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Friday, October 22, 2004
review: blue & whitein the 1990s, polish director krzysztof kieslowski directed a series of three interrelated movies titled "blue" (1993), "white" (1994) and "red" (1994), collectively known as the "three colors" trilogy. thanks to my friend, i've seen two of them already - blue & white. "blue" is set in paris while "white" in warsaw & mostly in polish (my father's native language). kieslowski (who died in 1996 at the age of 54, not long after having completed these 3 films) cleverly named the trilogy after the 3 colors in the french flag. he used blue, white, & red to give him the predominant color & mood for each film. the trilogy itself deals with the ideals supported by the french revolution - liberty, equality & fraternity.. and how these relate to modern relationship. the three colors trilogy is not a standard plot-driven film, but instead goes much deeper. it is a film with multiple levels of meaning & it keeps growing on u the more u watch it & the more u analyze it."blue"  blue's theme is liberty. it speaks especially about human loss and survival and true liberty. the story begins with a car crash that badly injures a 33-year-old woman & kills her husband together with their five-year-old daughter. the woman, whose name is july (juliette binoche), recovers physically & she must decide how to deal with her grief, most particularly for her daughter, & get on with her life. although she had not sought freedom, it has come to her, & she must make some difficult choices.
julie's husband was a famous composer who was working on much-awaited corcerto (the "song for the unification of europe" - intended to be played as a once-only concerto simultaneously by 12 separate orchestras around europe, as a symbol of its unification) at the time of his death & the unfinished piece of music haunts her. julie also discovers that her late husband had a mistress for years. on the other hand, julie's husband assistant, olivier, has been in love with her for a long time, & she must decide whether she is ready to risk emotional intimacy. julie attempts to start a new life free of personal commitments, belongings, grief and love. she shies away from human contact & seeks to cut off all ties to her former life & the pain that it brings. she does this by selling up the entire family estate and disposes all her husband's music scores in an attempt to kill his musical legacy. she intends to spiritually commit suicide by withdrawing from the world & living anonymously in small flat in paris in a quiet, simple & lonely existence. she swims regularly to free herself of thoughts of the past life or to cleanse her emotions of guilt. it shows how grief can turn a loving person into an emotionless recluse. although she seeks strength, it's really self-destructive. despite her intentions, people from her former & present life intrude with their own needs & she finds herself once again interacting with people & getting caught up in the lives of others. during her search for the liberty, julie learns valuable lessons from the different people she meets. she visits her institutionalized mother, who suffers from alzheimer. her mother is a representative of the extreme of liberty that julie seeks. because of her condition, she cannot recognize julie as her daughter. her mother spends her day in a hollow existence, 'seeing the world' through her television -- an illusion of freedom. she is free to see the world, but unable to interact with the images on the screen due to the lack of emotional connection with the events around her. the writer wanted to show what liberty means to us today, who already posses liberty. liberty means individual liberty, the liberty of life itself. the film questions the value of liberty & conveying that complete freedom may be impossible to attain. in the end, julie re-establishes the connections with her past. she shifts from a state of liberty into a state of union. she gives the family's home & name to his husband's lover unborn child & completes the composition of his husband's music. she also allows herself to love & be loved by olivier. i'm into the art of film-making. i always appreciate visual techniques, which makes the film so stylish, in this film such as multiple reflections & macro close-ups. a few examples: have a look at the scene of the doctor informing julie of her husband & daughter's death: all shot as an extreme close-up reflection in julie's eyes... or the close-up of the sugar-cube slowly absorbing the coffee and then turning to coffee's colour (symbolising julie's ignorance of everything else around her, where the significance of even minor events is heightened by the introspecting mind... another example would be the scene where the old woman's attempt to put a bottle in a recycling bin is virtually ignored by julie as she is in one of her introspective trances)... or the macro close-up of the music sheets, or the triple reflection of the image of julie's mother, in the tv screen in the window of the nursing home. the director clearly wants the viewer to understand what is going on inside julie by observing her face in close-up. what an exquisite face binoche has!
