The King, the Prince, and the Knights

The Barbarian Invasions

Denys Arcand

Canada

2003

I’ve always had special love about films that are eagerly celebrating life and at the same time scrutinizing it, and “The Barbarian Invasions” is one of those few movies that brim over deep passion over life. The film is not highly plotted, not really eventful to form the larger part of the film but also not that too uneventful to be confused with a head documentary. This sequel to a trilogy of drama-comedy by world famous director Denys Arcand is oozing with Canadian wit that it might have adopted from the French, with strapping opinion about life, and with simple film making investing on great characterization and film content.

The film is highly historical and allegorical which flaunts its intellectual endowment about the world giving these characters’ opinions about the planet we are living in valid, persuading, and something to be thought of. Almost all of the characters, except Nathalie, who is the heroin buddy of Remy, are all highly educated and politically, economically and philosophically opinionated human beings. Most of them are college professors of social sciences that’s why I was not surprised to hear dialogues of resentments like—the history of mankind is a history of horror, which is a statement of scepticism but at the same time declaration of intense observation about the world. The best allegory I have noticed in the film is Remy’s personification of his son Sebastien as “The Prince”—the timeless utopian character of a king by Niccolo Machiavelli. Sebastian, played by Stephan Rousseau, is an estranged son to Remy. Despite that painful fact, and despite his booming career in the international financial scene, and despite his antipathy to the broken family they have because of his father’s mistresses, he still finds it worthwhile to make the remaining days of his father’s life comfortable and forgiving. So Sebastien, using his money, intelligence, and smarts, is able to occupy the whole basement of the hospital for his father, to have a continuous supply of prohibited heroin for his father’s secret medication, to have his father’s previous college students to have paid visits, and accompanied by his charismatic front stage personality, as hugely contributed by Stephan Rousseau’s magnetic performance, he is able to become the epitome of the contemporary “Prince” Macchiavelli has been conceptually formulating centuries ago. The “Barbarians”, as according to Remy are his friends, fellow thinker, fellow socialists. Referring to our history, barbarians are the less civilized human beings, thus making the operational title of the film as the invasion of the less civilized. Since the film is intellectually-compelled, civilization is the intellectual counterpart of the operational title but it is not to say that the group Remy belongs to is a less intellectual bunch of people, rather a group of the alternative and freer thinkers as opposed to the hegemonies such as capitalism perhaps. Therefore, as I understand the film, “The Barbarian Invasions” metaphorically means “The Advent of the Independent Thinkers”.

 

 Liberation and education is at the core of this extremely lovely comedy-drama. Aside from the assistance of the physical element of our protagonist as a college social science professor, and of course his colleagues, and the students, and the university, the film is far above the ground committed to learning and continuous education. The scene where Sebastien asked the police officer what did he study in college and the officer answered Criminology minor in Psychology, and then the officer asked the same question and Sebastien answered Mathematics minor in Economics is the simplest yet most powerful movie scene that insinuated much about a person’s passion and core of intelligence or specialty. The scene where Remy asks his son what particularly he does in his job in London and his son answers him with foreseeable complexity is not a simple question born out of the situation or plain curiosity but more of learning that even on his dying age continues. The scene where Nathalie wanders around the house of Remy where she sees some of the books the now deceased man has used to mention is another powerful scene at least for me. The large acquisition of books all over the wall, Nathalie looking small is like a belated glimpse on who Remy is and its contrast to the seemingly living-in-the-shadow and philosophy/history-allergic Nathalie. Liberation is another significant aspect of the film. Sexual liberation has even been verbally mentioned by Remy which in the conservative and seemingly-virtue-abiding point of view is an immoral aberration, but of course not in Remy’s terms. “The Barbarian Invasions”, which strongly suggests a battle in the title itself, suggests a battle of the liberal against the conformist and what I really admire about the film is that Arcand is still able to make this queer powder keg an adorable and lovely piece of art. The Spanish film which would be released the next year after this one “The Sea Inside” is almost synonymous with “The Barbarian Invasions” in its non-conformist propaganda but the former which is directed by Pedro Almodovar, though visually more superior, is at times verging on obnoxious and subconsciously repelling while the one by Arcand is roughly almost consistently admirable.

