Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2010)

8.5/10
8.5 with the definitie possibility to move higher. This was the first Apichaitpong Weerasethakul movie I've seen and it had me spellbound from start to finish. A film about a dying man visited by all manner of ghosts and spirits (and who can indeed recall his past life), the movie is almost a little too opaque at some points, but in a good way - I feel like I want to watch it again and again until I get everything. The movie is beautifully shot and even the most absurd sequences (woman-on-catfish love? A son reincarnated as a red-eyed monkey?) are pulled off with such a deft touch it's impossible to imagine them any other way. Now I really have to get started on older Weerasethakuls.

The Sleeping Beauty (Catherine Breillat, 2010)

7.5/10
Catherine Breillat's latest is ridiculous, silly, and completely unsubtle, but I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it in spite of all those things. This version of Sleeping Beauty takes place mostly inside of the Princess' dream, and I thought it was a lot of fun - sweet and charming (mainly because of the adorable actress playing the 6-year old Princess), but nice and fluffy. When the 16-year old Princess finally awakens into present day, things get a little...Breillat-y? Well this is the only one of hers I've seen, but from what I gather, yeah. It's less enjoyable and certainly prone to generating more than a few derisive snickers but I dunno, I still liked the movie on the whole.

Film Socialisme (Jean-Luc Godard, 2010)

5/10
I really liked the first act of this latest mindbender from Jean-Luc Godard - it takes place on a cruise ship, there's all kinds of voiceovers and shots that don't seem to relate to one another, and you get the feeling like you're watching parts of three different movies at once. It's kaleidoscopic but also very interesting. After that however I thought the film dropped off steeply - once we were getting to distended, uninteresting monologues and static shots where nothing seemed to ever come together, I wasn't feeling it.

Aurora (Cristi Puiu, 2010)

8/10
I really don't know what to say about this one. Cristi Puiu takes 3 hours to tell a story that some Hollywood movies could smash into 3 minutes - a man named Viorel (played by Puiu), frustrated and alienated from a divorce, commits a series of murders. That's about it. The movie focuses on every minute detail in between and somehow, almost in spite of itself, it fascinates. Viorel is constantly shown to be on the fringe both figuaratively and literally, shot standing at the edge of the frame, outside doorways, and generally puttering around in the darkness - however, crucially, he isn't given a madman bent. In fact, there's barely anything notable or worthwhile about Viorel, and that's the point. More people walked out of this one than any other movie I saw at the festival but it really stuck with me.

The Five Obstructions (Jorgen Leth & Lars von Trier, 2003)

7.5/10
Interesting semi-documentary featuring the filmmakers Lars von Trier and Jorgen Leth. Von Trier challenges Leth to remake his 1967 film The Perfect Human five times, each time with Von Trier providing a different set of obstacles. For example, the first obstruction says that the movie must be made in Cuba, with no shot longer than 12 frames. Another obstruction says that the movie must be entirely animated. It's very interesting to see Leth respond to each of his challenges (and he does, with gusto) and to see Von Trier, ego in high gear, attempting to "defeat" (althoug he would call it aiding) Leth. Lots of fun.

Over Your Cities Grass Will Grow (Sophie Fiennes, 2010)

7/10
An interesting documentary on the artist Anselm Kiefer, who since 2000 has been constructing his own city in the South of France. Kiefer has built 43 buildings to house his artworks, and other towers, lakes, tunnels, and bridges. It's all quite impressive and director Sophie Fiennes gives plenty of respect to Kiefer's work, letting the camera linger over his sculptures for lengthy stretches. But as this was my third movie after working a full day, I was too tired to really appreciate it I think.

The Silent House (Gustavo Hernandez, 2010)

8/10
La Casa Muda (The Silent House) is a horror movie purportedly shot in a single, unbroken take (although the numerous plunges into darkness lead to skepticism), and it's also a simple story - a man and his teenage daughter head to an abandoned house that the owner hired them to clean up for him to sell. Almost immediately, strange things ensue. There is an impressive amount of suspense and tension, even if the scares don't always deliver there's still a lot to enjoy. Unfortunately, like Haute Tension, the movie feels the need to justify its own existence with a ludicrous plot twist, but there are so few good horror movies these days I find myself rather flexible when it comes to the story. Others might not be so forgiving though.

Tuesday, After Christmas (Radu Muntean, 2010)

8.5/10
This movie takes a very basic plot - a man cheating on his wife with a young woman, namely his daughter's dentist - and turns it into something great. Proof you don't need a blindingly original story to make a good movie, I suppose. Everything is really well acted, and the direction is impressive and surehanded. The lengthy, unbroken shot of the husband's revelation to his wife is a masterpiece, and the ending is both beautiful and saddening.

