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Jeune et jolie (2013)
what happened in the year when Isabelle was seventeen.
The beauty of the film lies predominantly on its vulnerable, delicate goddesy protagonist,Isabelle,who looks outrageously like alike a younger version of Julia Roberts, with a touch of girly innocence and less obtrusive, this is a star that brings the summer beach a shred of rosie taint and gossamer hormone heat. The film is not interested in giving a psychoanalysis of the characters' peculiar behaviors, nor inducing the audience's judgmental call by laying down a handful of evidentiary background. It simply told a story that I feel related to, as a precocious girl myself, the changing in my mentality on a daily basis is tantalizing, probably too chimerical to keep pace with the physique changing, and those changes keep pushing the boundaries with invisible flame burning inside me, I also like the excitement when received a message from a total stranger, putting on makeup for fun or just for practice, and going out in the noisy gloomy so that by the time I walk out of the building it will be dark, like a whole day just passed without notice. The fortunate difference is I've never encountered a traumatic emergency like that, I gradually stop this practice because my schoolwork is getting overwhelmed and have no mood to more rendezvous. If I have to make one disapproving point in the movie is its depiction of Isabelle's family and her relationship with her mother, which sort of allow the beautiful story become a generic and predictive one, of course, if there's a mischievous girl, we have to analyze her childhood memories and possible traumatic influence, there simply HAS to be a reason to justify its abnormality, a system of diagnosis and precedents with similar syndrome has to exist for us to corroborate and understand or even predict the behaviors. This psychoanalysis compulsiveness often baffles me when the concept of individuality seems to be quiet pervasively understood by the general populace, children growing in a wealthy and happy family can become all sort of formation whether you like it or not, and trying to label this as 'self objectification' or 'self-worth seeking''juvenile recalcitrance''coquettish trials to experience the feelings of growing mature'is not gonna work.
The relationship with her brother is beyond reproach though, in a primevally inquisitive and extremely genuine way, without fixing a value- laden adult assumption to it, the two siblings witness each other's growth with each other's innocent eyes, devoid of perversion or intrusion of the world of morally adults.
The Deer Hunter (1978)
i love you bay-bie!
Without conflating the movie itself to a higher cause of anti violence and caustic tirade of American's reckless and disproportionate decision of Vietnam war, I think deer hunter is The most well-made war movie I've ever seen, for its sheer richness of emotional depiction of each character in the movie, which further correlated to the audience and induce psycal analysis which transcends the movie in every possible way. One thing about war genre is that director can be obsessed with the infeasible idea of depicting the cruelty of as many people as possible, but deer hunter has no such ambition, it simply tells us a story between three blue-collar workers' life, totally changed by the harrowing war. But the pain is self explanatory, it is simply out there that we automatically internalize it without the necessity of the movie itself conflating it to the dark nature of humanity and warfare.
Normally, what kind of director have the guts to hold the camera steadily to a wedding for so long unabashedly, to meticulously and objectively observe every particulars and trivia happened there, thus allow the audience themselves to see each character's mindset and personality, each sparks and subtle fermentation between those young people, each encounters reflective of their unpreparedness of life and more solemnly and impending, the war, each purposeless and dare-devil machismo's ludicrousness, which only serve to contrast the utter atrocity and macabre of the war and even make the former seem juvenile and pediatric. The movie moves slowly as if it has all the time in the world, and it is about to show us the deeper reality between figures, we see Michale has this huge impulse to kiss Linda but his restrained it, this two-second moments has more romantic tension than all your contemporary New York City love stories can ever get in sum, and its not a punch in the stomach, we always sorta of getting it, Meryl's role in this dabble and cul-de-sac town is a marvel to everyone, she's vulnerable and delicate, has a drunkard abusive father yet she can maintain her breathtaking grace and have fun with her friends, she is meant to be something that has the chemical so powerful to change the route of the movie. We also see a grim-faced veteran sitting taciturnly at the bar, refusing to engage in the tumultuous and cheerful background, and the drunk crowd's amazing numbness show their unpreparedness an ignorance of the war, they have zero knowledge of what could be after them, possibly because of their youth and stupidity, but more likely because of their subconscious refusal to think about what is awaiting their far away from home, that's why when they are so heavily drunk and running naked on the street, they promised each other of never letting each other alone in the war,its a bit of martyred romanticism and adolescent promise, but its still effectively spellbinding immediately and Michale did realize its promise. And I really just enjoy the way they sang together in a bar playing snooker, ChristopheR Walken has such a style, as alway.The whole movie's opening is linear, chronically developed with steady pace without letting one single shot being wasted or redundant, shows us each person's traits and prebolds their destiny. The crowd's bantering and even verbal altercation on their deer hunting shoot ed in such a joyous way, that I simply give up my compulsory psychoanalysis and just enjoy their