Days Of Heaven

A phenomenal film, partly for its charming cast and tragic story, but mostly for the absolutely stunning visuals. It's an experience, worth embarking on twice, and it's also one damn pretty picture.

Terrence Malick is possibly the most interesting filmmaker working today. His first picture was Badlands in 1973, which garnered him critical acclaim in America and internationally. It took him five more years - until 1978 - to finish his second film, Days Of Heaven. After that, he moved to France, and stopped making films for twenty years. In 1998 he came out with The Thin Red Line, again to wide acclaim. Since then he has made The New World (2005), The Tree Of Life (2011), and To The Wonder (as yet unreleased).

What's fascinating about him is that despite garnering such critical and commericial success - and being known even by artsy European directors as a great director - there's reletively little known about him. He doesn't seem to do public interviews, or offer comment on puzzling aspects of his films. He just makes them, and sets them loose upon the world.

Nuremberg

A generally well-produced TV-Miniseries, with a particularly shocking second act. It doesn't deeply challenge issues, but informs, historically and emotionally.

The Nuremberg trials were a series of prosecutions run jointly by Allied nations in the wake of World War 2, to sentence the captured Nazi leaders for war crimes carried out under their command. Nuremberg was produced in 2000, starring Alec Baldwin as cheif prosecutor Robert Jackson, and Brian Cox as Hermann Göring - the former second in command of Nazi Germany, who establishes himself as a very Hitler-esque figure, with his radical ideas backed by incredible charisma.

The film portrays Jackson as idealistic, and Göring as conniving. Jackson is determined that the Nazis be given a fair trial; that justice be served. Göring is determined to exploit the court system to escape his fate. The two serve as tent poles for the two sides of the case, but there are a plethora of other characters and subplots revolving around them.

Touching The Void

Based on a true story, Touching The Void delivers an extraordinary tale of human survival, with breathtaking re-enactment that packs emotional punch.

In 1985, Joe Simpson and Simon Yates attempted to climb the west face of the Siula Grande - a 6.3km ascent that had never yet been completed. The pair climbed alpine style; this meant no camps halfway up, and no more equipment than the two of them could carry. Joe admits, in hindsight, they were a bit stupid.

Touching the void is a 2003 documentary based on the book by Joe Simpson, detailing their climb, and almost fatal descent. The film uses talking heads (that is, interviews with the climbers themselves), along with performed re-enactments filmed on location at the slope, to convey their struggle to survive, and the brutal decisions each had to make.

The Bourne Legacy

Awkwardly woven into the plot of the previous trilogy, The Bourne Legacy does as it's supposed to: it cashes in on past successes, and delivers a good enough film to sell tickets.

Sometimes sequels can be great things. They can develop a character, expand a world, explore new ideas, deliver new thrills, and make a healthy profit for the movie industry - all built upon the foundation of an earlier film. The Bourne franchise has had its fair share of this; The Bourne Identity was a well paced, well executed spy thriller that broke a dry spell of good spy thrillers (just have a look at the Bond movies coming out then). The Bourne Supremacy took the idea further - introduced new well-integrated characters, better explored Jason Bourne's motivations, and dialled up the action to boot. The Bourne Ultimatum improved on everything in Supremacy, and tied things up nicely with a happy - and importantly, non-violent ending.

The Bourne Legacy takes that fantastic foundation, chucks it in the dumpster, and goes on to tell its own mediocre story that taints the beauty of the first three films.

Batman & Jesus

This is an assignment I submitted for University. The task was to write a review of 800 words, for a film currently in theatrical release.

Because I had already done over and above this for Batman, and wasn't really interested in trying to condense all those thoughts, I decided to use 800 words to layout (in brief) the parallel between Batman and Jesus.

Once again, spoilers follow...

The Dark Knight Rises

       An Analysis of Metaphor

If you make yourself more than just a man, if you devote yourself to an ideal, and if they can't stop you, then you become something else entirely… A legend, Mr. Wayne

-Ra’s Al Gul, Batman Begins

The Dark Knight Rises is the final instalment in Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy. The films track the journey of Bruce Wayne, an orphaned billionaire who takes on the alter ego Batman in order to fight crime, and save the city of Gotham from destruction. In this tale, Nolan creates a parallel in Batman to that of Jesus Christ. The most obvious points of reference for this metaphor are in the death and resurrection of Jesus in the Christian tradition, as compared with Batmans’ in the final film – each as a sacrifice on behalf of the people.  Jesus is also invoked on a deeper level by the construction of Bruce Wayne’s character, and the way the trilogy deals with themes like, justice, compassion, hope and discipleship.

Platoon

Platoon is a classic war film that deals with the attitudes and actions of US soldiers in Vietnam. An intense experience, and essential viewing for war film fans.

First a quick note: having seen two war films in one day, I have to say that I'm not a huge fan of them. I do respect their craftsmanship and some of the messages they convey, but for a war film to be serious it almost inevitably loses a lot of joy. There are fun moments, in both Waltz With Bashir and Platoon, but they are dwarfed by the serious nature of their subject matter. I haven't seen a whole lot of them, for this reason, but there's no doubt in my mind that while Platoon is a great film, I'd sooner revisit the more sensationalist Where Eagles Dare because it's so much more fun.


Oliver Stone's Platoon follows a group of soldiers on the front-lines of the Vietnam War. The film, deservedly I think, won a slew of awards in 1986. It is a brutal vision of war (a response, Stone says, to the more jingoistic representations of Vietnam that came before), in which good and evil are far from cut and dry.

Waltz With Bashir

The film artfully presents one of the more recent atrocities of war with a compelling facade of a mystery being unearthed. An effective evocation of the madness that is war.

Waltz With Bashir is a documentary presented in an animated medium. This animation is not for kids.It deals with the events surrounding the Sabra and Shatila massacre during the 1982 Lebanon War. The dialogue is partially lifted from real interviews conducted by director Ari Folman, as well as voiceovers of himself, explaining his experience to the audience. The dialogue is assembled in such a way that the events of the massacre unfold like the clues to a mystery. The mystery is contained in the filmmakers mind; all he remembers of that fateful day is a vision of three soldiers rising out of the water, watching as eerie orange flares illuminate the sky.