Reviews

While not entirely a groundbreaking film in the strict sense of the word, there's just a number of firsts in "Heneral Luna" (2015, Phil.), the latest work from the director of the excellent Camera trilogy ("Confessional", "Mangatyanan", "Sana Dati"), Jerrold Tarog. Chief among which, of course, is the subject-matter itself: Antonio Luna (played to perfection by John Arcilla), the valiant and volcanic Filipino general who was a major force in the Philippines' fight for freedom and independence from the American colonizers during the later part of the 19th century. Filipino historical films or biopics seem to be generally restricted to just two prominent figures: Andres Bonifacio and Jose Rizal. From the top of my mind, I can only recall a couple of films that featured heroes other than those two stalwarts: a Macario Sakay film by Raymond Red and one about Lapu-Lapu starring Lito Lapid. If there are other such works still, they may have already been drowned in obscurity.

Thus, a film that details the significant contribution of Gen. Antonio Luna to our history (or his life and death, if one may opt to say so) should be most welcome. After all, as our history is undeniably marked by numerous wars and battles, it would be just apt that we get to encounter as well those who helped maneuver our frontline fight against the foreign intruders and colonizers. And so, how does Tarog's "Heneral Luna" actually come about as a viewing fare?

To put it succinctly, the film is brimming with delight, irreverence, and fervent and genuine patriotism. And to top it all, the characters, most specially the key figures, are portrayed with a fresh breeze of humanism, rather than as cold textbook derivations. While watching the film, one really gets the feeling that all the proclamations of nationalism and duty to and love for country aren't merely hollow airings, but are genuinely impassioned without having to spell them out in big, bold letters. And while at it, "Heneral Luna" manages to be consistently entertaining as well, with its humor and some off-the-wall moments. Such is the accomplishment of the film.

At the film's prologue, it's pointed out that the filmmakers have taken the liberty of combining "fact" and "fiction" to be able to bring across bigger truths. Thus, the inspired artistic choices: the young journalist who "interviews" Gen. Luna;the general's clandestine love affair with a woman named Isabel;the "flashbacks" within a narrative that's already by nature a flashback by way of history;Luna's stirring guitar-tuned flamenco under the moonlight which, in effect, is also a swan-song;the poignant touch of magic realism towards the end, accompanied by Beethoven's plaintive piano sonata. The film, likewise, doesn't shy away from a brutal and graphic depiction of the battlefront and of the tragic fate of the general in the hands of his own men. This is all due to the brave and intelligent screenplay by Tarog, E.A. Rocha and Henry Hunt Francia, and the unflinching and imaginative direction by Tarog himself. (If one is keen enough to pick up the "signals", the historical saga will most definitely have a continuation with the stories of Gregorio del Pilar (to be portrayed most probably by Paolo Avelino) and Manuel Quezon (most likely to be interpreted by Benjamin Alves);Tarog is no stranger to making a trilogy.)

On point of performance, while everyone has put in invaluable work, the film is undoubtedly owned by Arcilla. As the title character, the actor is able to delineate on screen the general's reputed fierceness, hardheadedness, brashness and fearlessness with gusto and aplomb. One can really see that he relishes his character flesh and bone that the screen simply flares up every time he's in the frame. But beneath the volcanic personality, one can still sense a deeply-felt love for the country and an unassailable desire to fight for its freedom till the end being harbored by the general. It's an incomparable performance that sees through the humanity of a "monster".

While it has to be admitted that the film's irreverence, narrative- and character-wise, isn't unique to itself as one can in fact recall Robert Altman's "M*A*S*H*", Franklin J. Schaffner's "Patton", Mike Nichols' "Catch-22" and even our own Mike de Leon's "Bayaning Third World", nevertheless "Heneral Luna" is to be applauded for being able to infuse fresh vigor to the historical drama that's rarely seen nowadays. If it's to be of any note, the film starts and ends with the image of the Philippine flag - in the first, the national emblem is fresh and intact;while in the second, it's burning to ashes. It's sad to think what this coda really says to our journey as a nation so far.

In the light of the recent typhoon that hit the country hard (that is, typhoon Ondoy), I thought it upon myself to re-watch "Black Rain" (1988, Japan), Shohei Imamura's haunting black-and-white masterpiece on the destruction and after-effects of the atomic bomb that hit Hiroshima in the closing period of the Second World War. The destruction and impact of both catastrophes (war and typhoon) may differ in degree and quality, but the trauma and scar (physically and psychologically) nevertheless are still there.

It is a testament to a film's power that its images remain as potent and as indelible as when they were first seen. It is only that the difference now, in my case, is that watching those images has assumed a greater sense of poignancy and potency due to a first-hand experience of a near-monumental weather calamity. There is a sense of kinship, so to speak.

Imamura has always been one of my favorite Japanese filmmakers. His films are always a pleasure to watch because of their anarchy, sensuality and earthiness:"The Pornographers:Introduction to Anthropology" (1966), "Eijanaika" (1981), "Warm Water Under a Red Bridge" (2001), his two Palme d'Or-winners "Ballad of Narayama" (1983) and "The Eel" (1997), to name some. Given the mood of his films, who would have thought that he once served as an assistant director to Yasujiro Ozu, Japanese cinema's most austere and minimalist filmmaker? But then, it is Ozu's rigorous formality and domesticity that Imamura was rebelling against.

But then again, with "Black Rain" one can unmistakably sense Ozu's imprints. The father (or the father-figure) being intent on seeing his daughter get married before time runs out on both of them, and the stillness and calmness of the scenes showing all members of the family together (notably, the dinner scenes or in Ozu's film lexicon, the tatami) are something that the revered master filmmaker would perennially explore in his works ("Tokyo Story", "Late Spring"). Essentially, the over-all subdued and deliberate quality of "Black Rain" is a remarkable contrast to the bacchanalian chaos and instinctual drive of Imamura's entire filmography.

Still, this is not to say that watching the film would not be an altogether unsettling experience. "Black Rain", as aptly described by American film reviewer Leonard Maltin, is "filled with haunting black-and-white images." In the film's first 15 minutes, Imamura pulls no punches in showing the immediate and graphic horrors of the nuclear bombing, one after another (stiffly-burnt bodies, hanging flesh, walking dead, fires and debris everywhere, madness all over). An assault to the viewers' senses, definitely it is, coupled with Takashi Kawamata's somber b/w photography (he did the lensing in Yoshitaru Nomura's crime drama "The Incident") and Toru Takemitsu's chilling score (he did the music in such classics as Akira Kurosawa's "Ran" and Masahiro Shinoda's "Double Suicide").

Even during the film's supposed "tranquil" phase (that is, five years after the atomic bombing), one can still never have a sense of contentment and order, with the uneasiness and pain still being strongly felt by the survivors, not only in terms of failing physical health, but more so in terms of psychological trauma and social stigma. The human race, it now indisputably appears, has been destined to bear the legacy of the Bomb, for as long as it lives.

I already wrote a piece about "Black Rain" some years earlier (posted in IMDb.com), but only in comparison to Volker Schlondorff's magnificent "Tin Drum", another film dealing with monumental human folly and global catastrophe. Moreover, it has never been my practice to write twice about a film that I already wrote something about before. It is in the light of the recent weather calamity that devastated our country that I was prompted to re-visit and write something again about this remarkable Imamura film, as there is a wealth of lessons to be learned from both the film and the recent event in regards the imperfections and dangers of scientific knowledge and action, and the long-term scars and wounds inflicted by a wide- scale destruction (whether human- or nature-induced).

There have been a number of films dealing with nuclear holocaust and destruction ("Testament", "Threads", "The War Game", each situated within their own respective countries);and "Black Rain" stands among them, if not more so, for both its unapologetic and somber portrayal of individual and communal disintegration brought about by atomic devastation and the fact that it has a historical event as its basis.

Few weeks from now, another disaster film from Hollywood, Roland Emmerich's "2012", will finally hit (no pun intended) the big screen. As we all know, this American director's bunch of "disaster/apocalypse" films--"Independence Day", "Godzilla", "The Day After Tomorrow"-- serves no other purpose than to be of mere entertainment value, with no real insight into the nature and wisdom of apocalyptic disaster and the human condition being affected. I wonder how this "gigantic" movie would exploit the trauma, disorientation and apprehensions still being experienced by our people because of the recent weather calamity. To say that this flick is a precautionary tale would probably be no more than an overstatement.

But yes, I will still watch "2012".

Before Austrian film director Michael Haneke got well-recognized and –appreciated in the international film circuit with such films as "Code Unknown", "Time of the Wolf" and "The Piano Teacher" (all of which were made in France and shown in Cannes), he already made his mark with a number of films made in his native Austria, one of which is this film called "71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance"(1994). This work is the third installment in the director's "glaciation trilogy" (the other two being "The Seventh Continent" and "Benny's Video"), thus called because of the central theme of the fine line between barbarism and civility in modern urban life being completely, hopelessly blurred. The "barrier" has been broken, so to speak.

As the title suggests, the film consists of 71 "fragments" or vignettes, seemingly random, unrelated and mundane, of various characters going through the motions and vagaries of daily existence in urban Austria. But one can sense that this only seems to be so, as the film's prologue suggests that this is the event that will loom over the succeeding "fragments". And that is, the 1993 Christmas Eve reckless shooting done by a 19-year-old student named only as Maximillian B. inside a bank and on the streets, before eventually shooting himself—one that is purportedly based on a real-life incident.

No explanations or back-stories are provided to the characters and their situations being shown "episodically" on the screen (a Romanian boy refugee, a bank delivery man, an old pensioner, a childless couple and, of course, the student himself). More often than not, a specific fragment is abruptly interrupted or ended by a black fade-out (an alienating technique Haneke once again utilized in the equally visceral and demanding "Code Unknown"). Some fragments happen for not more than a minute, while some last for as long as five or even eight minutes (notably the scene where the student practices ping-pong tennis facing an automated opponent and the scene where the old pensioner argues with his daughter over the phone, both of which vividly displaying a whole gamut of simmering emotions without ever resorting to histrionics). Even reinforcing the clinical, cold approach—for which Haneke is really known—is the utter lack of an accompanying soundtrack and the wordlessness of some scenes.

The sense of dread is punctuated by the ever-present television (as is the case in the two other films in the trilogy), from where a specific world news is being broadcast (like the ethnic war in Somalia and the child abuse charges against pop star Michael Jackson). This is as if to suggest that the looming event foreboded at the film's start is itself to become a subject of a TV news coverage which, albeit small in scale when compared to the news indicated above, is nevertheless not without a lasting cost to the human lives involved, physically, emotionally and psychologically. Having said this, how has the line separating civility and barbarism come to be completely violated in this thought-provoking film?

The trigger shooting perpetrated by the young student, which serves to be the film's denouement, appears to have been done for no apparent reason at all. It's senseless killing in its purest meaning (which arguably is the underlying essence of the middle-class family's suicide in "The Seventh Continent" and the teenage boy's videotaped murder of the girl in "Benny's Video"). And this is what makes the act all the more chilling. It's as if to suggest that such a self-destructive act is inherent in everyone of us, if not what makes up our essence, waiting only to be brought to the surface by a seemingly random and inconsequential spate of events (in "71 Fragments'" case, it's to be rooted in the student's lack of enough cash to pay for his car gas).

And when the "event" does finally happen, rather than to serve as an important food-for-thought, it's sadly reduced to no more than a piece of media sensation, regarded as the hot "news of the day", focusing more on "what" happened than on "why" did it happen. The alarming incident thus becomes another piece of media entertainment, to be savored by mass consumers who always crave for what is sensational and controversial, without ever thinking of its deep-rooted incitations and implications. (This is a thought which Haneke is to delve full-blown in "Funny Games", both the Austrian and American versions, though I really prefer the first one.)