dialog, this part could have worked as a audio-book. It's natural, plain and very characteristic, with the composing foggy sceneries of the valley, the happiness ofcommaraderies between the crowd is escalated to a ecclesiastic level, more like a ritual for them to re communicate and re unionize. Michale's stubbornness and his swerving principle has always accompanied him, (if he refused to lend a pair of boots, he wont do it), and that's probably another reason why Michale turned into a resolute and granite soldier with an uncompromising and courageous spine, though going through the same ordeal as nick and Stevie, he's the only one who still has the strength to try, try to assimilate himself into the old small town lifestyle, still has the power to purge the harrowing and slit-throat memories out of his brain while nick and Stevie had succumbed themselves to the inflictions and haunted fears, one physically and one mentally. Of course the most carving image of deer hunter is the notorious Russian roulette, probably the most nerve cracking moments on big screen with exactitude and genuine that I can barely watch through, which is the award-winning moments for Christopher walken as he gradually has a nerve breakdown under the audience's eyes. But the when the war ended, this sort of gambling is continued, thus I'm not sure if the director is predominantly inclined to flagellate the inhumanities of war, but how the war can bring changes to innocent individuals, with the side dish of the classic gravitas of war. Seriously I don't particularly see deer hunter as a war movie, but a movie consistently and continuously spanned around three friends' lives, from one of them's wedding to another's funeral, war is just one of the many important event that happened in their lives, the accentuation is surely not the war, it's the influence it has upon normal small-town human being, the antiwar sensation is something we can possibly deduce from the particulars of the movie, it never is the central topic, and it's the way I love to depict the war.
Requiem for a Dream (2000)
4D adventure to the purgatory for addicts
I literally felt pains on my arm which has multiple needle orifice after I watched this movie. This expanding suppurating wound and close ups depicting Leto shooting his last crack into his vein on the exact central spot of his fresh bloody cut is gutwrentching, cruelly genuine and like a slam in my face. The edifying prowess and earthshaking influence of merely a screen grab is a million times stronger than horrifying image on a cigarette packs. The camera went unflinchingly to the bare ugly fact to addiction when a tightly cut sequence of the depraved prognostics enduring their punishment(*ss to ass underground sex show and electric therapy and amputation surgeon )with contrast to the fleetingness of the pleasure it brings us(the fast-paced and highly simplified shots implies the swiftness of consumption of drugs) and their greater hope for the future, whether realizable or not. The daring visual way is so well suited in this particular movie that any other movie's possible usage will appear to be a pretentious failure to me. This film is the kind of film that you are not willing to go through again, not because of its quality, but the uneasiness it gives you is so cumbersome and memorable that it's like you yourself's personal travelogue to the grave.
Detachment (2011)
why not give adrian a chance to not look sad
Andrian Brody has the power to bring out the most profoundly sad roles and its not just because of his eye brows. He's a quiet and troubled teacher who's incapable of turning a blind eye toward those young misguided souls, despite the fact that he himself is suffering from a recently family member's death and constantly haunted by memories of his deceased mother. We started to introspect the question that can we maintain our saving grace or last shred of kindness if we areunder such circumstances, when our career is constantly getting sh*t atand ignored and even more tragically our faint hope for rising people's awareness and making a difference to the children still won't crumble into derelict. But IMO if we trim the sidekick story involving the unfinished romance with his colleague at all, the movie would be much more properly constructed, I'm kind of under the impression this line of story was not fully developed so instead of throwing a half-ass off- time life experience,divert some light that has been shed upon the redundant romance to the story with Erica, it would be my personal preference. The scenes when the officers took Erica away are some of the most heartrending moments I've ever beheld in cinema, in this perspective, Sami Gayle had strike me as a new scintillation among her generation. The always think it's rather intoxicating and predestined if some two total strangers started chatted on the street, and I expected more layer-developing conversations between these two. Of course he's been a father figure rather than a caring valentine to her otherwise the warmth would depraved to incestuous lust and perversion, but considering Erica's original recalcitrance and dangerously licentious life style, if His detached principles have had deviated a little, even just on the surface with more light-hearted bantering and edifying, the relationship between these two would be galvanized and worth more times rumination. I'm nitpicking in this film apparently. But I expected more from Adrian Brody, He can totally do his work just by his eyes, but in that case he'll stay a melancholic and poetically mysterious 'prince'. In some case the film only shows his dolorous and suffocating life and conveniently light-brushed some merriment, even when hes kissing his colleague his eyes were not looking at him. So in a way the character is still not quiet layered and chewy than I thought, detachment is the sort of thing he's been chasing for long and sometimes he did achieve, and we only get to see his own wound-licking after the fierce emotional confrontation. That's bit of tears-provocating due to the lack of main- characters' conversation.
