The Names of Love

I liked the concept of the film The Names of Love (the French title is Le Nom des Gens, The Name of People): a very French romantic comedy where the heroine is passionate about politics and her endeavor is to convert fascist men, or her view of a fascist man, by seducing one at a time. She even has a scrap book detailing her conversions. No Hollywood film would mix romantic comedy with a bit of fascism. Right away, though, she mistakes an old-fashioned man named Arthur Martin for a conservative – he’s actually a socialist (I don’t Hollywood even allows socialists to be in films). Anyway, a very screwball romantic comedy ensues. In some ways it is formulaic comedy but in many ways it isn’t at all. I liked it.

2011 Foreign Language Oscar movies Update

This year I had in mind to watch the entire cadre of Oscar nominated foreign language films. Admittedly, I have only seen one so far. I have had them on my Netflix queue for months but keep pushing the down in the order. Watching a foreign language film takes a little more of my brain power than I have lately, especially after a long day of hanging out with middle school students. I thought I was going to get the original Upstairs, Downstairs, but for some crazy reason, there is a long wait for that. Really America? People are going nuts for Upstairs, Downstairs these days – and not even the new one. Anyway, I finally ended up with I am Love, the Italian nominated film with Tilda Swinton, speaking Italian. It’s a doozy! It begins with a formal family dinner with the mega-rich Reccci family where cracks in the beautiful family demeanor become apparent. The cracks become chasms as the film progresses. The way the movie is filmed is interesting. Long, languorous shots of empty rooms or bees buzzing over flowers, for example. It also a lot about passion and love as the title suggests, but it all seems very chaste, until whoza, a very revealing sex scene, which seemed out of place, I thought. It’s a pretty fascinating film, overall, and it’s good to watch a movie that pushes the boundaries of what you think film should do. So, I’ll get working on the rest of the list (see below) I believe Biutiful is next.

2011 Oscar Nominees for best Foreign Language Film

I am Love, Italy
Dogtooth, Greece
Biutiful, Mexico
In A Better World, Denmark
Incendies, Canada,
Outside the Law, Algeria

Sugar

Sugar is either a baseball movie about a Dominican or an immigrant movie about a guy who plays baseball. After training in the Dominican Republic, Sugar leaves his family and a simpler life to strive for his dream of playing baseball with the Yankees. I won’t tell you the ending, but it is not predictable. The movie spotlights what it must be like for a non English speaker to come to a place like Iowa (where he plays on a minor league team) and try to assimilate. The boy/ man who plays Sugar is a real Dominican played by Algenis Perez Soto, and he’s very charming and is able to show his sense of displacement with just a look. We get to experience America through his intense stares. There are moments in the movie where you almost don’t want to watch it anymore because you fear the worst for Sugar and you want the best for him, but I’m glad I made it to the end. So, baseball fans, and fans of a quality American made movies in Spanish, I think you would like this movie. By the way, the directing/writing team behind this movie were also behind the great movie Half Nelson, a favorite movie of mine.

I also saw Beauty in Trouble, a Czech movie about a troubled marriage. The fact that it was a foreign movie and was supposed to be pretty good did not make it so. Another movie that I watched so you don’t have to. 

Departures, Guest Entry

Mary asked me to write a movie review which is quite unusual, as I don't watch all that many movies, and I'm jaded enough that it takes a lot to get me to rave over one. But Saturday night I had the opportunity to see 'Departures', a Japanese film well worth watching.


Here is what one reviewer had to say:


Winner of the 2008 Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film: "DEPARTURES" is an exquisite look into a man whose professional career takes an unexpected turn into the world of preparing dead bodies for funerals. The movie is a brilliant and seamless blending of several different themes: how people deal with loss and tragedy (the funeral scenes are quite moving); how the living cling to life through food, music and human contact - and how they instinctively avoid anything to do with dying until it is unavoidable, and how indeed it can be quite messy in several different ways. "moving and absorbing.


