Three Explosive Women

Question: What do the films Day Night Day Night, The Terrorist and Dil Se have in common?

Answer: All three have female leads who are on a mission to blow themselves up for their cause.

Motives and Organizations:

Neither film clearly spells out the exact reasons and organizations the women are seeking to kill themselves for, with Day Night Day Night being the most vague of the three movies. In Santosh Sivan's The Terrorist we can guess the identity of the group which is training the terrorists because the setting of Southern India & the bombing method evokes memories of how Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated by a woman suicide bomber in 1991. Whereas in Mani Ratnam's Dil Se, a few background scenes gave the cause to be related to conflicts in North Eastern India.

Story:

Day Night Day Night

: The story is more interested with the character's last day before she heads to New York for her mission. We never meet the people who are directing her for this mission and even though a few of her accomplices come to meet her, they are hidden behind masks. For some reason, everyone in the film is so friendly when talking with the female suicide bomber, who is extremely polite herself in answering questions regarding the mission's execution. She is completely relaxed to go on her mission and only when she reaches New York does she show signs of weakness and nervousness. In one scene, she phones her family but does not have courage to speak on the phone. This is the only film of the three where the girl attempts to query God when she finds herself afraid and weak to carry on with her mission.

The Terrorist

: The story starts off at the training ground where Malli (Ayesha Dharker) is getting her education in killing people. She is picked to be a human bomber and we follow her as she heads to a village before she will get the call to kill the 'minister'. Along the way, she befriends a little boy and gets better acquainted with a family in the village.

Dil Se

: A love story which seeks to pierce through the surface and understand what true love is about, including the seven stages of love.

Character(s) in focus:

Day Night Day Night

: The movie stays completely focused on the female suicide bomber at all times with her accomplices hidden behind masks.

The Terrorist

: Even though the center of attention is Malli, the film includes brief screen time for a little boy she befriends, a tiny cameo for a militant boy she has a fling with, an older grandmother in a coma along with Malli's trainers (without masks).

Dil Se

: Manisha Koirala plays the suicide bomber but since Shah Rukh Khan is present in the movie, the camera clings to him quite a bit. On top of that, most people will remember this film as the debut of Preity Zinta whose bubbly character lights up the screen.

Locales:

Day Night Day Night

: Concrete jungle -- a chaotic New York city with the skyscrapers, bright lights and throng of tourists. Also there are plenty of food places for the female character to spend her last few dollars on and also to lessen her stress. A candy apple, two pretzels and a single slice of tomato are the items she feeds on. Incidentally, she gets charged 0.65 cents for a slice of tomato.

The Terrorist

: Lush Jungle -- the forests of Southern India form both the training ground for terrorists and serve as a beautiful cinematic backdrop. Since Santosh Sivan is one of the best cinematographers in Indian cinema, the background is perfect for him to capture prize shots of lotuses, dew drops on leaves, calm waters and the enchanting forests. On top of that, Sivan uses the environment as symbology to depict certain incidents in the film. For example, a lotus flower sinking in the water foreshadows the coming death of an innocent child.

Dil Se

: The entire Indian subcontinent is a backdrop for this rich musical. From the heart pounding train song of Chaiyya Chaiyya shot in Ooty (Southern India), to the Indian deserts in Western India to Kashmir in the North with key scenes taking place in the capital New Delhi. Santosh Sivan is the cinematographer of this film which was released a year before his directorial venture The Terrorist.

Background score and music:

Day Night Day Night

: Shot with a digital camera, we do not get any background score but only the sounds that echo around the character, be it in her hotel room or in the traffic jammed city.

The Terrorist

: There is a background score which attempts to raise tension and give clues about the oncoming danger but for me, the film's images were far more memorable and powerful than the music.

Dil Se

: This film's music and songs have been some of the best to come out of Bollywood in the last decade. Of course, with lyrics by Gulzar and music by A.R Rehman, the songs were sure to leave a lasting impression. But the videos do justice to the poetic lyrics. The most popular song was Chaiyya Chayyia which featured soulful vocals provided by Sukhwinder Singh & Sapna Awasti. Also the memorable video with a dazzling Malaika on top of a train has played countless times on Indian channels around the World.