The characters building this mirror image of our world society are generally endearing, significant, and unforgettable, especially Sebastien, which I have discussed above in his the-end-justifies-the-means philosophy borrowed by the popular passage from Machiavelli. The protagonist Remy is another lovable film character at least of the 21^st century. Though I generally hate patriarchal objectification of women, his likability makes me forgive that side of his nature. Perhaps, to be more specific, the scene where he reminisce all beautiful women in the world that he has seen on TV and movies, from Maria Goretti who dips her adorable toes on the water, to Francoise Hardy singing on TV, to Julie Christie, etc, that scene is nothing less than a bittersweet longing for the past that is the purest recollection of the most pleasurable guilt every man could ever carry on so deeply. That sincere scene is one of the most sincere I have ever witnessed on any national cinema and that is more than enough for me to forget feminism for the mean time and at most realize the beauty of being objectified. 

One of the more important films of the 21st century definitely, "The Barbarian Invasions" is impeccably emotional that compliments the fissures of the intellectual. Showing a lot of astounding awareness and honest interpretation, this film ranges from sweet to bitter and from painful to pleasurable making it an unforgettable cinematic and human experience.

Artificially Sweet, Don’t be Deceived by the Wrapping

Hansel and Gretel

Yim Pil-Sung

South Korea

2007

 

I think this is going to be the first film to be reviewed here negatively, in most parts. The reason is because “Hansel and Gretel” is a pretentious, sugar-coated, and poorly-told dark fairy-tale aspiring to be as good as the Spanish “The Orphanage” or the Mexican “Pan’s Labyrinth” whose mastery in dark fairy-tale genre have been really competitive and impeccable. However, for Yim Pil-Sung’s work, the premise is actually promising and potent but the entire film is so sleepy and to be blatant it is a disappointment for Koreans attempt to do the dark fairy-tale genre. Two movies in my Top 20 favourite ever are actually Koreans—“Brotherhood” and “Joint Security Area”, because they have a genuinely beautiful understanding of the North and South Korea conflict, of friendship, and of brotherhood—but not yet thrillers like this one.

Stranded in the magical (or cursed) forest where the only place to stay in is the House of Happy Children, Eun-soo, a young husband and soon to be a father discovers the horror that is striving in the house. First, with the sudden disappearance of the children’s parents and the eventual learning that these children are looking for appropriate parents and that the ones he thought who are the real parents of these three children are just strangers trapped in the forest like him, and also another victim of the curse, and his quest for refusing to be another victim begins. But I never really felt that quest. The problem of the film first lies with its poor storytelling, and eventually poor directing. I have always been unhappy about films who are seemingly directionless and swirl its viewers around into circles making you lose your grasp in its narrative—which is a significant aspect of film viewing. That must be the reason why I haven’t appreciated “Trainspotting” and hated my friend who recommended it, but at the end of the day, it will always boil down to the viewer’s preferences. I really didn’t hate that friend of mine though, she recommended me “Bridges of Madison County” and I loved it. What I am trying to say here is that even though we have a certain standard of distinguishing good and bad films, at the core of our judgment is a personal aspect that we will inevitably be employing everytime we watch movies. About the circling-effect that I mentioned a while ago, I understand that the purpose of it in the film is for us to feel the slipping sense of time in the character of Eun-soo and the sense of immortality in the children which late we found out I the film that these children died decades ago. The treatment looks faithful to the coherence the film is supposed to possess at the end of it, but its execution in the film looks so amateurish and even more like a mistake more than an intention. The progress of the tension in the film and/or the revelation of the secrets are so serrated making most of its element so idle and obstructive. 

