Wednesday, May 28, 2003
Juliet Of The Spirits
Directed by Federico Fellini
A spooky opening sequence reveals a neat looking prim and proper country two storied house hidden behind drooping willow trees and a low fence. It is night and the lights in the house are switched on. After a clear look, the camera jumps inside the interior of the house and we see a woman with her back facing us, trying on different clothes and wigs, later revealed to us as Giulietta Boldrini (Giulietta Masina). She is our leading actress, the possessed protagonist in this hypnotically and metaphorically charged up masterpiece, and in real life, the wife of the director.
Giulietta is awaiting her husband for their private romantic wedding anniversary dinner but her husband, Giorgio (Mario Pisu) comes back with an entourage of friends who crowds the house and starts a party. Within the group is a clairvoyant and they decided to invite spirits out, hoping to bestow on them secrets on how to lead their lives. This fascination with the spiritual will dominate the movie that dissects the failing marriage.
Like most unions, Giulietta suspects Giorgio of having an affair after he mutters the name, “Gabrielle” in his sleep. It is said that the film was a parallel to Fellini’s marriage. John Baxter in Criterion DVD for the film re-release essay writes,“
Though Fellini and Masina shared a house, they occupied separate floors and had very different friends. Fellini flirted overtly with women but made his closest relationships with a succession of young gay assistants, among them Pier Paolo Pasolini.
Giulietta, who believed that Giorgio, will never betray her, consults guru, Bishma on her crisis. The psychic, dressed in milky white overalls appears sinister. Her immediate followers are a male and an indian female, who mimicks sex sounds as advices to Giulietta, on how to salvage her marriage.
This is in contrast to her encounter with her neighbour, Suzy, who indulges in promiscuity. She does not believe in marriage and her house is a playground with a bedroom that leads through a tunnel to a swimming pool; and a treehouse with a hoist for her play toys.
Giulietta also engages the service of private detectives who will clear her suspicions and bring out the truth in their flailing relationship.
Though Juliet Of The Spirits is Fellini’s first coloured film, cinematographer, Gianni Di Venanzo, paints a vivid picture that enhances specific scenes and creates an overall impending mood. When Fellini brought Joe, a friend home, he brews a red drink and performs bullfighting with a red scarf. After Giulietta’s mother, Caterina Boratto, tells her to apply make up while they were at the forest, we notice how her face is simple for the first time in the movie. We notice the difference between mother and daughter. Caterina Boratto’s arrogant and puffed up look reveals ample disdain for her daughter. When Sandra Milo as Suzy, her neighbour arrives at the beach, it is a pompous affair, involving setting up a yellow tent with followers trailing behind, as if she was a Greek princess on an outing.
Fellini seems quite at ease with this transition to colour. With it, Fellini’s characters who are either gaudy or appears to be out of a clown troupe, stands out more than they were previously in his monochromatic black and white films.
For the first time in Fellini’s films, it appears that he was trying to employ a different style as well. The characters try to fit into the camera rather than the other way round. When Giorgio was preparing to leave home for a trip to Milan, we see scenes being broken up into smaller and static shots provoking audience impatience. Giorgio was talking to Giulietta who walks into a static camera shot at a particular part of the room. Though they were in the same room, Giorgio seems distant as he never comes face to face with Giulietta, who, by this time, had already knew the truth.
Nino Rota distinctive quirky jazzy music adds an ironic delightful touch when it is layered unto moving scenes.
Juliet Of The Spirits is definitely a film about Giulietta. Her Juliet is perhaps too close to her real situation creating an eerie tension. We see her voices, her fears, her childhood memories, all bursting alive and intermingling with her reality. Her grandfather who ran away with a dancer suggests the fear of veering away from the norm. Her recollections as a child who is in a play, being burnt implies catholic guilt. These imaginations that appear on screen conflicting with the natural settings re creates a surreal and hallucinatory setting, reminiscent of pop art.
The long closing shot that has Giulietta strolling outside her house among the greenery is a memorable ending that encapsulates a feeling of loneliness. We feel with Giulietta once more, when she was in Nights of Cabiria, as a prostitute. This time however, we are distanced. Her strained appearance throughout the movie, methodical and mechanical acting as if she was telling us she is tired, oozes out pessimism. This ending tells it all.
If 8 ½ ranks as Fellini’s kingly masterpiece, then Juliet Of The Spirits is the queen, second to the throne, and definitive of his film canon. The chaotic visual impact interplay with the careful intentional static shots and haunting characters describes Fellinism starkly. The irony of Juliet Of The Spirits is that, by overcoming her ghosts, she becomes one herself.