My take? One of the best movies I have seen, if not ever, then in a long,long time. The story line was interesting and, as mentioned in the above review, there are several themes addressed within a novel arena. On one hand, it is the story of a young man in the midst of traumatic and transforming career and personal change, and the way he and those he loves deal with it. But the major theme is death. The funeral scenes are sad, funny, but most of all transfixing: a look at the compassion and ceremony surrounding preparation of the dead in a culture somewhat different than our own. I left feeling warmed, hopeful, and enriched. Pretty hot stuff for a six dollar Saturday night in Zumbrota.


My one major complaint was the quality of the subtitles. They were in white lettering which often played against a light background, making some of the lines unreadable. The viewer was still able to understand what was happening, but it was distracting at times, and I would have liked a clearer, easier read.

A reviewer of this film on the website 'Spirituality and Practice' wrote: English novelist and poet D. H. Lawrence once observed: "The human soul needs beauty even more than it needs bread." When we left this film, we exclaimed, "It is just so beautiful!

by my friend Julie

I Have Loved You So Long/ Sycheadaofjwoe

Guest blogger: N. Huelster
First attempt: Schenechdote(?); I was warned by a professor that this film was trying too hard to be "meta," was pretentious and not worth seeing. Giving it a try, however, proved this to be true. The name is similar to the name of the town in Upstate New York where the film takes place, but is a word meaning "a trope where a part is used to refer to its whole," which is supposed to explain the connection between the play within the film, I think, but frankly, the whole film is so messed up that I couldn't understand what the director was going for. The psyche of the main character is painful to witness from the start of the movie, and after his wife leaves him, and his health begins to deteriorate, it only becomes more and more painful to watch. Not only this, the effects of Kaufman's mixing of the fantastic with the real is lost in this flop, whereas in "Eternal Sunshine" it served the characters and the story to make a superb (and meta) film. Fastforwarded the last hour, it was my favorite part.
Second attempt: Il y'a Longtemps Que Je T'aime; French film starring English actress Kristen Scott Thomas. This was a good film, exploring the reunion of two sisters after one is released from fifteen years in prison for murdering her son. Throughout the film we learn her reason for doing it, and it turns out not to be the horrific act of violence that sustains much of the tension throughout the unfolding story- her introduction into her sister's new family, a new job, and new acquaintances on the other side of the prison wall to face (and to face her guilt). Thomas' character is bleak, and mysterious, and her relationship with her sister and her family reveals in the end what her true guilt really was. I at first liked the story for its sympathetic look at mental illness/ prison, but in the end the twist surrounding Thomas' crime gives the story a new depth. Bien!

Hodge Podge

I have actually seen four movies in the last week, but haven't been keeping up very well with ye olde blog. So here's a quick synopsis starting with last Friday night when I was watching a DVD with my niece Holly . . .
Charlie Wilson's War: Holly could barely pay attention to this political movie, what with all the texting and facebooking. I tried my best but also was a little distracted by the world of the Internet. And quite frankly it was a tad boring. I thought the concept, a war started in Afghanistan by huge American egos, was fascinating and learned a something, but I had trouble sustaining my attention. Tom Hanks and Phillip Seymour Hoffman were good in it, though.
Rachel Getting Married: I dragged Holly and three friends to this movie and regretted it. One friend said, "I never would have seen that movie if I knew what it was about." All four found it to be a real downer. Yet, I wanted to see it -- you know my penchant for anything Indie. Sure it was depressing and odd all at the same time. Oh, and irritating, note the bizarre dishwasher filling competition, and you will wonder what the deal is with these psuedo-intellectual weirdos. Yet, I thought Anne Hathaway was really good in it, and there were some genuine moments in the film and some really good music. Oh, and some annoying music too. The genuine moment came in the cold way Hathaway's mother played by Debra Winger politely dismissed her daughter as she left the reception -- that was painful to watch. So sorry friends for putting you through that, but you know.
In Bruges: is a violent black comedy with Colin Ferrel, Brendan Gleeson, and Ralph Fiennes, and it really was violent, but also funny. I couldn't imagine how a story of three paid assassins who have a strange holiday in Bruges, could possibly be funny, but it is. Worth seeing. and Bruges is incredibly beautiful.
Jodhaa Akbar: Finally, today I saw a 16th century, three hour Hindustani epic with subtitles. How does that grab you? Well, if you want to learn a little about Indian history in a toned down Bollywood style, you might like this, but I doubt it.

