Monthly Review : MOON (2009)

WHAT kind of a person takes a job situated in the middle of nowhere where he can barely see anyone? What kind of a person chooses to be so cut off from civilised company, distant from all he loves and all whom he cares for? Who would choose to go somewhere so far from validation, emotional satisfaction and the reassurance of your image reflected in the eyes of another?






Plot Overview :

With only two weeks left in his three year contract, astronaut Sam Bell is getting anxious to finally return to Earth. He is the only occupant of a Moon-based manufacturing facility along with his on-deck robotic computer, called GERTY. Direct communication with Earth is not possible due to a long-standing communication malfunction but he does get an occasional message from his wife . One day, while Sam is in his lunar rover he crashes. He wakes up a little disoriented, but basically fine--until a few days later, when he finds another man who appears to be... well, himself.

Review :

Taking inspiration from sci-fi classics like "2001:a space odyssey," & "Solyaris," comes "Moon," a killer science fiction that deftly toys with futuristic worry to construct a terrifically understated nightmare.What's most refreshing about the movie is that you're really only watching one man for an hour and a half, Inevitable parallels will be drawn to 2001:A space odyssey, with a monotone computer, but Moon manages to distance itself very successfully by having a computer which doesn't go crazy . When the 'twist' occurs about half way through, you really feel sucked in, imagining what it would be like to be in that position, and you remain there for the rest of the film. This film succeeds not through fancy special effects, but through the empathy you feel, and that is the mark of truly wonderful picture.

One of the emotional surprises in the film does come from Sam's interaction with Gerty the robot, his only companion. Gerty is the best on screen portrayal of a robot "friend" to date. He takes great care of Sam, not because he feels for Sam, but because that is logically the best thing for him to do, and yet he does his job well. He is neither sinister or abnormally compliant, his smiley "face" lending the film an at times eerie and other times emotive component that feels more realistic and effective then his counterparts like HAL .

Nathan Parker's screenplay is nothing mind blowing but if you're in the mood for a good psychological drama, this one more than fits the bill. It's slow moving but your head will be working a mile a minute trying to figure out the secrets that lay in store here. Which one of the Sams is the real Sam? Has all this isolation finally affected Sam's psyche ? Could the company that Sam works for be playing with him, putting him into some kind of experimental test or something?Debutant director Duncan Jones proves to be an expert in paranoia, creating a claustrophobic and weirdly surreal situation. It gets so crazy at one point that the two Sam's even start a fight with one another. The production design is really good too, the lunar rovers and the space shuttle, with its dirty white walls that somehow add to the suspense in their own way, are like throwbacks to old movies such as Alien .The atmosphere is also aided by the terrific score of cult composer Clint Mansell .

Any actor who has to work with the entire galaxy as his backdrop is going to find it quite a challenge to make himself stand out, but Sam Rockwell is more than the performer for the job. Moon is almost quite literally his show. None of the other actors in the credits even get five minutes of screen time , so it's 90 minutes of Sam. The actor isn't just in every scene, he's in every scene with no one else in front of him. It's action without interaction, but Rockwell has enough personality quirks to keep the movie from ever getting boring.Even though we only hear the voice from Kevin Spacey, he also made a very solid job by finding the perfect grade of personality and indifference, the robot GERTY needs to express the "feelings" trapped between conflictive directives which test its conscience.


Parting thoughts:

Moon combines intellectual challenges with an excellent narrative to bring a reflection on human condition.This film is a real masterpiece, and it is the best Sci-Fi I have seen this year.So, Moon deserves the most enthusiastic of the recommendations, because it is hugely entertaining and it makes you think a bit and teach something at the same time, and these days ,that is indeed priceless!We need more movies like this one.


Title :MOON

Dir :Duncan Jones

Cast :Sam Rockwell , Kevin Spacey

Rated R for Language

Country :UK

Language :English


DVD Features :Feature length audio commentary with Director & Producer
Cast Interview
On Location
Visual FX featurette
Q&A's with the director at Sundance Festival

Torrent File Name :Moon.2009.R5.XviD.LAP

Trailer Link :http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQTJUfqNJts

Monthly Review :TWENTYNINE PALMS (2003)

One of the most terrifying films I've seen as an
adult, Twenty Nine Palms demonstrates every human's vulnerability rendered unexpectedly .It reminds us that we are flesh and blood exposed to all the monstrosities of the world, regardless the strength of our minds or the intelligence of our emotions. In the end, (brutal) death is waiting and "deserve has nothing to do with it" which brings to mind the Charles Bukowski quote: "There are no beautiful women; there are no strong men"





Plot Overview :

American photographer David and his girlfriend Katia leave Los Angeles in his red Hummer and head off to the Joshua Tree desert in California where he hopes to find an appropriate setting for a magazine photo shoot. Although physically attracted to each other, David and Katia have trouble communicating. He speaks some elementary French, which is the language she uses regularly.The couple's relationship too is nascent with emptiness and malice.Their only 'pleasure' of keeping their relationship going is passionless sex. They brutalize each other, in small ways, she emotionally, he physically.That internal brutality is externalized in the last few minutes of the film leading to a shocking totally unexpected finale.