If in Polish auteur Krzysztof Kieslowski's world, chance incidents and fateful encounters are all part of a grand design to convey deep layers of human emotional truths (like in the truly majestic "Three Colors" trilogy), in Haneke's (or at least in the world of "71 Fragments"), such randomness is to be put in order by an inherent barbarism that's only barely creeping out of the human psyche.

Brillante Ma. Mendoza's latest film, "Serbis" (2008), may not even come close to the comparative brilliance of recent Filipino films like Jeffrey Jeturian's "Kubrador", Emmanuel dela Cruz' "Sarong banggi" and, yes, even Chito Rono's "Sukob", but it's still a curious work. For what the film lacks in plot and character development, which are really severely wanting, can be justly compensated by its prescribed milieu, which stands out as a character in itself--the movie theater run by the filmic family (no less named as "Family Theater").

With its dirty and dank hallways, its vandalized walls, its crumpled and faded movie posters, its hideously flooded and murky toilet, its duplicitous screening and projection room, not to mention its regular throng of patrons who may or may not be "there" for the featured film itself and the always-prevalent traffic and crowd noise outside, "Serbis" could've been made--or could be watched--just for this run-down and out-of-luck movie theater. (If this were a good, old classic silent film, then I could've mistaken it as a film about the theater itself.)

Mendoza may have seen--or at least, may have been aware of--Jacques Nolot's "Porn Theater" and Tsai Ming-liang's "Goodbye, Dragon Inn", which his film quite approximates in terms of setting and concern. But even then, "Serbis" doesn't have the self-criticizing humor of the former and the existential elegy of the latter, qualities which, in fairness to Mendoza, he may not have the intention of lending to his film. It's because from the looks of it (I mean literally), "Serbis" may be one of the many far-down-the-way descendants and variations of the Neo-Realist School of Thought (Naturalism, Abjection, Spontaneity, etc). But even then, unlike many of the best works from that venerated film-making method ("La Terra Trema", "The Bicycle Thief", "Shoeshine", "Salaam, Bombay!", "A Woman Under the Influence", "Rosetta", "Riff-Raff", even our own "Insiang", etc), his film actually eludes the capability of being situated in a wider social and political context, not even in a remote manner. Perhaps again, that's something that Mendoza may not even be set on achieving.

To put it bluntly, "Serbis" escapes any explanation, logical or otherwise. To say that it threads on naturalism is to state the obvious. To say that it borders on the absurd is to overstate the matter. To say that it has a radical agenda being rallied is to make the point moot and academic. But then, to dismiss the film as pointless and inconsequential is to underappreciate Mendoza's efforts in coming up with a "different" film like this. I say different in that while it's too lightweight to be considered an "art" film, it's too deliberate to be regarded as "trash" as well. (It wouldn't be selected for competition in this year's Cannes film festival if it didn't have "something" going for it, I guess.)

Still, I don't get it why some of the Cannes press and even the MTRCB here would be so bothered as to express aghast at some of the film's "disgusting" and "explicit" scenes. I contend that a couple of nude and sex scenes are just plain gratuitous, but the "disgusting" scenes being specified by the press are not even worth mentioning as to merit controversy. In themselves, these scenes just don't add up to a film that's already not meant to cohere. "Serbis" is definitely no "Irreversible" and "Humanite".

What can be a source of comfort is the fact that even works of disappointment do have their choice moments of saving grace. In this scant film's case, it's the selected portrayals of Gina Pareno, Jaclyn Jose and, yes, Coco Martin. If these actors are even "acting" in the film, that I don't know. Whenever Gina and Jaclyn (the beleaguered mother and daughter proprietors of the seedy cinema) are in the frame, they really command such a thespic presence, without them exerting so much effort (if there's one), even having themselves willingly sailed (I mean literally) through the muck and mire of the film. The same goes for Coco (the aimless son of the older proprietor), specifically with regards to the factor of being "dirtied" by the film. His character rarely utters a word in the film;most of the time, he's just seen doing "something", quietly and intently. But it's in such activities, I hope, that we get to have a glean of his mental and emotional state--like in the slow and long scene where he cleans the hopelessly recoverable cinema toilet (a part of his being "dirtied" by the film). Even the decried scene where he successfully pops a painful buttock pus using a cola bottle gets to signify a kind of self-epiphany (which leads to his ultimate detachment from his family by the film's end)!

Sadly, such choice moments of portrayal are still undermined by the fact that Armando Lao's script doesn't allow them to become fully-rounded characters as for the viewers to really feel their plight. These characters are made to appear as nothing more than like the strangers and acquaintances who we meet fleetingly and randomly in real life and then care for no more afterwards. If the fairly dignified thespic chops of Gina, Jaclyn and Coco are still led to feel that way, then what more of the other characters? This but true--like the projectionist character of Kristoffer King who is there just to be given a rough blow job by one of the theater's gay patrons and the ticket-booth attendant character of Roxanne Jordan who is there just to brazenly pose in nude in front of the mirror at the film's start. But then, didn't I mention earlier that "Serbis" could be just about the theater itself?

In itself, "Serbis" is a graphic and natural document of a Filipino slice-of-life, but not enough as to become a true piece of cinematic provocation and radicalness as what the majority of films being shown in Cannes are meant to be.

Jean-Luc Godard will always be Jean-Luc Godard. Either you love his films or hate them. Either you love the guy or hate him. Now, with "Weekend" (1967, France), I just don't know what to make of him (not that this is not what I generally feel whenever I see one of his films).

At the film's opening credits, it's outrightly declared that it's "a film adrift in cosmos". Godard must've meant that seriously, for once you've entered the film's universe, you're in for one wreck of a viewing experience. This is one chaotic universe--and I meant to say it in a pleasurable way!

To attempt to state the plot of the film could only be a disservice to it--though this is not to say that the film doesn't have a "plot"! To attempt to extract the essence of the film might only be a disgrace to it--though this is not to say that the film doesn't have an "essence"! To attempt to map out Godard's agenda in making the film could just turn out to be a mockery of the filmmaker--though this is not to say that the film doesn't have an "agenda"!

The plot? A couple goes on a weekend trip to their parents' house to execute a sinister plan....The essence? The decadence of bourgeois values, the arbitrary yet natural progression of fate, and the transformative power of social awakening....The agenda? For Godard to become increasingly political and to continue on deconstructing the traditional film narrative methods, and thus "alienating" the film audience.... (Much like, theater-wise, Bertolt Brecht had increasingly become political in his succeeding plays while at the same time had continued on employing "alienating" theatrical devices.)

But all of these takes a side-step to give way to the overwhelming chaos, arbitrariness and "playful" senselessness that truly characterize "Weekend". Or, perhaps, the "means" are designed to be of service to the "end".

This chaotic cosmos is potently embedded in the viewers' sensibilities by way of that jaw-droppingly sustained 10-minute dolly shot of a horrendous countryside traffic jam (the "mother of all traffic jams", as one film reviewer ably put it) that the above-quoted couple encountered on their way to Oinville (their parents' place). After that, the quirky and amoral couple would continue to meet along the way a whole lot of "hindrances" to their destination, most of which Godard leisurely takes his time to stage (as what he did, say, in "Alphaville" and "Band of Outsiders").

On the one hand, these "hindrances" appear to be a carry-over from the previous traffic jam that the couple went through (those car wrecks and corpses). On the other hand, they are intended to be an overt display of the filmmaker's alienating techniques (like at one point where the couple gets to encounter a pair of "fictional", "literary" characters and the man starts to blurt out how "trashy" the film is for all they meet are "crazy characters"--how hilarious!). On the other still, they serve as a venue for Godard's explicit political views, the expressiveness is of such a way that this may take the form of direct camera address (like in that long scene where these two "brothers" pour out their thoughts and sentiments about the oppression in South Africa and the discrimination of the blacks).

Now that I have mentioned things political, I'm not sure if it's even necessary to mention the political "awakening" that came upon the woman after the couple was kidnapped by a band of Communist guerrillas. The scenes comprising this specific episode tread the line of being absurd, grotesque and outrageous that seeing them can't even make one believe them.

The online Premiere magazine listed "Weekend" as one of the "25 Most Dangerous Movies". "Dangerous" in the sense of these films challenge our "bedrock notions" of what it is that we normally see in the movies and how we see them (with films like "A Clockwork Orange", "Eraserhead", "Requiem for a Dream", "Freaks"). It's a question of theme and method. Well, it's not that JLG's films have not always turned our viewing experience upside down. But when compared to, let's say, the ebullient fatalism of "Breathless", "Weekend" in fact exudes an apocalyptic melange and an irresolvable recklessness that make it rather an uncomfy fare.

The irony is that even if this Godard film is labeled as "dangerous", it's still worth a repeat viewing, much like all the other films that made it to the Premiere mag's list. It's one thing to say that this film poses danger and it's another to say that this film is "painful to watch twice". It's something that's worthy of another article--and actually there's an available list for that already!

Some films never really grow old. Decades after they have been first released, they still manage to pack a powerful punch. Perhaps, it's just a testament to the unparalleled skill of the filmmaker that his/her films manage to stand the test of time.

A few cases in point:Stanley Kubrick's "A Clockwork Orange", Jean Renoir's "The Grand Illusion", Francois Truffaut's "The 400 Blows", Vittorio de Sica's "The Bicycle Thief", Federico Fellini's "La Strada", Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho", Hector Babenco's "Pixote"....

And now, if I may add, Luis Bunuel's "Viridiana" (1961, Spain), Grand Prize winner at the Cannes International Film Festival.

To tell the truth, I was already hearing and reading a lot about this Bunuel film (his "crowning achievement", as not a few would put it) even before I got the chance to see it. When that chance finally came, I was afraid that the film's impact would be dissipated because of my "preliminary" knowledge about it. But then, the proof of the pudding is really in the eating.

That "Viridiana" would prove to be the very stone that the Spanish government would bash its own head with on grounds of "blasphemy" and "obscenity" serves to underscore the film's transgressive power. (This was the film that Bunuel made in Spain "upon invitation" after 25 years of being in exile and thus of making films outside his native country. Seemed like biting the hands of his "benefactors", eh?)

The film opens with a medium shot of the facade of the convent where the title character is set to take her final vows before becoming a full-pledged nun, and this to the tune of the orchestral "Hallelujah". At first, I thought that this accompanying soundtrack (which I already found hilarious) was already part of Bunuel's arsenal in mocking the Catholic Church. I was half right.

For while it can be admitted that the track serves to emphasize the sacredness of the establishment and the nobility of the novice's intention to become of service to God, the track will recur later in the film only to portray the ultimate crumbling of the sacred walls surrounding Viridiana's ill-fated Catholic life. And this, during the by-now-infamous destructive orgiastic feast of the beggars, such being the thing that these ungrateful creatures have given back to the titular character for all her "charitable work".

(Needless to say, along with the event is the truly lambasting and outrageous "Last Supper" gathering of the beggars, it's only after which that an old beggar started to play on the gramophone the "Hallelujah" track. If I may be allowed to sidetrack, De Sica subtly orchestrated a scene of a similar nature in "The Bicycle Thief" which may not be that popular, but if looked at closely would make the film justly qualify as a piece of "subversive cinema".)

One really has to see the entire set-piece to believe it. Watching it gave me the creeps, and when it was over, I felt quite devastated, much like Viridiana herself.

As any great work of art is subject to various interpretations, so is "Viridiana". And my own take (not without some careful considerations, though) is that, when given the opportunity, it is our basest desires (Sigmund Freud and the School of Psycho-Analysis would say the "Id") that would ultimately over-rule our lives, no matter how we veil it with Catholic devotion and modesty (as with Viridiana) or with bourgeois finesse and propriety (as with Viridiana's uncle and cousin).

The film boasts of a good number of sly and "psycho-analytical" images that bring home this point (like the cow milking scene with Viridiana which connotes her fear of sexuality and the uncle's rubbing off the footprints left by the servant's daughter who played jumping rope which connotes his incestuous carnality). But there could be no more telling indication of this than the bunch of beggars themselves (degenerates, thieves, rascals--however you may call this filmic representation of the "Id"!), who secretly mocks and disdains Viridiana's act of charity and piety (representative of Catholicism) and who destructively overtook the widowed uncle's estate (representative of middle-class hegemony).

