That twist.

I was in a Toni Collette mood some weeks ago and added a few of her films to my yet-to-watch list, from which I sometimes buy DVDs at random. So that’s why I found myself with a copy of The Sixth Sense on my desk. And to be honest, I was wondering what on earth I had done. Why would I want to own, let alone watch, a Bruce Willis film. When I think of him, I think of action movies, alpha men, or slightly over the top comic stuff. None of which interests me much, I must say. But hey, since I had the DVD in front of me I thought I might as well give it a go.

Now, there are a lot of films I see that I like, or like very much, but there are only a few that really move me, touch me, stay with me for days. The kind of films you want to creep into, be a part of, so that you’ll never have to leave that world.

And I must say that for me The Sixth Sense is definitely one of those films. I was completely blown away by the sensitivity of the subject matter, the actors, the whole feel of it. Gripped from the very first moment. Bruce Willis was absolutely amazing, as was Toni Collette. And the young boy, Haley Joel Osment, was spellbinding.

And, yes, of course, there’s that twist in the narrative, which is why this film got/gets so much publicity, but even without it, it would have been a wonderful film.

So go and watch it, but don’t read up on it, so as not to spoil anything, and let the whole thing wash over you and take you away. I promise you it’ll be worth it!

Adrian

Shaken, shocked and scared.

I finally got round to seeing The Silence of the Lambs the other day. Having heard so much about it, mostly in terms of “couldn’t sleep for weeks after seeing it”, “scariest film ever”, and similar reviews, I was prepared to be shaken, shocked and scared. So was I?

Well, in short: no. The film did not work for me, I’m afraid. I’m not saying I think it’s a bad film. On the contrary. Jodie Foster was amazing, Anthony Hopkins was amazing. But there were too many parts of the film I didn’t care much for. The whole ‘other serial killer’ story was maybe necessary but rather graphic (was that really necessary other than to simply shock?), the whole FBI doing their work bit was nothing out of the ordinary. Even Anthony Hopkins going all cannibalistic seemed so out of character and – though clever – not awe-inspiring.

What I did enjoy tremendously was the psychological thriller part of it. The meetings between Foster and Hopkins were magical. If that had been the main thrust of the film and if they had downsized the ordinary ‘how-catch-em’ part of it, it would have been a 10 out of 10 for me. There was an amazing tension in those meetings, they both played it so well, I could easily have watched that for hours on end. As it was, it lost some of its tension because of all the other noise going on.

Last line in the film was hilarious though. I’ll give ‘em that. No, I won’t spoil it by saying what it was. Just watch the film (again?) and see what I mean.

🙂

Adrian

Guilty Pleasure

It’s surprising how much negative press this film gets. Everybody seems to dislike it heartily, criticise it for almost everything, or ridicule it to death. To a point where you’re almost ashamed to admit you actually quite like it. But let me be bold: I do like it. In fact, I love it!

Come on, what’s not to love! It’s a splendour of a film what with all the costumes and period features, it’s got a lot of Shakespeare, so it can’t be all that bad, it’s funny, romantic, a little sad even, it’s got loads of tongue-in-cheek references, such as Hamlet’s skull and a “Greetings from Stratford upon Avon” mug in Shakespeare’s room.

Sure, it’s not a deep film. We’re not talking Bergmanesque struggles with the meaningful questions of life, death and religion, we’re not dealing with Tarkovskian atmospheric contemplativeness. But it’s just such a joy to watch, very entertaining, and the Romeo and Juliet story may be as old as the hills, it is still a masterful story and this original telling of it deserves more praise!

Adrian

It did not happen one Roman holiday

Funny how we all recently watched It happened one night and were told this was the original rom-com on which all subsequent rom-coms through the ages have been based. So when I saw Roman Holiday again the other day, I was struck by how right the above statement is. Just replace one heart throb, Clark Gable, with another, Gregory Peck, add a new girl being introduced, and hey presto.

Journalist guy meets runaway girl, recognises her and is hoping for a big news feature. Then he falls in love and subsequently won’t bother with getting his scoop. The similarities are blatantly obvious. Only question was: would he get her in the end? Well, maybe a right royal romance was a bit too much for the screenwriters to stomach….

Having now seen both I can see why It happened one night got so many Oscars. The originality and wit of that film was obviously hard to emulate!

