| Why are people such dicks |
[06 Jan 2010|12:49am] |
I entered the following to see what people search for, and man, why is everyone so negative? People, everywhere, overwhelmingly are douches.
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| Review of "Pushpak", "Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye!", "Gulaal" |
[06 Jan 2010|12:12am] |
Pushpak (Srinivasa Rao, 1988)
IMDB Link
I spent around twenty minutes looking for subtitles for the movie until I read somewhere on the net that the film did not have any dialogue.
An Indian film without any dialogue? That sounds absurd! Silence has never exactly been a Bollywood trait, so it did not cross my mind that a 1988 film was made without dialogues! Strange.
The film is comedy and for a while the film is pure gold. We are introduced to a university graduate, who is unemployed, and very poor. Some of initial scenes were hilarious. The man cannot afford to pay for a full cup of tea, so he only gets half a cup, and he drops in buttons and other junk in it, to raise the level of the drink, to make it appear full.
Eventually, the film goes for its main plot. The man finds a millionaire drunk on the roads, so he takes him home, and ties him up. He then uses the millionaire’s hotel key and lives in the hotel room, and uses the millionaire’s money to change his life. In the process he falls in love with a magician’s daughter and is followed by a hitman that is mistaking him for the millionaire. At a length of more than two hours, the film tries too much. Even a no-dialogue Indian film seems to fall in Indian cinema’s biggest mistake, which is trying to put too much in a film.
By cutting out the dialogue, the movie would have benefited from some other restraints. The hitman subplot could have been completely removed and the film probably had 45 minutes of it chopped off, and the finished good could have been a timeless comedy. Unfortunately, it’s not.
3/5
Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye! (Banerjee, 2008)
IMDB Link
The film works purely based on Abhay Deol’s depiction of the character of Lucky. Lucky is a mastermind thief that can steal anything.
But wait, the way I wrote it, makes it seem like he is a breaking into banks and museums, using cool techniques and gadgets, and going after rare diamonds or paintings. No, no, Lucky steals cars from the roads and stuff from people’s houses. He does it all the old-fashioned, simple ways. Jumping over walls.
But what makes Lucky so fascinating and successful is his charm and confidence. His boyish, angelic look does not people suspicious and he uses that to his advantage. He does not sneak around, hiding in the dark and being stealthy. He does it all in the open, easily walking in and out of houses, and I like it because it rings true. If one walks out of the house, in the light of day, holding a TV, no one will think that the person is stealing it. It’s just too normal for it to be criminal, and Lucky does all his acts with such calmness and gentleness about it, that it is easy not to be suspicious.
Lucky became a successful thief, but with his attitude and style, he could have been good at almost anything. Well, we might not notice someone like Lucky robbing us blind, but let’s at least keep an open eye to films like this, and not allow it to pass us by.
4/5
Gulaal (Kashyap, 2009)
IMDB Link
Its political themes, messages, and questions it raises are brilliant. As a film, it mostly fails. And that’s “Gulaal”, the equivalent of an intellectual writing a political book, might be brilliant in its ideas, but a shitty read.
The problem with “Gulaal” is you can feel it straining under its multiple sub-plots and characters and ideas, and while some directors are able to balance them out well, Anurag Kashyap is not one of them.
The film is about a political royalist group that wants to regain power in India. Dileep rents a room in a hostel as he is joining university to study law. Dileep is a mild-mannered, young man and soon becomes part of the circle of the political group. He is surrounded by shady politicians that are using him and others for their own political gains and rivaled against another political group of people that are as corrupted as they are. Both groups will go to any lengths to make sure they gain some success in the democratic system.
Director Kashyap fails mainly with his handling of Dileep. The film is supposed to be about him, given the focus he is given towards the end, but the film loses focus, and never really develops him, so his transformation and character decisions he takes never really clicks with me.
With the current political situation in Iran, a lot of what was said in the film sounded familiar to me, and I was very much impressed by its strong messages. But it just needed to have a stronger handle on its character and allowed them to develop more and maybe then the film would have turned out better.
3/5
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| Now where was I |
[04 Jan 2010|04:57pm] |
Duo and tacos for ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) tankshallkill
I've been putting up a doodle or two for each card on my tumblr,
so check it out if you're sketchily inclined!
