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Berlinale 2015, Day 9 (Yukinojo Henge)

It was so wonderful to see that this year I can watch the remake of a great movie from last year! I was so curious to see what Ichikawa would do differently than the already wonderful Kinugasa.

Yukinojo Henge (An Actor’s Revenge)
Japan 1963, Ichikawa Kon, 114′

For the synopsis you can really just read last year’s post, the script is nearly identical!

It’s madness to think, an actor could play the same role in a remake 28 years later. Well it’s Japan, so Kazuo Hasegawa did just that as his 300th movie and reprised his role as Yukinojo. You do see he’s older now and actually at times he does look a little too old for the role of a young man in his twenties at most. However both his feminine side and his vengeful side are still there in full bloom and I can not imagine someone else for Yukinojo. To be fair however, if judged on the performance of Hasegawa alone, I do slightly prefer the original as no matter how excellent of an actor he is, you can not unsee his age.

The remake stays faithful to the original story, no really meaningful changes are made, however the cinematography is much different: exterior scenes are deliberately shown as shot on a stage: the ground is not real dirt, the trees and houses and walls are almost symbolic, the background is solid black. It evokes a feeling of watching a theatre play. Also, most fights are stylised, no classic swordplay here. Blending and split shots galore! In general Ichikawa surprisingly went for the more artsy choices, which does work quite well with the script, as the revenge trip together with the constructed manner of the shots blend well into a Tarantinoesque artificialness.

It’s hard to say which movie is better, especially as we only have a heavily cut, almost disjointed 97-minute version of the original 5-hour 3-parter available. Without a doubt, the Hasegawa of the original is the better choice and in it’s current state the original loses to the remake which has no pacing issues for example. Ideally, the 1935 Hasegawa should have met the 1963 Ichikawa.  Scratch that, someone just needs to invent a time machine and rescue the original movie in all its glory.

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Berlinale 2015, Day 9 (Gentlemen Prefer Blondes)

I am going to finish blogging the Berlinale 5 days before last year, but last year I saw 27 films while this year it was “only” 20. At the same time, I think my postings became longer, so it’s all relative I suppose. (I am not even sure if greater length is a good thing – am I rambling more too?) At least this posting will be short, because.

Usually I try to see bigger pictures on the last Sunday, because I expect there to be less people trying to see them on this last day. But this year, there simply were no “big” movies of interest to me, but instead I was only interested in less popular titles. In this screening of “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” was packed though, just like “Paris, Texas” afterwards. I really enjoyed spending my last two films at the Berlinale staying seated in CinemaxX 8. It’s lovely to end the Berlinale with this, and the chance to do so is one of the reasons why I chose to see these films in the first place.

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Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
USA 1953, Howard Hawks, 91’

Marilyn Monroe plays Lorelei, a pretty blonde stupid money-grabbing showgirl who goes on an overseas trip with her down-to-earth muscle-loving deadpan-humoured friend Dorothy, played by dark-haired Jane Russell. On the trip, the family of Lorelei’s husband-to-be hires a private detective to find proof of her assumed infidelity, but throughout the process, Dorothy falls in love with him.

Just like everyone else, I know the film for the “Diamonds are a girl’s best friend” song, and Pixelmatsch rightfully concluded that the film is an operetta. Sure it’s actually a musical, but it’s closer to “Eine Frau, die weiß, was sie will” than to “Grease” or “West Side Story” if you ask me. As a result, we loved it! It looks awesome, it has a few great musical numbers, it has a very bold philosophy on love and relationships and most of all, it was actually funny. Who cares about whether the story fully makes sense or not. I think my favorite was actually Dorothy’s number with those ridiculously handsome swimmers, I understand why it’s less famous than “Diamonds are a girl’s best friend”, but it was so much more fun and it’s refreshing and only fair to sing about male beauty when the rest of the film showcases female eyecandy, right?

As I already said before for “Yolanda and the Thief”, I love musical films nowadays. Perhaps not all and perhaps only those of the screwball comedy or the step dancing variety, but it’s interesting how my slowly growing love for operettas has also changed my view on musical films. Life is better with musicals than without, that is for sure.

