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Reviews
Revelation (2001)
Might have some interest for fans of `The DaVinci Code'
I'll start by admitting that `Revelation' had me completely fooled. It had so many elements of the mega best seller `The DaVinci Code' that I assumed it was a quick knockoff to capitalize on the popularity of the book. It certainly feels like it was thrown together far too quickly. But since the movie came out well before the book, I'll assume this is an original mess. It is instructive to see how it is possible to take exactly the same elements and arrange them into an enjoyable book, which frankly some people are taking way too seriously, or totally incoherent movie.
Actually there are a lot of decent elements here. In addition to interesting historical background, the acting, dialog, and production values are better than average for this genre.
But in the end all of this is wasted in a confusing and pointless plot. Nothing could recover from a story this bad.
Alfred Packer: The Musical (1993)
It is a surprising sweet story
Cannibal: The Musical is Trey Parker's tuneful pre-South Park biopic of Alfred Parker, America's only convicted cannibal. It is a surprising sweet story quite similar to OKLAHOMA!, with the most notable differences being that OKLAHOMA! has a slightly lower body count and does not, so far as we know, include any eating of human flesh and that Trey Parker comes up with more interesting rhymes than Oscar Hammerstein II. I mean lets face it, Oscar could never have come up with `My father was an elephant, but that's irrelevant' or `The brains of a antelope, taste like cantaloupe.'
To be fair Cannibal has only two on-screen killings, making it really quite peaceful by current standards, and flesh eating occupies a very small portion of the total film. The movie is an odd mix of total absurdity and great historical fidelity.
It's a fun film in its own right, and for a student production is absolutely amazing.
The DVD commentary track is suitably odd. It consists of most of the cast/crew sitting around commenting on the movie while they get drunk. In addition to the more or less required of things like the fact that a given piece of dialog between two characters who were really filmed in different cities, this track include less common background data such as discussions of the boom-girls breast size and who was trying to make it with who during the shoot. Somehow it seems the perfect commentary for this movie.
Mies vailla menneisyyttä (2002)
Grand little film about the resilience of the human spirit
Short review: If you can resist the temptation to commit suicide during the first ten minutes or so, you will probably enjoy yourself.
I will admit that my knowledge of Finnish movies is not that great, OK I'm not sure I'd ever seen a Finnish movie, but when the theater offered free passes and it had a great blurb by Jim Jarmusch I figured I might as well give it a try. I'm glad I did.
Tragedies were traditionally about a fall from a great height, which is why they usually start with a King, or some such, and his life falls apart and then he dies. Comedies were somewhat the opposite. Based on that traditional definition this is one of the great comedies. That is not to say it is one of the funniest movies ever made, although it is quite funny, but that our hero is knocked so low in the first minute that most anything is big jump up. The movie is about the resilience of the human spirit despite the vagrancies of fate, bad people, and bureaucracies.
I would like to think that even if I hadn't read the blurb by Jim Jarmusch I would have thought of him. The style reminds very much of his films. Odd, often surreal, things happen, you get the really care about the characters, and your never quite sure where it is going to go. Like a Jarmusch film, describing the plot will tell you very little about what the movie is really about.
The film is mostly about people on the margins of society who, although ignored by most of the institutions of the country, stay alive and find joy by helping each other. The Salvation Army plays a large roll in the movie. I don't think any souls are saved but they help to save his body and he helps to save their hearts.
Warning to travelogue fans-If you are hoping for a view of beautiful Finnish landscapes, please note that the Finnish tourist commission did probably not support this film.
Warning to nitpickers-If you are one of those it-would-have-been-a-great-film-but-the-fact-that-the-cigarette-ash-kept-ch anging-length-really-spoiled-it-for-me types you should probably skip this one. I don't know whether the fact that the wounds on his face kept moving around and major plot points were never explained were accidental or just there to add to the surreal feeling, but if you worry about such things this movie will give you a real headache. Personally, I go with words of the great Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, "It has always seemed to me that so long as you produce your dramatic effect, accuracy of detail matters little. I have never striven for it and I have made some bad mistakes in consequence. What matter if I hold my readers?"
The Dancer Upstairs (2002)
Interesting use of language.
I went to a preview of `The Dancer Upstairs' with my lovely wife and a friend, and since both of them have written reviews for IMDb I thought I should weigh in too. I will briefly discuss my overall view of the film itself, but mostly I will discuss my view of the use of language in the film, which differs greatly with many other reviews I read here.
The film is not bad, and is a fairly solid first directorial offering, but not the tour de force one might have hope for from John Malkovich. It is an interesting story and a fine performance by Javier Bardem. Bardem's role as the central character, Rejas, is the main redeeming aspect of the film. The film is, on the other hand, a bit slow in places
On to language, which has been one of the most discussed aspects of this film.
First just a factual clarification, one reviewer mentioned seeing the film in Spanish. The Spanish language version is dubbed, ever though by the original actors. The film was shot in English.
It the risk of being considered heretical by many "serious" movie fans, this is a film that would lose much of its impact if it were fully subtitled. The fact that only the small portion of the film that is in the Indian language is subtitled serves to very effectively highlight the schism in the society that is, to a large extent the basis both for the ambiguities in Rejas's character and the revolutionary pressures which drive the story. That small amount of subtitling divides the society into `them' and `us' for more effectively than any amount of exposition. The fact that Rejas is the only character whose dialog is both in English and in subtitled Indian language very efficiently makes clear his uncomfortable position as a man who does not truly belong in either world.
I will go further and say that, even if you understand both languages equally well I think the English version may well be more powerful than the Spanish. Several reviewers have pointed out that the actors English was less than perfect, that they did not seem comfortable in English and at times they were a bit hard to understand. I will full agree that it is painfully obvious that the actors are not speaking their primary language, but I view this not as a flaw but as an asset. Remember that Rejas is not speaking his primary language, so the fact that he is fluent but imperfect and not totally comfortable as he speaks adds to his character. Further since he is clearly the viewpoint character for almost scene in the movie, the fact the other charters do not speak perfectly helps to highlight the fact that Rejas understands the language of the society he lives in, but in never fully comfortable in it.
If the Spanish version of the movie has the charters all speaking comfortably and clearly, I think a primary portion of the films power is lost.
Also, at least one reviewer mentioned that since this was a Latin American film it should therefore be in Spanish. Bardem said he had turned down several rolls playing Spanish characters speaking English, but he felt that this story, although vaguely based on actual Latin American incidents was universal, not Spanish, in nature. He also pointed out that if you feel that stories should be in their original language-Gladiator should have been shot in Latin.