Matty

I would be interested in knowing if Penélope Cruz knew when she signed on to this project that she would appear in the same film as Mark Strong’s testicles, Gabourey Sidibe’s crotch and a hectolitre of elephant ejaculate. The film succeeds in presenting all of the above without coming across as a random sequence of gags (though it’s not far from it) and without the punchline (always) consisting in the distastefulness or imbecility of the given joke. With his guileless rejection of what is proper in a civilised society, Cohen’s Nobby, proudly claiming to be English scum, fulfils a purpose similar to that of the earlier Ali G and Borat – he shows the pretence in which all intellectuals, petty bourgeois and snobs live, as they reveal their true face and true intentions when confronted with a man whom they despise too much to take seriously (among other things, this year’s American presidential election showed us what that can lead to). The other characters are (unintentionally) led to being exposed by Nobby, and the viewer is then (intentionally) led by the redneck jokes, which are drawn out to the point of absurdity. Sure, The Brothers Grimsby is very much a hit-or-miss affair, the editing could have been less frantic and the seriously depicted flashbacks (and the whole storyline about the importance of family) disrupt the pace and tone of the narrative, but I still found it funnier and more subversive than most mainstream comedies. The fourth star is for giving Donald Trump AIDS. 70%.

If I were able to think like a heptapod (and if events are not predetermined), I would read Chiang’s short story after watching the film. With knowledge of the original story, the film doesn’t manage to be surprising with respect to what it aims for from the beginning and what it so much relies on to its own detriment. ___ Whereas Chiang gets straight to the point, Villeneuve understandably dedicates much more space to exposition. The first encounter is thus preceded by a comically long “build-up”, during which the protagonists fly in a helicopter to Montana, put on protective coveralls, drive to an enormous spaceship, climb onto a lifting platform, ride the lifting platform (because we would be deprived of one dramatic ride if the platform stood directly below the opening) and walk into the bowels of the ship. The only function of this procedural porn is to prepare us for an essential and epic reveal which, however, doesn’t happen, because all we learn from it is what the aliens look like. The individual steps leading up to the act of communication don’t play any more of a significant role later. For me, the entire film was such a similar unfulfilled promise as the scene described above. ___ The long and slow opening sequence is also unsatisfying in introducing protagonist, whose actions throughout the rest of the film can probably be explained by the fact that she lives alone and compensates for her poor personal life with work (she is the only one who goes to school even when the rest of the world is experiencing an alien visitation). Many of the informative dialogue scenes, flashbacks with the child and the scene in which Louise translates a conversation in Chinese so that we know she also speaks Mandarin, feel similarly utilitarian and inorganic. The coldly engineered approach to the characters, who remain mysteries like the alien logograms until the end of the film, wouldn’t matter so much if it wasn’t in conflict with the melodramatic level of the narrative, which is based on the relationships and motivations of the protagonists and becomes dominant in the end (I consider the replacement of an accident, which perhaps could have been prevented, with an incurable disease, which can only be accepted as an inevitability according to melodramatic conventions, to be quite essential). ___ In the short story, a theory that is partially revealed is continuously applied to a universally comprehensible story whose main purpose is to make the heptapods’ way of thinking comprehensible. The aim is thus not to move the reader, but to help them understand how “it” all works. Conversely, the newcomers attempt to offer emotional rather than intellectual satisfaction, but they’re not very successful. However, Arrival is still a skilfully made sci-fi movie about the importance of (mis)understanding, though it is too reminiscent of Interstellar due to its expository dialogue, extremely serious tone and cold visual style, but I wasn’t as impressed with it as I was with the short story. Among other things, that is due to how doggedly it tries to astonish the viewer. Postscript: If the solution presented by the film for reuniting a divided world is the only one possible, then we’re pretty much fucked. 70%

Fire at Sea takes essentially the same approach as that used in Sacro GRA. The camera patiently observes several performers in long, mostly still shots that are generally not causally related, and returns to them from time to time. There is no accompanying commentary, no music, no speeding up or slowing down of the numbingly slow pace. The director only exceptionally interacts with the people in front of the camera.  Thanks to the fact that the shots last longer than necessary, we have enough time not only to think, but also to appreciate how Rosi composes shots. People are as equally important to him as the setting that surrounds and shapes them. Everyday moments in the lives of the local fishermen, boys spending time bombarding cactuses with faces carved into them and an old woman who in most shots is preparing a meal or making her bed contrast with stories that involve the introduction of the actors and are often about life. In accordance with the title of the film, in which two incompatible elements are also combined, the world of a crisis with a global impact and the world of ordinary people going about their daily activities are like fire and water. Without directly addressing more insistent (and thus less convincing) films, the contrast of the great tragedy and the parallel stories of everyday life on which the film is based leads us to consider our own position as those who live in relative affluence and security, and whose horizon is often also limited by our immediate surroundings. If only to get a full appreciation of the comfort in which we live, it is worth seeing this well-considered contribution to a topic that otherwise generates hasty conclusions. Only time will tell if Fire at Sea will hold up beyond the period that initiated its creation and rank among the classic works of Italian neorealism. 65%

