Ah no. Don’t see this film. If you do and you find something to like about it, some hidden profundity, please let me know. Its directed by Nicolas Winding Refn who directed Drive, a film I really liked. The Neon Demon seems to be about the fashion industry and, more specifically, the obsession with female beauty. Every character is unlikeable, the men are all voyeurs or predators, the women are all narcissistic and monstrous. Continue reading
Evolution (2015)
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This is one of the most beautiful films I have ever seen. Its colour palette, location and aesthetic are exquisite. It is also enigmatic, to the point of being unsatisfying. We see a small, austere, island community of women and boys. The women are pale eyebrowed, dressed in colours of skin and earth. The boys are prepubescent, unsmiling. They live in bare, white houses amongst black sand, rock and crashing waves. There is little dialogue and no context for this odd world. Continue reading
MIFF 2016 – day one
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I’m already tired but I’m here. Five hours of travel by car, bus, train and foot, passing by rain-obscured fields and suburban backyards, seeing that Franco Cozzo still lives on in Footscray. I’ve checked into my cute and quiet CBD apartment and battled the crowds of Swanston St to get to Melbourne Central for my first film. In a rush of enthusiasm, I booked a third film for tonight at 11.30pm. What was I thinking! I might skip it and go home to bed as tomorrow is a five film day. Continue reading
Sonita (2015)
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I couldn’t pass up this Iranian documentary about a young Afghan girl in Tehran, battling her family’s conservative plans to achieve her dream of being a rapper. In many ways it is like As I Open My Eyes made real. Sonita Alizadeh, like Farah in that movie, is young and idealistic, channeling her anger at the injustice she sees all around her into her song lyrics. For her it is the limitations placed on her as a young woman, destined to be married off by her Afghani family for a bride price, like so many other teenagers, and forbidden from performing. Continue reading
Under the Shadow (2016)
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I’m still thinking about this Iranian horror. It wasn’t a genre I knew about before A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night entered my life – my favourite film of last year. There are similarities between these two films, not stylistically but in their feminist subtext, although Girl delivers it much more subtly. And Under the Shadow is much more scary. I returned to my apartment afterwards and the quiet stairs and long corridors seemed disconcertingly like a carpeted version of the apartment block in the film. Continue reading
As I Open My Eyes (À peine j’ouvre les yeux) (2015)
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Farah is a young idealist, a singer fresh out of secondary school and living in Tunis with her mother while her father works away. Farah’s band sing songs of protest about the inequities and corruption of their country, songs that begin to be noticed by the authorities. The music is beautiful – a mix of contemporary and traditional, the lyrics like poetry, Farah’s keening voice a heartbreak. Slowly, we become aware of the world outside Farah’s relatively privileged, sheltered upbringing and her guilelessness begins to affect those around her. Continue reading
MIFF 2016 – only four sleeps to go
StandardYes gentle readers who live vicariously through my film viewing and reviewing exploits, the Melbourne International Film Festival (MIFF to close friends and lovers) is on again and I have a passport! A passport allows me to see as many films as my fragile body and mind can manage in sixteen days and this year, I have booked 70. Yep, 70. No, I haven’t aged twenty years in twelve months, I just have a new strategy – go in hard, fill up my dance card and then coast through the second week, returning tickets if I need to. That’s the plan anyway. Continue reading
Green Room (2015)
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Have you ever decided to go to the cinema and just pick a film that you know nothing about? That’s what I did with Green Room, all I knew was that it was a horror (not my favourite genre), it was about a punk band and Patrick Stewart was in it. If nothing else, it was going to be interesting. And it was an engaging, if gory, ride. Continue reading
The Piano Teacher (2001)
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Holy moly, this was a cracker of a film. Not to be watched by anyone who wants an easy ride – take this as a warning. Directed by Michael Haneke, who makes challenging films like The White Ribbon and Caché, The Piano Teacher also has powerhouse performances, themes that make you decidedly uncomfortable and no neat resolution. With all of the Haneke films I have seen so far, as the end credits roll there is a moment of incredulity and exasperation but then the characters and subtext worm their way into your brain and refuse to leave. Continue reading
Florence Foster Jenkins (2016)
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Meryl Streep plays real-life New York socialite Florence Foster Jenkins who was a long-time supporter of music and an amateur soprano. What makes her story remarkable is that she occasionally performed, usually to supportive groups of friends, and was recorded several times even though she was not very good. Directed by Stephen Frears and also starring Hugh Grant as Florence’s husband and manager, St. Clair Bayfield, this is the same story that is the basis of the French film Marguerite, also currently in release.
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