light-hearted and laughable

Juuso Laatio and Jukka Vidgren’s Heavy Trip follows a group of friends as they try to make it big in their small, Finnish town of Taivalkoski with their wannabe black metal band (later named Impaled Rektum). This film has been the most mainstream and modern film we have watched so far, and holds many similarities to a typical American comedy film (see The Hangover, Horrible Bosses, or Bridesmaids). However, it manages to transcend being a simple comedy film with its predictable, yet well-played plot and its setting in a specific cultural context. Similar to Good Bye, Lenin!, Heavy Trip shows that a good film doesn’t have to be difficult to watch (like Holy Motors or Raw) or have an intense plot (like Timecrimes), for as long as it makes its audience happy and feel good, then they’ve done their job.

For a movie that was centered around heavy death metal music (and other dark things, like the sounds of a dying reindeer getting caught in a bond grinder), Heavy Trip was incredibly funny, light, and dorky. From their awkward hair flips and impressive attempts at speaking English to stealing Jynkky’s coffin and having a bachelor’s party ruined by the Norwegian border patrol, the film is hilariously awkward, yet likable. The same description of awkward and likable goes for their characters; Laatio and Vidgren really developed the four guys well throughout the film and the actors portraying them did a great job with embodying their characters.

Though the killing off of Jynkky seemed like a random and cheap plot twist, it was an event that bolstered the second half of the film to be more driven by dedication, while still remaining funny. Not to mention, Jynkky’s death was practically foreshadowed at the beginning of the film where Turo states that he has legally been declared dead twice. This is where we can see an aspect of the film as a story about passion and dedication towards their goal. Personally, I have never heard so much heavy metal music in one sitting as I did when watching this movie, and even though I’m not familiar with the genre, I could tell that Impaled Rektum’s music playing was good. It’s also evident that these people know their stuff, especially Pasi, who can name every heavy metal song with just a few notes. Though similar to Holy Motor’s theme of commitment, Heavy Trip is different in that it deals with reality in a much more relatable sense, especially in the context of taking risks. This film also tackles friendship in a beautiful manner. Not every group of friends will drop everything, steal a van and cross the border to perform in a music festival, all while bringing along their friend’s coffin.

Overall, Heavy Trip was the funniest movie we’ve watched and a great end to the semester. Similar to our first film, A Woman is a Woman, which was light and not-so serious, Heavy Trip really proved itself as a music-driven and comedic film. Sir was right in saying although it may not have been the best movie created, or even the best movie we’ve watched in class, it sure as hell was funny. In conclusion, the past 11 films we have watched in this class have shown how wide and full of variety European cinema can be. But more than this, it has shown how culture will always present itself to the audience, either through music, landscape, or any other element.

no longer vegetarian or virgin

Julia Ducournau’s 2016 film, Raw, beautifully and disturbingly captures the emergence of a young teenage girl, Justine, as she balances her first year in college with her new-found love for human flesh. Unsurprisingly, Ducournau’s portrayal of cannibalism is extremely grotesque, with dozens of shots of dismembering, tearing-off, and biting at. I, myself, someone who is fond of horror films, couldn’t handle the gore and had to look away several times. Though this theme has been portrayed diversely in the cinematic film, Raw is unique. The Hannibal series and film portray the main character as a meticulous cannibal who plays smart, while The Santa Clarita Diet series puts a light spin on the whole cannibalism subject. Raw is unsettling in that its portrayal of cannibalism was irrational and animalistic, as implicated by all the dead animals in the veterinary school. It explores indulgences, not just for raw, human meat, but also for sex, alcohol, and other vices. It was a spin on addiction and how the more she tries to deny and abstain from her desire for meat, the more ravenous and voracious she becomes.

No one would think that a film on cannibalism would go hand-in-hand with the themes of coming-of-age, sexuality, and empowerment, but again, Raw impresses the audience and critics by doing just so. You can easily compare how different post-carnivorous Justine is to when she had just entered school. She was a vegetarian and a virgin. Timid, afraid. But as the movie progresses, we see how she starts to explore sexuality and discover who she is. She became more certain and controlled of her actions. Beneath its surface, Raw successfully tackles a young woman realizing who she is and what she wants, albeit, the answer to these are rather extreme and grotesque, like well… cannibalism and raw, human flesh. The director herself, Julia Ducournau, is a celebration of female power. For her directoral debut, she breaks boundaries and shatters glass ceiling by directing a horror film, an incredible one at that—a feat considering how male-dominated the field has become.

