Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter, Spring review

 Number 233 on the top 1000 films of all time is the Korean drama 'Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter, Spring.'

The film is set in a Korean Buddhist monastery exploring the relationship between the unnamed apprentice (Kim Young-Min) and his unnamed master (O Yeong-Su.) We see the apprentice grow from a little boy into a man with each stage of his life being reflected in one of the seasons mentioned in the title.

Christ, this was a tedious film. Maybe I'm just not spiritually enlightened, as this film heavily leant on Buddhist imagery. However, most of the allusions and symbology went straight over my head. Cats and roosters feature heavily, but I missed out on their significance.

This was because I was bored senseless. This film was so slow. Very little action happens on-screen. We could have seen the apprentice killing his wife's lover or a mysterious mother falling through the ice, but we don't. That would have only been too interesting.

Instead, we were treated to extensive sequences of men standing around, looking pensive, often in complete silence. We don't even get any music to interest us.  Sure the scenery was pretty, but not pretty enough to make up for such a monotonous film. Yes, you get slow-burners, but this wasn't even alight.

It would have helped if we had an interesting likeable main character to follow, but we didn't. From the start, it is obvious that our novice monk has a few screws loose. As a child, he takes delight by tying rocks to a frog, snake and a fish. When he discovers that he is responsible for the snake and frog later dying, he feels guilty and starts crying. Yet that doesn't excuse that psychotic behaviour. Considering he goes onto kill a man, I'm not being hyperbolic.

Yes, his master punishes him tying a rock around him, but that doesn't make him any more likeable. He doesn't get any more likeable when he grows up and falls in love with a woman who arrives at the monastery needing to be cured from a mysterious illness. In the process, he begins a physical relationship with her, breaking his vows in the process. After his master sends her away, our apprentice becomes the world's biggest whinger. He later attempts suicide, but even something as dramatic as this was so boring to watch. It was no more interesting watching his master go a similar route later on.

I'm honestly surprised that I had this much to say about this film. It was so boring that I was shocked that I didn't fall asleep in the first half hour. 

Arrietty Review

 Number 627 on the top 1000 films of all time is Studio Ghibli's animated fantasy film 'Arrietty.'

Based on the 1952 book of the same name, Arrietty (Mirai Shida) is one of a race of tiny people called the Borrowers. Her and her father Pod (Tomokazu Mirua) and her mother Homily (Shinobu Otake) live in the house of a sickly boy called Sho (Ryunosuke Kamiki.) They make their living through borrowing items that human beings won't miss. Terrified of humans, they live their lives in hiding. However, Sho discovers Arrietty and befriend her. Later when Sho's housekeeper Haru (Kirin Kiki) also finds the Borrowers and calls exterminators, Sho starts helping Arrietty and her parents to survive.

Mary Norton's book 'The Borrowers' has been adapted a number of times with Arrietty being the fourth adaptation. I am most familiar with the 1997 adaptation starring John Goodman, Jim Broadbent and Tom Felton among others. And I have always been a lover of Studio Ghibli films. Their animation and their music has always been second to none. Arrietty was no exception. The animation was beautiful as can be expected. It was the directorial debut of Hiromasa Yonebayashi who helped to animate Howl's Moving Castle, Ponyo and Spirited Away. Considering how gorgeous, the animation of Spirited Away is, it's no surprising that Arrietty was the same.

In Sho's home, there is a doll's house. This was installed by Sho's father who believed that there were little people living in the home. He put in the house just for them. And the detail was astounding especially within the ornate kitchen. Another scene sees a crow flying into Sho's bedroom window and getting stuck within the blind. Haru has to hit it away. It was a very funny bit of animation.

I also loved the music. French singer Cecile Corbel wrote the score and performed the theme tune and she did it justice. The music had a lovely element of mystique and wonder that can be expected within Studio Ghibli. We spoke about Spirited Away having wonderful animation. It also has a brilliant score.

However, where the film was so strong on animation and music, I do feel like it was quite light on story. Compared to other Studio Ghibli features, it felt far simpler and more basic. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it did make Arrietty far less punchier than some of its predecessors. While it was lovely seeing how the Borrowers live and function, I think too much time was spent on the set-up. By the time, we got to the main story, almost half the film had gone and the rest felt a little rushed. For example, the character of Spiller (Tatsuya Fujiwara) another Borrower who rescues Pod after he falls and twists his leg is left largely undeveloped. 

And Sho and Arrietty's relationship was rushed as well. The two trust each other far too quickly. Arrietty has been raised her whole life to believe that human beings are dangerous and she should never be seen by them, but all it takes is Sho giving her a sugar cube that convinces her to trust him. And as for Haru, she was a little too comical to be taken seriously as a villain.

While Arrietty has the stylistic flair and great music that we can expect from studio Ghibli, it wasn't anywhere near on the same level in terms of storytelling power.

Black Cat, White Cat Review

 Number 179 on the top 1000 films of all time is the Serbian black comedy drama Black Cat, White Cat.

Matko (Bajram Severdzan) is a small-time Romani crook who is down on his luck. He plots to rob a train with the help of hedonistic gangster Dadan (Srdan Todorovic.) But the duplicitous Dadan double-crosses Matko and takes the goods for himself. To help Matko pay off his debts, he convinces him to allow his son to marry Dadan's sister.

Black Cat, White struck me as being Serbia's answer to the classic crime caper a la Snatch or the Sting. We have Matko as the lovable roguish protagonist who must pull a feat of daring do to get him out of a spot of bother. There's Dadan as the over-the-top gangster - a touch too over the top I would argue, there was a lot of gratuitous cocaine use and fooling around with prostitutes, and even a cute love story between Matko's son and the local barmaid. There is plenty of physical comedy especially at the end when Dadan is tricked into falling into the local manure. And also lots of hammy violence like the during the heist sequence when Dadan shoots dead a witness.

Despite all this, I did find the film hard to follow. I'm obviously not from the Balkans so I had to watch the film with English subtitles, meaning I missed anything that didn't translate. But I also don't know enough of the different Balkan cultures so a lot o the cultural references passed me by - the wedding sequence, a vital element of the film was lost on me. But even more bizarrely, there was a very strange scene where a lady squeezed and picked up a nail with her ample derriere. Perhaps if I was of Balkan persuasion I might have understood this.

Although I could see what the film was trying to do, I couldn't follow it at all. It wasn't for me.