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xhanae
Reviews
Itiraf (2001)
When love and guilt go hand in hand.
What an interesting movie. I did not expect to be surprised this way. There are certainly some imperfections but the script works fine for the most part, the acting is unanimously good and the unfolding story is different. Also... I believe the use of lighting indoors and in night times somehow doubled the feeling of voyeurism ( the 'I am not supposed to watch this' feeling) I experienced when the couple were either fighting or pretending to be asleep when they weren't. What derived from this feeling was an enhanced interest in their lives.
Step by step we are being drawn into the dark core of a man twisted by both love and guilt. Consumed with guilt, he can't sustain a normal relationship with his wife who eventually leaves him for another man. Consumed with love he breaks every rule and damns himself to a vicious cycle of love and hate. He believes salvation will come thru confession ( this is also why he forces the wife to confess her adultery) but is confession really all that soul-cleansing? or is it equally beneficial for both parties involved? If you have a secret sin eating you out Itiraf will give you something to think about.
I have to say I loved the part of the male character. He was very much real, with a lot of defects and a weak personality but he also had a huge ego and a pretentious act ( Wasn't he the one betraying his best friend in the first place?). Oh yes! Flawed characters are a bliss, they make me forget my own shortcomings!
The themes of unreciprocated love and socially incorrect women come back in Itiraf too. And it is precisely what I hated about the film. It is a bit boring and slightly off balance to see Nilgun go from what looks like upper middle class to low class in a matter of minutes as the direct result of her being unfaithful. I understand the need to lower the wife's standing so the husband can go back to her but it borders sexism therefore not nice, nor is this an old fashioned Turkish movie where all kinds of incredibly horrible things happen to people.
All in all Itiraf is a decent movie worth the watch. I definitely recommend it.
Regarde la mer (1997)
Quelle horreur!
I had seen Under the Sand before watching See the sea so I had my hopes high while waiting for it to start on TV. What a mistake that was! Any mention to François Ozon turns my stomach upside down these days.
There is so little logic in the story( i.e a lonely mother lets a perfect creepy stranger in her property, she leaves the baby in the beach and bathtub all alone, she lets the stranger babysit her child, after finding the notebook on the tent she still invites the backpacker to stay in the house and ends up having sex with her etc...) that it is hardly believable. Every single impossible mistake the mother makes makes you wanna cry ' not again!'. After a while it looses credibility completely only to become the most disgusting nightmare one can have. Any and every deranging shockers are used. From fecal matter to teeth cleaning with feces dripped toothbrush, from oral sex with gay prostitutes to child-birthing details, from lesbian sex to lesbian kidnapper-murderer-psycho the director welcomes them all. And all this in 50 some minutes which is the only good thing about this film: it's short.
The only other movie competing with this one on the disgust-meter is the hostel. If that is art so is this.
Quelle horreur!
In the Valley of Elah (2007)
Somewhere along the Valley of Elah...
I've seen this film last night and came home with a heavy heart, I had to sleep over it and waking up I still feel weird.
Granted T.L Jones gives an incredibly solid performance and I honestly believe he should have gotten the Oscar this year. Not to mention Susan Sarandon in her small yet mind-blowing role as the grieving mother. I had tears in my eyes during the telephone scene ( why didn't you spare me one son?!?) so natural and powerful her acting is, she gets into your skin. Charlize Theron however, tho a decent actress, does not fit well in the detective role. Not only T.L Jones overshadows her in acting but the Emily character is also so lame in her line of work compared to Hank Deerfield that one can't help but wonder what the hell she is doing here other than selling(?)the movie. A pity since I like her normally. The rest of the acting is pretty good too so there isn't any problem there.
The movie works itself every single minute, always very grim, towards the inevitable very subtly and intelligently via cell phone recordings,the Doberman story,the jurisdiction debate, the voice of Michael that makes Hank wake up in terror and makes you wonder how a father can feel this scared hearing his own son and builds up a certain tension that one would wish over by the end of 2 hours... but NO! That feeling of uneasiness stays with you for a while which proves it is a good movie because it makes you think of things you wouldn't be thinking otherwise. Very good screenplay,excellent acting is good enough for many.
So what is it that I can't swallow? Not the violence since we've become so accustomed to it. Not the obvious sexism either because War is man's business after all. That PTSD is presented as the reason why Hank Deerfield looses his faith in the system ( contradictory too in the sense being a war vet one would expect him to have better stomach) and puts the flag upside down is a bit too much but hey! everyone is entitled to their own opinion.
What bugs me the most is the deliberate avoidance in clearing who's Goliath and who's David in Iraq. You can choose to see Michael and Steve as a child David who goes on unequipped to battle the Goliath because the 'unresponsible and inconsiderate' King permitted it. You can also choose to see them as a child 'hero' David who goes on to an impossible battle with Goliath. There is the other side of the mirror too... That Michael and Steve set out as little David but somewhere along the valley they became Goliath themselves. Who is David then? If this is the way the war is perceived,if we can't tell David from Goliath and still keep warring... then we have a lot of reflecting to do... a lot of praying too.
It's been 5 years.