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Films you will never regret having watched
Reviews
24 (2001)
Political propaganda
In 24 we get a lot of the worst clichés thrown together. The main character is a male blonde hero which takes on pretty much the whole world on his own, not much different than Rambo. He does extreme things, but always for the right reasons and it seems shear bad luck he always ends up in situations where everyone blames him for what he does.
Through all the action he still manages to "take care" of the people around him with a big hart. He's always against the odds, yet always wins. For lack better words he is the perfect man.
This is the first questionable thing politically. The "hero" myth. Needless to say all the women are rather helpless and need rescuing all the time. When he has been tortured for 2 years in China (and of course he didn't break), he comes back and goes into action the same day like he's brand new. When the same thing happens to his girlfriend, she is completely traumatized and unable to speak from the shock. Surely the gender choices must be coincidence.
The second problem is that this is yet another cop series, showing how humane the police are. Other than them there are the "innocent lives" and the evil terrorists. Needless to say, people blaming the US for something are delusional and are always cruel, killing anyone they no longer need. Across the seasons, a few different groups are shown, but the Arabs feature a lot which is very questionable and not at all unharmful right after 9/11.
Given, this series portrays a black president and later a female one, and it might have played a role in the later election of Obama which surely is a considerable historical event, but that can't make up for the load of crap we get to swallow.
This series clearly is about putting ideas into your head: whether it is the rotten gender issues, or that it's not perse nice for the police to torture, but hey, given what they are up against, we can't blame them and it's not like they like it. People fighting against an imperial government only have bad intentions, and they don't give a shitt about "innocent lives", and we are so lucky that there is agencies out there to protect us from all this evil.
Sure, the US government and the police need a lot of this kind of propaganda to make up for the horror they cause to many, but NO THANKS!
Noordzee, Texas (2011)
interesting idea but disappointing execution
This film disappointed me because the language used is some very clean and un-natural "dixi-antwerps". As the film plays at the sea side, it makes the accent even more unrealistic.
The movie is based on a novel and it feels like the dialogs have been taken literally which doesn't take into account how much more tolerant written language is compared to spoken.
Further, it feels like the scenes chosen drop a bit out of context, with little introduction as to why the characters feel towards one another like they do.
All in all, I found it mechanical and I didn't manage to feel with the characters.
The Power of Nightmares: The Rise of the Politics of Fear (2004)
Definitely worth watching
I clearly have to agree with most people that this is a very nice film, but I want to mark two things however: 1. I seriously regret that the film is more critical about the past than the present. In a society that is shifting to the right swiftly, it is far more important to analyse the present than to distract people's attention from it by pointing to the past. It is a bit the same effect as pointing at someone else's business if you have lots of cleaning up to do yourself. In short, the third film is far less powerful than the first two, and I found that a bit disappointing, since there are more than enough things to say...
2.This didn't happen by coincidence though, and neither did it happen only because it's just harder to do it about the present, but it has to do with the director's view on current politics. When we spoke to him after he showed his films, he explained that he thought this tactic of fear would be short lived, and blow in the politicians faces. I think this is a blatant error though, looking at how well propaganda works, and at how lame the people are in western nations. Curtis thought for example that a lot of the "anti-terrorist" laws would not be passed, and was overall optimistic about the future. This is clearly naive, and about the laws he has already been proved wrong, as they have been passed...
Kafka (1991)
conspiracy?
Last year in September, the IMF and the WB had a summit in Prague. They met in... the castle. Thousands of anarchists, communists, socialists and so on protested against the meeting. Trying to get in to the castle, they were stopped at the fortress wall, because nobody knew the passage trough that cemetery. Some of them protested violently, maybe like the anarchists in the movie. In the end over 900 people were arrested by the police and of most of them, their human rights were violated, some were tortured and sexually abused by the police.
Coincidence???
Maybe writers like Kafka and George Orwell just understood and managed to describe the top of the iceberg of what happens in this world, but they definitely are closer to the truth than people who pretend that everything is all right.
Further i think this is a really good movie, really kafkaesque, really good camera and acting work, beautiful music and overall creepy as fack. It does make you think for sure.
Het achterland (2001)
more possibility
I'm not sure, but from the speaking in the movie i think that Judith van Herck is a belgian actress. She is made to speak dutch like they speak it in Holland though, and i think that makes her loose loads of her spontanity. You kind of see that before she says something, she translates it and i have the impression that it keeps her from really emerging with her caracter.
Butterfly Kiss (1995)
amanda plummer is the best
You can say what ever you want on this movie, but amanda plummer stays the best actress on the planet. If you would meet her in the street she could make you believe that she has been like that all her life, because she lives in a role like i have seen nobody else do. By the way this isn't an easy role to play. Further it must be said that micheal winterbottom isn't one of the worst directors around either, as far as i know i haven't seen anything of him less than excellent. This movie was so good that i cried at the end
Ma vie en rose (1997)
I am astonished about some reactions
I am astonished about some reactions
I am amazed to read things like this, "To me, this was not a film about a "disturbed" child, but about parents. The parents made, apparently, no effort to explain the biological difference between boys and girls. Second, nobody enlightened the child on the difference between your secret, internal sensitivities and those that one displays publicly.", have you really not understood this movie or was it me?