Surprisingly good moments: the humorous teacher's three ways of enchanting out a student's gangsta curse, His response when caught the kid committing animal battery live. The collective performances of the colleague is transcendental and brings this movie to another level, we can see those mid classed teachers' own collapsing doldrum in life and absolute powerlessness when confronting misunderstanding, ignorance from students and even spouses, and utter disrespect emerging from twelve direction and each of them adapt to this environment by either growing detachment. Some acting are relatively weak but won't affect the general quality. i also think the blackboard illustrations are well fitted but really movies should really try to not accentuating so heavily on the faces(I've seen quiet a few of them doing super close-ups on the faces, whether to catch their minimal facial expression changes or just for visual pleasures), for one that we started to not buy the story that Adrian with face will stuck in a substitute teacher like that and getting hurt, for two its bit of a cliché these days
Black Narcissus (1947)
Kathleen Byron's stunning legacy to the world.
Its rather hard to believe this movie is produced in the 40s while the matureness and colorfulness of the cinematography is basically indistinguishable from some of the works produced in the recent decade, and the complexity and lingering influence of the story overshadows most of the contemporary commercial blasts, even the old school jazz soundtrack and elegance of stage performances add up to the spellbind capacity of the film. The most impressive scenes are definitely when Kathleen Byron quietly and composedly putting on her blood-colored lipstick, wearing a maroon low cut dress instead of virginity white nunnery uniform, the tension and detonating prowess of her performances is palpable. She is willing to abandon her religion for years to pursue secular pleasures, which is unrequited love and accompanying caustic jealous that ended up consumed her last shred of dignity and kindness and even her life. The enervation's of religion and diabolicalization of love and hatred is expressively contrasted, the courage to address the forbidden and controvertible issue in 1940 is invigorating for the contemporary generation, while the freedom and latitude is supposedly keeping widening, this kind of freshly iconoclastic question is less brought up by movies and the desensitized audience seem to be more satisfied with them. The story tells the story in a eerie context, the roof of the world surrounded by vibrant flowers and mistral blowing wind, with unsophisticated and secluded people,a living god abode in the middle of the mountain, and a rawly loved-by-all man with perfect masculinity and strange flirtatious gravitas. This all happens in a totally unfamiliar way, thus creates a sharp schism between reality.But do people living in an ordinary life ever question their religions? Or the doubt and incredulity only happens when we are not surrounded by cultured human beings and given an opportunity to be totally free and uncurdled in the nature?
Two Lovers (2008)
Lto the EONARD
This movie is so great that it gets into my nerves. The platitudes of ordinary un-fancy people's romantic triangle in a lowbrow and diversified community in a cosmopolis seems to be so decrepit that we can name at least three different ways to deliver the story successfully but uneventfully:one with a bit of crime scenes and intergenerational vendetta; some with razor-sharp witticism in flirtatious conversations and some with troubled souls suffering varied mental illness like autism but eventually crush into just the right person that appreciate the beauty of the schizophrenic. James Gray dare to present us a pure love story, with damn certitude of the solidity of the performances, successfully created a marvel: use the simplest or even somewhat weak story to make the most beautifully genuine movie. Without Joaquin Phoenix's impeccable and almost celestial performances, the story will easily crush into banal derelict, but when the seemingly everyday storyline carried out by the most powerfully telegraphic performances, the power can be escalated to another extremity. IMO two lovers can easily overshadow a galaxy of widely acclaimed romantic movies by woody Allen.
