| December 31st, 2006 by Eric K (Permalink) Add Comments |
El Laberinto del Fauno (Pan’s Labyrinth): What can be said about Pan’s Labyrinth that hasn’t been said by a glut of exuberant pundits the world over? That it is a one-dimensional, sugar-coated abomination of popcorn cinema with the imagination of a Bank of Scotland TV commercial. But that would be a lie. United reviewers globally in such a flatulent orgy of praise that almost threatened to smother any further appreciation of this masterpiece in critical establishment goo. Fortunately the heart-rupturing beauty of del Torro’s imaginative zenith ascends even the gushing superlatives of this short assessment and will no doubt outlast all the other superlatives heaped on it in 2006 to become a true classic of our time. An allegorical fairytale about an old war with a lot to teach us about a new one.
V for Vendetta: Fated from its conception to attract a vitriol of disgust from the fanboys, the filmic incarnation of Alan Moore’s finest character nevertheless provides as good a translation from sequential art to moving picture as any of us has a right to expect in these blockbuster/block-brained days. Lost an almost unforgivable depth in compression into 132 minutes; almost because the climactic Fawkesian explosion of London and the theatrically-masked V are iconic creations. At least it wasn’t League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.
The Prestige: The best thing about the Prestige is that it allows journalists like me to make pretentious, overblown interpretations about its post-modern assessment of cinema as cultural experience. The magic trick consists, we are told, of three acts: The Pledge: the magician shows us something ordinary (but of course, it isn’t); the Turn: the magician makes his ordinary thing do something extraordinary; and the Prestige: the “twists and turns” where you see something you’ve never seen before. The Prestige didn’t quite achieve this but it did accomplish the conjurer’s trickiest of tricks - successful distraction and entertainment satisfaction.
The Fountain: A great work of art that would have been a great work of film if only it could have constructed its metaphysical ruminations into the smallest semblance of a plot. A piece of cinema with the ability to change your perspective of the world on leaving the filmhouse and lend the next few days of your life a Bosch-esque, Gaia-dwarfing ecstasy. Drawn from a colour palette to rival a Florence graduate, Aronofsky has reminded us of the power of the camera in a world dominated by the stolid animatronics of pixelated penguins. I read recently about a species of moth that drinks the tears from the eyes of sleeping birds. I can think of no better analogy for the sentiment of this film than that, whatever sense that may or may not make.
Renaissance/A Scanner Darkly: Lumped together to celebrate a new seam of innovation running through the visual effects departments of modern cinema. Both suffered from leaden, unoriginal screenplay, but Scanner was as hallucinogenic as any of the substances its source material was written on and Renaissance is Sin City taken to its logical extreme. An illuminating example of the creative catalyst induced by strict artistic limits; seven years in the making, and you believe it.
Desu Noto: What’s great about manga is that it takes those moments in the playground when someone asked you “If you could have one wish what would it be” and just goes ahead and writes a comic about it no matter how dumb and unrealistic that idea is. So Death Note is based on the classic manga about a kid who finds a book enabling him to assassinate at will anyone he chooses. Inevitably, power goes to his head and the police detective’s son goes on a noble quest to purge the world of all its grubby criminals. Ryuuk, the Donnie Darko’s Frank-like demon that schoolkid Yagami Light communicates with is the real reason to see this film: a twisted, mischievous sprite that plays with our morals as disturbingly as any of the voices in our own heads (what’s that Jake? You want me to go stab Ben Elton in the face? Well, okay).
Clerks II: Truly unfathomable how this has missed all the end-of-year film lists I’ve seen. In a year when Borat’s facile attacks on middle America are seen as the pinnacle of noughties comedy it’s reassuring to see that Kevin Smith’s comic sense is not only as sharp as ever but has developed into that of an incisive cultural critic as zeitgeist-defining as his original Clerks. The script is as tight and relentlessly hilarious as is legally permissible without posing a serious threat to the cohesion of sides everywhere. On top of the satiric bellyaches, the film is also genuinely moving in a way that has previously alluded Smith’s sardonic send-up of the slacker generation, without descending too much into Hollywood schmaltz (a feat largely accomplished by conducting the fairytale romance scene amid a donkey bestiality cabaret performance).
Children of Men: Any film that gets me to care about the fate of some ugly, wrinkled little baby deserves all the praise it gets.
Volver: My token ‘arty foreign’ film, Volver also adds much needed sensitivity and humanity to my list. A ghost story with poignantly non-supernatural things to say about family, loss and love. This is also Penelope Cruz’s most affecting and convincing performance since she worked with Almodovar on All About My Mother.
Gwoemul (The Host): The best sci-fi is sci-fi that makes absolutely no sense scientifically and doesn’t care because it’s concentrating so hard on running from the scary monster thingy. After a negligent crematorium-owner dumps vat-loads of formaldehyde into a Tokyo lake, a giant man-eating lizard evolves into a walking virus plaguing the metropolis. Of course, the best sci-fi is also a revealing observation of contemporary society and ‘The Host’ asserts its political import as a scathing commentary on post-SAARS/bird flu hysteria.
Purchase or search for related items:
