So I really enjoyed this movie, easily one of the better time travel movies that I have seen, let me explain…

Timecrimes follows a man, Hector, who seems like an average man at first, that is until some weird things start to happen to him. The timeline of the whole movie only actually takes place within the span of one hour, the runtime of the movie is actually longer haha Anyway, due to different things happening to Hector, i.e. time travel, he goes back in time and has to do things in order to make sure the things that have already happened to him in the past, still happen to him in order to keep things in balance. However, Hector is eventually caught in a loop. The use of time travel in the movie is really well done, the audience has to really pay attention to the different clues, like the different items, each time Hector goes back in time. This technique that the director employed really caught my attention because it really had me yearning to find out more, and to be more skeptical about the things that are happening to the Hector that we’re following at any one given moment. This also helps the “rewatch-ablity” of the movie, since it brings up so many things as the movie is going along, you start to wonder to yourself “Oh dang, I wonder what else I missed”. I feel like it’s so easy to mess up time travel movies, or make it a gimmick, wherein time travel is only there for the convenience of the plot to fill in some plot holes that may not have been answered by the time the movie is about to end. Timecrimes uses time travel very effectively in order to drive it’s plot and to engage the audience to think more critically.

When I was watching this movie, all I could really thinking about was, “hey, haven’t have I already watched this movie?” let me explain…

So the movie “Heavy Trip” revolves around this heavy metal band called “Impaled Rektum” with their members: Turo, Lotvonen, Pasi and Jynkky. The band kinda sucks, but Lotvonen is keen on working hard to get is big break. A majority of the movie lies within this road trip that this band makes in order to play at a festival that they weren’t even invited in. This got me thinking, haven’t I seen this before? A movie wherein the protagonist, who is highly optimistic about their dreams and aspirations, and his band (yes pun intended) of comrades go on a road trip in order to accomplish something that initially seems impossible, along the way they have run-ins with many different characters who they seem to unintentionally rub the wrong way and have said characters chase them to their eventual destination. Once they get to their destination they do the impossible, but with the eventual repercussions of their actions on their way to get there, but they still emphasize the small victories. The plot of the movie isn’t an original one, it’s been done over and over again in movies like: We’re The Millers, Due Date, and Wild Hogs.

Just because the movie isn’t original, doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy it. The movie as a whole is very light-hearted, there aren’t too many scenes that require the full capacity of my brain to focus on every little detail, and sometimes that’s okay. Some movies are really just like that, like Heavy Trip, they’re just there for some cheap laughs and to, hopefully, bring a smile to the faces of the audiences, with a story of hard work, dedication, and eventual triumph.

So The Edukators are the real ones who are taught a lesson, let me explain…

When I found out that Daniel Bruhl, the actor who plays the main character in “Goodbye, Lenin!”, was also playing one of the main characters in this movie, I was pretty excited since I like his roles in the past. His role he played in the movie was good, but I wouldn’t consider it fantastic.

I think that the movie presents an interesting situation with the dynamic between the main 3 characters (Jan, Peter, and Jule) and Hardenburg. Most of the movie takes place in a cabin in the Austrian Alps where the main 3 have kidnapped Hardenburg after a “heist” gone wrong. I put heist in quotation marks because the main characters “educate” wealthy people by breaking into their houses as a form of anti-capitalist.  Instead of stealing from them, they just rearrange their furniture and vandalize the houses.

While at the cabin, Peter grows increasingly suspicious of Jule and Jan because they seem like they are becoming more and more friendly and touchy with each other since Peter is Jule’s boyfriend. While this is ongoing, Hardenburg is also growing, but more towards his old, younger and rebellious self. Hardenburg, despite being the leader of the Socialist German Student Union when he was in his youth, eventually became a product of the “system”. That system being the world of capitalist and corporate life. I think that the development of Hardenburg throughout the film is more significant since he learns to rediscover his true self.