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Berlinale 2015, Day 9 (End of Winter)

I like pre-purchasing tickets for the last day of the Berlinale because the tickets are cheaper anyways, and because having the tickets already motivates me to actually go and see films on the last day. Originally I even wanted to see 5 movies on this day (6451 shows how easy it is to do so), but I didn’t get tickets for “Wonderful World End”. That is fine – I don’t expect the movie to be good anyways, it will most likely be available online someday and this way Loris and I were able to enjoy the fine weather we luckily had that day.

After Pixelmatsch and 6451 saw “End of Winter” on day 1 (while Loris and I watched “Love, theft and other entanglements”), they both ranked the film pretty low. Honestly, if I hadn’t had tickets already, I most likely would have skipped on the film which, I think, would have been a grave mistake. Just like “Ship bun”, this is not a film you will easily find on the internet (I suppose). It was absolutely worthwhile to see the film at the Berlinale if this is my only chance to see it.

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End of Winter (Cheol won gi haeng)
Korea 2014, Kim Dae-hwan, 103′

Wife, two sons and a daughter-in-law attend a teacher’s retirement ceremony. There are dissonances between all of them, but when the father announces that he wants to divorce his wife (from whom he has been living separately for a long time), everybody is shocked. On top of that, a snowstorm keeps everyone up from going home as buses are not running, so the entire family is stuck in the father’s little apartment and forced to spend a few days together.

I cannot explain it, but this film was much to my tastes. 6451 is right with his assessment that this is a movie where essentially nothing happens, nothing big gets revealed (besides the divorce announcement at the beginning) and which doesn’t seem to lead anywhere. Nevertheless, I thought it was a lovely character study, and I especially enjoyed the father’s quiet grumpiness. In an effort to explain myself, the film reminded me a little bit of “Still Walking” which I disliked. In “Still Walking”, however, the entire family is dysfunctional in a different way: Everybody is polite but there is so much hatred underneath that I cannot possibly fathom why some critics ramble on about the film is about “love” in a family. There is no love between them, for goodness’ sakes. “End of Winter” is similar, but they are much more open about it in comparison. There is much miscommunication and simple refusal of communication, but at least it’s not pretense and hidden hostility. The daughter-in-law openly complains to him about her husband’s family, and the son asks his father the right questions – I liked how this family was generally less mean-spirited (except for the mannerisms of the mother maybe), which makes the gravity of their differences more interesting. I think if you are mean, it’s no big surprise you cannot truly bond with other people, but if you are simply normal, the inability to understand each other and be ‘good’ to each other is much more tragic and ultimately more interesting.

Oh, I should also mention that I did fall asleep in the film a little bit, but not for too long. It certainly is the type where not all that much is happening for sure, but it’s fine that way. For a young director’s work, I thought “End of Winter” was well-crafted, and I surely liked all the snow and the Korean barbecue. (The movie gave Pixelmatsch a craving for it, and now I am craving it too.)

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Berlinale 2015, Day 9 (Kurzfilme Kplus 1)

Sunday in Berlin-Friedrichshain at 10.30am – needless to say that there were pooptons of children. This time it was not huge groups of school or kindergarten kids, but affluent and hipster looking parents trying to instill some culture into their children. The whole affair was quite loud, but it actually made the Q&A rather pleasant. As always, the children asked a lot of “why”-questions and most of them were really good. I really liked the answers given by Montoya who explained his film so well that I liked it more afterwards, and I was in love with the Iranian woman who appeared on-stage with a light headscarf and a very cutesy but elegant outfit. I was impressed by how child-like and thoughtful her answers were, though sometimes she overdid it a little bit (and the children actually did not believe her version of the world). On top of that, the lady from the first film had stamps with her film’s characters for the autograph session. The children were delighted and I thought that marketing scheme was brilliant.

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Der kleine Vogel und das Eichhörnchen (The Little Bird and the Squirrel)
Switzerland 2014, Lena von Döhren, 5′

A short film about a bird and a squirrel fighting over something (food?) and then meeting a fox who tries to eat them. It looks utterly adorable and the kids laughed a lot, but I wasn’t a huge fan of the story itself. It seemed utterly pointless that the little bird couldn’t fly, and there was basically no point to the story except it had action that children like.

