Only Son, The (1936)

THE SCOOP
Director: Yasujiro Ozu
Cast:  Chôko Iida, Shin'ichi Himori, Masao Hayama, Yoshiko Tsubouchi, & Chishû Ryû
Plot: In 1923, in the province of Shinshu, the widow and simple worker of a silk factory Tsune Nonomiya decides to send her only son to Tokyo to get a better education. Thirteen years later, she visits her son Ryosuke Nonomiya, and finds that he is a poor and frustrated night-school teacher with a wife, Sugiko, and a baby boy.


Genre: Drama
Awards: -
Runtime: 87min
Rating: PG






IN RETROSPECT
Like Charles Chaplin, who only embraced the "talkie" years after they had become the norm, legendary Japanese director and world cinema's foremost humanist filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu was also late to the game. Made four years before Chaplin's first "talkie", The Great Dictator (1940), Ozu's The Only Son is not so much an early masterpiece, but a firm indicator of better things to come yet for the director. Still, there are moments of exquisite beauty in the film that only Ozu could have created. Although its restored version is not of the best quality in terms of visuals and sound, The Only Son remains to be a rare treasure for fans of Ozu.

The Only Son centers on the relationship between mother and child, as played by Choko Iida and Masao Hayama respectively. The mother toils endlessly in a factory to save enough money to send her eager kid to a high school in Tokyo. "Be a great man," she tells her kid. The bulk of the film then takes place more than a decade later as the mother travels to Tokyo to visit his grown-up son (now played by Shin'ichi Himori), who works as a poor night school teacher living in a shabby home with his wife and baby. Masking her disappointment at her son's poverty, she spends a couple of days with him and his family.

Ozu takes a bare-boned tale and makes a profound statement on life. Is it better to be rich or to be kind? Is it better to lead a simple life or an extravagant one? The film is a mix of hopefulness and sadness, though it generally has a melancholic feel to it. Like any Ozu film, the performances are superb. The actors do not seem like they are acting, but merely playing themselves as they would if they have been off camera. In one unforgettable scene, the mother talks about her hardship. Her son listens on, seemingly emotionless though deep down he feels immense guilt. Her wife, in a corner behind a wall overhears the conversation and starts to sob uncontrollably.

Such subtlety, such honest emotions. Such is the delicateness of Ozu's humanist vision, even in his first sound film, that his brand of cinema (if it's even called cinema) continues to inspire filmmakers and audiences today. The Only Son has a universal message: To be satisfied with what you have, to care for others, and never to give up in life. Even then, Ozu makes a final comment on Man's fate to struggle in the vicious cycle of being poor (both in wealth, and in terms of one's ability to accept one's state of being) by ending the film with a final shot of a closed gate.

Verdict: The legendary director's first talkie is as much an "Ozu" film as his last.

GRADE: B+ (8/10 or 3.5 stars)

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Melancholia (2011)

THE SCOOP
Director: Lars von Trier
Cast: Kirsten Dunst, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Alexander Skarsgard, Charlotte Rampling, & John Hurt
Plot: Two sisters find their already strained relationship challenged as a mysterious new planet threatens to collide with the Earth.


Genre: Drama/Sci-Fi
Awards: Won Best Actress, and nominated for Palme d'Or (Cannes).
Runtime: 136min
Rating: M18  for some graphic nudity, sexual content and language.


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IN RETROSPECT
Like Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life, Melancholia is a film that reminds us that although we are capable of big ideas, big emotions, and big dreams, our existence in the cosmos amounts to nothing more than nothingness, like a speck of dust on our planet. Of course Malick's film is more hopeful, more philosophical, and more divisive, but Melancholia proves that the genre of science-fiction can mix well with arthouse drama. The result is one of the most unique of cinematic experiences, and one of the medium's most thought-provoking entries in recent years.

The director is but of course Lars von Trier, the Danish auteur whose trigger-happy nature has got himself in trouble many times, yet he continues to make some of European cinema's most provocative and challenging works. Melancholia, which was in competition at Cannes (and going head-on with The Tree of Life in a clash of auteurship), tells a depressing tale of two sisters who are at odds with each other. They then discover that their strained relationship pales in comparison to a cosmic event that will unfold in due time as a mysterious new planet threatens to collide with Earth.