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| Review of "Women in Love", "K-20: Legend of the Mask" |
[05 Jan 2010|12:26am] |
Women in Love (Russell, 1969)
IMDB Link
The most famous scene in the film is one where Gerald and Rupert, two good friends, wrestle naked. It is the most homoerotic scene you can probably watch without any actual sex, and I would go as far as to say that it adds a masculine dimension to sexual tension and love between men. Their wrestling is akin to love making without the actual sex.
Their relationship is never actually homosexual, nor would I say it is secretly supposed to be. I will get to that a bit later, but first. The film, based on a D. H. Lawrence novel by the same name, deals with love. While the film is mainly about the relationship of two women with two other men, it does digress to other paths too. The heterosexual love itself is not conventional in any sense, because neither we nor the characters know if they are ever in love or trying to fall in love.
“I want the finality of love”, Rupert says to Gerald, talking about needing to love women. “I find that one needs one single pure activity. I would call love a single pure activity.”
“If there is no woman, then there’s nothing?”
“More or less”, says Rupert, “seeing there’s no God.”
“Finality of love” is a good phrase. We don’t want the process necessarily, but that final stamp, that period at the end of a sentence, the closure of your completeness. We need to feel complete and only love can make us feel that.
But can that work? The people involved in the film are never happy. Even when they seem to be happy, you can almost sense that it is just pretend. Rupert also loves Gerald and wants him, but not as a replacement for his wife. “You are enough for me, as far as a woman is concerned. You are all women to me”, Rupert tells his wife. “But I wanted a man friend, as eternal, as you and I are eternal.”
4/5
K-20: Legend of the Mask [K-20: Kaijin niju menso den] (Shimako Sato, 2008)
IMDB Link
It would have been more interesting to watch “K-20: Legend of the Mask” on the big screen and maybe a decade and a half ago, not only because it would have been more fun to see it when I was younger but it just does not seem to fit very well in 2008. There are two kinds of action-adventures nowadays. Dark and broody or light and tongue in cheek. This film is neither. It’s like Paul McCartney’s “Silly Love Songs”. “K-20” is out to be an action-adventure film and it does not care if it has been done before.
The movie is set in an alternative Japan, one which World War II never happened and Japan did not lose its imperialism. I’m not sure exactly why this alternative Japan was envisioned, since the era is 1949. They could just as well have placed it a few years back, and a Japan where WW2 never happened would have held true without needing to have a “what-if” scenario. The only reason for the alternative universe seems to have creators create a slightly steam-punk version of Japan. I kind of want to compare the world to “Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow” but I have not watched it, so my comparison might be inaccurate.
In this alternative universe, there is a criminal called K-20, someone who is stealing valuable items and is looking for a rumor machine called the Telsa machine that can destroy any spot on earth by just punching in its coordinates. Endo is a good natured, lower-class, circus acrobat and gets framed for K-20’s acts. Endo is rescued from jail, and with the help of an old man thief and an upper class, pampered young woman, he has to clear his name, stop K-20, and save alternative Japan and alternative world.
It is silly and entertaining, and I guess, some people wanna fill the world with silly action-adventure movies, and what’s wrong with that? I’d like to know.
3/5
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| Review of "Goodbye Solo", "An Education", "Broken Embraces" |
[04 Jan 2010|07:52pm] |
Goodbye Solo (Bahrani, 2008)
IMDB Link With his first three films very well critically received by critics, Ramin Bahrani is non-surprisingly being touted as a great American director. I did not like his first two films as much as other people and I did not watch “Goodbye Solo” as a Bahrani film, because I did not know until the film finished and I saw his name. The film deals with two characters. An optimistic African immigrant as a cab driver and his relationship with an older, white man as the passenger. Is this “Driving Miss Daisy” Bahrani style?
Not really, but that comparison still had to be made, for no particular reason. The black guy, Solo, is paid by the passenger, William, to take him to Blowing Rock in a week’s (or so, don’t remember the exact timeframe) time. Blowing Rock is a very high cliff and Solo realizes that William wants to go there to commit suicide. During the few days, Solo imposes himself on William, trying to befriend him, be nice to him, and prevent him from going ahead.
The story is a battle of two human natures, in itself, both very similar. Solo wants to help the man, regardless of who the man is. It is his nature to help people and his need to help someone comes before his knowledge of the person. And Williams wants to die, he does not need help or asks for it. These two people are acting out of something internal. Solo wants to help and Williams does not need help and both act in a way that does not matter who the other person actually is. Strip away all your preconceptions and see that both are acting through purely selfish reasons.