Directed by Federico Fellini
A spooky opening sequence reveals a neat looking prim and proper country two storied house hidden behind drooping willow trees and a low fence. It is night and the lights in the house are switched on. After a clear look, the camera jumps inside the interior of the house and we see a woman with her back facing us, trying on different clothes and wigs, later revealed to us as Giulietta Boldrini (Giulietta Masina). She is our leading actress, the possessed protagonist in this hypnotically and metaphorically charged up masterpiece, and in real life, the wife of the director.
Giulietta is awaiting her husband for their private romantic wedding anniversary dinner but her husband, Giorgio (Mario Pisu) comes back with an entourage of friends who crowds the house and starts a party. Within the group is a clairvoyant and they decided to invite spirits out, hoping to bestow on them secrets on how to lead their lives. This fascination with the spiritual will dominate the movie that dissects the failing marriage.
Like most unions, Giulietta suspects Giorgio of having an affair after he mutters the name, “Gabrielle” in his sleep. It is said that the film was a parallel to Fellini’s marriage. John Baxter in Criterion DVD for the film re-release essay writes,“
Though Fellini and Masina shared a house, they occupied separate floors and had very different friends. Fellini flirted overtly with women but made his closest relationships with a succession of young gay assistants, among them Pier Paolo Pasolini.
Giulietta, who believed that Giorgio, will never betray her, consults guru, Bishma on her crisis. The psychic, dressed in milky white overalls appears sinister. Her immediate followers are a male and an indian female, who mimicks sex sounds as advices to Giulietta, on how to salvage her marriage.
This is in contrast to her encounter with her neighbour, Suzy, who indulges in promiscuity. She does not believe in marriage and her house is a playground with a bedroom that leads through a tunnel to a swimming pool; and a treehouse with a hoist for her play toys.
Giulietta also engages the service of private detectives who will clear her suspicions and bring out the truth in their flailing relationship.
Though Juliet Of The Spirits is Fellini’s first coloured film, cinematographer, Gianni Di Venanzo, paints a vivid picture that enhances specific scenes and creates an overall impending mood. When Fellini brought Joe, a friend home, he brews a red drink and performs bullfighting with a red scarf. After Giulietta’s mother, Caterina Boratto, tells her to apply make up while they were at the forest, we notice how her face is simple for the first time in the movie. We notice the difference between mother and daughter. Caterina Boratto’s arrogant and puffed up look reveals ample disdain for her daughter. When Sandra Milo as Suzy, her neighbour arrives at the beach, it is a pompous affair, involving setting up a yellow tent with followers trailing behind, as if she was a Greek princess on an outing.
Fellini seems quite at ease with this transition to colour. With it, Fellini’s characters who are either gaudy or appears to be out of a clown troupe, stands out more than they were previously in his monochromatic black and white films.
For the first time in Fellini’s films, it appears that he was trying to employ a different style as well. The characters try to fit into the camera rather than the other way round. When Giorgio was preparing to leave home for a trip to Milan, we see scenes being broken up into smaller and static shots provoking audience impatience. Giorgio was talking to Giulietta who walks into a static camera shot at a particular part of the room. Though they were in the same room, Giorgio seems distant as he never comes face to face with Giulietta, who, by this time, had already knew the truth.
Nino Rota distinctive quirky jazzy music adds an ironic delightful touch when it is layered unto moving scenes.
Juliet Of The Spirits is definitely a film about Giulietta. Her Juliet is perhaps too close to her real situation creating an eerie tension. We see her voices, her fears, her childhood memories, all bursting alive and intermingling with her reality. Her grandfather who ran away with a dancer suggests the fear of veering away from the norm. Her recollections as a child who is in a play, being burnt implies catholic guilt. These imaginations that appear on screen conflicting with the natural settings re creates a surreal and hallucinatory setting, reminiscent of pop art.
The long closing shot that has Giulietta strolling outside her house among the greenery is a memorable ending that encapsulates a feeling of loneliness. We feel with Giulietta once more, when she was in Nights of Cabiria, as a prostitute. This time however, we are distanced. Her strained appearance throughout the movie, methodical and mechanical acting as if she was telling us she is tired, oozes out pessimism. This ending tells it all.
