Grade Scale
- A+: Never say never
- A: A masterpiece
- A-: A near-masterpiece
- B+: Very good movie
- B: Good movie but some minor flaws
- B-: Pretty good but some flaws
- C+: Slightly above average
- C: Average
- C-: Mediocre
- D: Bad movie!!!
- F: Atrocious, avoid at all cost!
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|  By Red | 
Directed by Michael Haneke, The White Ribbon is a mystery-drama that is based in a small village in Germany just before the outbreak of World War I. Like many other reviewers have, I would somewhat advise to see this movie without knowing too much about it. All you need to know is that this is probably an instant classic in my book, and knowing too much about the story would deprive you of the full effect the first viewing should have on the viewer.
The film follows the events taking place in the village of Eichwald, as the story is being narrated by the village school teacher. Eichwald is a very small village, everybody is under the rule of the Baron. The Baron employs over half the village as farmers, and lives what is apparently a very relaxed life with his wife and his three children. Along with the Baron, the town is run by the Pastor, the doctor, the school teacher, and the Steward. Nameless they remain, powerful figures they are among the town. The film begins with the doctor being involved in a terrible accident, in which someone among the village tripped the doctor and his horse by tying wire in between the two trees. While the doctor is sent to a hospital in a nearby town, the question of who did it still remains in doubt. What follows is a series of attacks from an unknown culprit, and nobody seem to connect any of the attacks into a single motive.
Along the way, we learn much about the villagers and everyday life in the early 20th century. Work is hard, times are rough, and the parents are some of the strictest guardians you will see on film. Most of the discipline comes from the Pastor, who doesn’t hesitate to whip his own children with a cane for being late to dinner. Religion is enforced to a high degree, even to a point as to where the movie gets it’s name from. As a sign of purity and innocence, the Pastor forces children of have strayed away from such values to wear a white ribbon on their arm and as a hair piece. This is supposed to give them a constant reminder of how they should act, remembering the ideals that their father has implemented in them. With this, Haneke is able to deliver certain themes to the movie, some that you won’t even realize that are there until the film is over. This is a theme that I wish I could elaborate more on, because it offers up such a great conversation starter, but I don’t want to ruin this movie for you in any possible way. Good thing people are allowed to comment on such posts, eh?
While the film is narrated by the school teacher, much of the film takes place away from the teacher. For most of his screen time, he is in a love story with a much younger girl that works as a sitter for the Baron. This love is put to the test after the girl is unfairly fired by the Baron, and she is forced to move back home in another village. When he’s not traveling to visit her, he begins to try and piece together the series of attacks that have plagued the town as of late. Nobody knows anything though, and hardly anybody trusts each other. As we learn more about the different villagers, it often leaves us in shock to learn of the events that take place within their own homes. After the entire viewing, one starts to realize exactly how these horrible attacks could possibly be taking place in such a small village. Like I said before, this movie brings up a good number of themes that stem from a number of places, most of all religion and politics. While the movie is never really resolved, one can put together the pieces and come up with a wide variety of opinions.
Shot in black and white, the movie is visually stunning. If I had popped this movie in the DVD player without reading when it was made, I would’ve sworn on my life that it was made no later 1960. Often using long single shots, this film paints the scene with such realism you can’t help but just sit back and admire what you are watching. DP Christian Berger is up for an Oscar here in two days, and this small foreign flick could very easily steal that award away from the giant blue aliens. Converting the footage to black and white was the absolute best idea that Haneke could have had for this film. One could even go as far as comparing the coloring of the film to some of the themes that take place within the film. Along with the camera work, the acting is spot on with every character. Not a single beat is missed with any of the casting, even with the children. It’s rumored that over 7,000 children were brought in and auditioned for these roles, and they were able to bring in the very best of the bunch. To pick out a single performance that you liked more than others is nearly impossible.
A visual treat, The White Ribbon is a movie that will not only be a spectacle for you to glare at, but also a film that will work your mind just as much as it delights your eyes. This is a classic in the making, and couldn’t get a higher recommendation from me.
A+
Notes: 144 minutes. Rated R for some disturbing content involving violence and sexuality. Seen in German with English subtitles.
