' and not the soberer, inoffensive The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo? Now imagine a worldwide bestseller with that name getting made into an A-list Hollywood film. I haven't read the book or watched the Swedish film based on it. But David Fincher is a past master at suspense thrillers about unsolved murders—Seven and Zodiac being his former achievements in the same genre.

And he has a way with character building—rarely done better than Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara) the angry young woman of this film, who looks like a punk (tattooed, pierced, sporting tight black leather pants and driving a motorbike like a bullet flying through the air) but has nerves of steel and ample angst to wreak havoc on anyone who so much as touches her. You notice this edginess in her utter discomfort with social graces or even an innocuous brush of hand. She's obviously had a violent past and suffered enough abuse to hate all of mankind, but particularly those who unleash their perversity on women. In many of her scenes in the first half, you notice harsh mechanical sounds in the background, such as droning vacuum cleaners, suggestive of her battered soul.

REVIEW: The Woman In Black

POTTER GROWS UP
 
Now that the Harry Potter series is over (unless prequels turn up), Daniel Radcliffe fans would obviously be interested in seeing what the actor would do next. Can he be accepted as just a normal character in a true-to-life film? 

REVIEW: Safe House

NOT A NICE PLACE TO BE IN

Thanks to the success of the Bourne series, Hollywood has produced a slew of films in recent years about former spies hunted down by their own organisations involving high-speed action in multiple countries shot with busy hand-held cameras, indiscriminate destruction of property and senseless loss of lives. This branch of the action movie genre needs to shut shop immediately, for it really isn't a thrilling ride anymore.

Even the ever-dependable Denzel Washington can't salvage Safe House from imminent doom. He's Tobin Frost, a rogue ex-CIA operative who's been missing for several years and suddenly lands up in South Africa trading some very important secrets with a MI6 agent. Sure enough, the minute he finishes the meeting, the carnage begins with half-a-dozen mean men with machine guns chasing him all over the place. He surrenders himself at the US embassy and is led to a safe house where young agent Matt Weston (Ryan Reynolds) is supposed to watch over him till further orders.

REVIEW: A Separation

A MARVELLOUS CINEMATIC ACHIEVEMENT

The opening sequence of Asghar Farhadi's A Separation reminds you so much of the first scene from Ingmar Bergman's Scenes From A Marriage. A couple is sitting before the camera answering questions posed by an unseen man, but basically talking to the audience. They're in a bare courtroom (unlike in Bergman's film where the couple is giving an interview to a tv channel in their plush drawing room), the judge pointedly asking the woman, Simin (the riveting Leila Hatami) why she wants to leave her husband Nader (Peyman Maadi).

She says she doesn't, but wants him to leave Iran with her and their teenage daughter in the interest of their child's upbringing. To which the judge asks her whether she believes the child won't get a good upbringing in Iran. Simin's fleeting expression of exasperation is a rare overt political moment in a film that gently explores so many different facets of life to illustrate how individuals and relationships are interrupted and disrupted by the forces of law, religion and patriarchy.

DVD REVIEW: Leila (1998)

THE WEIGHT OF TRADITION 

While teaching film appreciation at Mumbai University, I was introduced to a marvellous Iranian film called Leila by our visiting faculty, Mr. Ajit Duara. Directed by Dariush Mehrjui, it’s one of the most ‘modern’ films I’ve seen, not just for its thinly veiled critique of a traditional society that embraces the latest technological developments from the West, but shuns liberal thought, stifles individuals and drives a wedge into the healthiest of relationships; it also makes for an interesting study in creating a masterful cinematic work, within the limits of a restrictive environment. This is a unique facet of Iranian art-house cinema in general, apart from economy of expression, dogged unsentimentality and awe-inspiring acting. 

REVIEW: The Iron Lady

A TOOTHLESS BIOPIC

Meryl Streep's Margaret Thatcher is a frontrunner for the Best Actress trophy at this year's Oscar ceremony, having already picked up the Golden Globe and the BAFTA. And there's no dispute about Ms. Streep's prep work on playing yet another formidable character, complete with prosthetic make-up, body language and astonishing voice modulation. She's unsurpassed in her craft and the awards are validation of her enormous talent. But for once, this giant among artists fails to convey persuasively enough the individual behind the personality with all her triumphs and failings in equal measure.

REVIEW: War Horse

AT A GALLOP

Coming from another director, War Horse (six Oscar nominations) would have been a remarkable achievement.  But Steven Spielberg has been a trend-setter and cinematic visionary for so long, that a simple, over sentimental tale about a boy and a horse seems like something best left to a novice.  From the master one expects complex ideas and genre-breaking technique. (Every critic has noticed the similarity to the films of John Ford.)

REVIEW: Haywire (2)

DON'T MESS WITH HER

It’s good to know that Angelina Jolie (Lara Croft, Salt) and Uma Thurman (Kill Bill) are not the only actresses doing action parts. When once Modesty Blaise and Charlie’s Angels were more like curiosities, this is the age of the kickass heroine Lisbeth Salander (the Dragon Tattoo girl).  It makes business sense too to have more women out there, kicking, stomping, shooting, so directors are not averse to having women at the centre of the action.