What's my list, you ask? Here it is:
Stalker
Le Samourai
Bliss
Heart of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse
Saving Private Ryan
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Through a Glass Darkly
Persona
Three Colors: Blue
Three Colors: White
Three Colors: Red
Wings of Desire
Safe
Werckmeister Harmonies
Millenium Actress
The Player
Human Nature
Bulitt
Brazil
Breathless
Stranger than Paradise
Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!
Solaris (1972)
Farenheit 9/11
The Magdalene Sisters
Fat Girl
Being There
Mind Game
A Simple Plan
2001: A Space Oddessy
Amadeus
Hard Eight
Naked Lunch
Lost Highway
He Who Gets Slapped
Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
Pierrot le Fou
5 Centimeters per Second
The Girl Who Lept Through Time
5 Easy Pieces
Wild Strawberries
Amelie
Cries and Whispers
Ikiru
City of God (rewatch)
Raise the Red Lantern
Crimson Gold
Benny's Video
The Cremator
The Exterminating Angel
The Idiots
Crimes and Misdemeanors
Black Moon
Berbarian Sound Studio
Black Pond
What's Up Tiger Lily?
Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Sex (But
Were Too Afraid to Ask)
The Spirit of the Beehive
The Double Life of Veronique
The Quiet Family
The Holy Mountain
MASH
Tokyo Story
The Rules of the Game
The Adventures of Baron Munchausen
Funky Forest: The First Contact
Daisies
Come and See
Little Otik
That Obsure Object of Desire
Collateral
Chungking Express
Taxi to the Dark Side
Twist of Faith
Pixote
Stroszek
Arrietty
Taste of Cherry
Delicatessen
Mouchette
Kwaidan
In the House
The Element of Crime
Walkabout
La Haine
Bad Day at Black Rock
The Third Man
The Illusionist
Playtime
The Lives of Others
Capturing the Friedmans
Populaire
Vivre sa vie
Pauline at the Beach
L'avventura
The Virgin Spring
Women On the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
A Sunday in Hell
The Passion of Anna
Shoeshine
The Garden of the Finzi Continis
Repulsion
White Dog
My Sassy Girl
Days of Wine and Roses
Pather Panchali
Taxidermia
Hamlet
Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter...and Spring...
2046
Fantastic Planet
Eyes Without a Face
Onibaba
The Face of Another
The Hourglass Sanitorium
Possession
Sweet Movie
House
Valerie and Her Week of Wonders
El Topo
Election
Shaitan
Goodbye Lenin
That Girl In the Yellow Boots
The Andromeda Strain (netflix)
Forbidden Planet
Seconds
Soylent Green
Shark Skin Man and Peach Hip Girl
Babel
Welcome Back Mr. Mcdonald
We Are What We Are
Jean de Florette & Manon des Sources
The Station Agent
The Snowball Effect
Day for Night
The Stepford Wives
Heavenly Creatures
The Limey
Cure
Les Diaboliques
Cat People
Deep Red
La Ronde
The Earrings of Madame de...
Le Plaisir
The Conqueror
The Lost Weekend
Schlock
It's my insanely long list of movies that I want to
see. Some of them are pretty obscure and some of them are so well known that
it's surprising that I haven't seen them when I claim to be such a devoted film
lover. I saw Saving Private Ryan (1998) for the first time less than a month
ago. The only Karate Kid movie I ever saw all the way through was The Next
Karate Kid (1994). It's the least successful and most critically panned of the
series, but it did provide the breakout role for Hilary Swank. Incidentally,
this movie is what put me in the "hot" camp of the eternal debate
over whether Hillary Swank is hot or not.
 |
| I had trouble finding a flattering picture, I must admit |
But I digress...
I finally got around to seeing a movie that's been
sitting on my list for a while, which is the fairly recent Belgian drama,
Bullhead by Michaël R. Roskam.
More On the Director
Roskam is pretty much brand new. There's not a lot
to say about him because this is his only feature film to be released so far.
He's got a new movie, Animal Rescue, coming up, and interestingly, it is the
late James Gandolfini's last screen appearance. So far he's been working in the
crime drama genre, but that is no trifling statement. From the looks of
Bullhead, he's got a lot of talent and insight. It was
nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Picture, but lost to the
Iranian film, A Separation (2011).
