I can be your "Hero" baby!

I freaking loved Hero. I am a major fan of kung fu movies. Especially ones that have Ziyi Zhang and/or Jet Li in them.

The action sequences were choreographed so well. Obviously they used wires during some of the fight scenes, but that just gave the film an even more ethereal feel. I loved the use of fabrics and wind to lend to the fluid aspect of the movie. I also liked how every time a different version of the story was told, the characters wore a different color scheme in their clothes. And the color contrasts of the clothes and the surroundings were gorgeous and really lended to the atmosphere of the film. I also liked the camera’s use of slow motion.

The story itself was interesting. After every tale, either the king or Nameless, contradicted the other and said, “I know that’s not true, and this is why.” I felt like I was on the edge of my seat because I wanted to know which story was actually true. I thought it was interesting that when the king told Nameless that he knew he was lying and asked him why he was trying to kill him, Nameless actually answered him straight out. Then, the king was understanding about it. He kind said “Oh yes, I see. That makes sense that you would feel that way.”

As I said before, I really liked the movie. I’m glad this movie was chosen instead of Fearless, because I have already seen it. I realize that I could have gone out and rented Hero myself, but this was more convenient.

"Not One Less" Review

Not One Less is a movie about a thirteen year old girl who ends up being a substitute teacher for a tiny school in the mountains. She’s not very good at teaching or disciplining the students and just sort of let’s them run wild. She tells them to copy their lesson and they cannot leave until they do. After she tells them this, she sits on the front stoop and basically twiddles her thumbs. She does not really seem to care about the students. She seems to just be in it for the money. She will get fifty yuen at the end of the teaching period and an extra ten yuen if none of the students have left the school. An hour into the movie two of the students have left. One of them was recruited for a sports school and the other had to drop out to work. At first to me it seemed like she maybe cared that the student was not getting an education and that is why she was raising the money to travel to the city and look for him to bring him back to school, but she was just doing it to get the extra money. Teacher Wei was not very smart in her attempts to find the student in the city, but she was persistent, and eventually her message was broadcasted to the audience she wanted. However, during the time she was in the city, I was curious as to what was happening with the kids in the mountains. They were not getting an education while she was away. I thought the movie was interesting, I just do not really think she cared that much about her students. I liked the colored chalk at the end too. :)

"Swades" Review

The movie, Swades, was a long way of telling a common story. Boy goes back to visit family, boy meets girl, girl rejects boy, boy helps girl, girl falls in love with boy, boy goes away, boy realizes he would rather be back with girl, boy returns to girl, swelling music, happy ending.

However, even though it was long and not a new story, I feel that it was made in a way that was not boring. It held my attention the entire time; which is more than I can say for some of the other longer movies we have seen in class.

I really liked seeing all the elaborate costumes that are traditional of the Bollywood films. I thought the songs and performances were interesting as well; still, I agree with what Julia had said in class in that for the movie to succeed in the United States, the songs should probably be cut and also some of the other scenes that are not necessary to the story. Other than that, the storyline is very similar to movies shown in the United States and would succeed.

I found myself having to read the subtitles the entire time. The transition between the languages was very fluid and sometimes the character would have been talking in a different language for a couple of sentences and I would not have realized it yet.

I found the movie entertaining and enlightening. I feel it represented its main points really well.

"Monsoon Wedding" Review

The Indian movie, Monsoon Wedding, was decent. I really liked all the touches of Indian culture that ran throughout. I have seen a couple of programs about Indian wedding ceremonies, so I understood some of the things they were doing. Such as, painting the bride’s hands with henna, the marigolds, wedding garlands, and that there are three sections of the ceremony. However, I do think that if I did not know the background of the rituals, I would still have understood the movie.

I found the father’s personality especially interesting in that he tried to maintain Indian traditions and keep up his ideal nuclear family. This can be seen in the arranged marriage, keeping the marriage tent brightly colored, etc. It almost seemed like he was lying to himself about all the personality flaws of his family and when he did find out he almost seemed to ignore them; until the end that is. He seemed to ignore his wife’s smoking and his son’s flamboyant tendencies. He did not really seem to know about his niece’s flirtatious nature or his daughter’s relationship with a married man. I was worried that the father would not do anything when Ria brought the pedophiliac tendencies of the older relative to light. That is a very touchy subject for me. Luckily, Lalit did actually do something.

