Filmmaniak

An hour and a half of lethargic acting performances in a film where none of the characters really knows what they are doing and even less is known by the director, who takes a dull and unimaginative approach to the potentially interesting story of satanic murderers who break into a girls’ boarding school. There is zero atmosphere, suspense or period stylisation and the sporadic attempts at humour are cringe-worthy. I don’t understand the positive responses from overseas critics.

A mostly standard and, in terms of filmmaking, routine horror movie about a high-school girl for whom an unintentionally unleashed demon causes problems (while also abducting and killing her friends). The film deals with the issue of inclusion of minorities in society, is pleasing with several practical effects, and somewhat rises above the level of mediocrity with its emphasis on Indian mythology and cultural traditions, though that is also the only thing about it that doesn’t come across as hackneyed.

The other side of the dream of saving people’s lives, told from the perspective of a newbie EMT who is assigned to be the partner of an experienced paramedic in New York, but gradually loses not only his initial illusions, but also his own sanity and faith in humanity. Together, they ride in an ambulance to the most difficult cases on the streets of Brooklyn, so they keep company mainly with stabbed drug dealers, victims of shootings and domestic violence, overdosing junkies, decaying corpses and so on. The film deliberately shows only the worst that the EMT (to whom tribute is paid in the closing credits) could experience while on duty in order for him to suffer the psychological consequences of his work. Together with the fierce directing and precise acting performances, this makes the film a rather intense and gripping spectacle. But because of that, Black Flies also comes across as manipulative, an impression that is underscored by its heart-rending climax.

Blackout is a cheap, sometimes unintentionally ridiculous, often quite boring and, in terms of filmmaking, almost amateurish horror drama about a man who tries to put his life in order after the death of his father and breakup with his girlfriend. And he has also been a werewolf for a few weeks, but more is made of that only in the last (so bad that it’s good) quarter of the film. Until then, Blackout is mostly a stultifying and repetitive conversational film in which the protagonist uninterestingly talks with various people in his small town, where he tries to deal with the corruption around the local timber merchant.

Taking place across the Japanese countryside and major metropolises, Suzume is a visually impressive and slightly romantic fantasy road-movie in which a mythological storyline packed with magical ideas and inspired by actual Japanese natural disasters is combined with a subtle and emotionally charged story about growing up, devoted platonic love, feelings of guilt and parenthood. Makoto Shinkai still adheres to his trademarks without giving the impression that he is repeating himself. Authentically written characters and a number of charming details and subtle humour add surprising depth to the fantasy narrative. There are also demons that awaken repressed thoughts in us, mischievous cats that delight in destruction, the funniest cabriolet with a broken top and the best three-legged chair in the history of cinema.

Temporaries is a devastating social drama about a group of Guatemalan labourers who are repeatedly imported into a Canadian food factory without knowing their rights and working conditions, and are thus grossly exploited to the point of physical breakdown in a poorly thought-out and unjust system that eventually beats down everyone, including not only the suffering workers, but also their callous Canadian employers, who must meet quotas and are existentially dependent on cheap labour. The whole issue is seen from the perspective of a sympathetic interpreter who is the only one to see the workers as individuals, while also being aware of the other side’s problems, which makes the film powerfully empathetic without sliding into moralising judgments. The strong plot based on a topical and socially important issue further benefits from its gradual build-up of intensity and emotional conclusion.

This attractive attempt at an arthouse thriller resulted only in a tabloidish, formalistically incongruous and psychologically unconvincing treatise on the attractiveness of evil and a number of other topics, which it addresses in an exceedingly superficial way. If one of those topics was intended to be a critique of overtly biased and emotionally manipulative courts, then it was not a fortunate decision to conceive it from the perspective of an antisocial and bizarrely motivated protagonist who is fascinated by deviance.

A romantic drama about the beginning of a relationship between a dancer and a sign-language interpreter, who at the start admits to her that, as an asexual, he has no desire to have a sex life. This entirely realistic antithesis of Hollywood romantic relationship flicks excels with its natural characters with believable views, while it is most powerful in those moments when the pair of protagonists interact with each other, discuss their feelings and try to lead a shared life. In contrast to that, every scene in which only one of them is present seems significantly less engaging, which is also true of the filler shots from dance rehearsals and the passages with the interpreting of songs. The occasional humour (a drunken friend’s overnight stay, fast food as a treatment for emotional pain) is a pleasant bonus. At any rate, it’s a good thing that this viewer-friendly relationship movie was made at all, given that the topic of asexuality hadn’t previously been used to such an extent.

A mildly humorous relationship drama about a narcissistic bisexual indie-film director who begins an affair with a woman despite being married to a man, who happens to be his court actor. This gives rise to a bizarre situation in which the main anti-hero fights tooth and nail to hold on to his relationship with his life partner, while also being determined to continue his affair with his mistress and promising to start a family. The film is remarkable due to the fact that we follow its plot mostly from the perspective of a self-centred and self-pitying character who is simultaneously unbearable and charming, and whose insolent and supremely unempathetic behaviour increasingly escalates to absurdly comic levels. The result is an entertaining spectacle involving an unusual love triangle, focused on a caricature of a toxic man without a trace of self-reflection, but other than that character’s escalating inappropriate actions, it offers only poorly written supporting characters and excessive emphasis on explicit physicality in the bedroom scenes.

A charmingly minimalist romance between a melancholic labourer with an excessive fondness for alcohol and a shy, introverted shop assistant. This sombre old-world tragicomedy about the painful coming together of two desperate souls excels thanks to its flawless directing, Kaurismäki's unmistakable distinctive stylisation, dry humour delivered with a straight face and idiosyncratic characters. The film also has a social dimension, as it unobtrusively incorporates current events (in the form of radio reports about the war in the Ukraine heard in the timeless retro setting of Helsinki, which is given a nostalgic air), as well as superbly appropriate music and charming, loving cinephilic references to the work of Kaurismäki’s directing role models and friends from the world of independent and art film. And all of this in only eighty minutes.