Reviews

Genetic Engineering and human cloning could be the most debated issues of our times. It is easy to find at least one movie every year which tries to say something new on the topic. Last year I was not only amazed when I watched Moon but suddenly felt more sensitive and informed about the issue.

Unfortunately Splice wasn't remotely capable of doing anything like that. If it was at least entertaining I would not have regretted the few hours I wasted watching it. Much as I have liked Adrien Brody I hate to say that there is really nothing I can recommend this movie for. Occasionally you might find some scenes funny, which were not intended to produce laughter, but that is the natural response to a long, meaningless and boring sequence of chasing lesser known artificial animals.

The movie is neither a science-fiction (almost nothing is plausible) nor a horror movie as some might think. If it was made and marketed like a teen horror sequence (urban legend) or like a cathartic demon-slaying flick it would have probably been worth something, but as it is the movie is neither though-provoking nor entertaining.

The story isn't probably as bad, you gotta admit what poor screen-writing can do to a story. The context seemed very interesting at first – two scientists working on production of a new species by tailoring the DNA of other species in order to viably produce some chemicals that otherwise can't be manufactured. There is a lot of pressure to deliver results but nothing comes in between the researchers and their scientific curiosity. The new species are doomed to back-fire but the movie doesn't make any attempts to ask and address the questions on consciousness or genetic tailoring. Instead it unsuccessfully attempts to invoke a kind of fear of beasts of nature that you might have last seen in Anaconda.

The debate on genetic engineering is far beyond the scope of fear against nature. Instead of inspecting the human dilemma while tailoring the DNA, or visiting the clash between science and our ideas of consciousness, the movie chose to fuel a kind of fear against nature that is half a century old. Unfortunately that too isn't executed well. As I said, there is nothing I can recommend this movie to anyone for.

The way I discovered Miyazaki's movies was with a bit of surprise and curiosity, something that itself is best depicted in his movies. It was "Howl's Castle" that caught my attention while switching channels one Sunday. You can almost always see a sublime English influence in his work- characters with an innocent curiosity exploring a world of immense power and intractable magic. It is intriguing and immersing - a world that I hadn't seen since having read "Alice in the Wonderland" in my childhood for the first time. Music and art-direction is crafted very carefully to give an effect rarely achieved by cinema.

Castle-in-the-sky is probably one of the best of his works. We revisit Swift's "Laputa" from the Gulliver's Travels in the movie – a place far into the unknown that has had a history of the sort of power and intelligence that is unmatched by the modern civilization. The characters of the movie Sheeta and Pazu both find themselves onto an inevitable voyage to Laputa. Their rather exploratory journey to Laputa is full of hurdles and discoveries. As they run into air-pirates, plane-crashes and magical revelations we become a part of their joy, worries, inquisitiveness and amazement.

If you're thinking Harry Potter, then you're absolutely mistaken. This might just be the opposite end of the spectrum. The visual effects of the movie are not meant to transcend the limits of the real world by letting you be in a fantasy world of magic and wizardry but instead in a rather unique way to meditate on our being and might in this world, in a way the Gulliver's travel did. That all of it can be achieved through animation is something only Miyazaki can be credited to.

One thing that Miyazaki does very well is to not let somewhat sentimental moments in the movie become too sappy or theatrical. The story might have had a tendency to become that way but script kept it entertaining with jokes and "quirkiness" of its characters at times. The dubbing artists did a wonderful job in making this movie appear seamlessly "English". It would remain rather incomprehensible to me how movies from Far East can be enjoyed without any conscious attempt to overcome cultural boundaries.

There is a certain way of making movies about India – a tradition that has descended from great directors like Louis Malle and Richard Attenborough that helps us appreciate movies like Born-into-brothels, city of joy. Most of these movies present us the abject poverty of India, the absolute penury of its people. Yet, there seems a way out of this dejected existence – one that leads to happiness despite the misfortune of disease and untimely death.

Words may not be enough to express the genius of Louis Malle or Attenborough, but somehow too much water has flown down Thames since that image of India was believed in. The wilderness in East that we knew India as has experienced some major changes since World War II. With globalization, it is transforming into something else … for better or worse.

I would remember this movie not because of what it had to say about outsourcing but because of its somewhat accurate representation of India. There are things about India that are despicable- to most Westerners. But the way the movie approached the subject was not through insulting humor the way American comedies usually do, but instead with an entertaining exploration into the very land of mystery. Although mild it is a comedy, but the script seemed very much educated about how India really is. That it never mixed up any Arab stereotype with the Indian ones is both surprising and commendable for an American movie.

The first half of the movie that takes time to build up the image of India perceived by a foreigner is actually quite accurate. There are things unbearable and overwhelming about India, but much the way the protagonist discovers, it all becomes much easier when you lose yourself into the wilderness that India is. Holi, a festival in India, is seen as a a metaphor to that - an act of curiosity met with a deeper involvement.

Of course, it is the wilderness after all that forms the appeal of India. There is this whole set of rituals, mythologies, beliefs and practices that evolved with complete disconnection from the West and offer an alternate reality to the foreigner. This dualism of disgust and curiosity flows parallel in the movie and achieves a sort of resolution in the end. There are very few movies that have chosen to explore this interest in India, without getting into yoga, kamasutra and henna.