If 8 ½ ranks as Fellini’s kingly masterpiece, then Juliet Of The Spirits is the queen, second to the throne, and definitive of his film canon. The chaotic visual impact interplay with the careful intentional static shots and haunting characters describes Fellinism starkly. The irony of Juliet Of The Spirits is that, by overcoming her ghosts, she becomes one herself.
Sunday, May 25, 2003
North by Northwest
Directed by Alfred Hitchcock
I had watched North by Northwest first followed by Vertigo though in real life, Hitchcock had done the reverse. The psychoblabber and heaviness of Vertigo is in contrast with North by Northwest, which is lighter in tone, more characteristic of his style and in many critic's opinion, his most "entertaining" during the 50's. Apparently, the failure of Vertigo had meant the director needed something to appease and win back his audience and critic.
The film starts during the day (as different as the night of Vertigo) and a bustling city coming to life where people throng the streets. Hitchcock appears initially as a man who is refused boarding into a bus. Lead man, Cary Grant appears immediately as the charming Roger Thornhill – an ex divorcee and advertising maverick giving his secretary a list of things to do as they walked out of an office building, into the sun, among the crowds before getting into a cab. Here, he spouts a Zen line reflecting contemporary living, "Ah, Maggie, in the world of advertising, there's no such thing as a lie. There's only the expedient exaggeration. You ought to know that."
Like many other Hitchcock movies where the innocent man was mistaken for his crime (recall The 39 steps as one example), Thornhill was mistaken for George Kaplan, a spy by chance. He was held under gunpoint and kidnapped by Phillip Vandamm (James Mason). He escapes the kidnap and tries to prove his innocence but gets into more
trouble in the interim and had to escape from a murder he did not commit. He is in a fix and had to find the real George Kaplan to clear his name. In a train ride, another parallel with The 39 Steps, Thornhill was to meet his female saviour, the gorgeous poster girl, Eve Kendall (Eva Marie Saint), who seems to be attracted to him. In The 39 Steps, it was disgust at first with the leading lady.
Thornhill and Eve speaks some of the most corny pick up lines in film history. Their come on is blatant and suggestive. Read this, an extract from Tim Dirkes greatest film website:
Roger: What I mean is, the moment I meet an attractive woman, I have
to start pretending I have no desire to make love to her.
Eve: What makes you think you have to conceal it?
Roger: She might find the idea objectionable.
Eve: Then again, she might not.
Roger: Think how lucky I am to have been seated here.
Eve: (ironically) Well, luck had nothing to do with it.
Roger: Fate?
Eve: I tipped the steward $5 dollars to seat you here if you should
come in.
Roger: Is that a proposition?
Eve: I never discuss love on an empty stomach. [She actually says, "I
never make love on an empty stomach," but the line was dubbed over.]
Roger: You've already eaten.
Eve: But you haven't.
North by Northwest contains some memorable scenes. When Thornhill was waiting for a bus to bring him to Kaplan in the crop fields, he was attacked by a flying plane. Almost eight minutes was held in silence, of just watching Thornhill in non action before the plane appears. That scene creates effective suspense. While Vertigo had employed silence; where James Stewart as Ferguson was watching Madeline from afar, that silence was morose. There were always some action happening. Here, Hitchcock had eliminated action and perfected his art by making no "happenings" a cliffhanger.
The other oft talked about scene in North By Northwest is in Mount Rushmore, which was built in the studio. The sets look credible and the chase is hectic, giving the audience a rush of blood to the head. One calls to mind its similarities with Vertigo's classic opening scene where Ferguson was hanging onto a ledge.
The love plot unlike Vertigo does not take center stage. It moves the story along, and never reduces to melodrama unlike the former. Yet, we still feel with the characters.
Cary Grant gives his best as a wanted man and we are with him as a man on the loose. Eva is more complex considering she has an agenda for helping the suspect. She flutters between being seductive, furtive when she is held for an explanation by Thornhill and admission for her love to Thornhill. She continues to pull wool over the audience and yet continuously convince them of her predicament. James Mason as Phillip Vandamm might not have much to act in but he does play it out well. There was a homosexual tone that comes off as being a surprise when his side kick, played by Martin Landau revealed a betrayal among them and fired a shot at his boss.
North By Northwest seems too lightweight as compared to Vertigo. Yet, it is more entertaining and fascinating to watch, definitely more Hitchcockian. It would be unfair to compare the two movies. North By Northwest is a coming back to Hitchcock style after the psychosis detraction of Vertigo. True glory it is.