Of Gods and Men (Xavier Beauvois, 2010)

7.5/10
France's entry in the Best Foreign Oscar race, which also won director Xavier Beauvois the Grand Prix at Cannes. It tells the true story of seven monks in Algeria who are taken hostage by the Armed Islamic Group of Algeria. The film focuses on the days leading up to their inevitable fate, and is a really nicely told, quietly moving portrayal of absolute faith. It was enjoyable but it didn't bowl me over - just a well done, satisfying movie. Lambert Wilson is also really good in the role of the head monk.

Biutiful (Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, 2010)

4/10
The ultimate removal however was Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu's Biutiful, which never makes the slightest effort to engage the audience or make us feel any sort of pity for its put-upon, cancer-addled protagonist Uxbal (played by Javier Bardem with a stone face and fists shoved perpetually into his pockets, as if this alone is enough to invite sympathy). The movie is desperately grave and deals with what should be very emotive topics (human trafficking, impending death, abuse, the struggle to survive, righting our wrongs, etc) but they all glide by without hitting even the most minor of chords. Which is all inoffensive (if disappointing) enough but Inarritu commits one of my few cardinal sins of filmmaking when (slight spoilers) he repeats the mysterious opening scene from the beginning of the film in its entirety at the end - as if his audience is too stupid to realize the significance of such a scene and keep it in mind the entire time that they need it read back to them. Shameful.

White Material (Claire Denis, 2009)

7/10
I don't have a lot to say about this one except that I think I admired it more than I liked it. I also had to watch the movie with no subtitles (I speak French pretty well, but African and France French is a bit trickier) so that probably didn't help. It was very lovely to look at and it was definitely a sad story, but I couldn't help but feel removed from it most of the time. Still want to check out Claire Denis' other stuff though.

David Wants to Fly (David Sieveking, 2010)

7/10
Better-than-expected documentary about a guy (director David Sieveking) introduced to transcendental meditation via a lecture given by his idol (director David Lynch). We follow along with him as he first becomes enamored and later jaded with both the philosophy and the director who led him to it. The movie does a good job of taking us along David's journey, and none of it really feels staged or as if he's going in to the process with an agenda. He comes across as a bit of a naif, and it actually works to the movie's benefit. The movie asks the routine questions about the TM movement's ethics, politics, cultish behavior, etc, but Sieveking seems hesitant to really try to blow the whole thing wide open. Probably because, as the movie implies, he's not sure he wants the myth (both of TM and of Lynch) destroyed himself.

Le Quattro Volte (Michelangelo Frammartino, 2010)

8.5/10
Michelangelo Frammartino's sophomore effort, a delicious slice of dialogue-free slow cinema. The story follows a man, a goat, a tree, and a lump of coal, and is at turns happy, sad, tragic and amusing...Frammartino displays incredible respect and patience and you never get the feeling he's "stretching things out" - like the 'no dialogue' approach, everything feels completely natural and gimmick-free. It seems impossible to describe this one without selling it short but it really is a unique little gem, worth watching if you're looking for something different but wholly satisfying.

Enter the Void (Gaspar Noe, 2009)

6.5/10
This is a frustrator. Gaspar Noe's interminable Enter the Void is a brazenly unique cinematic experience - especially in terms of visual style. The movie is a treat to look at, and comparisons with a drug-obsessed 2001: A Space Odyssey don't seem so ridiculous when you start watching it. After an unbelievable title sequence (watch here) and a tremendous first act, things steadily head south. The second act is less interesting but still enjoyable, but everything falls apart by the third and Noe seems to know it, throwing everything possible at the screen in any order in all manner of gratuity just hoping something good happens. A movie about the life and death of a young drug dealer and the relationship with his sister, there are lots of good ideas here but in no known universe is this film worth 2 hours and 45 minutes of anyone's time. A tighter edit could have made this a masterpiece, as it stands it's just a disappointment made all the more bitter by all the wasted talent on display.