This movie does not aspire to do in cinema what the book world-is-flat did in popular literature. It is not trying to tell you that the world is changing to the advantage of the Third world or argue on whether capitalism is the only hope for the poor. It mildly makes fun of this whole world that corporate culture has given us when it pokes fun at imitation of American accents and at how that becomes a career skill for some. It looks at outsourcing as the outcome of this commoditization of human experiences altogether. I was made to feel that outsourcing is a by-product of uneven growth that our current economic systems result in. The resolution is probably through not letting oneself become a product of one's circumstances – be it corporate policies or greed for money.

That resolution could've been expressed much better way- but unfortunately the movie fumbled in the second half. If I weren't really impressed with the first half, I might not have finished watching it. Sometimes it even appeared whether the movie was meant to be a comedy or something else. Still, overall this makes for an interesting experiment with India.

I was led to this movie, partly because of a sort of dissatisfaction from what we've known as science fiction due to Star-Treks, Star wars, terminators and transformers. On my visit to the local independent movie theater, I was only expecting something like Apollo 13 and I would've been satisfied with just that.

But the movie proved to be much more. It wasn't just the cinematography, few captivating shots of the moon surface, or the great acting performance. It was as if the movie took a while to ponder over philosophical questions that science and technology raise- something that every science fiction ought to do.

This work won't be unworthy of a comparison with Kubrick's- space odyssey – only that it is probably not as visually stimulating as the latter. It does make good use of classical music like Kubrick's. I found the movie to be a bit more accessible than Tarkovsky's Solaris in that it is much more fluid and entertaining (Solaris was 3 hr long – executed very slow albeit with a similar idea). Like Solaris, the protagonist's recollections of the life on earth eventually result in some mental instability, but the movie stays away from getting into long philosophical debates on human experience or our place on earth.

In general, do expect a lot more than space travel in this movie. To cite an example, the isolation of Sam made him more attached to memories of his life on earth. I don't recall many other movies that have expressed it so well that in isolation, nothing really means anything. Kudos to the director! Such existentialist reflections aside, there are many instances when the movie makes a statement about unethical corporate practices, evasive HR responses - almost to the extent 'Michael Clayton' did. I think that makes it more worthwhile to watch. Still despite all that, it avoids taking any stances on controversies that bother all of us in modern times. It puts us through the fears of the unknown, catastrophes of distrust and what arises from distrust and isolation and all of that.

Still, somehow the movie isn't really as dark as the script might make it sound. There is isolation, mistrust, schemes, confusion, curiosities and despair, but the human experience probably transcends the realism of its existence – that was the idea I carried back from the movie theater.

For an average movie-watcher I think this was a rather strange vampire movie. The idea of vampires has been so beaten to death that it may be hard to expect an original movie. ''let the right one in'' doesn't disappoint us in any way but it still has had its own problems.

After reading the reviews and noticing the high ratings, I thought this was going to one of those phenomenal movies that explore the emotion of fear itself while letting it overlap with greed, revenge, sexuality or love. But unfortunately that deep exploration of fear (as claimed by many reviewers and friends) didn't seem to be so much there. I wouldn't for example compare this with Rosemary's baby, the Exorcist or even the Ringu. Still it was a nice break from the vampire slaying entertainment.

For an average movie-watcher this movie was quite strange in many ways. The involvement of Oskar with Eli, wasn't about attraction or conventional ''romance'' as you might expect reading the reviews- it was merely about a friendship formed in the vulnerability of childhood. The whole idea is unconventional and interesting but not very well executed. There is a little bit of incoherence and disconnection in the various carefully shot scenes.

The isolation of winter (a technique heavily used in Scandinavian cinema) was probably there to make us feel the need for support and love that Oskar himself feels. His involvement with Eli might have implied the need for courage and revenge he would've felt; ''Letting the right one in'' could suggest the ambivalence of weakness and revenge that Oskar harbored. But none of this was directed well. What we see is a different set of scenes that don't connect with each other to convey something. We may give credit to the script writer for all what he would've wanted to say.. but despite splendid cinematography the overall execution was far from perfection.

With so many loose ends and ambiguities, and the direction losing its focus intermittently this is not the movie that you would be eagerly waiting to watch. However, its good to see people trying such things in vampire movies - in a time when Twilight runs successfully in the theaters.

I would consider this to be a perfect documentary for its technique and narration.

The movie's account of the massive three-gorges project is quite detailed. But without letting viewers loose attention to its subject, the movie takes us through the history of China, the paradoxes of its "modern" path of development and even the myths and goddesses associated with the river. The movie aptly exposes and questions the "tourist" nature of our own interests in the vast orient unveiled to us. The satire in the film (which may not be all non-fictional) is sharp and quite funny. Overall, the story telling is so fluid that it may feel to be a fictional account altogether.

Like any other documentary this is a movie replete with the accounts of lives of the people associated with the project. However this movie accomplishes much more by reevaluating our own ideas of economic development; by showing us the two sides of it – fulfillment of a dream of progress and loss of an environment that constitutes the being.

Lastly, owing not just to the country of landscapic beauty that china is, there are some captivating shots in the movie that stay in memory long after the movie is over.