Camino del agua (Water Path)
Columbia 2014, Carlos Felipe Montoya, 8′

The story is really short – mother tells girl to go to a further away water source to fill up a bottle of water. She does so but on the way back a stranger with crutches asks her to give him water. She does so, but it turns out that the stranger lied to her and can actually walk just fine. She ends up filling up her bottle again at a pond, and a little fish gets caught in the water. I like how ambiguous the end is (we don’t know if she gets scolded, if the mother notices etc.) and especially how unclear the moral takeaway of the story is. Was her decision a “good” one?
Oh and how much I loved the little girl’s outfit! I was amazed at its cuteness. But I think all of these – ambivalent story, beautiful landscape, cute outfit – are things that little children don’t really care about. Only for adults like me it was truly fun.

The Tie
Belgium 2014, An Vrombaut, 7′
I think this one got an award for being visually impressive or something, but I thought it was remarkable that this was the only film I did not remember just from its title. It sure was beautifully rendered and features a cute idea, but its story was all but forgettable and I was not a huge fan of its style. But the children sure liked it.

Messages dans l’air (Air-Mail)
Switzerland/France 2014, Isabelle Favez, 6′

A cute little story and an awesome cat (see picture above! I loved the cat so much that I chose the picture for this blog post.) I doubt the children were very into it, but I certainly loved the style and enjoyed the sweet love story.

Agnes
Sweden 2014, Anja Lind, 15′

“Agnes” is the longest and one of the more meaningful stories in the bunch, about a 6-year old girl whose 16-year old brother is the most important person in her life. She experiences jealousy when he starts becoming alienated to her as he has a new girlfriend. But before it takes a real toll on their relationship, they reconcile. I didn’t fully get what was going on in their heads because it was all subtly hinted at, but I actually liked the way it was done.

Rosso Papavero
Slovak Republic 2014, Martin Smatana, 6′

A visually stunning dream sequence of a small boy who dreams of, well, a circus. The whole thing looked pretty surreal and the director actually said something about what it was supposed to mean, but I couldn’t understand his answer very well (sad!) One kid asked how those circus waggons could all disappear in a small tent, and his response was: “It’s a magic tent!” Cute.

Mahiye sorkh shodeh (The Fried Fish)
Iran 2014, Leila Khalilzadeh, 11′

Based on a Japanese children’s book, this is the story of a fish who gets caught, then fried but manages to escape being eaten. He offers a part of his body to animals who find him in exchange for taking him to the sea, but one by one they abandon him after eating his flesh. Ultimately quite a sad story, and I would have hated it as a kid. (What is the point of all this sadness?) I also was not a big fan of the animation which looked sloppily done. However, I really liked how it stirred up a lot of discussion with the children. (One of them complained that mice don’t eat fish hahaha.)

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Berlinale 2015, Day 8 (Otouto)

What the Queen wrote as a placeholder:

Placeholder for the only movie that 6451 and Pixelmatsch saw at different time slots, but I didn’t even though I wanted to. Weirdest thing ever.

Due to some weird reasons back in 2010 that I don’t remember anymore, I never finished the Berlinale post for Yamada Yoji’s remake of this movie. Of course, I had to watch the original this year!

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Ototo (Her Brother)
Japan 1960, Ichikawa Kon, 93′

Gen can be described with one word: sacrifice. Due to her stepmother’s rheumatism she manages the household while also attending school. Her younger brother Hekiro is a drifter, with no aim and no ambitions he walks through life carelessly, getting into trouble all the time. Every time Gen is there to bail him out, to protect him, to comfort him when no one else will. The mother is caricature of a Christian; influenced by a judgemental church lady she estranges herself more and more from this “weird” family in an attempt to exculpate herself. The father, a writer, has no interest in anything other than his work, offering no help to anyone. Only when Hekiro becomes seriously ill after his many escapades the family somehow pulls together.

Gen oozes sacrifice. It seeps off the screen into the audience! Hekiro is rage-inducing with his aimless drifter and seemingly complete disregard for the trouble and hurt he causes for the only person in the world that unconditionally loves him. One of the issues of the movie is that you never find out why Gen loves Hekiro so much: he has no redeeming qualities and there is no scene to explain why circumstances may have turned her so protective of her younger brother. What does work however is the portrayal of their relationship. Keiko Kishi wonderfully plays her role, as much as she oozes sacrifice, Gen’s love for her brother is tangible. Her little moment when she’s playfully upset about him are wonderfully cute and though you never understand why Gen has not abandoned her brother yet, you can easily feel the love she has for that worthless punk. In fact, Hiroshi Kawaguchi is just as proficient at being rage-inducing. His performance near the end, when he’s gravely ill and finally realises what his life has amounted to up until then is also very nice.