Note: Spike Less used Chaiyya Chayyia in the opening credits of Inside Man.

Even though I love Chaiyya Chayyia, the song that cast a spell on me was E Ajnabi (O Stranger). I can remember quite a few rain soaked nights that I heard this song on.



Overall impressions & comments:

Even though I thought highly of the cinematography in The Terrorist, I was not impressed by how the character's decision process was simplified; Malli's decision to take her life was difficult but the emotional hooks used to ease her choice were not to my liking. In fact, I felt the emotional hooks (grandmother in a coma to name one) were typical of most Bollywood films and had no place in a much superior film structure that Sivan was trying to construct.

Although there are no easy emotional hooks in Day Night Day Night, the overall friendly tone of the film's first half seemed a bit odd to me. I can understand the intent of Day Night Day Night was to remove any political agenda and only focus on the female character but the film appears to be too light weight and more of an experiment to make a meaningful film compared to a film like Paradise Now, which was completely gripping and engaging.

My most memorable moments of Dil Se center around the songs and a few collected scenes involving the chance encounters between Shah Rukh Khan and Manisha Koirala's characters. The film was supposed to usher in a new wave of Indian film making as it was the first collaboration of heavy weights such as Mani Ratnam, Shekhar Kapur and Ram Gopal Varma. The three directors were supposed to work on more films together but after the box office failure of Dil Se, no other projects between the three took place and they all went on to more fame with their separate paths -- Kapur with Elizabeth; RGV with Satya, Company and other Mumbai underworld films; Mani Ratnam with A Peck on the Cheek, Yuva and Guru.

Asian Spotlight: India, Part II

Aks / reflection / double / doppelganger / kagemusha:

A look-alike is discovered and asked to shadow the original. Strange consequences take the original out of the equation. Then the look-alike steps out of the shadow and becomes the very person that he was trying to shadow. But something even stranger then happens. The look-alike starts losing his self and he starts to identify with the original. This was the story of Akira Kurosawa's Kagemusha.


But recently two Indian film-makers have take this double idea and adapted it to two completely different stories, even though the leads in both movies play characters who are film extras dreaming of making it big in Bollywood. Rajat Kapoor uses the double idea and adds a nod to John Woo's Face Off in his dark and engaging film Mithya. Whereas, Rohit Jugraj takes a different approach and creates Super Star where a film extra has the same appearance with a new Bollywood actor and gets mistaken for the upcoming superstar. Mithya starts off with a touch of humour gets darker and darker until it ends in complete darkness, although that is the only possible ending. Super Star could have ended on an ironic twist at the 90 minute mark but continues for another hour to end on a customary Bollywood ending where happiness is ushered in.

I loved Mithya not only for the dark story but for the brilliant performances put in by Ranvir Shorey, Vinay Pathak & Naseeruddin Shah. Naseeruddin plays a gangster similar to the one he played to great effect in Kaizad Gustad's Bombay Boys. Shorey & Pathak have been putting in great performances recently and they have continued that trend here.

---

Sensuality, beauty, magic, myth, death and reincarnation:

I absolutely adored Pan Nalin's first film Samsara which was an intoxicating mix of Buddhism and sensuality. So I was looking forward to his second feature A Valley of Flowers. Like his first film, the mountainous locales are stunning, the female lead gorgeous (Mylène Jampanoï) and the sexual chemistry electric. Even though the story is much more imaginative than Samsara, the screenplay and editing let this film down slightly. Still, the movie is worth watching.

A thief (Jalan played by Milind Soman)

comes across a woman (Ushna played by Mylène Jampanoï) during his looting quests.


Ushna wants to travel with Jalan and is not afraid of his rugged looks and band of thieves. She quickly asserts her presence in the group and promises to lead the men to untold riches. On their heels is a mysterious man (Naseeruddin Shah) who is after Ushna.


