Reviews

Context: The Indonesian archipelago in Southeast Asia was slowly conquered by Netherlands over the 16-20th centuries, but after many fights, Indonesia finally won her independence in the 1945-1949 national revolution. However, being a colonial country, her economy still largely depended on the Netherlands.

Content: The protagonist Iskandar arrives back home from this war, some say with a soldier's PTSD, I'd say it's rather guilt. Either way, he is unable to find his way back in civil life whether he tries to follow civil or military rules, and he is also disappointed in what the country has become.

Realisation: The director is considered the fater of Indonesian film, as he and his studio had a huge effect after the country won her independence. Because he spent a couple of years in Hollywood, it is no wonder that the film has a very noir-ish vibe, although it's not very playful with camera angles, cuts or lightnings and shadowings. Even the music is Western-style, which is a shame, it would have been more interesting to see Indonesian art seeping into the film; instead, we only get a glimpse of it in one scene. Acting is kind of stiff, and not in the good, Bessonian sense.

Overall it's a surprisingly complex film thematically in a surprisingly Western-style realisation, especially for a country in ruins and without much prior experience.

(Cuban readers, please correct me when I'm wrong :)

Context: Cuba won her independence in the 1890s, but politicial life remained instable, especially after the Great Depression in 1929, which resulted in violent protests and a military takeover in 1933.

Content: In the plot, Yeye lost his father presumably in the Independence War, but inherited some land. He would like to marry Trina, but the ex-owner's son, Fernandez arrives in town and with the help of corrupt officials, he reclaims the land and also Trina... Knowing later films, it was weird that social issues are addressed, such as worker oppression or corruption, but they are not dealt with. When violence would break out, something always stops that from happening. In the end, a miracle helps to resolve the situatuion, because heavenly justice prevails, but not worldly. A story was rather confusing, as irrelevant characters were introduced, and the plot elements were not exposed clearly, I had to re-watch the film to understand it.

Realization: The start had a bit Soviet-style montage, and there were a few fancy, dynamic camera movements when there was a horse or train involved, but the overall look wasn't spectacular. Acting was not overly theatratical, so it was fitting for a silent movie.

Summary: Being one of the first Cuban important film, I can value its place in film history, but overall it felt outdated, as if I watch a film from 10-15 years earlier.

The context: This is one of the first stil extant Indian film, although it's partially lost. Shot by the father of Indian cinema, Mandakini Phalke.

The content: The film tells several well-known stories from the life of the Hindu god Krishna, showing him a mischievous but righteous child. The "Kaliya Mardan" is the last story, in which the snake called Kaliya keeps the villagers in fear, so Krishna fights it. This is quite hard to decipher, because either the director thought it's common knowledge or because about third of the film is lost. Similarly, because of this the story is not particularly deep and there's not much character drama going on.

Realization: I don't recall much camera movements or playing with the lights, editing is sometimes rough. The fantasy scene of the snake-fight gives us some neat effects, but the star of the movie is the child playing Krishna, who acts naturally and cute (she is the daughter of the director).

Summary: I don't want to sound unjust, but I am not familiar with the Indian movies of that era. So this might be quite a feat for Indian cinema, but I can only compare it to other films of 1919, and in comparison with those, it seems outdated. It reminds me of early Jesus-films, which were rather illustrations than movies. Technically it does not even get near the much earlier Melies-films.

Background: A highly debated topic was in the 19th century if Hungarians originate from Finno-Ugric or Turkic peoples. Sandor Csoma (1784-1842), a linguist and orientalist set foot in 1819 to research this matter in Asia, but reaching Tibet in 1822, he ended up dedicating the rest of his life to writing books about the Tibetian language and Buddhism.

This essay-documentary introduces Csoma as a Hungarian folk tale hero, but his adventures are getting more and more philosophical until the narrator speaks about nothhing but the Buddhist point of view on life. Hence the title: Csoma first was a guest of rulers on his way to Asia, by the end he realises he was A GUEST OF LIFE on his way from whatever was before his birth to whatever comes after death.

The style of this film is episodic, flashing quotes and illustrating whatever is told with home video footage style excerpts of the given places, and that helps the viewer taking up the traveller's point of view. When the narration is too abtract, minimalistic animations are used instead. Similarly, the music usually represents the style of the given region. Csoma being a polyglot, the narration uses a dozen languages without translation. Nothing is missed, it's just a way to illustrate Csoma's thoughts.

Overall, the Buddhist philosophy might be revelating for some, but I feel like the images did not convey and support them well enough to make this a great movie.

Setting: 1970s Hungary (Eastern Europe), somewhat loosening communist dictatorship.

Content: The plot is minimal, Juli (Jaroslava Schallerova) is engaged to Savanyu (Mark Zala) - a nickname meaning "sour" in Hungarian - , but she encounters and starts fancying a travelling musician, Geza (Lajos Balazsovits). This description is misleading, because Juli is totally passive and she lets happen whatever the men want to do to her whether it is the more traditional Savanyu or the more modern Geza.

