Matty

In an effort to track down the truth about the life of the lesbian nun Benedetta Carlini, Verhoeven employs the formula of historical biography to analyse the Church’s model of power, in which faith is only one of the means of survival and maintaining dominance. Until the end, the film does not give a clear answer as to whether the protagonist really communicates with saints and possesses mystical abilities, or whether she is merely capable of exploiting the fears of others. Due to the impossibility of a rational explanation of some of the events depicted in the film, both interpretations remain possible. As in Total Recall , there is not a clearly defined line between reality and illusions or dreams. In any case, the Dutch filmmaker approaches belief in the supernatural with cynical humour and a sense of the grotesque, both of which are apparent in the arrangement of the mise-en-scene, working with the aesthetics of contradiction and ambiguity, and in the composition of the shots. As a complex, ambivalent female character, Benedetta alternately elicits sympathy and repulsion. Though she promises her followers protection from the plague that is decimating the Italian population, she mainly pursues her own gratification. Salvation and redemption are only illusions. Unlike the unquestioningly listening, frightened and thus easily manipulated crowd, we see that it is not Jesus but rather the closed city gates that provide protection against the disease. No divine forces, just a lockdown. Besides her intelligence and charisma, what makes her a credible religious figure are the stigmata that she inflicts on herself with a shard of glass. Consequently, she can determine what God’s will is and cheerfully abuse the fact that each of the nuns interprets the language of God in her own way. For Verhoeven, religion is not a matter of inner conviction, but rather a culturally, geographically and historically defined phenomenon that serves momentary biological needs and the interests of power. Anything can be justified by God. A similar approach to the clergy is taken by other representatives of the Church, whose hypocrisy Benedetta points out through her own deeds as she retreats into the background in the second half of the film. After the arrival of the nuncio, she changes from a character who abused power in an ethically dubious way to a representative of the resistance against the system, using her own body and sexuality for emancipation. The struggle for dominance, which sets the dynamics of the narrative, is thus unpredictable and suspenseful until the final minutes of the film. Verhoeven typically is not judgmental, nor does he cheer for any side. With a sociological interest, he only studies from afar how easily – regardless of the period – faith can be transformed into an instrument of control and how much a person’s value and power depend on the given historical situation. 85%

In its uncut version, Peter Watkins’s magnum opus lasts almost six hours, but I was never bored for even a minute. The English director reconstructs the brief, brutally suppressed Paris Commune government in the form of a sequence of television and radio reports directly from the scene (in the film Culloden, he similarly demonstrated what the Jacobite uprising might have looked like if television cameras had existed at that time). He proceeds on the basis of thoroughly researched historical sources, from which he also quotes extensively in the intertitles. This would have been a unique work thanks only to the (non-)actors committed to their roles (for example, members of the bourgeoisie are played by conservative party voters so that their contempt for the rebels is more authentic) and the long, fragmented shots that capture the chaos of the times while also being highly organised, but Watkins did not remain at the pseudo-documentary level. In the spirit of the Theatre of the Oppressed, the (non-)actors sometimes break the fourth wall and comment on the staged events from the perspective of their own time (1999), or rather reflect on how older and newer media contribute to the formulation of reality and the unequal distribution of power based on class and gender. The film thus also conveys communal ideas by constantly drawing attention to the fact that it is itself the work of a group of like-minded people who are striving for economic and social changes. At the same time, it is far more dynamic and less self-centred than, for example, Godard’s deconstructionist film essays of the 1960s and 1970s. Although the set is minimalist (the entire shoot took place over the course of two weeks in an abandoned factory on the outskirts of Paris), at the end I had the feeling that I had a relatively good grasp of the period and the problems that the Parisian working class was facing at the time, and I also understood why comprehending them is relevant for the present. I imagine that in an ideal world, students would leave every history lesson with the same feelings. 90%