Like the other Bahrani movies, I was not fully won over at first. I did not like some of the plot devices (such as a character finding the other character’s diary and reading it aloud for our benefit) and I do not think Bahraini is really that good at directing his actors. But then something won me over. I don’t like the director’s comments or other reviewers affecting my perception of a movie, but there are always exceptions. Roger Ebert has talked to Ramin Bahrani and something the director said stuck with me. He says he asks the same question of all his characters. “How do you live in this world?”
And that’s a beautiful question. Of all the people who live in this world, from all walks of life, and all ages, it’s THE question to ask. How do you live in this world?With that in my mind, I went over the film in my head and liked it more. Bahrani cheated, but I’ll forgive him. I hope he continues asking the question.
4/5
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An Education (Scherfig, 2009)
IMDB Link Nick Hornby has always been the kind of author whose books have been decent adaptations, a rarity in cinema. The adaptation of his “High Fidelity” was amazing and on my list (of what, I’m not sure, but on some List of some category to decide later) and to my shock and surprise, I liked both “About a Boy” and “Fever Pitch”, considering the former had Hugh Grant and the latter Drew Barrymore, not exactly actors that draw me to the cinema.
“An Education” has, thankfully, no such rom-com actor to be a barrier to it for me. It is early 60s in England and Jenny (Carey Mulligan) is a smart, sixteen year old girl in high school who is smart, articulate, and is trying to get into Oxford. One day she meets a charming older man who befriends and seduces her, and gains both the trust of her and her family. Don’t worry, this older man, David (Peter Sarsgaard), is not going to kidnap her and sell her to sex slavery. It is well-handled love affair, understanding why Jenny falls for him, understanding why David falls for her, and understanding why the family allows it. Jenny is smart, David is charming, and the family, while protective, are simple and want the best for Jenny.
The “An Education” in the title, I guess, refers to Jenny’s education from this relationship. She is at a confusing stage in her life and cannot understand the benefits of her normal school education when it seems that outside the life she had experienced, there is a new, exciting world of concerts and Jazz bars and Paris.
Earlier in my review, when I mentioned Jenny, I put Carey Mulligan in the brackets. Try to remember that name if you can, because she really MAKES the film. She is lovely in the film, both smart and clever, has a passion for life, and her laugh is infectious. It is very easy to understand why an older man wants someone like a character played by Mulligan. She makes her into someone that is LIVELY and full of LIFE, something adulthood slowly erodes away.
4/5
Broken Embraces [Los abrazos rotos] (Almodóvar, 2009)
IMDB Link
When I watched Pedro Almodovar’s, critic darling, 2004 film, “Bad Education”, I was left so unimpressed by it that I could barely right a review about the plot.
I’m having the same difficulties about this film. Plot-wise, the film is nothing more than soap opera. A woman being a rich older man, having an affair with a younger director, jealousy from all corners, tragedy, death, and even a surprise “He is actually your father!” twist that is accepted so nonchalantly by the son that I am not sure if the movie was not taking us seriously or the characters.
Even though the movie is supposed to be dealing with strong emotions and passions, I was left cold from the very beginning of the film. We are introduced to a blind man that used to be a director (under another name). I could not care for him. Then we are introduced to a beautiful young woman and her relationship with an older business man due to circumstances. Empty so far. And secret, passionate love blossoms, there is no spark to it.
Because the film goes forward and back in time to tell its story, Almodovar applies the easiest plot device to make it mesh better, and that is by having one character telling another character the story of “what happened” towards the end, with the person hearing the story, so moved by the man’s life, that he takes an active interest in it.
Two other things before we close for the night. In the film a young man starts writing a script with the blind scriptwriter about vampires. While they passionately talk about it, the script outline is nothing more than shitty “Twilight” films about good vampires not biting people and love affairs between vampire and humans. The other thing is that there is a film within a film called “The Girl and the Suitcase”, a comedy the man has been working on and is very important for him, and after being shown an extended scene, one of the characters says that he could not stop laughing because of how hilarious it was. Again, I’m thinking. A bad vampire film and a bad comedy is heralded as great in the movie. Does Almodovar really think they are good or is he somehow pissing on all our faces? Either way, I’m not happy.
