Movie reviews

SERCE, SERDUSZKO

Watchable. Not your typical Jan Jakub Kolski film. We're leaving the fairy-tale countryside universe. The main protagonists are a punk and a little girl ballet dancer and it's a film of the road. There's a fantastic character of a priest rapping in religious fervour. The film fortunately retains much of Kolski's characteristic style.

The screening I went to was followed by a meeting with Borys Szyc who only truly proved his acting skills mocking movie directors. No film has given him the chance to show off the way he did then. He was brilliant.


LA ISLA MINIMA (MARSHLAND)

Watchable. Protracted and ambiguous to the point where I barely understood the film. Shot imitating the 1980s in a bad way (the picture looked old technically). There's a mystery which never gets fully explained.


QUE HORAS ELA VOLTA? (THE SECOND MOTHER)

Watchable. A social drama, well acted and involving but with an ending which offers neither a hope nor an explanation of the girl's motives.


IM LABYRINTH DES SCHWEIGENS (LABYRINTH OF LIES)

Recommended. Another great German film dealing with the country's Nazi past. Very much a courtroom drama but also subtly revealing both the concentration camps horror and the scale of ignorance in the happy-go-lucky post-war society.


FASANDRAEBERNE (THE PHEASANT KILLERS)

Watchable. A typical Scandinavian (even if geographically Danish) crime story: brutal, with the culprits being rich and being hunters fond of torturing humans as well. While it's all executed perfectly, the plot is standard in this manner.


SONG OF THE SEA

Watchable. Slow and stylish. Not to every taste. Disney it isn't. It's based on the touching Nordic or Celtic tale of a seal living as a woman and hence longing for the see.


AFRYKAMERA 2015

VIRUNGA

Recommended. A very well shot (especially the initial part in which the camera follows running shooters), planned and eye-opening documentary about national park rangers defending the world's only mountain gorillas habitat not only against poachers but even more so against a British oil company which is doing its utmost to drill in a section of the park. The film's so good it only makes me wonder what "Citizenfour" must be like as "Virunga" lost the Oscar race to the film about Edward Snowden.



THE BOY NEXT DOOR

Watchable. For a bigger part pleasing to watch - J-Lo plus a hot guy twice younger than her in steamy situations plus the tension in between. Ruined by a standard Hollywood ending in which the hot guy suddenly turns out to be a psychopatic killer and the whole thing ends in flames. Much over the top. "The Guest" it isn't.


MARY KOM

Walked out but would have stayed if I hadn't had a more promising cinema offer for the evening. Slow and ramshackle with mediocre music and even Priyanka Chopra looks so masculine she's hardly appealing to the eye. Still, my guess is it may be worth seeing for motivational purposes as it tells the story of a humble background female boxing champion who has everything going against her. All she's got is her inner strength and it suffices to succeed.


THE RIOT CLUB
Watchable. A very British film dealing with the class system. An Oxford University-based secret society consisting of upper class guys is capable of every atrocity committed out of the need to fill superior to lower classes while being sure of excellent connections to the legal and political circles letting them act in total impunity. Nothing new but very well acted by a few good-looking guys. New acting prodigies in the making.


PK

Watchable. Silly and intelligent at the same time. A warm comedy about an idiot alien deals with the notion of God/gods and the issue of charlatans. It's not very funny though. Nor is it high-tech.


YEH JAWAANI HAI DEEWANI

Watchable. A simple love story where the travel-hungry protagonist got me intrigued. It's about the clash of domestic and nomadic lifestyles. But it's mediocre in all possible ways.


THE SECOND BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL

Watchable. Great, if sparse, music throughout, with a Bollywood-style dance at the end. The dialogues should be amusing but somehow aren't. The pace is a bit too slow and the stories too far-fetched. A nice mix of English accents.


WOMAN IN GOLD

Recommended. First you just notice the great actors at their best. Then it becomes an involving courtroom drama. Finally, while mixed with the court case, a moving story of coming to terms with exceptionally traumatic past. And it's based on true stories surrounding a famous painting by Klimt.

Have you seen the hologram advertising the new Terminator in cinemas? It changes top to bottom revealing the machine and Schwarzie interchangeably. I love it!


JEWISH MOTIFS INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

RADICAL EVIL

Recommended. The film dissects, through the Einsatzgruppen quotes, psychological experiment cases and expert opinions, how ordinary people in groups can become ruthless murderers.

LE PROCES DE VIVIANE AMSALEM (GETT: THE TRAIL OF VIVIANE AMSALEM)

Recommended. Both a courtroom drama gripping from the first scene and a psychological film, the latter even more, about a difficult unrequitted love.


NIGHT FILM MARATHON - THE NIGHT OF AVENGERS

I skipped "Avengers 3D" as I had seen it before and had found it just watchable then. So I saw

CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER
AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON

Watchable. Both films have rubbish plots and the hot Chris Evans for a girl viewer to survive the movies. Plot-wise the first "Captain America" movie was much better.


CHILD 44

Watchable. Loosely based on Chikatilo's murders but as unexciting as a serial killer story can possibly get. What ruins the film is: Tom Hardy - it was hard to watch his ugly, fat, boar-like face for 2 hours 17 minutes, Tom Hardy again - his fake Russian accent sounded just weird and, finally, a protracted plot.


PIKU

Watchable. A nice light comedy about... family and constipation issues. Situationally amusing at times but not hilarious. No singing and dancing.


JOURNAL D'UNE FEMME DE CHAMBRE (THE DIARY OF A CHAMBERMAID)

Watchable. Don't expect hot action or eroticism. It's a story of violence and of a psychopathic relationship between masters and servants - psychopathic from both sides. It's just sick.


NIGHT FILM MARATHON - THE MARATHON OF MAD MAX

MAD MAX
MAD MAX 2
Watchable. Both 80s films get you interested from scene one and maintain a steady pace. Silly and full of violence for the sake of violence yet quite involving (in the action and its developments, not the twisted psychology of the characters). A nice 80s-style set of weirdos.

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD

Watchable. Tom Hardy's revolting face doesn't hinder much here. His deep, low voice is a perfect match for the burnt-out, cynical rebel. The female beautiful breeders characters and zombie-like bald swarms of workers are very naff. It's all too fantastical. The weakest of the three films of the night.


SHE'S FUNNY THAT WAY

Watchable. Again: well-acted but hardly hilarious. Some situation humour makes you laugh out loud at times. Lots of famous actors and one director (Quentin Tarantino) cameo, a ridiculously inept detective as well as amusing connections between the characters make for a good watch.


EDEN
Watchable. The director's name may appear somewhat Scandinavian but don't get mistaken - she's French and it's a typical French film following the hero seemingly all the time which is just plain boring. It's bearable just because of occasionally good music (the best bit is at the very beginning however, feel free to leave afterwards) and club atmosphere.