Melancholia is the name of that planet, and it also aptly captures the emotions of lead actress Kirsten Dunst (who won Best Actress at Cannes). It is also a fitting title to von Trier's film, which is as depressing as it gets. Dunst plays Justine, opposite Charlotte Gainsbourg, who plays Claire, her sister. Their performances are superb, though in my opinion Gainsbourg gives a more emotionally affecting display. Broken into two major parts titled 'Justine' and 'Claire', Melancholia starts off with a prologue that is a melding of ultra slow-motion imagery and haunting music 'Tristan und Isolde' by Wagner, and concludes with a final sequence that will floor you to the core.

von Trier's shaky camera and quick-zoom technique to shooting the film can be nauseating at times, especially in the first part 'Justine'. It gets better in 'Claire' though. Even then, the cinematography is beautiful; there are a couple of virtuoso overhead tracking shots of the two sisters riding their horses on a dirt track. The external shots of the huge lawn outside their home also reminds of the large, geometrically-shaped landscape garden in Alain Resnais' Last Year at Marienbad (1961). In Resnais' film, the shot is frozen in time. In von Trier's film, the shot is waiting to freeze in time, as if it is a filmic foreshadowing a half-century in the making.

Melancholia is not for the mainstream crowd, though it can be argued that its sci-fi elements could help pull some in. But if you are bold enough to try, you will be greatly rewarded. It is also an excellent introduction to von Trier for the uninitiated. With a runtime of more than two hours, it requires patience. Melancholia is a powerful Wagnerian opera. It is the mark of an auteur working at the height of his creative powers. For all of his big talk, von Trier understands the human condition. He understands our mortality.

Verdict: A bold work by Lars von Trier that is as much a unique cinematic experience as it is thought-provoking.

GRADE: A (9/10 or 4.5 stars)

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Point Blank (2011)

THE SCOOP
Director: Fred Cavaye
Cast: Gilles Lellouche, Roschdy Zem, & Gerard Lanvin

Plot: Samuel Pierret is a nurse who saves the wrong guy - a thief whose henchmen take Samuel's pregnant wife  hostage to force him to spring their boss from the hospital.

Genre: Action/Crime/Thriller 

Awards: -

Runtime: 84min

Rating: NC16 for strong violence and some language.

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IN RETROSPECT

You know what you get when a film is an action crime-thriller, runs at a tight 84 minutes, and is made by the French. You get excited. And rest assured the filmmakers will keep you in that state for the entire length of their film. Directed by Fred Cavaye, Point Blank is his second feature after his promising debut Anything for Her, also a crime-thriller, in 2008.

There are no known stars to pull the crowds in, but a quick glance at the film's plot outline is likely to hook you: A nurse intervenes to save a patient from suffocating to death after a mystery person tries to kill the latter in the hospital one night, only to find out that his pregnant wife has been kidnapped the next morning. To save his wife, he is forced to get the patient out of the hospital in three hours.

What appears to be a standard case of kidnapping turns out to be far more sinister. Point Blank is as much an action-thriller as it is a critique of corruption at the highest levels of a government entity, in this case, the French police force. This is best shown in the climatic third act, a highly-charged sequence set in a building that houses hundreds of officers.

When a female police officer (under the orders of a corrupted head) is determined to throw a pregnant woman out of a window to kill her, you know you are dealing with some really psychotic people. Evil lurks even in the most safest of places, something Samuel (Gilles Lellouche) the nurse will find out, as he tries to rescue his wife (and unborn child) from very nasty people out to protect their reputation.

Point Blank is edge-of-your-seat stuff. It is violent, gritty, and oozes so much suspense that there are few opportunities to catch your breath. It is a strong genre exercise by Cavaye, whose flair for capturing the immediacy of the film's action will not go unnoticed. More importantly, Cavaye makes us care for the lead protagonist, hence any perceived injustice towards Samuel (and whoever related to him) is likely to make our blood boil.

Watching Point Blank reminds me slightly of The Assault (2011), another French action-thriller, but is based on a true story of an armed Islamic group holding a couple of hundred passengers hostage in a plane on the grounds of Algiers in 1994. Both films are taut, well-paced, and are good examples of what the French could do with the genre.

