Mom’s Song (2020) ☆☆1/2(2.5/4): About his mother

Posted on November 6, 2021 by kaist455

South Korean independent film “Mom’s Song” tries to present and then develop its heroine no less than three times, and that is alternatively intriguing and frustrating. While there is some satisfaction from how it comes to focus more on the personality and humanity of its heroine step by step, what we get in the end still feels like the mere beginning of whatever could be told next, and I was also quite distracted by something unnecessary at the end of the film, which does not fit at all with what has been so caringly developed during most of its running time.

The first part of the movie is more or less than the extension of one simple circumstance between a lad named Dong-min (Sin Jeong-ung) and his divorced mother Hye-jung (Kim Hye-jung). When his mother suddenly calls him for a trivial domestic matter at one night, Dong-min, who has been living alone as studying in some college, is understandably annoyed, but he comes to a little shabby place where his mother lives alone, and she is glad to see her dear son again.

As she and Dong-min talk a bit with each other, we come to gather some background information on their family history. Despite many years between them, his father eventually walked away from Hye-jung and then recently married some other woman, and Hye-jung is still not so pleased about that although she has been busy with running a small karaoke shop for herself. We later see her taking Dong-min to her karaoke shop for getting some help from him, and then we get a little emotional moment when she does an impromptu singing in front of her bewildered son.

While spending more time with his mother, Dong-min comes to care a bit more about his mother than before, and there is a plain but warm moment when he willingly writes a letter to his younger brother as dictated by his mother. Although this moment does not last long, what is directly presented to us in the next scene implies that Dong-min and his mother becomes a bit closer to each other even though nothing much is changed in their relationship.

During its second part, the movie attempts a different variation of its heroine, who is incidentally played by Noh Yoon-jung instead. This time, Hye-jung is with Dong-min from the beginning, and they are in a hospital where his younger brother has stayed due to some unspecified injury. When we later see him being with Dong-min, he looks good enough to leave the hospital and Dong-min seems to be glad about that although he remains rather introverted as before.

Meanwhile, we also get a very awkward moment between Hye-jung and her ex-husband, who happens to come to the hospital along with his new wife for seeing his younger son. It has been several years since they had a divorce, but Hye-jung still feels bitter about their divorce, and her ex-husband does not have much to say except looking apologetic.

After that, the movie adds more things to be observed. There is a brief odd moment unfolded at a local Buddhist temple, and then we get a scene which looks like the modified version of one key scene of the first part. Again, Hye-jung suddenly calls her son at one night, but she is quite drunk at a local karaoke bar in this version, and Dong-min quickly goes there for taking her back to their residence, though he has to wait a bit as listening to her rambling on her difficult status of life. Before they eventually go back to their residence, Hye-jung sings a song, and this certainly resonates with a similar moment in the first part.

In contrast to the previous two parts, the third part of the movie is told mainly via the viewpoint of Hye-jung, who is played by Kim Hye-jung again. The scene between her and her doctor implies that she has had a serious kind of illness, but she cannot quit her current job right now as barely making ends meets everyday, and the only comfort at her workplace comes from a close colleague of hers. When we later see her having a private conversation with a sibling of hers, they come to talk about her life with her ex-husband, and, again, we come to sense some bitterness from her.

While I like this part better than the other two parts as it shows more care and attention to its heroine, director/writer Shin Dong-min inexplicably adds a personal footnote which feels rather jarring considering what we has observed from the film. Sure, the story has lots of personal elements as reflected by a number of notable personal stuffs in the film including an old video footage clip, and I understand that Shin really felt the need to do that little act of remembrance, but that is too distracting as clashing with the main purpose of his movie.

Anyway, the movie is still fairly engaging thanks to Shin’s competent direction, and his small cast members are solid in their plain but believable acting. Kim Hye-jung, who is actually Shin’s real-life mother, and Noh Yoon-jung are connected well with each other despite the considerable difference in their appearances in the film, and Sin Jeong-ung humbly complements his two different co-stars without overshadowing them at all.

Overall, “Mom’s Song” does not satisfy me enough due to its several notable weak aspects, but Shin makes a decent feature film debut here at least. As I reflect more on what I observed from his movie, I am more convinced that there are the glimpses of a more interesting story here and there in the film, and I sincerely hope that he may give us that better tale someday.

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Army of Thieves (2021) ☆☆1/2(2.5/4): Fairly simple to crack

Posted on November 6, 2021 by kaist455

Netflix film “Army of the Thieves”, which was released a few weeks ago, is fairly simple to crack as a typical genre product. To be frank with you, this heist flick is so generic in many aspects that I could instantly see through its rather elementary plot machinations right from the beginning, and I only came to observe its predictably perfunctory plot progress from the distance while mildly amused from time to time during my viewing.

As many of you know, the movie is a prequel to its predecessor “Army of the Dead” (2021), and it mainly focuses on one of the more colorful supporting characters in that film. He was introduced to us as Ludwig Dieter (Matthias Schweighöfer) at that time, but the movie shows that real name is actually Sebastian Schlencht-Wöhnert (Don’t ask me how to pronounce his real surname), and its early part depicts how unexciting life was for him when he worked as a mere bank employee in a plain neighborhood area of Potsdam, Germany. As a talented self-taught safecracker, he has been quite enthusiastic about a certain famous quartet of safes made by some legendary German locksmith, but nobody has yet checked a series of informative YouTube videos posted by him, and that makes him quite depressed to say the least. As a matter of fact, even the disturbing news about the recent zombie outbreak in Las Vegas does not alarm him much, though it later leads to a frightful recurring nightmare for him.

And then a little unexpected change comes into his mundane life. Somebody finally watched one of his YouTube videos and then posted a comment, and that comment leads him to an underground safecracking competition being held somewhere in Berlin. Although he is understandably quite nervous from the beginning, it does not take much time for Sebastian to get accustomed to this situation and then demonstrate his exceptional skill, and that certainly impresses the audiences including the very person who invited him to this competition via that YouTube comment.