Bunuel was one film director who had always been tenaciously consistent with what he presented in his works, thematically and stylistically ("Un chien andalou", "L'Age d'or", "El Angel exterminador", "El", "Los Olvidados", "Belle de jour", and the list goes on;to say that he is the "Father of Surrealism" is just simply one of the points). And if we are to go by "Viridiana's" suggestive final act (decadent? corrupt? hopeless?), then the whipmaster would definitely not allow his train of thought to be bent in any way, even if it would mean going to such cruel, but ultimately humane, lengths.

Not until the half-hour mark of "4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days" (2007, Romania), Cristian Mungiu's Palme d'Or-winning sophomore full-length film, do the viewers get to know what it is that agitates and makes the two central young female characters go through all the motions at the film's initial minutes (which actually comprise a day's start). And that is, abortion. And negotiating for an abortion during the waning days of Ceaucescu's Communist rule (the year is 1987), which makes it illegal and a criminal act and is thus punishable with imprisonment.

The girl suffering from an unwanted pregnancy here is Gabita and the one helping her to get a "doctor" who will perform the forbidden act is her friend Otilia, both of whom are university students. As is shown during the film's initial 30 minutes, it's not a walk in the park for the two women before they finally get to personally negotiate with a certain Mr. Bebe (the "doctor") in a run-down hotel.

This first-time personal encounter among the three characters happened way into the film's 30-minute mark, which is executed in one long take and is framed within a medium static shot. Yet, the formal stillness belies what is actually happening on the screen. For even this encounter, where everything is supposed to proceed smoothly already, unexpectedly takes a not-that-slight detour.

Lies, deceit, complications and compromise arise from this heady three-way encounter, the irreversible outcome of which is for Otilia and Gabita to lamentably prostitute themselves for the duplicitous Mr. Bebe before he can perform the sought-after "operation".

On the surface, "4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days" may just be put alongside many other abortion films that we know (like Claude Chabrol's "Story of Women" and Mike Leigh's "Vera Drake"), which are surefire shot for controversy given the divisive and tacky nature of the subject. However, if we are to look closely, Mungiu's film is not simply about desperate women going to all lengths to terminate the life that is just beginning to blossom within them, for whatever reason. (As for Gabita's reason, it's simply not stated in the film.) If I may daresay, it most significantly paints a picture of a society whose system's didacticness and pre-determination are the forces that propel its citizens to make life-altering (and -threatening) decisions that may well be their undoing, given the maxim that such "decisions" can threaten the fully-imposed social order and strata.

Abortion is prohibited not because life is respected and valued, but because child-bearing is what women are meant for, to rear children who'll grow up to be obedient and complacent citizens who'll faithfully (if not naively) reinforce the foundations of Communist rule. If women are to get any decent education at all, it should be the kind that'll make them fit to be "sent to the country" to work. If anyone takes the route other than what is "pre-destined" for him/her, then a sanction will be meted out accordingly.

This already-decaying state of Communist Romania is marvelously encapsulated in that family dinner party for Otilia's boyfriend's mother, wherein the beleaguered protagonist is on the verge of being quietly crushed down by the societal forces (under the guise of "conversation") at work. This is really one long, statically-framed amazing scene, treading through a whole gamut of conflicting emotions, becoming poignant and insightful at the same time. It's emotional without being hysterical. By the end of it (or similarly, by the film's day's end) we feel almost drained, but coming out to be more fortified because of it, much like Otilia herself.

At the film's closing credits (which came after a "sudden blackout", where it's just Otilia and Gabita who remain on the screen, both still and wordless), it's stated that "4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days" is part of a series ironically called "Tales from the Golden Age". I'm looking forward to seeing more films from the series. If they'd still come from the same filmmaker, from the same country and from the same sociopolitical system (notwithstanding the kind of issue that will be delved upon), then it'd be definitely wonderful.

On a strictly formalist level, Robert Bresson's swan song, "L'Argent" (1983, France;which directly translates to "Money"), can be regarded as Pure Cinema. That is to say, no emotions, no actions, no music, none of such "artificiality" that has customarily been associated with cinema. At best, the film (and for that matter, Bresson's entire filmography) can be described as a Cinema of Ideology.

What is strictly at work here is the "idea" of how money can corrupt and destroy the human spirit. Surely, this can be derived from the Biblical concept of "money being the root of all evil" (Bresson's Christian upbringing being almost always discernible in his films). But this is not to regard this essential commodity per se as the reason for all things evil. Rather, at least in the film's context, it's a particularly forged 500-franc note that set in motion a series of unpleasant and unjust events, with this quiet and unassuming gas station attendant named Yvon Targe at the (abysmal) center.

As suggested from the preceding paragraphs, what concerns Bresson here is not the characters themselves or the milieu they are in (the actuality), as let's say the Italian Neo-Realism would have it, but the idea of how an unscrupulous act can be the cause of another person's undoing. This is humanism in its abstraction. Thus, watching the implications and complications of the counterfeit 500-franc bill upon the lives of the characters--or upon the life of Yvon--is like watching statuesque figures ("15th-century Christian icons", as some would politely have it) being callously manipulated by their blind fate, perennially condemned to be dragged along by the turning of its wheels.

And it is Bresson himself who is the prime mover of this "wheel". In his hands, the "force" of this fate is of such a cold, detached, unforgivably rational quality that one can unfailingly have the feeling of not being able to bear it all. From the initial simple act of the two schoolboys having to knowingly spend the counterfeit money at a photography shop, to the final harrowing act of Yvon having to commit a terrible deed in the name of and as a vengeance against the money (in a figurative sense), one senses Bresson as having the big hand in this cause-and-effect chain of events.

If one gets such a feeling, it's because the filmmaker (already 82 at that time) intended it to be so. As "L'Argent" is a specimen of Bresson's own brand of Pure Cinema, he absolutely wants his exacting vision and conception to be seen and felt in each and every scene, unhampered and uncluttered by the "standard" cinematic manipulations of stylized dialogue, fancy emotions, accompanying soundtrack and contrived actions. In this specific cinematic world, the filmmaker is the cinematic god himself whose fuel for his performers (non-professional at that) is mainly his idea of how cinema should be.

(In reference to one of his films, a reviewer noted that it is Bresson himself who is assuming the different characters in the film. Curiously, the above-noted film elements are what define, not in a derogative way though, Bresson's introductory feature film, "The Ladies of Bois du Bologne".)

This, in effect, gives an entirely purist level to the filmic conception of what it means to be an auteur, formally introduced to movie lexicon by the French New Wave, as pioneered by Jean-Luc Godard. "Purist", in that, whereas the New Wave pioneers can still "play" upon the above-mentioned filmic artificialities, Bresson the auteur is no different from being a sculptor or a painter or even a novelist. It's his own soul that seeps through his work. The product is distinguished by the singularity of its maker's personality.

What makes this singularly cold, clinical method even more pronounced is how Bresson's characters always find themselves drawn into the vortex of some kind of moral and/or spiritual crisis. The intellectual thief in "Pickpocket", the desolate young wife in "A Gentle Woman", the abused teenage girl in "Mouchette", the self-destructive youth in "The Devil, Probably", the contemplative priest in "Diary of a Country Priest", and now the quiet simpleton-turned-morally bankrupt murderer in "L'Argent". Bresson's rigorous and steely formalist cinema should just be the perfect stage for the dark night of his characters' souls. Grace is attained not without some form of sacrifice and damnation of the soul.

It is this ideology that fills the mold of this filmmaker's astonishing pure art. Unrelentingly dark and morbid, perhaps, but a flickering light of salvation can still be seen through it all.

To speak relatively, if one were only to see now Hector Babenco's "Pixote" (1981, Brazil;pronounced as "pi-shot"), after having seen quite a number of films that deal with street children, juvenile delinquents, kids in trouble (Truffaut's "The 400 Blows", Bunuel's "Los Olvidados", De Sica's "Shoeshine", Nair's "Salaam, Bombay!", Bresson's "Mouchette", Nugroho's "Leaf on a Pillow", etc.), one might be afraid that the plight of the kid portrayed in the film might not affect one anymore, having been "de-synthesized" already after going through the emotional roller-coaster ride put in motion by the previously quoted films.

Thankfully, that won't be the case. For Babenco narrates his film in such a matter-of-fact manner ("artlessly", as one film reviewer put it, in a positive light) and that his central child performer, Fernando Ramos da Silva (13 years old at that time and a street kid himself), gives such a no-frills, wounded performance, raw in its simplicity (that hardened face, those lonely and longing eyes) that one is hard put not to be pierced in any way. (Such a feeling may achieve such a heightened realism when one learns that the child had only lived but a short life, having been involved in street crimes after the film and subsequently murdered.)

In about first half of the film, Pixote and his fellow street kids and delinquents spend their time in a repressive state-run reformatory school, where brutalization and humiliation, rape and murder, are the norm and culture;where they are forced to confess to their "crimes", on the flimsy notion that under the Brazilian law, underage felons are not "punishable" for their offenses. For these kids, the dubious freedom offered by the streets is more preferable than the harsh rehabilitation provided by these supposed well-meaning authorities. Within the walls of this supposed protective establishment, these young souls are soon to discover that love and care from parental figures are likewise nowhere to be found, if not to a degree worser.

(For Pixote, the only form of escape comes from puffing grass and sniffing glue, secretly smuggled inside the reformatory.)

When the kids burst themselves into a small-scale "revolt" to finally express and then fulfill their collective desire to get back to the outside world--their "home"--the intensity and form are of such a kind that one can't avoid thinking of the schoolboys' revolt in Jean Vigo's influential "Zero for Conduct". It's only that in "Pixote", the "uprising" is made to appear on a gutter level.

Once Pixote and his small group are back on the streets (the film's second half), they engage in robbery, pimping and drug-dealing to fend for themselves, along which they get to meet Sueli, a battered but kindly prostitute. Sueli willingly accomodates the four lost souls, in such a way that she allows her customers to be robbed by them and that she provides more than motherly care (at least to one of the children).

One would have thought that the street kids have at long last found the one person who can provide them the love and warmth that have been sorely lacking in their lives. But as dubious as the freedom that these kids believe the streets are providing, this new-found "maternal figure" cannot but stay forever.

Jealousy, squabbles, differences, and murder have only set the kids apart--and for good. And during that defining scene where Pixote, prompted by the circumstance, gets to shoot not just Sueli's arrogant American customer but also his fellow street urchin Ditto (more than a son to Sueli), he thereafter literally goes back to "infancy", as he sucks from the right breast of the disoriented woman, right there and then materializing his lingering desire for parental affection, the image itself both sad and unsettling.

It is so that Sueli, in a probable coming back to her "senses", lamentably pushes back Pixote from his "nourishing" position and rejects him, for good. Thus, in a quietly wrenching moment, Pixote, with that young-old face and those sullen eyes (not entirely dissimilar, though in a different context, to the young boy's mien in Elem Klimov's harrowing "Come and See"), gets himself up, puts on his coat and takes his gun (yes, a gun!), and sets off to nowhere, walking along the train tracks and with the morning light just beginning to show up. With that scene, Babenco may just be doing an homage (amongst many other homages found in different films!) to the iconoclastic final scene in Truffaut's "The 400 Blows".

But whereas we got to know what has become of Antoine Doinel three years later in the short film "Antoine et Colette" (as well as in three other feature films in the years thereafter), we are left grappling in the dark as to what lies ahead for Pixote after he finally disappears from the last frame, that being the last time that we'll get to see this real-life street child (notwithstanding the fate that eventually befell him in actuality).

"Pixote" may not be as nearly as whimsical as "The 400 Blows" or as hallucinatory as "Los Olvidados", but it still stands out among films of similar theme and texture because of its simple, raw power.