Adrian

The Three Big Questions:

What’s this one about?

Sports promoter promotes ‘little wifey’ who then blossoms into independent woman and the two live happily ever after.

What makes this movie so great?

Any film featuring Katherine Hepburn is great. Any film featuring Spencer Tracy is great. Any film featuring both of them is magic. The two of them had been making movies for a decade by the time they filmed this one, and it shows. As smooth a chemistry as there ever was. Probably smoother than their real-life love affair. And while on the face of it, films like these seem very traditional and stereotype enforcing, and therefore rather dated, it could still be said that this is a feminist film about a woman unshackling and fulfilling her potential and making her own life choices.

Should You Watch It?

Duh, of course you should!

Adrian

It’s funny how it can sometimes take decades before you finally get round to seeing certain films. For me such a film was Rain Man, the 1988 film which I finally managed to see today in January 2025!

As expected I suppose, Dustin Hoffman shines throughout, in one of his most remarkable roles. Purely amazing. As for the other star, Tom Cruise, I must admit my first reaction is always that I’m not such a big fan of him. The slick, Miami-Vice-clad, yuppie-type role he plays is so incredibly dated by now that that doesn’t help him. It makes the first hour or so of the film slightly hard to watch.

Thankfully, the latter stages of the film more than make up for it. The “I like having you for my big brother’ scene near the end is very touching and makes the whole experience worth one’s while. As Julianne Moore says in Still Alice, when asked what it’s about: “It’s about love”. And so it is.

So in the end it was a big thumbs up from me.

From you as well? Let us know in the comments.

Adrian

I like to watch the “Criterion Closet Picks” videos on YouTube. If you’ve never seen them: people from the film world, be they directors, actors or whatever, get invited into the Criterion closet, which is a closet full of DVDs and Blu-rays, and they get to pick and choose films they like. As long as they talk about them for a bit as well.

So I just finished watching the one where director Gints Zilbalodis from Latvia picks a number of films. Normally I may make a few notes with regards to the films that get chosen, but this time, it was the director himself who seemed such a great guy that I became curious about his films. The write-up said he had just made ‘Flow’ so off I went to the IMDb website.

Turns out Flow is an animated film, in a style which seems highly original, judging by the trailer. I’m not much of a fan of animated films, to be honest, but this one seems an absolute gem, about a cat (it helps if you’re a cat lover I suppose!) who has to survive in a drowned out world without human beings. Amazingly, there’s no dialogue and all the animals have real-life “voices”, which involved trips to the zoo to get recordings of some rarer species! It’s an almost biblical theme, but then without humans.

Premiering at Cannes earlier this year and winning awards in Annecy, it has since been submitted by Latvia for the Best International Feature Film category of the 2025 Academy Awards. The IMDb score of 7.9 underwrites the quality of this film.

It is out this month (December 2024), so definitely one to seek out. It’s a u-rated film, so why not try and make it a Christmas outing with the whole family!

Adrian

The Passion of Anna, Ingmar Bergman’s film of 1969, is not everyone’s favourite. Some like it a bit, most don’t like it all. The odd interludes with the actors talking about their roles feel experimental and out of place. Jarring even. And yet, having just seen it again after a long while, I must admit it’s growing on me. Especially after having heard some interesting information about it.

Liv Ullmann, who plays Anna, said in an interview that the English title is misleading. The film’s original title is En Passion (A Passion). No mention of Anna at all. And that piece of information may be the key to one’s liking the film better. It is NOT about Anna, but about the complete – both mental and in the end even literal – disintegration of a man.

Another interesting fact is that that same Liv Ullmann said that Ingmar Bergman basically spent his days filming his own life. His oeuvre reads like an autobiography. This particular film was written and shot while Ingmar Bergman’s relationship with Liv Ullmann was falling apart. Is the main character – Andreas Winkelman – really just another version of Ingmar himself? The film does seem to capture the strangling emotions of a relational breakdown perfectly.

It’s funny how those two small pieces of information will make one look at this film in a different light. So do me a favour, and try and watch it again. I’m hopeful you’ll be duly impressed with its emotional depth and Bergman’s talent. May those final shots of the film stay with you for a long, long time, because they’re beautiful!

Adrian