While the original had the better actors, the remake felt more relatable to me. Probably because the brother was less troublesome and the values and circumstances were less archaic. If you can somehow get over disagreeing with the values of the people and society the story is set in, you can enjoy some really strong performances from the main actors.

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Berlinale 2015, Day 8 (Ode to my Father)

This year, the Berlinale was barely showing any Korean films. Originally I thought that “End of Winter” sounded more interesting than the pathos-laden “Ode to my Father” (which it really was), so I only scheduled for the former. Then my plan was to see the previous Golden Bear winning short films which would have run right after “Ode to my Father” at the International, and there was nothing in this time slot so I decided to add it in. After getting sick, I kicked the short films out of my schedule because I didn’t want to stay up too late, and finally I ended up just seeing “Ode to my Father”. But since it was a very memorable experience (so much so that I revisit the film in my head again and again), it turned out very well this way.

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Ode to my Father
South Korea 2014, Youn Je-kyun, 126′

While trying to flee from the Chinese troops, Duksoo loses his sister which makes his father go back to look for her. With only his mother and two younger siblings left, he promises his father to take care of his family. Instead of pursuing his dream of becoming a ship captain, Duksoo goes to Germany to work in coal mines, takes over his aunt’s store on Gukje Market, marries a girl he met in Germany and goes abroad again, this time right into the Vietnam War. In the 80s, he finds his sister through a television program. In a timeline told from today’s perspective, Duksoo reminisces about these times and finally comes to terms with the fact that he will never find his father anymore.

I should have known that the film would be intriguing for me. Just like I adore evil women, love triangles and adultery in film, I love stories spanning an entire lifetime (or almost a lifetime). It’s the reason why I like “Huo zhe” so much, and why I was so deeply in love with Capek’s “An Ordinary Life” which I just finished reading. Interestingly, the fictionary lives in all three examples are parables; they are not exactly realistic or individual, but these people’s lives are the product of their time. They are designed to be mirrors of society and everything major in history had an impact on their lives (the Cultural Revolution, the Korean War, World War I respectively). At the same time, there are strong personal influences going into these protagonists: Capek has similar parents as his nameless character’s (especially the overbearing mother), Youn even gave his main characters the names of his own parents. While these three works are ultimately not comparable at all (and I feel a little ashamed for mentioning Capek and “Ode to my father” in the same sentence), the similarities are still striking and oh, I love these stories for that aspect.

At the beginning of the film, I wasn’t so sure I would like it. It starts off with an unbearably sappy scene in which Duk-soo’s family flees which is basically a “Lord of the Rings”-sized epic tearjerker. You are supposed to feel oh so sorry for these poor people running for their lives, and of course I did, except that I was rolling my eyes constantly and actively kept myself up from succumbing to the sappiness. Soon after, Duksoo’s accident in the coal mines in Germany were not much better. The scene in which Youngja kneels down in front of these very Nazi-looking Germans, pleading “These poor Koreans came all the way from their country to work for you!” Oh God, that line is so bad on so many levels that just thinking of it makes me cringe. At least they saved that scene a little bit by not allowing the Germans to suddenly have a heart, but the Koreans staged a nice little revolt which made the whole thing a tiny little bit more realistic. The whole first part of the film was about having mercy for those poor Koreans, it was simply embarrassing.

Afterwards, however, “Ode to my father” became one of those few films for me which actually turns better rather than worse towards the second half. While saving the sister of a little Vietnamese boy was way too blatantly reminiscent of Duksoo losing his own sister, I thought that most other callbacks to previous elements of his life were pretty lovely. The movie actually expects you to have some sort of memory while watching the film, you will find the old Duksoo say “I told you before” about how he wanted to be a ship captain and then some half an hour later, we see Duksoo on his first date with Youngja many years before, telling her about his dreams for his future. The film walks the fine line between overly pathetic and painfully touching, and for the second part of the film I was just crying non-stop. The KBS show in which families found each other hit a nerve somewhere, and after I had a stuffy nose the entire day, it was finally emptied out through a 20 minute long constant stream of tears. It was so darn touching! Oh and the end was wonderfully beautiful. I thought it was utterly satisfying yet bittersweet because, really, Duksoo’s father would have been so proud seeing his son uphold his family traditions, however pointlessly conservative they may be. I was touched by how he achieved everything in his life that his father could not do, and yet remained lonely and misunderstood even by his wife.

