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A movie and book review blog

  • Reading films, watching books,....
  • Mind candy in the dark
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Dec 31, 2004

A whole bunch of strangers, including Elvis Costello as himself, on New Year's Eve in NY in 1982. All their stories run parallel, totally unrelated, there is Ben Affleck, Paul Rudd, Jay Mohr, Kate Hudson, Jenine Garefalo, Courtney Love, Casey Affleck, Christina Ricci.......thats a whole load of actors, all emptying their minds, souls and their starved selves(starving for different things), and finally running into each other at the same new year eve party. I have no idea why it is called 200 Cigarettes?!!

Dec 30, 2004

It is a bit confusing, a bit slow for all the suspense it has and follows the French filmdom's rule of not ending happily - the end is always a compromise, not too sad but not a fairytale ending either.

Alain Delon who also starred in Le Cercle Rouge is the leading man, who is an art collecter/seller in Paris who is mistaken for a Jew and sent to prison camp during WW2. It is a charismatic movie, but I'd have prefered a different ending than the self-destructive one this one has.

Dec 29, 2004

Stephen King wrote the story which stars Johnny Depp in the main role as an author in a remote cabin trying to get his act together while being stalked by another author who claims he had plagiarized his story. Although it has a li'l suspense towards the beginning, the plot is obvious because lots of movies has been shot around the same premise.

Dec 28, 2004

I can forgive Tarantino(not that it matters) for Kill Bill series just because he made Pulp Fiction. The movie is a classic, one of the all time greatest movies to come out of Hollywood ever - the man certainly deserves some respect. John Travolta and Samuel.L.Jackson are amazing in their roles, truly deserve the boost the film gave to their careers later on. But the coup de grace of this film is its dialog - a dream come true of a script writer.

The movie is so full of cinematic intrigues and hidden meanings that come to light only after second and third viewings, but is a new experience every time. Watch the movie from the collector's edition DVD, there is plenty of extra material, like the entire soundtrack(the movie revived interest in fifties/sixties music in US), deleted scenes and unlimited trivia. Hats off to Quentin Tarantino.

Intimate Strangers

A French art house movie - kind that is usually adapted from a play, where almost all the scenes take place in one particular setting. Not exactly my kind of movie, I get bored when all that people do is talk, talk and more talk. But I have to agree, if viewers are to appreciate such a film it calls for great performances from the actors and actresses involved - which this film has, though I prefer something less sombre and more happening.

Dec 22, 2004

Cold Mountain

A love story set in the background of civil war. The coup de grace of the movie is not exactly the lovers - played by Nicole Kidman and Jude Law, but Rene Zellweiger who plays a supporting character named Ruby.

It is a good patrol of the civil war era through the travails of two estranged lovers, beautiful landscapes, well directed with a tight script and an engaging story.

Dec 21, 2004

"They say we all lose 21 grams... at the exact moment of our death. Everyone. And how much fits into 21 grams?" - the final thoughts of Paul Rivers played by Sean Penn in the film 21 Grams. And I had thought 21 Grams was a movie about drugs! Well, it is not.

Directed by Alejandro Inarritu(director of Amores Peros), with a mix-match timeline, 21 grams holds the viewer's attention till the very last. Not to mention the intense perfomances by Sean Penn, Naomi Watts and Benicio Del Torro. A well directed movie, although the chopped and pasted timeline creates a confusion, whick kind of makes the film more complex than it really is. When lives collide in a random moment, yes, the same premise as in Amores Peros, lives change, get destroyed or take an abrupt turn for better or for worse, then it moves on. Somewhere a total stranger has the power to completely change your life!
A true story of two journalists from the war torn Cambodia of the mid seventies. One is an American covering the vietnam war and its Cambodian aftermath for the New York Times, the other is a Cambodian journalist who acts as his interpretor.

Every generation has atleast one big war - a big scar that it tries to hide, to forget. For the late sixties and the seventies it was the Vietnam war, the ethnic cleansing of 2 million people under the dictatorship of Pol Pot. This is a story/movie that reminds how tainted our march towards 'civilization' has really been. The only things which we can take pride in is our friendships like the one these two journalists had.

Directed by Roland Joffe(City of Joy), this is one of the must-see films for a student of humanity.

Dec 20, 2004

Dec 17, 2004

The Missing

Ron Howard's tale of the frontier and the wild west, set in the south west, it stars Cate Blanchett and Tommy Lee Jones in the starring roles as an estranged father daughter duo who come together to help each other in a time of need.

It has the usual western theme of cowboys fighting Indians but with a twist. This time it is a frontier woman and her born-again-Indian father who gangs against the evil Indians who had kidnapped the woman's daughter with the purpose of selling her off to Mexicans down the border. Its a nice history lesson, to understand how people used to live in those days, nothing too serious, except the sweeping landscapes.

Dec 14, 2004

Kill Bill: Vol 1

I remember reading somewhere that Quentin Tarentino used to peddle his movie scripts on some beach in California(suspect it is Long Beach), thrusting it in to the hands of reluctant passers-by. He surely has come a long way from there, as Kill Bill proves. Now he can dance Hollywood on his fingertips, they'll take anything he dishes out, whether it be a real decent heist story(Reservoir Dogs) or a trashy Japanes anime video game made to satisfy his destructive teenage inner self(Kill Bill).

Or did he see Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and think that only thing that movie lacked was Uma Thurman, so I better make one with her in it?!! Kill Bill, for me, is a Tarantino comedy in the guise of a video game(if you have played Dead or Alive you'd know what I am talking about). Almost all scenes were funny, like computer games you went thru' levels, first you got your transportations(yep you have to fight for it too), then you went thru' different levels of enemies with increasing sophistication - first you fought off dwarfs and gnomes, then teeming midgets, then the devil's advocate and finally the devil him/herself - thats exactly what Tarantino does in this movie, except you don't have the joystick with you, he has it and he makes sure that you win this automated game.

And like all the computer games he has a version 2 out too, for those who have mastered all the thrill of the version 1 and are asking for more.
p.s - the 'fountainsque' blood works was totally brilliant, Tarantino.

Dec 11, 2004

My House in Umbria

An English movie set in Italy. We follow the life of an aging romantic novelist in a villa in Umbria and her proteges - who are a trio recovering from a train accident, along with her and their interactions. Its kind of funny, kind of beautiful, kind of sad and stars the famous British actress Maggie Smith in the leading role.

Dec 10, 2004

So British. There are no cool computer graphic ghosts or whiz ghost busters and the humor is so so British. In a way the whole movie has an effect of a play because there is no computer animation here and with zombies and ghosts and fights against ghosts shot in the old fashioned way, without the behind the screen gimmicks it is more earthy and appears less ghostly. All for a few laughs.

Dec 8, 2004

Cidade de Deus or the City of God is the slums(favela) of Rio De Janeiro. The movie revolves around drug trafficking, almost daily encounters with police and the striking point is the extreme young age of these drug traffickers - most of them are barely out of their teens and you would only rarely get to see anyone over 30. What happens to the kids then? They die!

It is a film from the eyes of a budding photo-journalist, a young boy(Rocket) from the favela who wants to break free from the drug world and wants to reveal to the world what it means to live in the favelas and why young kids end up as drug dealers. The cinematography is slick, fast cuts in tune with the fast paced life - you have to live a lifetime before you die with a bullethole in your chest at the age of fifteen or nineteen.

Directed by Fernando Meirelles and Katia Lund, Cidade de Deus will especially strike a chord with you if you come from developing countries like Brazil, India, Thailand or someplace like that. Your analysis of the film with your background of gritty realities of life in a developing country will indeed be different from the average American. Things and people are real in this movie, afterall its is based on a real life story. It won't surprise you when they say Brazilian cops face combat situations everday in their line of duty and carries more ammo and has access to more different kinds of guns and runs a thousand times more risk to die in combat than an American soldier in active duty. This holds true for the drug dealing kids in the favelas too. The movie starts in the sixties and spans a few decades hence, behind the beautiful but thin facade of the Rio's beauty to reveal its seldom heard dark side. Go watch it, there is nothing wrong in being better educated.

Dec 7, 2004

Seabiscuit

I am not much of a horse person, if I were I would have enjoyed Seabiscuit. Supposedly one of the greatest success stories of the Great Depression of the thirties, Seabiscuit was truly the dark horse who by mending himself, mended the people who took care of him as well. It has all the trimmings of a best seller book made in to a movie, which it is. A typical Hollywood feel good movie(well who said we don't need that?!) where the underdog comes from behind and takes the prize. In a way it also embodies the spirit of the people who made US what it is today - the ultimate risk takers with a never say die attitude. Seabiscuit is okay, if you like horses.

Dec 6, 2004

Ned Kelly

Mick Jagger was a hero of a movie? I never thought that had happened. Well, in Ned Kelly, the story about the famous Australian outback hero of the same name Jagger gets to play the hero and he does a good job too. Ned Kelly was remade later with Heath Ledger playing Jagger's role and with the supporting cast of Orlando Bloom, Naomi Watts and Jeffrey Rush. Supposedly remake is better than the original.

There is a lot of Irish in the movie. I think Kelly is an Irish surname and Ned's people is originally Irish who went to land down under. Liked the folk songs(kinda like extended limericks) they sing in the movie. Ned Kelly is presented as a RobinHood like figure, since I don't know Aussie history I have no ways to verify the truth about his character. An ok movie.

