പേജുകള്‍‌

Monday, August 16, 2010

ആന്ദ്രെ തര്‍ക്കോവ്സ്കി :എലെമെന്റ്സ് ഓഫ് സിനിമ

Andrei Tarkovsky: Elements of Cinema (2008)
Robert Bird
ebook

A revered filmmaker, Andrei Tarkovsky is secure in the long and illustrious line of Russian masters in arts and letters. Linking cinematic technique to broader questions of meaning and intrepretation, Robert Bird offers a wholly original investigation into the aesthetic principles of Tarvkovsky's filmmaking. While providing a comprehensive analysis of his work in all media, including radio, theatre and opera, Bird argues that Tarkovsky was most at home in the cinema. Accordingly, the author dwells chiefly on Tarkovsky's major films: Ivan's Childhood, Andrei Rublev, Solaris, Mirror, Stalker, Nostalghia and Sacrifice. With its wealth of film stills and photographs, this book is a key text for all admirers of Tarkovsky and European cinema.

DownloadLink
http://rapidshare.com/files/405483530/Andrei_Tarkovsky.Elements_of_Cinema.2008.eBook-cinema_of_the_world.pdf.html

ദി ഓര്‍ഫന്‍ ഓഫ് അന്ന്യാന്ഗ്

The Orphan of Anyang(2001)
Dir;Chao Wang
Country:China
9 wins & 3 nominations See more »

A prostitute from the Northeast, desperate and unable to make ends meet, abandons her baby. An unemployed factory worker decides to take the child for the 200 yuan (about $37 Canadian) a month in child support promised by its mother. His early attempts at child-rearing are somewhat painful to watch, but also charming and amusing. Eventually, he and the mother become friendly and it seems that the child will be raised in a sweetly unorthodox family. However, when the woman's pimp, a local gangster, not only finds out that he may have fathered the child, but also that he is dying of cancer, he decides that he must adopt the baby - and is willing to resort to violence if necessary

Friday, August 13, 2010

കിംഗ്‌ സൈസ്

Kingsize(1998)
Dir:Juliusz Machulski
Country:Poland

Kingsize is a fantasy film, made in the late 1980s (the synth-pop soundtrack will clue you in). There is a tribe of mouse-sized people who live in “Drawerland,” which is really the filing cabinets of a long-forgotten office. One of their tiny scientists has developed a formula that will enlarge them to full-sized, normal human beings. (They call our world “Kingsize.”)

The leaders of Drawerland (among them, Jerzy Stuhr) are worried that if the formula is made widely available, their entire population may disappear forever. So the politicians and conservatives want to suppress the formula to keep the populace from fleeing into the larger world. If you wanted to, you could say that Kingsize is an allegory for life under a Communist regime before the fall of the Berlin Wall. Or you could say that it’s just a silly fantasy movie with cute special effects.

And I was often amazed at how good the special effects were. Obviously the film was made on a limited budget (at least by Hollywood standards), but it’s surprising how freeing and inspiring that can be. Most of the “special effects” are simple sets and props. Repeatedly, I would be convinced by the texture and shape of some tiny (and/or gigantic) object. For example, in Drawerland, someone uses a sheet of paper as a blanket. The oversize prop has the exact right stiffness of a real sheet of paper, while still appearing to be as light as a leaf.

വിഞ്ചി

Vincy(2004)
Dir:Juliusz Machulski
Country:Poland
1 win & 2 nominations See more »

Petty thieves plot to purloin a Da Vinci painting in this caper comedy from popular and prolific action-comedy director Juliusz Machulski (Sexmission; Kingsize; Kiler).
Ex-con Cuma is on parole from prison, but a once-in-a-lifetime chance to steal one of the world s most priceless paintings falls into his lap. What s an inveterate thief to do? Cuma tracks down his old partner, Julian, who is reluctant to participate because he has found new employment as a cop. Finally, Julian gives in, the old gang comes together, and the heist is on.
Director Machulski s signature combination of humor and action makes this Polish version of heist films like The Score or The Italian Job highly entertaining.

Thursday, August 12, 2010

കാര്‍മെന്‍ ഗെഇ

Karmen Gei(2001)
Dir:Joseph Gaï Ramaka
Country:Senegal

There's an aphorism about translations that says that translations are like women--if they are beautiful they aren't faithful, and if they are faithful they aren't beautiful. This may not be a literal version of the familiar Carmen, but it is beautifully true to the spirit of the original. It is also unlike anything you've ever seen.

The acting and cinematography are splendid. The score honors Bizet in its tonality without ever quoting the opera. Djeïnaba Diop Gaï's Karmen is a shooting star. The original Carmen's transgressive sexuality, freely flaunted in a way that spills outrageously beyond societal rules, translates here into bisexuality. Other themes are also aptly and satisfyingly tranmuted--the smugglers are hauling dope; her toreador is a musical star.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