The soundtrack is impressive, when Leonard and Sandra first met in his boyhood room, the Spanish guitar's gentleness and inebriating sweetness easily drafted the audience into Leonard's heart. Interestingly, the same Spanish guitar was playing when he met Michelle in the middle of her crisis, two parallel woman tread on his heart gently and off- gaurdly. Every details depicted is romantically photographed and carefully calculated to make sure that every character has multiple layered personalities that can instantly connected by the audience. All the characters are in a way familiar with us and every move and gestures they made in the movie seem genuine to us. Leonard's awkwardness and his stilted efforts to look relaxed in a fancy restaurant and indisguisable happy smile after his first sex with Michelle, his faint but existing interest in Sandra, his uproarious and self-detonating love for Michelle, a girl apparently out of his league but daintily vulnerable with mesmerizing gravitas. The bursting eager to go away with Michelle that he can barely tear off the tape on the champagne case, the way he quietly take his coat and leave the tumultuous house full of celebrating crowd with agility and sky-high ecstasy. The dialogue can also easily divulge Leonard's heart, when Sandra sent him a pair of mitten, his response was straight, cruelly polite and collegial, its beyond reproach with some level of intimacy, but definitely not the kind of tone you'd expect from a obsessed lover. We can sense Sandra's tentativeness and despondency on her face, she's subconsciously aware of the fact that Leonard is not into her but shes constant trying. Her affection for Leonard is more of a maternal warmth, as a sharp contrast to Leonard's for Michelle, a flaming pursuit with unconditional gentleness and galvanized inspiration. He doesn't long for other's care, he wants to take care of Mitchelle, that's the plain hard fact existing in all urban lover triangle. This whole movie is totally a pretension-free,plus we get to see the Great Joaquin Phoenix' moves on a dance floor. What can't he do seriously, he can sing steady like a train and sharp like a razor and dance like he owns the place. Two lovers cannot go wrong simply because of Joaquin.
Dom Hemingway (2013)
Somehow Derivative but wont affect the enjoyment
Dom Hemingway reminded me a lot of films I've seen(ie, filth) and even the narrative structure is sort of familiar. But although the film can hardly be a original mind-blower, it does teem with hilarious conversation and thanks to Law's hard work. This film is not bad. I've noticed a pattern here for those superficially unconventional movies ranked R only because of good old blasphemy and nudity rather a deeper and darker theme but main audience are adults e who are in seek of fun thus essentially a mainstream ones like Dom Hemingway. The lead role are often casted by pretty faced actors so they can be "overweight and under-shaved but still don't give a toss", and are extremely narcissist about themselves, strutting around in three-pieces that soaked in whiskey and fags, annoyingly loquacious and mutter their tirade with visible spit. But as the storyline unfolds you'll see their own fatal flaws and troubled mentality etc,etc,otherwise wheres the fun. And after a sequence of hustle with hilarious dialogue and witticism and probably some grotesque and unearthly events and probably some nudity toppings, they lead role endured some sort of epiphany and end. The trendy thing to do is probably to comicalize, makes normal conversation comical with ticker-tape laughter-provoking verbiage, dramatize the drugs and parties and coincidence.
Im not trying to do a smartass parody here, I still think Jude Law had really tried to deliver a vivid Dom Hemingway, thrusting outta jail after 12 years for his foreseeable fortune and imperative retribution and long overdue daughter. And I did enjoy some of the funny moments(i.e.where are you going, to find dry cloth, where are you going, to find my bloody money) But derivatives' artistic value is always inferior to the original and iconoclastic ones, this film simply cannot be remember for long despite his exuberant color and sharp fast pace. Making a breakthrough requires more than gaining an extra 20 pound or mild hardcore content for an increasingly insatiable and fastidious audience.
Nymphomaniac: Vol. II (2013)
Lars chose the worst ending
Now we come to the second half, the light and brisk tone turned into darkness and intense.The volume II completed itself to a whole encyclopedia of sex, basically it encompass some most hitted genre of pornography, the heartrending yet anticipatory breakup with Shia and her son, the grotesquely sadistic sexual experience(Jamie Bell is a seductive rising star I think he looks extremely authoritative even in a gray sweatshirt), the lesbian trans-generational sex
but I have to say the second half chose the WORST ending. I almost felt Lars's ineptitude of finishing this overly ambitious and kaleidoscopic of nymphomania.
IMO the second half succumb to the exotic provocation and contrived completion, and thus lost the integrated genuinity and spontaneity in the film. The group therapy tirade is simply hard for the audience to buy, and to make things even worse, the objective outsider---the asexual erudite first expressly exalted Joe's curious tale to a feminist level, that's like obliterating the whole soul in the film and later tried to break his cherry . It simply does not end well, the second volume substantiates all the criticism, being pretentious and far-stretched. The beauty of loneliness and individual choice and more political-oriented feminism falters at the last 20 mins of the film. It could have stroked audience with Joe's poetic simplicity in her life, every change and decision has something to do with sex and if Lars let the audience themselves to retrospect the feminism.