There was one scene which I found especially memorable, much like Sasha’s horse from “Under Electric Clouds”, which is that Vietnamese boy who saved Duksoo from an attack just because he gave him chocolate before. To me there was something so simple and touching about it, much more so than some of the other aforementioned tearjerker scenes. I think the movie does well in these details, apart from the obligatory humorous tidbits (which of course must be done well since this is a big blockbuster after all).

Somehow Korean movies manage to hit my heart’s weaknesses like Chinese or Japanese movies never do. “JSA” makes me cry every time I see the film, “Silmido” completely broke my heart (shudder), and the movie whose touching story comes closest to “Ode to my father” is “Welcome to Dongmakgol”, another wonderful story with many weaknesses. Bottom line: I don’t care about the naysayers of this movie, for me it was actually an awesome experience.

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Berlinale 2015, Day 8 (Leave her to Heaven)

O is back to being energetic and healthy, but most recently the Berlinale blogging got a little hiccup mostly because I am in a writer’s slump. On the one hand, I feel my energy draining out of me now that it’s almost done (not entirely, but close), on the other hand, I had trouble with “Leave her to heaven” specifically because my thoughts kept wandering to “Ode to my father”. In good news, Pixelmatsch has been filling in the films he has seen – yay yay! Thinking about it makes me look forward to my meta postings at the end: Films we have missed, afterthoughts and statistics and rankings.

Just like last year, my Saturday was pretty short. We got a bunch of tickets (4 films) for Sunday, and by this time, both O and I were sick and after 3 days of getting at home after midnight, I really didn’t want to watch any late night screenings anymore. As a result, my choices fell on an afternoon film and one evening film so I could spend most of the day with O but without passing out by the end of the day. It was my most balanced day of the Berlinale, with two very nice, solid films but which did not blow my mind.

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Leave her to Heaven
USA 1945, John M. Stahl, 110′

Successful writer falls in love with a beautiful, strong-willed but slightly strange girl who turns out to be maniacally possessive to the point of murdering people just to have her beloved to herself. Starting out as a love story, it then turns into a murder story and then a courthouse drama.

I had no idea what I was getting into with this film (who is John M. Stahl anyways?), instead I was just taking my chances since I wanted to see a Gene Tierney movie. I was intrigued by her even before I ever saw “Laura” (becauseI thought she looked strange in a good way and because she dated Kennedy hahaha). Strangely enough, I didn’t think she was that great as “Laura”, a beautiful lady who is ultimately just innocent nice damsel in distress. But oh, she is absolutely gorgeous as Ellen who is just as evil as her bitchface suggests. The beautiful, charming, headstrong, but also crazy woman is simply perfect for Gene Tierney, and I absolutely adore her in this role. I have to admit that I am a big fan of these kinds of characters, and Tierney plays her in a shockingly convincing manner. I was also impressed by the styling of this film: When Ellen’s craziness gets overboard, her hair is done up in an utterly frumpy manner to indicate how out of control she has gotten. But when commits one of her worst crimes, she opens up her hair and is styled beautifully to give her the appearance of the victim. This subtly shows how purposefully she acts, and makes her so much more interesting than someone who is just mentally ill and not herself.

By the way, I was also quite smitten with the actress of Ruth, who is styled so cutely ever since the beginning that I had a hunch her and the protagonist must get together. Nevertheless, she never goes beyond ‘cute’ of course, and I suspect Gene Tierney would not have allowed her to steal her spotlight (she doesn’t).

Even though this is a Technicolor film, They shoot pictures don’t they lists the film as one of the 100 quintessential noir films (which are the most referenced and cited for the genre), indicated by that 100-icon. I am not surprised, Ellen Berent is perhaps my favorite femme fatale of all, and she is perhaps one of the most radical too, much like the protagonist of “Angel Face”. There are no gangsters in this film, it’s ultimately a family drama, but the characterization of its protagonist and its immensely beautiful style are very noir-like, so you can probably tell that I enjoyed the film very much.

