What the heck did i just watch?? This film was probably the most disgusting movie i’ve ever seen. While watching, I felt so awkward during the film and it was really off-putting. I was expecting the typical horror film plot in which the main character/s are being haunted/hunted by a monster of some sort. Little did I know that the main characters of this film would be both the ones being the monsters.

Even with the rare occurrences of addiction to cannibalism, I found myself expecting and foreseeing the turns of events in this film. I already started to suspect something weird to happen when the film was clearly trying to show the strictness of the family when it came to being vegetarians. Sort of like how game of thrones shows these details for you to analyse as sort of easter eggs, it felt obvious that there was more to the scene when the mom and dad were so insistent on her not eating meat. The roots of my suspicions probably stem from personal experience. No, I am not a cannibalist, but I used to have really strict parents as well. Parents that would reprimand me for doing a lot of things but wouldn’t really make me understand why.  These rules set for me by my parents didn’t stick later on in my college life, similar to that of Justine’s experiences. 

I found the movie to be very unrealistic, and that took away the greatness of the film. When the video of Justine acting like a beast uncontrollable over human meat surfaced because of Alexia, I would expect everyone else to be disgusted. Although people were seen to be avoiding her, none were really shocked about it. The fact that Alexia probably has been causing those freak accidents to happen at he same area frequently, and not getting caught. Even when Justine ate her sister’s own finger off and Alexia was not a tad bit pissed.These made the whole film seem so ingenue and I didn’t really feel a connection with the characters.

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?”

Although heavy metal isn’t my cup of tea in terms of music, this movie proved to be entertaining in it’s puns and gags. I was definitely not aware that heavy metal had a cult-like following in Scandinavian countries. The movie appeals to me because these four friends who have musical talent decide to pursue their journey after 12 long years of waiting for the right moment. The film’s characters had a different ray of personalities each with their own unique image are the most metal group of guys in their small village. It’s evident in the way they carry themselves that they idolise the icon rockband “KISS” as they even have the full face paint extravaganza going on.

The film strangely enough for me kind of reminded me of a film that came out early in the year, “Bohemian Rhapsody”. Because of the plot’s mix of comedy and serious plot lines. The difference being the true story factor of course as Bohemian Rhapsody was based on the true story of Queen. This film seemed like a spoof version of Bohemian Rhapsody with a twist of heavy metal instead of Queen’s pop/rock genre. The shift in seriousness of the film kind of catches you off-guard as the first half of the film is mostly where all the gags and comedic content is and then it shifts to a sort of serious drama. The directors really do a good job of attracting metal type music dorks to the film. Personally I could not fully appreciate the comedy as it does not completely relate to me but I’m sure a lot of musical fanatics thoroughly appreciated the film’s comedy.

“Raw” a coming-of-age film adds it’s own little twist to what it feels is peer pressures of the college experience. Raw has it’s fair share of peer pressure and “addictions” in the form of cannibalism. The film’s gory factor definitely had me squeamish as it was overly outlined with the explicit scenes of cannibalism. I found the play on Justine being a vegetarian throughout her life and having never tried meat interesting but the it gets even more interesting as she is going to veterinary school which instigates that she has a love for animals. A hazing ritual gone wrong unlocks Justine’s inherent character trait as she then longs for flesh after being exposed to a strange delicacy, duck kidney while also being drenched in animal blood. What’s strange to me is that the film progresses as if Justine is transitioning into a folklorish monster as the cravings were not instantaneous rather they came in stages.

You can say that there is a link between the start of Justine’s cannibalistic nature and her sexual awakening as the two emerge simultaneously. I mean the scene where she takes a bite out of her own arm during intercourse, that says it all. The college setting and trying new things in college is a great way to pursue a modern horror film such as this one as it isn’t too impossible for this story to be a possibility but then is a cinematically creative plot.

The plot of L’avventura, an Italian film directed by Michelangelo Antonioni in the 1960s, was by far one of the more interesting European films that we’ve seen throughout our short list of movies. Despite the short list of films that we have encountered throughout the entirety of the course together, I am quite positive that this film would be one of the better and more interesting films we will see because its mysteries.

Despite being a film that I actually enjoyed watching, it is important to note that the film is actually a sad one as it shows us the effects of what feeling alone is like. Don’t be fooled by the loneliness part as the movie is not actually a romantic one. The movie focuses around the mysterious disappearance of Anna while she was in a yacht with her friends in the islands of Sicily. Initially the movie reminded me of Ben Affleck’s film, Gone Girl. Unlike the disappearance that was involved in that movie, we notice that in L’avventura only two people seem to be looking for the young woman. Also distinctly compare to that movie, this mysterious disappearance actually becomes an inconclusive one. This can actually mislead us to think these were the only mysteries that were involved in the film. This initial problem allows the audience to be able to question the personalities of the other important characters in the movie. These come about because the movie does not give the audience context regarding their stories of the characters. This enables the audience to continue to watch while they remain interested in trying to get to know the characters even more, as they slowly reveal themselves even from the earlier portions of the film. For instance, Sandro immediately kisses Claudia the moment they figured that Anna had disappeared which is something I did not expect at all. This allows us to immediately question these 2 characters and what their roles were in the film.

Unlike Gone Girl, this mysterious film isn’t actually a thriller, where you end up holding on to your seat as we anticipate something exciting is about to happen. It actually slowly paced itself as it unfolded events. Despite the lack of context, the director does a brilliant job in slowly showing the audience of the film slowly understand the main characters in the film even more.

Visually, the manner of how the film was captured was actually quite magnificent and beautiful, regardless of the lack of technological progress during the time it was filled. Despite it being a black and white film, I actually visually enjoyed watching it. This removes my prejudice regarding the visuals of older films.

Regardless of how much I enjoyed the movie experience, the anticipation of what actually happened to Anna and why she did it remains a mystery. Because of this fact alone, it would be easy to think that I wasted my time trying to wait for what would happen. On the contrary, the movie shows another story which we can often forget, which are of the ones of the other two characters, Claudia and Sandro and how they copped with their loss of Anna and also of each other.

Because of these, if you are not easily frustrated, impatient, have the spare time and an eye for cinematic beauty, I would easily recommend that you watch this film.

There really is nothing refreshing about a film based on the drama of the elite in society. Films like “L’Avventura” really show that being part of society’s elite isn’t all sunshine and rainbows. Problems and dramas usually take to extremes and have odd twists. In the case of this film, the drama centers around the mysterious disappearance of Anna. What I found odd about the film is it’s unusual pacing of the series of events. It did not really follow the usual narrative development. There is also a lot of play on the deceit and betrayal the characters have. It’s like loyalty is not too popular amongst them as a lot of adultery occurs as well.

I found really interesting how it was not that big of an issue that they were unable to locate Anna. But I guess you can say it had it’s imagery as well. The group as a whole maybe figuratively are all also on the verge of disappearing themselves as they do not have many fulfilling relationships in general. The film really reminds me of the plot of “Beverly Hills 90210” in the sense where the attractions to each other are intertwined and how their moral compass is somewhat crooked. The play on Sandro and Claudia sort of detective work was interesting as they try to find clues on what led to Anna’s disappearance while at the same time fornicating with each other. How ironic that they start a casual relationship while trying to find Claudia.