Incendies (2010)

  ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Incendies (2010) – D. Villeneuve

I received this blu-ray as a gift (thanks Jen & Pete!) close to the release date back then and hadn’t watched it since – so I completely forgot the twists in the plot. I’m not quite sure whether I would have chosen this last night if I had remembered but there’s no doubt about its impact.  Director Denis Villeneuve handles the unfolding plot, which sees Canadian twins travelling back to an unnamed Middle Eastern country to find their unknown father and never-before-mentioned brother after being instructed to do so in their mother’s will, with aplomb. Although the terrain is dusty, Villeneuve dots the screen with teal blue, whether it be a bus travelling through the dangerous South in the flashbacks of the mother (Lubna Azabal) and her life during an early 1970s civil war, or the garments worn by those visited by Jeanne (Mélissa Désormeaux-Poulin) or Simon (Maxim Gaudette) in the modern scenes. Based on a play by Wadji Mouawad, the film is structured like a detective story, with the twins uncovering clues about their mother and her relationships on the way to a final revelation that plays like Greek tragedy borne out of the horrors of war.  I guess Mouawad didn’t name the war-torn country so that the themes could generalize to all war-torn areas in the world, which unfortunately seem to have increased since the film was made.  As usual, it is the poor and powerless who suffer the most. Worth a rewatch (if you are ready for serious fare).

The Clock (2010)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

The Clock (2010) -- C. Marclay

Christian Marclay’s 24-hour film, synchronised on screen to the exact time in the location where it is playing, is a monumental feat of editing (both visual and sound) and just plain gobsmacking.  It only tours museums so I was lucky enough to catch it at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image here in Melbourne today from 12:52 PM to 2:01 PM. In 2014, I had the chance to see 1:25 PM to 2:31 PM in Minneapolis; oddly, I did not recall any overlap until just before 2 PM when people started talking about it being too early in the day to drink.  Perhaps this is because the sheer number of clips, some familiar but many not and ALL of them out of context, might mean that you can’t remember having seen it in The Clock in particular.  Of course, I should have remembered Hitchcock’s bomb going off at 1:45 PM in Sabotage but I certainly knew that the 3:10 to Yuma was coming when its first clip appeared.  In fact, I was surprised that the first Yuma clip came so early – and also realised this time that there was at least one clip showing the child on the bus in Sabotage well before the explosion – so there must be a special treat for viewers in for the long haul who can see Marclay’s slow wind-up to some of the punchlines.  And there are indeed many punchlines – not just those favourite scenes that mention time – but an incredible array of visual and sound jokes produced by the editing and juxtaposition of scenes.  When someone dials the telephone, you know that another clip will show someone else in another place (but not another time?) answering the phone and then there will be phone after phone after phone.  Then a montage of train scenes or people in bed and the endless interspersing of people looking at their watches (or Big Ben).  The sound design is only partly diegetic – instead, the music and effects from a previous clip often carry over into the next one and some music is retained over several clips to set a mood (Shaft anyone?).  On Thursday nights, the museum shows the entire film (all night long) and last week someone tweeted about it in intervals – it seemed an extraordinarily impactful experience.  I’m tempted  -- but even after only one hour in the dark thinking about time, I saw the world outside in a different way (although this proved to be only fleeting – I need to get back inside!).  Highly recommended.

The Illusionist (2010)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

The Illusionist (2010) – S. Chomet

It’s another Jacques Tati feature come to life, even though the comic auteur himself died in 1982.  In actuality, he wrote the script (sometime after Mon Oncle) and his daughter asked animator Sylvain Chomet (who also did The Triplets of Bellville, 2003) to create the film, so that no live actor would end up playing her father.  Although not specifically M. Hulot, the Illusionist (named Tatischeff – Tati’s real name) gets into the same serene bungles, as he accommodates to the early 1960’s and the slow fade-out of the music-hall trade.  He isn’t alone in the seedy old hotel in Edinburgh where most of the film takes place – assorted clowns, ventriloquists, and acrobats also live there, feeling despair or seeking other ways to bring in money (Tatischeff moonlights in a garage).  All told, there is a wistful bittersweet air to the proceedings, not least because the illusionist is more-or-less adopted by a young girl (a cleaner at one of the venues he’s played at) who moves in with him and they develop a sweet wordless relationship that ends when it is time for her to move on and him to declare that magicians do not exist.  Oh but they do – not just in the form of Tati himself but also in the form of Chomet who has brought a thing of real beauty to the screen, hand-drawn but computer animated, subtly coloured in reds, greens, and browns, Miyazaki-like in the pleasure it takes in the environments that surround the action.  A wonderful tribute to the French legend and a contribution to his oeuvre (and to animation’s highlight reel) in its own right.