Rather than this plot, what actually happens in the movie is a series of everday situations of the young people, in which we can see them being somewhat restricted by the old world, but they are already more powerful.

Realization: But rather than all of the above, what we really encounter for most of the runtime is a series of songs mostly in the format of concerts. I think the songs do not fully reflect what's in the film, so they rather serve it by providing the contemporary atmosphere. The musicians (except for Geza, who is "just" an actor) are some of the iconic Hungarian bands of the era. Think of it as a Hollywood film featuring the Beatles, Doors, Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin in one. Accordingly, the camera shows rather groups of peoples than individuals.

Summary: I think this is a less focused work by Meszaros dealing with that particular age and somewhat feminism, just like in her previous films. It is more fun for Hungarians, who are emotionally involved with the featured musicians, but that generation, who enjoyed the changes and the music of that era is now disappearing.

First of all, it is always important to understand the context: during World War II the Soviet Union invaded Eastern Europe and established a communist dictatorship. The totalitarian dictatorship in Hungary loosened up somewhat by the late 1960s, but it was still an authoritarian rule. This is when and where the film takes place.

In the story Edit (Mari Torocsik) is the wife of an important politician, who suddenly passes away. She is expected to take on the widow role and live for his memory, but we learn that their marriage was not happy or intimate, so Edit would rather leave it all behind and forget about him, her villa, her social status. Her elder son, Istvan (Lajos Balazsovits) cannot let this happen - he represents not only traditional patriarchy but the authoritarian regime as well.

I'm not going to spoil the story; the point is that similarly to her previous film, The Girl (1968), Meszaros places the city characters into the countryside setting to highlight the contrast between the traditional and the new. This latter is of course represented by the younger people, particularly Istvan's younger brother and Istvan's girlfriend, Kati (Kati Kovacs - she is primarily an iconic singer rather than an actress). As I said, I won't tell you how the film unfolds, I'm just giving here some pointers.

What surprised me is that music is much more present than I expected; Meszaros already used beat music as the main theme in her previous film, but this time we also get our share of classical and folk music, making me think that the film might have worked out as a musical. Acting is low-key.

Overall, I think this can be paired up with The Girl (1968). Thematically and stylistically they are very similar, while each has different strengths and weaknesses. The literal translation of the title would be "halo effect".

Like in many other countries, it was the Lumiere brothers who introduced the movie camera to Romania. But unlike in many other countries, here it was not an inventor or an entertainer, but a doctor, who purchased it.

Gheorghe Marinescu was a neurologist who purchased the first movie camera in Romania and recorded patients with neurological disorders in a "before and after" style between 1898-1901. This made him not only the first Romanian filmmaker but also the world's first documentarist.

This is the context you need to know to view this film, because all you can see is a woman limping and then walking normally after a cut. In between, likely there was a "hypnotic suggestion", as the title implies. For us, everyday viewers, this would have been more interesting, but then again, this film was not shot with the purpose of aesthetics or entertainment, this was done for medical reasons.

The plot is about Nagima, an 18-year old, Kazakh girl, who is poor and lonely. In this story we see how she handles it. She doesn't care much about the poverty but she does long for love. I tell this in every review of mine, that as an outsider I probably miss some of the local context, so there might be an aspect that reflects on Kazakhstan. What I do see is that Nagima is oppressed by male dominance (landlord, boss), by the institutions (hospital) and also by higher classes. The plot also has an existential aspect wondering if life is worth without love, and whether all the misery is worth living.

The first, socially sensitive third of the plot is dominated by Nagima's weariness to draw the viewer down to her level of being emotionlessly tired, and then the second third lets us understand her past, feelings and thoughts, and the film becomes much more emotional under the surface. The final third elevates into the aforementioned existential plane, but all along the plot is down-to earth. While this might sound like misery porn, it is neither elevating or downtreading, or rather it is both.

The realisation is fun, there are a lot of static images, long takes, it is so slow sometimes that we can see the scene long before and after something happens in it. These are usually more distant takes, but there are also many close-ups which do not show the object but rather a part of it. The scenery is shabby, nature is vast and arid, and similarly, the characters also don't talk much. Nagima's emoitonlessness is contrasted by other characters' more vivid acting, which sometimes make it look bad acting. By the way, it's a women's film, there are almost no men at all which gives their appearance significance. I liked the music, they sound like traditional Kazakh instruments with a modern, dissonant take.

All in all, I enjoyed the film, it is well thought-through and realised. I think it could have had a much bigger impact on the viewer if it decided to go to a negative or a positive direction.