That person in question is a young female criminal named Gwendoline Starr (Nathalie Emmanuel), and she has an offer Sebastian cannot easily refuse. She knows where three of those legendary safes are now (As some of you know, the last one was already shown to us in “Army of the Dead”), and she wants to use his particular set of skills for opening these three safes one by one before they are all retrieved and then disassembled forever. Although he naturally hesitates at first due to the considerable risk from this ambitious criminal operation, Sebastian is eventually drawn to the challenge of cracking all of these three safes, just like I cannot help but drawn to reviewing and analyzing some very challenging movies.

What follows next is an obligatory part where Gwendoline’s other accomplices are introduced to us one by one. While Korina Dominguez (Ruby O. Fee) will take care of the security systems of the places respectively containing those three safes as a very skillful computer hacker, Rolph (Guz Khan) is going to handle their vehicle for getaway as quite a skillful driver, and Brad Cage (Stuart Martin) is ready to do any physical action as your average tough guy.

As these five main characters briskly accomplish their first mission during the following part, director/co-producer Matthias Schweighöfer did a competent job of balancing this part well between humor and suspense. Although we already know how this part will end, the mood is often cheerful enough to engage us for a while, and the score by Hanz Zimmer and Steve Mazzaro, which is one of the more humorous ones from Zimmer during recent years, gladly go along with that with a few amusing musical touches besides the expected appearance of a certain famous opera piece by Richard Wagner.

Unfortunately, the screenplay by Shay Hatten, which is based on the story by Hatten and co-producer Zack Snyder, becomes rather repetitive and stale after that narrative point. When a zealous French detective enters the picture later in the story, the level of tension is accordingly increased for a while, but the movie does not surprise us much as this detective finds himself one or two steps behind Sebastian and his gangs again and again, and Hatten’s screenplay also fails to imbue enough life and personality to its main characters besides Sebastian, who come to us as nothing but mere plot elements to be moved from one narrative point to another.

Anyway, besides showing that he is a fairly good filmmaker who can handle several different action scenes as well as required, Schweighöfer demonstrates here that he is also an engaging performer to watch. Although the screenplay demands him to be neurotic too often in my humble opinion, Schweighöfer manages to hold the center before the movie eventually fizzles around the end of the story, and several other main cast members surrounding him mostly acquit themselves well even though they do not have many things to do because of their rather bland supporting roles.

On the whole, “Army of Thieves” is not as disappointing as “Army of the Dead”, but I cannot recommend it because it does not distinguish itself much compared to many better heist films out there. As far as I know, there will soon be a sequel of “Army of the Dead”, but, considering the lackluster results of “Army of the Dead” and “Army of Thieves”, I do not see why that sequel should be produced, and I really do not have much expectation on that.

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The Night House (2020) ☆☆☆(3/4): Alone in her house

Posted on November 5, 2021 by kaist455

“The Night House” is a little horror film which did a rather impressive job of unnerving me from the beginning to the end. Although this is another case of woman-alone-in-terror flick, those expected moments of suspense and dread in the film are skillfully handled on the whole, and it is also supported well by the good acting from its very talented lead actress.

At first, the movie, whose story is mainly unfolded in and around a lake house located in some remote area of New York state, quickly establishes its heroine’s gloomy current status. During more than 10 years, Beth (Rebecca Hall) lived happily with her architect husband, but, alas, he recently committed suicide for no apparent reason, and she has been quite devastated and depressed to say the least. She was the one who often needed some emotional support, so he willingly provided that as a good husband, and that is why she feels more baffled and miserable while often wondering what actually drove him to killing himself.

Despite her rather fragile mental condition at present, Beth tries to go on with her life shortly after her husband’s funeral, but, of course, that turns out to be more difficult than she thought. When she returns to her workplace, everyone including her best friend Claire (Sarah Goldberg) is naturally worried about her, and Claire suggests that Beth should have a drinking night along with her and their colleagues, but the mood soon becomes quite awkward when they later come to talk about the death of Beth’s husband. Beth does not mind this at all first, but it does hurt her feelings as she and others delve more into their grim conversation subject, and she only finds herself becoming more exhausted and depressed around the time when she returns to her house.

Meanwhile, we also get to know how Beth has been often unnerved by something inside the house. Whenever she tries to sleep after some night drinking, she hears strange sounds, and she also experiences several inexplicable incidents including the text from her husband’s smartphone. As she gets more disturbed every night, she comes to feel more of the possible presence of some supernatural figure, and that may be her husband’s ghost trying to tell something important to her besides his weird suicide note left her. On the surface, it looks like he was somehow influenced badly by her occasional melancholia, but the rather unnerving words in the note indirectly suggest that she may be in some serious unknown danger.

Maybe she is simply coping with her grief and following anxiety and depression, but Beth still cannot help but notice disturbing signs popping here and there around her. The smartphone of her husband turns out to contain the photograph of a woman who happens to look quite similar to her, and Beth’s suspicion grows more when she later discovers more of what her husband was hiding from her. There are a number of old strange books about a certain subject, and then there is also a hidden house on the other side of the lake, which, to her surprise and bafflement, is almost identical to her house which was incidentally designed and built by her husband himself.

Now I will be a bit more careful in my description of the film for not spoiling your entertainment, though, if you are a seasoned moviegoer like me, you will get a pretty good idea on what is going on around our heroine. As trembling more along with its heroine, the movie provides us a number of effectively unnerving moments which often make her and us question her sanity, and director David Bruckner and his crew members including cinematographer Elisha Christian and editor David Marks ably maintain the disturbingly gray ambience hovering over the heroine. The movie frequently looks pale and gloomy even during its daytime scenes, and we are more reminded of whatever is menacing its heroine somewhere inside the screen.

Around the point where it finally reveals the origin of its heroine’s continuing terror, the screenplay by Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski comes to lose some of its narrative momentum as heading to its inevitable finale, but the movie still keeps us on the edge while diligently doling out good scary moments as before. I particularly like how it presents some of key shots in subtle but undeniably terrifying ways, and the result deserves to be compared with the scariest moments from Leigh Whannell’s “The Invisible Man” (2020).