J. Hoberman, The Village Voice's resident film reviewer, described "The Battle of Algiers", Gillo Pontecorvo's Golden Lion-winner at the 1966 Venice International Film Festival, as the "revolutionary du jour". I have to agree. Completely.

Everything in the film could and should inspire ferocious and deeply-rooted ideologies and sentiments pertaining to one's own nation's freedom, independence and basic human rights.

The film is already four-decades old and the subject that it depicts, the Algerian people's struggle for liberation and self-determination against the French colonial government during the mid-'50s, can be rightfully considered as an integral part of modern history, but even when viewed from today's vantage point (as in my case) it still manages to unsettle and stun, to provoke and inspire. "The Battle of Algiers" possesses such staggering turmoil and realism that, as the events gradually unfold towards the nationwide street revolution, one can't help but be wide-eyed and unnerved throughout the film's 2-hour running time.

It works well to the film's advantage that it has managed to acquire through time an uncanny sense of historical immediacy. It feels as if Pontecorvo were still alive today working as a TV news reporter or documentarist recording with his own camera the incendiary real-life events right before our very own eyes. The Dziga Vertov principle of "life caught unawares" has moved onto a new level of meaning. It now becomes an almost-impossible task to draw the line between fiction and documentary, between what is staged and what is actual, if there really is such a distinction.

In my humble knowledge, no other highly-political film of World Cinema during those times and after has come close to the feral neo-realist energy of "The Battle of Algiers"--not even Costa-Gavra's "Z", "Missing" and "Amen", not even Francis Coppola's "Apocalypse Now", not even "L'America" (Amelio), "The Mission" (Joffe), "World Apart" (Menges), "Bloody Sunday" (Greengrass), not even our own "Orapronobis" (Brocka), just to name a handful.

What can even be more baffling--and thus put one more notch higher the film's above-mentioned quality--for today's viewers is how "The Battle of Algiers" can put in context today's headline-hogging and highly-relevant spate of "political terrorism", international and local. As "outsiders" having to become aware of the headlines mainly by means of TV or newspaper, it has become a necessary habit (justified or otherwise) to regard these bombings, assassinations, insurrections and any other forms of "terroristic" acts as a work of pure evil and inhumanity. This is for the reason that what we, the spectators, get to encounter immediately is the outcome, the damages done, of the event in question (the what and the how). More often than not, we don't get the opportunity to dig deep into the ideologies and motivations that led to the act (the why). If we ever had the chance to know the raison d'etre of the act, most likely the account is biased or blurred, thus further fuelling our "prejudices".

The numerous bombing incidents in the film (as well as the attacks on the French officials), mostly at the cost of innocent lives and in broad daylight, can be a sure cause of alarm, considering that these events essentially ring true as to what's being delivered from today's news. But as director Pontecorvo and writer Franco Solinas take pains to give an objective account of the Algerian struggle for liberation and independence--or of the Algerian insurrection, popularly known as the Front Liberation de Nationale (FLN), if one takes the liberty to use an "extreme" description--we get to come to the knowledge that these extreme measures used by the Algerian nationals could be the only possible way to attain an extreme goal, otherwise unimaginable through "simple" and "humble" acts (like the local prohibition of vices associated with the colonial government, such as alcohol, drugs and prostitution).

The unbiased account of the historical events is such that the high-ranking French colonial officers, during those tension-filled and critical moments (like the setting up for explosion of a resistance fighter's hideout), still get to exhibit some kind of humanity for their considered "enemies of the state" ("If you want to die there, then let the children out first", is one such line). Such "humaneness", though, by the very situation itself (or the description of the situation itself), gets to border on a comical awkwardness. These colonizers still manage to put a smile on our faces.

An intertitle towards the film's end says that the Algerian people finally attained freedom by 1962 (not after some nationwide turmoil, bloodshed and protest, those "unintelligible and frightening rhythmic cries"). However, if we are to take bloody seriously the film's timeless immediacy, then the battle doesn't only stop at Algiers. It continues on and on, in another form, in another place, in another era. Whether won or not, only history can tell.

As a post-Halloween presentation, Titus Brandsma Center, a Carmelite-run service organization here, held a screening of 3 Asian horror films:Higuchinsky's 'Uzumaki'(Japan), Youn-Hyun Chang's 'Tell Me Something'(South Korea) and 'Three', a trilogy of shorts by Ji-Woon Kim(S. Korea), Nonzee Nimibutr(Thailand) and Peter Chan(Hong Kong). The conceit behind the event was to "run along the same vein" as 'The Ring', a trend-setting, box-office hit Japanese spine-tingler(recently shown on Philippine television in a tolerable Filipino-dubbed version).

OK, 'Uzumaki'(which translates in English as "spiral" or "vortex")is a bizaare study in communal fixation and paranoia, with any swirl-shaped object as the ubiquitous motif. This debut film by Higuchinsky(who worked before as a director of music videos)succeeds in conveying the sense of collective disturbance and fear that grips the small community of Kuzouguchi, its distinguishing claustrophobic quality brings to mind the kind evoked by David Lynch in 'Blue Velvet'--it's only that the Japanese director takes one step further with his really, really fantastic and grotesque turn of events. But I guess that to fully enjoy the film, one should take it AS IT IS, with any "interpretation" of the purported "metaphorical" significance of the spiral following later(in my case, much, much later, if ever).

While 'Tell Me Something', bad luck of all bad lucks, was the much-maligned film in the line-up--with good reason. For despite its fair share of gore and tension, and a good-looking lead pair(the lieutenant and the lady under surveillance), a stubborn fact still shows up:that the film is another jaded offspring of the jaded serial-killer genre(it doesn't really take a lot of mindwork to guess, about 45 minutes--or even less!--into the film, who the murderer is;now, even this is a jaded remark!). Strangely though, on 2nd viewing, I began to find 'Tell Me Something' to be kind of interesting(it appeared that it wasn't really that bad), for at least, it scored a few points in the following:having a toned-down tension, evoking a noirish atmosphere with its rain-drenched urban locale at night and going against the "obligatory" fate of the lead pair being eventually romantically or sexually involved with one another(never mind the lack of a well-defined motivation, anyway, the two are as aloof to each other as they are to the viewers)--sigh, even this is a jaded indulgence!

But I still believe that Korean Cinema is one of the exciting film industries that we have, serving us with a good number of brave and provocative films in recent years, among them, Chul-Soo Park's '301/302', Jin-Ho Hur's 'Christmas in August', Ki-Duk Kim's 'The Isle' and 'Address Unknown', Jung-Ji Woo's 'Happy End' and Ji-Young Chang's 'The White Badge.'

Thankfully, the best was saved for the last, for 'Three' was the clear favorite of the audience(including myself). To be noted particularly are the 1st and 3rd episodes:Kim's 'Memories' and Chan's 'Going Home'(I wish I could say the same for the 2nd short). What I'm interested is how did these 2 episodes work upon the emotion of fear, as it's a given fact that such feeling is the one that films of the horror genre want to arouse mainly from the audience.

In 'Memories', where does fear spring forth? As it turns out, it's from the husband's(Bo-Seok Jong)"ghost of his own making", so to speak, as there's a terrible secret that he tries painfully to conceal. He may have succeeded in keeping it from other people's notice, but definitely not from the prodding of his own conscience, thus the hallucinations and nightmares(even if it appears that these don't seriously bother him at all!).

As it should be, the viewers don't completely have any idea about this "secret" at the start of the film, but through Kim's skillful interweaving of the husband's and the "lost" woman's(Hye-Suk Kim)respective scenes--he, as he confronts his terrifying nightmares;she, as she wanders through a barely-inhabited city, where various omens singularly happen to her--all told with little use of dialogues, it little by little builds up toward the grisly revelation, its utterly nightmarish quality is like Franz Kafka and Edgar Allan Poe have joined forces for the modern times.

The director may have relied on "old tricks" to scare the audience(anyway, it worked), but the best thing is that we can make sense of the fear thus evoked, we can "connect" with it. And this, the fear of having done a terrible misdeed and of having to face up with the nightmares(or "bad memories")that consequently spin out of one's own sinful act--whether one gets away with it or not.

On the other hand, watching 'Going Home' is like watching an assortment of 'Psycho', 'Awakenings' and 'The Sixth Sense.' However, it's of such a potent tragicomic quality that the viewers are still put under the spell, brought into force by a marvelous confluence of terrific performances(with Leon Lai at the forefront)and astounding mood photography(predominantly slimy green)by Wong Kar-Wai's "recording angel", Christopher Doyle.

Going through my files, I came upon my few notes on an early work by Chan, 'He's a Man, She's a Woman'(featuring the late Leslie Cheung), a hilarious comedy of errors-cum-ugly duckling tale-cum-gay film. Having this film in mind as I try to recollect 'Going Home', it makes sense why odd humor shows up from some nooks and crannies of this otherwise poignant and eerie tale of the transgressive power of love. Handled foolishly, this uncomfortable blending of humor and horror might've churned out another low-grade and campy shocker('Starship Troopers' and 'The House on Haunted Hill', anyone?).

Whenever the emotion of fear is aroused in us by this awarded episode, it's FOR Leon Lai's bespectacled, agonizing character--for his not being able to bring up the kind of family that he deserves, for his failure to achieve what could've constituted his happiness in this temporal life(the episode's title, in fact, implies "being with one's family"). And so, as in 'Memories', the "fear factor" here makes sense.

Fyodor Dostoyevsky's novel 'The Brothers Karamazov', for all its monumental breadth and depth in philosophy and theology, has at its very core the dominant figure of the Father, whose callous authoritativeness and irresponsible disposition--and eventual murder--have decidedly molded the characters and philosophies of his four sons--Mitya, Ivan, Alyosha, Smerdyakov--and altogether marked their essentially tragic fate.

Two films I recently saw, though not really epic in scope, have arguably imbued the spirit of the literary masterpiece:the French 'Human Resources' by Laurent Cantet and the Russian 'Mother and Son' by Aleksander Sokurov are predominantly deferential to the parental figures, respectively, of the Father and the Mother.

If Dostoyevsky's 'Karamazov' is in the manner of the psychological/existential probing of the human soul with a murder-mystery on the surface, in what way do the two films work on their archetypal themes?

'Human Resources' works as a labor drama as it involves an educated son (Jalil Lespert as Franck)who returns to his hometown after years of studying in Paris to be trained as part of the management staff of a factory(whose name serves as the film's title)where his father(Jean-Claude Vallod as Jean-Claude)has been devotedly working for 30 long years.

Despite being imbued with fresh ideas and attitude, Franck tries as much as possible to maintain a "moderate" persona at work in deference to his father's unquestioning servility--to the point of becoming an anonymous piece among the assembly of workers(who isn't, anyway?).So we can initially see that the son's newly-assumed, though arguably much higher, position is "humbled" before the father's mere length of service.

But little did Franck expect that he would be gradually immersed in--and eventually, fiercely committed to--a sensitive issue regarding a planned assembly-line scheme that almost all the factory workers consider as exploitative and inhuman, as it would basically enforce the policy of "reduced hours and workers, forced production quota, less pay." I say "almost", because everyone else is visibly concerned except for the young man's father, with whom the "business as usual" philosophy is adhered to the fullest, despite the fact that in the near future, the management would already have "no business" with him.And this is what agitates Franck further.

Thus, in an emotionally-shattering confrontation, the son makes it known to the father the worthlessness of all his labors and value as an assembly-line worker.With his new-found cause, Franck may have saved his father's reputation, but not his own future("When are you going?" and "Where is your place?" are his meaningful queries by the film's end).

While 'Mother and Son' is an entirely two-character drama(Gudrun Geyer and Aleksei Ananishov in the title roles)that is outwardly simple but, in fact, open to multiple interpretations.I have my own take on the story(uncertain though it may be), but for fear of pre-empting those who might want to see the film sooner or later(and of putting myself to shame), I better not dare to give my piece of mind on the matter for the time being(I patiently watched the film three times for three straight days, but still...!).Instead, let me say that, as this was made by a contemporary Russian filmmaker(acclaimed in Cannes for his equally maverick works, 'Russian Ark' and 'Father and Son'), it was closer to the mood and leanings of the above-mentioned Russian literary classic--dark, brooding, eerie, lambasting.If you thought Andrei Tarkovskij was enough to rattle your brains out, think again.