Open City
Directed by Roberto Rossellini
Open City was made after the Second World War and it reflected Italian’s neorealism movement which in Fellini’s words, were borne out of necessity, rather than creating a different art form. The directors had no budget and they needed to make a movie which mirrors the feelings of the people.
The war drama details the common people’s resistance against the Gestapo. Giorgio Manfredi (Marcello Pagliero) absconds to his friend, Francesco (Francesco Grandjaquet) apartment when his identity was found out by the Germans. Francesco who is marrying Pina (Anna Magnani) the next day, sends her son, Marcello (Vito Annichiarico) for priest Don Pietro (Aldo Fabrizi) to help Manfredi. They seek for Pietro as he is sympathetic towards the cause and he has more contacts. He also has privileges from the Germans as he is part of the church.
As typical of Neorealism, the movie is shot with little money, often in streets and employs amateur actors. Yet, neorealisim shows the hard life that the people were leading honestly. The kids who bombed the Germans were very young but they reflected the kind of hatred that they had towards their enemies. When Pina speaks to Francesco at the stairway, she speaks of her worries while Francesco tells her that their revolutionary efforts will prevail. The lifestyle of the actress Marina (Maria Michi), who was Manfredi’s ex beau, was frowned upon women who sold their soul for money.
It doesn’t take much to figure out Open City. It’s good versus evil theme is best exemplified at the ending.
The Pianist
Directed by Roman Polanski
My friend who was watching The Pianist with me didn’t think Adrien Brody who played Wladyslaw Szpilman was worthy of his Academy Award Best Actor Win. In fact, by the second half of the movie when Szpilman had escaped from the workforce in his ghetto, we already feel as if he was becoming Tom Hanks in Cast Away. This became more eerily true when later, he grows a beard and the whole film chugs along with long durations of silence of him looking at the world happening outside through his locked apartment or when he was hiding in the hospital.
Adrien Brody uncannily resembles Ross Of The Friends sitcom (David Schwimmer) though he looks thinner and has a sharper nose. Physical similarities aside to an American actor, Adrien Brody seems to be in a world of his own throughout the movie, which is also like Ross in the sitcom. Ross is the one who is often the butt of his own jokes and his acting is to act stupid most of the time. I do like Friends for a good laugh though.
The Pianist is in essence the biography based on Wladyslaw Szpilman, a pianist for the Polish Radio whose dreams and love is disrupted by the war and the film is his account of what he witnessed. From being forced to migrate to the densely populated Jewish settlement to playing the piano in a black market bar at the ghetto, Adrien Brody seems to carry it off with a singular look. it was only when he loses his family while they were packed off in a train to a concentration camp that he displays his emotions. He weeps and walks along, trying to find someone among the desolated and emptied buildings while dead bodies lie scattered.
When a movie about the Jewish holocaust is released, it is almost certain that critics and moviegoers would write or praise it off as success. It is impossible not to be shocked, upset at the plight of the Jews or feel angry at the German soldiers. The massacre of the Jewish entire race is real and no one can deny its horror and to a certain extend understood, how such a large scale killing could occur.
Yet, a movie about the holocaust does not maketh a movie good simply because it deals with the topic. Annihilation on a large scale creates emotional drama that appeals to the people’s sympathy.
The Pianist, in this front, like other holocaust movies, shows the unflinching details of the Nazi’s atrocities. Dead bodies ply along the streets. Jews are packed into trains sent to concentration camps. The German soldiers kill and rape wantonly. That is just about it for The Pianist. Serving as a background for our main character, it works well. It tells.
Lacking though is Wladyslaw Szpilman, the man, himself on how he survives. We see him going through the actions of looking for food. We see him getting sick. We see him looking outside through the windows while the Resistance declares war against the Nazis. We see him playing the piano in his head but only for a few minutes. Only when he was told to play his instrument by a German soldier while he was hiding among the debris, did we feel that The Pianist has come alive. We knew that the piano playing in his head is a force keeping him alive. However, nothing was quite prepared to tell us of this scene. The film hardly mentions his thoughts. Perhaps a monologue or narration will allow us more insight that will make The Pianist more revealing and moving.
Critics have called such a direction “cold and detached” without the high faulting melodrama that characterises most holocaust movies but they forget that we want to know what is happening in a movie. We want to feel, not just to feel sorry for Szpilman. We certainly don’t want to be dumfounded towards the end which The Pianist does. Actions like scrapping for food tells us he is hungry and that’s about it.
Some critics have also said that the movie was trying to make a point that luck sometimes determines if a person live or die in war torn times. That is quite a lame rhetoric which is too obvious to be mentioned.