ദി ജാപ്പനീസ് വൈഫ്‌

The Japanese Wife(2010)
Dir:Aparna Sen
Country:India

Aparna Sen’s Japanese Wife, based on the novel of the same name by Kunal Basu, is the most offbeat love triangle one can hope to come across. Snehamoy is a “chhaposha” (simple, average, middle/lower middle-class) Bengali school teacher at the Sundarbans, while Miyage is a shy Japanese girl residing in Yokohama, who, through pen-friendship, end up having a 17-year long platonic relationship and marriage despite never getting to see each other in person. The third angle is a young widow who silently loves Snehamoy, who in turn gets subtly attracted to her physically. The movie is, lets face it, based on an improbable premise, and the emotional impact is not as much as a movie such as this ought to have. But the acting of Rahul Bose as the soft-spoken teacher, Moushumi Chatterjee as his loquacious aunt, and especially Raima Sen as the young widow, are pitch-perfect, which in turn get amply complemented by the impressive photography – the tranquility and fury of the region and the river Matla have been very well captured. The standout moment in the movie – the kite-flying competition between Bengali and Japanese kites; the overhead shots of the soaring kites took the film to a different plane altogether at times

ക്യാപിറ്റലിസ്റ്റ് മാനിഫെസ്റ്റോ : വര്‍ക്കിംഗ്‌ മെന്‍ ഓഫ് ഓള്‍ കന്ട്രീസ് ,അക്കുമുലെട്റ്റ്

Capitalist manifesto:Working Men of all countries,
Accumulate
(2003)

Dir;Gok Kim & Sun Kim
Country:Korea
With their characteristic dark, manic wit, the Kim Brothers offer a sardonic parable of the logic of capitalism: the endless cycle of wealth production and profit and the endless cycle of desire and gratification, both running inexorably towards crisis -- as experienced when supply exceeds demand. The characters are an exploited vendor of porno videos, a teenage prostitute and a hooker who uses her physical assets as collateral for stakes in a floating crap game. The narrative loops and twists like a Moebius strip, while the various settings keep interfacing like spaces in an MC Escher hall of mirrors. Brilliantly original.

A strange and yet unique story about hoodlums who spend
most of their times either on gambling or dealing pornog-
raphies, high school students who sell their bodies, and
prostitutes. This film meticulously depicts how capitalism
reproduces ruling party and the opposition even in social
outsiders. The viewers may find its outrageous repetition
and bold description a bit odd, but then again its audacity
and joyousness make this eexcperimental film something
to remember.
Directors’ statement
Capitalism wants accumulation. It absolutely subsumes peo-
ple. Their labour power is nothing but an apparatus to help
capital circulate. The capitalist society where desire does
not produce capital, but capital produces desire, is where
we all live now. Capitalism evolves. It makes variations on a
deceptive method to expand the quality and quantity of
accumulation. Now desire becomes capital, capital becomes
desire – now capitalism relatively subsumes people. The
faster its accumulation gets, the bigger its desire gets.

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

ദി ഫൊട്ടൊഗ്രാഫ്

The photograph(2007)
Dir:Nan Triveni Achnas
Country:indonesia
2 wins & 1 nomination See more »




Sita is an escort at a karaoke bar who struggles to raise money to send her daughter out of the city to live with her grandmother and settle her debts with her pimp. She moves in with aging photographer Jan and helps him fulfill his last wishes.

ഐ വിഷ് ഐ ന്യൂ

I Wish I Knew(2010)
Dir;Zhang Ke Jia
Country:China



Like his last film, 2008's 24 City, Jia Zhangke's Un Certain Regard title I Wish I Knew is a documentary/fiction hybrid about modern-day China. Where 24 City took a personal focus on the citizens of a Chinese town affected by the construction of a high-rise condominium, I Wish I Knew takes a broader view, examining the history of Shanghai as viewed from the present. It combines interviews with citizens, actors, and filmmakers with architectural shots of present-day Shanghai and footage of actress Zhao Tao wandering the city. The film is never less than gorgeous, and there's often an intuitive and pleasing internal rhythm to how he cuts within and between shots.

Monday, August 09, 2010

ജെര്‍മല്‍

Jermal aka Fishing platform(2008)
Dir;Ravi L.Bharwani
Country:Indonesia
2 wins See more »

A jermal is a wooden fishing platform located in the middle of the ocean, supported by stilts and carrying very few of amenities life has to offer. This is the entire setting for the Indonesian film Jermal: a glorified boat dock unconnected to anything else. There's a forward section where implements to reel in fishing nets are located, a work house-type structure where the fish are cleaned, rudimentary sleeping quarters for the child workers, a fairly large open space where they capture rain water to use for drinking and a structure home to Johar (Didi Petet), a large, bearded man we assume is using the kids as slave labor.

The film, written and directed by a trio of filmmakers (Ravi L. Bharwani, Rayya Makarim and Orlow Seunke),

After his mothers death, 12-year-old Jaya (Iqbal S. Manurung) is sent to his father, Johar (Didi Petet), who works as a supervisor on a jermal (a fishing platform perched on log stilts in the middle of the sea). Johar is shocked, never knowing he has a son, and rejects the boy as his kin. Fully aware he cant bring Jaya back to land due to a dark past, Johar is forced to accept the boy as a worker on the site.

Faced with constant rejection from his father and relentless bullying by the other boys who work on the jermal, Jaya decides to take fate into his own hands. He gives up hope on being accepted and learns the skills and attitude needed to survive on the jermal.

Jaya increasingly becomes like the other boys: a tough, rough survivor; while Johar is forced to gradually face and accept his past. Eventually, both Johar and Jaya learn that they are bound by their past, united by the space in which they move, and connected by the inescapable truth.