The disciple has learned his lesson from the master--by heart.(I have another Russian film in waiting, '100 Days Before the Command' by Hussein Erkenov, said to be another 'obedient' disciple.)

With regard to the narrative technique, the two films move radically on different threads.

Laurent's work is molded according to the style of a neorealist "docu-drama"--the emphasis is on the commonplace and the seemingly trivial, but not to be taken for granted;the characters are portrayed by non-professional or first-time actors who, for the most part, have lived the lives they essay onscreen;and to further bolster the authentic feel, dramatic frills and shrills, the "workshop-intensive"-type of acting are shunned(this isn't to say, however, that there are no crucial turning points in the film, as the above-mentioned confrontation between the father and son indicates;it's just that the emotions are raw, rather than garnished).Again, the viewers are asked to observe, to immerse themselves in the lives and concerns of these ordinary people, who are essentially no different from them.

I say "again", because 'Human Resources' was released around the time when other French-language dramas of the same mold had initially made their way to the silver screen:'La Promesse', 'Life of Jesus', 'Rosetta', 'Humanity', 'Dreamlife of Angels.' There seemed to be a "trend" back then.

But if these films--particularly 'Rosetta' and 'Humanity'--tended to be "inward-looking", to dwell in their anxiously-guarded private world, Laurent's film, as its primary issue(the workers contending with a proposed labor scheme)calls for, doesn't only concentrate on the two central characters but takes into consideration the other critical characters as well--their fellow factory workers(in the same way that Dostoyevsky pierces through the souls not just of the Karamazov brothers but also of the various important figures that directly or subtly affect their lives).

For his part, Sokurov's excruciatingly meditative and tranquil dialectics in his film(as if some kind of painter was deeply-absorbed in putting on canvas every scene), with an attendant sense of something forbidden taking place, is counterbalanced by the pastoral countryside, now and then draped in golden sunshine rays, heavy clouds and smooth wind, an expressionist camera focus and a few of the most astonishing shots ever composed onscreen.The "exact" nature of the "troubled" relationship between the mother and son can be gleaned from their evocative gestures and utterances--like "You always kept your eyes on me.I was ashamed", the son says to the mother and "I was afraid that they would take you away from me", the mother lets it known to the son.

Ah, to dissect an age-old commandment!

For the young Pelle in Bille August's 'Pelle the Conqueror',the only way to change the course of their hapless immigrant life is by "conquering the world", with America as the foremost destination.While for the young mother Selma in Lars Von Trier's 'Dancer in the Dark', though she still believes that Communism is the best social order there is(having migrated from Czechoslovakia), when it comes to musicals, the Americans are still the best(just figure out the congruence in this line of reasoning).

Why do I mention this? It's because having seen both films in the course of a day, I came upon the curious realization that the two have a sort of "kinship"--that is, that both have something to do with, well, America.

When it comes to films about the immigrant life, couldn't there be any place better than America as a distant land of promise and hope? What difference does it make if a particular dreamy-eyed character opted to try his/her luck instead in, say, Poland or Austria? Or perhaps, in Mexico or Iceland?

Well, I think I just have to settle for the rather "simplistic"(if not "silly")assumption that America just sounds good--that is, in terms of wealth, power and such universally-accepted values of freedom and democracy.Let's just say that what these downtrodden characters find miserably lacking in their native land, they hope to gain in abundance in the New World.

Is that an enough ego-booster for a country that already has too much of a bolstered ego? Thankfully, there are films that dare to bring down to earth, so to speak, such a highly-inflated belief(whether on an epic scale, like Gregory Nava's 'El Norte' or on small terms, like Jim Jarmusch's 'Mystery Train')--and August's and Von Trier's cinematic pieces further add a bitter flavor to the sweet taste of success.

Of course, the two directors' methodologies in their respective films differ significantly from each other, but the harsh and unapologetic tone undeniably resonates throughout in both.

In 'Pelle the Conqueror', August lets the father-and-son immigrant(Max Von Sydow and Pelle Hvenegaard, respectively)struggle through life in a foreign land "other" than America before finally deciding to try their luck once again in "that" land.It's tempting to comfort oneself with the thought that America might just be the long-fantasized wonderland for these hopeful wanderers, but what the father and son have gone through in Denmark makes me want to think otherwise.It may only be the foreboding of things "still" to come.

How August depicts old Lasse's and young Pelle's everyday life--and that of the people around them--in the farmland of their work is in the justifiable manner of what is termed as Cinema of Abjection(Mira Nair's 'Salaam, Bombay! and Vitali Kanevsky's 'Freeze-Die-Come to Life' would be fine examples).Again, how it is to live in utter destitution and decrepitness is presented in its ugliest but, ultimately, truthfully humane form:the fly-infested stable, the body of a lifeless infant in the river, the stolen cow's milk being fed to a hungry cat, the dead teacher in front of his class, the mere appearance of the circus-loving bastard son, the accident-trigerred dumb-like behavior of the farmland's rebellious stablekeeper.

It now probably appears to the father and son that dying of hunger in one's native land is no worst off than suffering the brutal conditions of work in a foreign country.But rather than dampening his spirit, it has only fuelled the young Pelle to "look further ahead." But is it for the good?

The film ends with a far-angle shot of the young boy approaching the vast sea, determined to "conquer" the Land of Dreams that is America.The very distant camera, the frosty coldness of the surroundings and the indifferent yet uneasy stillness of the sea may only foreshadow the risky possibility that the land-to-be-sought is just as unwelcoming and unfeeling as the land-to-be-left-behind.

Meanwhile, the heroine(Björk as Selma)in 'Dancer in the Dark' has already found her means of livelihood in America(in an aluminum factory), working herself to the limits in order to save up the necessary amount needed for her only son's eye operation(even if she herself is in urgent need of one).Things appear to run smoothly, until, of all people, a police-neighbor(David Morse), whom Selma considers as a trustworthy friend, is tempted to do an unimaginable deed(for reasons that are "economic" in nature), further leading to an "involuntary" gruesome act that seals the young mother's fate.

The viewers know throughout that a great injustice has been done to Selma.But then, it's to be borne in mind that this was partly "willed" by herself, since she never for once deviated from the true purpose of her saved-up money, which could've been used otherwise to pay for a more competent private lawyer.Mother surely knows best, as they say--to the point of denying herself in favor of others.

Thinking further, however, while the American jury that tried Selma's case may be only doing its job, couldn't it have been swayed by mere sentiment? Was the fact that the plaintiff was a "democratic" American and the defendant a "communist" Czech plain coincidence? It didn't help at all that what the embattled mother testified in court was part of her "musical fantasies", incomprehensible in a place that purportedly adheres to strict logic.

We can now state that in filtering out the bright promise of America through their respective cinematic lenses, August, on the one hand, focused mainly on the harsh working conditions of a migrant job, in a reflexive manner(as the characters are in Denmark),while Von Trier, on the other, turned his attention primarily on the American jury system and its own interpretation of "justice."

I've only seen a couple of the Swedish filmmaker's works(the other one was the later 'The Best Intentions'), but I hope I'm justified in saying that his dramas have a heart for struggling characters, those who are on the crossroads of their lives.

While the Danish auteur's audacious cinematics--the kinetic and intrusive hand-held camera, the "unprocessed" cinematography by Robby Müller, an incredible portrayal by a first-time film actress, the "extreme" factor in the narrative--are again in full force in his Cannes Grand Prize-winning piece, though you may sometimes feel that you've already had enough of those in 'Breaking the Waves'(so what would that make of his upcoming 'Dogville'?).It's a curious thing, too, that the key scenes appear to be derived from some early classics:like the one where Selma pathetically provides a semblance of normalcy to her solitary confinement(similar to what Giulio Brogi did in the Taviani bros' 'St. Michael Had A Rooster')and the other where she's in deeply-felt terror as she literally walks with heavy feet toward the death stand(comparable to what Isabelle Huppert movingly displayed by the end of Chabrol's 'Story of Women').Anyway, cinematic derivation is an accepted practice in filmmaking--even with someone as original as Von Trier!

It's easy to watch a film that deals with a historical tragedy if it leans heavily on the victim's side--that is, on the one who is conquered, vanquished, oppressed;the one who didn't intend and is merely at the receiving-end of the catastrophe.For it's clearly defined where our "sympathies" should lie.Our moral duty as film-viewers is unambiguously called to task and eventually fulfilled.

Thus, in a film about Nazism and the Holocaust, we are almost always moved by the fate of the Jews, the sole target of the so-called "racial cleansing" (e.g., the Hungarian Jews in Kjell Grede's 'Good Evening, Mr. Wallenberg').Or in a film that portrays Japan's imperialist might during World War II, it's not unlikely that we're on the side of that country's colonial subject (e.g., the Chinese villagers in about the second half of Zhang Yimou's 'Red Sorghum').

But what if the supposed aggressors were also the unwilling victims? Would it be easy for us to look at the other side of the coin?

Such daring questions may possibly come up upon watching Volker Schlöndorff's 'The Tin Drum' (TD) and Shohei Imamura's 'Black Rain' (BR).The two films deal with a critical period in their respective countries' history:the rise of Adolf Hitler and his National Socialist (Nazi) party in Germany and the dropping of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima, Japan.Both events were inextricably linked with the Second World War, wherein Germany's and Japan's roles were, unfortunately, always viewed in the nature of destruction and assimilation.So we can imagine the risky and unconventional position of Schlöndorff's and Imamura's films.

The two master directors didn't have to move away from home, so to speak, to illustrate the horrific implications of the Führer and the Bomb.As they saw it, it wasn't only the exterminated Jews and the colonized territories that were the immediate victims of a destructive craving for world dominion;it was also the people of their own.

In TD, it's the child Oskar Matzerath, who had the "misfortune" of being born in a "disgusting" world(something which he already "perceived" while still in his mother's womb!);in BR, it's a Japanese landowner couple and their 25-year-old niece named Yasuko, who never thought that their lives would dramatically change on the morning of August 6, 1945.

But these unwilling--if not unlikely--victims have their own way of facing up to the monumental monstrosities that are of their own nations' making.

At the age of three, Oskar decided to make that fatal--and fateful--"fall" so that, though he may age through the years, his body would "forever" be of a small child, being a form of rebellion against a disgusting world--on a personal level, against the "unholy triunity" in his family;on a social level, against the incipient ascenscion to power of an innately mass-destructive Führer.Why would I let myself grow up when those around me have shown, with their despicable acts, that they, too, haven't "grown up", the little rebel seems to ask.

In the course of this "micro-revolt", Oskar's sole "companion" and "weapon" is a red-and-white-striped tin drum, supplied to him regularly (in a subtly subversive act) by a kind Jewish store owner(who, along with thousands of others of his own skin, would later fall victim to a one-man-guided racial annihilation).This, together with his powerful, shrieking voice, are Oskar's "sound-proof" shields against the noises and shrills of a world in chaos.

While in BR, the devastation of the atomic bomb is of a wide-ranging implication that, even if half-a-decade has already passed, it can still be potently felt, physically as well as emotionally.The scars are endured not only by the body but also by the soul.

But for the landowner couple, the ill-effects of the Bomb shouldn't get in the way of their niece's being able to live a happily-married life.Thus, every possible oppurtunity for engagement and, eventually, marriage is taken by the couple for Yasuko's sake, even if the wounds and memories of that fateful morning are destined to stick with them for the rest of their lives.