Verdict: A thriller genre exercise by the French that is tight, taut and riveting. 

GRADE: B+ (8/10 or 3.5 stars)

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Separation, A (2011)

THE SCOOP
Director: Asghar Farhadi
Cast: Peyman Moadi, Leila Hatami, Sareh Bayat, Sarina Farhadi, & Kimia Hosseini
Plot: A married couple are faced with a difficult decision - to improve the life of their child by moving to another country or to stay in Iran and look after a deteriorating parent who has Alzheimer's disease.


Genre: Drama/Mystery
Awards: Won Golden Bear, Best Actor, Best Actress (Berlin). Won 1 Oscar - Best Foreign Film. Nom. for 1 Oscar - Best Original Screenplay.
Runtime: 123min
Rating: PG for mature thematic material.


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IN RETROSPECT
Like The Artist, the silent black-and-white film that made all the right noises during the awards season, A Separation also picked up one award after another, cumulating in its Best Foreign Language Feature Oscar win in late February, about a year after it bagged several prizes including the prestigious Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival. A hit with film critics worldwide, A Separation comes with extremely high expectations, which is what I feel goes against this terrific and insightful film about the lives of Iranians, and the social dynamics that affect them.

As you will see in this dialogue-driven drama, the lives of Iranians are not all that dissimilar from us. Writer-director Asghar Farhadi, who previously made About Elly (2009), a mystery-drama centering on a disappearance of a young teacher that won him Best Director at Berlin, observes his society with the keenest of eyes. Eyes that are not tainted by personal biases or the fear of being censored by the highly conservative Iranian government. Eyes that help to illuminate the conflicts as caused by "separation", and as faced not only by Iranians, but by everyone who is essentially human.

The theme of "separation" is dealt with as if through a prism, with one event as the focal point - that of an impending divorce between a couple whose child must decide on who to follow. This particular event shapes the entire film, as each subsequent incident or conflict following it gives rise to a myriad of issues that intertwine with each other such as religion, finances, the pursuit of truth, and the fear of retribution. The characters are compelling, not only because the acting from the cast is top-notch, but also that Farhadi has written them for who they are, and not who they should be.

Lies, and webs of deceit are spun, yet Farhadi is not interested in the truth that his characters are searching in others as well as within themselves, but the truth of life, that life is often a bed of wilted roses, that life is always unpredictable. A Separation is a good film, but it is not great. Stripped down to its bare essence, it is a picture that has been made before, perhaps not in Iran, but by other filmmakers seeking for the same truth in their own countries. It happens to be that Iran is such a closed society that any lens to view it from within is a welcome opportunity.

Other Iranian filmmakers like Abbas Kiarostami, Majid Majidi, and Jafar Panahi have established themselves as artists of their own culture, contributing extensively  to its richness, while also dissecting its ugliness. With A Separation, Farhadi joins them in a collective quest to bring Iran to the world through an artistic medium, enlightening a multi-national audience, while at the same time, finding one's own cultural identity amid the dust of politics, discriminations, and restrictions. A Separation is far from the masterpiece that nearly everyone claims it to be, but it is still an excellent film. 

Verdict: Over-hyped, but still an insightful look at the human issues facing Iranians today.

GRADE: A- (8.5/10 or 4 stars)

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Mulholland Dr. (2001)

THE SCOOP
Director: David Lynch
Plot: After a car wreck on the winding Mulholland Drive renders a woman amnesic, she and a perky Hollywood-hopeful search for clues and answers across Los Angeles in a twisting venture beyond dreams and reality.


Genre: Drama/Mystery/Romance/Thriller
Awards: Won Best Director, and nom. for Palme d'Or (Cannes). Nom. for 1 Oscar - best director.
Runtime: 147min
Rating: R21 for violence, language and some strong sexuality.


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IN RETROSPECT

Say what you want about David Lynch, but he remains to be one of the world’s most idiosyncratic filmmakers. Love him or hate him, his works could be strange, beautiful, and twisted at the same time. But there is no doubt that Lynch’s cinema is one-of-a-kind. It is difficult not to have an opinion after viewing his films. The Oscar-nominated director of The Elephant Man (1980) and Blue Velvet (1986) is rewarded with another Oscar nomination for Best Director for this film, which has since regain a newfound appreciation after frustrating viewers a decade ago.