This film’s uncommunicative narrative doesn’t give us many answers, as it limits the information it provides about the central characters to what we are seeing. Doubts persist even after a plot twist at the end of the film that doesn’t answer questions regarding Armand’s and Elder’s motivations, but only raises more questions. Though the two actors, whose reactions often lead us to wonder who or what they are observing, turn in convincing performances, they neither help us understand the characters’ behaviour nor mitigate the reserved nature of the film, which is in large part due to the detached observational style of the long static shots, in which it is obvious how much care the director and cinematographer took with the compositions in terms of depth of field and keeping the actors at a certain distance from the lens. In the shots with Elder, for example, we see more things happening in the background, which corresponds to the young man’s greater interaction with the outside world. Conversely, Armand’s isolation from his surroundings is reinforced by shots that separate him from the surrounding space. Thanks particularly to the filmmaker’s clear, consistently followed concept, From Afar is a noteworthy study of two contrasting characters. However, it does not offer commentary about life in contemporary Venezuela, as a similar story could take place in practically any given city. Also, in its negligible consideration of the influence of the place and period on the protagonists’ behaviour, From Afar is too consistently minimalist for its own good. 65%

Though Orphan has an ambitious narrative concept, it suffers from haphazard execution. It is a film that wants to be mysterious, but instead is just confusing. Though it doesn’t underestimate the viewers and lets them find their bearings in the non-chronological narrative, it doesn’t do much to spark their curiosity. Instead of the individual stories posing and answering similar questions and forming a coherent whole, they come across as a quartet of autonomous short films without a point or much coherence, a quartet of unfulfilled promises. At the end, the nymphomaniac protagonist is as unreadable as she was at the beginning, or rather she remains the embodiment of a male fantasy, a beautiful promiscuous creature without depth, who enjoys satisfying people of both genders and needs nothing more out of life than sex and money. The male characters, most of whom are defined only by their aggressive behaviour, don’t come off any better. Though the film is a failure overall, it manages to be pleasing in its individual details, such as the consistent visual style, economical editing and the raw acting performance of Adèle Haenel. Because of her, I would rather see a film that cares more about the characters than about the originality of the narrative structure. 55%

The Last Family is a devastating story set in a housing project that deserves admiration for the nostalgia of its simple look back at the nearly 30-year history of one family and one country, for its consistent fulfilment of the chosen concept and for the most appropriate use of the word “Congratulations”. In his directorial debut, Jan P. Matuszynski partially revives the legacy of the cinema of moral anxiety by examining the life of an intellectual in a time of repression while limiting direct references to the period in which much of the film takes place. Though it is indicated by the removal of the socio-political context, I don’t think the young director merely wanted only to show how he is able to masterfully handle an in-camera montage and how he can induce a depressing mood. The film is closed off from the outside world in much the same way that its protagonists are confined to small prefabricated apartments for the entire first hour. Their lives are limited to the private sphere, as if there is no public one. The claustrophobic feeling of limited space (and limited freedom) is aided by shooting the characters from a great distance (we thus see what a cramped environment they find themselves in) and in extraordinarily long shots (instead of analytical editing, which would “break up” the space and at least make it feel a little bigger). It is only in the second half, after a dialogue scene between the son and his parents that lasts several minutes and was shot with a static analogue video camera, that we finally go outside (though in several cases, this ironically involves a funeral) and we can breathe with the characters. In these instances, the actors are shot from closer up and for a moment the film is not so suffocatingly confined. The following minutes, however, mercilessly show us that Beksinski and his son are dragging the past along with them (similarly to the way Zdzisław carries his own shit with him in one scene due to a defective toilet) and it occurs to them that their inability to be happy may not be due to the given period, but to themselves. They are still desperately searching for satisfying means of self-expression (painting pictures and making home movies, which are unobtrusively integrated into the rest of the film) and they still do not have firm control over their own lives (the phenomenal scene with a plane crashing during a live broadcast). The prefabricated apartment becomes a symbol of a certain way of living and thinking, which is probably not peculiar only to the Beksinskis, but also to a significant part of the population of post-socialist countries. The Last Family, like the dramas of the Romanian New Wave, says much more about life under socialism (and after it) without direct allusions than all of the museum-piece tragicomedies from Czech directors. Unlike them, Matuszynski doesn’t compromise, doesn’t dupe us into believing anything and doesn’t make excuses for anyone. 90%