Dec 5, 2004

Bourne Supremacy

I knew this was Hollywood masala, but I like such flicks, seem to give you your money's worth. They burn enough cars to satiate your appetite for destruction. They have those edge-of-the-seat car chases to give you the much needed adrenaline rush after a dull work week. They take you to all those places who want to go - Moscow, Berlin, Goa and Italy. Then they have that charismatic(mainly because he's a recovering amnesiac)and intelligent ex-CIA agent who is the perfect combo of brawn and brains and for me personally, this time they have a whole part of the movie shot in India - Goa to be precise and with a super duper car chase thrown in. Cool. I knew Jason Bourne was a cool dude.

Dec 4, 2004

A very interesting, different film from the People's Republic of China. Oh no...don't say you've seen Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon - thats not the real Chinese cinema, it was a canned product for people used to Hollywood consumption standards.

The central concept of the movie might seem so alien to Hollywood viewers - a policeman loses his gun, almost loses his job, go nuts about it and is considered as a social outcaste. Here in US, were you can simply walk in to a store and buy the firearm of your choice the whole premise of this movie might seem pathetic. But thats how things sometimes happen in 'the rest of the world'.

The cinematography is really cool, smart shots of small town China of the present day, their social interactions, an honest view in to a world so different and wonderfully directed for a movie of such a low budget($250,000).
After long Bollywood makes a commercial movie that is up to the current standards of world cinema - thank you Ashutosh Gawarikar! A Hindi movie cannot do without its quintessential songs and melodrama - that is what makes it a Bollywood movie. It is an artform by itself, but how can you make it a competitive film appealing to world audience, Swades is the answer. 

 Even ShahRukh Khan, the immutable stammering, stuttering, lover boy of Indian cinema has broken free of his stereotypical role and played the role of a confused young scientist with passion. A.R.Rahman's songs are mind blowing - hats off to the maestro. After almost sixty years of independence Indians finally realize that they should have something else to show off other than the oft repeated 'great heritage and history'. 

Swades asks the much unsavory question to the current Indian junta - "what do you have to boast about your present?" Inspired by the true story of two young engineers who brought electricity to a village in Maharashtra, Swades is a tightly knit film which gets as close as it can to the real life in Bollywood terms.

Nov 16, 2004

A coming of age story from Spain. Nico and Dani are grade school pals who spend some glorious days of summer together at some beach resort in Spain.

It is a summer of sexual awakenings and boyish innocence. They go chasing after the girls at the same time are deeply devoted to one another. It is a movie about teenage experimentation with a backdrop of sunny Spain.


Nov 14, 2004

All The Real Girls

It is an all to real movie about a small town boy falling for a small town girl in small town USA. The script of the film is really cool, kinda like real life conversations without the cinematic pretense.

Directed by David Gordon Green it won a Special Jury Award at Sundance and is purported to the gems of indie cinema.



Nov 13, 2004

Fuente amarilla, La(or the Yellow Fountains is a spanish movie with a Chinese theme! Stars Eduaordo Noriega(he of Abres Los Ojos)and Silvia Abascal. Abascal plays the half Chinese-half Spanish girl in search of her parent's killers.

The search delivers her straight in to the hands of the powerful Chinese underground mafia operating in Spain, specialized in human trafficking. It is an interesting movie, fast paced and Noriega has given a commendable performance. The title of the film comes from Chinese mythology, when people die they are supposed to go and drink at a yellow fountain, where there will no sorrows and you will be united with your loved ones.

Nov 12, 2004

Stepford Wives

Had heard not so good reveiws about Stepford Wives, but I was not disappointed. Nicole Kidman has the lead role in this movie where she, a high profile media executive moves to Stepford, Connecticut taking a break from being a career woman.

Not a bad story idea. People are raving about the 1975 original movie of the same name though I am not very sure about it, technology was not as good as it is in 2003, will have to watch it soon. Kidman is a perfect choice of the role, so is Matthew Broderick as the not-so-glamorous husband.



Nov 7, 2004

Barbershop II

Barbershop I was real good stuff, can't say the same about Part II though. The sequel just cashes in on the success of the original.This time around the Ice Cube's Barbershop has a rival in business. Change, the only constant is the main theme of the movie. The only one thing that has not visibly changed is Cedric the Entertainer.

Nov 6, 2004

Last Orders

The last orders of a dead man to scatter his ashes at the seaside resort where he spent his honeymoon fifty years ago, is carried out by his friends. The movie progresses through conversations of the characters in a typical English pub - The Coach and through the flashbacks of memory of everyone involved which forms the well knit montage from which the film evolves.

Micheal Caine is the one who issues the last orders, he is not there at the point of time when the movie starts, but we see his life and times leading to his final exit through the flashbacks of others' memories, including his wife's. It is a movie that'll pluck at your heart strings without being over the top sentimental. As the British would say it, "Bloody Brilliant!"

Nov 5, 2004

The Householder

The first ever movie to come out of the Merchant-Ivory collaboration. The director-producer-writer trio of James Ivory, Ismail Merchant and Ruth Prawer Jhabhwala make their first film based on the story of a newly married couple in New Delhi in the early sixties.

Berkeley born James Ivory falls in love with Indian miniature paintings(Mughal) in some exibition somewhere in California, he has no idea what these paintings are about or where they came from, inquisitive for knowledge as he is, he digs out the source and makes a documentary about them! This leads him to his meeting with Ismail Merchant, which becomes the first move towards a long lasting partnership in world cinema - the Merchant Ivory Productions. The two then approach Ruth Prawer Jhabhwala in India, German born budding writer settled in India with her husband, for her novel, The Householder. Neither of the three has any experience in making a feature film, but they embark on the adventure nevertheless and thus we have The Householder, starring young(at the time 25) Shashi Kapoor and Leela Naidu as the newly weds grappling with life in an Indian city.

In a way the young couple is representative of the spirit of India at the time - the early sixties, when Nehru was unleashing his 'dreams unlimited' through his 5 year plans, the country was changing, the youth was the strongest currency in the market and this sudden transformation to individualism and freedom did bring about increased responsibilities and friction with the old. It is a tightly knit movie from the first timers, maybe one of the few where Merchant-Ivory didn't take refuge in the relics of the Raj and the young energy of the film is refreshing.

Nov 3, 2004

A heist movie - this time its French for a change. Although after watching heist after heist movies - the Italian job, Mamet's Heist, Reservoir Dogs and the like, I think I arrived a bit late at the Red Circle. But it has a quality that Hollywood films lack - it lacks coolness, it is more real, more gritty and more human like. The scheming thieves lack the super hero genes so common in the Hollywood kind. But all said and done I like the Hollywood ending better, when the thieves win!

Nov 1, 2004

Legally Blonde

There is hope, even for blondes. If Reese Witherspoon plays the blonde she cannot be that dumb anyway.

Oct 31, 2004

Kolya

Little Kolya is the five year old bundle of inspiration that carries this movie forward. I had kept myself from taking this movie because this seemed to be one of those movies about a kid coming in to the life of an adult, hitherto kid-less, then the kid change the life of this person. Well Kolya is exactly that but it is a really interesting movie, Prague just before the fall of Communism in 1989, the lives of people and all these serious things are told with a cute child in tow, no wonder it won the best foreign film Oscar in 1997

Oct 29, 2004

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

This had to be one kickass movie of its times, one of the coldest periods of cold war, 1964. Cuban Missile Crisis, assassination fo President Kennedy, the Russians getting ahead in the space race and then comes Stanley Kubrik with this funny satire about the Cold War.

The opening sequence,mid air tanking of a B-52 bomber was scavenged by the film's photographers from old stock footage from one of the studios in Hollywood and was used in the film, thus the start itself alerts the viewer of the out-of-the-box nature of the movie. Peter Sellers plays three different roles in the movie, each one better than the other. The War Room in Oval Office, is an interesting set so is the cockpit and controls of the B-52 bomber which the set technicians had to create all by themselves because the US navy refused to let them show any B-52 bombers. The War Room is equally famous, so much so that when Reagen became the President he asked his aide to be shown the War Room, to which the aide replied there was no War Room in the Oval Office, then Reagen said, "I thought there was one, they showed it in the film Dr.Strangelove!"

The screen play is crazily hilarious, it is like watching the world with your funny glasses on. The poster of the movie shown here was only released in urban centers because Columbia Pictures thought it was too artsy for commoners to understand.

Oct 27, 2004

The Searchers

This is a movie I took as a result of watching an American Movie History course which I happened to see on TV while flipping channels, the course was for correspondence students and that day they were dealing with Westerns. The Searchers they said was one of the better made westerns and possibly one of the best.

This 1956 movie is the first movie to have a feature length behind the scene documentary because John Ford kept a camera behind the camera shooting the real film so as to have video record of all the activities which went to the making of the film. But the DVD I saw didn't have this Behind the Scenes documentary, it'd have thrown light in to some more stuff.

The Searcher's is an engrossing movie, another first it has to its credit is, it is the first film to be shot in Monument Valley, Utah which later became the staple landscape of all Westerns. Great landscape, the villanious hero played by John Wayne, the simpler but more handsome young cowboy played by Jeffrey Hunter, the vagaries of life in the West, the enmity between Indians and cowboys and the story that keeps you bound to your seats makes The Searchers a true Western.

Oct 26, 2004

Did you know they make Bollywood Masala Movies in Argentina too?!!! The villain can make an effortless transition in to Bollywood filmdom, in many scenes he reminded me of Prem Chopra of a more silent kind.

