Talk to Her

Director: Pedro Almodovar
Year: 2002



















I fail to understand why so many people don't like Almodovar's cinema. Probably its the way he deals rather casually with topics like homosexuality, promiscuity, & sex in general and even murder, without being the judgmental in the least; combined with the way he dramatizes everyday situations. It is often hard to accept a film like Bad Education or even Volver, but Talk to Her is one movie that will appeal to even those who do not quite identify with his genre of movie making.
Talk to Her is a love story, & a tale of friendship of two men brought together at a hospital, caring for their lovers who are both in a deep coma. Its also a story of hope & of sacrifice. It moves far from the realms of morality & political correctness & explores love that transcends all boundaries, even reason and reality.
If you watch this movie being judgmental or expecting a statement or a message, you will be left with a bitter taste in your mouth, but just going with the flow will unravel to you the real essence of the movie. It wasn't made to decide what is right & what is wrong, neither to put the viewer in a moral dilemma, but just to delve into human feelings, "go with the heart" as they call it.
The movie boasts some excellent acting, especially Dario Grandinetti as Marco & the beautiful Leonor Walting as Alicia, though she's in a coma through most of the film.
The riot of colours is an usual treat like in most of Almodovar's movies, but subdued in scenes with Marco & Alicia, probably to bring out the contrast between the lives of the two women & hence their fates. The music is also well chosen, but that is classic Almodovar.
Talk to Her is one of Almodovar's best, & a movie that one will remember fondly a long time after watching it.

Herbert

Director- Suman Mukherjee
Year- 2005













They hardly make movies in bangla like this these days. I watched this movie (on DVD) after watching a series of ridiculous no-brainers, Bong Connection, Kailashe Kelenkari (more a jewelery ad than a movie), Aamra... all touted to be "different", but none hit the mark. But once in a while comes a movie like Herbert, which deserves far more appreciation that it actually got from the audience.
First time director Suman Mukherjee does a brilliant job of this adaptation of Nabarun Bhattacharya's novel. The story unfold though the life of Herbert Sarkar, the orphan son of parents who linger through a ghostly presence throughout the movie, outside his window, observing their child as he lives, his father making a movie of this life of obscurity. The screenplay often ventures into surreal & neo-realistic imagery, though most of the times it is very real & palpable.
Herbert is rather comic, even in his everyday tragedy of a life, almost Quixotic. He loses his parents, falls in love, breaks his heart, witnesses a friends' suicide, gets involved with the Naxal revolution, loses his nephew who was also probably the only friend & "comrade" he ever had, turns first to the occult then swindling people, & finally on the verge of fame & fortune, he is shamed & dies alone, slashing his wrists, leaving just a suicide note that is only the confused thoughts of a insane person to those left behind. Only posthumously does he manage to cause an" explosion" raising the question "Aren't all madmen political dissidents?"
Subhashish Mukherjee, a wonderful theater actor, not often seen on the big screen, brings Herbert Sarkar to life. The other actors also do justice to their roles. The music of the film needs special mention, the background score adds to the drama of the film.
Herbert is no a movie for everyone though, it needs an open mind & acceptance of nuances into eccentricity to fully appreciate it. For anyone who can however, it is a rich, fulfilling experience.

Apocalypse Now

Director: Francis Ford Coppola
Year: 1979



















Francis Ford Coppola's masterpiece & one of my all time favourites. This adaptation of Heart of Darkness is a visual treat from the opening shots of the helicopters bombing the quiet forests of Vietnam set to the tune of The Doors' The End to the climax with Willard executing Col. Kurtz, this film keeps the audience in a daze. This is one of those movies which are never appreciated fully with one viewing. It requires several, to understand & appreciate each little aspect of it, the music, the plot, the acting, the cinematography... it's sheer genius.
Martin Sheen plays arguably the best role in his acting career as Captain Willard, bored, disillusioned & yet hungry for the adrenaline rush of a mission entrusted to him, to find & assassinate the enigmatic Col.Kurtz who has set himself up as a God-like figure among the local tribes in Cambodia & formed his own army. Col. Kurtz is of course played by the larger than life Marlon Brando.
What follows is a series of events, blurring the lines between reality & imagination, good & evil building up to the inevitable climax, but by that time the movie & the viewer has already crossed the line into a kind of madness & is left almost in a daze.
The use of music in this film is spectacular. The classic opening sequence set to The End, the helicopter attacks set to March of the Valkyries, and the assassination scene, all make astounding use of the music, it almost becoming a part of the scene.
Apocalypse Now is in one word, beautiful, even though it is disturbing. It's best to watch the 2001 Director's Cut, available on DVD which has been remastered & brings out the delicate beauty of this movie, & contains several scenes which were originally deleted. A must watch for every self respecting movie viewer.

Paths of Glory

Director: Stanley Kubrick
Year: 1957



















Like Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket, Paths of Glory too is understated. There is hardly anything that affects the viewer or catches attention in the first 45 minutes or so of the film, except for the scene where the general goes on asking the soldiers if they are ready to kill Germans & there is this one soldier, shell shocked, with an almost happy expression on his face, foreseeing his death in the battlefield.
Paths of Glory does not directly give any anti-war messages, there are no long speeches about it, no sentimental tear-jerking scenes, but Kubrick manages to make his point clearly.
His one voice of conscience is the Colonel Dax, who ultimately goes about business of war as usual, failing to protect his men from both the enemy in the battlefield & the enemy within. But the movie does manage to affect viewers in a subtle but powerful manner.
Scenes of war are neither glorified nor are they shot in a way as to induce horror. They are rather matter-of -fact & normal. What stand out though are the court martial scenes, with the prosecutor & judges bearing an almost diabolic quality, making the helplessness of the prisoners & Dax more apparent.
The scenes that build up to the firing squad executions are somehow more dramatic than the execution itself. And by underplaying gruesome elements like the shooting of the wounded prisoner, almost dead from his injury... who is "pinched on the cheek a couple of times" to wake him up before he faces the firing squad, Kubrick manages to horrify his viewers in a delicate & lasting way.
Overall, Paths of Glory is one of the most powerful anti war statements on celluloid, ever, along with Full Metal Jacket, & surely one of Kubrick's best.