henri_aqua Reviews

Jalla! Jalla! (2000)

If this isn't funny, what is?

[11 March 2002]

This is a multi-cultural comedy. With true love. True sexual problems. A family trying to match-make the wrong couples. Pitbulls. Vacuum pumps. Swedish chewing tobacco. And a parrot who swears in Arabian.

The acting is superb. The story is serious enough to make the characters all the more lovable. Go see it! Now!

Enigma (2001)

Nice myth, vague history, still ok. movie

[15 February 2002]

Well, well. Those second world war movies keep on coming. Of course you cannot expect historical accuracy in a popcorn blockbuster. To find such a movie good because it is more historical than U-I-forgot-the-number-now movie is not a compliment either. Who took this sorry excuse of a movie serious anyway??

But to hate it because it is not accurate is also maybe exaggerated. It is not a documentary. It is a fictional story. Not only was the ENIGMA decrypted by three Polish mathematicians, Alan Turing was not really like the hero in the movie either. He was homosexual, arrested after the war for his homosexuality, which was illegal in the U.K., prescribed a hormonal therapy and then committed suicide. A tragic story of an unloved hero. Clearly unsuited for a blockbuster. Like most of real life actually.

However the filmmakers made this clear. The fact that the movie is a German (yes, look at imdb main details) produced movie is not entirely unamusing while watching the movie either. I watched an interview with Mick Jagger who had a big laugh with the German blokes financing his movie. If you take it that way the movie has good suspense and action. If you want to learn about history look in the books.

Wilde mossels (2000)

Lust for life and drama on the Dutch countryside

[28 January 2002]

Now this was a good movie. I walked into the (sold out) cinema unknowing what to expect. I got a wildly imaginative story of adolescent youths living in Zeeland, Netherlands.

****minor spoilers****

Actually they are stuck on the countryside, working in jobs, they don't like, proving their bravery in stupid and dangerous tests and smoking milled mussels (I am not joking) to bear it all.

The story revolves around Leen who is the one who desires the most to get away, but has also the most to loose. His getting away daydream fantasy of Ireland is hilarious. On top of it he has to deal with his mother who is sexually attracted to him. (both roles are beautifully acted)

Finally the three friends set out to leave their home by whatever means. Things really start to get wrong from this point...

*****spoiler end***************

This movie is very tragic and very comical. It is set in the Netherlands, and profits from the genuine habits and landscape of this region. The tale is about youths who cannot live out their dreams, as much through mental as real barriers. The main character is convinced that Ireland is the promised country, showing just how isolated they must have grown up and how clueless they are about everything around their immediate neighbourhood. (Don't get me wrong Ireland is cool). The movie is frivolous, but never vulgar.

Some characters are not very developed, e.g. Leens step father. The story around Leens father complex is down right annoying and is too much emphasized.

But these are only minor drawbacks. I recommend this movie.

Yellow Asphalt (2000)

A memorable movie about an alternate Israelian reality

[9/10 · 14 January 2002]

This film comprises of three short stories. Every story circles around the culture and life of a beduin tribe living in Israel. All three stories are based on true events and are acted by the beduins themselves. They are about the clash of western civilization (or intrusion) into the world of values of the beduins, where patriarchical rules and blood revenge are a part of their culture.

The director neither judges nor glorifies that life. Indeed he needed to live several years among the beduins before they trusted him enough to do the film (the director was present during the showing of the movie).

This cautiousness pays off very well and gives a nice combination between authenticity and storytelling.

The characters are very involving, the acting is superb (from the beduins as well as the professional actors). The photography revels in the strange beauty of the desert.

The beduins themselves are a widely ignored part of the Israelian people. The director (who is Israelian) deliberately tries to make the audience identify with a group at the edge of his society (they are very poor) and which is muslim.

It is a very good movie which doesn't make many compromises or avoids many taboos. I recommend it.

Chico (2001)

Cruel movie about a cruel century

[9/10 · 12 December 2001]

***Some Spoilers*** I gave this movie a rather high rating, but one has to be cautious when watching it. I didn't know how to write a review without referring to the story more closely, then the changing history of the 20th century plays an important role.

The main character nicknamed Chico is not exactly an angel. Through his father he is raised as a true communist fighting for the world revolution. Chico is originally born in Bolivia, but is of Jewish-Hungarian-Spanish origin. During his life he acquires maybe a dozen languages and as many nationalities.