Mulholland Dr. could tie with Blue Velvet as Lynch’s magnum opus. Weird, horrific, and most of all, haunting, it is an experience that defies expectations. Written by Lynch himself, Mulholland Dr. could either be the most brilliant film conceived by the most bizarre of human minds, or the most useless, illogical, and downright unfathomable ever.

The plot of Mulholland Dr. is not crucial to understanding what the director’s vision for the film is (thankfully, as I wouldn’t know where to start). Lynch takes two simple concepts of dreams and reality, and draws up a complex relationship between them. He merges them together, then dissects them, then attempts to turn them into each other. And if that is not enough, he confuses us further by not establishing which is which in the first place. When the dust settles (if it does), the question to ask is: Does it all make sense? Does it even suppose to make sense?

Curiously, Mulholland Dr. works more effectively as a film when it is left to vagueness and the bewilderment of the viewer. Apparently, it works even better when one is puzzled and comprehends the “puzzlement” as key to appreciating Lynch’s dark, twisted tale. Even if the film is picked apart and understood with clarity, it still stands firm and strong as a near-perfect piece of storytelling, one that is surprisingly without any discernable loopholes.

The performances by the cast are generally excellent. The chemistry between the two lead actresses – Naomi Watts and Laura Harring – is outstanding and provides the film with a strong emotional core. Watts, in particular, makes her acting breakthrough here, with a daring performance that is perhaps only second to her career-best display in Alejandro Inarritu’s 21 Grams (2003). There is some controversy over the quite explicit homosexuality portrayed by the two leads. However, under Lynch’s assured direction, it becomes integral to the building of character relations in the “dream” half of the film, and the instigation of tragedy in the “reality” half.

The intoxicating music by Angelo Badalamenti adds a sense of the unknown to the film, appearing to come from deep within the mystery that is Mulholland Dr., rather than as an aural accompaniment to its dreamscapes and nightmares. There is a noirish quality to Lynch’s film that makes it visually captivating, and atmospherically dense. There is also the feeling that all is not right in Hollywood, where the film is set, and in which it tries to satirize.

Even though Lynch gives us a shocking climax that concludes the film powerfully, in essence, it is still incomplete. There is no ending really. In fact, it is a pseudo-ending because Mulholland Dr. works like an endless cycle filled with Lynchian ambiguity and his brand of “hallucinatory (in)sanity”. Each round brings one deeper into what seems like a bottomless abyss, raising questions on the temporality of reality and dreams, and the “reality” of imagination. With Mulholland Dr., Lynch has made cryptic cinema his very own and an art form, and all the better for it. This is the cinematic equivalent of the ultimate Rubik’s cube.

GRADE: A+ (9.5/10 or 5 stars)

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Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992)

THE SCOOP
Director: David Lynch
Cast: Sheryl Lee, Ray Wise, & Madchen Amick
Plot: A young FBI agent disappears while investigating a murder miles from Twin Peaks that may be related to the future murder of Laura Palmer; the last week of the life of Laura Palmer is chronicled.


Genre: Crime/Drama/Mystery
Awards: Nom. for Palme d'Or (Cannes).
Runtime: 135min
Rating: M18 for strong violence, sex, and drug content, and for language.


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IN RETROSPECT
You could say that this is a surprise. American auteur David Lynch has made his fair share of great films, some of them masterpieces in their own right. Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me, however cheesy or seductive its title is (depending on how you look at it), fails to compel. Made a couple of years after the success of the television series 'Twin Peaks' (1990-1991), also created by Lynch, Fire Walk with Me is sort of a prequel (or sequel) to the acclaimed series that sharply lost its lustre in its second season.

The film starts out as an unpretentious police procedural as two detectives seek to solve a murder case involving the deceased Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee), whose body was found floating in a river. The plot then flips on its head when one of the detectives disappear, and with a little help from some bizarre time travel, viewers are taken to a week before the death of Laura. We follow her like a curious stalker, only to enter the horrors of her final days as the lines between reality and surreality blur.