The flashbacks are so unfortunate and unoriginal. They are just simple cuts to the past, and the past is so uninteresting, so well-worn, and so much a catcall—like the brutally treated children in an orphanage with the overdone dirty place and dirty faces. The strength though of the film is its visuals. The first time I scanned though the film, I am jaw-dropped by its deeply fairy-tale inspired cinematography—the yellow-orange-red-gold combination is so melting in the eye, and all the toys all over the house are so charming and pleasant to the eyes which of course is a contrary to the real thing that is happening in the house. The film also employs a lot of jump cuts. It’s too bizarre to see jump cuts nowadays especially when the situation doesn’t really require it. Jump cuts are not recommended when your scene’s energy level is relatively low and if it is not preceding any such scene. 

I hated the film because it fell into the trap of usual storytelling and common directing when in fact the over-all concept of Hansel and Gretel and its dark treatment gives you a huge chance to make it twisted and brilliant. That kind of film is something a director can play on all his creativity and imagination to make this one a hell of a film. But the product is so pale, weak, and this is something you wish should have been done on a different time, and different team because everything has been taken wrong in this film. A total waste of money and time, there are a lot of scripts waiting to be produced out there and yet this one wastes its opportunity.

“Hansel and Gretel” is of course candidly colored, but everything else is a mistake. I did not see anything new about this dark fairy tale. This one should not be compared to “The Orphanage” and “Pan’s Labyrinth”, they are way too superior in any single aspect of filmmaking.

A Could Have Been Animation Masterpiece

Up

Pete Docter

USA

2009

The 10^th another eye-candy and chicken soup-soul production of PIXAR animations distributed by Walt Disney has kept up to its reputation of being more than a scrumptious visual feast for the children, the young at heart, and for the whole family. “Up” soars way and beyond the sweetest imaginations and talents in this contemporary animation era which I shall call the PIXAR Era. As opposed to the dark and political animations from France, Japan, and even Palestine, American popular animation has for me successfully accomplished the intermediate step of bringing up commercial animations to the pedestal of great films. Entering the more social and bravely the controversial sphere is the subsequent plinth PIXAR could opt though for them not to do it is definitely not a disappointment and could even be one if they do so. The world obviously loves, adores, and more importantly consumes the way they do over the past decade beginning with the lovely “Toy Story” in 1995 to my favourite “Finding Nemo” in 2003 all the way to this Academy Award Best Picture nominee.

A charming entertainment is expected for an old man bringing his house to a mythical Paradise Lost through a hundred thousand balloons together with a chubby and cute grade school boy scout who is a reminiscent of him when he was young.  The film is composed of three parts—the background of the objective, the quest to achieve the objective, and the adjusted objective. Adventure films usually put in most of its strongest elements in the middle part which is the quest. You can take as an example “The Lord of the Rings” and even “Harry Potter”, where the quest for the objective is like 90% of the whole film. In “Up”, the nucleus is its strongest link. Most of the time, adventure films let the quest-part usurp the power of the entire film. “Journey to the Centre of the Earth” perhaps is an example when the journey is triggered by an advanced academic interest by a Geology professor and his nephew’s stride to follow and investigate why his father never came back in the travel to the centre of the earth. The motivation sounds exploratory and sincere but the treatment to the potent of this spur has been taken too negligibly as if the reason looks more of an excuse rather than a real reason. The 180 degree of this narrative flaw is nothing less than “Up”.  

