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Lost In Translation * Sofia Coppola * 2003

Bill Murray plays the film actor Bob Harris who is in Tokyo to shoot some commercials. Scarlett Johansson is Charlotte who is also in Tokyo because her husband is working as band-photographer. From the first minute Coppola lays much stress on the differences between American and Japanese culture and continues to do this in the film. Both Bob and Charlotte are lost in Tokyo, having problems sleeping, have no clue how to behave in the Japanese city and keep running into eachother in the hotel lobby in the middle of the night. A strange friendship between the old man and the young woman develops in which Bob becomes a bit of a teacher for Charlotte. A nice film with nice shooting. <27/9/04><3>

Lost * J.J. Abrams & Damon Lindelof * series 1 2004

I remember when the first series came on Dutch television. Big anouncements, advertisement in tv-guides, raving commentaries. In that time we just had “Operation Robinson”, a “Big Brother” like “real life soap” and I expected “Lost” to be the original or at least an American counterpart. Later I heard that “Lost” was “Twin Peaks on a deserted island” and similar expressions and then people who followed the series were very enthousiastic about it and I understood that it was an actual series and not some time-filling “real life” thing. So in the end I watched the first series.
The two episode pilot is superb. Extremely realistic scenes of a crash-site of an airoplane, flashbacks of the crash which are also very realistic, survivors who stranded on a remote island with ‘something’ on it. A very nice mix between a disaster series and a Stephen King story. As the series continues the episodes do not have much to do with eachother, some are simple soap things with relationships that form or break, pragnancies, etc. In some episodes some strange things happen, but the high tension of the first two episodes never returns. What people like about the series is that in flashbacks you get to know a few of the characters and how they are connected to eachother. Personally I don’t think that this has much to do with the fact of them being on a deserted island. The series become a bit boring, but towards the end, things get better. The last two shows are again to parts of one episode and I feared that the series would suddenly end to announce the second series. Indeed, the last two episodes are again good, but just when things get really interesting again, it is “to be continued”, thank you for watching, goodbye. Very irritating, especially now that I see that there is already a third series. The different series do not stand on their own as in, for example, “24”, so I have my doubts if I want to see the second series only to have to wait to be able to see the next. Besides, “Lost” is not that good, so will I keep following them? You may see.

Los Sin Nombre * Jaume Balagueró * 1999

I wouldn’t have chosen this film for the title, cover or story on the back, but my girlfriend thought it would be a nice film. “The Nameless” proved to be a very dark and particularly grim and gruesome thriller/horror. If you like Japanese films like “Ringu”, this one is for you. This Spanish film is shot in colour, but there hardly is any. The images are dark, the atmosphere pressing. This last is mostly caused by the constant deep rumbling on the background.
The story is about a women whose daughter was probably found dead six years ago. Back then an extremely mutilated body of a child was found. Yet the woman gets a call from her dead child and a haunting search for her begins. Claudia is lured into the web of a group of extremists who think that by means of pain they can concentrate the ultimate evil and gain evil powers. The atmosphere is fantastic, the story (based on a book by Ramsey Campbell) has details you would never come up with, but unfortunately the last 10 minutes and the conclusion are fairly weak. Especially see it if you like extraordinary dark films.

Lord Of The Rings

Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring * Peter Jackson * 2001
Lord Of The Rings: The Two Tower * Peter Jackson * 2002
Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The Ring * Peter Jackson * 2003