The three main characters of Jan, Peter and Jule, isn’t really anything new in terms of film or even in fiction. The story of their love triangle is fairly predictable, but their characters learn to not judge people based on appearance, especially when they find out  about Hardenburg’s youth. In the end, they are able to get away from the authorities and leave Hardenburg on good terms. The last scene of the movie implies the three have settled their differences since they are all laying in bed together. So yay for polygamy? haha

You know when you’re younger and feeling rebellious, especially when you reach your freshman year in college? Yeah well this movie takes that up several notches, let me explain…

So the movie follows the protagonist, Justine, who is entering her first year in veterinary school and is forced to undergo the many different freshman year initiations that everyone has to go through. On the first night of being at the school, Alex shows Justine a class picture of their parents at the school, so they had to go through the same initiations. One of the initiations requires them to eat a raw rabbit kidney. Justine refuses at first, stating that she is a vegetarian as well as her family. Her sister, Alex, who is either in her second or third year, sees that Justine doesn’t want to eat it, but forces her to eat it.

This becomes a big turning point in the movie, where Justine realizes that she has an almost primal urge to consume meat, even though she has been a vegetarian for most of her life. This is where the rebellious side of her comes out, consuming meat. The trope of kids entering college and tasting (yes pun intended) their first lick of freedom, is taken on a different turn. Most people, me included, would assume that since Justine unlocked this hidden desire for meat, there would be montages of her chowing down on different types of meats and buffets, but nope. Justine discovers her appetite for meat is only a stepping stone to something more sinister, she discovers her true desire is for human flesh. The “WTF” moment of her realizing that she likes human flesh (yes it was show in great detail), was only compounded by the fact that her sister is also a cannibal! We learn when Alex runs to the middle of a road and making a car swerve and then chowing down on the driver and passenger who died in the accident. Alex even goes so far as to tell Justine to eat as well, telling her that she (Alex) did this for her (Justine).

At the end of the movie, it was later revealed that the mom of Alex and Justine, is also a cannibal, but she (the mom) was able to temper her cravings by becoming a vegetarian. So the cannibalism runs through the family, but is only passed on to the females, this is also backed up by the statement that the father told Justine that she shouldn’t have girls. I think the biggest lesson from the movie is, although the movie is an extreme example, that sometimes your parents know what’s best for you, even if that lesson has to be taught the hard way.  

I can’t tell how serious the people who made this movie are taking themselves, let me explain.

So the movie is styled as a found-footage movie, which immediately reminded me of The Blair Witch Project, which may not have been the first found-footage movie, but was certainly the one that made them somewhat mainstream. Since the movie was made in this format, it really keeps with the “indie” style that makes it seem like it’s not a big budget film. The look of the movie doesn’t detract from anything that happens in the movie narratively. The story is still easy to understand, since a lot of it happens through exposition from the interviews that are conducted for the short film that is being recorded.

Going into the movie, I didn’t actually think that there was actually going to be trolls in the movie. I thought to myself that “trolls” could be referencing something in real life. To my surprise, there were actual trolls. The filmmakers played really hard into the fact there were trolls that were living among human beings and there was a whole government agency that is tasked with dealing with the trolls. Part of the fact that made it seem like such a “human” task, dealing with the trolls, is how the trollhunter (Hans) talked about how he doesn’t want to do the job anymore because the hours are so demanding, the benefits are that good, and that he isn’t compensated properly. All of the things that Hans mentioned are things that people with real jobs in real life complain about, so that helped sell the world that the filmmakers were creating, one wherein trolls exist. Even though it was a fictional world that the filmmakers were depicting, it was one that was still rooted in real human struggles, which I think is a good decision that the filmmakers made.

One last thing, I just thought that it was humorous that they, the filmmakers, actually incorporated a type of troll that lived under a bridge where people would sacrifice goats to, just like in the fairy tales that many people, including myself, would hear when we were growing up.