The first part of the film is overflowing with warmth that I have ever witnessed. The childish dreams all of us used to have are simply awakened by the young Carl Fredricksen’s dream of being an explorer to the Paradise Lost and also by his soon-to-be-wife playmate’s imagining of an old house into a flying craft. After a couple of sweet boy-girl playtime on this old house, the two soon grow up, get married, and purchase the old house they used to play at. There are scenes suggesting Carl’s wife’s inability to bear child and those so lovely. There is also a montage where the couple keep s a jar coin-bank with a label reading Paradise Lost, but incidences like tires exploding and trees hitting their roof cause them to break that jar coin-bank and use the coins for something else instead. Until they grow old with their childhood dream of going to the Paradise Lost growing as silver as their hair. Carl finally remembers that romantic adventure to their youthful dream and on an attempt to surprising his wife with a plane ticket to Venezuela, she dies. This is not more than half 40 minutes of the total running time of the film but this part for me is eternal. The visuals are oh so God beautiful. The sophisticated mixture of mushy red, childish yellow and sentimental orange-gold provides the most and best eye-popping pictures I’ve ever seen for an animation. This manipulation of beauty through light, colours, positions, and astounding musical score is completely way beyond my imagination. It is heavenly full of heart and passion, an absolute work of geniuses who deeply adores two simple yet inexplicable human life mystiques—art and love.

With its eye-warming, heart-warming, and soul-warming first part of the film, the hardest thing to do now is not to let the first half eat the rest of the film, which it became short a little. The quest part is not that lovely at least for me. Aside from the fact that it has applied a regular-looking cinematography, the adventures itself is not excellent. To be perfectly honest, I wish the film ends at the part where Mr. Fredricksen’s house flies up and away above the city up until the clouds. I don’t mind seeing it as a short animated feature but for sure PIXAR, Walt Disney and most of the commercial pop-culture consumers would mind. I just wish it could have ended that way, and it would become my favourite short film ever or one of best movies I have seen ever, if not the best. But due to its commercial market and value, that part to where I want to end it is just the beginning of what the public consumers would really consume—the adventure part. 

 

Bringing eternity back in the discussion, I could have felt more eternity for the love of Carl to his wife if it ends that way. The ending could have been heartbreaking, nostalgic, fantastic, and childish. A flying house made possible by a hundred thousand of colourful balloons is the sweetest accolade I could ever employ for my childhood and may also for yours. I love seeing the house soar up high with these helium-filled elastics for this parallels love. That image also is one of the strongest and sweetest imagery I have ever witnessed not just in the history of animation but even in art in general. Mr. Fredrickson is old, he lost his wife even before they could have made their most treasured childhood dream of travelling and exploring Paradise Lost. His wife dreams of building a house beside the top of the falls in Paradise Lost. Their house alone though is endangered of being bought by a multi-million corporate company and even the old man’s stay at their house is at stake after a community incident which made the local government order him to stay at some elderly village. I like to say I know how he feels because it makes me feel alive and more human. On the day that he is supposed to be fetched by the elderly village attendants while as the construction foreman and his boss eyeing for the lot of his house show up with sly faces, the old man launches the balloon out of the chimney, the edges of the house break off against the ground, and with a loud thud of happiness and tone of winning against these people way down of his window, Mr. Fredrickson sets his and his wife’s house into where they really want it to be built. This imagery blows me away, at the same time pierces my heart. We all have childhood-buried dreams and fantasies, and most of them are too fantastic we can literally only take them as a dream. We grow old and our childhood dreams become less and less stellar and brilliant. We wake up one day and we realize how much we want to fulfil a dream that now seems to be extremely distant, and too impossible. I find the film beautifully heartrending because it is a realization that these dreams don’t have a room of achievement in the real world, and that we need a medium to where it may come true—and films provide that, “Up” is a proof. 

 

While I love to dwell on that could-have-been aspect of the film, I would like to talk a bit about the end of the film. I call it an adjusted achievement, Mr. Fredricksen’s goal is to move the house to the Paradise Lost but he ends up doing another adventure and achieving another goal. The part where he sees a note from his wife saying that it is time for him to have a new adventure is another sweet element in the film. This enunciates another endlessly seeming beacon to the old man’s life, with a kid friend, and a yellow retriever, Mr. Fredrickson finds a new dream he never really dreamt of.

I will say that “Finding Nemo” still happens to be my favourite animated film because it is consistently great from the very first 5 minutes until the last second of the movie, and because its background of the quest is heartbreaking, its quest is incredible, and the ending is inspiring. As opposed to “Up” which I totally commend the first part/background of the quest, its quest and ending is good but overshadowed by the first part. Generally I find this blockbuster animation a touching one.