It is difficult to say a movie is bad especially if everyone tells you it is good. A major motion picture like the Pianist provides a descriptive narration with grandiose settings that tries to reclaim the horror of the holocaust. It is a visual spectacular that tries to stirs up emotions but does not rank up high as a great movie considering it was too hyped up. Besides the enchanting piano music that engages the audience, nothing else quite touches you.
La Ceremonie
Directed by Claude Chabrol
Catherine(Jacqueline Bisset) is an art gallery owner who hires Sophie (Sandrine Bonnaire) to look after their house. Her husband is Georges (Jean-Pierre Cassel) and they have a pretty daughter, Melinda (Virginie Ledoyen) and a younger son, Gilles (Valentin Merlet).
Though Sophie appears weird, she does her job well, keeping the house spick and span, and the family praises her cooking. They however do not know that she is illiterate or dyslexic. Because she couldn’t read, she is unable to order groceries through the phone and she lies to the family by saying that she has poor eyesight. When they sent her to the optometrist, she buys a cheap pair of specs. She refuses to learn driving though they want to send her for lessons. She says she prefers to walk. She refuses their help and remains locked up in her room, watching TV most of the time, besides doing housework.
If her eccentricities are a silent protest against the help or condescension (depending on how you see it) that the employers showers on her, the post lady, Jeanne (Isabelle Huppert) is her direct opposite, a brash outspoken, mischievous woman whom George dislikes because he suspects she has been reading their mail.
As expected, Sophie befriends Jeanne when the latter recommends her a box of cheap milk chocolate at the supermarket. Together, they had fun cooking wild mushrooms for dinner and helping out at the church. When Jeanne is with Sophie, she also influences the maid by bitching about the family members.
Much has been written about how Chabrol describing it as “The Last Marxist” film. Some critics have also read this film as the portrayal of class differences, suppression and resolution.
It would however be too simplistic to think of La Ceremonie as just a societal reflection of class distinction. Chabrol’s characters are real people. George is the traditional family man who puts on classical music and makes sure that the whole family watches Don Quixote with him. The family with the exception of his son, seems to share similar tastes. Catherine on the appearance, seems to be good towards Sophie but she appears queasily displeased when she learns that Sophie is volunteering on Sunday, coinciding with Melinda’s birthday party. She says as casually as she could that she will try to manage herself but when Sophie disappears after preparing the food for the party, she was sore. The film is subtle on how the family actually treats Sophie because the family was always trying to be good people. Their dinner conversation before Sophie was hired centres around if she is good looking and a good cook. Yet, when George is mad that Sophie didn’t hand over the file to his despatch, Catherine insists that this is not the girl’s job.
Virginie Ledoyen as Melinda stands out in the family as a helpful and more reasonable woman who calls her father a “fascist” and even advises Sophie to stand up to them if they are unreasonable. She makes tea for herself and even pours Sophie a cup. Sophie however maintains her distance and their conversation degenerates into an ugly blackmailing scene. Virginia also helps Jeanne with her car when it breaks down. Yet, after finishing her job, she throws the rug back at Jeanne. This is an unexpected gesture which seems to reveal that despite her good intentions, her upbringing is one of incivility towards others.
The family, despite their bourgeois lifestyle, are not evil characters. They are as real as some people whom we know and are rich.
Sophie who was once in the papers for arson and Jeanne for killing her own child might seem like a pair of lesbian lovers; and their outlandish devilish antics recall Thelma and Louise. The pretty Sandrine Bonnaire who is reserved, most of the time, seems to timid to do anything. Her plaits capture a quaintness about her. We are of course taken aback towards her demeanour towards the explosive ending. It is as if she has become a totally different person. Her detached cool manner seems eerie rather than fear of what we thought she was suffering from originally.
Isabelle Huppert as Jeanne is convincing as the disillusioned woman who dislikes the rich. Yet, when she needs a ride from Catherine at the train station, she becomes likeable and friendly. Her craziness is probably stemmed from a boring job at the post office which she claims gives her much time to read. She had taken a book out of the library and ransacks the family property when she is with Sophie while the family is on vacation. It is as if she was jealous of the family. When Melinda helps her with the broken down car, we sense her animosity towards the girl.
La Ceremonie strengths lies with its frank look at people whom we cannot bring ourselves to dislike and we are unable to judge them because they seem to behave as of what is expected of them.