The story is about a guy's hunt for his father(possibly lost in Kumbh Mela of Argentina, whatever that is), which turns in to some corrupt cops hunting for this guy all over the road, since he witnessed a murder of a prisoner in custody by the said cops. Meanwhile to keep the things more entertaining the director/the story writer decided to gift the guy with a girl friend, so there is an ample measure of romantic heat. As the hero is an innocent crusader searching for truth in all forms he gets help from Argentenian version of Hells Angels who are staunch supporters of Jesus and who pop at the right places in a police chase so as to confuse cops and allow the hero an easy getaway. Thus the story continues and all this is available in a DVD format made in MSPowerpoint.

Oct 25, 2004

Winter Sleepers

I was going to start with the sentence, "this is a very different movie", then I saw on the DVD the bold letters which says 'from the creators of Run Lola Run', well then different is an understatement. The camerawork is very peculiar, a kind of shot which is often repeated in the film is where you have a birds eye view along with the soaring motion of an ascending bird, its something to experience.

Since this movie is from 1997 I can say for sure the main theme of the much famed Memento is a straight lift from this film, where one of the characters has a short term memeory loss and takes these groovy pictures with his use and throw camera and captions them, so that he can refer back to them and recreate his yesterdays and day-befores. Kinda cool concept, huh!?

Another mysterious element of the movie is its story. The five main characters are interconnected by one accident, though none of them knows it and it is funny how they pass each other in the crucial situations not knowing that the ones they are searching for are right infront of them. Very interesting film and ultra cool photography.

Oct 22, 2004

Prisoner of the Mountains

The contrasting characters of the two soldiers are well developed, the mountain village and its unique lifestyle is something not seen everyday. I think this movie paved a way for lot of films which came later in a similar vein - like the Oscar winning No Man's Land and Kukushka. And in a way these later movies bettered the defects this one had, but still it is worth a watch.

Oct 19, 2004

A Painted House

Usually I put John Grisham in my list of paper(-back) tigers, the kind of books you take on airplanes or trains and don't really mind if you lose them during the course of the journey. But reading A Painted House changed all my perceptions of Mr.Grisham. It was simple language, a paperback with none of the pretentions of 'world class writers', but this one was definitely not use and throw, it was a keeper.

This led me to the video movie made for Hallmark channel and I can truly say the movie did not disappoint me at all, unlike many other book-turned-into-movie stuff. It is the story of a boy growing up in the cotton country of the American South at the fag end of WW2. If you want to know a thing or two about rural American culture of the forties and the fifties this is the movie, it is all the more entertaining because it is seen through the eyes of child. Cotton farmers steeped in debt, hill people(remember Beverly Hillbillies), Mexican who came every year from across the border in time of harvest, GM and Ford factories 'up North' - everyone represents the nation that once was US of A.

Oct 18, 2004

Since Otar Left

Brilliant, bloody brilliant, you have to pinch yourself to make sure that you are watching a movie, it was that damn real. It is from the former Soviet state of Georgia, where the son of the family has gone abroad insearch of job. The abroad is Paris and the son in question holds a medical degree and is working as an illegal construction worker in France, but we never actually see the son(Otar) in this movie.

It is a poignant story of his mother, who eagerly waits for her son's phone calls and letters. The other two important characters are her daughter(Otar's sister) and her daughter who shares the apartment with the matriarch in Tblisi. The movie progresses through life and reflections of these three generations of women, the impact of Otar's ultimate farewell on each of them. Julie Bertucelli has composed an everyday poem of breathtaking beauty, proving it once again it takes a woman to make a movie that'll touch every heart it passes through. The actors have played their parts extremely well, the most commendable is Esther Gorintin, the aged matriarch who is so true to life. I just read that she started acting at the ripe old age of 85 and she's still going strong. Whoa!!!

Oct 17, 2004

Oct 11, 2004

Santitos is funny, although it supposedly tells a sad story - of a mother who lost her daughter searching brothels for her missing daughter whom she thinks, has been kidnapped and sold in to prostitution.

The relationship between devout catholic women and the church in Mexico is portrayed as almost homely, like a mother-daughter relationship. The myriads of saints are their friends in need, they serve the same purpose your friend may serve on the other end of the phone listening to your sob story. The film follows the mother, Esperenza on her journey to find her daughter, from an obscure village in Mexico, to Tijuana, to LA and back to same obscurity. Although the premise is serious, the movie is witty, bold and the gritty world around us shot in a lighter vein. Impressive.

Oct 10, 2004


Nobody Knows Anybody

From the team that created Abres Los Ojos (better known by its Hollywood remix - Vanilla Sky), this is another psychological thriller starring the same leading man, Eduardo Noriega and the same mind boggling confusion between what is real and what is not, but less successful this time.

If you like architecture or is/was an architecture student(like I am/was) you'd like the detail at which the Spanish city of Seville is represented in the movie. There is even a scaled model of the entire city which plays an important role in the movie and lets not forget the famous Alamillo bridge by Santiago Calatrava which also feature prominently.

Apart from that if you are expecting the mind blowing power of Abres Los Ojos, you'll be disappointed, its just a few gamer dudes out to destroy the world. Better luck next time.

Oct 8, 2004


I don't why Denzel Washington's movies are so typecasted. He is always the hero who has insurmountable obstacles to conquer in an almost impossible situation, which in most cases involve saving the life of a child, but somehow you can be sure before you start watching the movie - that child is gonna be safe, as for Denzel it is a 50-50 chance.

Man on Fire is such a typical Denzel Washington-saving-a-child movie and for a change (yeah and we really need it), this time it is set in Mexico City where they kidnap children left, righ and center just for kicks!!! Marc Anthony commits suicide in the movie(hopefully in the real life with JLo he'll fare better) and then there is a fair measure of violence, bombings and kidnappings thrown in..thats about it and ofcourse Denzel saves the day.

Oct 7, 2004

Cyclo

Cyclo tries to tell the story of a cycle-rikshaw driver in Ho Chi Minh city, but gets overly poetic and becomes a montage of disconnected (but beautiful) imagery. While watching it I was sure it was directed by the same director who directed "The Vertical Ray of the Sun", because both movies emphasized much on the imagery and bits and pieces of random poetry than on the cohesiveness or the script of the film which rendered it tedious to watch in the long run.

I was not wrong, a search in IMDb has revealed that it was taken by Anh Hung Tran the very same director of "the vertical..." Most of the movie is like a guessing game, characters don't speak much, there are abrupt actions, random insertions of poetry, haunting imagery akin to moving paintings but without any connection to the plot. This goes on for a while till you grow tired of guessing and decide to sleep. I am not that arty-farty yet.

Oct 5, 2004

Back and Forth

Back and forth between a rock and a hard place - the situation in the movie can aptly summarized in those words. Filiberto is an illegal migrant Mexican worker who has just returned home to Mexico, after working in the asparagus fields in the US.

It makes you realize that poor all over the world are trapped by their circumstances, from which there is no escape except perhaps prison or hard labor. This is a film about the social realities that exist in the gritty bloody world of the poor and the downtrodden. The world which, through some quirk of fate or blind luck of birth, we didn't have to cope with, but Filiberto has to.
Movies narrated by children have always been a sure success with me, starting from the 'To Kill A Mocking Bird' to this latest one from Argentina. Valentin is the story of a 8-9 year old boy, named Valentin growing up in a city in Argentina somtime during the early sixties with his grandmother. His parents are separated, he tries to find parent-figures in every adult he meets and in turn he touches their lives in his own special way.

It is said to be semi-autobiographical film by writer-director Alejandro Agresti, who also plays the role of Valentin's unreliable father in the movie. It is a beautiful story of childhood, written in a heart tugging way that only a child's innocence can achieve. Rodrigo Noya who plays Valentin in the movie is an absolute darling and carries the whole film on his small shoulders, successfully.

Oct 4, 2004

The Ox

This movie by Sven Nyqvist has a line-up of the best Scandinavian actors - Stellan Skarsgaard, Max Von Sydow and Liv Ullman. The movie starts with "a murder" of an ox, which becomes a turning point in the life of the protagonist - played by Skaarsgard, and his family.

Its funny how the remote rural areas in the globe has the same value systems, the same attitude and the same set of characters, whether it is the Nordic north or a remote village in rural Brazil. It is an interesting movie, a learning experience.

Sep 28, 2004

The Seductor

A Spanish movie about a teenager falling in love with his beautiful and married next door neighbor who is almost as old as his mother. Suburbs look the same everywhere, cool young things drive Vespinos and teenage agony is the same anywhere on the globe.

Sep 26, 2004

Metropolis

Man, oh man oh man!!! I mean Ger"man". The art of perfection has always evaded me, so when I see a practioner of this high art succeed they always command my complete respect as do the makers of this 1927 German silent sci-fi flick.

Metropolis tells the story of a future metropolis where the ruler class reside in fantastic architectural masterpieces above the earth enjoying the fruits of labor of the worker class who live in subterranean caves under the ground and who report daily to ten hours of intense manual labor for their rulers. The story is not much of a crowd puller, but the technical perfection of this Fritz Lang classic which was shot 80 years ago is beyond words. The special effects in the movie are so convincing, you wonder how they could have made it possible such a long time ago with equipments that lacked any sophistication to do it.

As a student of architecture few years back, we had used a lot of graphics from metropolis as a background for our posters, pamphlets etc without knowing about the source where it came from. The architectural eye of the movie makers, constructing a future city is a point to be applauded. After watching the Metropolis, the making of the film(bonus materials) is worth a watch to know how the German film makers made the impossible possible within their limited technical resources. There is definitely a lot of science behind this science-fiction film.

Sep 24, 2004

Shame

My first Ingmar Bergman ever. This is also the first time I have come face to face the great acting persona of Liv Ullman.