Like “The Invisible Man” depends a lot on Elizabeth Moss’ strong performance, the movie relies a lot on its lead actress, and Rebecca Hall, who will impress us more with her upcoming directorial debut film “Passing” (2021), does not disappoint us at all as giving another solid performance in her acting career. She is absolutely convincing during many scenes where she has to convey to us her character’s growing terror and dread, and she is also supported well by several good supporting performers including Sarah Goldberg and Vondie Curtis-Hall, who plays a caring neighbor living not so far from Beth’s house.

In conclusion, “The Night House” will probably not surprise you much as mostly playing within its familiar genre territory, but it is still engaging mainly thanks to a number of commendable aspects including Hall’s terrific performance. During my viewing, I did care and worry about what eventually would happen to her character in the end, and that is always a good thing to be appreciated, you know.

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Zola (2020) ☆☆☆(3/4): Based on one amusing Twitter tale

Posted on November 5, 2021 by kaist455

“Zola” is a darkly amusing cautionary tale of sexual exploitation which will definitely make you wince more than once. Cheerfully bouncing from one absurd moment to another, the movie never overlooks the seedy and exploitative aspects of what its heroine lets herself tumble into, and we come to observe its story and characters with morbid amusement and fascination even while feeling more and more uncomfortable along the story.

As some of you know, the movie is based on David Kushner’s Rolling Stones article “Zola Tells All: The Real Story Behind the Greatest Stripper Saga Ever Tweeted” and a Twitter thread from 2015 by an African American woman named Aziah “Zole” King. Although the story told via those Tweets of hers turned out to have many embellished aspects as she admitted later in Kushner’s article, it went quite viral at that time, and that was how it came to draw the attention of director/co-writer Janicza Bravo, who subsequently wrote the screenplay along with her co-writer Jeremy O. Harris.

The story of the movie is mainly unfolded via the viewpoint of Zola, who is played by Taylour Paige. When she is working at a local restaurant in Detroit, Michigan, Zola happens to come across a young Caucasian woman named Stefani (Riley Keough), and they come to befriend each other quickly as spending some time together later. Because Zola is a part-time stripper just like her, Stefani suggests that they should go to a local strip club together, and their friendship seems to be solidified more as they respectively work and then earn some money at that place.

And then Stefani makes an interesting proposition to Zola. She will soon go to Florida along with her boyfriend Derrek (Nicholas Braun) and a certain friend of hers for earning more money there, and she suggests that Zola also should go there along with them. While she is reluctant at first, Zola eventually decides to accept Stefani’s suggestion, and Zola’s boyfriend does not mind this at all because, well, he has accepted how she works to earn their living everyday.

When Zola meets Stefani and two other figures on the next day, we instantly see bad signs. While Stefani shows more of her uncomfortable sides as casually using the vernaculars of African American women right in front of Zola, it is quite apparent to us that Derrek is your average hapless boyfriend who seems to have no idea on whatever Stefani is going to do in Florida. In case of the third figure, who is simply referred to as “X” (Colman Domingo) in the beginning, this African American dude looks rather fishy despite his ebullient attitude, and we come to sense that something is going on between him and Stefani.

Anyway, their drive to Florida is fairly eventful to say the least. As X is driving his car, Stefani and Derreck often attempt to brighten up the mood, and we accordingly get a dizzy sequence where they do lots of silly things in front of their smartphones. As watching all these silliness, we cannot help but notice the superficial aspects of their following online activities, which are further accentuated by that frequent notification sounds from smartphones on the soundtrack.

Once Zola and her new friends arrive in Tampa, Florida, she and Stefani promptly go to a local strip club and then do their job as planned, but, as she warned to us in advance, the situation later becomes quite problematic for Zola. She belatedly comes to learn that Stefani has been doing some other thing for getting extra cash, and, not so surprisingly, X is the one pulling the strings behind Stefani’s back.

Zola naturally tries to walk away from Stefani and others, but she only finds herself getting more involved with these increasingly untrustworthy figures. When she sees how pathetic Stefani looks, she cannot help but feel sorry for Stefani, so she decides to give Stefani some extra help, but that makes her get more involved with not only Stefani but also X. After reminded again of how dishonest both of them have been to her from the beginning, Zola feels more urge to leave right now, but X will certainly not give up any good opportunity to get more money for him, and there is a brief but chilling moment where he switches back and forth between two very different modes.

While its heroine gets mired in more seediness and exploitation, the movie hurls a number of deliberately uncomfortable moments including the one showing lots of male body parts, but it steadily maintains its gradually distant attitude in the disturbingly lightweight atmosphere, which is often emphasized by Mica Levi’s unconventional score throughout the film. In case of the main performers in the film, Paige and her fellow cast members are believable in their respective parts, and Riley Keough and Colman Domingo have some juicy fun with their broad but colorful supporting characters while Nicholas Braun manages to earn a bit of our sympathy despite constantly looking dopey and confused.

On the whole, “Zola”, which is Bravo’s second feature film after “Lemon” (2017), is as uncomfortable to watch as other similar films such as Harmony Korine’s “Spring Breakers” (2012), but it is one of the better works from its genre field thanks to its good performances and effective storytelling. It is seedy and disturbing indeed, but it is presented without enough style and mood, and that is enough for me for now.

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Eternals (2021) ☆☆1/2 (2.5/4): The Curious Misfire of Chloé Zhao

Posted on November 4, 2021 by kaist455

“Eternals”, the latest offering from Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), is a curious misfire whose heart seems to be in some other place. Like “Black Widow” (2021) and “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” (2021), it attempts to try something different from many of previous MCU flicks, and it does have all the right elements and talents for that, but the overall result is often slow and ponderous as riddled with too many obligatory instances of plot exposition, and it feels more disappointing when you consider a number of small but inspired moments generated among its diverse array of main characters.

During more than a half of its long running time (155 minutes), the movie explains a lot as gathering its many different main characters one by one along the story. Since around the birth of the whole universe, there has been a very powerful celestial entity which has controlled over thousands of different galaxies and planets, and the Earth is one of those planets. When the Earth and the humanity were threatened by vicious alien creatures called Deviants around 7000 years ago, this powerful entity sent a group of guardians called Eternals, and we get the first action scene in the film when the Eternals show themselves in front of humans at one of the first sites of human civilization history (If you have any basic knowledge about this famous site, you will have a small laugh for the rather incorrect geological details of this scene).

