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Reviews
Ghahreman (2021)
Complex Mystery
In my view this is a story of corporate corruption. I appreciate that some people see this in a different light. The main character is encouraged to tell a story - by the prison authorities and then a Funding Organisation which is not exactly true. It includes some White Lies etc... but Social Media will neither forgive nor forget and his story is pulled apart piece by piece.
Honey Boy (2019)
Impressive and Necessary
I am not convinced, thank Goodness, that this is indeed the true autobiography of Shia LeBoeuf.
However. there are some overwhelming performances in this. Noah, the son, the adult as well, the kind prostitute who helps Noah and above all the father acted by Shia.
It is not easy and sometimes you wonder what on earth you are watching but it is heartfelt.
Loro 1 (2018)
This is a film of great importance
Why? Because you can quibble with this and with that. But this is a first class film and it must not go unseen.
A Warning to the Curious (1972)
Atmospheric ghost story
I saw this on television one Christmas Eve when I was in my teens and it is my favourite ghost story. The story by MR James has been altered with director's licence by Laurence Clark and for once the changes chime in perfectly to make this more than a story of an obsessed academic and it becomes a poignant story of a working class clerk with talent and ambition to become an archaeologist. It becomes a story of class conflict and alienation.
Peter Vaughan was at his best in the role of the unemployed man who looks for and finds treasure that professionals have been looking for in vain. The setting in Victorian Norfolk is accurate and atmospheric and it gains from the involvement of another man who is a guest, perhaps not initially drawn to the clerk but forced in the course of the story to act through sympathy and later horror.
Fences (2016)
Family and racial drama
I regret but I was disappointed. As a play this would be magnificent but film is not play unless it is a film of a play. The acting is terrific but it could have taken place against a moving background - yard, house, street. The intensity of the dialogue even Shakespearean, would be excellent for a drama in the theatre but not for a film. Imagine a play where we had long discursive periods of silence. That is the equivalent of this film. I wished it would finish. I had come for a film and not for theatre. Also, as a character,Rose not of course as a dramatic character, I think is a weak woman. I am sure she is right for the period and the society but today why could she not stand up for her son?
Manchester by the Sea (2016)
Grieving brother is left guardian of 16 year old nephew
This is a very disturbing film because there are no easy answers and no feel good conclusion. There is plenty of humour and the characters are all far more complex than anyone seems to give them credit for. Lee, whose brother has held the family together, finds that he has been left guardian of his 16 year old nephew Patrick ( a lovely guy)but it seems an impossible conundrum because of an unspeakable family tragedy which presumably leaves him feeling he is not a fit father among other things, he cannot find work in Manchester where Patrick needs to stay, presumably because people think he is unlucky and he has to work in Boston. If there is any thawing in Lee's terrible grief it is slight but perhaps as he tries to do the best he can for Patrick, he finally finds a solution that allows Patrick to stay in Manchester but leaves the door open for Patrick to stay with him in Boston.
Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014)
ageing actor setting out in new direction learns insights into himself and the world
This I found to be a tremendous film, it is funny, it is absorbing, it describes people I cared about and it released stress. These people are even more stressed out than I am and I found certain scenes and the whole deadpan humour hilarious. The main character is interesting, deep and sympathetic but so is his protagonist, so is his sullen bad tempered daughter. He is not just an ageing actor, the film asks what we are and why we think we are here and what we crave from others. He gives his all, he suffers the rebuff of the leading theatre critic who will not even bother to see his play and somehow he bounces back and succeeds with his play and indeed he has got a touch of genius. I found this gripping and was not disappointed and at least it is a serious meaningful film.
Toto le héros (1991)
A complex story deeply moving
I saw this film believing it to be comedy and less than halfway through felt deeply antagonistic to the director's idea of humour. A few minutes later, I realised my mistake and wept through the remainder of the film and again when I saw it next, and again! It is a story of a deeply flawed man with profoundly complex issues, some of which you can understand from his family history. As to whether he was switched at birth during a fire, or whether that was his way as a child of rationalising the inequalities between himself and his neighbour's child, that is open to question. His relationship with Evelyn and the way he identifies her with his dead sister, Alys, is a kind of idealisation. I am not entirely sure how much of the film is real and how much is wishful thinking on the part of Thomas. But whenever the theme music plays, the mood becomes both happy and sad.
Bir Zamanlar Anadolu'da (2011)
This is not a whodunnit
It is a calm film. It reminds me of the French inter-war films about professional people, such as teachers or doctors. It accompanies a team of policemen, a prosecutor and a doctor who at dead of night are searching for a body with two men who have confessed to murder. The search continues all night, the work carries on into the next morning. I felt as if I had joined the team, was experiencing the boredom, the welcome break, the teamwork,the friendships and the inter-relationships that made up the general working conditions. We are not looking for clues and the mystery is why the two men killed the victim. It is beautifully shot, displaying the wild, open land of Anatolia on a stormy autumnal night.