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Reviews
Czlowiek z marmuru (1977)
father and daughter
'Man of marble' is usually seen as an bold, anti-communist movie which is strikingly accurate at the deep level of practices within communist countries. Indeed, trough a story of a student who tries to make a graduation film Wajda beautifully succeeds in describing at the same time the soft violence of the '70s in Poland and the totally different hardcore 'prison' violence of the Stalinist regime in the 50's. Hence, it is gradually revealed trough the eye of the camera the contrast between the heroic, raw atmosphere of the first communist years and the light perestroika of the present cinematographic time. Nonetheless, there is a common thread throughout the movie as the all-pervading party monopoly deeply affects everybody and no one has the option of an Utopian escape.
The no exit strategy is probably for me the main theme of the movie. The rebellious young girl who tries to see beneath the propaganda images is also on psychoanalytical trip to confront her family history.
There are two scenes which can more or less summaries the story: in the first one, we can see her right at the beginning in a rough quarrel with her Television supervisor, and we can consequently grasp the theme of the incessant conflict with the authority. However, if on the one level wecan see her rejecting the father figure, on the second level we can witness desire as the film maker is practically possessing the hero statue which she finds in a basement of a museum.
Well, basically the catch of the movie is the intertwine of the story with the girl on the way of her desire and the political level which makes this trip also a trip of a historical clearing up. And, in the strange development of we find that the "fake" hero is in fact an authentic one and that we did know the secret of the narrative - the "hero"(the father, the phallus) of the propaganda is the "true" hero, as he had to face real tough moral problems and he lived "the life in truth" . The heroine can develop at last real emotional attachment with the paternal image and she eventually can end her trip by accepting an ally and a friend in the final scene.
V for Vendetta (2005)
The Real Nature of Terror is not Pulp
This movie is after all not so bad, but it lacks everything that stirs inside me after an 'interesting' movie. Well, you should say 'it not the movie stupid', 'it is you', but however...Along visual pleasure, a movie should scratch something on your memory or emotions, so that you can connect with the fictional world. Sadly, the only thing that leaves me with something is Portman who is a perfect vulnerable actress close to the flirtatious Scarlet Johanson in Match Point.
As for the Utopian nightmare, London as a Leninist brave-new-world-1984 meets Matrix-goes-to-the-opera is anyway my kind of 'bullocks'. Yet this nightmare is a corny fantasy as long as the authoritarian/totalitarian context is totally misconceived. I have lived my first thirteen years in a communist nationalist regime, and the fear, or the real nature of terror is just pulp here.
The Machinist (2004)
a Freudian friend
The movie is filled with psychoanalytical hints and starts with 'the image in the mirror', as Bale's character tries to unite and discover his real self and develops major Freudian themes such as the Oedipus complex and the Super-Ego guilt.
The plot has moreover highly educated hints with Dostoievski playing the leading part (The Idiot, the remorse, the prostitute, the epilepsy) and works within a powerful imagery suffocated by red and white contrasts.
I loved the invasion of the knifes, a total party of Freudian symbols, but still there were too many unclear things to leave me bothered with just one. Sometimes to stress the mystery without keeping a tight hand on the symbols is undermining and the main flaw in the script starts from letting too much space for over-interpretation.
However, the movie should lie next to Psycho in the Movie Theory Courses as a brilliant stuff for psychoanalytical themes.
War of the Worlds (2005)
close to failure, but visually audacious
WoW is nothing but a good visual experience, including a few close-ups even though it was sometimes too palatable that we should 'read' fear. Otherwise, there were some clear flaws in the plot. First of all, the history is partially an atonement experience, as the male character tries to pay for lacking 'father' abilities. In this point, the movie ends in fact while this underdeveloped repentance story is being overwritten by the aliens attacks. Thus, we discover that Cruise is heroic protecting her daughter, but still there are many scenes which seriously lack credibility.
Therefore, it was hard to believe that Cruise needs to kill the lunatic warrior in the basement, as there was nothing imperative in his murder. Even though it is suggested that the lonely warrior was on the edge, it wasn't necessary in that moment for Cruise to resort to the killing. Or the movie do not convince me it was compulsory for him to kill. Moreover, in the scene where Cruise should perform heroically, destroying one of the aliens machines, it is hard to imagine the crying desperate people caught by aliens would react properly and mobilize to save Cruise. Secondly, it is hard to grasp the fact that aliens could not absorb Cruise more rapidly - the hands of two humans have more power than the aliens machinery - and thirdly, as in a Hollywood sequence, the hero fighting for his life has the time to leave grenades inside the machine.
To sum up, the visual fragrance of the war is effective, yet the plot undermines the narrative. The actors are playing their parts professionally and Cruise manages to express genuine fear and stupor . Yet it is a movie which clearly I would forget in a day or two.
Tesis (1996)
thriller like-tension, but still lacking climax strength
'thesis' is a commentary on violence and media within the genre and it actually uses all the stereotypes of the 'gore movies'. As the title shows, it has a composition of a thesis which tries to argue that people are fascinated with blood and stories about murderers.
amenabar manages to keep the tension up to a point where you don't really care who is the murderer, and yet the clues are tremendously well revealed in the plot. Constantly, there are two or three different possible scenarios in the narrative, so it is hard to have a clear-cut opinion on who is the murderer. The thrill has a Hithcockian flavor and sometimes the director realizes to build the 'caught in the spider web' desired character . The plot has also in the '90 manner postmodern/intertextual hints for the aficionados, as gus van sant or amenabar himself are direct references.
More than this, the actors are playing well their parts, even though bosco herranz has from the beginning the mischievous look that 'communicates' more than ambivalence. It is as he is almost entirely on the other side. However, there are frightening scenes where it is hard to say what is next move in the intrigue.
To sum up, a performance which has all the ups of a clever thriller but, at the same time, the anti-climax end is more or less similar to 'the others' end.