I can’t remember the last time a movie was so beautiful, and yet so maddeningly obtuse. Thanks to abundant CGI enhanced landscapes, the world of The Wanting Mare is a sight to see. Taking place in some unknown time in the future, the film focuses on the city of Whithren, which suffers from sultry, mercury breaking heat year-round. Horses trot along the coast, and they are the biggest export. Once a year, the horses are rounded up and shipped south to the city of Levithen, which is under a constant winter. The inhabitants of Whithren long for the cold, but a ticket on that yearly transport is only available to the rich and the thieves, who are willing to kill for it. The main characters are a woman who lives with dreams of “the world before,” with said dreams passed down generation to generation. What is crazy is, we never hear what these dreams are. And as the movie progresses into the next generation, a new plot unfolds involving getting someone a ticket to the south, which doesn’t fit into the how the film opened. It’s a good thing this film was only 90 minutes long, because there’s only so far that gorgeous scenes can take you. The city of Whithren gasps like a life on its last dying breathe, and unfortunately it is more alive than the characters in this messy movie. ★½
Quo Vadis, Aida? (translated Where are you going, Aida?) may be the first Bosnian film I’ve seen, which is cool by itself, but the film is outstanding too. Based on the events of the Srebrenica massacre, an event of which I was sadly unaware, it follows a teacher, Aida, who has been forced into the role of interpreter between her Bosnian people, the invading Serb army, and the UN peacekeepers who are supposed to be keeping the Serbs in check (and failing miserably). Aida has been a translator for the UN during the Bosnian war when the Army of Republic Srpska nears her hometown of Srebrenica, and she gets her husband and two children to come to the UN camp for safety. It’s a hopeless situation, because the invading army ignores all of the protests and threats from the powerless UN, and Aida knows it. When the army comes to the gates of the UN camp and starts strong arming its way around, Aida does all that she can to try to save her family. Though the Bosnian War happened when I was a teenager, I know very little about the conflict, and this is an eye-opening film showing the human toll the war took on everyone involved. Just like so many civil wars, it pitted neighbor against neighbor; there were moments where Aida had friendly conversations with their invaders, people who were former students of hers, knowing that if her son wandered outside the gate, those soldiers would be commanded to shoot him. Fantastic film full of drama, intensity, and crushing loss. ★★★★½
Before going in, I made a mental note to give up on Hotel Coppelia if it was bad. I guess it was just good enough for me to stick around to the end, but just barely. It takes place in the mid 60s in the Dominican Republic. Longtime dictator Rafael Trujillo was recently assassinated and there is a power struggle erupting in the country, bordering on a civil war. The duly elected president has been cast aside by a military coup. Amongst this turmoil, the viewer follows a brothel in a run-down former hotel. Judith is the boss and she only cares for the building and her pocketbook; she is strict with her girls and looks out for them only so far as it keeps money flowing in. When fighting on the streets draws near, Judith at first welcomes the deposed president’s rebel fighters, and when they are overcome, she allows in the American soldiers too. Americans are there fighting FOR the military in power, because the US leaders fear communism taking control if the people win back the government. Judith doesn’t care about any of this, just that she and her business survive till the end. Not a very likable person. There’s only 1 recognizable face in this film (Nick Searcy, who plays the US commander) and only 2 decent performances in the whole picture (and neither is Searcy). Nashla Bogaert plays one of the prostitutes struggling to do what’s right, and Jazz Vilá gives a heartfelt performance as a homosexual/transvestite sex worker at the “hotel”. The rest of the cast is full of hams and over-acting, and the plot does nothing to draw the viewer in to the predicament of either the country or the workers in the brothel. ★½
Preparations to Be Together for an Unknown Period of Time (yep, that’s a long title) is a very good film, following a woman named Márta who’s recently returned to her home country of Hungary. She was on a path to success in America as a very well regarded brain surgeon, but gave it all up to pursue a man. A month ago, at a medical conference, she met János, and he said he’d meet her on a bridge in Budapest on a specific date. On that day, János isn’t to be found, and when Márta tracks him down, he says he doesn’t recognize her. Márta gets a job at the local hospital, where of course János works. At first the other doctors in neurology don’t think much of Márta, but she earns their respect with her brilliance in diagnosing patients. Meanwhile, she’s been stalking János, and also seeing a therapist; she’s wondering if she made the whole thing up in her head. The ending comes out of left field just a bit, but the journey there is a whole lot of fun. There’s a heaping of psychological suspense, some quiet thrills, and lots of guesswork and mystery. Is Márta crazy? Is János who he says he is? And lets not forget the young med student, Alex, who become smitten with Márta. I’d like to rate this film higher, but the nature of the mystery really only lends itself to a single viewing, so I’m going to knock it just a bit, but I definitely recommend checking it out if you like foreign films. ★★★½
News of the World is a good old western, a genre that you don’t often see with leading man Tom Hanks. He plays Jefferson Kidd, a grizzled former military captain (from the recently ended Civil War) who makes a living now going from town to town in southern Texas, reading the local and federal news. In one such trek, he comes across an overturned wagon with a man who’s been killed, and a frightened 10-year old girl hiding. The girl doesn’t speak any English, only the local Native American language of Kiowa. Kidd goes through the dead man’s belongings and finds a letter certifying that the girl was found among a Kiowa village that had been razed by the Union Army. She’s of German descent, but her family was killed by natives when she was 4, and she was raised by them, and the man was taking her to the Bureau of Indian Affairs to get her reunited with surviving family. Kidd gets her to the checkpoint, but the head of the Bureau there is going to be gone for three months, and with surly types around that’d love to get their hands on a little girl, Kidd takes it upon himself to make the dangerous trip to the girl’s family. They must go through lands of outlaws, Confederates who refuse to believe the war is over, and a daunting landscape of desert and dust storms. It’s a very good, tense film, with some brevity to keep it from feeling too dark (the communication barrier being one example). Hanks is great as you’d expect, but Helena Zengel steals the show as the girl. The desolate and open lands of southern Texas is the other big star, the films exudes the feel of the land in 1870. Very entertaining and well put-together picture. ★★★½
- TV series currently watching: The Boys (season 2)
- Book currently reading: Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
Jons Movie Takes 