Catfish (Henry Joost & Ariel Schulman, 2010)

8/10
This was a pleasant surprise because I'd never heard anything about it, but it seems a lot of people were mislead by the marketing campaign to believe it's some kind of horrror/suspense movie. The first 30 minutes certainly set the framework for it but then the movie goes in a completely different direction. In short, a 20-something is sent a package by an 8 year old girl named Abby containing a painting of a picture he took for a newspaper. Eventually he becomes tangled in a penpal/email/Facebook/texting friendship with Abby, her mother Angela, and her older sister Megan. I won't say anything else but it's a very interesting story (shot documentary style) that develops in very smart, unflinching ways. The acting is superb, my only nitpick was that the movie felt like it was treading water for the last 20 minutes. Still enjoyed it a lot though.

The Strange Case of Angelica (Manoel de Oliveira, 2010)

5/10 This was my first Manoel de Oliveira film. I figured the guy is 102 years old, might as well get started while he's still alive. But really I was disappointed. The plot is a young photographer summoned to photograph the body of the recently deceased Angelica. Soon the photographer's pictures of her seem to come alive and he's being visited by her in his dreams (or are they?). The movie is beautifully shot and often feels like a visual artifact from the 60's (in a good way) and de Oliveira's stoic direction is pitch perfect. However the story is largely uninteresting, the dream sequences are corny, and the ending is milquetoast. Basically I wanted to like this one a lot more than I did, but I won't let it sour me on the rest of the director's oeuvre.

The Social Network (David Fincher, 2010)

9/10
I was really, fully in the grips of this movie from start to finish. I found everything about it absolutely fascinating. If it doesn't win Best Adapted Screenplay I'm going to be shocked. About the only minor fault I could find with it is that sometimes the movie feels just a little too...stylized? Glamorous? Something like that. But it's a small nitpick because everything really was great - the story, the dialogue, the music, the acting (Jesse Eisenberg strikes an incredible balance between being sharp and totally aloof at the same time)...I was really impressed.

Onibaba (Kaneto Shindo, 1964)

8/10
Pretty cool Japanese horror/family drama from 1964. Centers around an old woman and her daughter-in-law. Waiting for their husbands to return from the war and living in poverty they resort to luring samurai to their deaths and selling their armor and weapons for cash or food. The brash friend of both husbands returns with news of their deaths, and starts up a romance with the daughter in law, much to the old woman's (extreme) consternation. I wasn't as in love with it as I hoped to be but I still enjoyed it a lot. The final scene with the woman and daughter was particularly incredible.

The Town (Ben Affleck, 2010)

5.5/10
The more this film is in my mind (including while I was watching it), the more problems I find with it. Affleck certainly has talent as a director, but contrary to Gone Baby Gone, his source material fails him in a big way. Rarely is anything in a movie so off-putting as to when our anti-hero (here Affleck's bank robber) is saddled with all kinds of tropes to force us to sympathize with him - his mother abandoned him and his father's in prison; he wants to Get Away From This Life and Make a Change; he lives by a flimsy Hollywood code of morality and refuses to kill people; the "mob boss" has him by the balls, he's really handsome and really genuinely loves The Girl - all of this is well and good but he's a criminal, and no amount of prettying up can change that. I'll say no more for fear of spoilers, but needless to say I wasn't a fan of the direction his character went in.
I also thought the central relationship was extremely forced (as far as anything suggested in the movie's timeline, the entire thing takes place in the span of 4 days or so) and various plot points come and go only when needed (an incriminating tattoo or Affleck's character's daughter and ex-girlfriend). The ending is ludicrous, mawkish, and the definition of a movie taking the easy way out.
None of this I can really pin on Affleck - as I said, it's his material that doesn't live up to snuff. In fact the movie has its share of strong points - the acting is all-around top notch, the action scenes are exciting and very well-shot, and the pacing never really slows. A bistro scene involving Affleck, Jeremy Renner and Rebecca Hall that has us all guessing how much each knows about the other is particularly worthy of praise. I wish I could say the same for more of the movie though.

Five (Abbas Kiarostami, 2003)

5/10
(Like 8 1/2, not trying to be cute with my rating...OK maybe a little)
Abbas Kiarostami's Five, aka Five Long Takes Dedicated to Yasujiro Ozu, is exactly that - five takes, each averaging about 15 minutes, of various things - a piece of a branch battling with the tide on a beach, a pier and the people walking on it, a beach in winter with dogs frolicking, a bunch of ducks on the beach, and the reflection of the moon in the pitch-black water. Tough thing to rate as it's pretty much what it says on the tin. I can't help but wonder if, like Kiarostami's Shirin, he's playing on the role of the viewer in cinema and the narrative structures that he will inevitably force onto what he's seeing...but then I also can't help but wonder if this wasn't already done by someone like Andy Warhol many years ago. Shirin was far more successful in that regard, Five is little more than a curio.