"white" karol finds himself destitute, with no access to any money & with his sole possession being a suitcase containing his polish hairdressing diplomas & a porcelain statue he steals from a store (the statue being a pathetic reminder of his pre-paris dominique). but to top it all off, dominique then takes a great pleasure in taunting him over the phone with the sounds of her lovemaking with her new lover! *ouch!* surely life for our poor karol is at its rock-bottom. there is clearly no equality for this man. in the first half of the movie, karol is a complete innocent who is treated unjustly. as he plays polish folk songs in paris metro, he catches the attention of mikolaj, a polish bridge player. mikolaj offers to help get karol out of paris & take him back to his home city of warsaw in the suitcase. but alas, the suitcase itself is stolen by thieves! of course, they try to rob him, but he has nothing worth stealing so they beat him. despite rough treatment, we see karol pleased to just be alive & back in his snowy home city & cries out loudly : "jesus, i'm home at last!" the second half of the movie follows karol's plan to regain his equality with dominique. still hopelessly devoted to her, even despite what she's done to him, he feels compelled to win back her love & respect. in warsaw karol gets involved with some capitalists, & he gradually becomes very wealthy. he then fakes his own death & leaves his fortune to dominique, who comes to warsaw for the funeral. he uses his newfound wealth & power to reignite dominique's interest in him, then sees her for one last time & make love with her (karol suddenly regained his sexual powers). however, as the morning rise, karol is gone & dominique falls into his trap as karol makes it appear as though his ex-wife has murdered him for his money. the film is actually a black comedy. it deals with its theme -equality- in an ironic fashion. it is an excellent character study. *beware, a man scorned can be just as dangerous as a woman scorned* the ending is rather ambiguous, though (although i'm belong to eruopean audiences type who don't mind being left to draw their own conclusions in certain situations). karol finally gets his revenge alright, but does he gain his equality? well no, not really, as dominique is left in prison & he is on the outside. but the stage now is set for them to be in a relationship in which they will be equals. when karol goes to the jail where dominique is being held, through the windos, dominique uses sign language to tell karol that she still loves him & is willing to marry him again, if she can get out of prison. karol begins to cry, realizing that he too still loves her. stelly @ 8:08 AM Thursday, October 21, 2004 review: piano teacher erika is a fortyish, brilliant yet strict and harsh piano teacher at a prestigious college in vienna. and still virgin. she is as strict on herself as well as her students. at school she rarely accentuates the positives to her students. her anger takes the form of verbal abuse to her students who are unable to achieve the artistic integrity she demands. she looks blankly out the window while her students play, then belittles them for missed notes, or tell them they'll never be good enough. she doesn't want to help her students. she wants to destroy them. she competes with her students to make sure she remains the best, especially when it comes to schubert. so when one of her pupils starts to shine, she ruins her career by sticking glass in her coat pocket so the girl will slice up her hand and can't play! isabelle hubert absolutely shines in her role as a psychotic piano teacher who can't get what she wants so goes out to ruin the life of others.
erika seems to be living two lives at the same time. at work she is respected among her peers and her students. when she gets off work, however, she transforms into this horny woman. in dealing with her erotic longings, the few things that give her pleasure might seem disgusting : frequent visit to sex shops (she sniffs semen-filled tissues discarded by masturbating men from hardcore video cabins *yaiks*), voyeurism (she spies on copulating couples at movie driven-ins and she gets so turned on she urinates on their vehicle), and the worst part: sadistic genital self mutilation (she cuts her vagina with a razor).  she hides all this from her mother, of course. she has this powerfully protective mother who is so possessive and dominating. she treats her like an untrustworthy teenager even though she's coming up on 40. she scrutinizes over erika's activities and invades her space and overall privacy. she demands erika be home every night before 10. and when she fails to call, this tyrant mother embarrasses her by calling around town looking for her, then trashing her wardrobe in form of rage. they have this kind of love/hate relationship. they fight nonstop yet weirdly at the end of the night the two of them climb into the same bed.
