I was crossing over from French to German stuff last week, but I’ll start with the unrelated before getting to Germany.
Z for Zachariah (2015): the plot is not that of book by the same name but rather seems an update on The World, the Flesh and the Devil, which was too cautious about race issues. In a way, this fixes that, but there’s a (spoiler) detail that made it irritating.
SPOILER gives away ending and director intent
The director intended to let us know that John killed Caleb, as can be seen when Ann figures that much by pushing a glass until it falls – but that death should have crashed the man into the trough for the water wheel, and we see that it is still in place afterwards. This made me search for WTF was supposed to happen. An easy rewrite would have the cliff tie off point to the side with a brief shot of Caleb moving from the trough to the side before going up. Sloppy to not do that.
Hard Truths(2024): Bitter and scared woman bitches about everything. Poignant and sardonic, it doesn’t feel right to label it ‘bittersweet comedy’ because it felt deeper than that. Exceptionally good.
I’m Thinking of Ending Things (2020): Charlie Kaufman twisted this story into a nonlinear mashup of times and faces, but the theme might be summarized as an introspection on desire and one’s own shortcomings. After viewing, it needs time to settle, and possibly to rewatch in a year or two.
Submarine (2010): Fails bechdel test. Many films do – including the previous Kaufman piece – but here I really wanted some female voices instead of yet another tale of a boy’s first love from only his point of view. It’s a perfectly fine film if that’s what you want, but it left me flat.
Pete Seeger: The Power of Song (2007): Documentary on Seeger. Good info, some song clips. I wasn’t engrossed, but I did learn interesting bits.
Our Man in Havana (1959): Graham Greene story starring Alec Guinness in satire of spy stories before we had any 007 flicks. Set in Cuba at a time when Castro only allowed filming if the Baptise rule was shown in the negative. Cast also includes Noël Coward and Burl Ives. Not bad except for an editing issue near the end that bothered me, but generally skippable if it weren’t for the historical aspects.
A Covenant with Death (1967): Mediocre movie about a Hispanic judge protagonist with non-white culture. So innovative!? Maybe then, but strained now.
Peter von Kant (2022): French! Ozon! After watching this, I had to rewatch its source, and after watching both, I decided that this was tighter and more ‘fun’, but it blows the point of the whole movie in the final minutes… but perhaps by condensing the possible interpretations of the original into fewer possibilities gives more people satisfaction.
The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant (1972): German! Fassbinder at his best! Petra rants about herself while commanding her silent assistant. I much prefer this version to its remake.
Fox and His Friends (1975): Fassbinder. Ignorant carny buys lottery ticket while hooking up with upper class gay guy – and wins! Now introduced to a more sophisticated set, he doesn’t realize he’s getting used. It’s a compassionate look at the tragedy of it. Also, there’s a fair amount of full frontal male nudity, but no sex. Moderately recommended.
Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (1974): A look at race relations at a time when the older generation remembers WWII, a German widow (with her Polish immigrant husband’s last name) falls in love with an Arab. Everyone freaks out. What to do? Fassbinder handles it perfectly.
World on a Wire (1973) (Welt am Draht): I wrote about this last week over here. Highly recommended, but veerrrryy long and probably only interesting to people wanting to study film. Notice the use of glass and mirrors. Both this and the totally skippable The Thirteenth Floor are based on the book Simulacron-3 – but this version is the good one.
I was crossing over from French to German stuff last week, but I’ll start with the unrelated before getting to Germany.
SPOILER gives away ending and director intent
The director intended to let us know that John killed Caleb, as can be seen when Ann figures that much by pushing a glass until it falls – but that death should have crashed the man into the trough for the water wheel, and we see that it is still in place afterwards. This made me search for WTF was supposed to happen. An easy rewrite would have the cliff tie off point to the side with a brief shot of Caleb moving from the trough to the side before going up. Sloppy to not do that.