Jalan is slowly intoxicated by Ushna and turns against his friends.

The two go around stealing powers from priests and tantrics in their quest for immortality. In one of my favourite sequences in the film, Ushna steals the shadows of people with good luck so as to change her misfortune. Things take a very interesting turn when the two lovers are confronted by the mysterious man in the valley of silence (another interesting sequence in the film). From then on, the movie moves ahead a few centuries in Japan before the karmic cycle catches up with the two lovers.

---

Displaced by Politics:

When Mani Ratnam tackles films about political situations, he carefully manages to weave stories about relationships and family within a political context. In his political films, the focus is always on the individuals and how their lives are effected by the chaos around them. In Roja the backdrop was Kashmir and terrorism, in Bombay he set a love story against the Bombay riots while Dil Se was a passionate love story with a core thread about suicide bombers and Eastern Indian issues; Yuva was about how the younger generation in Calcutta handled politics. Now in A Peck on the Cheek, Ratnam has shifted focus to Sri Lanka where struggles between the army and militants has resulted in mass migration of people to Southern India where they were known to have languished in refugee camps.

In terms of story, screenplay and acting A Peck on the Cheek is clearly superior to Roja, Bombay, Dil Se & even Yuva. A Peck on the Cheek tackles the difficult questions of adoption and displacement in a very mature and intelligent manner. Although, Ratnam carefully avoids taking any political sides and shows the militants cause as a matter of fact without attempting to judge or put down one side. I could have done without some of the songs but the visuals in the videos are breathtaking. In terms of technical support, the stellar crew of A.R Rehman (music), Ravi K. Chandran (cinematography), Sreekar Prasad (editing) and Sabu Cyril (art direction) are in fine form and help to beautify this solid story.

---

Serving up an old style as a new one:

True to form, a film titled 'Style' offers no substance whatsoever. Tashan means style in Hindi slang and the film is too concerned with being cool and having smooth characters. The waver thin story is just an excuse to hop around India, having the actors dance in a few songs and dressing in funky clothing. The biggest talking point about the movie has to be Kareena Kapoor's well toned body. In this respect, she continues the recent trend of Bollywood actresses to hit the gym.

In 1989 when Maine Pyar Kiya was released, Salman Khan become the first Bollywood lead to have a six pack and a well toned body. A few years after that, hitting the gym become the in-thing in Bollywood and the film industry was packed with macho studs. With the exception of Shilpa Shetty, no other Bollywood actresses were concerned with going to the gym and this trend was limited to the male actors. But that changed in 2006 when Aishwarya Rai & Bipasha Basu showed off their well toned female form in Dhoom 2. A few other actresses followed suit after that like Esha Deol. And now Kareena Kapoor has joined the list. She is so happy with her results that she shows it off to all those interested in the video for Tashan -- Chaliya (note: the following is only a clip of the song).

At the video's start, she emerges from the ocean in a yellow bikini and the camera ensures we get a good look. And in case someone missed the view, director Vijay Krishna Acharya ensures the camera goes back for a second and third look.

Ofcourse, the six pack rush in the male actors was given another lease of life last year when Shah Rukh Khan decided to beef up and showed off his results as well in Om Shanti Om:

---

Religion & Inspiration:
Bhavna Talwar's Dharm received a good deal of buzz last year. Even though the film is beautifully shot, the story of a Hindu priest's values being tested was a bit weak for me. In fact, one could see where the conflict points would take place in the story long time before they happened. And also, the sermon in the end was good natured enough but once again common place in Indian movies.

I was looking forward to seeing my first film from Gautam Ghosh -- Yatra. Unfortunately, my severe disappointment with the film leaves me with little words to say. I like the overall framework of a writer's life and the writer attempting to visit his muse again, but when the inspiration was to be found in the kothas (brothel), I lost interest as this was a topic covered enough times in Hindi films since the 60's.