After seeing West Side Story, it occurs to me that this is turning out to be a great year for musicals. Unlike Annette, which exhibits a clash of different poetics, West Side Story is, in its basic outlines, a pure musical melodrama about love that does not distinguish between good and evil; only its lack of an overture and intermission prevent it from being perfect. Spielberg and Kushner did not radically alter the timeless story of the multiple characters, who are prevented by violence, poverty and racism from fulfilling their dreams of building something of value on the ruins in which they live. Rather, they just fleshed out Tony’s past, added one important character (stylishly played by Rita Moreno), made the female characters stronger and more active, changed the order of certain songs, and made the motifs particularly relevant for the present day (racial violence, immigrants vs. white trash, tradition vs. foreign cultural influences). In comparison with the 1961 adaptation, the cast is more diverse (no whites playing Puerto Ricans, plus a lot of deliberately un-subtitled Spanish lines), as is the ensemble of characters (which include a trans boy). The actors, particularly Ariana DeBose as Anita, are fantastic, and the way Spielberg (or rather Kaminski) uses colour to differentiate the characters and bring clarity to the scenes in which several of them appear at once is admirable. Together with the specific lighting, choice of locations and camera movements, the colours also help to define the feuding sub-worlds, whose conflicts (whether physically, when the Jets and Sharks rumble at midnight, or in a parallel cut) are the emotional highlights of the film. And emotion is plentiful in West Side Story. The version from the 1960s, to which I returned a few days ago, is a nice colouring book and I watched it mostly with detached appreciation. Spielberg's treatment, which adroitly dances between the reality of the gritty New York streets and stylisation in the mould of classic Hollywood musicals, absolutely captivated me from the mambo in the school gym (which, like latter-day America, is a great, colourful celebration of life) and I just continued to be carried away, thrilled and moved by it. That’s not even to mention the clear arrangement of the dance scenes, the smooth tempo changes and the brilliant rhythmisation achieved through in-camera editing, which is not surprising for a director who also shoots action and comedy scenes as musical numbers. 90%

If you have an appetite for a strong dose of laughter and millennial angst, this sharp Jewish comedy of errors is an ideal choice. Big family get-togethers are horror shows in of themselves, and even more so when you attend them in a state of uncertainty about your job, your romantic relationships or your sexual identity (and you definitely do not want to talk about any of this with your second cousin). Emma Seligman manages to capture the oppressive awkwardness of such gatherings with well-observed situations, authentic dialogue and excellent use of the claustrophobic space of a single home, where almost the whole story takes place. Her narratively concentrated and brilliantly paced film is equal to the best episodes of Fleabag in terms of the screenplay and acting (the superb Rachel Sennott plays the lead role) and is directed with such assuredness that I found it to be one of the most promising debuts since Greta Gerwig’s somewhat thematically similar Lady Bird. 80%

Mark Cobden, English teacher, year of birth 1964. He killed a man while driving drunk. As punishment, he has been sentenced to spend four years of his life in an underfunded British prison among inmates who don’t have to go far for a punch or a kettle of boiling water and sugar (many of whom would obviously need psychiatric care rather than time behind bars, but there is no capacity for that). From the moment he enters the prison, we follow his efforts to settle into an environment that he is absolutely not cut out for and to come to terms with his guilt, which is never in doubt. In parallel to this, the drama of a guard being blackmailed by one of the prisoners unfolds. There have already been so many stories set in prison that I didn't expect much from Time. However, it is an outstanding psychological study of how prison can fundamentally transform an individual (for better or worse) and, paradoxically, how difficult it can be for both prisoners and guards to behave morally in an environment where one should be getting rehabilitated. The two main characters, convincingly played by Sean Bean and Stephen Graham, repeatedly face difficult tests of character with no ideal solution. Whatever they do, either they or the people they care for will most likely find their lives in danger. Through gritty, suspenseful and moving situations that reportedly reflect the reality of the British prison system (the indirect criticism of which is an undercurrent of the narrative) quite authentically, the show’s creators depict the more general themes of guilt, punishment and forgiveness, and ponder over something that perhaps all of us have considered – what does it mean to live a good life? There are no clichés or – with the exception of one parallel montage with an improbably precise synchronisation of events – no artificially created drama. Rather, there is simply a credibly depicted prison atmosphere and several believable characters with their own demons and ethical dilemmas.

Paris, 13th District is a portrait of a generation whose lives are characterised by the instability of their work, living, relationships and even their identity (fragmented by digital technologies). It is a portrait of a world in which communion happens only during sex. Otherwise, it is characterised by separateness, which is highlighted by a split screen and the frequency of long-distance conversations, and contrast emphasised by the black-and-white cinematography. Like the lives of the characters, who are rootless and constantly on the move, Audiard’s tenement love poem lacks a fixed point around which everything would revolve. Perspectives constantly change and the micro-stories start anew (as in a multi-episode series), the rhythm is irregular and the relationships are fleeting. Something more stable emerges very slowly, as if incidentally. Merely the expectation of whether something will occur in the end is not enough to hold one’s attention for the film’s whole 100-minute runtime. You have to form a connection with the characters, which is relatively easy thanks to the great actors and sensuous cinematography, which takes into account the photogenic nature of the locations more than the social dimension of life in this particular part of Paris. The conclusion, which comes without a deeper examination of many of the themes alluded to in the film (e.g. the weight of cultural traditions and family and personal traumas), is banal and, in retrospect, the whole film gives the same impression, as it begins and ends with clichés relating to the emotional life of millennials without looking beyond them. 70%

