Raise The Red Lantern

I haven't watched this for a decade or two but did last night and it's still an exquisite masterpiece. It's a tale about patriarchy but is flawlessly filmed and so tightly written it barely needs any props except for red lanterns. Watch it if you've never seen it. A classic.

Four Months, Three Weeks, Two Days

I don't make a habit of watching ordeal cinema but this (Palme d'Or Winner) Romanian movie is the toughest film I've watched since Irreversible. I could only watch it in two halves because of the sheer exhaustion of being so tense at watching the very simple plot unfold. Not my idea of entertainment but easily the kind of cinema that shakes me out of my complacency that it is losing it's power as an art form. Watch this and you wont think films are just make believe.

While looking for a Youtube trailer I discovered the full length film with Thai subtitles. Go ahead. Take a drink.

A Separation

Very quickly the protagonists in this movie become quite annoying and I found myself siding with the judge and the daughter who is completely blameless and suffers the most. However this story's magic lies in it's ability to convey ambiguity and nuance. There isn't a single mistake that all parties don't make that I haven't made. That includes the couple above and the slightly over Islamic under educated couple who become embroiled in the lives of the more educated and upwardly mobile ones.

This is a move about everybody losing unless key insights are learned from mistakes made and in that sense is as fine an introduction to Iranian metropolitan life as a person could wish for. It won an Oscar for best foreign film of 2012.