After Love is the French response to A Separation. Even though the film gives priority to the woman’s perspective, neither partner is portrayed as a villain who would try only to do harm. The problem with Marie and Boris is their unwillingness to listen to each other and their lack of desire to find a shared solution. Through their daughters, however, they not only wage war with each other, but occasionally find reconciliation (a convincingly constructed scene of them dancing together, which will probably make you just as sad as the central couple are that they can no longer be together). In competition with many other dramas about relationships past their expiration date, After Love tries to captivate with its unusual ordinariness. A significant part of the film is made up of the ordinary, everyday activities and interactions of several characters. However, the little things become excuses to bring up old grievances, resulting in conflicts and arguments. Without any major dramatic twists (the film ends with the only, slightly disturbing dramatic event), we gradually come to understand what brought the couple together before and what is driving them apart now (rather a lot of attention is paid to the economic situation of each of them). In my opinion, significant value added is brought to the film by its manner of filming in unusually long shots, with the camera reacting quickly to the characters’ movements, thanks to which the well-coordinated actors do not fall out of their roles (including both of the absolutely naturally acting girls). Despite its parameters of a stifling stage play (for the most part, it involves four actors in one house), the film doesn’t lack dynamism or lightness, and even while maintaining an unsentimental distance, it manages to draw you in, move you and possibly revive your own memories of the long and painful reverberations of what you once considered a constant in your life. 75%

In the Blood is very long and pretty much about nothing. It is possible to make a more compelling, highly subjective generational statement about the empty existence of today’s youth – see American Honey. Unlike the characters in Andrea Arnold’s film, however, the party-going Danish medical students don’t have to worry about whether they will still have a place to lay their heads tomorrow and whether they will run out of money for food (and alcohol and drugs). Their problems stem simply from not knowing what they want and not appreciating what they have. Since the camera stays glued to their bodies through most of the film or during the tripping scenes (when the main protagonist finds himself in the jungle not only in a figurative sense), it directly adopts their point of view, thus leaving no room for critical distance. It is not a character study, but rather an observation that leads nowhere. Rasmus Heisterberg does the bare minimum to humanise Simon and his peers and explain why they behave like a bunch of immature idiots for whom the apex of fun is taking a live goat to a party. At the same time, the film’s creator does not face the characters with moral dilemmas leading to a fundamental realisation, nor does he force them, figuratively speaking, to reap what they have sown. At roughly the midpoint of the film, after one of the few dramatic scenes (the fall from a bicycle), the agitated naturalistic style calms down (the shots are longer, the colours are cooler, the composition is more balanced, handheld shooting is no longer prevalent), but there is no fundamental transformation of the protagonist. Despite giving a sign that Simon is at last seeing the light, the film ends forgivingly, thus raising the question of what it was all for. If you can identify with the unlikable protagonist or at least get used to him after some time, it is likely that you will enjoy these poorly plotted two hours in his company – thanks, among other things, to the convincingly depicted setting. However, it will be more fun and rewarding for you if you spend the same amount of time with your real friends. 60%

Indivisible is a martyr’s story of conjoined twins who, on the threshold of adulthood, learn that they could be surgically separated and live more freely than before. To make the story more heartrending, the beautiful, likable girls of flawless character are surrounded exclusively by negative characters who abuse them in various ways and prevent them from being happy. Imbued with religious motifs (while being critical of religion in its extreme form) and lightened up a few times by “on the road” escape scenes, the tragedy is as predictable as the evil-hearted supporting characters, who behave from beginning to end exactly as you would expect based on their appearance and demeanour. Though only the central characters undergo some sort of development, we spend a long time with their parents, who are just as unlikable at the end as they are at the beginning and the film makes no effort to understand them. The stylistic enhancement in the form of long steadicam shots à la Sorrentino is a mere quirk without any rationalisation in the story (if we don't go into dubious interpretations in the sense that the sequences are uninterrupted, just as Daisy and Viola are inseparable). In most respects, Indivisible is a weak example of a would-be high-minded festival film that exploits the unfortunate situation of its characters only for the purpose of moving the audience. 45%

This is what Home Care could have looked like if Czech filmmakers were not afraid to rub viewers the wrong way. But Godless goes to the opposite extreme. It confines viewers to a narrow academic format, showing them only dirt, disgust and pain, and communicating with them only to the absolutely necessary extent (for example, we learn the protagonist’s name only after an hour). As shown by Ralitza Petrova in her directorial debut, it is still cold and grey in Bulgaria and warm colours are taboo. The characters with their listless gaze live in ugly housing estates, staving off depression with morphine and food (the logical reaction to a confrontation with death? Peel a tangerine), and if they already have it bad enough, they are in danger of having it even worse. All of them are basically and without deeper justification cynical and mean, basing their relationships solely on sex and exploitation, and they have no aversion to stealing others’ money, identity or life. Sure, it’s set in a country scarred by decades of communism, a land without God, and I get the point, but it sufficed for me to read the title and watch the first ten minutes. The remaining ninety minutes are stultifying variations of the same thing without any nuance or change of tone. As a parable about divine justice or a spiritual work along the lines of Carlos Reygadas’s works, the film somehow holds up, thanks mainly to its devastating ending, which doesn't say more than is necessary, but in competition with much better nuanced and less straightforward social dramas from neighbouring Romania, Godless is ill-considered exploitation of misery whose creator takes delight in suffering instead of reflecting on how to get out of it. 50%