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Berlinale 2015, Day 8 (Der Geldkomplex)

Lukas Förster liked the movie, and Loris liked aspects of the movie. In that respect, I am glad I saw the film because it’s the kind which you probably can never get your hands on ever again. I instantly took interest in the description on the Berlinale website, and the adaptation of an old novela sounds intriguing (in the case of “The Painted Veil”, the slightly romanticized film adaptation is actually awesome). Sadly, it ended up being one of those “What the heck did I just see?” kind of movies in which I also – unfortunately – fell asleep to. Considering how short the movie is, missing some 15 minutes or so felt like a lot. It reminded me of this very stressful day in which I slept through almost the entirety of Rossini’s “Il Turco in Italia”. Until today, I feel like my impression of the opera is inadequate since I missed so much (and I would like to see it again especially now that 6451 told me he liked it). I have similar feelings about “Der Geldkomplex”, though I have no particular desire to see the film again.

By the way, this was one of the few times where I sat upstairs in the Delphi theater. We had seats in the very front, so the view was much better than most places downstairs. It’s definitely something to keep in mind when faced with an almost filled-up theater. Afterwards, we didn’t stay for very long. A good Q&A would have helped a lot, where the filmmaker could have explained some of the background of this pretty confusing movie he has made. Shockingly, in this case the Q&A just made it worse. The director essentially said “Oh I didn’t want to write my own script so I stumbled upon this story and randomly decided to adapt it” (which honestly is quite offending to Reventlow’s possibly good book), then went on to say a lot of confusing things including how nobody really knew anything and they just sat together to develop the characters at random. It totally sounds like the entire movie was made on drugs, and there was no structure or intent anywhere.

drrt

Der Geldkomplex (El complejo de dinero)
Spain 2015, Juan Rodrigáñez, 76′

As I mentioned before, I simply have no idea what the whole story is about. I liked its first scene and some later scenes, but I am unable to put them together to an actual story. I never read zu Reventlow’s epistolary novela the whole thing is supposed to be based on, so I have no idea whether the original story is just as confusing. Maybe the film actually is supposed to be some kind of mumblecore thing in which nothing happens and people just talk, but then how is it a literary adaptation? Other than that, I actually liked the concept of the film: A bunch of people hang out in a serene, beautiful place, doing nothing but talk about life, themselves and so on. It could have been fantastic, if only I knew what it was all about.

Taken out of context, however, the film did have a few moments which I thought were interesting. I thought the first scene, in which one of the guys is being coached to ask for 3 million euros – sofort! (hahaha) – was quite amusing, but the greatest scene was definitely the paella one, in which we see nothing but the paella pot from bird’s view and a few guys arguing about whether shrimp (or something else) goes into paella. It made me hungry and the repetitive humour of the scene gave me a glimpse of what the film could have been. Finally, I liked how they all ended up breaking into song, even though it’s a cliché (and I am ultimately glad that Star Trek DS9 did not have a musical episode).

The good thing about this year’s Berlinale was that there was no movie which I perceived as a waste of time (unlike last year, where some movies were saved only through the grace of Stephen Horne’s accompaniment), but “Der Geldkomplex” came pretty close.

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Berlinale 2015, Day 7 (Ten no Chasuke)

I have never actually been to a premiere in the Berlinale Palast. Before this, I have only seen specials and repetitions of competition films here, and while I think that it’s a decent venue, there is something I simply don’t like about it. This time, at least I got to know that the personnel here is very nice and competent. I’ve always wanted to experience a premiere of a competition film at the Berlinale, only to realize with “Ten no Chasuke” that it’s quite pointless unless you are really into someone in the cast and even then you might only get a glimpse of them. Compared to that, the Panorama and Generation premieres I have seen so far have always been amazing, followed by an interesting Q&A. Oh well.

Also, it’s the last day of February and I still have a long way to go to blog the Berlinale. Seriously, my February is always entirely dominated by the Berlinale, though that is also somewhat awesome.

drrt

Ten no Chasuke
Japan/France 2014, Sabu, 106′

Chasuke is a tea boy in heaven, where heavenly scriptwriters write the stories of everybody’s lives. While serving tea to them, Chasuke reads various people’s stories and especially falls in love with one girl, who is going to die soon. Since Chasuke’s actions are not dictated by any script, the girl’s scriptwriter sends Chasuke to earth to save her.