So the movie as a whole was technically one “cohesive” movie, but it played more like an anthology piece. Let me explain…

Alright, just a little background, an anthology is a compilation of different works. So when I say that The Five Obstructions plays more like an anthology piece, it just means that they all seem like they are completely different from one another. The “they” that I’m talking about is each short film that is created within the movie. The five obstructions represent actual obstructions that are put in front of the director (Jorgen Leth) of a famous experimental film called “The Perfect Human”, who is tasked by another director (Lars von Trier) who is a fan of Leth, to recreate his film given the different obstructions. The film as a whole is a documentary on how Leth is able to work around the obstructions that are presented to him. The five obstructions are: 1. Leth must remake the film in Cuba, with no set, and with no shot lasting longer than twelve frames, and he must answer the questions posed in the original film; 2. Leth must remake the film in the worst place in the world but not show that place onscreen; additionally, Leth must himself play the role of “the man”. The meal must be included, but the woman is not to be included. Leth remakes the film in the red light district of Mumbai, only partially hiding it behind a translucent screen; 3. Leth failed to complete the second task perfectly, von Trier punishes him, telling him to either remake the film in any way he chooses, or else to repeat it again with the second obstruction in Mumbai. Leth chooses the first option and remakes the film in Brussels, using split-screen effects; 4. Leth must remake the film as a cartoon. He gets aid from Bob Sabiston, an animator, who creates animated versions of shots from the previous films; 5. The fifth obstruction is that von Trier has already made the fifth version, but it must be credited as Leth’s, and Leth must read a voice-over narration supposedly from his own perspective but was actually written by von Trier.

The entire movie plays each version of “The Perfect Human”, as if it’s a different movie while trying to keep some things together such as the two directors working together. I think it would have been more interesting to watch to see a movie wherein the “student”, Trier, is learning directly from the “old master, who still has a few things up their sleeve” in Leth. It would have made for a more cohesive movie, at least for me.

I’m going to be honest, it was fairly hard to watch this movie. Let me explain…

The movie itself was hard to watch not because the scenes from the movie were very graphic or “for mature audiences”, but because there wasn’t too much going on in the movie. For the majority of the movie, it takes place in a cottage by the sea where the two main characters, Alma the nurse and Elisabet the famous stage actress are residing. They are there because the doctor assigned to Elisabet thought it would be best for her recovery from her sudden immobility and mute-ness. Since Elisabet is in a state where she is not speaking, it only leaves Alma to do most of the talking. This one-sided conversations are what add to the difficulty in following along to what is going on in the movie.

Alma later confirms that Elisabet has been able to talk this whole time when she (Alma) goes to confront Elisabet about a letter that Elisabet wrote revealing that she (Elisabet) is studying Alma and reveals one of Alma’s deepest secrets. This leads to many back-and-forths between Alma and Elisabet that includes Elisabet running off and Alma begging forgiveness and left me asking myself, “What’s even going on?”

My own confusion was even furthered when the husband of Elisabet comes to the cottage looking for his wife. The husband then confuses Alma for Elisabet, although Alma tries to convince him that she is not his wife, they still have sex. So again, “What’s even going on?” It is then later revealed that Elisabet tried to have an abortion, but eventually gave birth to a boy who she resents, which mirrors Alma, who got an abortion but regrets it everyday. By the end of the film it seems like Alma is having a full on identity crisis and is proclaiming that she is indeed herself. Which had me asking another question, “Who’s who and doing what?”