One gets an ominous feeling as the film progresses but it is hardly more shocking than the explosive ending. Chabrol’s treatment of La Ceremonie’s ending haunts us not only because it is immediate but also treats it as if it is just a natural development.
Directed by Alfred Hitchcock
I had watched North by Northwest first followed by Vertigo though in real life, Hitchcock had done the reverse. The psychoblabber and heaviness of Vertigo is in contrast with North by Northwest, which is lighter in tone, more characteristic of his style and in many critic's opinion, his most "entertaining" during the 50's. Apparently, the failure of Vertigo had meant the director needed something to appease and win back his audience and critic.
The film starts during the day (as different as the night of Vertigo) and a bustling city coming to life where people throng the streets. Hitchcock appears initially as a man who is refused boarding into a bus. Lead man, Cary Grant appears immediately as the charming Roger Thornhill – an ex divorcee and advertising maverick giving his secretary a list of things to do as they walked out of an office building, into the sun, among the crowds before getting into a cab. Here, he spouts a Zen line reflecting contemporary living, "Ah, Maggie, in the world of advertising, there's no such thing as a lie. There's only the expedient exaggeration. You ought to know that."
Like many other Hitchcock movies where the innocent man was mistaken for his crime (recall The 39 steps as one example), Thornhill was mistaken for George Kaplan, a spy by chance. He was held under gunpoint and kidnapped by Phillip Vandamm (James Mason). He escapes the kidnap and tries to prove his innocence but gets into more
trouble in the interim and had to escape from a murder he did not commit. He is in a fix and had to find the real George Kaplan to clear his name. In a train ride, another parallel with The 39 Steps, Thornhill was to meet his female saviour, the gorgeous poster girl, Eve Kendall (Eva Marie Saint), who seems to be attracted to him. In The 39 Steps, it was disgust at first with the leading lady.
Thornhill and Eve speaks some of the most corny pick up lines in film history. Their come on is blatant and suggestive. Read this, an extract from Tim Dirkes greatest film website:
Roger: What I mean is, the moment I meet an attractive woman, I have
to start pretending I have no desire to make love to her.
Eve: What makes you think you have to conceal it?
Roger: She might find the idea objectionable.
Eve: Then again, she might not.
Roger: Think how lucky I am to have been seated here.
Eve: (ironically) Well, luck had nothing to do with it.
Roger: Fate?
Eve: I tipped the steward $5 dollars to seat you here if you should
come in.
Roger: Is that a proposition?
Eve: I never discuss love on an empty stomach. [She actually says, "I
never make love on an empty stomach," but the line was dubbed over.]
Roger: You've already eaten.
Eve: But you haven't.
North by Northwest contains some memorable scenes. When Thornhill was waiting for a bus to bring him to Kaplan in the crop fields, he was attacked by a flying plane. Almost eight minutes was held in silence, of just watching Thornhill in non action before the plane appears. That scene creates effective suspense. While Vertigo had employed silence; where James Stewart as Ferguson was watching Madeline from afar, that silence was morose. There were always some action happening. Here, Hitchcock had eliminated action and perfected his art by making no "happenings" a cliffhanger.
The other oft talked about scene in North By Northwest is in Mount Rushmore, which was built in the studio. The sets look credible and the chase is hectic, giving the audience a rush of blood to the head. One calls to mind its similarities with Vertigo's classic opening scene where Ferguson was hanging onto a ledge.
The love plot unlike Vertigo does not take center stage. It moves the story along, and never reduces to melodrama unlike the former. Yet, we still feel with the characters.
Cary Grant gives his best as a wanted man and we are with him as a man on the loose. Eva is more complex considering she has an agenda for helping the suspect. She flutters between being seductive, furtive when she is held for an explanation by Thornhill and admission for her love to Thornhill. She continues to pull wool over the audience and yet continuously convince them of her predicament. James Mason as Phillip Vandamm might not have much to act in but he does play it out well. There was a homosexual tone that comes off as being a surprise when his side kick, played by Martin Landau revealed a betrayal among them and fired a shot at his boss.
North By Northwest seems too lightweight as compared to Vertigo. Yet, it is more entertaining and fascinating to watch, definitely more Hitchcockian. It would be unfair to compare the two movies. North By Northwest is a coming back to Hitchcock style after the psychosis detraction of Vertigo. True glory it is.
Open City
Directed by Roberto Rossellini
Open City was made after the Second World War and it reflected Italian’s neorealism movement which in Fellini’s words, were borne out of necessity, rather than creating a different art form. The directors had no budget and they needed to make a movie which mirrors the feelings of the people.