From a non-essentialist perspective, Joe's life choice shouldn't be analyzed in a gender context, although the social convention and stereotypes makes the assumption that woman leading a licentious life would be recognized as schizophrenia and sinful yet male womanizer would be shouldering much less pressure. I think it doesn't matter if the lead role happened to be a woman or man, it's all their own tragic but willful choice. Eccentuating the historical differences between genders is no longer the task of feminism, especially not in an old schooled preaching way. Joe's sexual adventure shouldn't be comparing to men's to make it justified, the very categorization itself in an unnecessary context would be fallen into the scope of social stereotype, thought nothing condemnable, there's more I expected from the proclaimed-to-be-feminist movie.
Nymphomaniac: Vol. I (2013)
brisk and cold adventure
The first part of nymphomaniac is my personal preference compared to a more intense and excoriating second half, it chronologically and objectively depicts the young Joe's sexual adventure and all the important trivial element of life stemming from sex in the world. The first thought after watching in my mind is "wow this woman lives in heaven",not because of her excessive intake of lustful pleasure of course, but because of her utmost freedom and domination in her life. In the perspective, though I don't want my gender discrimination law interest makes me to become a bore of it, but I have to say it's a real brisk movie depicting just another troubled human being in a seemingly iconoclastic and overly provocative way while not preaching a higher cause to the audience.
I'm fascinated by the way the story unfolds, a conversation between the nymphomaniac Joe and the encyclopedic erudite played by Stellen. Every monotonous thing in an asexual bibliophile's room seems to be connected with the exotic and erotic story of Joe's. To someone it may seem stretched or much ado about nothing, but I used to play this game with my friend trying to prove the philosophy that the everything in the universe is intertwined and connected in an unfathomable way, one must keep in practice to see the bonds. So I guess that's why I think its perfectly clever to use this approach to coldly unravel Joe's story, in this way we can see Joe's life from Joe's own description with an unsettling objective heart, we see her childhood and family, which is perfectly normal to me thus constitutes another brilliant move---its shatters our value-laden assumption of the film that people who suffer from grave psychological illness must have some traumatic childhood memories, or major life crisis, because we think the illness itself is an abnormality, we simply don't believe that people's problems can be independently developed, we have to attach some reasons to explain those phenomenon. And then her rather hilarious and reckless girlhood, the process of her becoming an official nymphomaniac and leading an orderly life with normal day job and compact schedule of different sex encounters. We see she managed to organize a harmonious symphony with three kind of sex, the telepathy man, a panther-authority man who's in charge and the man she loved. Her love of life, the only repetitive sex she probably had ever had with,played by Shia Lebeouf, showed up in her life in different life phases, happened by an almost destined romantic coincidence, and ended in an unfinished and excruciating way, just when we are expecting the secret ingredient of sex to escalate the whole story to a new level, it breaks our old schooled expectations rather ruthlessly. Iwould be lying then if I say I didn't feel flabbergasted when see shia lebeouf, the transformer dorky college boy's transcendental performances. He maturely presented us a man in love and get tortured by it, a man that you would see on the street in London everyday, well-dressed and deadly attractive if you'd rather spend time with him. Despite the role didn't have much time in Joe's life, he's undoubtedly the indispensable ingredient.
Young Joe is delicately beautiful in the film. Skinny and innocently drifting among a galaxy of men and dealing with a hysterical mother(wonderfully played by Uma Thurman). This level of carelessness indicates her loneliness and estranged nature in her personality. The silent recalcitrance with a pretty face desensitized us and caught us offgaurd, I cant seem to find the object shes trying to rebel against, I'm not convinced by the answer "love" in the movie. Probably its just because of his insatiable sexual appetite that keeps her from intimate relationship, It's just her individual voluntary choice, I don't think we ought to locate an answer for her. IMO that's precisely the beauty of the film, it's a girl's choice, and she's not callous of departure and love, the grief they bring is the sacrifice she has to pay for her choice. I don't think its really the place to talk about feminism embodied in the movie, In my comprehension, it's one peculiar individual person in the phantoscope of life.
I like the parody of all the excessive advertisement, its like "blast" it can't be a not pretentious and bourgeois provocation to certain critics, but I really did enjoy it no matter what. The cold and light tone of the first half of Nymphomania has made a joyous contrast to the second half.