VN:F [1.8.4_1055] Rating: 9.8/10 (4 votes cast)
| By Castor |
Mulholland Dr. is one of the most enigmatic and elusive movie of the decade and has left countless viewers feeling confused, baffled, stunned or even cheated and angry. Many have asked how such cryptic piece of non-sense could even be considered as art. Mulholland Dr. is like a puzzle with many pieces that do not fit anywhere. It is a fact of life that David Lynch’s movies are not for everyone: They require multiple and highly focused viewing and simply are too “open” for interpretation for some people. David Foster Wallace stated perfectly why Lynch’s movies are so polarizing:
David Lynch’s movies are often described as occupying a kind of middle ground between art film and commercial film. But what they really occupy is a whole third kind of territory. Most of Lynch’s best films don’t really have much of a point, and in lots of ways they seem to resist the film-interpretative process by which movies’ (certainly avant-garde movies’) central points are understood. This is something the British critic Paul Taylor seems to get at when he says that Lynch’s movies are “to be experienced rather than explained.” Lynch’s movies are indeed susceptible to a variety of sophisticated interpretations, but it would be a serious mistake to conclude from this that his movies point at the too-facile summation that “film interpretation is necessarily multivalent” or something-they’re just not that kind of movie. Nor are they seductive, though, at least in the commercial sense of being comfortable or linear or High Concept or “feel-good.” You almost never from a Lynch movie get the sense that the point is to “entertain” you, and never that the point is to get you to fork over money to see it. This is one of the unsettling things about a Lynch movie: You don’t feel like you’re entering into any of the standard unspoken and/or unconscious contracts you normally enter into with other kinds of movies. This is unsettling because in the absence of such an unconscious contract we lose some of the psychic protections we normally (and necessarily) bring to bear on a medium as powerful as film. That is, if we know on some level what a movie wants from us, we can erect certain internal defenses that let us choose how much of ourselves we give away to it. The absence of point or recognizable agenda in Lynch’s films, though, strips these subliminal defenses and lets Lynch get inside your head in a way movies normally don’t. This is why his best films’ effects are often so emotional and nightmarish. (We’re defenseless in our dreams too.)
It is impossible to talk in-depth about Mulholland Dr. without fully spoiling the movie so please do not read past this paragraph if you haven’t seen the movie yet. If you would like to read my nearly spoiler-free review of the movie, you can go ahead and read my earlier review. In this post, I will delve deeper into the world of Mulholland Dr. and some of the possible interpretations as well as take a closer look at the numerous themes of this incredibly multi-layered movie.
Continue reading 1001 Movie Club: Mulholland Dr. (2001) »
VN:F [1.8.4_1055] Rating: 7.7/10 (7 votes cast)
| By Castor |
Cache (US: Hidden) is a critically acclaimed mystery thriller directed by Austrian director Michael Haneke and starring French actors Daniel Auteuil and Juliette Binoche. Georges Laurent (Auteuil) is a successful TV host of a book-club type show while his wife Anne (Binoche) works for a book publisher. They have a 12-yr old son and seemingly happily live in a cozy book-lined upscale apartment. The obviously well-to-do family starts receiving sinister videotapes of themselves and are perplexed by the meaning of those. Someone is watching them and they don’t know why. The threat slowly grows as the Laurent go through their daily lives. One day, the family starts receiving disturbing drawings of blood coming out a child’s mouth.
Haneke builds up the suspense patiently and methodically. The Laurent continue to live their life but it progressively starts to take a toll on them. Georges and Anne starts having fights because she thinks he knows something that she doesn’t know. He has a hunch about who is sending those tapes and doesn’t want to tell her. The viewer knows as little as the couple itself so we become detectives trying to solve this creepy riddle. Even as the plot unfolds it never becomes clear who is actually tormenting the Laurent. The film is ultimately a subtle political commentary on responsibility (here France toward Algeria) for past and present action. Let’s just say that Laurent did something bad to someone else when he was only a 6-yr old kid and willfully let himself off the hook because he was so young after all. However, this is now coming back to haunt him decades later.