It is quite painful to follow this character through many failed revolutions (Bolivia,Chile to name a few) and many failed identities (Secret Agent, Journalist, Mercenary) until he joins the Croatian army during the war against Serbia.

This is the breaking point for the character and the watcher. Where the siege of Vukovar is shown with detailed cruelty.

I like this movie because the main character is searching for a just cause to fight for, realising the more he takes part in the conflicts the more he looses a clear cause. He tries to take refuge in his many identities as a Jew, Christian, Hungarian, Bolivian, Journalist, Soldier but there is no redemption and no escape as to all his fights are vain.

The drawback to this film is that at some points this message doesn't really come clearly out. Chico is very enthusiastic about war, speaking with terrorists like he is speaking to friends. He crosses the line between morality and amorality many times.

The photography is realistic, coarse grained, sometimes a little bit cheesy looking. The scenes in Yugoslavia are nothing but terrifying. Real TV news scenes are interspersed giving the movie an even more realistic touch.

To some persons maybe it seems too superficial to condense all revolutionary conflicts of the second half of the 20th century into one character, but it is well done.

This movie is not for kids. For historic interested people it is a must go. But also the performance of the main character is worth the admission.

Ichiban utsukushî natsu (2001)

A truly beautiful, but unusual Japanese movie

[10/10 · 16 November 2001]

Firefly Dreams is a movie about the friendship between a young teenage girl and an old Lady who she visits in her summer holidays. Naomi is a spoiled brat and send by her father to the countryside, after her mother runs away. There she works at the restaurant of her aunt and uncle. Close lives also Mrs Koide with whom she used to play when she was a kid. From there the story unfolds. I have to praise almost all aspects of the movie. The plot is well thought and all characters are believable and very interesting even the ones who just appear in a few scenes. The photography is marvellous, the landscape is breathtaking and rounds up the plot very nicely. The aesthetic is very different from recent Japanese movies I saw (e.g. from Kitano). It is violent free and it is set mainly in a rural area. Maybe this is so because the director is English and chose a different approach for portraying Japanese life, but this is just a speculation. The acting is great and for me this is the first time I think I learned something about normal Japanese everyday life through a movie. Surely the development of Naomi, how she grows up - and indeed has to grow up - through friendship and also sorrow, is the driving force of the movie. The movie has a slow pace, so if you are an action-movie fan, don't go. Everybody else: you will not regret it!

Mullet (2001)

Does Mullet taste good?

[4/10 · 16 November 2001]

Well, I never ate Mullet (an Australian fish living in muddy waters), but this movie didn't necessarily encourage me to try. I saw the movie in a festival in Germany without subtitling. So I thought (cause my Australian English is really not that good) I am somehow missing most of the jokes, but looking at the audience, maybe there were not so many to start with. The story is: A guy nicknamed Mullet comes back to his home village after he left for three years without saying good bye. In the meantime his brother married his ex girl-friend. The film now shows how the people react to him coming back. Most of them squarely tell him to bugger off again, but he doesn't understand why and refuses to change. I think I already gave this movie more story than it has. The characters are going nowhere so is the plot. The end comes out of the blue, very unsatisfying. The actors are o.k. but cannot save a weak script. Save your money for a good Australian beer at your local pub.

Cabaret Balkan (1998)

Details are important

[10/10 · 28 August 2001]

This movie impressed me a lot, however the fine details and message of this movie might very easily escape the unwary viewer. I was lucky to watch the movie with a friend from Ex-Yugoslavia who could point out what exactly lied behind every small gesture or circumstantial hints hidden in a single sentence.

The characters in this movie are in a constant dilemma, half self-inflicted, half caused by higher powers. Yugoslavia at that time is isolated - mentally, economically, morally. There is no valve to let of the steam, so the people take on themselves, murdering, plundering, threatening and raping. Almost every character is shown to be not fully guilty, but nevertheless brought down by their own acts of violence. The bus scene especially shows that the Yugoslavian people have forgotten to take their fate in their own hands. A young men is fed up with the system, his wasted life and the apathy of his people in general. The best scene in the movie for me

Tragic-comically ends this scene like the whole movie. The whole plot takes place one day before the Dayton agreement, another twist of fate, that just on this day those people lose their lives for nothing and absolutely nothing.

When you watch this movie you have to realize the deeper message has been made for the Yugoslavian audience to show them the mechanizations of their lives and their own guilt going with it. He tries to hammer this in the minds of the viewers hence the compressed plot and intermingling of scenes. A masterpiece.