The plot of the movie itself started of very confusing. I was confused as to how all of this happened to her suddenly. Not to mention, how weird her school is. What kind of veterinary school initiates their freshmen by dousing them in cow blood and forcing them to eat raw rabbit kidney? This question is never really answered throughout the film, but we slowly start to realize what is happening to Justine, especially when we see her sister do the same things. Towards the end, we are sure now, this is genetic, and the parents knew this would happen. The audience is then left with many ethical and methodological questions, why would the parents let their daughters go to the same school knowing that this would be the outcome? Should the parents have let them know about this inevitable future of theirs beforehand, or let them figure out a solution as they go along? Nonetheless, the film ends on a hopeful note, Justine still has a lot to learn about herself, but she’ll figure it out and be saved.

your days of plenty are over

It’s easy for me to decide that The Edukators was my favorite film we dealt with in this class. The way it melded its elements together—the musical direction led by artists like Franz Ferdinand and Jeff Buckley, the landscape provided by the view of the Alps, its dialogue between socialist and capitalist messages, and their light insertions of romance and humor, all these played wonderfully in the film. More than anything, this film manages to remain relevant through its portrayal of economic activism and revolution as a silent war between the poor and the rich—a war that is still continuing to this day.

From a surface level, Weinggartner’s film focuses on three friends, the Edukators, who break into rich people’s houses and take one of the owners hostage to prevent him from revealing their truths. It would seem like The Edukators would be a violent film, but it actually tackled the discourse between youthful idealism and older pragmaticism very peacefully. Jan and Peter’s method doesn’t involve theft nor violence, but rather to move furniture around—a creative manifesto that forces isolated rich people, detached from reality, to see how their greed has hurt other people. But I can’t help but call into question their modus operandi. Is this technique the best one to push for their cause, or is it just a superfluous method? Though their movement managed to disturb the rich, did it, as implied by their alias, educate them?

The director, Weinggartner, also used his own experience during his time as a former activist to convey his message. We can see snippets of this in his use of storytelling for Hardenberg to really show a genuine experience. For instance, Hardenberg’s life is a great example of how someone, even a rebellious student, can subtly fall into the practices and lifestyles he is against. For Hardenberg, and many other people, he started to see the changes as a necessity (for his safety, for his family), until all of a sudden, he became the person he was, at some point, so infuriated by.

Despite its heavy implications on political and socialist movements, The Edukators still managed to be a comedic film that places value on relationships, both romantic and platonic. The love story between Jan and Jule provides a sort of side story, of a man who falls in love with his best friend’s girlfriend. This love triangle is similar to the one portrayed in A Woman is a Woman, though played a lot more realistically than the French musical. But it becomes a sore point for the trio, especially when it gets in the way of how they go about their mission to get themselves out of the mess they created. Obviously, the film holds many similar political semblance as Daniel Bruhl’s other film he starred in, Good Bye, Lenin!, but it varies in that it places importance on this friendship and their measures of action, contrary to Good Bye, Lenin!

The film also shows scenes of the Alps and the landscape surrounding it. This homage to culture is also seen in Trollhunter’s portrayal of the Norwegian landscape and L’Avventura’s scenes shot all around Italy. More importantly, these three films’ use of landscape indicates an element of isolation, a choice to be away from reality and civilization. Overall, The Edukators’ acts on a socialist message designed not just for Germans, but all people, through its use of storytelling, art, and love.

a crazy afternoon

Nacho Vigalondo’s Timecrimes stars Karra Elejalde, who plays Hector, an everyday man who, seemingly by accident, is pushed into a time loop with his future and past selves. From this description, you would think that Timecrimes was just going to be another science-fiction slash time travel movie, but Vigalondo adds another element—one of horror. Unlike many of the time travel genre’s accompanying elements of action, humor or romance (like the Back to the Future trilogy, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Groundhog Day, or Time Traveller’s Wife), Timecrimes gets the audience hooked at the premise of the film wherein Hector is being chased by what appears to be a deranged killer.