It starts like Solaris and ends like Stalker, but in between, you will see things you have never seen from Tarkovsky. Take, for example, the superbly “acted” scene of horses copulating, whose post-coital resonance is permeated with a feeling of emptiness and futility. However, Japón is not an ordinary festival drama filled with existential angst. Yes, the protagonist is clearly seeking spiritual redemption, but it seems that sex is the most effective treatment for his state of mind. Of course, one of the first images that becomes embedded in the viewer’s memory is the ceaselessly moving head of a bird (analogous to the way the protagonist has resigned himself to existence and is only living out his days), but a few minutes later, the protagonist announces with unexpected guilelessness that he has come to the mountains to kill himself, to which another man responds with absolute calm. The entire film is characterised by this blending of naturalism (which is aided by the 16mm camera and masterful work with natural light) and allegory, in which specific people merely represent certain general life principles. The physical aspect intermingles with the metaphysical and it is difficult to look away from it even though the narrative is extremely slow and we don’t really understand who is doing what or why most of the time. Moments that you would expect to be serious are unexpectedly funny (the preparation of the body before sex), sometimes the narrative switches from acted to documentary mode, when the (non-)actors casually look into the camera and give the impression that they are not following a script. As a self-taught filmmaker, Reygadas does not imitate festival dramas with his debut, but rather discovers his own filmmaking voice in a rather intuitive, unaffected way and offers a unique viewing experience. 85%

A single night in one city. People and buildings collapsing. Conflicts arise between classes and generations, personal and political problems become intertwined, comedy and drama blend together. The Divide is a film with a very topical message – when the system collapses, those at the lowest level, who play the biggest role in the fact that it hasn’t already collapsed, pay the highest price – and a lot of nervous energy that is not entirely easy to get in tune with and absorb, because the situation becomes more and more tense from the opening relationship quarrel. Everyone is constantly in motion and in conflict. The narrative does not give us an opportunity to get to know them in quieter circumstances. Furthermore, the characters are a bit like sitcom caricatures, the confrontation of different points of view is formulaic in places and the power of the emotions at the end overwhelms the effort to somehow bring order to the chaos (which, despite the use of real protests, is too obviously artificial). However, it is actually admirable that a grotesque film full of anger and tension, and which is anything but restrained, was made about society on the verge of collapse. 75%

Edgar Wright has made more evenly balanced films than Last Night in Soho, in which Thomasin McKenzie awakens from a nostalgic daydream of 1960s London to a nightmare of disillusion. At any rate, his musical stab at post-#MeToo horror is highly entertaining and original. In fact, it is more original than you would expect from a genre movie that is so enchanted by other genres and undergoes a transformation according to which genre Wright is referencing at the given moment. That transformation is always complete. The stylisation changes along with the heroine’s motivation, goal and place in the narrative. A comedic fish-out-of-water drama in a university setting first becomes an observational movie of someone’s glittering life in swinging London and then an amateur (giallo) detective flick that continually slips into a ghost/zombie/splatter horror movie or a claustrophobic psycho-thriller along the lines of Polanski’s Repulsion. Wright and Krysty Wilson-Cairns managed to incorporate into the story a warning against idealising the past (or rather the attempt to interpret it according to today’s values) somewhat more elegantly than the motif of trauma imprinted on bodies and places. However, I definitely do not think that, with respect to its bold stylisation, the film stigmatises mental illness and sex work, as some foreign reviews accuse it of doing. It is a stylish genre mishmash. It may not work perfectly, but I enjoyed it from the opening to the closing credits. 80%.

A little girl and big men. A goldfish and a banknote. Luck and misfortune. A banal micro-story unfolding in real time. Nothing happens that couldn’t happen at any time on the streets of the real Tehran, or any other city for that matter. Nothing that would prevent us from believing. A unique aspect of The White Balloon is the child’s perspective. The little girl in the lead role, switching naturally from crying to smiling, is amazing. Panahi has managed to capture the entirely ordinary and fully justified fear of a child who is defenceless in the world of adults. Politics, the military and religion are of secondary importance to him. Those who want answers to the big questions must start with the small ones. 80%