Uhhhh...yeah. That's pretty much all there is too
say. There isn't a whole lot of background on this movie or the director, which
is a shame because the movie was pretty good. Prett-ay, prett-ay,
prett-ay...pretty good.
The Movie
I only really had one major problem with the movie,
so I'll just get it out of the way now. The major flaw of the movie, for me, is
that it was way too dark. I don't mean mature and solemn themes, dark. I mean
like I couldn't see anything. Maybe it was my TV, maybe Netflix was having a
problem, but it appeared, or rather didn't appear (ha), that nearly 80% of the
movie was underexposed.
 |
| What am I looking at? |
I feel like a really old man even complaining about it.
It's a little baffling because it's a € 2 million film done by a professional
director and screenwriter. It has a major star (for Belgium) and there's
nothing amateur about it. I mean, I get why they wanted a darker aesthetic, it
just didn't need to be so dark that you couldn't see anything. I spent most of
the movie looking like Jaden Smith.
Some more minor complaints were that sometimes the
film got needlessly technical and complex in the story. They included a few
subplots and dialogue heavy scenes that were hard to follow. The movie overall
wasn't confusing, though.
A third thing I should mention is that the movie had a
very de-saturated aesthetic when it came to color, and it's something I notice
a lot in European films. I put this last because I'm not sure that it's a
complaint. I should point out that the
entire film isn't like this, just most of it. I find it really
interesting. We have that kind of look in films in the US, too, but not as
often. It's pretty big in movies like Road to Perdition (2002) or No Country
for Old Men (2007). It's just an interesting pattern I've picked up on, but I
might just be making that up in my head.
 |
| An example of the low-intensity color pallet |
The film revolves around several characters but one
character in particular, Jacky Vanmarsenille, is in the middle of it all. What
drives the story is this deal he gets into with the Belgian mob to sell illegal
cow hormones and the consequences that arise from that. What the film is really
about, though, is Jackie as a character.
Jacky is one of the most irredeemably sad and broken characters ever written.
He reminded me of Dawn Wiener from one of my favorite movies, Welcome to the
Dollhouse (1995). The two have nothing in common, of course, but what links the two in
my head is how completely terrible their lives are and how little hope we as an
audience have for them.
 |
| Quick shout out to Todd Solondz, one of my favorite filmmakers |
Due to a childhood tragedy (which is shown through a
series of flashbacks, and contains one of the most disturbing scenes I've seen
in a long time), he has become mentally scarred and fallen into a debilitating
addiction to steroids and hormones. He has huge muscles, a caveman like walk,
and stone face. Behind it all is an incredibly insecure and shameful man. To
give credit where credit is due, Matthias Schoenaerts does an incredible job of
maintaining a character that is constantly aggressive, abusive, and
reactionary, but still remains sympathetic because he is so insecure and
traumatized from the abuse he suffered as a child.
The movie does a really great job at showing the far
reaching consequences of abuse and child trauma as well as the things we don't
see behind people. Jacky is essentially a completely unlikeable character, but
because of how he is written, performed, and conceived he becomes tragic. His
aggression and hot temper is the result of his suffering as a child that still
plagues him in the present. Needless to say, things don't turn out great for
him.
The movie is valuable because of the way it presents
its themes and the struggles of its characters. Technically, it's very well
made, aside from the complaint I had earlier. The story and structure is good
enough, but I wouldn't expect everyone to agree with me on that. Jackie's
backstory is introduced a little late in the film, so his actions start out as
very hard to understand. This didn't really bother me too much, but I can see
it bothering others.
Now that I've watched it, though, I'm curious what
the Academy Award competition had over it. Looks like I've got more movies to
add to my list.
Movies I Also Saw This Week
Lincoln (2012)*, Movie 43**
*My second time watching. I think I liked it better
the first time. Daniel Day-Lewis really holds it together. Otherwise it's a
little schmaltzy. Still good, though. I like the scenes with James Spader.
**I finished it. That's all I have to say about that
No comments:
Post a Comment