Fire Walk with Me cannot stand alone as a feature film. It is incomprehensible to the uninitiated, especially those who have not seen the television series. While I admit I am one of them, I do have the experience of watching and occasionally revisiting the films of Lynch, thus I know what I am in for. Lynch is an auteur in the purest sense of the word. He makes the kinds of films no other director could effectively remake. In Fire Walk with Me, he has made a film that is truly his - a nightmarish psychological horror film that is imbued with surrealistic imagery. In short, the film is a Lynchian experience.

Only that Lynch tries too hard to be Lynch and overwhelms his viewers with an assortment of visuals, and distracting editing (both film and sound) techniques that are more common with horror B-movies than Eraserhead (1977), Blue Velvet (1986), or Mulholland Drive (2001). Still, Lynch's skill in racking up the tension through mood setting, sound design, and camera placement remains admirable.

Not for the first time, Lynch's favorite composer Angelo Badalamenti delivers a fine score that invites us to join in the psychedelic, and occasionally perverse fun. Perhaps the most memorable of parts in this forgettable film is a loud, thumping 20-minute sequence in a strip club that is as provocative as it is sensorial. But unless you are a die-hard Lynch fan like myself, there is no reason to catch this, for you will be disappointed, just as I was.

Verdict: David Lynch tries too hard to be David Lynch in this atmospherically dense but superficial mystery-horror film.

GRADE: C (6/10 or 2.5 stars)

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Simple Life, A (2011)

THE SCOOP
Director: Ann Hui
Cast: Andy Lau, & Deannie Yip
Plot: The middle-aged son of a well-to-do family takes care of Ah Tao, the family's house servant for more than sixty years, after the latter suffers a stroke.


Genre: Drama
Awards: Won Best Actress, and nominated for Golden Lion (Venice).
Runtime: 118min
Rating: PG


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IN RETROSPECT
A Simple Life did not win four awards at the Venice Film Festival 2011 for no reason. In competition for the Golden Lion, but missing out on the top prize, this new film by Ann Hui speaks to us in a genteel way; it is deeply affecting yet does not resort to theatrics to squeeze every emotion out of us. Hui is no stranger to film festivals around the world. Her films such as Summer Snow (1995), and Ordinary Heroes (1999) have graced the Berlin International Film Festival, and her name has been quite ubiquitous at the Golden Horse Film Festival and Hong Kong Film Awards for the last three decades. Thus, it is not a surprise to see A Simple Life being well-received critically.

Like its title, the film is a simple and straightforward look at life. The life as we know it, and the life as lived by us. It may be a tale between two characters, Ah Tao (Deannie Yip) and Roger (Andy Lau), but it is a tale that closely embraces us with its heartfelt and universal themes. This is a film for everyone who has lived, and who continues to struggle to live, for it is inspiring to see Ah Tao, a devoted house servant of over sixty years, taking care of Roger, the middle-aged son of a family who chooses to remain in Hong Kong to work in its film industry.

For much of the film after Ah Tao suffers a stroke, Hui situates it in an old folks' home. This is a bold move by the director, who makes effective use of such a place in two ways. First, through the eyes of Ah Tao, we feel her fears of a new environment, thus allowing us to be closer to her. Second, through our own eyes, we see aged people who have lost their ability to take care of themselves, triggering not only our sympathy, but our thoughts of the future: Would we become like them one day?

Hui challenges us visually by making us uncomfortable with such a setting, yet slowly but surely pulls us into the lives of these people. In a complete role reversal, Roger takes care of his lifelong servant, and in a couple of scenes, engages in lively banter over who had a crush over them when they were younger, and looking through old stuff in a box and reminiscing the past. Hui is adept at balancing humor and tears in this bittersweet film, which offers poignancy and nostalgia in abundance, and an exceptionally strong performance by Yip, who is duly rewarded with Best Actress at Venice.

Besides being a competently crafted drama, A Simple Life is also a critique on the state of distant relationships among family members as caused, but not limited to, migration and the lack of communication in an increasingly urbanized and borderless society. It also probes the question: Is the unconditional love given by a person not related by blood more valuable than one who is blood-related? The ending wraps up the film with a kind of melancholic simplicity that reminds that of Edward Yang's Yi Yi (2000). Only that this is wordless.

Verdict: Amid the laughter and tears lies a film that subtly calls to attention the fragility of human relationships, no matter how close they are, in a modern, urban society.

GRADE: A- (8.5/10 or 4 stars)

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