American History X (1998)
Its amusing how one-dimensional this film is.
So Edward Norton is supposed to be a chameleon kind of actor, abode in the upper echelon of thespian professionalism with a distinctive character and absolutely a cut above the rest of the Hollywood illiterates. I've heard of this movie for so long but never intrigued by the signal-blazing poster and preaching-sound plot. But then I watched it by default and become so angry that compelled myself to rant out my rage. Its rub*ish, don't sully your eyes by it.
Honestly, every character is black and white. Long overdue prodigal son who used to be a loving a caring straight A student got lectured by his racist old man and SUDDENLY abandon all his DOUBLE PHD black teacher's words and starting to mutter extreme racist remarks on news report when his "honest hardworking" firefighter dad got shot and killed. Then unsurprisingly he was claimed to be brainwashed and apparently become the rabbis of his secret guild. And his uncontrollable ANGER(so symbolic and repetitively accentuated in the movie that you started doubting if the director thinks the audience are all eight year old) moved to his family, to defend his belief and stand out for his horrendous looking lady friend. he even stuffed a chunk of beef into his sister's mouth to shut her up. AND he killed the guys who tried to sneaked his car through the most thrilling way(I didn't know if you put mouth on curbs and kick it could kill a man). I'm flabbergasted how the storyline goes exactly as I predicted(I learned in primary school if you want to salute a kind of concept you first suppressed it and then through a heavenly epiphany you realized the folly of you and the mightiness of the concept, say the virtue of be punctual), I thought maybe deviated a little from the standard via but sadly, sadly it doesn't. the linchpin of the movie got his second life and love education behind bars by his fellow linen worker and a f*ck in the a*s.
Every character is either purely good or evil, all deprived of sanity and love and proper education. The fat bug killer is a racist for a reason, he simply is insolent and grumpy as hell about his life, he eats jelly beans with a bow; the mason-vision gangster are dramatized and demonized to present the very extremity of racism, which itself desensitize the audience and shift the concept of racism to terrorism. Apparently the director itself is undereducated but ridiculously bold to produce a film regarding racism without do much research about the itself. You'd startled by the level of superficiality and phoniness of the film. They even spent 3 mins on a black versus white basketball game.yeah.
The Immigrant (2013)
every frame is a silent love letter
The storyline is tragic but light, it's the antithesis of a traditional tears-provoking heavy story. the lightness allows us to feel the intense and paradoxical personalities of cotillard, Joaquin phoenix and Jeremy Renee. Marion simply used her eyes to manifest ewa's vulnerabilities and amazing surviving tenacity, admittedly shes a timid and innocent soul with a face that's probably too beautiful for her own good but enough to save her from the borderline of deportation. The first echelon of her character is a caring sister who will sell her dignity to protect her. Then we see the stubbornness and amazing grace of her in the theater, surving among the jealousy coworkers and even maintaining her christianitybeing a prostitute. But Marion's character development is naturally not as multiple as Joaquin phoenix's. we see a self-loathing scumbag 'gentleman', who is capable of denying his own affection toward ewa to make life ahead, everything that matters seem to do with money and this is not his fault. Exteriorly hes the charming and uncanny businessman drifting between the line of legality, bribing cops to feed his exotic girls business. Interiorly he just cannot evade from his intense possessiveness and madness of ewa, he cannot stand a single moment of ewa being with Orlando, because he knows ewa would never love him back, or he is deeply diffident of his own life and line of work, hes trying but doesn't believe he can provide protection to her. He pictured his cousin, the Orlando magician a bright version of him, casually charming and easygoing, and most importantly, with an overboard career and ewa's love. Without any doubt the self-denying prolixity and growing affection of Marion makes phoenix's role more juicy and expressive and present us the luxurious outbreak(the moment he sent ewa away). With his immaculate deliverance, Bruno Weiss is alive and make us all reminiscent of somebody. The tragic story does not seem to matter that much to me, Im simply more interested in this conflicting figure. But above all, I think the most noticeable merit of this incredible film is its cinematography, every single frame is literally an oil painting with a self explanatory emotion. Sometimes is exotically vintage(scenes in theater) with this pleasant thespian old-school traits, and sometimes its dark boldness give us the synaesthesia of desolation and frigidity of 1920 new york city.in this perspective, the immigrant is an art piece, it makes those films which use background sceneries to escalate emotions and win critic's attention look like drama school boy production.