Here are the movies I was able to watch in March:
Ikiru (1952): Ikiru, which means “to live”, is a Kurosawa masterpiece about a man who learns to live in the face of soulless bureaucracy, civil politics, officious functionality (or rather, dysfunctionality). The movie begins with the information that a senior civil worker - Public Works Section Chief Mr Watanabe - is about to discover the stomach cancer that will kill him. We witness him at his desk, slowly, methodically stamping paperwork with his seal, changing nothing, accomplishing nothing, keeping his position secure by allowing for no alteration. (One of his younger workers has nicknamed him The Mummy.) Meanwhile, a group of mothers demand a park to be built and the removal of open sewage in their neighbourhood. They are promptly given the runaround through all of the city works departments, in a kafkaesque labyrinth nightmare of public irresponsibility. It is the same theme we see explored decades later in the Tojo movie Shin Gojira, in which Japanese politics and bureaucracy prevent actual, essential decisions and actions from being made. The focus in this movie, however, is less on a giant rubber monster bent on destroying Tokyo, and more on an elderly man who comes to experience life for the first time in a long time. At his funeral, which is interspersed with scenes of Watanabe pressuring the local city government officials to get the impossible park built, politicians argue over who should really get the credit for the accomplishment. It is only the group of mothers from the beginning, for whom Mr Watanabe expended his last energy, who come in and grieve his death, shaming his workmates and family. None of them can understand the sudden change that came over Watanabe - some attribute it to a love affair (he does spend time with a young woman who is full of life, but it is not a romance). The change occurs after Watanabe discovers he will die, to which the writer who takes him out for a night of debauchery proclaims: “How tragic that man can never realise how beautiful life is until he is face to face with death.” But the change is truly crystallised when Watanabe decides to spend himself on behalf of others, not to serve the bureaucratic system, but to serve instead the women and their families who were suffering. Eventually some of the civil servants at the funeral discern that Watanabe changed and lived because he knew he was going to die, and they proclaim that they would do the same thing. But one of them says: “But any of us could die at any moment.” So what is stopping them from living, and from living for others? This is a vital and beautiful message for our day and age.
Memory: The Origins of Alien (2019): On the 40th anniversary of the release of the iconic space horror, this documentary looks back at its creation. It follows the inspiration of the writer, Dan O’Bannon, the director, Ridley Scott, and the primary artist, H.R. Giger. Alien is presented as an amalgam of myths, drawn from the cultural “cauldron of stories”. So we have the Furies and the Oracle at Delphi; Egyptian mythology; mediaeval demons; Lovecraft’s weird fiction; comic books and 1950s-60s space movies; the horrors of nature such as parasitic wasps; and the guilt of a misogynistic culture all coming together to create a monstrous threat that we all felt deep in our subconscious. They focus quite a bit on the chest-buster scene, naturally, as it was a huge transformation point not just in the movie, but in movies in general. There was a lot of background info that I hadn’t known before, so this was a really fun watch.
Gilbert (2017): Wow. A behind-the-scenes look at one of the strangest, most unique, funniest and in some ways saddest comics ever. Gilbert Gottfried, who died in 2022, was very improbably married with two children. The documentary looks at this strange family life, alongside Gilbert’s birth family, the start of his career, his cheapness, the trouble he got in with certain jokes and tweets, and the universal love and esteem he received from other comedians. Lots of dirty jokes in the movie, as is to be expected.
A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014): My favourite Persian black and white vampire movie of all time. I had seen this one before when it was in theatre, and I remember it being incredibly cool, a little gory, and featuring one entirely bloodless scene that was amongst the scariest I had ever seen. The movie holds up. It is a mix of 1950’s American cool, Spaghetti Western,1980’s pop/skater culture, modern Iranian life, female empowerment, tense love story and Vampire chic, with the perfect soundtrack. The central image is of a youngish girl, wearing a hijab (which is a remarkable replacement for the traditional vampiric cape), out on the streets at night. This is normally a time of incredible vulnerability and danger for women and girls in all cultures, modern Iran included. This vulnerability is highlighted by the juxtaposition of the Girl with an abused, cheated, and depressed prostituted woman. The juxtaposition is so powerful because the Girl is not at all vulnerable; she is the danger in the night, and she stalks mainly those who have been preying upon women, and who believe her to be an easy target. An excellent reversal and subversion of the genre, and well worth the time if you are into that kind of thing. Directed by Ana Lily Amirpour, starring Sheila Vand, and executive produced in part by Elijah Wood (Frodo).
The Northman (2022): The Swedish/Icelandic viking story at the heart of both Hamlet and The Lion King, but with a lot more blood. Directed by Robert Eggers, who has previously helmed excellent, fantastical and dark movies such as The Lighthouse and The Witch, this movie combines real life violence with the raw elements of Norse religion - seers, Norns, Valkyries, the World Tree, and Valhalla. It is the well-versed but still fresh-seeming story of a young boy whose father, the king, is killed by the king’s half-brother. The new king takes his brother’s wife for his Queen, and tries to kill the boy, who escapes. The boy’s life is now bent upon revenge, and he gains an awful lot of muscle and fighting ferocity in order to accomplish it several years later. Egger’s best talent may be creating an atmosphere that melds myth, confusion and realistic humanity. To the end, Bjork plays a seer.
Triangle of Sadness (2022): A crazy movie. Begins with a scathing take down of the male modelling industry, moves into an awkward set of conversations about money and gender roles, then changes the setting to a luxury yacht where horrible people play out class system dynamics until everyone starts vomiting. We then end up on what seems to be an abandoned island with part of the shipwrecked yacht passengers, and where the class dynamics are overturned by one of the unseen crew who actually knows how to do stuff to survive. But then class and power dynamics are subverted one final time. It is a trip, a little disjointed, but definitely with something to say. Warning - an awful lot of vomit.
RRR (2022): I’m not completely sure what I just watched. I know it was my first Telugu-language movie (dubbed into Hindi and with English subtitles). I know it was over three hours long, and included at least two huge, long dance scenes and several very long and massive fight sequences. I also know it was an over the top, gloriously absurd action movie based (very loosely) upon real-life revolutionaries against British Imperial rule in India. It also seemed to be a pretty blatant piece of Hindu-nationalist propaganda, much of which I would have missed had I not been watching with an Indian friend who was able to pick up on the worrying elements with ease. The English characters and dialogue were, frankly, ridiculous and utterly one dimensional, but this perhaps makes up for decades of English writers creating frankly ridiculous and one dimensional Indian characters. It is certainly watchable and entertaining, but you should go in with your eyes open, aware that it’s extremely violent, and ends with as nationalistic a song as you could imagine.
Kubrick by Kubrick (2020): Based upon an extremely rare taped interview of the notoriously reclusive master-director, Stanley Kubrick. Kubrick speaks about his films, his process, his actors, his themes, and art in general, and his words are accompanied by scenes from his oeuvre of movies. Having seen most of Kubrick’s films, this was a fascinating glimpse into the mind of the perfectionistic auteur.
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