Anyway, as shown via a series of flashback scenes, the Eternals came to live quietly and separately for next several centuries once their job seemed to be done around the 16th century, but, of course, there comes a big trouble not long after what happened in “Avengers: Endgame” (2019). After the whole Earth is suddenly shaken up by an inexplicable global earthquake, those old foes of the Eternals appear again, and Sersi (Gemma Chan) comes to see that she and her fellow Eternals including their leader Ajak (Salma Hayek) must gather together again as soon as possible for protecting the Earth from what may be its greatest threat.

Along with Sprite (Lia McHugh) and Ikaris (Richard Madden), Sersi soon embarks on going here and there around the Earth for meeting their fellow Eternals, and director/co-writer Chloé Zhao and her cinematographer Ben Davis did a splendid job of presenting various locations with each own different mood. For example, Ajak’s residence in the middle of some remote area of South Dakota will bring you back to the memories of Zhao’s previous acclaimed works including “The Rider” (2017) and “Nomadland” (2020), and those stunning landscape shots will remind you a lot of those works of, surprise, Terrence Malick. In case of a part involved with Kingo (Kumail Nanjiani), we are served with something quite colorfully flamboyant due to his current occupation, and a part involved with Thena (Angelina Jolie) and Gilgamesh (Don Lee, who is also known as Ma Dong-Seok to me and many other South Korean cinema audiences) turns out to be surprisingly funny and poignant in the middle of somewhere in the Australian outback.

As you have already noticed, the main cast members of the film are relatively diverse and inclusive compared to many of previous MCU flicks, and this aspect brings some fresh air to the MCU franchise. I appreciated how the movie plainly and sensibly handles the deafness of Makkari (Lauren Ridloff, who is actually an accomplished deaf actress who was recently Tony-nominated for the 2018 Broadway revival of “Children of a Lesser God”), and I also enjoyed her romantic interactions with Druig (Barry Keoghan), who still loves her a lot despite their many centuries of separation. In case of Phastos (Brian Tyree Henry), this nerdy black superhero dude has been having a healthy and loving marital relationship with his husband (He is played by Haaz Sleiman, who drew my attention for the first time via his memorable supporting turn in “The Visitor” (2007)), and their little moment of affection feels natural instead of being obligatory.

However, these and other good individual moments in the film do not mesh well with what we always get from MCU flicks. There are lots of action scenes during the last hour of the film, but they feel rather bland and anonymous on the whole, and the villain figures of the story are also flat and uninteresting to say the least. All I can remember about the Deviants is that they look merely bad and hideous with lots of CGI tentacles, and what is eventually revealed during the grand finale of the film is not particularly impressive compared to what we have seen from countless MCU flicks again and again during last 10 years. It goes without saying that Zhao is a very talented director who deservedly won two Oscars for “Nomadland” early in this year, but she seems to be on autopilot whenever the movie is on action mode, and that is another disappointment in the film.

Furthermore, though Zhao and her co-writers Patrick Burleigh and Ryan and Kaz Firpo do pay much attention to building up their main characters, I must say that some of dramatic elements among the main characters do not work as well as intended. As many of you know, the movie has drawn lots of attention for having the first sex scene in the MCU franchise, but that scene is just, paraphrasing what my old friend/mentor Roger Ebert once said in a certain one-star review, your average rumpy-pumpy scene limited by its PG-13 rating, and it does not add anything particularly substantial to the developing relationship between those two main characters in question.

Anyway, the cast members of the film have a fairly good chemistry among them. As Gemma Chan dutifully holds the center as required, her fellow cast members fill their respective spots as demanded, and Angelina Jolie and Salma Hayek demonstrate again that they have lost any of their talent and presence yet. While Richard Madden and Lia McHugh are well-cast in their respective roles, Kumail Nanjiani, Don Lee, Lauren Ridloff, Bryan Tyree Henry, and Barry Keoghan contribute some colorful personality to the film in each own way, and you may be amused a bit by when Kit Harrington, who plays Sersi’s human boyfriend, briefly shares the screen with Madden, who once appeared along with Harrington in HBO TV drama series “Game of Thrones”.

In conclusion, “Eternals” does not impress me enough, but it is not the bottom of the MCU franchise at least (That is still “Thor” (2011) and its following 2013 sequel in my inconsequential opinion), and I do not deny that I had some good fun while watching and then writing about it. As movie critic Justin Chang aptly said in his LA Times review, this will probably be the least interesting work in Zhao’s remarkable filmmaking career even though it will possibly be regarded as one of the more interesting products in the MCU franchise during recent years, but she will surely move onto better things out there, and I hope that the MCU franchise will continue more genre experiments like this instead of reverting to its fed-up old ways.

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Never Gonna Snow Again (2020) ☆☆☆(3/4): An odd immigrant masseur in suburbia

Posted on November 3, 2021 by kaist455

What an odd and strange film “Never Gonna Snow Again” is. The movie, which was selected as Poland’s submission to Best International Film Oscar in last year, initially baffled me a lot as I tried to figure out what and how it is about, but its decidedly calm and enigmatic mood gradually engaged me as it effortlessly glided from one curious moment to another along with its elusive hero, and it eventually came to me as a glacial but haunting fable about kindness and compassion.

During the opening scene, the movie subtly sets the tone right after its very first shot, which shows a young man coming out of some moody forest. He is a Ukrainian named Zhenia (Alec Utgoff), and he comes to Poland to work as a masseur, but there is something weird about this guy. According to his immigration papers, he was born in Pripyat, Ukraine seven years before the Chernobyl accident, and that certainly draws that attention of an old immigration official who is going to determine whether Zhenia can stay in Poland or not, but it does not take much time for Zhenia to get what he needs. He turns out to be a skillful hypnotist, and the immigration official soon becomes quite relaxed as Zhenia handles the rest of his work.