Shame, although a war film or more correctly a film set during the war, is more of a character study than a war movie. It follows the life of a couple played Liv Ullman and Max Von Sydow eeking out a living in a farm on an island in Sweden. Shot in B/W this film follows the fate of these two people, carrying the burden of their tribulations and personal mishaps in a time of great turmoil.

Sep 22, 2004

Por La Libre or Dust to Dust as it English title is, is a colorful, youthful Mexican movie which centers around the death of a patriarch and his subsequent change in to dust(via an incinerator). So the urn containing his ashes is the protangonist in the movie, along with two young men who are cousins and are the grand children of the deceased person.

After watching this movie I have a very serious question to ask all the border crossing Mexicans, Mexico is very beautiful, its freeways can compete with any in the developed world and Acapulco kicks ass and still you want to stich yourself in to dashboards and illegaly transport yourself to the US? Why? Unemployment?

The movie is youthful in spirit, the two young actors really fit in to their roles and it doesn't try to teach the next important lesson of life. The photography and colors are cool, corruption exists everywhere and old benzes live long.

Sep 2, 2004

Super Size Me

A documentary with the sole aim of exposing the evils of fast food culture to the American public by Morgan Spurlock, who undergoes the dangerous experiment of intense "fast-foodization" himself.

As a part of this expose, Spurlock eats at McDonalds, 3 times a day for a month and nothing else - all the food he ever consumed during this month came from McDonalds all over the United States. He started off as a healthy young man, with his blood sugar, pressure, cholestrol in their healthiest of ranges and in just a matter of a month, he gains almost 30 pounds, his liver is poisoned(similar to liver poisoning by years of alcohol use) and has an addiction to fast food charecterised by cravings, high heart rate, pressure on chest, decreased libido and a lot other harmful vital signs.

In addition to Morgan's own adventure, during the course of the documentary we see how the American school system feeds its children almost totally on fast foods and sugar, how "super-sizing" became an everyday phenomenon and how less, the doctors themselves know about the effects of fast food.

The documentary doesn't imply we need to embark on an all-out war against fast food. But its always advisable to watch what you eat, after all you have only just one body and moderation is the key.

Sep 1, 2004

Juan Jose Campanella's, Son of the Bride is one of the near perfect achievements in film making I have seen in a long while. The story, the dialog, the camera, the acting, the editing, everything is perfect, there are no loose ends - a beautiful film, I think I should buy the DVD.

The story takes place in modern Argentina, where the the protagonist - aka the son of the bride is a restaurant owner, there are too many appointments and conversations crowding his life but somewhere along the way a heart attack makes a guest appearance. The story goes on from there. Cannot call it much of a story, but all I can say is it didn't even register in my mind while I was watching the film. The love between his father and his mother(an Alzheiemer patient) is touching, so is the poem his li'l daughter writes. When you dissect the movie the events it build upon seems trifling, but watch in its entirety - you have a gem in world cinema.

Aug 26, 2004

Marooned in Iraq

Most of the Iranian or Iraqi movies I have watched lately has a documentary quality, this one is no exception. It is a story of an old Kurdish folk singer crossing the border during Iran-Iraq war, to rescue the woman he has loved all his life. His two sons accompany him in the mission, although the last part of the journey he completes all by himself.

Bahman Ghobadi, the director of the movie has succeeded in bringing the aspects of Kurdish life that are unknown and scary to the rest of the world, the situations that Kurds face it daily. The homeland of Kurds, Kurdistan is spread across four countries, most of the times at war at each other. Every time there is a war, Kurds are the first casualty, most of them had spent the majority of life in mountain camps, the roar of fighter jets is their everyday radio, at one time chemical weapon strikes against the Kurds were so frequent that chemical scarring and deaths were common as flu and orphaned children comprise a large section of population. The film tries to touch all these aspects, weaving it in to the story. I'd say it is more of a documentary with some entertainment value. And with all these atrocities against Kurds, it comes as no surprise when Mr.Ghobadi says Kurds have more amateuer film makers per capita(even the cab drivers save up to buy 35 mm camera to make films!) than most other countries!

Aug 25, 2004

Corky Romano

A slapstick comedy starring Chris Kattan. It's kinda entertaining, cliched scenes and jokes abound, along with the facial muscular contractions performed by Kattan. Its funny for a mindless evening when you are stoned and almost on the way out.

Aug 24, 2004

The Terminal

Tom Hanks is one of the best actors to come out of Hollywood in the last few decades, this movie is a feather in the cap of this amazing actor. Viktor Navorski is an East European visitor to United States who gets caught in JFK airport with a cancelled entry visa and an invalid passport as his country ceases to exist after an uprising.

I am thankful that Spielberg didn't pursue the romantic angle between Hanks and Catherine Zeta-Jones and spoil the film. There are holes in the story if you try to analyze, but then who cares, it had some very interesting characters and great acting with Hanks leading the crowd.

Aug 23, 2004

Very Annie Mary

Its one of those fairytalish English movies with an undecipherable accent - of course it takes place in a picteresque Welsh village. Annie Mary is played by Rachel Griffiths who has a perpetual comic look on her face like Minnie Mouse which makes the film interesting. A simple film with a fresh innocence.

Aug 22, 2004

Along Came Polly

This is my kind of chick flick, if it was a chick flick. Ben Stiller, Jennifer Aniston, Alec Baldwin and Philip Seymour Hoffman make up the cast in this John Hamburg comedy. Although in a very short role Hank Azaria will have you in splits with his French accent. A good movie to enjoy in the company of friends.

Aug 21, 2004

Teen Deewarein

After long a Hindi film, a Nagesh Kukunoor one at that. It seems to be on a different track than his earlier movies like Hyderabad Blues, Rockford and Bollywood Calling. The opening shot is an almost exact copy of Shawshank Redemption, the rest of it luckily is not.

Naseeruddin Shah is an actor par excellence, with his effortless acting he proves it once again in this movie. Jackie Shroff is okay, Nagesh Kukunoor is good, so is Juhi Chawla. Gulshan Grover is a much underrated actor, he shines as the police officer in charge of the prison. The dialogs in this movie made me aware how Indian English is a world apart from the kind of conversation we have here in US. The long drawn sentences between two people, the heavy content laden words used in India now seems kind of dramatic, like reading prose.

Aug 20, 2004

The Village

Shyamalan's best film to date, he seems to have created a genre all by himself. Another movie which tells you not to worship the very earth so-called pompous all knowing film critics walk upon. It'll definitely break the stub off all you self-important people. But if you are one with a streak of impishness, I assure you, you'll love it. Life's not all that scary, you know.

Other ++++

+ M.Night’s Shyamalan’s cameo appearance is one of the best done by a director so far (amongst the ones I have seen)

+ Bryce Dallas Howard is real hero material (oops heroine)

+ Mind blowing camera

Aug 19, 2004

Interiors

The DVD cover says Woody Allen, wrote and directed this film. No, it couldn't have been you, Mr.Allen. It's a film for those 'extreme-artsy' types which definitely I am not. Diane Keaton is one of my all time favorite actresses but she seems so not like herself in the movie. All in all a slow one which takes some patient to sit through and devoid of Allen's hallmark wits.

Aug 18, 2004

American Splendor

A documentary/feature film about the creator of a comic called American Splendor - Harvey Pekar. The way the movie is shot like it is the storyboard of a comic book, a refreshing change. Although Harvey is an ordinary person like all of us, the film does not bore one as one would expect the story of a hospital file clerk would. Harvey Pekar is the common man with a 'comic' genius who manages to strike gold, the American dream.

Aug 12, 2004

Children of Nature

An Icelandic film centered on two inmates of an old age home which switches back and forth between reality and dream(at the most crucial points). Two childhood sweathearts meet in an old age home and decides to run away to their old village, now abondoned by all its inhabitants. Its an ok film, 'am not particularly impressed by it.

Aug 9, 2004

Aug 6, 2004

Capturing the Friedmans

A very good and an acclaimed documentary on the Friedman case that took place in Long Island in the early eighties directed by Andrew Jarecki. It is an interesting case-study of an American family falling apart, when the head of the family, the father - Arnold Friedman is accused of paedophile charges and to the horror of all horrors, his youngest son, Jesse is also accused of the same charges.

There is a wealth of home video material which went in to the making of this documentary because of Arnold Friedman, a home video enthusiast and later his eldest son David, who decides to document the whole trial process. Arnold Friedman had definite paedophile tendencies but he denies having carried out his advances to children anywhere near the home he lived, in his computer class or the suburban community which turned his main accusers in the case. But its Jesse who takes your sympathy, wrongly accused for a crime he didn't commit, then spend 13 years of his prime life behind the bars and come back to the society at the age 31 with a label as a child molester. Even in the most dysfunctional family, nobody could have had it worse. A very rivetting and objective documentary, justifies its Oscar nomination.

Aug 5, 2004

Magdalane Sisters, The

A harrowing tale(s) of escape of three young woman from a conventwhere they were enslaved against their choice. Or it'd be wiser to say they had no choice to speak of. This Irish film by Peter Mullan is a window to the rest of the world, of the inhuman practices meted out by Catholic nuns to young women/girls kept in their convents. It is not a prototype for Irish catholic convents of the 40-50 years back, but such institutions definitely existed.

These girls come in to the convent for various reasons, some of them gave birth before marriage and their families disowned them and put them in to the care of sisters. One of the girls was raped by a cousin of hers and her family to escape the shame forcibly sent her to the convent. At the convent the young women are made to work for a laundry the nuns operate for commercial purposes. Its like an emotional boot camp with no doors for escape. Human rights violations happened whenever and wherever the authorities got drunk on authority, either in the name of politics or religion. This film is a proof and its triumph is the ultimate escape of the girls, although it is not what I'd call dramatic.