I really appreciated that Hemant forgave Aditi for her promiscuity; however, I do not know how realistic it was.

Some of my favorite parts were the awkward interactions between the servant girl, Alice and the wedding coordinator, P.K. Dubey. I am very glad they ended up happy and together. I thought his obsession with eating marigolds was weird though.

Overall, I liked it.

Love's a Bitch

The movie Amores Perros was an amazing film. I loved that it had all the stories tie together at some point. It really demonstrated the idea of what a small world it is. I agree with what Julie said in class about how the stories jumping around and tying together was somewhat like the movies Crash and Pulp Fiction.

The stories themselves were very real. I actually liked that none of them really had a happy ending and that the endings themselves were left somewhat open.

It was a very heart-wrenching movie. I was especially affected by the whole dog fighting portion. I was almost in tears during all of those scenes. I was also really bothered by Ramiro cheating on his wife. I think him cheating on Susana bothered me more than Susana cheating on him because he was also abusive to Susana. The movie was definitely filmed in a way that you really feel for all the characters at some point. That also made everything very real, because bad things happen to everybody; maybe not to the extent of the characters in this film, but they happen nonetheless.

I liked the subtle (and sometimes not so subtle) biblical touches in the movie, such as the hit man referring to the two brothers as Cain and Abel.

As I mentioned in class, I was a little confused about how the dog, Richie, survived under the floor boards for so long. I was also curious as to why he couldn’t get himself out and why they left chocolate out for him. Chocolate kills dogs! Also, if there were as many rats as Valeria said there were, I’m pretty sure that chocolate would have been eaten at some point.

The entire movie was awesome however, I loved it.

Pan’s Labyrinth: A Global Film, Centered around Local Circumstances

Pan’s Labyrinth (El Laberinto del Fauno) is the story about a young girl who travels with her mother to an old mill to live with her new step-father, a cold-blooded army captain, during the Spanish Civil War in the 1940s. From the very beginning, it is obvious to the viewer that the girl, Ofelia, has an active imagination and bases many of her adventures on the fairy tales she reads. Once Ofelia is at the mill with her step-father and mother, she is led by a fairy to a labyrinth where she meets a faun. The faun tells her that she is the Princess Moanna reincarnated, but the only way to return to her kingdom is to first complete three tasks. The movement between reality and fantasy is extremely fluid to the point where the viewer might question if the adult characters in the film are experiencing the magical aspect as well. Even though this Mexican-Spanish co-production is centered around very specific events, the film is presented in a way that international audiences can appreciate and gain something from it. Paul Julian Smith really hits this idea on the head when he says in Film Quarterly, “Pan’s Labyrinth reveals that, given sympathy and attention, films based on local events can have immediate and profound significance for global audiences.”

Subtle touches of Spanish culture can be seen throughout the film. Near the very beginning, Ofelia’s mother, Carmen, warns Ofelia against reading fairy tales because they will turn her brain to mush. This is a very common scolding by parents in many cultures, but here there is a specific allusion. Don Quixote is Spain’s national narrative and its main character reaches his downfall because of the fanciful beliefs he has. It is also probably no coincidence that Pan’s Labyrinth is set at an old mill, which is reminiscent of Don Quixote’s most famous quest, in which he charges a mill under the delusion that it was a giant trying to attack him. There is another subtle Spanish reference in the beginning of the film when Ofelia replaces the eye of the statue. The popular Spanish film The Spirit of the Beehive is also about a girl in the countryside post-civil war. In that film, the girl, Ana replaces not the eyes of a stone statue, but a manikin. (Smith 5). These touches have special meaning to people familiar with Spanish culture, but do not seem out of place or farfetched to those who are not.

One of the more obvious stresses on locality is the focus on the world of women being completely separate to that of men.

Captain Vidal, the stepfather, embodies a masculinity so exclusive it barely acknowledges the existence of the feminine. Welcoming his pregnant wife and stepdaughter to the mill he addresses them in the masculine plural form (“Bienvenidos”) on the assumption that the unborn child, his true priority, is a boy... Del Toro suggests that this fantasy of pure male filiations, without the intercession of women, is fundamental to Fascism. (Smith 6).