---

From Bombay to Bangkok, India to Thailand:

Nagesh Kukunoor's 1998 film Hyderabad Blues was a breath of fresh air. It was a good film put together on a shoe string budget. I missed his second film Rockford but Kukunoor took a major mis-step with 2001's Bollywood Calling, his parody about the Bollywood film industry. He brushed that failure aside and delivered a very poetic film in 2003 with 3 Deewarein. However after that he delivered a dud in Hyderabad Blues 2, a needless sequel to his debut film. A sweet coming of age cricket film in 2005 (Iqbal) was followed by his most mature film to date in 2006 with the emotionally touching Dor. So I was curious to see how his new flick Bombay to Bangkok would fare.

In essence the film is sort of half-way between his best and worst works. There are some promising moments, a very honest performance from Shreyas Talpade (who stars in his 3rd straight Kukunoor film) and some hilarious characters like the wanna be rapper son of a gangster (Naseeruddin Shah plays another don). Kukunoor tips a nod towards Iqbal and includes a replica scene from that movie in a moment when Talpade runs onto some hay to the background of music from Iqbal.

What I liked most about the movie is the title, as it indicates the next country in my Asian film spotlight: Thailand.

---

Film (Year, Director): Rating:

Mithya (2008, Rajat Kapoor): 9

Super Star (2008, Rohit Jugraj): 7.5

A Peck on the Cheek (2002, Mani Ratnam): 8.5

Valley of Flowers (2006, Pan Nalin): 8.5

Tashan (2008, Vijay Krishna Acharya): 4.5

Yatra (2006, Gautam Ghosh): 5

Dharm (2007, Bhavna Talwar): 6.5

Bombay to Bangkok (2008, Nagesh Kukunoor): 6.5

Notes on recent films

District 13 (Director, Pierre Morel): Rating 7/10

Luc Besson is an industry in himself. Over the last two decades, he has been responsible for some very interesting films and characters (Léon to name one), which have led to other copy cat films and series spin offs (Le Femme Nikita). But in the last few years, he has been doing more writing and producing a series of action packed films. The genre films come garnished with some touches that only Besson could do. The fast paced action scenes are centered around a typical good-evil-revenge story yet the unique characters and sometimes a few twists make most Besson films fun to watch. The same could be said for District 13 -- it is fast paced, with a pinch of humour, contains unique situations and is overall enjoyable. The film is set in Paris 2010, a city that has still not learned how to deal with its differences. Following the riots in 2005, the film shows a scenario in the future where the French government erects walls and separates the neighborhoods into districts. People know which district to stay away from. The interesting aspect of the film is the angle where the government admits its failure and comes up with a wicked plan to ‘cleanse’ the problem. Given the current world situation, this evil solution is entirely possible. In fact, a few countries have tried it in the past. The film also clocks in just over 80 minutes, ensuring that the lean-thin story does not overstay its welcome.

The House of Sand (Director, Andrucha Waddington): Rating 10/10

I must be a sucker for Brazilian films. I sometimes get hooked emotionally and can’t get the film out of my system. Such happened with Cinema, Aspirins and Vultures, The Middle of the World and even Central Station. The simple stories of a journey combined with stunning landscapes seems to do me in. In the case of House of Sand the landscape could not be more poetic and isolated – white sanded desert surrounded by the ocean on one side. The rain fills the lagoons in the desert and threatens to erode away the houses standing on the sand. Ofcourse, when the wind kicks in, the sand becomes a force to deal with and it threatens to enter and take over a house. This battle of the house vs sand sounds like The Woman of the dunes but on the DVD interview, the director mentions he was inspired by a real life story of a Brazilian woman who tried to prevent the sand from taking over her house. And when she died, the sand moved in and swallowed up the house. In this film’s story, it too is women trying to fight with the sand.