Schlöndorff interpreted his bleak subject in consonance with Günter Grass' novel of the same title(the first of his "Danzig trilogy"), from which the Palme d'Or-winning film was adapted--in a flight-of-fantasy manner, as if to say that all the workings and consequences of Hitler's Reich were the destructive fantasies of a delusional mind.Or that's how the stunted Oskar would want to see it.Thus, the horrible shriek on the bell tower, the rain-drenched disorder in the open-ground meeting of Hitler's Youth, the wine-glass-breaking circus act for the bedazzled SS officers, the mother's fish-consumptive breakdown--these are just some.

This director born by the New German Cinema(along with the likes of Werner Herzog and Rainer W. Fassbinder)knows too well how to find his way through the labyrinthine intricacies of Grass' literary piece that the result is a splendid masterwork, with, as Leonard Maltin puts it, "memorable sequence after memorable sequence." Another thing memorable, of course, are the superlative portrayals throughout(the mother, the father, the uncle, the Jewish merchant, the maidservant, the midget travelling performer), most specially by the incredible 12-year-old David Bennent as the unusual rebel Oskar.

On the other hand, Imamura takes more the role of a quiet observer in BR(also based on a novel)that the outcome is a somber and stark black-and-white portrait of his own national tragedy, painfully real as it is creepily unimaginable, as if reality and nightmare have merged into one paradoxical whole(in a way that Ingmar Bergman would have it, on a more intimate level though, as can be perceived in 'Scenes from a Marriage' and 'From the Life of the Marionettes').For who would ever imagine that these things could happen--a young boy who has become a horrible nuclear "monster", making his presence known to an older brother, a throng of people grappling for life in a poisoned river, a stupefied mother hugging her stiffly-burnt infant, a blinded man "looking" for Hiroshima? Such are the images that make up the initial quarter of BR;and the images are so strong that they'll haunt you DURING and AFTER the film.

Even the second half, where everything should've been "pacified" already, is not without unsettling images, more so because of the quiet and deliberate manner in which they are executed--the last moments of an old man in his deathbed, Yasuko's hair gradually falling down, the tableau-like encounter of a traumatized soldier with the horrors of his past.

The Japanese master's deft hand in exploring the dark undercurrents of Japanese life with his peculiar brand of humor and pathos is evident here, as he still displays in his comeback masterwork almost a decade later, 'The Eel.' Unlike in the last film, though, the destabilization in BR is to be viewed from an encompassing perspective--as an irreparable consequence of Japan's historical blunder.

To focus on unlikely victims is not to say that this "side" was more devastated than the "other" and so, is more "deserving" of our sympathies.Rather, it's one way of bringing across the painful lesson that in a historical tragedy like fascism and war, there are really no champions, only casualties.

Michael Haneke and Lars Von Trier are two contemporary filmmakers who have no qualms about going to extremes in the service of their craft;they are always willing to transcend the boundaries of their art.It's well and good if their lead performers--Isabelle Huppert and Emily Watson, respectively--share the same attitude and goal.What more can you ask for?

Being "extreme" and "out-of-bounds" doesn't necessarily have to sound "pornographic" and "outrageous" (if what you have in mind are such disguised-as-art excesses like Oshima's 'In the Realm of the Senses' and Makavejev's 'Sweet Movie').It may as well have to do with the daringness to tackle crucial and sensitive issues of morality, psychology, individual action and responsibility, and social judgment and acceptance, in such a way that has never been done in the cinema before.(To be fair, though, the aforementioned films were also attempts to tread on infrequently-traversed issues;it's only that gross treatment eventually took the upper hand over well-intentioned substance.)

Haneke's 'The Piano Teacher' (PT) and Von Trier's 'Breaking the Waves' (BW), both Grand Jury Prize winners at the Cannes Film Fest, are both liberated cinematic works in the above-mentioned sense, aside from the significant fact that both have female protagonists who are experiencing the same level of moral/psychological quandary and are thus forced to make extreme decisions regarding their extreme situations.

This piece now serves as a comparative appreciation of the two films.

PT opens with Isabelle Huppert (as Erika) quietly arriving in their home after a day's work, when her mother (Annie Girardot) comes out and reprimands her for coming home at such a late time.A confrontation ensues--until Erika grabs her mother's hair.What exactly does Erika do during her off-work hours and why the overprotectiveness of the mother, despite her daughter's age? Things are just about to heat up.

Meanwhile, BW starts off with an extreme close-up of Emily Watson (as Bess), with an impish smile and twinkling eyes, being sternly asked--we eventually learn--by the town clergy questions regarding marriage and her preparedness and capacity for it.To such questions, Bess answers with child-like simplicity and straightforwardness.But why the clergy's doubt and hesitation over her entry into a married life, despite her being at a rightful age? The chapters are just about to open up one by one.

How did Haneke and Von Trier track the lives of their respective lead characters?

As in 'Funny Games' and 'Code Unknown', the Austrian filmmaker's camera in PT is still, lingering and observant, which only serves, ironically, to underscore the deeply-rooted tension in the situation.Thus, when moments of Erika's self-destructive eroticism gradually reveal themselves onscreen (like the genital mutilation in the bathtub, the visit to a male-frequented porn video shop and the look-out for a copulating couple in a drive-in theater), after an initial brush with her outward character of being a dignified and disciplined, but rigid and icy, piano teacher (the kind who can't and won't see her students' potentials), we are simply drawn into "savoring" a delicate situation wherein man's secret and subconscious urges come to the surface.

It's like a graphic demonstration of a Freudian case history, specially if we consider that the film is situated in Vienna, the city where the great psychoanalyst primarily cultivated his field--and which may be one of the instigators of Erika's morbid ailment, what with its high standards on the arts and scientific research, which may really be too much for the woman (not to mention, of course, her troubled relationship with her parents).

On the other hand, the Danish director's jittery hand-held camera and Robby Muller's desaturated cinematography, other than being an illustration of what was to become a discernible movement style (as can be seen in 'The Idiots', Vinterberg's 'The Celebration' and Levring's 'The King is Alive', though BW is not included in the Dogma '95 film series), accentuate the precariousness and delicateness of Bess' life, being a child forever trapped in a woman's body, unable to free herself from the encroaching shadows of her parental figures.Thus, her marriage to an oil depot worker (Stellan Skarsgard as Jan) is simply beyond the comprehension of almost everyone in the rigid parish community (and so, the seeming "incomprehensiveness" of the colors and angles).These people may have every reason to doubt and worry, but what can be more reasonable than the purity and intensity of love that Bess and Jan have for one another? Again, the unadulterated quality of this love is expressed in the desaturated colors (and thus we can see that the framings and photography in BW serve a complex purpose).

From what was written above, we can further point out that both PT and BW progress according to the psycho-emotional dynamics of the female protagonists.It is through their actions, feelings and words that refuse to be confined within the limits of convention and normalcy that we follow the films.These films become these characters, in the deepest sense.

And as the two audacious and unapologetic auteurs would have it, they'll put their characters (say, the complacent affluent family in Haneke's 'Funny Games' or the beleaguered doctors in Von Trier's 'The Kingdom') in a situation wherein they're inevitably drawn into decisions and actions that are not usually within their "normal" stock of choices and capabilities.

And it is to be particulary noted that, as far as the two women are concerned, such pivotal moments are in the nature of sexuality, which only planted the seeds of their own undoing, self-destructive as it is self-gratifying.

For Erika, it's the arrival of the young and handsome Walter (Benoit Magimel), the further provocation of her sadomasochistic perversions (her penultimate act with a sharp knife is of a phallic significance, similar to the brutal conclusion of Breillat's 'Perfect Love');for Bess, it's the paralysis of Jan during a work accident that serves as a basis for performing an unimaginable self-sacrifice, scandalous for the parish community with its tight-locked moral code because of the sexual liberalism that the act evokes.

Huppert's character in PT is the most extreme that she has essayed so far in her entire brilliant career (despite similarly provocative roles in 'Coup de Torchon', 'Story of Women', 'Entre Nous', 'Madame Bovary' and 'Un Merci pour le Chocolat'), while Watson's in BW is remarkably complex and intense for an introductory role.

Extreme decisions and incredible sacrifices.Such are the dictums in Haneke's and Von Trier's finest cinematic transgressions.

Bruno Dumont's 'Humanity' (L'Humanite´) is a film that easily invites controversy(though such a choice situation musn't already alarm film people--spectators and creators alike--for there has always been and will always be films that arouse controversy, whether intended or not, from Luis Bunuel's short 'Un Chien Andalou' and Orson Welles' legendary 'Citizen Kane', to the almost-obscure 'Deep Crimson' by Arturo Ripstein and 'The Piano Teacher' by Michael Haneke).

When the film was awarded the Grand Jury Prize at the 1999 Cannes International Film Festival, the director had to suffer the humiliation of being loudly jeered upon reaching the stage by "some people" present during the rites.I have no idea though if Emmanuel Schotte and Severine Caneele had to go through the same ordeal when they were awarded the Best Actor and Best Actress awards, respectively, for the film(though that's not an unlikely possibility, specially if one learns that both were non-professionals performing their very first lead roles in the film).

After seeing 'Humanity' myself recently, I was quite amused at how easily I made "enemies" with a few acquaintances(who saw the film, too) when I unhesitatingly told them that it's a good film, even being brave enough to point out that it's one of the best, daring and original works in recent years.Even if I would be put in a quixotic position for championing the film, I would not in the least be bothered, for I honestly believe in my conviction(anyway, I only have the Cannes jurors, headed at the time by David Cronenberg, to back me up).

The general hostility toward 'Humanity' converges upon the assertion that the film is nothing but a "pointless", "senseless", and "self-indulgent" piece of cinematic "trash." I can't and won't blame them;rather, I appreciate these people for always having a ready, but not-so-novel, tirade against a film that doesn't readily lend itself to general viewership and appreciation and exactly conform to the accepted "entertainment" standards of movie fare(Bunuel's 'Viridiana', Antonioni's 'Blowup' and Kubrick's 'A Clockwork Orange' were among the classic casualties).

What's wrong with 'Humanity'? As it appears, some people can't see the point in why a film that's supposed to center on a police investigator's hunt for the culprit in a gruesome rape and murder of an 11-year-old girl would eventually delve, for the entire 148 minutes, into "nothing"--into "inactivity" and "complacency" that have completely "nothing to do" with the basic plot.Sad to say, the film is not the average edge-of-your-seat, popcorn-munching manhunt thriller with you-already-know-what-happens-next twists and turns--and it doesn't intend to be one.

Said differently, 'Humanity' is not an easy fare--in the sense that it painstakingly brings the viewers into an intense and intimate contact with the subterranean layers and subconscious motives--with what really lies beneath--of human behavior and relationships.The film becomes a device for a psychoanalytic coming-to-terms with our own humanity.Maybe that scared off--subconsciously--those who decry the film, as a Freudian analysis is likely to result in.

However, Bruno Dumont doesn't profess to give the answers, but to simply describe, a kind of scientific documentation.

This can be seen in the manner in which the filmmaker narrates the film--and this is where the issue comes from.

Being a specimen of what can be termed as Cinema of Naturalism(Erick Zonca's 'Dreamlife of Angels' and the Dardenne brothers' 'La Promesse' and 'Rosetta' fall under this;even Dumont's introductory film, 'Life of Jesus'), Dumont does away with the professional maneuverings of acting and scene construction.Instead, in a modernist interpretation of the Dziga Vertov-principle "life caught unawares", every moment is presented without the principal figures having to be "aware" that they're making a film;everyone behaves intuitively and instinctively, as if in complete "disobedience" of any filmic instruction.

And the result is a naturalism that is brutally, graphically raw and inherently incendiary.

The incapacity--due to a deeply-harbored personal trauma--of the police investigator (Schotte) to pursue the culprit and thus serve due justice is carefully and uncompromisingly reflected in his fractured day-to-day interaction with other people(his mother, the lovers next door, his superior), where emotions are kept unexpressed and any chance for bonding and intimacy is kept at bay.Even the persons surrounding the troubled and stoic policeman are not without their inner ailments, mainly repressed but now-and-then provoked by the sporadic violence and tension that erupt within their remote and quiet provincial town, otherwise a wonderland of lust and idleness. (In this respect, David Lynch's 'Blue Velvet' comes to mind, minus the surrealist conceit, though.)