After that, we see Zhenia going to an affluent but rather isolated suburban area full of identical houses which will surely make you hum Malvina Reynolds’ song “Little Boxes”. This area may look a bit too artificial to you at first, but I must tell you that, to my little surprise, it is actually a real housing estate in Walendów, eastern Poland, and I am quite impressed by how the movie generates the sterile sense of ennui and boredom within this seemingly comfortable background. We do not see many people on quiet streets except a few passers-by, and those houses look empty sometimes even though we see some of their residents as Zhenia drops by one house after another.

In case of the first house to be visited by Zhenia, it is quite a mess to say the least. The family living there must have had some big party on the previous day, but nothing has been cleaned up yet, and the wife is stuck with this daunting mess after the husband and their son hurriedly leave, but she soon gets relieved once Zhenia begins to work on her body. As she gets more relaxed on his massage bed, he embarks on hypnotizing her, and she finds herself feel a little better in her body and mind once his job is done.

And then we see some other usual clients of his. One of them is a terminal cancer patient who has tried lots of various things for handling his gloomy circumstance along with his concerned wife, and there is a little amusing moment when he later says that he should try hypnosis someday, while having no idea on what Zhenia just did to him before he wakes up. When Zhenia later comes to the house belonging to a frigid middle-aged lady, she gradually becomes softer as talking with him, and she surely gets relaxed more when she reaches to her unconsciousness via Zhenia’s hypnosis.

Meanwhile, the movie also pays some attention to Zhenia’s private life. He is living alone in a cheap apartment without making any connection with his neighbors except a woman who constantly struggles with handling her pet dog, and he frequently dreams about his childhood memory associated with, yes, the Chernobyl accident and what he lost during that tragic period. In addition, there is some problem with his current status as an immigrant worker, and it seems quite possible that he may be deported at any point.

Nevertheless, he keeps trying to comfort and help his suburban clients as usual, and many of them appreciate his service a lot, though some of them find themselves emotionally attached to Zhenia a little too much. There is a little humorous moment of misunderstanding involved with two of his clients, and then we get a melodramatic scene when the wife of that cancer patient comes to depend on Zhenia more than expected later in the story.

While never clarifying what its hero exactly feels and thinks, the movie continues to dole out oddly compelling moments to intrigue and fascinate us more thanks to the competent direction of co-directors/co-writers/co-producers Małgorzata Szumowska and Michał Englert, who also handles the cinematography of the film. Many of the key scenes in the movie are impressive for their precise scene composition and evocative atmosphere, and we accordingly come to accept several surreal moments including the one associated with the very title of the film.

As the center of the story, Alec Utgoff, a Russian actor whom you may recognize for his supporting turn in the third season of Netflix drama series “Stranger Things” (That actually helped him get cast for this film, by the way), diligently carries the film while deftly embodying his character’s uncanny aspects. He is also supported well by a number of different performers including Maja Ostaszewska, Weronika Rosati, Łukasz Simlat, Katarzyna Figura, Andrzej Chyra, and Agata Kulesza, who is solid as she was in Paweł Pawlikowski’s “Ida” (2013) and “Cold War” (2018).

In conclusion, “Never Gonna Snow Again” is your average arthouse film which will demand some patience from you due to its dry storytelling and slow narrative pacing, but it is still worthwhile to watch for its distinctive qualities to be appreciated. To be frank with you, I don’t think I totally get it, but it lingers on my mind even at this point, and I am willing to revisit it someday for more understanding and appreciation.

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Naked Singularity (2021) ☆☆(2/4): Tepid Singularity

Posted on November 1, 2021 by kaist455

“Naked Singularity”, which somehow crept into South Korean theaters in last week, is not as singular as whatever it wanted to be. The movie itself is not awful at all, but it is a tedious mess of half-baked ideas which did not interest me that much throughout my viewing, and I only came to feel sorry for some of its main cast members, who, in my inconsequential opinion, are too talented to appear in this bland misfire.

At first, the movie seems to want to be as angry and absurd as Norman Jewison’s “…And Justice for All” (1979). Just like Al Pacino’s lawyer hero in that film, Casi (John Boyega) has been pretty tired of being stuck inside a problematic legal system as one of its mere cogs, but, as a public defender, he keeps getting saddled with numerous cases beyond his control. No matter how much he tries, he finds himself more frustrated and exasperated, and that makes him have more doubt and disillusionment on his life and career – especially when he gets suspended for several months just for causing the petty ire of one of his usual judges.

Meanwhile, there comes a case which looks seemingly simple at first but turns out to be quite more serious than expected. The defendant in question is a young woman named Lea (Olivia Cooke), and she gets herself into a big trouble after letting herself associated with a small-time local drug dealer named Craig (Ed Skrein). There was a vehicle which has a considerable amount of drug hidden inside it, and this vehicle unfortunately happened to be taken to a city facility where Lea works. All she will have to do is doing some inside job for helping Craig buy that car during the following auction, but things has gotten quite complicated after she got caught by two cops with a small portion of drug in her possession, and she must balance herself carefully between the police and her potentially dangerous associates.

Now this situation is pretty much like what we have seen from other countless crime movies such as Quentin Tarantino’s “Jackie Brown” (1997), but the movie, which is based on Sergio De La Pava’s novel “A Naked Singularity”, does not develop this part much as paying more attention to Casi’s increasingly peculiar state of mind. More exhausted by his jobs, he begins to see strange things popping up here and there around him, and an odd guy living in the same apartment building naturally gives him some information about a certain scientific term called, yes, Singularity. It seems that things are really falling apart as Casi has always felt for years, and the movie even gives us the countdown for whatever will happen around the end of its story, through, with occasional blackouts along the story, that only made me quietly hum a certain part of one of the highlight songs from musical film “In the Heights” (2021).

As a consequence, this quirky side of the film merely feels superficial without bringing any mood and personality to what can be regarded as a mediocre variation of those numerous heist flicks out there. Finally deciding that enough is enough, Casi embarks on a plan for beating the system in addition to benefiting himself a bit, and his close colleague Dane (Bill Skarsgård) gladly joins him without any hesitation, but they soon come to find that the situation can be way over their heads. Besides a certain local ethnic criminal organization Lea and Craig are supposed to deal with, there also come a bunch of criminals who are the original owner of that drug, and both Casi and Lea must think fast for avoiding any fatal misstep.