The story opens in 1910, when a husband takes his pregnant wife, mother-in-law and a band of followers to live in the desolate white desert in Northern Brazil. However, through a series of incidents, the husband dies, the followers run away and the women are left to fend for themselves. Their first instinct is to get away but that proves to be a difficult task. When an opportunity to leave presents itself, the mother, Maria (Fernanda Montenegro) decides they should wait because her daughter Áurea (Fernanda Torres) will soon give birth. We next find the two women 8-9 years in the future, in 1919, the year of the Eclipse. Áurea has given birth to Maria who is now about 8 years old. Once again, Áurea carves an opportunity to escape but when returns home to fetch her mother and daughter, the sand has destructed their house leaving the mother dead. But young Maria has survived and the chance for escape goes. Eventually, Áurea grows old and at the start of World War II finds another chance to escape. This time however, she has found a reason to stay (love with Massu) and sends Maria off. Finally, Maria returns to find her mother in the year that man landed on the moon.

Besides the stunning landscape, the genius of this story is getting real life mother-daughter Fernanda Montenegro & Fernanda Torres to play multiple roles. Montenegro plays 3 roles – the mother, then she plays an older Áurea and finally she plays a 58 old year old Maria (Áurea’s daughter). Torres plays Áurea and a 28 year old Maria. This is a great move because it shows that no matter how much children are different from their parents, they reflect an aspect of their parents. In this case, the physical similarity is pitted against the stagnant desert and makes for a great character-study. In the end, when Maria returns and tells her mother, Áurea, that man has landed on the moon, Áurea asks what man has found on the moon. “Nothing” replies Maria, nothing except “sand”. We see a smile on an aging Áurea’s face and the camera than moves back to let us see the moon shining on the white desert, making the entire desert look like the moon’s surface. This really is a movie that if one is not in the mood for, they will not like. In fact, the first 10-15 minutes are probably the most dull but after that, the epic battle of sand vs humans takes over. Ofcourse, there is a raw sex scene thrown in the movie which changes the relationship between Áurea and her 8 year old daughter Maria and results in Maria growing up to be a wild passionate woman, willing to throw herself at anyone. In fact, it is that wild passionate side of Maria’s personality that gains her freedom from the desert.

Guru (Director, Mani Ratnam): Rating 8.5/10

Little more than 12 hours after I finished seeing House of Sand, I saw Mani Ratnam’s latest flick, the much anticipated Guru. The good thing is this Bollywood film does meet the expectations in some regards and even exceeds it in a way. When it comes to acting, no one could have expected such a fine performance from Abhishek Bachchan. This is clearly his film and he owns every frame. At the peak of his character, Guru’s, powerful speech, Abhishek’s voice sounds like his father’s. That is inevitable but one can’t help but think that it is Amitabh himself delivering those dialogues. Besides Abhishek, the rest of the cast rise to the occasion as well - -Aishwarya Rai has given one of her best performances in years, Madhavan has a short but strong role and Mithun is a real delight. Mithun Chakraborty is certainly aging gracefully and his tender yet principled role is an ideal foil to Guru’s cold ruthless capitalist ways.

A.R Rahman’s music is soothing, the visual are stunning (Istanbul and India look just beautiful). But my problem with this film is the same as I had with Rang De Basanti. There is something which still holds back certain Bollywood films from greatness. Both these films contain an underlying message that is misguided and feels wrong. In both films, the main character(s) are shown to be heroes yet they are misguided but the movie still glorifies them. In Rang De Basanti the youth clearly have the wrong idea but the story only fuels their naivety. Guru on the other hand is shown to be a clever businessman but he bends the rules too frequently. In return, he blames the government. Yet, he could have met the government’s needs while still expanding his company to reap profits. But I suppose the argument is that no company can ever grow at such a rapid pace without breaking some law – be it moral, ethical or even environmental. Even the judges in Guru can’t make their mind up if Guru is a thug or a genius. In my opinion, Guru is a capitalist thug. So should I slam the movie for that reason? Not really. But I have to take some points off for the needless Turkish cabaret song at the start of the film with Mallika Sherawat. Mallika can’t belly dance, in fact her extras did a far superior job than her. But the problem is the majority of the Indian male public does not care for her dancing ability and will be preoccupied with her other assests. Still, her cameo is one of the film’s weakest elements.