Ladykillers, The

Starring Tom Hanks, as The Professor, Ladykillers is the story of a casino heist which almost succeeded but for a lady. The lady in question,Mrs Munson(played by Irma.T.Hall) is a god-fearing, church junkie with a passion for gospel music. This is not exactly the best movie Coen Brothers have ever made, but its passable, funny and reflects the amazing range Tom Hanks has. Irma.T.Hall fits like a glove in to her character and so does the portrait of her husband hanging over the fireplace.

Aug 3, 2004

From Dusk till Dawn

Directed by Quentin Tarantino twister in one night. You start watching a gangster movie of two thieves - George Clooney and Tarantino himself, halfway through the movie Tarantino decides that his thirst for blood cannot be quenched by mere handfuls of blood splattered by some shots in the head fired by these vily gangsters, so he turns the movie into a vampire thriller.

So he brings in Salma Hayek, who has to play a seductress turned she-vampire. In true Tarantinosque style the movie has blood, blood, blood and more blood and gore. In between all that there is a plot that travels from US to Mexico in an RV. Not bad, but take it only as pure entertainment, nothing beyond that.

Aug 2, 2004

Master and Commander

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, is definitely not my kind of movie. It was okay, but it created an Oscar flutter, I can't imagine that! It is a good education about the times when sailors were like astronauts in the sixties or computer geeks of the late nineties, when sea was the final frontier, before it gave way to space and the internet.

Russell Crowe fits the role as the captain of the English, other performances are okay, it seemed a bit put together for the movie kinda script, a tad rehearsed perhaps. If you want to see a real movie of sailors and the life at sea I'd still suggest the German submarine classic, Das Boot.

Jul 30, 2004

I,Robot

It is easier to criticize than to praise. I have always been lavish in my criticiscm of Hollywood, for once I'd like to rectify that and give Hollywood its due. I,Robot is a movie only Hollywood can produce with the finesse it has. From Isaac Asimov's story of the same name, the film stars Will Smith as the protagonist in this futuristic saga set AD 2035.

In this scenario, thirty years from the present, robots serve as helpers to all human-beings creating almost a Walmart Superstore of robots called US Robotics which aims to put one robot in every home. But somewhere in the process, some of the robots go 'Darwinistic'(read evolve) and we have a major riot in our hands. Will Smith gives a good performance, the robots are cool too and the graphics are pretty neat. Born sci-fi readers might have a different opinion about the film, but for common man(woman) like me this is as good a sci-fi movie gets in Hollywood before it gets lost in the 'matrix' and gets reduced to incomprehensible jibber-jabber. All credit to Alex Proyas.

Jul 28, 2004

For those who where growing up during the late eighties when 'the wall' came down this is a movie you can empathize with, more so if you are an East German, like the hero of the movie, Alex.

Alex is brought up by his irrepairable 'party'(as in communist party) girl of a mother with true socialistic values. When the wall falls in Oct '89, we see him as youngman along with the protestors screaming to tear down the wall. Thats also how his mother sees him last, before she collapses on the sidewalk from a heart-attack on the way to a party party.

The movie is about Alex and his friends' efforts to recreate the former socialist state within the newly liberated and united Germany. Its funny, natural and a treat to watch.

Jul 23, 2004

Brazil

Its the name of a futuristic paradise, where everyone wants to go - music, free life and salsa dancers, that must be their marketting strong points. The movie is a sort of retro-futuristic prophecy or commentary whatever you may call it. More than science or gadgets(they are there) the emphasis of the film is on the political and social scene in a futuristic society.

Post 9/11 this Terry Gilliam masterpiece has become all the more relevant and the Oscar nominated screen play is eerily remniscent of what the real world is now, replete with 'terrorists', 'patriot acts' and 'dept of homeland security', just as in the film! Everybody is scared of terrorists and the government is actively hunting them down, 'deleting' many innocent citizens taken into custody without any need of warrants and this ironical situation receives the pie in the face when one of the character asks another, "but tell me, how many terrorists have you seen in real life?" and the other character racks his brains just to come up with the conclusion, "None". Does it remind you of something? Or have you got trapped in this film called 'Brazil'?

Jul 21, 2004

12 Monkeys


Send-back-in-time movies make me a little wary, but this one rose above the cliche, at least for me. It had an intriguing plot, that keeps you at the edge of your seat, not too much science to torture your mind whether technology could really make it possible or not and Brad Pitt was brilliant although it was Bruce Willis's film.

Its a good sci-fi flick to come out of Hollywood, I think, reminded me of the more recent British sci-fi film - 28 Days Later, but ofcourse it didn't have the Bruce Willis factor or should I say the Die-Hard factor. All in all I liked the movie, could be called a good sci-fi film if you don't try hard to question the science part of it.

Jul 20, 2004

Kitchen Stories


Swedish furniture designers - the fountainhead of all talent in the furniture design field. Now this film reveals to you the extent to which they will go to perfect ergonomics and work flow patterns associated with a single piece of furniture, say a bar stool.

The movie is funny, not in an American way, but in a slow laid back European style. A furniture company sends its representatives all over the Nordic wilderness to the homes single men to study the kitchen behavior of bachelors. This is 1950. Fun begins or rather its a study of interactions of me, extremely funny I'd say, in a closed space.

Jul 19, 2004

Solas


A gem of movie from the Spanish director, Benito Zambrano, Solas won 5 Goyas(Spanish Academy Awards) and I'd say everyone of them was justified. It is the story about Maria, a 35 year old pessimist, part-time alcoholic who is employed as a part-time cleaner and her mother, a simple peasant woman who comes to stay with her daughter when her husband falls ill and is admitted in a hospital in the city(where Maria lives).

A moving story about two women, whose lives are always in crisis. Their lives, their relationships, the simple friendships they form in this fragile world is the fodder of this film. Solas means Alone, alone in their own lives as the world moves mercilessly around and ahead of them, this film follows three people(or four if you count the barman) - Maria(Ana Fernandez), her mother(Maria Galina) and their old neighbor, played by Carlos Alvarez-Novia and the bonds they forge in unconsciously makes the film poignant and etches it in to your hearts.

Jul 18, 2004

L'Atalante

Jean Vigo's masterpiece-acclaimed-after-death, L'Atalante is so far ahead of its times(it was released in 1934). It tells the idyllic story of a sailor and his bride, sailing a barge down the waterways of France with a crazy old man as their first mate. It is interesting to note that all the three who played the main characters had long successful runs in the film industry, almost till their deaths in the late sixties and early seventies. All, except for the young and charismatic director of the film - Jean Vigo himself. Vigo died before he could see his film released and the film itself had to wait ten years till someone found out that it was one of those hidden diamonds of world film!

The camerawork and frames of L'Atalante are commendable for a film that old, a path breaker for the future art house movies. If people can give Citizen Kane a 10/10 which I guess is mostly because of it being such an outspoken film for its times, L'Atalante deserves a perfect score for being perfect in the art of film making.

Jul 17, 2004

Winged Migration


It is hard to categorize Winged Migration in to Documentary or Feature Film classes, because it is both in some way or the other. All in all it is a beautiful film about the parallel world of birds. Though I knew vaguely about the concept of 'imprinting' it was this movie that showed the effect and extent of 'imprinting' on wild birds. After you watch the movie you should take it upon yourself to watch the making of the film, because without it there will too many holes in the story.

The film charters the migrations of various bird species all across the globe in a fictious one year period, although the film was shot over a period of four years with four hundred people serving as crew at all the scattered places ranging from India, Peru, United States, New Zealand, Artic and the Antartic. The camera work will leave you with your mouth open for most part of the film, it is why its essential to watch the making of the movie, lets feast on some knowledge and leave those flies out of our mouths!

Jul 16, 2004

Talk To Her

Pedro Almodovar's fatalistic film about bull fighters, patients-in-coma, male nurses and travel writers - thats Talk to Her. A sensous film filled with colorful imagery. There are two women confined to their beds by being coma, there are two men who love them. One of the women dies, the man who has been loving her shifts his affection to the other woman in coma. Now there is a triangle, then one man is eliminated from the scene and the woman wakes up. One man, one woman, everything's perfect, the film ends.

Jul 15, 2004

Gaslight


Gaslight stars Ingmar Bergman in her Oscar winning role as best actress in 1944. Bergman is good, though the story is a bit dated, but then it is from sixty years ago,what did I expect? It has obvious shortfalls, like the villian -Charles Boyer who plays Bergman's manipulative and vicious husband, has villian written all over him that one wonders why was Bergman's character the only one not to notice that, then her saviour or the man who has a secret crush on her conveniently turns out to be a Scotland Yard detective. But all its faults and sepia tint, I'd say it was a gripping movie, enough to put off sleep till 3 am when we finished watching it.

Jul 13, 2004

Prizzi's Honor

Imagine Jack Nicholson as Micheal Corleone, the young heir-in-waiting for Marlon Brando's Don Vito Corleone in the Godfather. While imagining give Micheal Corleone a comic twist, tone down a li'l bit of his youthful intensity and up a notch of dry wry Nicholson humor - you have Charley Partanna, a potential mob boss waiting in the wings in this laughworthy yet serious movie - Prizzi's Honor.

