Reviews

One of the better commercial Finnish films of the last decade, "Musta jää" is a tight love triangle with unexpectable plot line. At many times (and quite surprisingly) it is almost hitchcockian in atmosphere, as you always know a little bit more than any of the characters - and in the end, the whole plot seems to be about masquerade à la "North by Northwest" or "Vertigo", with one of the main characters slowly turning into the character he/she performs.

Although the film suffers from few unnecessary sex scenes (not counting the over-the-top lesbian scene!) and quite unimpressive soundtrack, the film as a whole stands out as a remarkable effort. Kotwika has the patience to tell his story mainly through his fine actors and actresses, not through the images - the patience lacking from most modern film directors. He also explains the motives of his characters through their actions and expressions, not through their words. Kotwika seems to have some virtues of an old-time filmmaker, who still believes in his audiences intelligence. In that sense, his film hasn't appear a minute too soon on our Finnish screens.

Takashi Miike is a director with huge energy when making a film. His trouble is that often he makes features based on only one idea, and doesn't bring up any better ones during the film. The idea in "The Happiness of the Katakuries" is combining horror comedy with musical. The result is completely pretentious. Every song number seems to be there just to point out the movie's obscurity. There is no real reason for the characters to burst into singing: the songs tells us nothing about their emotions. Same goes with the animated sequences. It is everything but enjoyable to watch a film, that tries deliberately to appeal with its oddity. "The Happiness of the Katakuries" tries so hard to be a cult movie, that it is disgusting.

I advise everybody to concentrate on better Miike films, like "Audition" and "Ichi the Killer", to name but a few.

I don't know why there's only few films about tank drivers or leaders, although tanks are among the most cinematic of all vehicles: frightening, attractive, impulsive... These symbols of war are loaded with the kind of emotion that is the essence of cinema. Unfortunately they are mainly seen as external effects, and war is only rarely seen through tank crew's eyes. Luckily we have "Zhavoronok", a Soviet masterpiece that almost makes any other tank film seem unnecessary.

The story is about four POW's who escape from Nazi testing ground driving a T-34, and are chased through Germany while the tank itself proves to be nearly invincible when handled the right way. The tone is heroic, but not without ironic touches. The story has been handled with even more appealing sense of action than the American WW2 films of the time, although it's makers never forget to add exciting (and deeply Soviet/Russian) sequences with nightmares and absurd visions.

"Zhavoronok" is a quite rare film. I myself have seen it only on VHS-tape I bought from Moscow. It didn't have even subtitles, although it didn't need them. I sincerely hope that now, on the era of DVD's, "Zhavoronok" will make it's way to foreign markets, so that western viewers could also find this astonishing chase movie.