Dhoom 2 (did someone really direct this?): Rating 5/10

If the movie only had Abhiskek, Hrithik and Aishwarya in it and a few badly choreographed motorcycle and action scenes were removed, then this film would have been much better. Uday Chopra can’t act and is a waste in any film. Ofcourse, he had to be in this movie because he was in the first film and his brother is the film’s producer. He takes away enough negative points from this cocktail mix of Hollywood films.

Woh Lahme (Director, Mohit Suri): Rating 8/10

I am not sure how much of this film is based on fact and how much is fiction. Aspects are based on Mahesh Bhatt’s relationship with the once legendary Parveen Babi, but where is the line between fact and fiction? It is clear that some scenes in the film are about Mahesh wishing he had done more to help Parveen. It really was a sad fate to learn that the once hot starlet died a lonely death last year, with a full 2 days passing by before anyone knew of her death. Mohit Suri has done a great job of translating Mahesh’s tender story and giving it a powerful treatment. Both Kangana Ranaut & Shiney Ahuja are very good, with Kangana giving a tender performance of an actresses struggling to deal with her inner demons. While Maine Gandhi ko Nahin Mera dealt with a similar topic, Woh Lahme gives a horrific in the face view of what it is like to be trapped in a tormented mind. And on top of that, this film contains one of the best Bollywood songs I have heard in years – ‘Mujhe Pyar Hai’ and its remixed version are just too good to turn away from.

Zatracení, The Damned (Director, Dan Svátek): Rating 4.5/10

Nothing to praise about this low budget Czech film about an innocent prey caught smuggling heroin out of Thailand. The only redeeming aspect is the film within film aspect where a character tries to save his half-brother by putting together archive footage of his brother’s time in Thailand. The acting is substandard and even though the footage idea is interesting, it gets dull after a while.

End of November wrap-up

Seven films ended this month’s movie watching. No specific criteria was used to pick the films but just an assorted collection of English and Foreign movies. Not a bad set in the end.

Roja (1992, directed by Mani Ratnam):

It took me almost 14 years to get around to watch this film. However, this was one of those movies that I knew so much about despite not having seen it. I had heard the songs, watched the music videos and had seen quite a few enough movie clips that I didn’t feel a need to see it. But I was repeatedly reminded that this movie had to be seen. I am glad for all those reminders because this is indeed a movie that has to be seen. When this film first came out, not many in Northern India had heard of A.R Rahman, Santosh Sivan, P.K Mishra or even Mani Ratnam. But Roja changed all that. Rahman’s music has truly reached the far corners of the world, past the Indian borders; P.K Mishra’s offbeat lyrics have generated a lot of musical hits; Santosh Sivan’s cinematography has garnered a few awards for him on the global scene and he also tried his venture at film directing both for independent and commercial films. And Mani Ratnam went onto make Bombay which truly shone the spotlight on him in Indian cinema.

But what of Roja? Somewhere in between the songs and the love story lies a beautiful political debate about a topic that the world ignored until 2001. Terrorism, Freedom fighters, militants and insurgents were terms that have existed for the longest time but the West (especially America) chose to not openly use such terms because it had no need to. Ethnic cleansing and proxy wars were conducted in Kashmir in the 1990’s with the aid of the Taliban but it went under the radar so to speak. While Roja got plenty of respect in India, no one really cared for it outside the country. An Indian plane was hijacked on the eve of 2000 and the hijackers demanded to be flown to Khandhar where they fled to safety after killing an innocent person on board. What did the world do? Nothing! India was left to clean up the mess while the rest of the world got drunk and celebrated the new century. And then more than a year later, 2 buildings fell and everything changed. Did everything change? Did terrorists not exist in Kashmir before that? Did a corrupt regime not support and train young "freedom fighters" to kill innocent people? The same corrupt regime became an ally in the "war on terror" after 2001 (or as Borat calls it "war of terror"). But I am getting off-tangent here. This film also contains another topic that the West will start exploring more via films in the upcoming years – kidnapping of innocent victims to demand release of terrorist prisoners. Roja shows how militants (freedom fighters, terrorists, whatever they are called) kidnap an innocent person (engineer) and use him as a bargaining chip to get their leader released in exchange. Back in 1993, it might have seemed unrealistic that the Indian government would release a terrorist in order to save an innocent person’s life but that is exactly what happened on the eve of 2000 when the families of the kidnapped plane victims urged the government to release the terrorists in exchange for their loved films.