However, the movie fails to generate any fun or thrill even during this part. Although it muses a bit on some multiple possibilities along with Casi and Dane, we already can discern where it will inexorably arrive along with its main characters, and the following ending feels hollow and artificial without anything for us to reflect on in terms of story and characters. We do not get to know much about its main characters as they are no more than cardboard caricatures, and the story itself feels blander and emptier because of that.

If you remember his breakthrough turn in “Attack the Block” (2011), you surely know well how electrifying John Boyega can be, but I must tell you that he is far less interesting here as often being awkward with his flat role. He does try as much as he can with whatever is given to him, but he still fails to compensate for many weak aspects of the film, and I would rather recommend you to watch his powerful acting in “Red, White and Blue” of Steve McQueen’s recent anthology series “Small Axe”.

In case of the other main cast members, they have a little more advantage as the more colorful characters in the story, but they are mostly wasted on the whole. While Olivia Cooke manages to bring some pluck to her supporting role, Ed Skrein and Bill Skarsgård frequently go over the top as required, and Tim Black Nelson and Linda Lavin are sadly under-utilized despite their distinctive presence.

Directed by Chase Palmer, who wrote the adapted screenplay with David Matthews, “Naked Singularity” fails a lot in many aspects, and that often took my mind back to several recent films which did a better job in each own way. If you want a more entertaining and whimsical social satire, there is Boots Riley’s “Sorry to Bother You” (2018). If you want to a full-throttle courtroom satire drama, there is “…And Justice for All”. I assure you that you will have a more meaningful time with either of them.

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Ron’s Gone Wrong (2021) ☆☆☆(3/4): His little malfunctioning friend

Posted on October 31, 2021 by kaist455

Animation feature film “Ron’s Gone Wrong” may aim low from the beginning, but it is more entertaining than expected. Although many of its components are familiar to the core, it fairly works well as cheerfully swaying back and forth between comedy and drama, and its wholesome message on friendship will certainly be appreciated by both of its young and old audiences out there.

During the first act of the film, we get to know the miserable current status of Barney Pudoswki (voiced by Jack Dylan Grazer), a lonely and socially awkward kid who always dreads going to his middle school everyday but virtually has nobody to lean on around him. Although his father Graham (voiced by Ed Helms) and his grandmother Donka (voiced by Olivia Colman) surely care about him a lot, Graham is usually busy with trying to sell odd stuffs to those oversea buyers, and Donka is mostly occupied with handling domestic matters in her own old-fashioned ways which incidentally embarrass Barney a lot.

Anyway, Barney has recently felt more miserable due to a certain technical trend which has swept all over his hometown. A big digital technology company has just released a new artificial intelligence device which will enable many kids out there to get a lot more friends via online services, and this awesome device, which is called the B-bot, quickly becomes quite popular among Barney’s schoolmates. As discerning that everyone at the school except him has each own B-bot, Barney becomes lonelier than before, and even his class teacher does not help him much while quite oblivious to his growing embarrassment.

Because he is soon going to have his birthday, Barney hopes to get a B-bot as his birthday present, but he is let down by what his father and grandmother sincerely give him later. Seeing how much his son is disappointed and then humiliated for not having a B-bot, Graham decides to get it as soon as possible, and Barney is certainly delighted when his father manages to get it for him later.

However, as already shown to us in advance, this B-bot is actually a malfunctioning one supposed to be destroyed sooner and later, and we accordingly get a series of silly comic moments as Barney tries to make his B-bot work despite a number of signs of serious malfunction. For example, it calls Barney by some other name, and it also has several other problems including failing to connect with the online control system of that technology company.

Barney naturally comes to consider getting this B-bot repaired or replaced, but then he changes his mind as coming to see how singular this B-bot, named Ron (voiced by Zach Galifianakis), is compared to many other B-bots out there. Sure, it is still struggling in its ongoing learning process while not giving any online service it is supposed to provide, but Ron turns out to be a pretty good companion for Barney, and Barney is certainly happy and delighted to have a friend at last.

Of course, it does not take much time for that digital technology company to notice the singular status of Ron too. While Marc Weidell (voiced by Justice Smith), the well-meaning CEO of the company who developed the B-bot for a very sincere personal purpose, is quite interested in getting to know more about what makes Ron so special, his second-in-command Andrew Morris (voiced by Rob Delaney) has the other idea on how to deal with this matter, and he is really willing to do anything for protecting the business interest of his company.

What follows next is quite predictable, the screenplay by co-director Sarah Smith, who directed the film with Jean-Philippe Vine, and her co-writer Peter Baynham bounces along its familiar narrative with enough amount of humor and sincerity. While you will be amused a lot by a big mess which Ron and Barney inadvertently cause at Barney’s school, the dynamic development of their friendship along the story turns out to be more poignant than expected, and the film makes some sharp point on human relationship and online social media services via some of Barney’s schoolmates, who turn out to be as lonely as Barney despite many online services provided by their B-bots.

In the end, the story culminates to a big climactic part accompanied with plenty of action, but it still holds our attention as never overlooking the touching aspects of its two main characters’ relationship. Zach Galifianakis ably balances his likable deadpan voice performance between comedy and drama, and he is complemented well by the earnest voice acting by Jack Dylan Grazer. Around Galifianakis and Grazer, the film assembles a number of notable performers including Ed Helms, Justice Smith, Rob Delaney, and Olivia Colman, and Colman has lots of fun with her eccentric supporting role as she previously did with the villain character of “The Mitchells vs. the Machines” (2021), another recent animation film whose story also happens to be involved with advanced digital technology as well as human relationship.

In conclusion, “Ron’s Gone Wrong” does not bring anything new to its genre territory as reminiscent of many other kid adventure movies including “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial” (1982), but it is still enjoyable enough for recommendation, and I think it will make a nice double feature show along with “The Mitchells vs. the Machines”. Although I prefer the latter a bit more for having more wit and energy, “Ron’s Gone Wrong” has its own endearing qualities to remember, and I am fine with that.