Haneke intentionally leaves the ending open-ended and highly open for interpretation with many questions left unanswered. Some viewers will not mind, I personally felt I needed to know who sent those tapes but only because of that uncomfortable feeling of personal violation and not knowing who did it.
The cast performs on a high level. Daniel Auteuil slowly evolves from a smug and slightly blazed character at the start of the movie to a more introspective character who can lose his temper quickly. Juliette Binoche gave a strong performance as well in a supporting role. The movie features no musical score which gives it a quiet and sinister atmosphere.
A disturbing, unsettling and haunting psychological thriller that plays it close to the vest. Highly recommended especially if you like Hitchcock.
B+
Notes: R-rated for strong violence, 117 minutes
VN:F [1.8.4_1055] Rating: 9.3/10 (3 votes cast)
| By Castor |
 “Laugh, and the world laughs with you. Weep, and you weep alone.”
Oldboy, directed by highly acclaimed director Park Chan-wook, is the second part of the Vengeance trilogy which I’m watching in reverse order. Oldboy follows the story of Dae-su Oh (Min-sik Choi), who is kidnapped and locked in a cell without any explanation. No one will tell him why he is held captive, or when he will be released. He soon learns, on TV, that his wife was murdered and that he is the main suspect. He very slowly adapts to his new environment by plotting his vengeance, writing down the names of all the people he may have wronged, practicing martial arts against a wall, and digging a tunnel with a chopstick. Fifteen years later, he is suddenly released with money, clothes and a cellphone. As he attempts to make sense of why someone would do such thing to him, he finds himself in the middle of a conspiracy masterminded by the same person who locked him up fifteen years ago. His quest for revenge is complicated when he is given five days to figure out why he was subjected to this punishment.
This is a revenge fantasy, alright, but nothing like your bloated low-grade action movies such as The Punisher for example. The plot is complex and slow-building but contains several mind-blowing twists which are certain to keep you thinking long afterward. The conclusion is shocking and revolting and I’m sure some people hate/will hate the movie for it. Strong performances are given by the cast. Min-sik Choi is intense and nearly over-the-top but it works wonderfully in the world of Oldboy while Yu Ji-tae plays Lee Woo-jin the calm, collected and cunning bad guy (but is he?) much like a Christian Bale would if it was a Hollywood movie. Kang Hye-jeong plays the love interest of our main character in an understated and self-effacing manner. The movie is stylishly and breathtakingly shot giving the movie a gritty and sometime surreal feel while the musical score complements the action on the screen well.
Mixing a masterful plot-line, a twisted and disturbing ending, world-class acting, direction and cinematography, Oldboy is a gift from the movie gods!
A-
VN:F [1.8.4_1055] Rating: 8.8/10 (12 votes cast)
| By Castor |
 Directed by Academy Award nominee David Finch, the hauntingly creepy Mulholland Dr. is a dark psychological thriller/mystery which catapulted Naomi Watts to stardom. I waited a long time to watch this movie which most people would deem as not making sense whatsoever. What I love about this movie is that it is completely open for interpretation: There is about as many interpretations/theories about the movie as there is people. Punctuated by very macabre sequences and erotic scenes of lesbian intimacy, the film is full of cryptic dialogues and seemingly unrelated sequences. The fact that the movie was initially shot to be broadcast as a TV series for ABC probably added to the disconnected and confusing feel of the movie. I really don’t blame ABC for backing off this project, there was no way this would ever make it to your average prime-time national TV slot.
The movie starts with a stunning dark-haired woman (Laura Elena Harring) escaping from a murder attempt on Mulholland Dr. when the limo she is in is hit by another car. Apparently shaken and confused, she walks toward Los Angeles and hides inside a house which an older red-haired woman just vacated moments earlier. Starry-eyed and perky aspiring actress Betty Elms (Watts) just arrived in LA from a small town in Ontario and enters the apartment, finding the dark-haired woman, who calls herself Rita, confused and suffering from amnesia. Blonde-haired Betty agrees to help Rita find out her real identity and the two women are soon intertwined in a twisted mystery that will challenge the very notion of fantasy and reality as well as obscure the space and time continuum of the movie. Several seemingly unrelated parallel stories also interject the main plot of the movie among which one in particular is unspeakably terrifying and really FREAKED me out (I won’t even say anything, just that’s it’s there). This is all I’m going to say about the plot of the movie. Not only would it spoil the movie, but it would be nearly impossible for me to explain what I saw, it’s a personal experience that one only gets by seeing the movie.
