Reviews

This is the sort of art house movie that gives art house movies a bad name. The film is about stalking and all the scenes are filmed as if from security cameras. Some shots are split screen, some are complete with time of shooting, some are desperately fuzzy, etc. The two actors, a man and a woman are shot separately - I think the man is in Germany and the woman in London but to make sure I would have to watch it again and I am certainly not going to do that. All they do is wander around streets and through buildings and stare off into space. There is no interaction between the two and all dialogue or more properly the two monologues are voice over. The man appears to be writing a book about being stalked by the woman, there are, at times, even typing noises on the sound track. The woman gives a kind of stream of consciousness rant about being betrayed. All in all it is very much like an film made by an undergraduate trying desperately to be original except that it's about 10 times longer and watching it seems like 100 times longer. I am not sure that you can write a spoiler for a movie like this because nothing happens but in case someone thinks it does contain a spoiler I apologise.

A pioneering 'berg' film from the silent days of German cinema starring Leni Riefenstahl, later made famous or infamous as the documenter of Nazi Germany in 'Triumph of the Will' (the 34 Nuremburg rally) and 'Olympiad' (the 36 Olympics). This was her first acting film and she does a lot of dancing (quite good) and some over-acting, (quite bad) waving her arms in the air and rolling her eyes, taking her cue from Mae Marsh, no doubt.

The eternal triangle story is so simple I still can't believe Fanck took 1¾ hours to tell it. However to give him his due a lot of the film is taken up by scenery shots some of which are quite spectacular. A downhill ski race is also a feature although Fanck clearly plays fast and loose with times and locations so don't expect anything to make a whole lot of sense during this section. If they had had continuity girls at that time this one would have been looking for another job in real short order.

The climax of the film comes when 'The Mountaineer' sees his fiancée (Riefenstahl) being groped by some man. He is furious but in true public school style attempts to sublimate his anger in a daring mountain climb much like Riefenstahl sublimated her excessive emotion in a dance earlier in the film. (Quite clearly at the time violent exercise and a cold shower in the morning was thought to be a cure for everything.) Half way up they have stopped for a rest on a narrow ledge when a chance remark by Vigo, the companion, makes 'the mountaineer; realise that it was the guy he is now roped to who was groping his fiancée. He is so furious that forgetting the floor space is somewhat restricted he makes a threatening gesture towards Vigo who instinctively steps back and …..whoops! (An earlier comment on this site stated that he planned to murder Vigo but Fanck makes it clear that he did not, it was an accident.)

An interesting comparison can be made between Fanck's movie and the recent mountaineering drama documentary 'Touching the Void' in which fact virtually duplicates the fiction of 'Holy Mountain'. Watching the two in close proximity is very illuminating for the ethos of both films. I think the earlier movie has the edge when it comes to cinematography despite the fact that fixed camera position is the rule though I expect in some of the locations even actors' movements must have been a problem. The shooting of the film itself was plagued by weather problems, ice kept melting, snow turned to slush and the whole project was nearly thrown out by UFA. This is not a great movie but, especially with the comparison with 'Touching the Void', it is a fascinating movie from a historical perspective as well as worth watching in its own right if you are a fan of silent movies.

The filmed events take place over two days as the director, Visanna Prathanage, took pains to inform the audience in an interview about the film. It looks at 3 separate lives, a Muslim family fleeing from the Tamil Tigers focusing mainly on a young boy and his dog. A Sinhalese woman whose fighter pilot husband crashed in the north of the island several months ago and was captured by the Tigers, now she is increasingly desperate to find him. Finally there is a young man who on a trip with friends to a brothel discovers that his sister is working there. Their paths cross casually at the end of the movie but not in any meaningful way as in 'Amores Perros'. Although the events that take place may have great significance in the lives of the characters the director fails to make us feel much sympathy for any of the three. Any political statement or anti-war sentiment is very much played down. There is some nice photography of Sri Lanka but apart from that there is little that stands out about the movie. Despite its awards I believe that if it had come from anywhere but Sri Lanka it would have been consigned to daytime viewing on some obscure TV satellite channel.

The story concerns a family of extremely fat Hong Kong pork butchers, father and two sons, a young pimp who is trying to set up an internet call girl service and a beautiful young prostitute who blackmails the first two for a rich man we never meet. Along the way we are treated to escaped pigs being chased through narrow alleys, people being chased through narrow alleys, pigs being chopped up, people's hands being chopped off (and stitched back on to the wrong arms, sex, blackmail and general confusion.

This is not an art house movie. There is no pretence at art. The film is not character driven because none of the characters are on screen long enough for their personalities to be developed and consequently we can feel no sympathy for their plight. The social commentary is crude and obvious, the poor people do over the pigs while the rich people do over the poor people and take their money to boot and just to emphasise the point there are lots of shots contrasting the corrugated iron hovels of shanty town with posh apartment buildings soaring towards the sky.

This is the first Fruit Chan movie I've seen and it will almost certainly be the last. Unfortunately it is not quite bad enough to be one of those movies like 'Plan 9 from Outer Space' that keep you watching in awed fascination just to see what new depths it can plumb, this movie is just common or garden bad; bad with no distinguishing features.

The basis of the film's is on one of those legends which crop up around great men like weeds on a driveway. This one concerns the Emperor Napoleon who, while in exile on the island of St. Helena after his defeat at the battle of Waterloo, was supposedly replaced in captivity by a lowly sailor doppelganger. Don't expect any major fighting or spy style action because things don't turn out exactly as the plotters expect.

As an amateur military historian I found that the film's exposition was very slow as Napoleon's entourage plan to free him from St. Helena. Whether or not this slowness helps those who are unfamiliar with the life of the Emperor is hard to say. However as soon as the great man is free of the island the film gets into its stride and gives us some neat touches of humour and a few nasty jibes at both the tourist trade and bureaucracy. Once in Paris, in order to pass the time while he waits for the signal to start the rising that will see the overthrow of the Bourbon kings of France and his own re-ascension to the throne, Napoleon applies his organisational and tactical gifts to selling groceries with amazing results.

The whole film is an exercise in feel-good. No stupendous insights into the character of Napoleon or what it feels like to be cast down from such an elevated position but it all makes for a couple of hours of pleasant amusement. Such a pity that the warm fuzzy feelings engendered by a film like this evaporate so quickly as we emerge from the darkness of the cinema into the harsh light of the car park.

This is a dogme film using location shots, no props, natural lighting as far as possible etc. The story concerns a Yugoslav Serb artist, Dragan adrift in France. He goes into a bookshop to try and buy an art book and meets a girl, Jeanne, who works there somewhat intermittently, and they fall in love. Although they have to speak in English because she can't speak Serbian and he can't speak French remarkably they never have to struggle for words (I do tell a lie he does have a problem - once.) One night they are stopped by the police after some drunken bad behaviour on Dragan's part and Jeanne discovers to her horror that his papers are not in order and he will be allowed three days before being deported by the authorities. His friends had warned him to regularise his stay with the authorities but he had ignored them and now they are both up the proverbial creek. Elodie Bouchet as Jeanne puts in a good performance and the cinematography creates a nice atmosphere from its shots of Paris streets and claustrophobic apartments but the pacing of the film is glacial. There is little or no dramatic tension until Dragan gets his marching orders from the cops, there is no witty dialogue and no real political point to make as in L'Afrance another French film which deals with more or less the same subject but in a rather sharper way.