 and then there is walter klemmer, a young, handsome, charming, wealthy, athletic, and talented boy who finds erika interesting and applies to be her student. the sexual tension between teacher and pupil is immediately apparent. he is attracted to her and tries to find the person beneath the rudeness and blank face. unfortunately he discovers more than he wanted. in one of the weirdst, most uncomfortable sex scenes ever, he makes a move on her in a bathroom at the conservatory. she's into it, and takes control immediately. yet every time he advances she backs off. this woman is absolutely freaky. she agrees on klemmer's seduction but on HER terms. on the other day she asks him to fulfill her deviant sexual fantasies - which is sadomasochistic practises that she desires so much. she tells him she want to be tied up, slapped around and beaten, sexually humiliated -- the list goes on and on. she wants to be his love-slaves, which sickens him as well, no doubt. after he rejets her initially, she crawls into bed with her mother and jumps on top of her, trying to make out with her and who knows what else. *sicko* at first she is successful at dominating walter, but the tables are turned as she becomes dependent on him. she thinks she is in control, but it becomes very apparent to her that she isn't. we see how the once confident erika is overcomed by desperation. she visits him at an ice rink and messes around with him again, orally, and then vomits all over the floor. walter naturally begins to lose patience - and interest - in her sick little games. the final climax leaves erika a wounded, broken woman. walter gives her what she wants. he beats her until her face is bloody and then proceeds to rape her. and turns out it's not really what she wants after all.
piano teacher is based on a controversial austrian novel. it's extreme and provocative. it deals with taboo issues of secret sexual desire and mental breakdown. it is not an easy film to watch and enjoy - viewer looking for a pleasant and agreeable entertainment are urged to search elsewhere. it's not that kind of comfortable movie - it's a feel bad movie, nor a film with a message that could take us into an enlightened state. it's difficult to digest and raises plenty of questions. its disturbing images might stay with you long after the closing credits, it even leaves a sour aftertaste for days. when the movie was shown at the cannes film festival it provoked a storm of controversy, with many juries walking out before the film had finished. nevertheless the film went on to win honours for its brilliant actrees and actor. it had been called everything from brilliant to disgusting and if u are brave enough to sit through the torturous 2 hours and 10 minutes, u too should have your very own cannes film festival award! it is a character study movie. but after getting to know her character, u realize that u really don't want to know her innermost thoughts. as the film progresses, it becomes clear that this woman's troubles go way deeper than we may anticipate. how screwed up, complicated and dangerous a human being can get after 40 years on this planet. how the smart woman turns out to be a wild sex beast and at the end of the day, she really just wants to be tied up and humiliated. she is so lonely and isolated. every frame of this movie is scraming it: she is about to explode. she cannot adhere to a healthy loving relationship. u can feel her frustation. maybe we should put ourselves in her shoes: try to imagine sharing the same bed with your mother for 20 years, u will probably end up just as freaky as erika. the writer shows us a dark side of life - of human nature. if you can't face it, just don't see it. cinema today needs more challenging film like this. anyone who has an appreciation for european cinema, especially fans of french or art-house cinema (like me), this is definitely your cup of tea! *about the choice of schubert's music* schubert's music is one of the saddest in the history of music. it's the music of the loneliest pilgrim. contrary to beethoven's music - which is so clear & straight forward, the change of moods in schubert's music is so sudden that it is often difficult to follow (not merely go from loud to soft but from a scream to a whisper - a level of intensity achieved by the 'madness' of schubert)... so are the turns & twists in this story. a haunting & disturbing finale: erika stabbing herself in the shoulder and walking out of the concert hall's lobby. a little heavy handed ending that gives the film the sad conclusion. one important lesson to learn: think twice before u go after a forty year old woman who shares the same bed with her mother. stelly @ 7:54 AM |
