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thaddyxcore
Reviews
La otra conquista (1998)
Comment on Religion
I have never really been able to connect with movies on the level that other people seem to be able to, possibly because of emotional unavailability. However, I did semi-connect with the people and cultures in this movie and both of their journeys. The characters are realistic, the acting is good, and the set-up of a lot of the scenes seems to leave several images in your mind--on purpose in my opinion. The dog being sacrificed and lifted up as well as the Virgin Mary crying seem to be some of the main images that my mind can't seem to shake after watching the movie.
All-in-all, this movie was a great and even interesting account of the events of Hernan Cortez and his massacre of the Aztecs and their religion and beliefs and I really enjoyed it.
Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence (1983)
War Film with Good Message
This is a very realist movie set in a Japenese prison camp. The acting in this movie definitely isn't the best that I've ever seen, but the violence and action was so realistic it almost seemed like a documentary on the events and it made you forget the horrible acting. This movie also makes a point found in a lot of westerns -- that everyone has their own view on any given situation and that any person could use their own set of values to see their actions as right or wrong in the context of their own morals. This is shown with the guards and the prisoners both believe that they are right. This movie is a great war film that leaves you with a definite shocked feeling after it's over.
Los olvidados (1950)
Neo-realist masterpiece
Los Olvidados was a great film about the trouble-making lives of Mexico City boys and their different paths deeper into delinquency for some and further away for the others. Pedro is what seems to be the main character arc of the story, with his hesitance from the beginning to be a contributor in the rude antics of the boys. Jaibo is the worst out of all the boys, actually killing another boy at one point in the story. The symbolism of the neo-realist dream in the middle of the movie is apparent in comparison to the rest of the movie, with direct parallels to the storyline with the symbolic parts of Pedro's dream. This was a great piece of work of Bunuel's.
La battaglia di Algeri (1966)
Great film with a good message
Battle of Algiers was one of the best films in the class I watched it in. It seems to be just as relevant now as it was in 1965. I enjoyed the time line of the way the movie plays out, with the last few minutes played at the beginning and then the series of events that led up to it after. It really makes you think during the movie about how the characters got to be in the situations that they were in. All in all, I think this movie has an important message about what is going to happen every time you try and hold a certain group of people down. Any minority group restricted in the same way that the Algerians were is going to react in the same way that they did in this movie, and the way the French acted to control the algerians and label them all as terrorists seems to remind me a lot of America.
White Dog (1982)
A Comment on Racism
White Dog rings familiar to anyone raised in the south, in my opinion. A dog that was born, trained, and raised to hate African Americans is hit by an actress who then begins to take him in and become his friend. Once she figures out he is killing black people, she takes him to a camp to try and get him re-trained to not have a problem with black people. This looks for a while like it might work, and the dog becomes friends with the black man who tries to train it. However, by the end of the movie the dog forgets what it learned, gets confused, and tries to kill both the black and the white people in the ring with it. They end up having to kill the dog, showing that you can't ever really un-train the racist out of anyone, especially a dog.