Again, not everyone has experienced the influences of Fascism, but the concept is portrayed in a way such that most people can empathize with the characters. “[Del Toro] has taken a tiny terrible moment in Spanish history and translated it into a masterful film with which global audiences and prize juries alike clearly feel a deep and emotional connection” (Smith 9).

Pan’s Labyrinth incorporates certain global themes as well. A young girl journeying through a strange new place is reflective of both Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz. Alice follows a white rabbit down a rabbit hole resulting in her falling into Wonderland; and Dorothy is whisked to Oz in her house by the cyclone along with her dog, Toto. Also, the concept of the ‘wicked step-parent’ is an extremely common theme in fairy tales. The most popular stories incorporating these ideas are “Cinderella”, “Snow White”, and “Hansel and Gretel”. It should also be mentioned that each of these stories features a young girl as the victim of the step-parent’s abuse, as it is in Pan’s Labyrinth. In addition, the idea of ‘three tasks to be completed before the prize can be won’ is repeated countless times in literature and movies. It can be seen in the Harry Potter series during the Tri-Wizard Tournament, The Magrvandia Chronicles on the quest to find the Crown of Silence, and in the Brother’s Grimm fairy tales “The Three Feathers” and “The Frog Prince” to name a few.

The number three by itself is a universal number symbolic of completion, fluidity, and unity. This can be taken religiously, as in the trinity, mathematically as in the Fibonacci series (every third number is an even number, etc.), or structurally as in architecture (pyramids). Besides the three tasks Ofelia must complete, the number three is brought up several times. The film focuses on three main women (Ofelia, Carmen, and Mercedes), there are three fairies the faun keeps as pets, three compartments to choose from in the Pale Man’s den, three thrones at the end of the film, and when Ofelia fails to pass the second task, the faun tells her that the moon will be full in three days.

Pan’s Labyrinth is a film set during the Spanish Civil War with many other subtle touches of Spanish culture. This gives the Spanish people a film to identify with and feel a sense of pride about. However, despite these local trends, the story’s concepts are on a global scale and therefore more accessible than most foreign films.

Works Cited

Morris, Wesley. “Pan’s Labyrinth.” Boston Globe 12 Jan. 2007

Rhode-Brown, Juliet. “A Review of: Pan’s Labyrinth.” Psychological Perspectives Jan. 2007: 167-169

Scott, A.O. “Pan’s Labyrinth.” NY Times 29 Dec. 2006

Smith, Paul Julian. “Pan’s Labyrinth (El laberinto del fauno).” Film Quarterly 2007: 4-9

Turan, Kenneth. “Pan’s Labyrinth.” LA Times 29 Dec. 2006

Utichi, Joe. “Review-Pan’s Labyrinth.” Film Focus 2008

Wilmington, Michael. “Pan’s Labyrinth.” Chicago Tribune 28 Dec. 2006

The Wind Will Carry Us

I have read in a couple of reviews that Abbas Kiarostami's films have a general theme of journeying or searching and The Wind Will Carry Us is no exception. Behzad physically journeying to the town and the whole “finding himself and becoming a better person” mindset was apparent.

The scenery I think was the most interesting part. It was like a postcard or painting. I also found the references to the Iranian poems were also interesting. I also read in a couple of separate reviews that the poems were never censored in Iran. This surprised me after learning about the extreme censorship in that country.

As I said before in the forum from class, I realize that they’re documenting the mourning rituals, but the whole idea of waiting for the old woman to die seemed cynical to me.

The cell phone bit I believe was a reference to today’s enslavement of people by technology. He had to drop everything he was doing and drive miles away to a freaking mountain to get a signal! That just sucks.

Maybe one of my problems is I am generally not a fan of movies with deep hidden meanings and open endings. I usually go to the movies to relax and simply chill. Perhaps if I had had a different mindset in watching the movie I would have enjoyed it more. I realize it is an art form to film in that way, but the seeming uneventful-ness and droning on was slightly irritating and made the movie dull in my eyes.

I felt “blah” about this movie. I did not like it, but I liked it better than Underground.