2/5
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| Mad philosophizes |
[02 Jan 2010|07:55pm] |
My post and its comments (thanks guys) made me think. The first thought was scoff (sorry guys) because "be positive! be happy! enjoy life!" has, to my knowledge, never helped someone in my position.
But after my initial cynicism faded off and my marathon of Indian films hyped me up (songs do that do you), I started thinking.
Why not live like this: Out of all the choices one is faced with every moment in one's day, why not think about it, and choose the one that is most positive.
Brilliant! Seemed so simple and common sense! A calculated, logical way of living based on weighing different options. But instantly, problems arise. What is the "most positive"? This depends on one's purpose in life is. So you want to be rich, then the most positive choices you have to take are the ones that positively take you closer to your objective.
But that does not work for me for two reasons. One is that I do not really have an objective in my life but more importantly, such an approach can result in harming other people, as the best action that most positive affects your objective in life can also be the action that is most destructive to other people's lives.
So, hmm. How about if we consider positive action as a less self-less act. Is it possible to live a life by choosing actions that add most value to people's lives. Again, the first problem is, which people? For the sake of continuation of this self-dialogue, I'll say the impact should depend on proximity to you, in terms of levels of affections. That is, if faced with two options, one which adds value to someone you like and one to a stranger, then choose the first one. While favoritism has its flaws, I'll put it aside for now, because that's not whats still causing me an issue with my initial proposition.
The bigger flaw is that Being Good is sometimes not really helpful. This is the biggest thing I have an issue with. For example, imagine if someone does something to do you harm, by being forgiving and passive, you are actually RE-INFORCING the bad behavior. Your good action might seem ideally positive and may make you feel better about yourself, but it is more harmful, because the oppressor (on whatever scale, from stealing your lunch money to massacring your family and raping your baby) will most likely continue the behavior.
Continue this thought. If a wife is being abused by her husband, being good to him and being positive to him will not rectify the problem, it will only make the husband continue his act.
And so, I rethink my original statement. How can I choose the most positive action? Because if the positive action is a Good one but can have Bad impact, then how is that helpful?
I'm going to think about this more.
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| Iran is getting busy again |
[27 Dec 2009|07:37pm] |
The death of Grand Ayatollah Montazeri (a sort of reformist super cleric who was under house arrest for years) coincided with the Ashura, the Shia ceremony mourning the martyrdom of Hussein has caused the protests to flare again.
This time around, I've lost some of my initial post-election energy and anger. During the last few months, I have chilled out and seen events more logically, and talking to some Iranians made me feel more pessimistic about events. People are angry, with no specific plan or desired outcome, aside from "change" ,as if blind change is a good plan.
Other things I hate:
- Making "heroes" of victims. I read that Times is making Neda, the girl who was shot in the post-election events, as the woman of the year. I wonder if they will use the word hero and courageous, because she was neither. She was just an bystander who was shot for reasons we can't really understand. Who shot her? Was it an order? Was it by mistake? Was it a trigger-happy Basij? Was it on purpose? Was it really even someone from the government? Whatever the reason she was not a hero, a victim, yes, but not she did not actively do anything aside from being at the wrong place at the wrong time (she wasn't even participating in the protests, just watching).
- Politics as a fad. Oh, of course I fell into this trap too, and thought all the green internet icons and pages was fantastic and show of brotherly and sisterly support, but really, it's was as pointless and trendy as those Save Darfur tshirts. Certain LJ communities had lots of Iran-protest theme icons and news reports, passionate and angry, but without followup interest, it's as meaningful as one's passing interesting in Twilight.
- Enemy's enemy is my friend. No, it is not. It is possible for one's enemy's enemy to also be one's enemy. It is this false thinking that messes up the world constantly. No one liked Rafsanjani before, now he is everyone's buddy, just because he opposes Ahmadinijad? The four big names of the Reformists are Rafsanjani, Mousavi, Khatami, and Karoubi. Rafsanjani was president for 8 years, Khatami was president for 8 years, and Mousavi was Prime Minister for 8 years. That's 24 years, almost the full life of the post-revolution Iran. Karoubi is the only one who was not in a leadership position and frankly, its because no one has ever voted for him.
- Lack of Knowledge. Which brings me to my next point. Lots of people have no knowledge of the complexities of the politics and by "lots of people", I dont mean American middle aged conservatives or young hippy british teenager but actual Iranians living in Tehran. Their field of vision is just ten inches infront of their face and their memory only goes back 30 minutes. Their whole understanding of the big picture is basically, "I'm in Iran, I know its bad" and try to argue with them and they just repeat that but louder.