Time travel plots usually provide a way for man to manipulate his ending (or past) towards his preference; an opportunity to play around with destiny and fate, which will predictably result in a mess. I find that time travel movies will typically have an interesting premise but towards the middle can get a bit repetitive, while the end is practically foreseen. I used to think that directors and writers would get lazy with their work by just creating the same scene over and over again, but Timecrimes doesn’t fall to this same mistake. East time travel is different, in that something is revealed which changes the viewer’s perspective entirely, showing just how much thought is put into the process. It’s an interesting method of interacting with the audience—by having the character go through the realizations in sync with the viewer.

Vigalondo seems to place an important role on identity in the diegesis of the film. Hector develops as he goes through each time travel, he tries to play smarter by doing exactly what was done to him by the previous Hector, like calling his house and hanging up, luring a new Hector, and letting the woman from the forest die, as long as it would get him back to his normal life. As the movie progresses, the plot becomes wider (as more time travelling occurs), but still manages to remain focused on the same character, and better yet, the same Hector. We get to understand the identity and fate of Hector, which is quite contrary to the audience’s experience in a complex film like Holy Motors, where even though the whole movie centers around one character, Oscar, the viewers never get to know the reality of who he is exactly.

Initially, I thought it was strange that we were going to watch another science-fiction movie, right after Trollhunter, but after watching Timecrimes you can see that they’re not much of the same type. Trollhunter is more adventurous and mythical, while Timecrimes makes use of a low budget and keeps the visuals very simple. This film proves that a good horror or sci-fi film doesn’t need crazy special effects or colossal amounts of blood and jump scares, rather, a good, properly thought-out storyline accompanied with committed and talented actors, like that of Elejalde, will do just the trick.

creatures and cultures

When I found out that we were going to watch a found footage film named Trollhunter, I was excited; I love watching sci-fi films that tackle supernatural monsters and mythology. I was expecting that the film would be a lot more serious, like Cloverfield or The Blair Witch Project, but I was pleasantly surprised with how Øvredal managed to incorporate some light humor and satire into its sci-fi/fantasy/horror aspects.

I really liked how Øvredal gave the cinematography a found footage style. Trollhunter’s attention to details, especially of authenticity and continuity, was something I really appreciated with the film and something I think sets them apart from a lot of typical found footage films that focused too much on its horror elements. For example, when Kalle died and the camera lens cracked, they (annoyingly) kept that crack on film for almost 5 minutes until they could change the camera when Malica arrived with, both literally and figuratively, a new lens. The effort to try to convince the viewers about the authenticity of the found tapes was entertaining, especially at the start with the black screen with text and the end of the film with the press conference. They were really pushing for a conviction that the film was realistic and “raw and unedited”, making me think that maybe this wasn’t just an effort to try to portray a good found footage movie, but perhaps also trying to hint at the possibility of this reality—of trolls and secret government agencies actually existing.

Aside from this attention to detail, having a mockumentary style film provides the opportunity for the filmmaker to manipulate the plot and the scenes to their advantage. This helps in keeping the film interesting, while still maintaining that realistic and unprocessed aura. An example of this can be seen when we contrast the mockumentary to the documentary style of The Five Obstructions. Though its five remakes kept the film interesting, the scenes in between them could get boring at times.

Most importantly, I appreciated how much Norwegian culture was evident in the film. Even though it was trying to come off as a horror or sci-fi film, I couldn’t help but really notice how much of their culture was being reflected inadvertently. When I was doing research on the film’s background I found out that Øvredal really wanted his film to accurately represent Norwegian folk legends and he even used inspiration from many of the country’s myths. Even if the CGI and special effects were adequate for a monster movie, I was still fascinated with their portrayal of the trolls on the camera, because unlike most horror films, they really tried to show what they looked like and they stuck to physical details common in most popular folklore. Additionally, one of the best outcomes of having a documentary-style film is its random, yet seemingly normal insertions of the Norwegian scenery in the background whenever they were travel or filming the trolls.