Says it got 8 Oscar nominations, one for Nicholson himself. Kathleen Turner and Angelica Huston play the female leads in the movie directed by John Huston. It could be called the love story between a mob hot shot and a hit woman or it could be just a comic satire on how the mob world works, whatever it is, it was enjoyable two hours.

Jul 12, 2004

Prince of Tides

This is the first time I saw Barbara Streisand movie and she's not bad as I had expected. She acts well and I cannot say much about the direction, though nothing stands out. Nick Nolte is an ex-football coach with a scarred childhood and a suicidal sister. Streisand plays the therapist and the doctor for his sister. I think I should read the book now(written by Pat Conroy, the novel has the same name as the film). In a way it is a love story, which as it progresses brings out scary skeletons from the closet of past, it just a little stop short of being your prototypical chick flick.

Jul 8, 2004

Cinema Paradiso

World cinema at its mushy and sentimental best. Well, if you are really bent on taking a romantic movie, get some tips from Cinema Paradiso. From Guiseppe Tornatorre, this Oscar winner for the best foreign film in 1990 is an art house movie which will appeal all cinema-goers. I saw the newer version, the original version is supposed to be longer and darker.

Salvatore is the central character of the film, we follow Salvatore's life from his childhood in a small Italian town and his preoccupation with the little movie theater in the town - Cinema Paradiso. Salvatore grows up along with the changing fortunes of Cinema Paradiso and its keeper, Alfredo. There is also a love story woven between the folds, fortunes are which are drastically altered by one of the characters. Only one true love in your life, as the movie seems to say. It might seem to be a very gooey gooey movie, but its a real treat to watch, the music score is remarkable too. Definitely worth a watch.

Jul 6, 2004

The Firemen's Ball

Czheckoslovakia, before it was broken into bits was where this movie was filmed. The same country banned the movie from showing in its theatres when it was released. I don't know what is so bad about the movie, there is nothing contreversial in the film, it just revolves around a night when the firemen stage their annual ball in town. Maybe the communist government was just paranoid? It is from the director of "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" and "Amadeus", Milos Forman. Though I couldn't really understand what was so great about this movie. Maybe the ban in its country of origin and the Milos Forman tag I s'pose?

Jul 4, 2004

Alex and Emma

I have no tolerance for gooey gooey romantic comedies, this film re-asserted this fact.

Jul 1, 2004

Anne of the Thousand Days

A short course on British history for me. I have heard the name of Henry VIII many times though I didn't know anything about him as I was not enchanted by the numerous British Kings and Queens, their hunting parties, tea parties, coronations and related antics. Henry VIII movie was suggested by one of the fellow bloggers, so I thought I shall give it a try.

Anne of Thousand Days is about Anne Boleyn, one time wife of Henry the Eighth and the mother of Elizabeth I. It is an interesting movie, a crash course in the Britian of the middle ages and it is an entertaining story too. Personal and political games abound the story in which Richard Burton plays Henry. Not bad for a movie based on a historical plot.

Jun 30, 2004

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf

This movie has given me a whole new perspective on Elizabeth Taylor, where she's much more than a man-killer with more husbands than days in a week or a fat obnoxious aging starlet. Here was a woman who could really act! No wonder they gave her the Oscars for this one.Richard Burton, her one time real life husband plays her husband in this film, he has given a commendable performance as well.

The story of the movie is rather heavy, full of metaphors and deep pointy suggestions at what life really is. Though I wonder how much of this'd really happen in a similar real life incident. The story encompasses a single night where a middle aged couple(Taylor and Burton) play hosts to a newly married couple. The men are both professors, one who has spent almost his entire life teaching on the campus and one just starting out. It is an interesting film, maybe one of the films that defined the thinking man's Hollywood movie, a bit to heavy for me, worth a watch anyway.

Jun 25, 2004

Today, mercury hit a new mark on the Fahrenheit scale, obviously Ray Bradbury is pissed and so are a lot of others. Today, I realized why United States of America still retains the title "the land of the free and home of the brave" (this film getting made and released proves it). Today, Michael Moore, yes that opinionated jerk, propagandist liberal, manipulator of facts, self-appointed soul keeper of American politics had his movie Fahrenheit 9/11 released nationwide. Today I saw this "liberal" movie in a theatre bursting at the seams in a city, which till now I had considered a red-neck haven (my bad) and to add to my surprise the red necks followed it up with a standing ovation when the titles came rolling in.

About the film : Don't go anywhere near it if you are a hard nosed conservative, you might embark on a shooting spree at the theater itself, in order to cleanse the world of those mindless idiots who fall for all this over-the-top sentimental mis-information. Otherwise the movie shows a world of improvement in Mr.Moore's talent as a film-maker(some'd say propagandist), better than Roger and Me and Bowling for Columbine. If it had an OST I'd buy it, loved all the songs! Its easy to accuse Moore of concocting evidence. But if you could really read the evidence in the first place, Florida and later Iraq would not have happened, and Michael Moore would still be the little known fat guy munching on a dough nut at some unheard of street corner at Flint, Michigan still dreaming of making a movie that'd rock America and get the longest standing ovation (20 mins) in the history of Cannes!

p.s - in one of the earliest books on war games -the Mahabharata, Sri Krishna(the in-house spin doctor) advises Yudhistira (the good guy king), "a lie told for the greater good of humanity ceases to be a lie." Yeah all is fair in love and war.

Jun 24, 2004

Tea with Mussolini

A band of British ladies in Florence before and during the war form the interesting group on which this movie is focused on. This Frank Zefferelli film staring Cher, Joan Plowright, Lili Tomlin, Judy Dench and Maggie Smith is kind of like a book turned into a movie, but I guess it was not a book, the story/screen play was written for a movie.

It is amusing to see the antics of British ladies, because after America, the British always seem very decorous and proper. I loved Cher's and Joan Plowright's roles. A laid-back movie.

Jun 23, 2004

Lovers on the Bridge(Amants du Pont-Neuf, Les)

Another French love story, this time it is set during the bicentennial of the French revolution - 1989 and stars Juliette Binoche and Denis Lavant.

Two homeless bums, meet on Paris's oldest bridge - Pont Neuf, closed for renovation and their home for the moment. Its kind of slow moving at the start, but the story picks up and you'll find yourself in the middle of an interesting love story. It makes me wonder at the different sorts of people who end up homeless, all bums have a history, eh? Directed by Leos Carax I'd not call it a moving love story, maybe if you want to see a different foreign film, this could be it.

Jun 22, 2004

Jules and Jim

This sure was a strange film. I wonder why Jules and Jim was so famous? Maybe because of its revolutionary story line(the story takes place before and after WW1) or is it because of the director, the famous Francois Truffaut?

What I found from the movie is that lot of French films have a narrator who links the various scenes of the movie. This movie(1962) has it, so has Amelie and so has the Spanish Apartment. My experience is limited to the movies I have watched. Another question I have is, why is it called Jules and Jim, it should be called something like Catastrophical Catherine or something. The movie is a love triangle between Jules,Catherine and Jim. I liked one dialog in the movie, where Jims tells Catherine(played by the immortal Jeanne Moreau) which transcripts to the idea that - "lot of us have the dream of making love to the stranger we met on the train, but for the sake of our significant other and for the sake of the love between us, we rise above that dream, above that selfishness and dedicate ourselves totally to our significant other, but you Catherine cannot do that." The whole movie revolves around this handicap of Catherine, not my cup of tea.

Rhapsody in August

The rhapsody started with good intentions, but somewhere near the crescendo it lost me. I took it because it was directed by Akira Kurasowa, after Darsu Uzala I had realized Kurosawa was not that artsy as I had thought. But this one shattered all my expectations, not because it was too artsy, but because it lacked the quality of a master's touch.

The story is about an elderly woman, grandma to four youngsters living in the hills behind Nagasaki, still in the shadow of that dreadful August day in 1945. The story is fine, but the way the children narrate it to the viewers under the pretext of educating youner children, their frequent excursions to the city to relive the past - all seemed pretentious. As if they were laboring to make the viewers understand thru' some kind teacher - student technique. Richard Gere has a small role in the movie as the Japanese-American nephew of the old woman.

All in all, it seemed to me like a slow moving film, with special effects like thunderstorms produced by pouring milk in a glass of water and shooting it close-up, I am wondering where was Kurasowa?

Jun 21, 2004

The Princess Bride

This is one wacky bed time story! Enjoyed every bit of it. It also stars my favorite kid of the TV land - Kevin Arnold a.k.a Fred Savage of The Wonder Years. The movie is built on a traditional framework of a grandfather reading a story for his sick bed-ridden grandchild(Savage), but don't that fool you. It is nothing but traditional!

The character are wacky and endearing, so are the witty dialogues. From the start it has the airs of an out-of-the-box fairy tale, which it lives upto through out the way. Robin Wright Penn is the Princess Bride, directed by Rob Reiner, it is a good entertainer for children and adults alike.

Jun 20, 2004

Love and Death in Long Island

It had Jason Priestley on the cover - thats the reason I took this movie. I thought it'd be fun to see Priestley doing a serious role, other than the teeny bopper stuff of his I had been familiar with. I was a regular watcher of Beverly Hills 90210, the original series when it started airing in the early nineties and Brandon Walsh played by Jason Priestley was one of the goody goody chocolate box heroes who appealed to the age I was at the time.

Coming back to Long Island, it didn't doesn't ring up any high scores in my register. But its a different movie all the same - one could say its a bit quirky, even. It also stars the British actor John Hurt who plays an author in present day England who has just started discovering modern day contraptions like the Television and the Microwave and on the way he also discovers Ronnie Bostock(played by Priestley) and this leads him to Long Island, NY where Bostock's home is. I can warn you it is a slow movie and movie is mainly Hurt's rather than Priestley's.