Review :

With his first film, "Life of Jesus", philosophy professor turned film maker, Bruno Dumont announced himself as a director to watch. His sophomore effort " La Humanite " managed to spark equal amounts of praise and condemnation, solidifying Dumont as a provocateur with a bleak view.Twentynine Palms adds another slow-paced, meditative shocker to his resume and is, no doubt, a film that should divide viewers as either a thoughtful work of existentialist horror or an indulgent failed experiment.

Bruno Dumont depicts man and his nature (like in his two previous films). He's obsessed by man's behaviour and he's tackled the subject in a more radical manner here. Several scenes represent the bestiality in humans. Bestiality is depicted most explicitly in the scenes when the couple makes love and fight. The groan of sexual pleasure is the same as the groan of agony. It is these moments of intercourse that are the most telling of Twentynine Palms’ obtuse philosophy. David and Katia only engage in the activity in spaces of false nature-in the motel pool and in their hotel room beneath a picturesque image of snowy mountains-and the one time they attempt to have sex in the desert they come up dry and impotent.

The disconnection with the natural world around them is key to the film’s gradual exposition that between these two people there is something deeply wrong with their understanding of each other and the world around them.The view is harsh and negative .The sequence in which David and Katia are all naked on the rocks made me think of Adam and Eve. This is a divine vision of a world which seems forever gone. These landscapes are also repulsive because dangerous. Nothing happens in them and danger could come out at any moment.It is as if in this empty setting in which everything needs to be created from scratch, Adam and Eve had no other choice but to play a part in their own destruction.

Dumont’s narrative punishes both characters by this point, slapping them down for some obscure reason. The deep irony that Katia fawns over nature, but David, who has a profession involving finding and appreciating locations, fails to engage the world around him is key to the reason why he ends up being the one who cannot reconcile what he learns by the film’s end. At first it appears that both achieve a realization of the reality of their relationship, but, like the ideas that drive the film as a whole, this realization is neither completely understood .

Rajneesh, the great spiritual teacher who has blended his experiences in the East and the West, had observed, "You can't buy into one-half of a polarity without getting the other half. You want good? You've got evil. You want pleasure, you've got pain. That's just the way it is." In Twentynine Palms, we watch David & Katia desperately reach out to each other for as much pleasure as they can get. In the process, they are isolated from the world around them and oblivious to the presence of other human beings. Eventually, David's compulsive sexual urges become the occasion for Katia's pain and some outsiders crash this party of two. For Dumont as well as for Lars von Trier (director of 'Antichrist'), the shadow side of America is violence, and it is not a pleasant sight.


Parting Thoughts :

This film should be seen for its originality, for its difference from the standard fare. This is not a fun movie to watch. But this will be the one that you will never forget. I recommend it to people who are open minded about their films and about the possibilities of films like these.

Title : TWENTY-NINE PALMS (2003)

Dir: Bruno Dumont

Cast : Yekaterina Golubeva , David Wissack

Rated NC-17 for explicit sexuality, violence ,nudity

Country :France / USA

Language : French /English

DVD Extras: Directors Note of Intent and Bio Director Interview Previews

Trailer Link :http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pk_hxeJIaaQ

Torrent File Name :Twentynine Palms [2003][DVDRip][Xvid]

Monthly Review : MYSTERIOUS SKIN (2005)

"Mysterious Skin" is like a big tree falling slowly onto a car full of little children. It starts out by letting you know something disturbing will happen, slowly builds you up, and then surely yet surprisingly delivers the final blow as we encounter a jaw-dropping turn of events.After the final scene I sat for about a minute listening to the music as the end credits roll, a cold but very beautiful melancholy washing all over me. It was an extremely affecting moment from a movie I could only describe as life-changing.






Plot Overview :

At age eight, Neil and Brian played baseball in their hometown in Kansas. Both boys were sexually abused by their baseball coach.Ten years later their lives are wildly different.Neil has grown into a calculating gay teenage prostitute who hangs out in parks looking to be picked up by older men.Brian quietly exists as a nervous introvert who is convinced that he was kidnapped by aliens .Both boys deal with the abuse in completely different ways. Neil embraces the time as a shining example of the one time he was truly loved, while Brian erases the event from his memory and transforms it in to a fantasy involving space creatures. But the scars of abuse are long and deep, and soon both boys must confront each other and their pasts if life is to move on.

