Obscure movies

[y66]

Taipei Story by Edward Yang.

 

In an intro on the Criterion Channel, Martin Scorsese says "his pictures were like nothing I'd ever seen before and they represented a truly unique approach to film making. This is one of those great moments that come along every so often in the cinema when people band together, pick up cameras and find new ways of telling stories about the world around them and how they see it and express it."

 

In a discussion by filmmakers Hou Hsiao-hsien, who plays the main character, and Edmond Wong, Hou says that when Yang came back to Taiwan after studying and working in the U.S. "he saw the meaning in everything and had a penetrating vision of the meaning behind the city of Taipei. .. Before that, we saw movies as extensions of the theater. Emotional relationships, falling in love. We made purely commercial films. It was all about box office. It was never a penetrating look at something like Taipei laid out before our eyes. Taipei was changing completely. That's why it's called Taipei Story. There were all these different people living there with different backgrounds and other cultural influences like Japan and the Japanese language. He saw all that."

 

Edit: Also watched (over 2 days) A Brighter Summer Day by Yang. Film buffs with 6 hours to spare will enjoy both movies.

[y66]

We watched a couple of movies directed by Susanne Bier: Open Hearts (2002) and After the Wedding (2006) both starring Mads Mikkelsen. Both movies felt somewhat contrived but we enjoyed them anyway. All of the performances in Open Hearts and Mickkelsen's performances in both films were quite good. In Danish with subtitles.

 

Roger Ebert believed movies are like a machine that generates empathy by helping us see things from other points of view. If this was Bier's goal in Open Hearts, I would say she nailed it.

[helene_t]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Keeper_(2018_film)

 

The Keeper is the true story about a German prisoner of war who married an English woman and became a professional football player. A very beautiful film, and very close to the true story.

[shyams]

Clouds of Sils Maria. Saw it on TV while on vacation earlier this month.

 

Wikipedia says "the screenplay was written with Binoche in mind and incorporates elements from her life into the plot" but in my opinion it was Kristen Stewart who outshone her illustrious colleague.

[helene_t]

It is Latin American Film Festival in New Zealand at the moment.

 

Friday we saw a brilliant Brazilian film, "A little secret". It starts with two parallel, somewhat dull stories: One about a young Brazilian woman who falls in love with a traveler from New Zealand. And one about a Brazilian puberty girl who has some health problem and is insecure because of her small breasts. One wonders what the two stories have to do with each other, and why someone bothered to make a film about them. Then the plot thickens .....

 

It's a true story, by the way.

[Zelandakh]

Friday we saw a brilliant Brazilian film, "A little secret".

This is the imdb link if anyone is interested and has problems finding it from Helene's description.

[FelicityR]

It's not that obscure, but my husband has it in his top 5 war films: Das Boot (1981) We watched it recently.

 

Apparently there's a TV remake on Amazon Prime Video, but the original 1981 version without any computer enhancement or graphics scores a highly-respectable 8.3 stars on the IMDB.

 

I thoroughly enjoyed it even though it's 'a man's movie'. There's a startling fact at the end of the movie, that I won't divulge now. Just to say it proves how utterly destructive and nihilistic war is.

 

Here's a review from the IMDB. It's my view, too.

 

War movies have been biases to one side or the other. This movie does not make heroes or enemies of the German U-boat sailors. Instead, it grips the viewer with realistic depictions of what it was like to be a U-boat sailor for the Germans in WWII. It starts off with young (17 year old to 25 year old) men who have been filled with propaganda about the war effort and glorious battle. After this young crew of immature sailors start to experience the true horrors of war, you can not only see, but experience with them the boredom, laughter, camaraderie, team work and death. In a world where you have no windows, where your ears have to be your eyes, where a cat and mouse game is played and the loser dies, these young men age 10 to 15 years. It makes the viewer realize the horror of submarine warfare in WWII. The most realistic war movie I have ever seen.

[y66]

The Salesman (2016) directed by Asghar Farhadi. My wife and I both enjoyed it. In Persian with English subtitles.

[FelicityR]

Another 'war' - this time a low-budget - movie based on a true story that I watched with my husband about six months and left a lasting impression is Kajaki (2014). I'm not a great fan of modern war films as many are so overzealous and filled with characters you don't empathise with, but this was different.

 

Here is a review from the IMDB that sums up the movie perfectly:-

 

You will cringe, laugh, cry and hold your breath in shocked disbelief and utter horror: one of the most intense and most touching war films I have ever seen.

 

There's only a handful of so called "war films" I consider to be films about the actual reality of war. HBO's mini-series 'Generation Kill' is probably the most realistic when it comes to the depiction of modern warfare - but 'Kajaki' (also known as 'Kilo Two Bravo') gives it a run for its money: this criminally under-seen masterpiece should be considered a modern classic. The production values are fantastic; the cinematography, the script and the direction are absolutely flawless - but you won't notice them. What you will notice is the outstanding ensemble of actors, portraying characters in a way you forget you're watching a movie. They will make you cringe, laugh, cry and hold your breath in shocked disbelief and utter horror.

 

This film had me literally on the edge of my seat the entire time, but what really grabs you by the gut is not just the suspense and the horror; it's the relationships between these soldiers and how they look out for each other. How close men become when their lives depend on each other has probably rarely been depicted on screen with the intensity and no-bullshît, keep-it-real attitude as is the case here. And knowing that what you're seeing actually happened only adds to the experience (for this film IS an experience). Definitely not the kind of war film that you come across very often. Superb. 9 stars out of 10.

[y66]

We watched Das Boot last night. That was so good, especially the character of the captain, the performance by Jürgen Prochnow and the mixture of human decency, pride in German competence and contempt for Nazi arrogance and the insanity of war.

[barmar]

We watched Das Boot last night.

It was a critical and commercial success, received a number of Oscar nominations and won a number of other awards, and is considered one of the greatest German films in history. If it's obscure, it's only because it has been nearly 4 decades since it came out, it's not any kind of "cult classic".

[y66]

In the Fade by Fatih Akin starring Diane Kruger in a performance that won best actress at Cannes in 2017. This is not Akin's best movie but it is topical and Kruger is mesmerizing. The scenes in which Kruger's character is second guessed by her mother and her in-laws were interesting. Perhaps Akin will explore that dimension of otherness in a future film.

[y66]

"Reprise" by Joachim Trier. A young, talented director and writer -- Trier -- makes a movie about two young men who are close friends and aspiring writers trying to find their way in the world without becoming cliches of young aspiring writers and without killing their charming, boyish affection for each other which is convincing and endearing to the end.