Jun 17, 2004

Whale Rider

An incredibly beautiful movie. Keisha Castle Hughes has presented a talent that is way beyond her years, if she was an American she'd have converted her Oscar nomination into an Oscar.

The film is set in the Maori heartland, ie NewZealand. Pai(played by Keisha) is a Maori girl who is the last descendent of a long line of Maori chieftains, but alas! she's a girl, which means she broke the male chain of chieftains - thus her birth was her unluck and her people's, so believed her grandfather. This heart rendering story follows Pai's efforts to prove that even though a girl she's fit to lead her people if a need arises. But her grandfather would have none of it. Though he inhabits a space-time of present day NewZealand, he firmly believes women are not supposed to be leaders.For the rest, watch the movie.

The photography is par excellent, so is the music and so are all the actors - a brilliant combination directed by Niki Caro. This film should be made a must-watch in all the countries which practise female infanticide, enlighten yourselves people, times, they are a'changin'..

Jun 13, 2004

Chaos

My guess is all the women will love this movie, becuase in a way it represents them, their emotions and their struggles with the world in general and men in particular. Brilliant acting from the two leading women in the movie - Catherine Frot and Rachida Brakhni has added to its quality.

The photogrpahy has a home movie awkwardness, the kind you and me would do with our Sony handycams, I don't know how they have achieved it.Written and directed by a woman, Coline Serreau this is a must-watch movie for all the females of the species.

Jun 11, 2004

The Deep End

Tilda Swinton has done good acting in the main role of the movie, The Deep End, as a mother who tries to cover up what she thinks is a murder comitted by her son. There were some parts of the story which I found questionable but all in all it was an average thriller with some very good sea blue photography. The actor Goran Visjnic who plays is a major role in the film, is a Croatian army-vet in real life was a quite a discovery for me, People Magazine had voted him the sexiest import in 1999. Maybe you can see it for Tilda, Goran and the photography.

Jun 10, 2004

Pirates of the Caribbean

The Curse of the Black Pearl is an entertainer par excellence. So is Johnny Depp. I was blown away by his performance in this film, which also stars Geoffrey Rush, Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley. The story is set in the times when the sea was still the final frontier(yeah Star Trek was yet in the future)and anybody with a dash of adventure in their veins made sure that they dashed to the sea and atleast spent a season or two exploring the far reaches of the oceanic horizon. I am not going to disclose the story, but let me just say it is an out and out entertainer and will definitely live upto your money's worth. Go Pirates!

Jun 5, 2004

The Day After Tomorrow

Saw The Day After Tomorrow yesterday, a week after its release. To me it seemed like Roland Emmerich had some messages weighing down his chest that he had to release to humanity as soon as possible and being a film maker he did what he always did - he made a film. The story is so made up, with a real loose plot, without any coherence or valid explanations, but the special effects are fantastic. The kind fifty years from now, some teenager watching the same movie would exclaim in appreciation, "Man, thats some special effects for a movie that old!"

The Day After Tomorrow,is where finally film makers have caught up with the environmentalists and have overtaken them sans effort. There are lavish CGI powered scenes like New York in a big freeze with a scene stealer of an accelerated super freeze of Empire States Building with windows popping out, snow blizzards in New Delhi and LA ripped open by tornadoes starting of course with the ripping off of the Hollywood sign on the hills.

Environmental activists who worked with Day After Tomorrow said that the exposure and media coverage they got while shooting the film was many times more than the what they received from decades of activism! Experts at Lawrence-Berkeley lab in CA warn that although the climatic changes in the movie take place at a fast-forward pace which in real time might take decades, the cause(the changes in the Gulf Stream) and the effects might be the same but not on such a compressed scale of time as depicted in the movie. In other interesting news, related to the movie, on April 1, 2004 NASA issued a memo saying, "No one from NASA is to do interviews or otherwise comment on anything having to do with ... " the film, “The Day After Tomorrow.” (which they later retracted).

A global climatic change in a compressed time scale of a few days does give tremendous freedom for CGI and special effect artists, but if it succeeds in making the Americans with behemoth SUVs who drive 6liter-V8 engines in the urban jungles of San Francisco or New York (why do u need an SUV to drive in a city, to make up for you small u-know-what?), to take a second look on their choice of personal transportation, that’s the best that Hollywood can do for the environmental cause.

Jun 4, 2004

The Piano

Mind blowing photography! It is one of the best aspects of the film. Set in NewZealand, it is a story of a mute woman, who is an excellent piano player, sent to NewZealand by an arranged marriage. She takes the piano with her but is forced to leave it on the beach she landed as it was too heavy to carry to her new husband's home, deep in the forest.

The film thrives on the bond between the woman and her piano and how far she'd go to have it by her side. It is also an interesting portrayal of new European settlers in NewZealand and their relationships with the native Maoris. I am not one who is drawn much towards intense emotional drama involving two or three people, so if you like that kind of story this one is definitely for you.

Jun 2, 2004

Bitter Sugar

It is the story two young people, Gustavo and Yolanda, bursting with dreams in the communist Cuba. Gustavo is an idealist, who believes in the revolution, in the good that it can bring, whereas Yolanda is suppressed by the suffocating atmosphere around her brought about by the system. And then, they fall in love.

The movie by Leon Ichaso is shot entirely in black and white maybe to accentuate the funlessness in Cuban life. But I wish they had shot it in color, it'd have been more vivid(maybe thats exaclty what the director didn't want) and more informative. It gives a real and glaring picture of hopes and dreams being destroyed in the contemporary Cuba and how every Cuban aspires at least at some point in life to be in that dangerous raft heading towards Miami. Beautiful and thought provoking movie.

Jun 1, 2004

Barcelona, one of the cultural capitals of European new wave is the location for this MTV-ish movie. A Parisian guy spends a year in Barcelona on a student exchange programs where he shares an apartment with students from different parts of Europe. If you have shared an apartment and lives of your friends as a student or in your early adult year this is one movie you can easily empathize with. It is said that the applications for admisssions for EC's Erasmus (that is the name of the exchange program thru' which the protagonist arrives in Barcelona) program doubled after the release of this movie!

Chocolat

It has all the airs of a best selling novel made into a film - in its style of narration, in the particular type of story involved and in the development of characters. Juliette Binoche plays a woman who opens a choclatarie in a remote French village with her small daughter, Anouk. The villagers first treat her as an unwanted guest who had invaded into their quiet peaceful lives with a mysterious and devious sweetness that goes by the name of chocolate.

The film follows Binoche's character thru' her encounters with villagers - some pleasant and some not so pleasant, her rebellions against the rigid village code and her meeting with a mysterious stranger - Johnny Depp. Its a modern day fairy tale directed by Lasse Halstrom which talks about things French and thus enchanting to the American audience.

May 23, 2004

Rabbit-Proof Fence

This time, for a change, the movie is from Down Under. It is a look at the often disregarded piece of Australian history, that of the role of aborigines, how their lives changed in the process to change the bush country of Australia into a civilized world.

From 1917 to 1970, half-caste aborigine children(one of their parents will be an aborigine and the other usually white), were systematically removed from their aboriginal homes and placed under government custody. This was supposed to convert them into civilized human beings who'll speak English and will end up as maids and bell-boys for the ruling class(read glorified slaves). The story follows the escape of three little girls, forcefully taken away from their mothers and placed in a government camp.

The girls make their escape from the government camp on a rainy night and the story follows their trail 1500 miles across the bush country to their homes and mothers. Its a true story, written by Doris Pilkington, who is the daughter of one of three girls(Molly Craig) who makes this historic and unbelievable flight to freedom. Directed by Philip Noyce, this movie is a tribute to the struggle of, what is termed as the Stolen Generations of Australia.

(p.s: if you like this movie check out movies in a similar vein, like Skins and Smoke Signals about native Americans made by acclaimed director - Chris Eyre)

May 22, 2004

A.R.Rahman is the best thing that happened to Indian movies in last 20-30 years or so. Oh God, what was it like in those days without the maestro, Rahman, can't believe I lived through them! And Tamil movie industry, is the massive juggernaut that rolls through the ancient relics which dictates the like of the rest of Indian movie industry and clears a path for things new, contemporary and exciting. Hats off to them.

Boys, is the latest offering from Tamil movie industry which takes on contemporary issues like dating, MTV, the youth culture and doesn't try to gloss it over with an overdose of 'Indian cultural values'. Ofcourse, the selling point of Boys is its music, composed by A.R.Rahman. I liked all the songs and they are very contextual, unlike most Hindi movies which takes off on a song and dance routine which usually will have no connection with main story line. Man, I am totally sold out on Boys, go watch and rate it yourself.

Finding Nemo

Disappointed. After Shrek and Monsters Inc. the other famous animated movies I had great expectations for Nemo, add to the fact that our library never seemed to have a copy of Nemo it was always in circulation. The dialogs are very contemporary American, which makes me feel whether those viewers outside US be able to get the gist of the ideas implied. Its seems to be a family movie, intended to make children take the right route to adulthood.

May 20, 2004

Anger Management 

Anger Management, it got on my nerves as much Jack Nicholson was getting on the nerves of Adam Sandler in the film. Sandler came off as a perfectly normal guy who was being sent off to an a 30 day anger management session with a wacho shrink, played by Nicholson. Ok, in the end we find out the whole thing was a set up, but the reason of this set-up was that Adam Sandler was not normal, he was edgy. For me he seemed perfectly normal right from the start who had to undergo this horrible experience to correct himself?!?!!?

