Film 2010: the top 10

The wait is over. With The Social Network finally seen, it’s time to pick the ten movies I’ll remember most of 2010.

1. Mr Nobody

An ode to being unable to choose. Highly personal and good, that’s the way we like our films. Reviewed here.

2. Fish Story

The story of my solitude: if my solitude were a fish, it would be so militant a whale would fear it. A cruelly underrated film on how a flopped punk record will save the world in 2012. I’ll let you in on a secret if you swear you won’t tell: sometimes I watch back a couple of scenes to live through the film’s emotions. Technically probably underneath Inception, but here’s a film that managed to build a path to a great climax, so it stole the n°2 spot. Reviewed here.

3. Inception

Not the masterpiece it’s hailed to be and not as bad as the other critics say. A horrible waste of a climax and an unnecessary bow to commercialism. When oh when will directors learn that audiences are able to sit through a brainy finale? On the other hand, isn’t it fun to point out to people that their criticism on this “allegedly intelligent film” was wrong? The closest a popcorn movie has come to a mindfuck in ages. Reviewed here.

No one knows about Persian cats

The nicest finds are always the films you never thought you’d come across. For example, No one knows about Persian cats. Behind the title lies the story of an Iranian couple, desperate to play rock music. Since their sort of music isn’t allowed in Iran, they dream of a visa that’ll take them to London – home of the indie rock scene. Cue a series of unsuccessful attempts to get a visa, clandestine concerts and meeting lots of other artists who live under the radar.

No one knows about Persian cats combines comedy and drama. The adventures of the young couple is as funny as it’ll warm your heart. Not everything deserves such praise, though: because the film couldn’t allow itself to become quite public, the cast doesn’t really have an equally high standard: some actors are quite good, but some lack the magic of being convincing. Nevertheless, this mix of social commentary, drama and a couple of Iranian songs deserves to be seen, so why don’t you make an effort and try to locate this film? The videos, made by indie bands from Iran, don’t always mix with the story, but they do give a good indication of what’s going on in Iran music-wise. “Indie,” an Iranian fan says, “I like… 50 Cent, Madonna.”

No no, none of that, genuine indie… with a heart as unstable as the singer-songwriters from London, the city the Iranian couple wants to end up in. Will they succeed? All the odds are against them, up to the farmyard cows who produce less milk when the band is rehearsing.

No one knows about Persian cats forces you to think of Iran for 100 minutes, but it’s a fresh point of view. You’ve heard a lot about Iran, but have you met the cool cats? High time to do so, as no one knows about them.

7/10

R.I.P. Juan Piquer Simon

“He makes [films] because he loves making them, whatever the outcome.”

That would be the best way to describe J.P. Simon (as he liked to call himself on his foreign releases). Simon was the director of Slugs, Pieces, Les Nuevos Extraterrestres and Supersonic Man.

A clip from his E.T.-like movie is featured in this montage (fast forward to 1:20 if you must). Here’s a homemade trailer for Pieces. It’s quite gory, but should make you realize the man made more than Supersonic Man.

Who Killed Captain Alex?

And now for a bit of good news: Uganda now has its first action movie. If you found “Belgium made its first giallo” sound ridiculous… you were right… but it’s still nowhere as ridiculous as Who Killed Captain Alex?, the first action movie made in Uganda.

According to Ugandan newspaper The Observer, Who Killed Captain Alex? is about the aftermath of a police raid in Kampala (Uganda’s capital), in which a police captain (Alex) and a drug racketeer’s brother are killed. Both sides were out for revenge and a bloody ‘war’ ensued.
Sounds like a lot of action? Wrong, this sounds like a lot of “ALALALALALACTION”. And sadly that’s a quote from the trailer and/or the film. Because the beginning of the film is pretty much like the trailer. And the most wonderful display of a non-sequitur story you’ve ever seen. But bear in mind the story is nowhere near as mind-blowing as the special effects.

Sounds like it’s time for the trailer? You bet!

Who Killed Captain Alex? was released by Ramon Film Productions. May they live long.

The Night Porter

Today an old review. I wrote this in August 2000 and had pretty much forgotten I’d written it… until I received a message on Facebook last week, thanking me for the review. This girl had read my review, watched the film and liked it enough to send this message. May Il Portiere di Notte by Liliana Cavani inspire you too…

Even though I was planning to watch something else that Saturday night, I came across BBC2 where The Night Porter was on and saw it once again. The first time I saw the movie I was a bit disappointed. I had heard so much about this movie that the film couldn’t live up to my high expectations. But some scenes found a place in the back of my mind and stayed there. The second time I saw it I was intrigued more and more and ever since I see it as the classic it should be.