I am quite sure that there's much more to this film than what a foreigner can understand. I say this, because as an Eastern European I did get extra layers, which are probably invisible for viewers who did not have their shares from the Soviet Union. This is often an issue with arts: you understand your own context, probably you understand the dominant American contexts, maybe you even understand your regional contexts, but in every other case you will miss a significant portion of a film. So, Kazakhstan is a Central Asian country with Mongol-Turkic and Islamic roots, dominated by Russia for a few centuries before gaining independence recently; however, the domestic rule is still authoritarian.

The story is autobiographical; the backbone of the plot is that Amir, a film director's private and professional lives are in crisis, when he sets up to visit her ailing mother in the countryside, and in the meantime he dreams, fantasizes and remembers.

And let me now refer back to my first paragraph: I think I am not mistaken to believe that Amir is a parallel to contemporary Kazakh society, who are trying to cope with their past, present and possible future. This is the aspect that is hard to comprehend as a foreigner. It is much easier to resonate with Amir's crisis, his desires, fears, insecurities, standpoints both as an artist and as a family man. Several reviewers noted that the film is also quite funny; I'm afraid I missed most of that unless it was obvious enough even for me.

Visually it is less fun apart from some setups; there are not many noticeable plays with lights, editing, camera movements and other effects. There's little soundtrack and not much room for acting.

Overall I cannot say I enjoyed much the contents and the formalism of the film, but it had some fun parts, and as I mentioned, a movie experience is very dependent on the viewer's taste and understanding, so that's just me.

Okay, the title is a bit of an exaggeration, but the main and only point in the film is its title: "An Ingenious Response to Colonialism". The documentary presents the Trobriand (a few islands in Papua New Guinea, Melanesia) version of cricket, which is highly customized by the natives to fit their culture. Beside a little explanation, all we can see is a demonstration of the game, which is fun, probably even more so for cricket-fans, but the film never really explores its idea. The title implies that rather than adapting a foreign custom, Triobrand made that foreign custom adapt their culture. I would say this is a halfway result, because it was not the colonizers, who changed by adapting a new custom.

As for the film's looks, it's nothing more than a regular documentary, neither the images, the movements nor the sounds support the film's idea. Exotic stuff are fun to see, but there's so much more to a film if all means are utilized. Overall, it's probably fun to a cricket fan, but for an average viewer one hour is too long without proper content and realization.

The plot: It's a middle class woman's and a working class man's romantic relationship. You cannot really spoil it, as not much happens; it's about what they experience as their worlds collide.

The themes: We are in the context of Cuba's communist revolution, and while social "progress" is on its way, traditions (religion, gender roles... etc.) and poverty hinder it.

The form: A mix of documentary and fiction. The film's director made documentaries, this was her first feature. It was shot in 1974, but she passed away before post-production and the release was only in 1977. Luckily, she had assistants such as Alea, the most significant Cuban filmmaker up until now. So the director had made documentaries before and while this film is partly fiction, she kept many documentary-like elements, such as narration, interviews, real people who are not acting with their real stories. Dynamic editing gives high energy to the film, and the Soviet-style montage-technique can also be discovered in some instances, such as in case of the slums being demolished.

Personal note: The themes are delivered, it's fun to watch. Nothing extraordinary, but I cannot complain.

Since there's no valuable review, let me add my amateurish opinion, it might be helpful for some, although I'm neither a movie or a Northern Africa expert :)

While my "repertoire" of Egyptian films is only about a dozen, based on my experience I think it's safe to assume that the 1940s were dominated by simplistic entertaining films of jokes and songs. I'm quite sure that many jokes were puns and cannot reach the ears of non-Arabic speakers, and it's worthwhile to mention that the concept of Arabic music and its rules are quite different from Western principles. Finally, it is also essential to know that the lead, Umm Kulthum is a legendary singer.

As for the film itself, it's definitely not a great one, I've seen much better ones from the 1950-1960s, so again, while I'm no expert, I can safely tell at least that much. The plot is not really tight, 2 hours are way too long for the relatively simple story: there is a poor, but righteous woman, Fatmah in a poor, but righteous community; she falls in love with a rich and immoral guy, Fathy, and while the love is mutual, the guy's immoral environment and his own immorality pulls him back away from his love. The rest would be spoiler.

The main theme is that of a typical Capra-film, such as You Can't Take It With You (1938) or It's a Wonderful Life (1946): the poor community is righteous and strong together (and nationalistic), the rich are immoral and mime foreigners. Another theme could be Fathy's character development. Unfortunately, neither of them are really explored well enough and although the story is warm-hearted, it remains shallow. The camerawork is occasionally interesting, but most of the time it does not add much to the film. Acting is good enough for this level, and as for the songs, as I mentioned, I absolutely dare not judge them, I have zero knowledge in Arabic music.

To sum up, it feels like it's a simple, uplifting, entertaining film with a moral lesson for the masses, similar to Afrita hanem (1949). A must-see classic for Egypt, negligible for others.