The Saragossa Manuscript (Wojciech Has, 1965)

8/10
Wojciech Has directed two notoriously bonkers movies that have been on my list to see for a long time - this one and The Hourglass Sanatorium. A local theatre was showing the former on the weekend so I checked it out. Released in 1965, it's certainly a strange beast. It takes place during the Napoleonic Wars and sees a Polish officer finding the manuscript, and a Spanish officer helping him translate it, only to realize the book is telling the story of the Spanish officer's grandfather. The grandfather's story is the subject of the film, and the tribulations he goes through over the 3 hour running time are too much to get into here, but they are certainly...bizarre. Has (adapting the novel of the same time) often nests a story within a story within a story within a story to the point where it's tough to remember who's relating what and to whom. It doesn't add up to a great deal in the end, and I think Has is more having fun with what most of the tales are centered around - evil spirits and how the affect the lives of men. Indeed, the movie is pretty funny at times, and never takes itself too seriously.
The surrealistic "feel" is similar to some of Alejandro Jodorowsky's movies, although the overall tone is not nearly as silly or scatological. I do wonder if he saw it prior to making his Fando y Lis in 1968, however.

Only Lovers Left Alive (Jim Jarmusch, 2013)

7/10
I liked Jim Jarmusch's last movie, The Limits of Control, quite a bit when I saw it in theatres. I'm not sure if it would hold up on a repeat viewing, though, and Only Lovers Left Alive is the reason for my skepticism. In a lot of ways it's a very similar movie. Slow, stylish, and it's easy to feel like it's more of a showcase for Jarmusch's favorite music than anything else. But luckily Jarmusch's aesthetics line up with what appeals to me, so I enjoyed myself. Swinton and Hiddleston are fine, and the movie glides along with an effortless cool and sexiness. Any plotting involving Mia Wasikowska and John Hurt's characters feels pretty incidental, but they play their parts well too.
I very much enjoyed the urban decay portrayed in the movie in Tangier and in Detroit (but mostly Detroit) although I wish Jarmusch had done more to tie it in more with his characters, or emphasize the connections between the two.

Distant (Nuri Bilge Ceylan, 2002)

8/10
I've only seen one Nuri Bilge Ceylan movie, Once Upon a Time in Anatolia, which I enjoyed very much. This one is very good too, about a man who loses his job and stays with his wealthier relative. The focus of the film is on both men's aimlessness. Yusuf, put out of a job by the economic climate, has an aimlessness that's a little more "real" - he has no education, no skills and no money. Mahmut, his relative, has more money and some skills (he's a photographer) but is equally unmotivated - in the career he hates, with his ex-wife, and with his lover.
Their relationship comes to a "head" (as much as anything can come to a head in this movie) in a particularly brilliant sequence. Mahmut can't find a missing watch. Yusuf claims he hasn't seen it. Mahmut finds the watch, but doesn't tell Yusuf - in fact, he makes it apparent that he's gone through Yusuf's stuff "looking" for it. Mahmut is so emotionless he can't even bring himself to accuse Yusuf to his face of the theft he knows Yusuf didn't commit. So he dishevels Yusuf's bag hoping to draw him into a confrontation. Yusuf instead departs without saying a word to Mahmut, apparently unperturbed.
What the movie shows is two men more or less crushed to nothingness by factors both external and internal. It ends on an ambiguous note but there's no mistaking the sadness that runs through the whole movie and both its main characters.