- Bias in Reporting. Yes, I know the Iranian official news media is not the best source for anything, but neither is the western media, but mainly and specially, neither are the fucking twits and blogs which keep getting heralded as the new wave of journalism. Its not. Its an absolute useless form of journalism, its only function is to feel excited about the live updates and the feeling of voyeurism. Otherwise, its selective, biased, exaggerated, and nothing more than loud gossip.
- It could be worse. I'm astonished by how no one realizes that the Iran government is not acting as terrible as governments generally act in the face of such protests. To some Iranians, they act like they are living in the worst government ever, but if this was in Saddam's Iraq, not one person would be protesting in the streets now. Nor would the same events be allowed to be replicated in many of Iran's neighbors. Sure, it happens in Pakistan, but fuck lot of good it did them.
None of this means I'm AGAINST the reformists and PRO government. But I realize that it is not something that Iranians need to understand first what exactly they want, who is going to lead them, and where they want to head. Iranians interested in changing their political future need to first look internally and have a strong plan. Mob mentality sometimes can bring a positive change, but not always, and not thata chance one should rely on.
It is not the Iranian government that needs to mature, but the Iranian people who are in need of maturing. It is a change that needs to happen from bottom to top, in a reasonable time, not a mass outbreak of passion, choas, and then wake up, after the whole thing, with a hangover, and a "oh fuck what did we do" mentality.
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| TV Review of "The Inbetweeners", "Hung" |
[26 Dec 2009|05:45pm] |
 The Inbetweeners: Season 1 & 2 (E4, 2008)IMDB LinkThe one thing I’m getting tired of in British comedies is the fact that they really never have a happy outcome for their characters. It is okay sometimes, but this is one reason that the American comedies are more successful internationally. We want the characters, whom we watch in episode after episode, to once in a while, if not always, come to a happy ending. In a way, it also kills the comical aspect of it, because we know that no matter what the characters do, it won’t end well. In “The Inbetweeners”, it never does. This series is about a group of high school teenagers. The show is narrated by Will who has just moved from a private school to a public one due to her mother’s financial difficulties. Will is a posh dork, one of those people that you pretty much understand why they are bullied. He quickly attaches himself to a group of average students and befriends them. The rest of the characters are Simon, Jay, and Neil. Simon is the most likable but he is still unpopular. Jay constantly exaggerates his stories and lies a lot and Neil is a bit dumb but happy. The show is like films such as “American Pie” about unpopular kid’s quest to be popular, liked, and have sex. Their plans never work. I like the show and it is funny, and their banters are familiar to me, and there are many exchanges which remind me of my own school days. It also makes me miss the kinds of friendship one has and only has in school, before one mature. In the strange, confusing, world of being a teenager, one is only able to find refuge in the companionship of other teenagers. If the show had a bit more love for its characters to make sure they do occasionally succeed (even Tom from “Tom and Jerry” would sometimes win over Jerry), then I would have loved the show more. 3/5
 Hung: Season 1 (HBO, 2009)IMDB LinkA new trend in TV shows seems to be about average people being forced to get involved in unethical professions due to their circumstances. We had “Weeds” and the really, fucking brilliant, “Breaking Bad”. This time, HBO wants to try their hand at it. The average person is high school coach and history teacher. His wife has left him for a doctor and lost his teenage kids to the wife because his house burnt down, and he did not insure it. Ray (Thomas Jane) used to be a handsome, popular, athletic young man, the kind of person who assumes life will always turn out well for them. But now he is older and is a failure, and needs money to rebuild his house and get his kids back, but what asset does he have? His huge dick, it seems. And he tries to market that by being a gigolo. But like “Weeds” and “Breaking Bad”, crossing the mental line into doing a job one did not expect doing before is the easy part. The difficult part is actually getting to know the ropes. Even whoring oneself out is not as easy as it seems. He soon pairs up with another unsuccessful person. Tanya (Jane Adams) is a “poet”, the sort of person who calls themselves that but have never actually published anything. Tanya convinces Ray that she will be his pimp. So far, all of this sound like it would make for a brilliant show, but it does not know where to go with it. The show has so little idea about how it wants to explore the business side of the profession, that it keeps sidetracking into uninteresting plotlines, like the ex-wife’s relationship with the kids and Tanya’s relationship with her new boyfriend, neither of which are why we are watching this show. The ten-episode first season seems like a pilot, given how little it actually progressed. A failure. No wonder I never heard anything about the show aside from the initial news of its premise before the show debuted. 2/5 |