Review :

Because of its refusal to flinch at or turn away from the sordid reality of its subject matter, "Mysterious Skin" is not a film everybody will be able to sit through. It is ugly and harsh and almost impossible to watch at times, for there is no denying that what it shows us is deeply and profoundly disturbing and that it disgusts and offends us . Yet this is no cheesy exploitation film, but rather a heartfelt and compassionate work of art that makes us see the horror of the situation in a truly empathetic way. We come to care very deeply for these boys as we are forced to see what it is they're going through and to share in their pain.Similar films can often get carried away by sensationalizing events or leaving you with an artificial ending, which is completely opposite from the way 'Skin' works.It relies on script and characters to tell the story, and they all achieve greatly.

The movie shows how, in Neil's case, the early childhood experience has made it impossible for him to view sex as anything but a "business transaction," thus explaining his turn towards prostitution. He acts out his anger and confusion by indulging in self-destructive behaviors and by shutting himself off from any kind of rich emotional attachments with anyone other than his platonic girlfriend Wendy. Brian, for his part, has responded by becoming, essentially, asexual, a means of subconsciously recoiling from the personal violation that occurred to him as a child and of avoiding having it ever happen to him again.Both the characters are mentally disturbed, and this comes across often as we watch their everyday lives.As Brian's story progresses, his life will begin to fall into a bit more order, while as Neil's story progresses, it's going to get more messy and off-kilter.

Also this film points out that both young boy characters are molested by a coach who had access to the kids,because their parents were too busy to pick them up after school.Brian's parent's are so busy with office work that they have no time to take care of Brian .Neil has no father & his mother is a broke alcholic.The Baseball League coach, who it just so happens is a pedophile, who takes full advantage of the lack of these kid's parents concern for their children's welfare, by befriending them after the games, taking them home, feeding them a lot of junk food, & then playing secret games with them. .This is, very sadly, the main concern for children in today's world who are molested. Wake up parents! There are major sickos out there who can even be our neighbours or relatives as paedophiles don't have a tag plastered on their face saying "Stay Away " & yes as this film shows it can happen to your kid too without the right kind of love ,care and attention on behalf of the parents!.

The film is directed by Cult Director Greg Araki.He's a self-styled peculiar filmmaker who works largely with gay themes wrapped around inventive production design and confrontational violence.Few other directors like Gus van Sant would be brave enough to make a motion picture that presents a story that includes pedophilia and there find a moving study of developing sexuality in youngsters that becomes an important and sophisticated drama.Araki directs this story with such grace and finesse that he makes each of the main characters not only credible but also multidimensional and lovable. Araki chooses to candy coat his sets and photographs the drama through his unique lens of dazzling ethereal music and romantic angles. The journey may be a rough one, but it's presented in a soft way to make it palatable. Araki has done what filmmakers struggle with—he's punched through his highly visual style into a territory where it takes on emotion. He's found a way to make his pretty pictures powerful.

The entire cast should be congratulated. But the film belongs to Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Neil who is nothing short of riveting in his role and is awe-inspiring as the heartless rebel who oozes with sex-appeal in the most disturbing way. He makes us believe he's both enjoying and repulsed by his own personality. An amazing scene in which he is sitting in his bathroom after just being tortured, naked, wiping blood off his cold body, shows his dilemma about the real world and the regret of his own choices in life. Brady Corbet was barely 16 when he was cast as the lead in this film, yet he plays his world-weary role of Brian as if he were middle aged. We feel his pain, and know he is deluding himself with his alien fantasies.

The child actors, Chase Ellison and George Webster, were well selected for their vulnerable and innocent portrayals. It's difficult for me to admire Bill Sage, as the abuser, because he was too convincing as an amiable, warm helpful, generous, good-looking, young but realistic pedophile and not the evidently slimy caricatures and misfits pedophiles are made out to be.Other good performances come from the beautiful Elizabeth Shue as Neil's loving but reckless mother, Michelle Trachtenberg as his close female friend Wendy.

Parting Thoughts :

Mysterious Skin begs to be discovered for its powerful emotional design. The film celebrates a dark subject with candy colored ferocity you won't see anywhere else. There's never been a movie like this. It's time to pay homage to a filmmaker who has refused to bend to anyone's ideas of what his movies should be. It has a dark soul, but Mysterious Skin vibrates with an exploding heart only an abused teenager could produce. Definitely a movie to be watched,I highly recommend this bold picture to all of you.

Title : Mysterious Skin

Dir: Greg Araki

Cast : Bill Sage,Elizabeth Shue,Michelle Trachtenberg,Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Brady Corbet

Country :USA Language :English
Rated R for sexuality and violence

DVD features :Feature Length Audio Commentary with Director & Cast
Interview with Cast
London Film Festival Q&A session with Director Araki

Trailer Link :http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Lp5v4oQZRw

Torrent File Name :MYSTERIOUS.SKIN.DVDRIP.D7S