It took about three years before Dumont followed-up his equally intense debut 'Life of Jesus' (an awardee, too, in Cannes).His third feature, 'Twenty-four Palms', is hopefully due next year (maybe in Cannes again?) and based on initial readings, it promises to be just as intriguing and provocative.

It's not easy observing humanity.

With Michelangelo Antonioni's emergence as a filmmaker, a new face was given to Italian cinema.It was not the oppressed and hard-luck face one sees in Vittorio de Sica's films ('The Bicycle Thief' and 'Umberto D').Nor was it the superficially flamboyant and jolly face one notices in Federico Fellini's works ('La Strada' and 'La Dolce Vita').

Rather, the kind of face one encounters in Antonioni's films bears the stamp of contemporary urban life--blank, weary, estranged, lost.In essence, Antonioni can be considered as the cinematic alter ego of the German novelist and short story writer Franz Kafka ('Metamorphosis' and 'The Trial')--both are unflinchingly consistent in their concerns and preoccupations:the metaphysical anguish and anxiety of contemporary existence.Whereas Kafka's method of discourse borders on the surreal and the absurd, Antonioni's takes the form of symbolism and allegory.

It's no coincidence that his films are always peopled with characters who occupy a prominent place in society:the privileged young adults in 'L'Avventura', the successful novelist and his wife in 'La Notte', the industrialist's wife in 'Red Desert'--their material abundance masks an emotional void.The vacuity is made all the more palpable by the intense clash between appearance and substance, between what they have and what they are.

Antonioni's 'Blowup', the top winner in the 1967 Cannes International Film Festival, furthers his filmic thesis.This time, the urban malaise is onerously felt by a young, accomplished and bratty photographer (David Hemmings).The superficial glossiness and the emotional pretensions of the fashion world and pop culture through which he navigates have already taken their toll on him, so much so that he remains "nameless" throughout the film (in the same way that readers know the protagonist in Kafka's 'The Castle' only by the initial "K."), a mark of individual dissolution and alienation.As he tells us, London (the main setting of the film) has got nothing to do with him anymore and in his job, he's always in the company of pretty ladies, but that's just it--impersonal and distant;he's simply "fed up with those bloody bitches."

Until that chance encounter with an anonymous caressing couple at a solemn park, whom, without second thoughts, he takes pictures of.As he develops the pictures into larger sizes (hence, the title), something "unpleasant" is beginning to take shape out of the seemingly ordinary shots:a case of infidelity and murder--which may explain the lovely woman's (Vanessa Redgrave) agitation and persistence in having the roll of film for herself.This "eerie" discovery has shaken the photographer out of his humdrum and mechanized existence to investigate further about the "crime"--for nothing.

In the hands of the novelist Kafka, such a storyline may be used to prompt the readers into utilizing their imagination for them to have a grasp of the gruelingly bizarre odyssey into which the writer plunges his atomized protagonist in his search for what is true and real--if there's really such a thing.

The filmmaker Antonioni has a different take, though.As apt to his camera medium, he makes use of a film's "look"--the mood, texture, atmosphere--to convey certain concepts and appearances that permit of myriad interpretations.

In 'L'Avventura', we have the barren island and the silences.In 'La Notte', the transparent glass windows and the silences.In 'Red Desert', the fog and, still, the silences.'Blowup', it's significant to say, has one special affinity with the last-mentioned film:the intelligent use of colors to tell or hint at something.

In both films, Antonioni had Carlo di Palma as the director of photography;and I should say that Di Palma certainly had an intuitive grasp of what was in the filmmaker's complex and brooding mind.

But whereas in 'Red Desert', the sharp and strong colors were glaringly used to indicate the intensity with which modern industrial decay and pollution can bring a young wife to a downward spiral into madness, in 'Blowup', the color schemes were intriguingly quiet and subtle that, to the uninitiated, they might end up as "mere" garnishes and decorations, as just "being there."

Go, figure out for yourselves the metaphysical/hermeneutical value of the following:the models' outfits, the photography studio, the row of houses, the antique shop, the photographer's friend's painting, Redgrave's black-striped long-sleeved shirt and black tie, the corpse in the park.You may also want to try peeling off the layers of meaning that may lie beneath these instances:the menage-a-trois on a floor-size cut of aqua-blue cartolina, the photographer's whimsical purchase of an antique propeller, his having found himself in a middle of a jammed-down band concert, his chance initial tour of the ghostly park. (Maybe that's why the film became a cult favorite--one realizes that there's a pleasure in seeing the film again and deciphering the hidden meanings;the film turns out to be a challenging puzzle!)

That's what Antonioni's masterpiece is all about:tranquility and subtlety.About three-fourths of the film is narrated in puzzling silence (the final sequence itself is a seven-minute pantomimic silence, which may have influenced Tsai Ming-liang for his final shot of the crying woman in 'Vive L'Amour';in fact, the latter has certain semblances of 'Blowup').By such a silence, Antonioni wanted the viewers themselves to sense the existential melange eating their souls.As it were, the pervasive danger of contemporary living is individual disintegration and dissolution, brought about by no less than one's immediate culture and milieu.

And as far as the "nameless" photographer is concerned, if the image captured on the photo doesn't exactly reproduce the material world and our experiences, as its function is supposed to be, then what is still there for us to discover and know what is real and true? Could it be that the life we live is nothing but an illusion, hence our morbid feelings of anxiety and despair?

Sounds fantastic, but why not?

Mujeres.Femmes.Ragazzo.Women.They have always been the central figures in Pedro Almodovar's films.His "inspirational muse", so to speak.

His first full-length film, 'Pepi, Luci, Bom', focuses on three female friends (an abused heiress, a masochist wife and a lesbian rock singer) living in the drug-and-rock-'n'-roll-era Madrid;'Matador' has a woman lawyer taking up the rape case of a young man who faints at the sight of blood, while struggling with her own perversion of being sexually-aroused by scenes of murder;the cult hit 'Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown' features the brilliant Carmen Maura as a voice actress clinging on to what's left of her stable mind after being left by her lover (who has a wife, by the way);the under-appreciated 'High Heels' gives us the captivating duo of Marisa Paredes and Victoria Abril as celebrity mother and daughter trying to pick up the pieces of their broken relationship;and, of course, the Oscar-awardee 'All About My Mother', which serves as, in the words of film critic Leonard Maltin, "a paean to women--in real life, in film and on stage."

With his latest and widely-acclaimed work, 'Talk to Her', most people have remarked that the Spanish filmmaker has "shifted" his attention to the "less-fair sex" (the title of his film-in-progress, 'Male Education', is an indication that he is progressively heading toward that direction).Well, not quite.We may have seen for most of the screening time crucial developments in the lives of the characters of Javier Camara and Dario Grandinetti, but what--or rather, who--actually triggered those developments?

How could possibly the journalist Marco (Grandinetti) and the nurse Benigno (Camara) cross paths and develop an intense friendship (the most vivid portrayal of male friendship in the cinema as far as I know, almost surpassing the kind seen in Truffaut's 'Jules et Jim' and Tornatore's 'Cinema Paradiso') if not for the respective women in their lives, by way of the essentially similar tragedies that befell on them? Whenever we see the two men in their respective moments of emotive outpouring--Marco in quiet desperation, Benigno in an outburst of speech--they're always meant for the bullfighter Lydia (Rosario Flores) and the ballerina Alicia (Leonor Watling).

It's in the passivity of the two women in their "clinically-dead" state that the two men are spurred to activity that'll definitely have a major bearing on the course their lives will take.In that sense, Lydia and Alicia are actually active, the ones who still "have the say." It's true that Almodovar focused this time on two male characters brought together by fate and chance, but it's really a way of saying, at least in this case, that such a friendship wouldn't have happened without the quirky and unpredictable trajectory of life playing its hands first upon the two ladies.

In the above-mentioned films, the maestro of the outrageously original stories of love, desire and relationships always gives his female protagonists a definitive and pivotal moment of assertion--a kind of breaking the barriers.

In 'Women on the Verge...', it's when Carmen Maura decides to finally do away with all the things that remind her of her nowhere-to-be-found lover, to the point of literally burning the house down (well, almost);'High Heels' has Victoria Abril bringing the audience to their feet when, while doing her job as a newscaster, she suddenly owns up on nationwide TV to a sensational crime being implicated on her;while in 'All About My Mother', it's hard not to be moved by the sight of Cecilia Roth (the 'Mother' in the title) carrying in her arms the newly-born son of the AIDS-stricken nun (who died while giving birth), an epiphanic moment where each one reciprocally replaces the loss in the other's life.

Such a moment is not missing in 'Talk to Her' either.

It's tempting to say it's the stunningly kinky 'Shrinking Lover' part.But it should not.

Rather, it's that equally stunning--and surprising--moment where Marco, after a long while, visits Benigno in prison, for the latter has been convicted for "taking advantage" of the comatose Alicia.The two men's exchanges and gestures give us a masterful suggestion of homosexual affection.Thus, even if Almodovar has bestowed the moment of realization and re-evaluation upon his male leads this time, the emotional structure is still molded according to feminine sensibilities.

If in his early obras, Almodovar always portrayed men as the cause of suffering of women, in his latest masterpiece, he seems to have taken his "revenge" by letting the "less-fair sex" feel right in their hearts how it is to be the fairer sex.Aggression toward the opposite gender gives way to affection for the same gender.

As if such were not enough, the film's concluding moment offers a clue to a beautiful relationship in the making as provoked by the resurrected character of Alicia, the ballerina.It's still the woman who comes the last--and the best--out of the Pandora's box of tragedy and despair.

When Roman Polanski won the Best Director award for 'The Pianist' in last month's Oscars, he missed what could've been his chance to personally dedicate the award to his fellow Poles who were the heart of his film.If it was Pedro who got the "bald man" instead, he might've taken the opportunity to "talk" to all the women out there, they whom the maestro has always loved in his films.

The subject of Roman Polanski's Palme d'Or-winning (and now, Oscar-nominee) film, 'The Pianist',isn't exactly new and provocative:the suffering of the Jews under the brutal and merciless rule of Adolf Hitler during World War II, when the Third Reich was ominously gaining power, the driving force of which was the assertion of Germany's superiority as a race and a nation.Or simply put, the Holocaust.

This has already been touched upon in some early films, like Germany's 'My Mother's Courage', Italy's 'Life is Beautiful', Sweden's 'Good Evening, Mr. Wallenberg' and, of course,Steven Spielberg's Oscar-winning 'Schindler's List' and 'The Last Days' (as a producer).Such works were already enough to break one's heart, to stir in the viewers such emotions as grief, fear and anger.With Polanski's latest work, who would want to visit an unpleasant and bleak territory once again?

Well, I daresay that it would be a lamentable mistake not to do so.As I go on with this piece, I hope that I'll be able to justify such assertion.

'The Pianist' is a quietly powerful and honestly moving true-life tale of individual survival in the face of massive destruction that was the Holocaust.The film opens with an actual, black-and-white footage of Warsaw, Poland in 1939, when the citizens were still able to go about their daily business in a relatively peaceful and joyous manner.But in the following scenes, all of this was about to dramatically change as the Nazis started to invade Poland, bringing forth misery and grief to the Poles, most specially to the Polish Jews--and this, ironical enough,in vivid colors!

If in 'Schindler's List' and 'Good Evening, Mr. Wallenberg', it was the collective suffering of the Jews that was the central focus, in 'The Pianist', Polanski chose to adopt a different approach:to center on the suffering of a single individual.And that individual was Wladyslaw Szpilman, who possessed deft hands in playing Chopin pieces on the piano and upon whose memoirs the film was based.

