I haven’t read any of Stieg Larsson’ Millenium books. That’s not likely to change, but David Fincher is directing this surefire trilogy. After falling in love with nearly every one of Fincher’s films, I can’t help but get excited for anything he does. He could craft a film about monkeys eating their own shit and I’d be pissing my pants with anticipation. In Fincher’s hands, the film’s lead Rooney Mara is sure to become one of Hollywood’s must watch actresses. Oh… Did I mention that Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross are doing the score? That's music to my ears.
A new film year is in motion and I figured I'd put a finger on the films that have caught my eye...Obviously aside from the first three months...
21. Alps
A visual taste of Dogtooth.
Director Yorgos Lanthimos made a splash last year with his Academy Award nominated film Dogtooth. Featuring bizarre family mechanics and unflinching use of taboos, Dogtooth is the type of film that could alienate reserved film fans. Expect more of the same for Lanthimos’ next film Alps. Although details are scant, it’s said Alps tells the tale of people who agree to “stand in for the lost loved ones of others, replicating their behavior and gestures, ostensibly to help with the grieving.” I can’t wait to go in the deep end with this one and embrace the macabre.
I think that most of the things we possess in life, or even like for that matter, are representative of who we are as a person, or who we want to be. What we eat, how we dress, how we act, and what we like are the building blocks for our social images. I noticed over the years the numerous facets of my social schema, but there was always one that kind of annoyed me when it comes to films. Said issue was the notion that I instantaneously fall in love with quirky and dramatic independent films. What does this say about me? Well, depending on which paradigm we take, it could mean an assortment of things. Now, I'm not entirely sure how this perception of an "indie maven" gained any credence, but I often felt this assertion gravely mismatched my own perception of the films I liked and who I was. Out of curiosity, and to see how quirky I like things, I started to strike up a list of my favorite films of all time. It took me a while to honestly form a list of 50 films that I could watch endlessly, and because of this, my own judgement of myself was somewhat in flux. Yet, with numerous additions and subtractions, I have finally assembled a list of films that I can say are truly representative of me. Here is my list:
"Film as dream, film as music. No art passes our conscience in the way film does, and goes directly to our feelings, deep down into the dark rooms of our souls."
- Ingrid Bergman
Throughout my life I have started reading numerous books, only to put them down days later without even getting halfway through. This is mostly due to the fact that books are a time investment that I'm not really committed to make. Whether it's 300 or 1,000 pages, a book always seems tedious to me. Of course, I certainly see the benefits for reading as a means for entertainment and the expression of one's own imagination. Yet, for as open ended reading can be, it's a long and drawn out medium for me. Sometimes with books it takes pages to accurately depict a tone, establish a character or to even adequately set up a given situation. In the case of film, it's the opposite as they can do all of the above within one scene as they can attack the viewer with a plethora of tools ranging from score, acting, mise-en-scene, and the dialogue (text). If anything, I'd say film does something that reading a book can't do, it attacks the senses.
Salvatore Cascio as Toto in "Cinema Paradiso"
Without a doubt, one can immerse themselves in a book, but with a film, you can truly feel it, and this isn't in the sense of 3-D. With a mixture of special effects and sound, you can be found within a hurricane or a world other than our own. Through a handheld camera and gritty acting we can be placed in a place as real, and as authentic as our own backyard, or our own city. No matter how it's done, film can seemingly drop a viewer into any life, any world, and any situation, and convince you that you're there as an active voyeur experiencing what the characters are enduring. You can feel the sweat dripping down the back of a soldier in a desolate land; you can feel the blast of a rocket ship as it moves at the speed of light. It's a magical perception that I can relate back to the film "Cinema Paradiso" which is more or less a love letter to the art of film. The film follows the life of Toto, a young Italian boy who becomes infatuated with movies via a theater that plays edited Hollywood and Italian films in his small town. Toto seemingly loves every aspect of film, especially the hypnotizing effect films can have on a viewer, but more specifically he loves the way film makes him feel. It can make him laugh, cry, fearful, etc. The most pertinent thing is it makes him grasp a range of emotions that, for lack of a better phrase, enriches his life.
Needless to say, I share a similar sentiment with Toto. I love films simply because they allow me to experience emotions, ideas, people, and cultures in various ways as I sit in the confines of a darkened theater. Yet, where Toto fell in love with film as a child, I really didn't become enamored with film until my sophomore year in high school. Hell, I can even whittle it down to one film that ignited my interest and it was Paul Thomas Anderson's "Punch Drunk Love".
It was with this film that, for the first time in my life, I took in all of the ingredients that make up a film (score, cinematography, etc.) and realized the potential and profound effect they can have when wrapped into one cohesive bundle. This effect was further exacerbated by films like "Amelie", "Lost in Translation", and "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind", as they showed me the infinite bounds a film can possess.
Certainly, I liked movies prior to that point, but not to the extent I do now. Films were merely a distraction then, now they're a form of entertainment as well as an extension of life and a hymn to the very breaths we take. Now I actively seek out films from the past, from Fellini to Hitchcock, as well as those due in the near future from film's latest auteurs. This notion is evident of how I no longer view my interest in film to be just a hobby. Initially I did, but now it's a passion that pumps blood through my veins just as much as my heart. And it is this passion that I hope bleeds through each one of my film reviews and any other film musings I may post. For film is my religion and the likes of Tarantino, Truffaut, and P.T. Anderson deliver sermons to me daily. And much like the case of Toto, the Cinema will be an integral part of my life until I can no longer breathe. But, until then, it will be one of the biggest proponents for breathing another second longer.
