Japon

Films/DVD Asylum

Movies from comedy to drama to your favorite Hollyweird Star.

2002 Mexican film about a painter who walks to a small town, presumably for the purpose of killing himself. Why he wants to kill himself in this small town is not stated. Why he wants to kill himself is also unclear, but the film provides enough clues that we can fathom a guess: As a painter, he has spent his life observing people and events, painting them, that he has lost the ability to feel life, to feel apart of something rather than an observer. Depressed, he seeks to end his mundance existence.
When he arrives at the town, he is greeted by the "mayor", who appears to be a self-appointed leader, who grants people approval whether they can stay. There is no law, no political structure.
The film is about his stay in this town, observing rather than explaining and giving us a point of view. There is symbolism. For example, we see a pretty graphic scene showing horses in copulation. Soon thereafter, we see a graphic scene between our subject and an old woman he has been boarding with having sex. The scene is preceded with him literally telling her that he needs to have sex, I suspect because he needs to find out if sex carries any pleasure for him. It does not, he weeps in her arms at this realization, and, I think, that this act is precisely like that of the horses (although I think the horses got what they wanted out of the relationship.)
During the course of the film we see him develop some emotions, such as when he tries to help the old woman care about her nephew's attempts to dismantle her home.
The film was made largely starring locals. There is an odd scene in the film with everything stops, and we get to watch drunken locals singing, some of it painful to watch and listen to. It was as though someone grabbed the camera when the cameraman was not watching, recorded some nonsense, then put the camera back, the cameraman none the wiser. After that brief interlude, we go back to the story.
The film was directed by Carlos Reygadas, and this is his first full length film. I understand that he left the study of law in Denmark to become a director. I admired his use of local citizens to make the film, and I do think that there is a story here, but there is no backstory, which translates into little commisurating with the characters, or even fully understanding them.
I also think the premise of the film was touched in the French film L'Humanite, only done much better. The acting is quite competent, the dialog sparse, much of the communication takes place with looks, and expressions. The film clocks in at a little over two hours, but I will say that the time moves briskly, particularly for a film with little dialog. Was it not Miles Davis who said that the silence is more important than the notes?
The film won an award at Cannes, if that is important to you. An odd film, but one that I enjoyed, despite its flaws. It is certainly a human film, one that depicts real issues with real people, and I respect the difficult film to make, and in some places to watch, that Reygada has made. I look forward to his future films.

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Topic - Japon - jamesgarvin 14:41:13 11/20/06 (0)

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