May 17, 2004

Spring Forward 

Its two men talking set inside a visual poem. The movie starts in Spring in Connecticut, when Paul(Liev Schrieber)comes to work at the local park system. His partner is Murph(Ned Beatty), a wizened old man. The movie goes forward thru' season along the conversations of these two men as Paul, an ex-convict tries to fall in with the system and Murph. The camera has captured the bounty of seasons in the fullest degree, there are lots of right-on philosophical dialogs. It was a slow moving film, I felt like I should take it like a vitamin pill 5-10 minutes daily, small snippets to drive life the right way.

May 8, 2004

The Navigators 

It was Ken Loach's film Sweet Sixteen which made me look for more Loach movies at the library. Landed on this one, made a year previous, The Navigators centers on the railroad at Yorkshire. The socialist director in Loach had this time taken upon the privatization of Bristish Rail in 1995.

It is satirical, at the same time poignant and touching, peopled with real men trying to hang on to the only job they know how to do. The one thing I regret is the lack of subtitles in the DVD I was watching which meant that there were some gaps in my understading of the film since I couldn't follow their accent properly. Like any Ken Loach movie this one is also a fine portrayal of life as we live it - not very rosy.

The Spanish Prisoner 

I took David Mamet's Spanish Prisoner from the library thinking that I had not seen it before, turns out that I had, but except for a few scenes I couldn't recall anything, not the plot or the story. That was good because Spanish Prisoner turned out to be quite an intriguing entertainer. The plot thickens at every new scene and you are caught up in the mystery. It stars Campbell Scott as the hero and for a change, Steve Martin as the villian. David Mamet's wife Rebecca Pidgeon also has an interesting role in the film. Worth watching if you haven't seen it or have turned amnesiac like me.

May 7, 2004

  • 5/07/2004 04:15:00 PM
Finished reading the book a few minutes before I started to watch the film of the same name written by Laura Esquivel and directed by Alfonso Arau. A treat for the senses, don't blame me you are overcome by a sudden urge to create culinary wonders.

Every chapter in the book starts with a recipe, an ethereal one at that, you wish you could atleast see how they'd look like once they are done. Watching the movie right after reading the book afforded me the simple pleasure of seeing how those wonderful recipes looked like in real life, although second best only to tasting them ourselves. It is a love story of Tita and Pedro, their troubles and turmoils and their final union after 22 years during which had taken place a marriage for Pedro and an engagement for Tita among other things. The book and the movie is an excellent primer for those who want to explore the "mystic realism" of Latin American writers.

May 6, 2004

  • 5/06/2004 10:32:00 PM
Envy was the last movie I saw in theater, the first weekend we came from the trip and struck by an irresistable urge to go to a movie hall we zeroed in on envy. It seemed promising starring two actors we like, Jack Black and Ben Stiller. Can't say much about the movie. Jack Black's role is not what could be termed as comical and Stiller's role is downright serious. A movie for a lazy afternoon, maybe not worth buying tickets, better rent the dvd/video when it comes out.

May 5, 2004

  • 5/05/2004 09:42:00 AM
Steve Martin and Eddie Murphy together in a movie written by Steve Martin himself, it has to be funny. Steve Martin is the owner/producer/director incharge of Bowfinger films who is trying to make a film with the actor Kit Ramsey, played by Eddie Murphy. The problem is Kit Ramsey doesn't know that he's in the film! How Martin and his mismatched bunch of helpers go about shooting this film something of the innovative. And man, Eddie Murphy could really act, this is the first time I am givng him his due credits.

May 4, 2004

  • 5/04/2004 02:08:00 PM
Thank God that Sharukh Khan had to decline the title role as he had to go to London for his back surgery and it came to Sanjay Dutt instead. The role fits Dutt like a custom-made glove and he's at his brilliant best as the Mumbai-don turned medical student Munna Bhai.

If you have lived in Mumbai, you'll certainly appreciate the rawness and the comedy of the film. There is not much forced tickling comedy, rather its the dialogues that make you chuckle over time. Arshad Warsi as Munnabhai's side kick Circuit is at times better than Munnabhai himself. Although there is some melodrama in the film, it is excusable for the rest of the film makes up for it. The success of the movie rides on the fact that all the characters are believable and gels well with the story.One of the funniest movies to come out of Bollywood in the recent times.

May 3, 2004

  • 5/03/2004 01:55:00 AM
From the story by Alan Silitoe, Loneliness... is about the story about a rebellious and angry youngman who is sent to Borstal school after he's caught stealing from a bakery. Tom Courtney, as the rebellious hero, Colin Smith gives a commandable performance. This is a movie against the system or a person's statement against the system and how he wins by losing the race. This cinematic poem by Tony Richardson, picturised in dreary grey Nottingham, asserts itself from the opening shot itself and is touted to be one of the best British films ever.

May 1, 2004

  • 5/01/2004 04:03:00 PM
This French-Canadian film by Denis Villeneuve is said to have won many awards. It starts with a fish, on the cutting table, which is just about to be cut and packed into cans divulging some of the great philosophies of life by telling us the story of a young woman. Water or shades of water is the predominant color theme of the film. It reminds me of the Kiezlowski films, Blue or was it White? There is too much stress on making it artsy and thereby unco-ordinated. Too much co-incidences and plots linked to plots thru' some random and seemingly senseless incidents at the time, but which are shown connected later on. Hmm... Iam getting confused already.

Apr 30, 2004

  • 4/30/2004 12:03:00 PM
Leila is a young Iranian woman, happily married to Reza living somewhere in urban Iran. All is roses and pearls till the couple realize that Leila cannot have a child, not that Reza is desperate to have one. The more conservative mother-in-law and aunt-in-law decides that Reza should remarry in order to have progeny. Leila meekly agrees to this and goes along with the proceedings.

To an extent I can understand the Leila's submissiveness to this decision considering the society she was born and brought up in expected her to be like that. What I don't understand is even though his wife agreed to his mother's decision of taking a second wife, why he himself went ahead with it although reluctantly? Add to this the fact that Reza's father and his three sisters were totally opposed to his second marriage. Its slow moving at times, I don't understand the mind games of the two main characters - Leila and Reza. One thing I learnt from the movie is Iranian cities are very modern - wide highways, turnabouts, ramps, modern apartments, cars and ladies in black chador.

Apr 28, 2004

  • 4/28/2004 11:54:00 AM
I bought this book for in-flight reading for a long flight from NYC to Seattle and then onto Anchorage. Finished it by the time we touched down. Set in London, it is about a middle-aged literary editor, Rose. As is anticipated by the title, it is about the mid-life crisis she undergoes.

I selected it from the rows of best-sellers at the airport kiosk because I thought it was the story of an everyday woman, some of us who have been thru' such things and some of us will get to that age in the future. Its an ordinary story, narrated in a way that makes you want to read. The setting could have been anywhere - London, New York, Tokyo or Rio. To me it feels like a story about women by a woman, for there are other interesting female characters in the story as well. An easy read, we should be hearing more about Elizabeth Buchan on this side of the Atlantic soon.

Mar 18, 2004

  • 3/18/2004 10:15:00 PM
Shot at a beautiful Italian fishing village on the coasts of sun drenched Mediterranean, Respiro reminded me a lot of fishing villages in India. The only I difference I could see was the fisherfolk in Italy were white tending to be brown, whereas in India they were brown tending to be black, all the rest seems the same.

A beautiful film, about mothers and sons, husbands and wives, children living in a un-artificial world and a lot of Vespas. For me it is film about unfettered childhoods, about villages acting as one big family and simple human travails and joys. Emmanuel Crialese, the director sure is very talented, but why is it there are only three films, ofcourse more should be on the way. For now, I will try to get the other two, which I desperately want to see now that I am so moved by Respiro.

Mar 17, 2004

  • 3/17/2004 11:51:00 AM

Sex and Lucia 

There's some sex, there's Lucia, there's a floating island somewhere in the mediterranean and there is an interconnected web of characters who are more or less unaware of their interconnections till the very last. Directed by Julio Medem, it follows Lucia who is a waitress and her writer boyfriend, Lorenzo, who is absent at the beginning of the film.

The story of the film is closely woven into a novel Lorenzo is seen writing. There are characters of the novel you meet in real life and then go off into the realm of fiction. The movie seemed to be slow moving in the beginning, its the second half thats real fast paced, good that I did not give up on it after the first half.

Mar 15, 2004

  • 3/15/2004 10:22:00 AM
One thing I learnt from this movie, hitherto unknown to me is that there was a genocide of Armenians in Turkey in 1915 which left a million and more dead. Thats all I got out of this film by Atom Egoyan. I am a true outsider with no knowledge about the enmity between Turks and the Armenians. It seems like the director's idea was to reach out to the world and remind them of the forgotten Armenian genocide. But it was a very convoluted way he took to get the message across and by the end I felt like he never got it through. It'd have been much better had he made a film directly focussed on genocide instead of incorporating plots, plots, more plots and then some sub plots.

First there is the Canadian-Armenian young man, Raffi, who I think is the main character of the film. There are subplots involving him and his mother, him and his girlfriend(who is his step-sister), then his mother and his girl friend(who is her step daughter), him and the customs-officer and by the end you lose track of everything and the film loses its emphasis. The main plot revolves around a movie being made(film-within-a-film), which is also called Ararat, centered on the Armenian massacre and Raffi is a production assistant for the same. I wish they had shown this movie instead of the real one because then it'd have been easier to empathize with genocide victims. All in all a hodge-podge in the name of a movie.
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