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The Asian Angel (2021) ☆☆☆(3/4): Accidental travelers

Posted on October 31, 2021 by kaist455

“The Asian Angel” simply rolls along with its two different sets of characters and then observes what occurs between these two contrasting groups. Despite the considerable language barrier between their groups, the main characters in the film somehow manage to make some communication between them, and the movie calmly and sensitively depicts their accidental journey as alternating between amusement and poignancy.

In the beginning, we meet Tsuyoshi Aoki (Sosuke Ikematsu), a young struggling Japanese writer who has been a widower since his wife’s recent death. Because his older brother Toru (Joe Odarigi), who has been doing some small shady business in Seoul, South Korea, promised to him that things will be better for him and his young son Manabu (Ryo Sato) in Seoul, Tsuyoshi comes to Seoul along with Manabu, but the situation does not look that promising to him to say the least. While he cannot speak Korean at all, he is bothered a lot by the current political hostility between Japan and South Korea, and it also turns out that Toru is not living as well as he has boasted.

Anyway, Tsuyoshi tries to do his best under this rather depressing circumstance for himself as well as his son, and Toru seems to try more for his younger brother and nephew, but, alas, there comes a big problem. They suddenly find on one day that Toru’s South Korean associate runs away with nearly all of the money belonging to Toru, and Toru and Tsuyoshi consequently become quite despondent. When Toru suggests that they should go to a small city on the east coast for the possible avenue of profit, Tsuyoshi agrees to go along with him despite his reservation because, well, there is no choice for him at present besides that.

Meanwhile, the movie also pays attention to Choi Seol (Choi Hee-seo), a young South Korean woman who has been struggling with her sinking music career. She was once a fairly promising new singer some years ago, but, as briefly reflected by one scene showing her accidental encounter with Tsuyoshi, she has been stuck in a daunting situation without any possibility for comeback. To make matters worse, she may have to accept whatever she is demanded to do by a certain rich and powerful prick who can help her reviving his career, and that makes her much more depressed than before.

We also get to know Seol’s two siblings: her old brother Jung-woo (Kim Min-jae) and her younger sister Po-mu (Kim Ye-eun). Both Jung-woo and Seol have respectively tried their best for earning enough money for them and their dear younger sister, but these three siblings are not particularly cordial to each other even though they have lived together in a small residence. When Jung-woo, who seems rather dim but is a decent good guy nonetheless, suggests that they should visit their parents’ grave together, Seol is not so interested as being occupied with that impending matter on her life and career, but then she agrees to go along with her two siblings because, well, there is nothing else to do for her now.

Of course, Seol and her two siblings happen to come across Tsuyoshi and his two family members on a train to the east coast area, and Toru impulsively decides that he and Tsuyoshi should hang around with Seol and her younger sister for a while at least. Jung-woo does not welcome this much at first, but then he does not mind this at all mainly because Toru is willing to pay for the hotel rooms for him and his two sisters, and the mood becomes a bit more relaxed as everyone comes to enjoy a dinner together later.

After learning of Seol’s ongoing problem, Tsuyoshi comes to care more about her despite the language barrier between them, and he and his two family members come to spend more time with Seol and her two siblings on the next day. When they all happen to be stuck in some remote rural area, Seol suddenly has an unexpected medical emergency, and that reminds Tsuyoshi a lot of his dear wife’s recent death. He has not gotten over her death yet, but he also finds himself getting closer to Seol, and Seol does not mind this at all because she needs someone to lean on.

Even at that point, the screenplay by director/writer Yuya Ishii continues its leisurely stroll along with its main characters as they keep moving together from one narrative point to another. When they happen to spend another night together later in the story, the mood becomes warmer and more humorous than before, and you will be amused and then touched by when Tsuyoshi struggles to make more connection with Seol at one point. I must say that a certain plot element mentioned by the main characters more than once is blatantly symbolic, but I will not deny that I was tickled by when that plot element is fully shown on the screen around the ending of the film.

The main cast members of the movie are all solid in their humble ensemble acting. While Sosuke Ikematsu and Joe Odagiri complement well each other, Choi Hee-seo, who was memorable in “Anarchist from Colony” (2017), Kim Min-jae, and Kim Ye-eun are believable as three different siblings who do not get along that well with each other, young performer Ryo Sato holds his own small place among his adult co-performers despite mostly remaining quiet and silent throughout the film.

On the whole, “The Asian Angel” is a modest but engaging hybrid between Japanese and South Korean cinema, and I enjoyed how it gradually attains a sort of equilibrium between Japanese and South Korean characters despite some strains in the beginning. After all, it is always interesting to watch different people making connection with understanding and empathy, and the movie did that job well for us in my trivial opinion.

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Shadow of the Vampire (2000) ☆☆☆1/2(3.5/4): Filmmaking with the Vampire

Posted on October 29, 2021 by kaist455

F.W. Murnau’s “Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror” (1922) has been regarded as one of the greatest silent horror films for many good reasons, and one of them is the striking image of its titular character. Although the film itself was virtually the unauthorized film adaptation of that famous vampire novel by Bram Stoker, Murnau and his leading actor Max Schreck created one of the creepiest vampire characters in the movie history, and their result remains, shall we say, undead as residing somewhere deep beneath those countless vampire movies coming after this great film.

Inspired by the undeniably vivid and striking appearance of Schreck in “Nosferatu”, E. Elias Merhige’s 2000 film “Shadow of the Vampire” attempts to develop one darkly amusing premise: what if Murnau actually hired a real vampire as his leading actor at that time? This surely sounds pretty preposterous to say the least, but the movie handles this utterly unbelievable premise as seriously as possible for working as a deadpan one-joke horror comedy, and the overall result is further enhanced by another memorable vampire performance which deserves to be compared with Schreck’s in the 1922 movie.