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| Review of "Castaway on the Moon", "Strange Circus" |
[24 Dec 2009|06:29pm] |
 Castaway on the Moon [Kimssi pyoryugi] (Hae-jun Lee, 2009)IMDB LinkA few years ago I saw a South Korean romantic-comedy called “Someone Special”. The film never gained the popularity of other South Korean films but it quickly shot up to be one of my top romantic films, giving me a giddy, happy feeling watching it. “Castaway on the Moon” does not have the same director or writer (although it has the same lead actor), but it did give me the same feeling watching it. And given that it has only one user comment on IMDB and it seemed to have flopped in South Korea, I think it will share the same fate as being generally unknown in a few years. The film starts with a man standing at a bridge. He jumps off. He washes up to a land and realizes that he is on an island. The first amazing idea is that he has not washed up to some far off island, but a small bit of conservation land under the huge bridge. The huge pillar of the bridge is on the island and he can see the city buildings right in front of him. But he is still cut off, because how is he able to get out? He has a phone, so he calls the police who does not believe him and hangs up on him. He then calls his ex-girlfriend who does not even listen to him. Thinking who else he should call, he gets a call. Telemarketing from the bank offering loans. The battery runs out. A boat passes by and he waves shouting for help, but they just see him waving, so they wave back. He tries to swim, but is not able to. Being stuck on an island in the middle of the sea is something we are used to, but there is something tragically funny about being stuck on an Island which is basically in the city and yet completely cut off from the modern world. The man writes “HELP” in the sand. After a few days, he resigns himself to the life in the island. There is a scene with him lying in the grass feeling bored. But he is satisfied with the boredom. He sighs and smiles and says, “Perfect boredom”, and there is something wonderful at that. He has found peace with doing nothing. He changes the writing on the sand from “HELP” to “HELLO”. Somewhere in the city, there is a young woman. She never leaves her room and only speaks to her parents through SMSes. Her only contact to the world is through her online presence where she has fabricated a complete new life with fake pictures of other women to represent herself. Her only hobby is to take pictures of the moon. One day, through her telescope she sees the man on the island and watches him… There will appear to be two stories here initially. One a survival and one a love story, but like “Someone Special”, it’s just about people not fitting in the world, wanting to die and be alone and resign themselves to isolation, and yet, unable to resist the urge of companionship, of the need to connect. It is this dual conflict that I feel very much at home with. The need to be isolated and the need to know there is someone aside from you that you can communicate with. “Castaway on the Moon” has flaws and like “Someone Special”, it is not for everyone. But if it finds its correct audience, then it will set its hook on, and they will love it.
5/5
 Strange Circus [Kimyô na sâkasu] (Shion Sono, 2005)IMDB LinkJapan takes everything to the extreme. This is a film on child molestation, but the molestation is amped up. The father places the twelve year old girl in a cello case, pokes a hole into it, and makes her watch while he fucks the mother, without the mom’s knowledge. Later on the mom catches them having sex. The father, world’s cockiest pedophile, grins and pats the mother’s head when she sees them in the act. He then places the MOTHER in the cello case forcing her to watch while he rapes the girl. The mother becomes jealous of the daughter and starts beating her. Chasing her during one of her belt whipping sessions, the mother accidentally falls downs the stairs and dies. The daughter then takes the place of the mother. Talk about having a shitty childhood. Or IS IT? Because suddenly the film changes narratives and we realize it was a story written by a woman in a wheelchair. It was all fiction. Or IS IT? The film toys with reality and fiction, and even has one character actually asking another character what is real and what isn’t. Sounds good? Sounds messy and it is. Surrounded by surreal scenes of walls of blood and a circus, the film stumbles badly through a controversial theme. Director Shion Sono has made some interesting films. “Suicide Club” is a cult favorite and “Exte: Hair Extensions” was a dark comedy about hair extensions that kill people. His talent seems to shine more when he does not take himself very seriously and in “Strange Circus”, its serious shit. His 2008 film, “Love Exposure” might be an interesting film, it has good reviews and at almost 4 hours, it seems to be some sort of EPIC love story. I’ll get back to you on that.
2/5 |
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