The bigger the hype, the less I want to see a film. There are other reasons why I didn’t watch these films earlier: I don’t read novels, so I never read the book and I particulary don’t like the fantasy genre. Still, now that the hype made room for new hypes and because I was curious about the (possible) Nordic mythology influences in the book / films ànd because the complete trilogy can now be bought on DVD for merely E 15,-, I decided to buy the box and watch the films afterall.
First, I don’t particularly like the story. As you all know, the “ring of power” has been discovered and in order to prevent evil to prevail, nine persons are appointed to destroy the ring, which adventure forms the core of the films. In the first film the ring is discovered and from the different inhabitents of “Middle Earth” (“Hobbits”, “Elves”, “Dwarves”, “Men”, etc.) representatives are chosen for the quest. In the second film, evil starts a campaign to take over Middle Earth and in the last film the last part of the quest is shown. Each film takes about three hours. The films are lauded for the brilliant effects. Indeed, sometimes they look nice, but sometimes they don’t! Also good for the big audience are the (to me) superfluous lengthy battle scenes which are not particularly impressive (maybe on the big screen they were).
So far for the films. The story is somewhat of a true epic myth with typical elements such as pride, endurance, adventure and (here very obvious) the battle between good and evil: a nice setting. As for the mythological influences, there are a few Northern elements, of course the name “Middle Earth” (from “Midgard”, the “middle garden or the realm of mankind) for the earth, only one time you get to see runes (I believe in the book the language of the elves is written in runes), here and there you get to see a glimpse of Northern ethics, such as in the scene where a hobbit has to tell a king his son is dead and offers his service instead. Then you have vague references to Northern gods, such as a description of a man with a long cloak and a big head (Odin), or the castle of Minas Ithil which could be a reference to Odin’s throne. There is also a scene in which the sword that had cut off the finger with the ring of power is reforged, which could remind of the story of Sigurd. “Isengard” reminds of “Niflheim”, the world of ice and a few other names could refer to myths of the North. On the other side, there is probably as much Greek and other mythology to be found, like the Argonauts, the statues of the ancestors in LOTR. Overall, I didn’t find too much Nordic myths in the film (at first sight at least).
Overal. I don’t know if the films where worth the hype. The books are probably better, the films are just a nice (but long) watch. Maybe the mythological style appeals to the minds of the masses, I don’t know, but I rather read them myself instead of reading them vaguely used in fantasy writing. Oh well, the films are an amusing watch, but don’t expect too much of it if you haven’t seen the films yet.

Looking For Richard * Al Pacino * 1996

Pacino as director? Well, he made a strange thing. He wanted to show why Americans have so much problems with Shakespeare and to try to change that. He asked people if they ever saw Shakespeare. Well, with films like “Prospero’s Books” by Peter Green, “Hamlet” with Mel Gibson, “Richard III” by Richard Loncraine who put the story in Nazi Germany, “Orlando” with Tilde Swinton and especially the wonderfull “Romeo + Juliet” with Leonardo DiCaprio, I suppose people who like the more serious films, will have seen some modern versions of the old plays (and there are many modern versions of “Othello”).

Still Pacino made a filmversion of the play “Richard III” and at the same time a documentary about the making of this film. In this documentary you see Pacino questioning people on the street about Shakespeare, his discussions with actors, scholars and other people about the play, the meaning of the text, the interpretation of it, etc. This makes “Looking For Richard” a strange watching experience. In a way “Richard III” is a bit clearer now. What characters are who and how are they related to eachother, what is the background of the story, etc., but on the other side, you get to see only fragments of the actual play, so you do not get into the actual story. In the line of interesting experiments with Shakespeare, this is surely not the most boring one, so should you get the change, just go and see it.

Lilja 4-Ever * Lucas Moodysson * 2002

The Dutch public channel Nederland 3 has an ‘Danish summer’. Two Danish films a week during the summer season. This is very nice, because they show some films that have been on my wish-list for a while. Unfortunately I already missed two of them while I saw others that I had already seen.
“Lilja 4-Ever”, I have known about this film 4-ever! It is a Danish film, but it mostly plays in Russia and it is spoken in Russian. I know only two of the films of Moodysson, but “Fucking Åmål” is in a few ways similar to this one. Lilja from the title is a 16 year old girl living in Russia. In the first scenes we see her mother take off to the USA and leave Lilja behind. She now has to rely totally on herself. Her aunt puts her in a crappy appartment, but since Lilja still goes to school, she has no money for the rent or food. This soon becomes a big problem. Together with her much younger only friend Volodya Lilja dreams of better times. This seems to happen when Lilja meets Andrei, but things do not turn out exactly as she hoped…
This film shows the desperate situation in a poor, annamed Russian small town in a rather confronting way. You can quickly see where things lead to, but I won’t give that away here. A fact remains that like “Fucking Åmål” again presents a confronting view on the hard life of a teenager and this time put things in a bigger perspective to at the same time put a serious worldwide problem to question. A good film, but definately not a nice watch! <15/8/05><3>