What makes Roja incredibly interesting is that the film attempts to have a dialogue on the topic of jihad and whether violence is justified or not. An interesting scenario added in the film occurs when young kashmiri youth crossing the border into Pakistan to get training in the terrorist camps are gunned down by the Pakistani army by mistake. Was it really a mistake? Or was it another instance of the double-sided political game being played? The film ends on a note of slight optimism, but unfortunately, optimism is something not found when it comes to the Kashmir debate nowadays. One can’t change the course of events – proxy wars once started can’t be un-stopped. But atleast this film will stand as being one of the first few movies (since the 1990’s) to tackle a very common topic nowadays, although the effort slants a bit towards the commercial.

Note: the film suffers from poor dubbing. In order to make this film more accessible to the Indian market, it was dubbed in Hindi and leads to mangled dialogues in some scenes.

Premonition (2004, directed by Norio Tsuruta): Rating 6/10

Watching Japanese horror films post Ring and Ju-On is a mixed experience One tries to watch a different story yet one can’t help shake the sense of familiarity that exists in most frames. The same techniques, the impending doom that is about to unfold and a terrified face waiting to greet its victim. In this film, a newspaper has the ability to predict people’s death. The newspaper merely serves as a warning but if someone acts on the headlines and tries to change the future, they will end up in an infinite cycle of their worst nightmares.

The Assassination of Richard Nixon (directed by Niels Mueller): Rating 9/10

This is Sean Penn’s film. He is an almost every frame and carries this film with his fine acting of a troubled person stuck in a corrupt and insane world.

Remember me, my love (2003, directed by Gabriele Muccino): Rating 8.5/10

A family of four yet each person is their own island. The father hates his career and life; the mother aspires to be an actor and wishes she never game up on her dreams after marriage; the teenage son is frustrated with not getting the girl he loves and the 18 year old daughter is willing to do anything to get on tv. A soap opera in one sense but yet, I was drawn to this film. Plenty of scenes capture the perfect loneliness that a family can go through and no matter what age a person is at, they still long for that innocent happiness they once knew they could have had.

Take the Lead (directed by Liz Friedlander): Rating 7.5/10

The trailers made this film look like two clichés in one – a high-school dance story combined with the element of an inspirational teacher helping troubled high school kids. But the trailers were wrong. The teacher is not a paid member of staff, he is someone from the community who volunteers his time to help the kids. The film is a fictional story based on the real life work of Pierre Dulaine (played by Antonio Banderas in the film) who believed that teaching ballroom dancing to kids will give them dignity and teach them how to respect other people. The film was fun to watch, even though it felt clichéd at times.

I Can’t Sleep(1994, directed by Claire Denis): Rating 9/10

This film deserves a longer write-up. Every frame contains enough action to give us an insight into the complicated racial & cosmopolitan Parisian life. Two brothers, one a struggling musician and the other a transvestite dancer, a newly arrived Lithuanian citizen and a series of murders! Yet Denis knows what to show and what we need to understand ourselves. Everything is not laid out for us but we have to decipher what is going on. And that is what makes this such a rich watching experience.

Little Jerusalem (directed by Karin Albou): Rating 8.5/10

Paris again, but a completely world from the one Denis focused on. This one deals with questions of philosophy, religion and the morality of sexual relations from a Jewish point of view. The philosophy is European (Kant’s need for routines) and the main character is caught between her love for philosophy and her need to live within her religious boundaries.