Overall, I genuinely enjoyed Trollhunter for its style and story, but its subtle play on certain elements like culture and comedy really adds some depth to the movie for me, bringing it beyond the simple and characteristic thriller-fantasy film.

confusion and curiosity

If last week’s film, Good Bye, Lenin!, was an example of how great films don’t need to be difficult to watch, then Holy Motors is its antithesis. Leos Caprax’s Holy Motors was, and I seem to keep saying this after almost every movie we’ve watch in this course, one of the weirdest films I have ever seen. This mainly came from the film’s difficulty to understand. I found myself feeling confused and even grossed out at some point, yet none of that stopped me from watching. It was a movie that knew just how to disturb its audience while still leaving them wondering what each scene meant and what will happen next.

Holy Motors follows a man named Oscar as he goes about what the audience can assume to be a day in his life as an “actor”. He has nine appointments for the day, which entails him to use an insane amount of make-up, props, and full-on identity and personality changes. As he goes through the appointments, they start getting weirder and weirder, from an old lady, to having simulated alien sex, to dismembering, to killing, and to even dying (but also, never actually dying).

Each story simply had no basis or end—they were kept unexplained, leaving the audience in the aforementioned confusion and curiosity. I was left with so many questions, was the scene with the “daughter” just another appointment? Or was it his real life breaking in between scenes? Why did Oscar kill that random guy in the café? Why did he never die amidst getting shot at multiple times? All of these, and more, led me to start second-guessing everything in the film. I started to construct my own theories and explanations that would try to remotely answer these queries, like maybe just like the actors of characters who die in scenes, the actors in this reality (like Oscar) are never harmed.

Acting and performance plays a main role in the film. Very simply, Holy Motors is about an actor acting without any cameras around. The whole story, especially that of Oscar’s, is a symbol for the crazy life that actors lead. It presents a case of how they can get lost in their own characters, they become their characters. Whether this is good or bad is answered by whether the viewer chooses to look at the film as a prime example of commitment or as a case in point of going crazy. The world in which these people live in shows how the lines between reality and entertainment are so blurred that only a select people seem to know what’s going on.

More than anything, this film presents performance as an art and as beauty. It’s intriguing and captivating, but you’ll never know what it’s truly about. Just when you think you start to understand, you’re faced with a new sequence that you’re left dumfounded with.

how far will you go?

Simply put, Good Bye, Lenin! was an easy-to-watch film, and for the first time in this class, something I would choose to re-watch over again. There was nothing particularly difficult about the film, as compared to our other films discussed in the class (*ahem* Persona) yet, Good Bye, Lenin! was a discreetly socially conscious film that was incredibly relevant to society. Despite the lack of a seemingly “difficult or bothering” plot, it still managed to be very successful due to its entertaining presentation of a harmonious balance between history, comedy, and familial ties.

Discussing this film’s historical context is a bit difficult for me, as I am not so well-informed on the happenings of socialism in East Germany, but anyone can tell that this movie was about a people’s love for their country. It’s obvious that Christiane was very dedicated to her country, but we can also see this same love in the actions of the family’s neighbors. These people, mostly older people who had lived most of their lives as socialists, seem to have enjoyed playing pretend for Christiane. You could almost see how they felt a bit sentimental over their times before the revolution. After doing some reading, I became familiar with a German term, ostalgie, which encapsulate the common theme of the movie as “nostalgia for a communist past”. Even Alex can be said to be a little nostalgic, as he really put a lot of effort onto recreating a communist life for his mother again.

However, Alex’s actions also show another great theme of the movie, of going to great lengths to protect your family. Alex literally changed the world for his mother, Christiane, even to the cost of his own happiness and comfort. I think that Alex was doing this all somewhat out of guilt for putting his mother in the hospital in the first place (because Christiane collapsed into a coma after seeing Alex being arrested at a anti-government rally). Because of this guilt, Alex’s efforts to revert his home back into its socialist state comforts not only his mom, but Alex himself. A less obvious act of love in the film is seen in the storyline of Christiane herself. She had given up a potentially more extravagant lifestyle outside East Berlin, as well as risking her relationship with her husband, just to protect her kids. A great contrast with Persona on the portrayal of motherhood.

