Change Your Image
ufahawaii
Reviews
Das weiße Band - Eine deutsche Kindergeschichte (2009)
a significant work of art
The extraordinary composition of frames serves to create a visual basis for a terse, complex narrative. The visual composition of each scene conveys what the verbal content alone would not. The acting ensemble was of the highest imaginable caliber. There emerges a third dimension in this art work which is seldom achieved in just 'motion picture'. Moralizing based on this work is really irrelevant. Expectations of linear, tidy narrative would not be met. The ambiguity which seems to pervade the core of the story is itself an aesthetic device necessary to the purposes of the maker of this work. Hanneke seems to have been developing and perfecting his skill in telling a story by thinking about his work as a painter of successive pictures connected by a common meaning.
JFK (1991)
this is the definition of tiring, not tiresome
I saw JFK recently on tape in a period of about five days and I cannot imagine how I sat in a theater for the entire length of it, which I did when the film first came out. What I found particularly tiring and grating were the fake Southern accents, many as embarrassing of Vivian Leigh's in "Gone..". The story itself and the message I believe would have been more effective with less hysterical cutting and flash backs which detracted immensely from any sense of reality and continuity. I know the effect aimed at was in part the insanity of those involved in this sad chapter of American history, but making the narrative so shapeless is not the best way to achieve historical reconstruction by aesthetic means. Still, the film is a unique achievement and an act of courage.
Das indische Grabmal (1938)
my first experience of beauty
I saw this film when I was 10yrs old, just before WWII. Even as a child I thought La Jana was the most beautiful human being that I ever had seen. I would love to see this film again, but I don't know how or where to find it. Any help will be most appreciated. I remember how terribly sad I and many relatives were when the death of La Jana was announced in late 1940. I recently read that La Jana was selected for the part of LolaLola in Blau Engel but that Sternberg's wife who was a friend of Dietrich managed to give the part to Dietrich, thus changing cinematic history. In retrospect it seems that Dietrich rather than the imperious La Jana was a better choice for the part, even at the expense of beauty.