Maaaaaaaaaannnn this is the weirdest movie I’ve ever seen, let me explain…

Okay, so the movie follows this guy, Oscar, and his driver, Celine, around Paris to various “appointments”. The appointments requires Oscar to take on various roles, that he’s given via a folder of the persona he will take on, and go around Paris in said persona. The first one being a female beggar, the next one has Oscar dawn a motion capture suit for a movie or a video game (it’s not explicitly stated what it’s for). The weirdest role (in my opinion) that Oscar has to play is some sort of a leprechaun. As the leprechaun, he is wearing many prosthetics to make his appearance more gross and repulsive. He then proceeds to run through a cemetery taking the flowers from the graves and eating them. BUT that’s not even the weirdest part, he then goes to a photoshoot, bites off an assistant’s finger and then kidnaps the model and brings her to the sewers of Paris. The model doesn’t say or do anything, but just goes with it, which confuses me just as much.

An interesting part of the film is the revelation that he is part of an agency that has other “actors” who take on different personas through their various “appointments”. This was seen when Oscar was talking with this lady who he knew in the past, but maybe as a different name when they were in an appointment together.

Maaaaaaan, this movie is by far the most entertaining movie we’ve watched in class so far, let me explain…

So the movie itself had a lot of comedic elements, which is why it made this movie the most entertaining movie we’ve watched in class so far. There were a lot of jokes that dealt with the time period that the movie is set in, that being right after the fall of the Berlin Wall with the reunification of East and West Germany. My favorite joke was when the mother saw an ad for Coca-Cola being put up in the building across from theirs. It was particularly funny because Coca-Cola was a symbol of Capitalism and the West, but the mom was a firm believer in socialism and East Germany.

Although the joke was funny to me, I think it was only because I understood the context of what was going on. Many of the jokes required some sort of knowledge of what was going on in the world at the time. The assumptions of the writers relied heavily on a learning curve that the audience had to adjust to. That learning curve being that the audience knows the background of the film, like what was going on in the world at that time.

I’m not faulting the writers too much because the film was released in 2003, about 14 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall. So at the the time fo the release, the main target audience would’ve been alive to witness it happen. For future viewers of Good Bye, Lenin!, need to have prior knowledge of the background in order to enjoy it fully. Since the film doesn’t age too well, but that didn’t stop me from enjoying it.

Maaaaaaaaaaaaan was this movie hard to watch, let me explain…

The movie revolves around 3 main characters: Anna, Claudia (Anna’s best friend), and Sandro (Anna’s lover). *SPOILER ALERT* So the thing that drives the plot of the movie is the disappearance of Anna. Most of the movie consists of Sandro and Claudia looking for her. But why was this movie hard to watch? The most glaring thing is that Anna is never found. Usually in movies the problem is introduced and eventually payed off by the end of the movie, not the case with L’Avventura.

Another point that makes the movie hard to watch is that the characters, at least the main 3, are hard to relate to because none of them are like-able. I can understand that some characters are really written for the audience to not like them, but nah dude, it’s all of them.

Let’s start with Anna; Anna from the get go seems like s brat who is used to got whatever she want and when she doesn’t she’ll make it seem like it’s the biggest inconvenience in the world. For example, after reuniting with her lover, Sandro, she then creates this scene when they’re swimming in the ocean that there’s a shark nearby just to have more attention focused on her. That’s not even the half of it! She then argues with Sandro that they were separated for too long (one month) and that she “can’t take it anymore”. Girl, lent is longer than the time that you spent apart, and if you can’t even handle that, maybe it wasn’t meant to be.

Then there’s Sandro, Anna’s “lover”. Why did I put it in quotes? Let’s find out. So most of the movie Sandro is looking for Anna. Seems nice right? WRONG! He asks Claudia to go with him and then he falls in love with Claudia faster than Usain Bolt can run the 100m dash. So okay, Sandro and Claudia are now together, but NOPE! He gets caught by Claudia with a next girl that catches his eyes. DAMN DUDE!! Keep it in your pants!

The last of the main 3, Claudia, is probably the most “innocent”, but she is no walk in the park either. In the movie, one moment she’s Anna’s best friend, then the next moment she’s falling in love with her former lover Sandro. Claudia doesn’t do herself any favors by just letting herself just be victim to the things that are going on around her.