Although in the early part of the film, the viewers still get to witness the brutalization of the Jews by the SS guards, when they were rounded up, confined in blocked settlements and cramped ghettos, and finally brought to the labor and death camps, this is presented as happening right before the own eyes of Szpilman (an old man feeding on spilled food on the ground, a mother bewailing over the loss of her baby, a little girl looking for her mother, a young boy dying in the pianist's very arms) that the effect is one of muted grief and shock, both on the protagonist's and the viewers' part (unlike in 'Schindler' and 'Wallenberg', where the scenes of mass murder and deprivation were intended to bring about a forceful shock).And in the succeeding parts of the film, when it would be otherwise inevitable to show the hellish condition in the camps (as 'Schindler' and 'My Mother's Courage' did), all the horrors and ruins of the Nazi occupation are instead reflected in the physical and internal sufferings of Wladyslaw Szpilman.

In fact, there's a considerable part of the film, executed in a quietly riveting manner, where the viewers only see Szpilman, desolate, haggard and in fearful and anxious silence, going from one place to another within the completely-ruined Warsaw, for fear of being caught by the SS guards and alleviating hunger and thirst with whatever comes his way.Such an insufferable existence would have easily defeated the man, if not for the one thing that the Nazis haven't completely destroyed in him:his passion for music.Whenever the moment permits, Szpilman still gets to perform his Chopin pieces on the piano--even if only in his mind, for he can't already lay his fingers on the keys.The piano is his identity, his livelihood, his life;it's the one thing that enabled him to confront and live through the horrors of the Holocaust.

And 'The Pianist' is the masterpiece that enabled its maker, Roman Polanski (who was a young child at the time of the Nazi invasion of Warsaw and who turned down 'Schindler's List' when it was first offered to him by Spielberg), to finally come to terms with that tragic period in his country's history that he himself experienced.

To ignore 'The Pianist' just because one is wary of having to visit a 'familiar' landscape once again is to ignore the individual's gift and capacity for surviving the hardest and cruelest of times, as inspired by Szpilman in us, we who have our own share of sufferings, whatever the degree is.

Much of the film's life comes from no other than Adrien Brody, who commanded such a subtle and affecting portrayal of the downtrodden pianist.Polanski made the perfect choice of having him solely for the lead character (in the same way that Stanley Kubrick perfectly suited Malcolm McDowell in the role of the deviant youth in 'A Clockwork Orange').I couldn't think of any other actor who could've given justice to the delicate person of Wladyslaw (not even Nicolas Cage or Daniel Day-Lewis, Brody's fellow best actor nominees in this year's Oscars).

The 29-year-old actor doesn't need to utter a word to express his sufferings.It all shows in his sullen eyes and undernourished physique.All the brutalization and demoralization being undergone by all the other Jews in the film are movingly embodied by Brody (as Szpilman) himself.

I've already seen all the other films nominated for best picture in this year's Academy Awards.Truth to say, they don't hold a candle to Polanski's masterpiece when it comes to starkness of content and sincerity of emotions.

Edward Yang's "Yi yi" has the sensibilities of Ingmar Bergman's (a family in crisis) and Tsai Ming-Liang's films (modern-day alienation and estrangement). It doesn't frequently happen that the viewers get to see a film where ALL the characters are deeply steeped in melancholy and depression, from beginning to end, for reasons that are personal and intimate--existential at best.

The writer-director (who won the Best Director award at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival;and I think he deserved it, for his direction was dramatically eerie) doesn't leave a stone unturned in bringing the viewers right into the heart of his characters' personal crises. Observe the following:the immobile and observant camera (it does move at times, but only to observe), the painful and eerie silences (only the cinema can do that), the remarkable "reflective" shots, where we see each of the characters--either conversing with someone or deep in his/her own thoughts--through a glass, thus baring his/her "soul" and the utterances which are moving and shattering in their simplicity and sincerity--a mother despairs over the monotonousness of her life, a son wonders at the sadness that envelopes people and truth being partially known, a father doubts about happiness being attained even if one doesn't love what he/she does, a daughter unbearably suffers from guilt feelings about her grandmother's death. And this is not to mention the other characters, too!

The emotional odyssey is definitely unsettling and draining, so that by the time the film ends, the viewers are stupefied by the enigma that is "Yi yi" as are their own selves. But I wouldn't mind going for the ride again.

Govind Nihalani's "Hazaar Chaurasi Ki Maa" served as the opening film of a festival dedicated to Indian films held here recently.As such kind of film event is a rare occasion in our country, so is the film a rare gem.

Given its material (which was adapted from a novel by Mahaswati Deva), the film has the potential of becoming overtly political (like Constantin Costa-Gavras' "Z") or expressly melodramatic (like Regis Wargnier's "Indochine").But it is a fine attribute of the film that it provides just enough background for the viewers to become acquainted with the intense sociopolitical events in India (particularly in West Bengal) in the 1970s---a radical outlawed movement, the "Naxalbari," proves to be major headache for the established leadership---and keeps finely checked and nuanced the thoughts and feelings of the characters that the result is a quietly powerful and moving drama of loss, alienation and enlightenment.

The brutal murder of a radical and forward-thinking son causes for the mother to embark on a journey of self-examination and -discovery---asking questions as to the circumstances that led to her son's untimely death, what made her overlook and take for granted her son's "secret" activities, and seeing in her own family the very things her son had rebelled against (complacent, hypocritical, reactionary and bourgeois attitudes and values in modern society).

The film proceeds on a slow and reflective pace so as to be proper to its conversational approach, which is of such a length that the characters gradually open their minds and hearts to the viewers regarding the lamentable family loss and the state of their society in general.Take careful notice of the scene where the mother visits her son's girlfriend, who is also a member of the movement and where mother and son "meet" one another for the last time.

To be distinguished too are the stunning performances, specially those provided by the actors who played the beleaguered mother, the loving aunt and the ill-fated son.

If you have the opportunity, don't miss "Hazaar Chaurasi Ki Maa."

Alejandro Inarritu's "Amores perros" was the opening film of a film festival held here a few months back.There was a good number of filmgoers who attended, but the film actually started late (about 7:45 pm, from the supposed-to-be 7:00 pm---it was alright, for I also came in late).The film ran for about two-and-a-half hours, but there was never a single moment where I felt my eyes to be already asking for one good snooze.This Oscar-nominee for Best Foreign-Language Film is so powerful, so moving and so gritty that to divert your attention from it even for a few seconds would be a big mistake (the Academy Award jurors had already committed one by giving the "bald man" to Ang Lee's "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon").

In essence, "Amores perros" contains three stories;though the characters (there are two brothers who become rivals for the love of one woman;there is an ad model who suddenly loses her "market value" because of an accident;and there is an unkempt and odd hitman who is abandoned by his family) move within the same urban landscape, they in fact have nothing to do with one another---they appear as total strangers to each other as is common in a cityscape.They have their own stories to tell---except for that fatal car accident at a city intersection which becomes their "common fate." That accident was actually "triggered" by the dog owned by one of the brothers (Octavio), as he and his friend were on a rush to bring it to the hospital after it was shot during a dogfight.

The fateful incident brings each of the characters to a re-examination and readjustment of their lives, making decisions that, whether they intended the outcome or not, would ultimately help them in finding meaning in themselves and their situation:for Octavio, that an adulterous love can't really go through, even if the feelings are sincere and affectionate---what can be of help for the moment is to live on one's own;for the model (Valeria), that the value of one's being can't be measured in terms of the glitter and glamour of a commercial and material enterprise, for they're only momentary and superficial---what can really mold her being is the love and companionship offered by the man closest to her;and for the hitman (El Chivo), that the fatherly love he can show to his only daughter is his one remaining redemption.

And this, while they are all affectionately tied to their dogs!

A non-linear narrative, an alert and nervous hand-held camerawork, a gritty photography, a well-written script and first-rate performances---plus the dogs---all these serve the film well.

I thought David Lynch's debut film, "Eraserhead," was enough.Then came his very recent film,"Mulholland Dr." and I was in again for the most mind-boggling and eerie viewing experience I've ever had.(With regard to generating such kind of experience, the only other contemporary film that has done so that I can think of is Alejandro Amenabar's "Abre los ojos.")

So, how do I understand "Mulholland Dr."? Let me count the ways.

1.) It can be a mystery/crime thriller:There appears to be an attempted murder against a beautiful and sophisticated woman;the failed crime leads to a memory loss that only complicates matters regarding who she really is and tracing the lead back to the prime "motivation" of the "crime."

2.) It can pass off as a rags-to-riches or a star-is-born story:There's this woman named Betty who comes to Hollywood to pursue her dream of becoming an actress;the realization of her dream is almost within her reach if not only because she becomes deeply involved in "Rita's" (the woman mentioned above) case.

3.) It can just as well be a satire or black comedy:That is, on Hollywood as the "City of Dreams," on dreamy-eyed would-be actors and actresses, on pushy and despotic studio magnates, and on burned-out and (in certain instances) self-important film directors.

4.) It can be seen as a love story:Once again, not "just" a love story, but one that borders on the controversial and sensational, for, in the course of the film, we find that Betty and Rita have developed "tender feelings" for each other (which may be crucial in discovering the latter's true identity and digging the roots of her quandary).

5.) There's simply no need for any explanation at all:I guess that's one thing we should bear in mind for us to fully appreciate and enjoy "Mulholland Dr." We should let ourselves be completely lost in the maze that Lynch has set up for us.The thrill lies in complete acquiescence to the director's own "set of rules" and complete immersion in his own "private world."

(In my own case, just when I was beginning to be proud of myself for being able to follow "Mulholland Dr." with little problem, here came the pivotal last twenty-five minutes of the film and everything came back to square one;I came out of the film reaching for an ammonia.)

Cop movies usually feature the heroic exploits of the cop-hero, which include chases, stunts, explosions and, well, women (as seen, for example, in Hollywood's "Lethal Weapon" series starring Mel Gibson and in Hongkong's "Super Cop" starring Jackie Chan).This has the implication of telling the movie audience that our cop-heroes work themselves to death, in the name of law, duty and public order---hooray!

But ever heard of cops nursing broken hearts, who have an obsession for foods and who keep on meditating on their hapless existence? That's actually the kind of cops you can see in "Chongqing senlin."

The film is unique because it presents two seemingly "different" and "unrelated" stories of broken-hearted cops and their new-found objects of affection, situated against the background of modern-day Hongkong.Thus, with regard to the element of chance and coincidence, of spontaneous and unexpected encounters, Wong Kar-Wai's film is in the same line with Krzysztof Kieslowski's "Trilogy of Colors," Milco Manchevski's "Before the Rain," Claude Lelouch's "Chance and Coincidence," Alejandro Inarritu's "Amores Perros" and Quentin Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction."

The "first" story tells the story of Ho Chi-Wa (Takeshi Kaneshiro), who calls himself "police no. 223," an undercover agent who was dumped by his lady-love whom he calls Mai;and in order to keep the feelings for the woman alive in his heart, he goes into an obsessive search for cans of pineapples that will expire on May 1, 1994, because Mai loves pineapples and his birthday falls on the said date.The expiration is particularly considered because, in the police agent's opinion, it appears that not just food, but everything else---feelings included---expires.Now comes this alluring lady in raincoat and darkglasses (a big-time illegal drug dealer, actually), whom Ho Chi-Wa meets by chance in a bar.

The "second" is about Ah-Wu (Tony Leung), who refers to himself as "police no. 663," a traffic police who was also dumped by his girlfriend, a flight stewardess.Depressed, he engages in a pouring out of sentiments to objects that remind him of his failed love affair, but ultimately, clearly "reflect" himself---soap, towel, uniform, stuffed toy.However, things might just start to fire up again for the law enforcer when a young and easy-going lady who works as a counter-girl for a food station (where he regularly buys fish and chips and black coffee) develops a crush on him and gets hold of the key to his apartment by chance.

Hip, hypnotic and delightful;"Chongqing senlin" is something that shouldn't be missed.(No wonder "Pulp Fiction" megman Tarantino took it on him for the film to be released in the US.)