Do you know Bashir?

Waltz with Bashir

Ari Folman

Palestine

2008

“Memory fills the holes with things that never happened.”

The film is about the search for lost memories—memories that are traumatic, something that is related to war and or a massacre. Ari, is a filmmaker who has been suffering from dissociative amnesia for 20 years after he experienced being drafted to the Lebanon War in 1982. He talks to his fellow soldiers of the said war and seek professional help from psychologists and professors to lead him get a bigger and fuller picture of his lost memories.

“Waltz with Bashir” is a perturbing yet stylish, intelligent and psychological, and above all else—a hell of a film. The cinematic experience is really fascinating and one of a kind in every aspect. From its solidly coherent form to its timely and haunting content, the film never felt short of successfully translating the cruelty and dreadfulness of any war. I have seen a lot of war films but this one is outstanding, keeping aside the fact that this is animated which actually gave the extravagant amount of surrealism in the film, the film has a poignant reference in the recurrence of war in the society and in its basic unit—family. There is a scene when Ari is talking to his doctor friend and tell him that Ari has been living in the massacre and war even before he has been drafted in the Lebanon war. Ari’s father also experienced war, it is during the 2nd World War, and since Ari was young he has already been living in the terror of any war could ever bring. This realization is of course disputable but the orientation of the present to the past and the past’s connection to the present is observed in vicious cycle that will continuously inhabit people’s psyche. 

The film has a great form. The documentary style supports the search tremendously. It adds slowly building tension and more expectations that are either correct or wrong. The third person point of view or the filmmaker point of view is perfect since it is from the very beginning we already know that this one is going to be a quest movie. I also love the transition from Boaz’s point of view into Ari’s. The opening scene of the 26 angry dogs gives a strong start for the film, Boaz reveals that this is a dream and Ari later on has been revisited by disturbing flashbacks of his memory. It is from other person’s memory that ours are revisited. The motif of kids is made available since the opening sequel when a mother and child are frightened by the 26 angry dogs, and all of Ari’s friends have all their kids. Children are reference to the open ended but most likely to be doomed future of another war that Ari’s children could be then experiencing.

The first question that may arise after watching the film is why this is made animated. The immediate reason maybe is that it is going to be more affordable. With all the explosion and crane-utilizing shots, the film could be so costly—that is the economic perspective. The artistic reason on the other hand could be that expansive and accessible utilization of surrealism that is the fundamental representation of the war as an experience of our protagonist. The montages on the film which I really admire are too expensive and dangerous to be produced. Like the scene where a tank is driving in a narrow street devastating all the walls it is hitting and crashing all the cars it is stepping on. That scene is accompanied by a song I guess is entitled” Good Morning Lebanon”, and the scene is so beautiful as the tank crashes everything on its way as the song goes—“Good morning Lebanon..too much pain to carry on..good morning Lebanon.. may your creams come true..may your nightmares pass..your existence is a blessing.. Lebanon..you are torn to pieces..you bleed to death in my arms..you are the love of my life..oh my short life..tear me to pieces..I’m bleeding. 

The content the film is tackling is very huge, very timeless, and psychological as well as very social. It’s as if every emotion in the film is bone-seated that at times the deepness of these emotions will give you a hard time which is the surreal and which is the real. The film captured the horror of a war, and that is the best compliment a war film could ever get. "Waltz with Bashir" has been effective because everything is set-up to a soldier point-of-view instead of the generals and high-seating officials' idiosyncrasies. Bashir, the president of Lebanon whose assassination triggered the Sabra Massacre has never really been included in the plot. He never spoke in the film, but his assassination impacted drastically lives of many people including our protagonist. Just an asymmetrical realization, ordinary people cries when popular people grasps their last breath, ordinary people lives are changed even without the slightest sight of these powerful person's shadows.