The war drama details the common people’s resistance against the Gestapo. Giorgio Manfredi (Marcello Pagliero) absconds to his friend, Francesco (Francesco Grandjaquet) apartment when his identity was found out by the Germans. Francesco who is marrying Pina (Anna Magnani) the next day, sends her son, Marcello (Vito Annichiarico) for priest Don Pietro (Aldo Fabrizi) to help Manfredi. They seek for Pietro as he is sympathetic towards the cause and he has more contacts. He also has privileges from the Germans as he is part of the church.
As typical of Neorealism, the movie is shot with little money, often in streets and employs amateur actors. Yet, neorealisim shows the hard life that the people were leading honestly. The kids who bombed the Germans were very young but they reflected the kind of hatred that they had towards their enemies. When Pina speaks to Francesco at the stairway, she speaks of her worries while Francesco tells her that their revolutionary efforts will prevail. The lifestyle of the actress Marina (Maria Michi), who was Manfredi’s ex beau, was frowned upon women who sold their soul for money.
It doesn’t take much to figure out Open City. It’s good versus evil theme is best exemplified at the ending.
The Pianist
Directed by Roman Polanski
My friend who was watching The Pianist with me didn’t think Adrien Brody who played Wladyslaw Szpilman was worthy of his Academy Award Best Actor Win. In fact, by the second half of the movie when Szpilman had escaped from the workforce in his ghetto, we already feel as if he was becoming Tom Hanks in Cast Away. This became more eerily true when later, he grows a beard and the whole film chugs along with long durations of silence of him looking at the world happening outside through his locked apartment or when he was hiding in the hospital.
Adrien Brody uncannily resembles Ross Of The Friends sitcom (David Schwimmer) though he looks thinner and has a sharper nose. Physical similarities aside to an American actor, Adrien Brody seems to be in a world of his own throughout the movie, which is also like Ross in the sitcom. Ross is the one who is often the butt of his own jokes and his acting is to act stupid most of the time. I do like Friends for a good laugh though.
The Pianist is in essence the biography based on Wladyslaw Szpilman, a pianist for the Polish Radio whose dreams and love is disrupted by the war and the film is his account of what he witnessed. From being forced to migrate to the densely populated Jewish settlement to playing the piano in a black market bar at the ghetto, Adrien Brody seems to carry it off with a singular look. it was only when he loses his family while they were packed off in a train to a concentration camp that he displays his emotions. He weeps and walks along, trying to find someone among the desolated and emptied buildings while dead bodies lie scattered.
When a movie about the Jewish holocaust is released, it is almost certain that critics and moviegoers would write or praise it off as success. It is impossible not to be shocked, upset at the plight of the Jews or feel angry at the German soldiers. The massacre of the Jewish entire race is real and no one can deny its horror and to a certain extend understood, how such a large scale killing could occur.
Yet, a movie about the holocaust does not maketh a movie good simply because it deals with the topic. Annihilation on a large scale creates emotional drama that appeals to the people’s sympathy.
The Pianist, in this front, like other holocaust movies, shows the unflinching details of the Nazi’s atrocities. Dead bodies ply along the streets. Jews are packed into trains sent to concentration camps. The German soldiers kill and rape wantonly. That is just about it for The Pianist. Serving as a background for our main character, it works well. It tells.
Lacking though is Wladyslaw Szpilman, the man, himself on how he survives. We see him going through the actions of looking for food. We see him getting sick. We see him looking outside through the windows while the Resistance declares war against the Nazis. We see him playing the piano in his head but only for a few minutes. Only when he was told to play his instrument by a German soldier while he was hiding among the debris, did we feel that The Pianist has come alive. We knew that the piano playing in his head is a force keeping him alive. However, nothing was quite prepared to tell us of this scene. The film hardly mentions his thoughts. Perhaps a monologue or narration will allow us more insight that will make The Pianist more revealing and moving.
Critics have called such a direction “cold and detached” without the high faulting melodrama that characterises most holocaust movies but they forget that we want to know what is happening in a movie. We want to feel, not just to feel sorry for Szpilman. We certainly don’t want to be dumfounded towards the end which The Pianist does. Actions like scrapping for food tells us he is hungry and that’s about it.
Some critics have also said that the movie was trying to make a point that luck sometimes determines if a person live or die in war torn times. That is quite a lame rhetoric which is too obvious to be mentioned.