Good Bye, Lenin! presented many questionable decisions, but overall, was a film about love and life. This film is a great example of how classic, great films don’t always need to be difficult to watch or so complex for the viewer, it can be simple, light, and even funny at times.

the perfect human x5

When I heard that we were going to watch a movie actually made in the 21^st century, I was excited—I felt like the best films I could relate to and understand were more modern films. The Five Obstructions is a documentary film directed by Lars von Trier and Jørgen Leth. It follows the two directors as von Trier challenges Leth to remake his own famous short film, the 1967 The Perfect Human. Each remake, however, was accompanied by an obstruction or obstacle set by von Trier. Though many people have viewed The Five Obstructions as a game of one-upmanship, I chose to view it as a film that examined the friendship of the two directors. One that showed how one friend challenges another to better his skill and widen his own way of thinking. The roles between a mentor and his protégé have suddenly switched—von Trier was now guiding Leth as he starts his film anew.

I think that the challenges were something that they both enjoyed doing. It was an opportunity for something different than the typical, almost routine films they would normally do. Leth did it not because he had to, but maybe because he wanted to. He needed a challenge. We can tell from the original film that Leth had a style of filming: classical, simple, and rather minimalist. But von Trier challenges this through his obstructions with a different cinematography, with a loud, disorderly, and almost uncontrollable setting, with Leth in front of the camera rather than behind it, and with Leth using a new and modern technology, which he had no experience with at all. Even von Trier was evidently not giving Leth these obstructions just for fun—he was critical of them, as we can see when he fails Leth in the second obstruction. Von Trier knew what he wanted from Leth without giving it away. We know that these challenges work when, after completing the first obstruction, Leth was grateful for the obstruction, stating: “the 12 frames were like a gift.” The two brilliant filmmakers knew that there was always more to improve or change about any project, for even a film called ‘The Perfect Human’ was no perfect film.

The Five Obstructions was definitely a more modern film compared to what we have been watching, but we can still use the things we have seen in this film to understand the older films in terms of what goes on behind the camera, or rather, in the head of a filmmaker. Long, silent shots, similar to the ones used from The Perfect Human, seem to be common in many of the 60s films we have watched in class. The Perfect Human even reminded me of the style of Persona, with its black and white film, and silent and strange aura. The documentary also used a lot of dialogue, which I enjoyed. Although, the film was a bit repetitive, I didn’t mind so much because there was also something new and different with every remake.

Overall, the film was a challenge of creativity. A challenge to test our own limits, and to go beyond our first impression. The film was a literal work of art, with how it showed the process and thinking that went behind making a film. The result of the fourth obstruction was my favorite. It turned The Perfect Human into a contemporary piece of art. Leth was a perfect example of one of the greatest challenges of filmmaking: working with what you have and making it better than what was expected.

gone but certainly not forgotten

Of the three films we’ve watched in class, L’Avventura has been my favorite so far. It was a movie that captured the beautiful Italy, with all it’s cobblestone roads, open balconies, and far away towns. The women in the cast looked stylish with their rich Italian dresses, matching perfectly with each character’s personality and background. Unlike Bergman’s Persona, L’Avventura was a film that I think was meant to be filmed in color, showing off the scenes attached with all its emotions. Other than its impressive aesthetics and cinematography, the plot kept me intrigued. When the film started off with the mysterious disappearance of a woman, I was hopeful that it would be as great as the renowned Gone Girl (2014) movie, with the audience trying to unravel the case of whether she had died or simply walked away. It was about halfway through the movie when I realized that it wasn’t about the search for Anna—not entirely. For the most part, L’Avventura was about the egocentric affair of two people and the lavish, yet seemingly predictable, lives of their friends.

After Anna had disappeared on the island, everyone spent all of 3 days searching for her. It wasn’t long until Sandro became enamored by Claudia and kissed her on the boat. But it wasn’t just these two who didn’t seem to care much for Anna’s whereabouts, but their entire group of friends. Each couple too preoccupied with their own problems to even mourn for Anna, instead moving on almost instantly with parties and sex. Claudia was the most concerned, but only until she decided to choose her affair with Sandro over Anna’s life. Halfway through the film, when Sandro and Claudia finally decide to be together, was the start of the decline of the memory of Anna. The film wasn’t about finding Anna anymore. Anna was forgotten. She started to fade into the background, but was still present enough to haunt the two lovers, especially Claudia.