How should I put it – “Ten no Chasuke” was panned by critics and unlike “Under Electric Clouds” it was rightfully so. To me the film was an example of how movies should not be made: Incoherent storytelling, wasted side characters, overly melodramatic ending, absolutely absolutely horrible directing and cinematography (you may disagree, but this is how I see it). The first indication that the movie might not fulfill my expectations was the moment when they showed how the actress of the female protagonist was walking on the red carpet and tons of otaku were having her sign her gravure shots. This does not bode well. There is nothing wrong with a gravure idol becoming an actress, heck I love Sibel Kekilli to pieces, but I got the feeling that she was foremost a bikini model and indeed it was. She had a mute role (thank goodness) and she barely had to act.

To be honest, the complaints of “Ten no Chasuke” have no end. The story made no sense, it completely lost its suspense after Chasuke managed to save the girl’s life (and thus fulfilled the job he had to do in the first place) and towards the second part, I wasn’t even sure what the whole point of the film was anymore. His problems with the yakuza seemed totally unresolved and the whole “Chasuke heals people’s illnesses” plotline was utterly unsatisfying too. I already mentioned the ending, but its badness can barely be put into words (they both randomly get revived and she randomly regains her voice? hello?) and the “we can take our future into our own hands” makes no sense whatsoever within this setting, where people’s lives are being foretold by heavenly scriptwriters. For a premise so interesting and cool, “Ten no Chasuke” is probably the biggest disappointment in years.

Nevertheless, I enjoyed the film as curious as it may sound. Sure the last 30 minutes were a complete waste, but it started off incredibly strong. I almost laughed out loud a few times, and I am in love with all the side characters (oh and how awesome is Chasuke’s sister?), I just wished they had gotten an actual purpose in the story. More than anything, I enjoy how the film shows a somewhat alternative Japan – one which is not serene like an Ozu movie but actually loud and lively. On my only trip to Japan (which was before “Tamako Market” aired), I was fascinated by the covered arcades. Unlike the ones in Paris, the ones in Japan are really ugly but there is so much culture and life in them that I am surprised why you don’t see more of them. I liked how “Ten no Chasuke” took place almost entirely in one of these arcades, and how the entire story is a product of this setting (albeit a bad one).

I doubt I will ever watch another Sabu movie in my life, it’s totally not like Hirokazu Koreeda who is actually a good filmmaker.

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Berlinale 2015, Day 7 (Que horas ela volta?)

For some reason one of my minor fascinations is Brazil. It’s the reason why I watched the marvelous Tropa de Elite and what made me check out the Brazilian films at every Berlinale since then. This one looked promising so it had to be watched. Turns out it was a good idea, it even won the Panorama audience award!

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Que horas ela volta?
Brazil 2015, Anna Muylaert, 111′

Val has been working as a maid in a rich family’s house in São Paulo since more than ten years. She’s irreplaceable help for the parents and a loving nanny and basically second mother for the 17 year old Fabinho whose actual mother is not at home too often. Things change when her actual daughter Jessica announces her visit after being apart for more than ten years because she wants to apply to university in São Paulo. Her confident demeanor shakes up the whole household starting with using the guest room of the house that’s 5 times the size of Val’s room because after all she’s an invited guest.

As Berlin is basically a town of left-wing extremists, with a few rich people, Nazis and old people at the fringes, the movie was a riot for the audience!

The topic of the movie, class relations between the rich and the lower classes and the new-found pride and self-confidence of the latter, is very modern. Jessica and Val are from a working lower-middle class family from the rural north. While Val is deferential, calling the Patrons Dona and Doctor, making sure not to cross invisible lines, always eating the cheap ice cream, Jessica doesn’t care: She’s a guest so of course she takes the guest room, of course she calls the Patrons by their names, of course she walks around the house, of course she eats the good jam and ice cream when it’s offered. She knows what she’s worth and while she’s never rude, this clashes with her mother’s ways and the Patrons’ habit of being the undisputed higher class. While they treat Val with respect and trust they nonetheless see her as someone lower in ranking. Dona Barbara feels threatened as she has been hiding her jealousy of the close bond between Val and Fabinho while her husband and Fabinho are fascinated by this, strange, prideful creature, which of course creates even more tension. In the end, Val and Jessica manage to overcome their differences and estrangement and begin a new part of life together on a very hopeful note.