The Time To Live And The Time To Die

Saw The Time To Live And The Time To Die, a melancholy little coming-of-age story about a Taiwanese boy and his family during the 50s. Being that this is the 50s and Taiwan, there's hints of Communism entering into full swing but this is a child's-eye view of the world and thus socio-political upheavals are not the point of the film. The film has a peaceful, rich atmosphere. The town they live in looks extremely real, with trash in the streets, people lounging about. It's not dirty, just warts-and-all believable. This is very different from most Chinese and Japanese films I've seen, which are usually unnaturally polished and plasticky. A far cry from this simple and humble depiction of an actual town.

Like many coming-of-age films, this has a wistful and nostalgic feeling of loss about it. The protagonist has kind of a wild youth, running with gangs of boys and starting turf wars. As he gets older and must take on more responsibilities, he turns away from his "family" the gang and towards his own family, symbolically passing the torch to the next generation.

I liked this film although it did bum me out. It's got tons of atmosphere and some great subtle acting. Of course when it's time to get sad, we get really sad but in earned, well-observed ways. A sweet, intimate little film.

Check It

Saw Check It (thanks, Nina!) It was the film about the gay gang in D.C. It was very emotional. The kids in the film are in a gang, so they do things that gang-members do, like rob stores and jump rival gang-members. They have not had easy lives and, lacking an infrastructure of parents and family, they have trouble making appointments, trouble controlling their anger. Many of them are involved in prostitution. There's heartbreaking scenes where they talk about their bad tricks.

The film follows one social worker as he tries to get them into real careers. There's another tear-jerker at the end when he's publicly thanked by the gang members. Many of the kids want to get into fashion. One starts getting into boxing but just sort of stops after a while and we hear that the guy who was going to sponsor him in fights had to close his gym and now lives out of a car. These are the would-be saviors of these kids? It's heartbreaking that that's the best they've got.

This film is very complex. The kids in it are poor, black, and gay. These forces interact with each other in complex ways. I think this will be a kind of Rorschach film. If you wanted to, you could see worthless, indolent youth, spiraling further into violence and sex. You could also see bullied kids fighting back at the whole world. I don't have any easy feelings about this film. I feel like they should try to make it in fashion, in boxing, that they should stick with school and avoid prostitution, but that's easy for me to say isn't it? If I were in their shoes I'd probably be dead by now. These kids are tough and fabulous, but they shouldn't have to be.

Belladonna of Sadness

Saw Belladonna of Sadness (thanks Lea and Ian!) It was a beautifully animated film about a woman in vaguely medieval times who is raped on her wedding night. After some further misfortunes, she makes a bargain with supernatural forces for power and revenge. The film comes from the 70s and has some amazing psychedelic sequences, especially relating to the supernatural creatures. The nature of the power she buys is traditional witchery: aphrodisiacs and potions to prevent pregnancy. There's a coda to the film which was apparently added on in a re-release tying this female empowerment to the ensuing French revolution (it's not clear exactly where this film takes place however.)

The film is seriously beautiful however. There's a lot of slow pans over still images, lending the film a static, timeless, fairy-tale-like quality. This is mixed with some frankly erotic animations of orgies, people flowing into each other, combining with and transforming into giant phalluses and vaginas. It's noteworthy that the creature the protagonist makes a deal with resembles a penis almost from the first moment he's on screen.

I dug this film. It's stillness makes it drag a bit near the end, but I think it earns its slowness and its pauses. It's the sort of film that can put you to sleep or entrance you and it rewards entrancement. A very pretty film.

Kopps

Saw Kopps, a fairly goofy Swedish comedy about a group of small-town cops who spend their days messing around, bickering like children, and eating hotdog waffles. One day a pretty lady from HQ comes by to tell them their station will be shut down on account of no crime. So, the cops stage heists and try to convince everyone that gangs are coming into town.

The premise is funny and there's several outrageous scenes. One of the cops is an action-movie fan and spends a lot of tense moments quoting Scarface. He's probably the funnest character (also the star of this gif) The others are funny mostly in their ineptitude and their non-cop-like behavior. The film has a low-key style, often using lazy whistling on the soundtrack and deriving humor more from situations than from gags.

I can't really recommend it. It's completely inoffensive and sweet but I didn't think it was particularly funny. It's kind of nothing.

Stanley Kubrick's Boxes

Saw Stanley Kubrick's Boxes a documentary about the many boxes of research materials Stanley Kubrick left upon his death. The filmmaker examines the contents of the boxes and turns the film into a Citizen Kane-style hagiography for Kubrick. I was under the impression this film would detail Kubrick's failed Holocaust documentary but (although it's brought up) it's not the focus. Kubrick's perfectionism is.

The film is short and kind of meandering, concluding at last that Kubrick's perfectionism was the thing that kept others in awe of him, enabling his triumphs but also isolating him in his fortress of photographs and paper. Despite being only 45 minutes long, we take a detour to interview a man who wrote a crank letter to Kubrick about what changes were needed for 2001: A Space Odyssey to be a great film. The documentary is an interesting little look into Kubrick's life. It's a bit overly full of people shaking their heads at his peculiarities but I suppose the peculiarities make the man in this case.

The Great Happiness Space

Saw The Great Happiness Space, a documentary about a Japanese host club, a sort of gentlewoman's club where women can go to buy overpriced drinks for the hot guys who work there. In return, these "hosts" sit with the women and listen to them and laugh with them and sometimes also have sex with them. Many of the women who frequent these clubs are themselves prostitutes and are kind of addicted to these clubs, their prostitution sometimes caused by their debts to these clubs. It's a very interesting and alarming viscous cycle of purchasing professional affection. The hosts for their part are fairly attractive (they all have this uniform, Goblin King in a business suit, sort of look) but the pretense of actual affection is paper-thin. They talk of how they manipulate the women to form emotional bonds with them, how they pressure them to buy drinks.

Whereas these women sell their bodies, the men are mostly selling their emotions. One host talks of losing himself in his role, becoming confused as to the boundary of reality and fantasy. One of the women tells the camera that she is, for real, no kidding, in love with one of the hosts, that she wants to give him all of her money and to die for him. The host waves this off, accusing her of trying to manipulate him. She is devious, he tells us. He hates her.

The film is fascinating. It starts off making the Host club seem kind of sexy and glamorous but slowly peels back layer after layer of the artifice, revealing the ugly manipulation underneath and then revealing the common, human need for companionship under that. One host is moved to (perhaps drunken) tears as he talks about how they all, the men and the women, only want to be loved, how money both enables and distorts these relationships. Several times the hosts talk about their jobs in terms of "healing," as though they were doctors or therapists. One of the hosts is chastised by the owner for feeling guilty for manipulating the women. "You think this is a psychiatric institute? Never forget, this is your job."