If ever there was a difficult movie, it was The Night Porter. The pace is slow and the characters are all weird. There aren’t many movies where you get a homosexual Nazi wanting to be a ballet dancer and a sadistic Nazi still in love with love with a masochistic girl from the camps. (There’s more, but I don’t want to spoil the plot.) Only a spark of the plot could have been the subject for lots of raunchy exploitation movies, but “The Night Porter” manages to keep its class. The movies is set years after the war. Some Nazis were fortunate enough not to be caught and got on with their lives. Unfortunately one person has survived the camps as well. She immediately recognizes Max (Dirk Bogarde), her cruel S&M-master, and he (now a night porter in a hotel) recognizes her (Charlotte Rampling) as well. The only problem is that the other living Nazis cannot know she’s still alive, or they would assassinate her. The passion between Max and his former slave returns and the Nazis find out about their relationship. Max tries to keep her out of their hands, so madly in love that he wants to die for her. (Again, more information would spoil the movie.)

The Night Porter is one of the few movies where S&M-relationships aren’t immediately reduced to a bunch of idiots and losers playing around with whips and leather masks. It also dares to show you other Nazis than the Pavlovian dogs you normally get to see. And above all it stars Charlotte Rampling as Lucia. Watch her as she performs the dance of Salomé and gets a present from Max (know your Bible and have an idea of what’s to come). Watch her face and her near-skeletonlike body very closefully: that is how you should act disgust. Watch her as she locks herself in the bathroom and tries to hurt Max’s foot with some glass. Listen to the music, the perfect addition to this murky movie.

Due to the difficulty of the movie it’ll never raise above its status as cult classic and actually that’s a shame. Be brave and try it.

Here’s a YouTube clip by ScathinglyBrilliant that combines scenes from the film with a Billie Holiday song. It’s not the same as the other clips you find on YouTube, which I often found too much censored on the shock scenes (and the jam scene – which is a spoiler). So there you go… take it away, Billie.

P.S. On second thought, it made me wonder why I had never locked this film into the Kurtodrome Vault… well, better late than never: it’s in the Vault now.

La Teta Asustada

Every now and then, a film introduces you to a character that remains with you for a considerable time. 2010 had a.o. the dreaming boy in Mr. Nobody and La Teta Asustada‘s Fausta, a young woman with a potato in her vagina. Yes, you read that correctly and yes, I’ll return to this unconventional plot element later, but first a question.

What are the ingredients of breast milk? According to an Argentinian tale, a suckling baby will get more than just milk, if a mother’s worried, the worries will pass onto the baby as well. And that is why the film’s title translates as “the frightened tit”, a title that could’ve limited the film’s release in a couple of countries (the US and Hungary, probably) and thus it was replaced by The Milk of Sorrow, a rather poetic title.

Fausta’s mother was raped and her subsequent unease is something young Fausta sucked in. To the extent where Fausta, now a young woman, has put a potato in her vagina, to scare off possible bad men. You don’t have to be a genius to work out that – unless you believe the folk’s tale – it is not the healthiest solution. The potato grows inside her body and frequently causes Fausta a lot of pain.

Things don’t get much better when Fausta’s mother dies and Fausta has to find a job. She takes up the position of a maid for an eccentric lady who just can’t (or rather won’t) remember her name. When Mrs. Aida has trouble with her necklace, the pearls fall on the floor and Fausta is promised a pearl for every song she sings. At first, Fausta refuses, but the need for money forces her to become more open. She even has to open the door for a man, the gardener, who to anyone else but Fausta seems like a very gentle man. But this is Fausta, who, when walking in open air with another girl, almost crawls behind her friend when passing a member of the male species.

Fausta’s rather unusual anti-rape mechanism is shown quite tastefully. You only hear about in a dialogue between a doctor and Fausta’s uncle. Fausta sits quietly in the background as if the person they’re talking about was someone else. A bit more visual is the occasional scene where we see Fausta’s feet when she’s sitting on a bed. All of a sudden, a tiny root drops on the floor. The rest is left to the viewer’s imagination – though DV recommends not to think about it too much.

The film is sober, but not boring – unlike what some reviewers seem to think. We’re witnessing a frightened young woman who’s forced to become more social. She’s no longer a young girl who could hide in her safe home. What’s stronger, the folk’s tale or living in the real world? La Teta Asustada is a psychological process.
The film isn’t just about Fausta but also mentions Fausta’s family and the wedding receptions they host (this probably contradicting Fausta’s mourning). I’m not sure this needed as much screen time as it received, the film seems to want to visualize the contrast between life and death a bit too much (there’s even a shot of a blooming potato plant, as a contradiction to the potato inside Fausta’s body that causes decay and possibly even her death if Fausta doesn’t want to have it removed), but overall, The Milk of Sorrow is a really good film.

And because people seem to remember the end of a review better than what’s been written earlier and because she deserves it, Fausta was played by Magaly Solier.

8/10