At first, the movie observes the ongoing filmmaking process of Murnau, played by John Malkovich, and his cast and crew members in Berlin, 1921. While those financiers of his have been rather nervous about the production, Murnau is quite confident about completing the production according to his grand vision, and his cast and crew members dutifully follow his direction even though they are not so sure about what their movie is about, let alone how it is about. Once their job at the studio is done, they are going to shoot the rest of the film in a number of outdoor locations selected by Murnau in advance, but, to their confusion and bafflement, they are not informed much on what and how they are going to shoot the film in these locations.

Above all, they have not met its leading actor yet. All they know about Max Schreck so far is that he is very, very, very serious about playing his role as realistically as possible, and they become all the more curious about him as they later go to their first outdoor location, which happens to be located in Czechoslovakia. According to Murnau, Schreck, who is still not shown to them even at this point, has already been there for a while because of getting immersed more into the mood of the location, and it seems the location is indeed an ideal place for that. For example, the old inn in which Murnau and his cast and crew members except Schreck are going to stay has a shabby but authentic sense of history and superstition, and, besides using the inn for shooting several scenes of his film, Murnau is willing to hire several local people just for the extra authenticity from their mere presence.

When Schreck, played by Willem Dafoe, finally appears in front of everyone for shooting his first scene in the film, he does not disappoint Murnau and his cast and crew members at all. As a matter of fact, he looks so eerie and disturbing right from the beginning that nobody complains much about his rather eccentric conditions. He wants to shoot his scenes only during nighttime, and Murnau emphasizes to others that Schreck does not need any makeup because he always prepares himself in advance. Regardless of whether the camera is rolling or not, Schreck is always supposed to embody his character, and this professional commitment of his must be respected all the time.

The movie does not hide Schreck’s true identity and his unspeakable nature at all, and that is where its dark fun comes from. It soon turns out that Murnau made a heinous deal with Schreck for making him play the leading character of Murnau’s film, and Schreck is already quite excited for what he is going to get once his last scene is shot, though he still cannot help but driven by his insatiable thirst for blood. In fact, he has already been feeding on one of the key crew members, and this surely exasperates his director a lot (“Why him, you monster? Why not the… script girl?” – “Oh. The script girl. I’ll eat her later.”).

As Murnau and Shreck are constantly engaged in their morbid tug-of-war in front of and behind the camera, the screenplay by Steven Katz makes an interesting juxtaposition of vampirism and filmmaking besides becoming a deranged tale of artistic ambition and exploitation. While Schreck can be regarded as your typical troublesome star actor, Murnau comes to us as your average megalomaniac movie director willing to do anything in the name of art. And I am sure that there are millions of professionals in movie business field who will see a lot of themselves from what the other characters around Murnau and Schreck have to endure and suffer throughout the film. After all, the essence of filmmaking is sort of sucking the life and spirit of whatever is happening right in front of the camera and then immortalizing that on film, and even Schreck shrewdly recognizes this aspect when he has another argument with Murnau at one point. After watching the movie, you will probably think twice about how some famous filmmakers like David Fincher or Stanley Kubrick tend to shoot the same scene more than 100 times.

Because many real-life characters in the story except Murnau are quite unknown to many of us in comparison, the movie freely pushes its story premise while also sticking close to its original source of inspiration. Besides inserting a number of key shots from “Nosferatu”, the movie also recreates several other memorable moments of “Nosferatu” as Murnau and his cast and crew members keep making their film despite a series of unfortunate incidents. When Fritz Arno Wagner (Cary Elwes) arrives later in the story as the new cinematographer for Murnau, things get rolling more smoothly than before, and then there finally comes their leading actress Greta Schroeder (Catherine McCormack). Despite a little personal problem of hers, this young and beautiful actress is ready for her closeup, while having no idea on what her director is going to do to her during the shooting of her last scene.

As heading toward its inevitable finale a bit too hurriedly during its third act, the movie stumbles more than once, but it still holds our attention thanks to its palpably spooky atmosphere generated on the screen under Merhige’s skillful direction. He and his cinematographer Lou Bogue fills the screen a number of nice period details to be appreciated by the audiences familiar with “Nosferatu”, and the melancholic score by Dan Jones subtly suggests the darkness hovering around the characters in the film while occasionally accentuating several impressive moments in the film. One of such moments is a surprisingly poignant scene where Schreck unexpectedly gets what he has yearned for many centuries while he is playing a bit with a movie camera, and this indelible moment leaves a much more powerful impression than a similar one in Neil Jordan’s “Interview with the Vampire” (1994).

It goes without saying that the movie lives and dies with the unforgettable performance by Dafoe, who deservedly received an Oscar nomination for that. With his sharply gaunt appearance, Dafoe is born to play devilish figures to say the least, but he goes further here as fully immersing himself into his character, and he gives us a chillingly grand performance to be savored in many aspects. While deliberately exaggerated at times to our amusement, he never overlooks his character’s sheer depravity, but he also somehow earns our pity as ably conveying to us his character’s remaining humanity. When Schreck happens to discuss a bit with two other characters on Stoker’s novel, Dafoe and the movie delve quite deep into the misery and despair of being a vampire for centuries, and that will certainly remind you that being a bloodsucker forever is not as cool as shown in those Twilight flicks.

Although Dafoe virtually steals the show, the other main performers in the film are also wonderful in their respective roles. I must tell you that Murnau in real life was actually quite a nice and sensitive person, but Malkovich is often fun to watch while looking as smug and arrogant as demanded, and he and Dafoe complement well each other as carrying the film together. As Murnau‘s ever-suffering cast and crew members, Carry Elwes, Eddie Izzard, John Aden Gillet, and Udo Kier are enjoyable in their colorful supporting performance, and Catherine McCormack brings some jolliness to the film before her character belatedly comes to realize the terrifying fact behind shooting her last scene.

Although it could push its story promise further for more fun and intrigue for us in my humble opinion, “Shadow of the Vampire” is still a very compelling piece of work in addition to being one of better vampire films during recent years. It is a bit shame that Merhige mostly stepped away from filmmaking after his next feature film “Suspect Zero” (2004), but he gave us one excellent horror film to remember at least, and it will continue to be regarded as one of the highlights in Dafoe’s long and illustrious career.

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