Lila Dit Ça * Ziad Doueri * 2004

Chima is a dreamy young man of Arabic origin with a Muslim background. He lives in a dreary suburb of the French city Marseille. He falls in love with Lila, a girl with a daring appearence and a dirty mouth and mind. Chima finds himself balancing between two extremes. His mother finds the girl improper (and her husband also ran off with a French woman), his friends first want to get to know her, but when they fail, they say Lila is a whore; but still Chima is attracted to the girl and struck by her frankness. Eventually things go expectedly wrong.

“Lila Says So” is a typical French drama about two youngsters discovering sexuality from completely different starting points. Nothing really happens and the film calmly flows towards a predictable end. Good acting, a simple but effective story. A nice film to see some time.

La Ley Del Deseo * Pedro Almodóvar * 1987

law of desire

The film director Pablo seduces young men of which two fall in love with him. Since Pablo is no man of relations, he keeps both of them at a distance, but one of the young men can’t stand the situation. Quite a dull homo-erotic film. I recently saw something similar, but in that case I turned it off after half an hour. This film of Almodóvar was not that bad, but still not too interesting either.

Levity * Ed Solomon * 2003

The director of the terrible “Bill and Ted” films made a nice drama with a bunch of famous actors. Billy Bob Thornton is Manuel Jordan, a man who spend 23 years in prison because he shot a man during the robery of a shop. Being released he searches for redemption. He comes back to the city where he used to live and finds himself running into the rotten spots of society. The film touches on several problems of our society without becoming to heavy or moralising. There is a disco where people use too much drugs. There are two gangs fighting eachother for nothing. A local ‘priest’ (a wonderfull part by Morgan Freeman) turns out to be a criminal. Then we have Jordan himself who tries to make sense of the world that he lives in and especially his feelings of guilt. The film may be a drama, but there is also room for humor, especially Thornton’s extreme ‘dryness’ is great. A very nice film.

De Legende Van De Bokkerijders * Karst van der Meulen * 1994

When I got these TV-series on DVD, I thought that it was one of these old Dutch series now available on DVD. This Dutch/Flemish series even look old, but they seem to be of 1994, Van de Meulen’s last work even. The series give an over-romantisized vision on the famous “Bokkerijders” (in nowadays spelling this would be “Bokkenrijders” btw.) gang. “Bokkerijders” literary means “goat riders”. Like in the famous song “Goat-riders in the sky”, this devilish gang would fly through the nightly sky on their goats. Myths were spun around the theme, giving the goat-riders many elements of the “wild hunt” in which Odin/Wodan leads his army of the dead through the sky in certain times of the year. In fact the “Bokkerijders” were a violent criminal gang (or gangs) that ravaged the Dutch province of Limburg (and Noord-Brabant and a part of Flanders according to some) in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. The trials are quite well recorded and the criminal acts documented (usually violent robs of churches and farms). The “Bokkerijders” supposedly swore on “the dead hand” and they had a pact with the devil, they appeared out of nothing and disappeared into thin air. That is why ‘the devil thing’ I suppose. The “Bokkerijders” already got romantisized elements during the Romantic period and more so in more recent times. To speak with the Dutch scholar of folklore Gerard Rooijakkers, the bad elements in our folklore that we cannot get rid off, are romantisized and re-used to make them harmless. The violent gang of the “Bokkerijders”, became fighters for the weak and poor and against suppression of the Austrian leaders and the Church. This is the version that you will get in these series. Amusing, not boring, another well- produced Dutch series about the Middle Ages and in this case, adding to the mystifying or a dark element of our past.