After the Wedding

My cousin Clare recommended After the Wedding so of course I had to see it. It is a Danish film that begins and ends in India but takes place mostly in Denmark. The plot is so compelling, that you really can't do anything while watching the movie except read the subtitles and watch the great acting. (No crosswords can be completed) I can't reveal anything here without spoiling the film for you but suffice it to say it is surprising. The lead actor Mads Mikkelsen is quite something to look at, I don't usually think of such a stern looking man as so handsome. The movie does get a tad too melodramatic at times, perhaps too soap opera-ish, but it's a page turner movie-style. Thanks Clare for the recommendation.

La Vie En Rose

I finally got a chance to see La Vie En Rose, the biopic about Edith Piaf. I have Piaf's music on my iPod and play it for my students from time to time, much to their wonderment. And, I guess, I was a little leery about watching the movie, maybe for the same reason I never saw Angela's Ashes; I loved this book so much and had read that the movie was a dour remake of the original; I didn't want the movie to ruin my vision of the book. When I heard that La Vie En Rose focused on Piaf's train wreck of a life, I was leery. Despite these reservations, the movie was fascinating and the lead actress, Marion Cotillard, is captivating and impossible not to watch.

Paris, Je T'aime

You may have noticed that I am attracted to movies with certain characteristics. I watch a lot of independent films, movies with certain actors I like (Ryan Gosling or Mark Ruffalo, Juliette Binoche to name a few), and of course, movies about France or movies in French; I'm a bit of a Francophile. I like other than French foreign films usually (when I am up for subtitles), but gravitate the the French ones in particular. So Paris, Je T'aime was right up my alley; it combines France, French, independent film with Juliette Binoche, what else could you ask for? It's a collection of short films shot in Paris and about love. An amazing array of well known directors and actors take part in the project. Directors such as Gus Van Sant, Wes Craven, the Coen brothers and many more and actors such as Steve Buscemi, Rufus Sewell, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Elijah Wood, Gena Rowlands and Natalie Portman. About half of it is in French. Some of the films are truly memorable, some truly strange, and some truly forgettable. As I watched these short films I was amazed at how easily the directors can present a story in sometimes just 5 minutes. So if you want to slog through a unique movie and find some gems, you might enjoy Paris, Je T'aime.

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is about a 42 year old French man who has a stroke and becomes paralyzed, unable to talk. He communicates through blinking his eye as a nurse goes through the letters of the alphabet. He writes a whole book like this (the book is what the movie is based on). It's pretty amazing. I would definitely not call this movie action-packed, but pretty interesting.

Moliere

Moliere is about the great French playwright who wrote in the mid 1600s and entertained the royal court with his farces. The movie is comedic and tries to be like the farces that Moliere wrote, lots of silly coincidences and broad characters. The actor who plays Moliere is Romain Duris who is funny and expressive does hilarious impressions (check out one particularly funny one of horses); there is also something kinda sexy about Duris in a waifish guy kinda way. ((My mother thought the man who played the absurd Mr. Jourdain was a better actor.) My seven-year old nephew, who can't even really read the subtitles, thought the movie was funny, "I liked the part where that guy fell off the horse." My mother really enjoyed it a lot and said that when we heard Moliere's farcical comments we all laughed. Also she enjoyed the cinematography, the movie is set in beautiful and grand rooms and includes incredible scenery.

Weird romance meets the G8 conference

I found another odd movie at the library. (You gotta love your local library!) It's called The Girl in the Cafe, and it is strange in that it is about a May-December romance and discussions of world poverty with the back drop of Iceland and the G8 conference. Bill Nighy, a great comedic actor who was was the aging rocker in Love Actually, plays Lawrence who works in finance for the British government and is trying to push for more aid to 3rd world countries, meanwhile he meets Gina, played by Kelly McDonald (beautiful actress who pops up in your odd British comedy now and again) in a cafe and a really odd, hesitant romance begins. It seems odd they are together and stranger still that she becomes an activist of sorts right in the middle of their tryst in Iceland. I'm glad I saw it but not necessarily worth seeing if your movie watching time is short.

I'd like to start some kind of ratings system for movies I see, but not sure how to go about it. Any thoughts, loyal readers :) All 2 or 3 of you.