Dear friend,
in previous decades I have been a patron in the past of the Far East Film Festival in Udine: that’s where I first ‘met’ Bong Joon-Ho (with a screening of Memories of Murder), took a picture of Takashi Miike holding a huge (fake) syringe, and appreciated Kill Bill’s debt towards Lady Snowblood. And this was just the 2005 edition. Due to my new geographical coordinates, it’s been more complicated for me to attend the latest editions, but every year I think (usually when it’s too late) about going again. This week’s visions, mostly linked to Asia, feel a bit like my personal homage to FEFF.
As I wrote last week
, I loved Taiwanese horror Incantation. When I looked for more information about it online, the common remark was ‘yeah, it’s good, but it’s no Noroi’. So, of course I had to watch this one as soon as possible. And while I agree that Incantation owes it a lot, I really didn’t like it. It’s also a found footage film, but it’s disguised as a documentary, bookended by more found footage. To me, it completely lacks any emotion, and any coherence. It’s like a scrapbook of scenes: five minutes are devoted to one person; thirty seconds to another. A couple of characters just scream. There are pigeons. Ectoplasmic worms.
I know, when the end comes you can see how all the bits and pieces fit together, but the ‘solution’ is just disturbing, and not in a good surrealistic way. I can concede that the horrifying fleeting image in the last scene is very effective, but that’s it.
I watched 2 Rings 2 furiously (meaning, both the original ones and the American ones) a few months ago, but I had forgotten the black sheep of the family, the sequel of Hideo Nakata’s first film that has been locked in the attic to make space for Nakata’s new shiny (mm… not really) sequel. I had very low expectations, and during the first act it didn’t do anything to change my mind. But then it became a bit weird, sort of midichlorian-y (even before Phantom Menace, not to mention Attack of the Clones).
Don’t get me wrong, there isn’t almost any horror scene in this film, and I’m disappointed that it has possibly even less regard for Ring’s characters than Ring 2, but by the end it gets so unpredictable that I was pleasantly surprised. I declare this film the best Ring sequel.
This must be what David Cronenberg’s dreams are like. Sex, death, body horror, metal (the material), surrealism, futurism, more metal (the music genre).
YouTube suggested a few of videos of the ‘The top 10 most underrated Asian horror films’ kind; a couple of them mentioned this movie, so, here I am. Now, I don’t know what the other candidates for those lists were, but, while not a bad film at all, I wouldn’t call The Promise a masterpiece. Once all cards are on the table, it gets quite repetitive, but the first twenty minutes are great, and I genuinely loved the first jump scare (the one where you expect to see a face… and a face appears, but not in the way you’d think).
Is it rude to point out that a few months after producing the directorial debut of his daughter Ishana, M. Night Shyamalan just released a film that’s essentially a showcase for his daughter Saleka? I’m not disputing the talent of either artist, but this movie feels just like a pretext, and not a good one.
The premise is very intriguing, and there’s a great 15-ish-minute section about an hour in, but otherwise, this felt a contrived, utterly implausible, straight-to-video-quality film (even the cinematography looked so flat by the end of it).
Josh Hartnett’s acting is so cartoonish that you must assume that it is by design; to his credit, every person his character talks to is instantly won over by his awkward-sitcom-dad mannerisms, so maybe it is a good strategy. But in real life, the guy would look suspicious to absolutely anyone.
On the plus side, it was great to see Alison Pill and even Hayley Mills (well, it’s a Trap for a Parent, do you get it?).
Look, sometimes you don’t have time to watch a new film and you just want to relax in front of something familiar and funny. Since Kim’s Convenience is currently my background-tv-series for cooking and having supper, it felt natural to re-watch Simu Liu in his biggest movie role. Shang-Chi is in line with the other nice films of Marvel’s phase four: well made, more sensitive to non-western cultures, somehow managing to bring in incredible actors. A bit forgotten in the grand scheme of the MCU, but fun. And I have a soft spot for Destin Daniel Cretton (and Brie Larson) since Short Term 12. Having watched it (this time) as an evening-palate-cleanser, over three nights, I don’t feel I have the right to rate it differently from the previous two times.
Another film recommended by (random) YouTubers, Confessions starts where most other films end, with revelations about a murder. It’s such an abrupt start that I had to check I hadn’t inadvertently moved the cursor to a later point in the film. After twenty minutes of a monologue delivered by a teacher in a very noisy class of teenagers, the actual story begins, and it’s a story about good intentions, bad intentions, and their consequences. A thriller, rather than a horror, that gives all of its characters a clear - though not always embraceable - point of view. It’s a bit easier when most of the film narration is delivered via voiceover monologues (that somehow reproduce the structure of the original novel by Kanae Minato), supported by impeccable visuals. A bit rounded up maybe, but it deserves four stars.
In summary, 7 films:
- 4 horrors, 2 thrillers and a super-hero film
- 4 Japanese films, a Thai film, and 2 US movies (with directors of Asian heritage)
- 4 original films, and 3 adaptations (one of which is also a sequel, another one is part of the MCU)
- 6 first-watches, 1 rewatch
- 1 film from the ’80s, 1 from the ’90s, 1 from the 2000s, 2 from the 2010s and 2 from this decade