Mulholland Dr. has a non-linear narrative order which is itself open for interpretation. Simply put, the movie is like a dream put on film. Every single detail in the movie from objects that appear on the screen to what the characters say are little pieces of the puzzle that can be used at some point in the movie. As Mulholland Dr. makes less and less sense, it becomes more and more engaging and exhilarating. What in the movie is real and what is fantasy? There is no definite answer of course but it is fun to try to make sense of it all. The movie is not all dark and creepy and features an hilarious cameo by Billy Ray Cyrus for example. Naomi Watts gives a strikingly amazing performance as Betty/Diane. She shows excellent control inhabiting Betty and Diane, two distinct and completely different characters, to great effect. Better than that, she purposely plays below her capacities (a Lynch staple) only to explode when you least expect it: For the first half of the movie, she is mechanical, a bit forced and apparently gives a sub-par performance. Then comes the audition scene which is a blueprint of great acting as she takes horribly banal material and turns it into a fantastic scene. Then, in an instant, it is all gone: She is Betty again. That single scene is an incredible showcase of acting talent and I was completely blown away. Laura Elena Harring is strikingly beautiful (she is a former Miss USA after all) and does a solid job as Rita/Camilla. The two actresses have great chemistry together and there is serious sexual tension between the two especially once they get romantically involved. The movie is beautifully shot with a retro-like recreation of Hollywood as a nightmarish place to be in , a place which according to Finch, attracts naive and innocent people with dreams of fame and wealth and spits them out as disillusioned people who were the coy of a town with a beautiful facade but an ugly back-alley. Finch masterfully creates a dark and oppressing atmosphere where you expect something creepy and macabre to hit the screen at any moment. As the tone of the movie changes in the last third of the movie, the warm and fuzzy locations leaves place to stark and cold sets. Angelo Badalementi’s musical score is haunting and highly effective.
 My interpretation (Spoiler Alert):
Ok, theories and sub-theories abound and mine isn’t better than anyone else’s. Never-ending mobius-strip, parallel universes, fantasy, reality, split-personalities and what not, my theory is the most traditional and widely accepted one. To me, the entire first two thirds minutes of the movie are a dream by Diane Selwyn, a struggling actress who came from a small town in Ontario, Canada. Diane being the present and real person while Betty is Diane’s version of herself in the dream when she first arrived in LA as a naive aspiring actress. In my opinion, Betty and Rita/Camilla met early in their careers but Rita/Camilla went on to become a successful actress while Betty/Diane did not which would explain her disillusions toward the end of the movie. Diane blames the way Hollywood works for her failure and believes she would have gotten a big role instead of Camilla if not for some behind-the-scene conspiracy. I believe the lesbian relationship between Diane and Camilla is real and because Diane can’t take the humiliation at the party from seeing Camilla in the arms of the director, so she decides to pay a hitman to have Camilla killed. Before the end, she has horrible remorse and dreams of what could have been. The thing is this interpretation could be reversed, with the beginning as reality and the ending as a nightmare. That’s the beauty of this movie. There is literally dozens and dozens of potential interpretations to suit your taste!
Weirdest and most complex movie I have seen in a long time. Mulholland Drive is a very artsy and surreal movie from the wildly twisted vision of David Finch which is best seen at night and in the dark (like every Finch movie!). It blew my mind away but requires multiple watches to build a coherent interpretation of this movie. Just like dreams and nightmares though, there is no real explanation or end destination for the movie. Definitely not for everyone! If you need everything to be clearly laid out for you, this movie is not for you!
A
Note: R-rated for (hot) sexual content, some violence and disturbing sights
VN:F [1.8.4_1055] Rating: 8.8/10 (5 votes cast)
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