Arguably, Claudia was a romantic at heart, she just wanted to fit in like all her friends, but she was still riddled with guilt. I think Claudia was even jealous of Anna, with the way she waited for Anna and Sandro after they had sex at the start of the movie and when she was trying on the brunette wig. When she finally had Sandro, we can tell how much had changed: “Only a few days ago, only at the thought that Anna might be dead, I felt that I could have died too. Now I won’t even cry. I am afraid she might be alive!” On the other hand, Sandro didn’t even seem to be really bothered by Anna’s disappearance, he was easily distracted and veered away from his mission to find Anna as soon as Claudia arrived. Their moral compasses were unsound, operating mostly on what they thought was love. It’s easy for me to say that both the characters were selfish. Despite this, it was also their characters that made me love the film. Frustration with them shows just how affected I was with the movie, how much I clung to its story, immersed in the experience.

While I’m a sucker for romantic movies where the girl and the guy fall in love with each other against all odds, I knew that this movie was not it. While Anna and Sandro didn’t have a great relationship, I can’t say that Claudia and Sandro did either. They could clearly only be together when they were alone in their bubble, a relationship hinged on physicality—joint together by sex. It was a desperate attempt to be in love and avoid loneliness. L’Avventura was barely a love story, but rather a story of two people too scared to be alone, too scared to face the reality of possibly having lost a friend, and instead they reach out to one another.

silent, eerie, and lost

persona pic.jpg

After watching Ingmar Bergman’s Persona, I could understand why many critics would describe the film as either a psychological horror or psychological drama. Yet, as I tried to explain the plot of Persona to my friend who hasn’t watched it, I realized it was hard to encapsulate the horror or thriller aspect of the story, because when you think about it, there was nothing particularly scary about it. I ended up just telling my friend, “basta… it was just such a strange movie…” And I don’t think I was completely wrong.

Persona starts off with a montage of disturbing footages, which were often obscure, hard to make out images, and sometimes sexually explicit. A boy waking up in a morgue walks up to a giant screen and sees the blurred image of two women. The film proceeds with the rest of the movie, revolving around Alma, a nurse, and Elisabet, an actress who suddenly went silent. On the surface level, the film was minimalist, with two, maybe three, characters in the whole film, but it’s acting, lighting, script, and other elements made it much more complex and mysterious. As I mentioned earlier, there was nothing particularly scary about Persona, but it also became a perfect example of a horror movie—without the cheap scares and jump shots, with no over-the-top blood-gushing-out-of-wounds scenes, no serial killers, ghosts, nor monsters. Just the frightening loss of one’s own identity—which is arguably one of the scariest things that could happen to a human.

It was a story of two seemingly different women, one a nurse and one a silent patient, who come together in a household and grow so close together that their identities blur and merge. This central theme was foreshadowed constantly, from Alma telling Elisabet how much they look alike and if she tried hard enough, she could be Elisabet, to Alma sleeping with Elisabet’s husband who mistakes her as his wife. In a quite literal take, the scene where Bergman would combine half of each other’s faces or superimpose the two faces, morphing them into one, showed this same loss of identity—of Alma becoming Elisabet.

It was another silent-esque film. The dialogue was almost non-existent, but the communication was there, just manifested differently through facial expressions, body language, and the score. Alma’s storytelling was so strong and raw; offering a different view on motherhood as a burden. The film was eerie, tense, and charged with so much emotions—fear, anger, love, and grief. Even as I’m writing this post, I’m still not entirely sure what was real in the film and what was not. The film remains a mystery to me, but it also leaves me wanting more. Persona is considered by some as one of the greatest films ever made, and it’s evident that it inspired many future film makers. Overall, Persona was a film that moved you. Shook you. Disturbed you. Which is essentially what a film is meant to do, to move the audience, either positively or negatively.