Of course this movie is not about a disturbed child! Maybe this movie is about the fact that all people, from the moment they are born, are conditioned to be like this and like that, and especially not to be themselves. Boys have to play with cars and guns, and girls with barby puppets, and most definitely not the other way around, otherwise you should take your kid to a therapist. Boys have to wear trousers and girls skirts or frogs, just check school uniforms, there are still quite some schools where girls may not wear trousers except for the really cold winter months. A child can not explore the world in a natural way, whenever it yells to test the capacity of its lungs, and any adult might dislike that, it is silenced, with other words whenever they are themselves, they are silenced. We are all conditioned like rats in a skinner box and we are no more and no less than rats in a skinner box until we can say f**k you to that society, those politicians, law enforcers, teachers, parents, employers, media, so called friends that don't accept us like we are, etc that gratefully fulfill the role of skinner. Maybe the biological difference between the two sexes is much less clear than most of us think and are people in the first place humans rather than men and women, and maybe hormonal and genetical, there are many stages between "absolute woman" and "absolute man".
I also don't think that the film wants to implement that the boy could have these feelings as a secret, but nobody else may know that. With other words you are saying the same like all the other skinners, whatever you think, try not to give in to it, and keep acting like a robot, wearing your mask because your real self is disgusting and abnormal, and something to be ashamed of. For myself, i am a guy, but i like to wear long skirts, noting to do with gender (there is fundamentally nothing female about a skirt) because the are comfortable and give your legs much more freedom than trousers, but i never wear them when I'm at my hometown, because i just don't feel like being stared at by the local baker, neighbors, etc. I just can't cope with being the weirdo again, and i am like everybody else in this society threatened with being laughed at, being discredited,... if i am myself.
I also read:"Great! Great! Great! I've told everyone I know to see this one! Really a fun, entertaining, charming, sweet film. It will take you emotionally all over the place. But believe me, it is really a great emotional ride. I love to see films like this that show all aspects of life! Enjoy this one with several friends!"
I think this film was everything except charming, entertaining, sweet, fun... I think this film tries to confront people with the DISGUSTING society to which they all contribute, it is a good movie, but it has nothing to do with sweetness and charm and the like. Now sorry for the enraged start that i took, of course everyone understands a movie in their way, and i don't want to sound patronizing, but i was shocked by some reactions.
Some Nudity Required (1998)
Absolutely fabulous!!! (Slasher, slasher, slasher, kill tha' bitch)
I also saw this doc by accident, but it's the most amazing one I saw all year!
I couldn't imagine that there is a market for movies like this, it is so obvious that there is no acting whatsoever involved, no plot... bad camera work...
The interesting and highly entertaining part of this doc is to hear about everybody in the business say that this is only on the way up to the A-movies. At the same time all the actresses are extremely unhappy, feel abused and discriminated, feel that they are treated in the most sexist way possible(yes, they DO realise that, you know). In the doc, the directors also openly admit that they choose the actresses on their tit-size and nothing else ("and of course, we assume that you are prepared to do the nudity, don't you love?"). Therefore half of hollywood is filled with actresses who had boob-jobs done, only because they saw that as their only option to ever make it in hollywood, and now regret it. What a wonderfull world!
It is no secret that there are quite some men out there trying to get horny on big boobs, but that the industries apply the theory of low level sexism to the letter, was a suprise for me.
Check out this one quote, from I think a producer:
"On one hand, you have snuff-movies, which are extremely violent. On the other hand you've got X-rated movies, which are completely sexual. The best way to make that acceptable and combine that for the broad public is an "Erotic thriller," cause that's what every hollywood B-movie is called.
This documentary is definitely worth checking out.
La vie de Marianne (1995)
To long indeed
It must be admitted that the movie is incredibly tiring with for example dialogues over ten minutes no exception, but I disagree that this would be a to heavy role for the main actresses, as I was quite surprised by the acting achievements. I think that the combination of being really calm but expressing her mind in a very quick and firm use of language makes Virginie Ledoyen perfect for roles like this. Further i think it must be said that this movie can be compared (as far as the atmosphere of that time and the costumes and the scenery are concerned) with movies like "Valmont".
La vie de Marianne (1995)
To long indeed
It must be admitted that the movie is incredibly tiring with for example dialogues over ten minutes no exception, but I disagree that this would be a to heavy role for the main actresses, as I was quite surprised by the acting achievements. I think that the combination of being really calm but expressing her mind in a very quick and firm use of language makes Virginie Ledoyen perfect for roles like this. Further i think it must be said that this movie can be compared (as far as the atmosphere of that time and the costumes and the scenery are concerned) with movies like "Valmont".
Boys Don't Cry (1999)
cruel world
I only read one thing about this movie before seeing it: "never will you be shocked more by the sentence "based on actual facts"", and i think that's true.
It is impossible to believe what people are able to do to each other only on a base of homophobia.
I think it is a good thing they made a film out of this, so people can realize in what world they live.
Xích lô (1995)
personal opinion
It's a hard, violent film, but the camera-work and montage are exceptional
Wag the Dog (1997)
Analytical, political
I think it's again a beautiful example of the hypocrisy of this economic and political system. Everybody knows about certain abuses, but nobody resists them. Don't you americans never think of a better society? Of course a lot is exagerrated in that film but it is true that certain people can just make a war for political or ECONOMICAL reasons. The film itself, technically seen also is typical american. The complete sterile camera-style which you can see in most Hollywood movies. Is it impossible for american cineasts to find a more creative way of filming?
L'appartement (1996)
idea
I think the film makes a subtile reference to rouge of Kieslowski, as the whole atmosphere gives me a feeling of red. It seems to be that a lot of the backgrounds contain red, think of the tea-room f.e. I also think this is one of the greatest movies of the last years.
Eldorado (1995)
meaning
This is my favorite film, as it gives a great atmosphere of the nightlife of Montreal, combined with fantastic music. It is again a proof that cheap movies with actors that write their own dialogues stay the best.