It is difficult to say a movie is bad especially if everyone tells you it is good. A major motion picture like the Pianist provides a descriptive narration with grandiose settings that tries to reclaim the horror of the holocaust. It is a visual spectacular that tries to stirs up emotions but does not rank up high as a great movie considering it was too hyped up. Besides the enchanting piano music that engages the audience, nothing else quite touches you.
La Ceremonie
Directed by Claude Chabrol
Catherine(Jacqueline Bisset) is an art gallery owner who hires Sophie (Sandrine Bonnaire) to look after their house. Her husband is Georges (Jean-Pierre Cassel) and they have a pretty daughter, Melinda (Virginie Ledoyen) and a younger son, Gilles (Valentin Merlet).
Though Sophie appears weird, she does her job well, keeping the house spick and span, and the family praises her cooking. They however do not know that she is illiterate or dyslexic. Because she couldn’t read, she is unable to order groceries through the phone and she lies to the family by saying that she has poor eyesight. When they sent her to the optometrist, she buys a cheap pair of specs. She refuses to learn driving though they want to send her for lessons. She says she prefers to walk. She refuses their help and remains locked up in her room, watching TV most of the time, besides doing housework.
If her eccentricities are a silent protest against the help or condescension (depending on how you see it) that the employers showers on her, the post lady, Jeanne (Isabelle Huppert) is her direct opposite, a brash outspoken, mischievous woman whom George dislikes because he suspects she has been reading their mail.
As expected, Sophie befriends Jeanne when the latter recommends her a box of cheap milk chocolate at the supermarket. Together, they had fun cooking wild mushrooms for dinner and helping out at the church. When Jeanne is with Sophie, she also influences the maid by bitching about the family members.
Much has been written about how Chabrol describing it as “The Last Marxist” film. Some critics have also read this film as the portrayal of class differences, suppression and resolution.
It would however be too simplistic to think of La Ceremonie as just a societal reflection of class distinction. Chabrol’s characters are real people. George is the traditional family man who puts on classical music and makes sure that the whole family watches Don Quixote with him. The family with the exception of his son, seems to share similar tastes. Catherine on the appearance, seems to be good towards Sophie but she appears queasily displeased when she learns that Sophie is volunteering on Sunday, coinciding with Melinda’s birthday party. She says as casually as she could that she will try to manage herself but when Sophie disappears after preparing the food for the party, she was sore. The film is subtle on how the family actually treats Sophie because the family was always trying to be good people. Their dinner conversation before Sophie was hired centres around if she is good looking and a good cook. Yet, when George is mad that Sophie didn’t hand over the file to his despatch, Catherine insists that this is not the girl’s job.
Virginie Ledoyen as Melinda stands out in the family as a helpful and more reasonable woman who calls her father a “fascist” and even advises Sophie to stand up to them if they are unreasonable. She makes tea for herself and even pours Sophie a cup. Sophie however maintains her distance and their conversation degenerates into an ugly blackmailing scene. Virginia also helps Jeanne with her car when it breaks down. Yet, after finishing her job, she throws the rug back at Jeanne. This is an unexpected gesture which seems to reveal that despite her good intentions, her upbringing is one of incivility towards others.
The family, despite their bourgeois lifestyle, are not evil characters. They are as real as some people whom we know and are rich.
Sophie who was once in the papers for arson and Jeanne for killing her own child might seem like a pair of lesbian lovers; and their outlandish devilish antics recall Thelma and Louise. The pretty Sandrine Bonnaire who is reserved, most of the time, seems to timid to do anything. Her plaits capture a quaintness about her. We are of course taken aback towards her demeanour towards the explosive ending. It is as if she has become a totally different person. Her detached cool manner seems eerie rather than fear of what we thought she was suffering from originally.
Isabelle Huppert as Jeanne is convincing as the disillusioned woman who dislikes the rich. Yet, when she needs a ride from Catherine at the train station, she becomes likeable and friendly. Her craziness is probably stemmed from a boring job at the post office which she claims gives her much time to read. She had taken a book out of the library and ransacks the family property when she is with Sophie while the family is on vacation. It is as if she was jealous of the family. When Melinda helps her with the broken down car, we sense her animosity towards the girl.
La Ceremonie strengths lies with its frank look at people whom we cannot bring ourselves to dislike and we are unable to judge them because they seem to behave as of what is expected of them.
One gets an ominous feeling as the film progresses but it is hardly more shocking than the explosive ending. Chabrol’s treatment of La Ceremonie’s ending haunts us not only because it is immediate but also treats it as if it is just a natural development.