  

Biutiful (2010)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Biutiful (2010) – A. G. Inarritu

I haven't been keeping up with Inarritu's films but this way too intense look at a man dying of cancer trying to wrap up his affairs, his very complicated and very depressing affairs, seems to indicate that he has gone to another level. Or perhaps it is Javier Bardem's acting that keeps this aloft? (Although the art direction, filled with reds and greens, and cinematography thereof, is worth a look). Sure, it could have done with some cuts to tighten things up, but Barcelona never looked grimier (I bet) and this deserves the plaudits it has received.

  

Inception (2010)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Inception (2010) – C. Nolan

This is an ACTION movie, so there are car chases and shoot-outs and the pace is pretty frenetic (and the soundtrack loud). But it is also one of those movies designed to BLOW YOUR MIND -- how many levels of dream within a dream can you stand? Whose dream is this anyway? A most enjoyable ride, especially if you don't worry yourself about whether there really is any moral to this story.

And Everything is Going Fine (2010)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

And Everything is Going Fine (2010) – S. Soderbergh

You have to really like Spalding Gray (and to have seen some of his previous monologues) to appreciate Soderbergh’s masterly knitting together of excerpts from an array of Gray’s public appearances (monologues and otherwise).  And I do.  Watching this film was like revisiting a long lost but fondly remembered friend.  And he is telling all of his old stories and some new ones.  In fact, I was surprised at all the things that happened to Spalding Gray since I last checked in with him.  Despite having a family (and opening himself up to some dad humor), things took a turn for the sombre after a rough automobile accident in Ireland in 2001 and culminated in Gray’s (presumed) suicide in 2004 (from the Staten Island ferry).  He talks about death a lot over the years – or perhaps Soderbergh and his editor Susan Littenberg purposely chose death obsessed clips.  Nevertheless (and as always), the thing about Gray’s monologues is that they are so life affirming (and funny and neurotic and naked).  Listening to him talk about his life makes you want to pay more attention to your own – after all, we’ve all got plenty of fodder for monologues.  But, honestly, Gray created a poetic art-form that we are fortunate he shared with us even if the constant sharing itself (along with underlying mental illness) seems to have encouraged a desire for (what he may have sadly perceived to be) the perfect narrative closure.    

Uncle Boonmee Who Can Remember His Past Lives (2010)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Uncle Boonmee Who Can Remember His Past Lives (2010) -- Apichatpong Weerasethakul

Set at a slow but relaxing pace (many scenes occur in a dark green dusk), Apichatpong's Cannes-winning film is full of magical and mundane happenings. In fact, it is the inter-mixture of the ordinary and the supernatural, seemingly unsurprising to characters in this NE Thailand setting, that is most striking and gives the film its surreal and playful quality. Ostensibly the plot focuses on Uncle Boonmee's slow death from kidney failure but not everything fits easily into a linear narrative. If you enter prepared, you may see wonders.

Arrietty (2010)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Arrietty (2010) -- H. Yonebayashi

I liked this latest offering from Studio Ghibli (overseen but not directed by Miyazaki) a lot better than Ponyo or Howl's Moving Castle.  Taken from classic children's book The Borrowers (which I didn't think I'd read until I saw this), it tells the story of "little people" who live under the floorboards of an actual human house and who scrounge together an existence from bits and pieces of things they can purloin.  Like a lot of great science fiction, the film treats the premise entirely realistically showing how the characters might tackle instrumental goals (such as scaling a cabinet or procuring a tissue) given their size and the resources at their disposal.  Like all Studio Ghibli fare, the film also has heart and indirectly addresses some basic human feelings associated with loss and connection. Well worth a look.

Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2010)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2010) -- W. Herzog

Herzog's latest film is an EVENT movie, requiring attendance at the cinema, otherwise you might never see the sensitively rendered prehistoric paintings of Chauvet Cave in 3D (as they must be seen, because you'll never be allowed inside yourself and 2D just wouldn't do). Although somewhat subdued, Herzog's probing intelligence and pleasure in absurdity (the master perfumer?) are here and he is occasionally playful (although not "in your face") in his use of the technology (a spear, a bird, a bug, a branch, and a man asking us to be quiet protrude from the screen). Overall, though, the ecstatic truth resounds from the paintings themselves and what they tell us about us; Herzog's presence is just the icing on the cake.

Black Swan (2010)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Black Swan (2010) – D. Aronofsky

Thinking this was a "body horror" film kept me on the edge of my seat for most of the film (even a bloody toenail makes me squeamish), and the film does take physicality as its content and its metier (above and beyond the discipline of ballet, there's drugs, possible eating disorders, sexuality, injury, death). Natalie Portman's performance is visceral and her weight loss for the role gives a creepiness to her performance (that is belied by the Ashton Kutcher movie that ran as a trailer). The tension is sustained throughout all of Portman's interactions with others and then at a certain point in the film, Aronofsky leaves the throttle open and things become insane. Only the American accents spoil the Red Shoes mood.