K I N O . M A N A S
PAGIRIAMASIS ŽODIS AUTOREI Man didelė garbė, kad vis tik mano gyvenime išaušo tokia diena, kai aš gavau galimybę sukurti leidinį apie tai, kas mane iš tiesų domina. Viso to dabar nebūtų ir dabar aš čia nerašyčiau, jei ne vienas žmogus – Aš. Todėl norėčiau sau padėkoti, kad tuos dvidešimt metų, kai visuomet buvau šalia savęs, visuomet tikėjau, kad ateis geresnė diena ir kad svajonės taps realybe. Na, gerai, šiek tiek meluoju. Buvo tų sunkių dienų, kai netikėjau, kad man pavyks, kai norėjau viską mesti ir bėgti laukais kuo toliau nuo visko. Vis tik nepabėgau ir šis leidinys turi galimybę išvysti dienos šviesą. Už tai sau ir dėkoju. Erika, žinau, kad nedažnai tai sakau... na, gerai, vėl meluoju. Erika, žinau, kad dažnai tai sakau, bet dar kartelį, šį kart viešai, sakau tau, kad tave myliu. Nepaisant visų tų žodžių, kuriuos tau pasakau, kai būnam piktos, nepaisant to, kad ištisai išpili kavą man ant klaviatūros ir man tenka viską valyti. Nepaisant to, kad niekad nepadarai man gražios šukuosenos ir neleidi sportuoti. Nepaisant to, kad stumi rytais mane iš lovos į šaltą realybę. Nepaisant to, kad pili man šampūną į akis. Ir net nepaisant to, kad tau, ko gero, rimtas asmenybės susidvejinimas, aš vis tiek tave myliu ir žaviuosi. Ir jei galėčiau, pridėčiau tave Facebook‘e prie mane įkvėpiančių žmonių. Viso šito nebūtų jei ne tu. Ačiū tau už begalinę kantrybę ir tikėjimą manimi, kai netikėjo niekas. Tikiuosi su lyg šiuo kūriniu nesustosi ir išpildysi kitas tris mano kuklias svajones – gauti Oskarą, gauti Nobelio premiją ir apkeliauti visą pasaulį. Ir jei galėtum, visą tai atlik iki keturiasdešimto gimtadienio, nes paskui turiu šiokių tokių planų veisti pandas Šveicarijos Alpėse. Pabaigai, kad viskas atrodytų dar prasmingiau, pacituosiu tau Alberą Camiu:
„No matter how hard the world pushes against me, within me, there’s something stronger – something better, pushing right back.” Pagarbiai, Erika Židonytė
©Gaidys Žinduolis 2013
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Alfredas Hičkokas (1899 m. rugpjūčio 13 d. – 1980 m. balandžio 29 d.)
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A SADISTIC PRANKSTER Alfred Hitchcock, who was born in Leytsonstone, London, 113 years ago today on 13 August 1899, is rightly being celebrated this year. It’s the 90th anniversary of his first film and the British Film Institute is having a special season celebrating his genius. Classics such as Rear Window, Vertigo and Psycho have made him one of the most popular and celebrated of all film makers. He was also one of the 20th-century’s most enthusiastic practitioners of the creepy and sometimes warped practical joke. He admitted to Francois Truffaut in 1966 that “I do have a weakness for practical jokes and have played quite a few in my time.” Alfred Joseph Hitchcock’s pranks varied from ostensively harmless japes, through mind games, and on to sadistic humiliation. Some pranks were simply amusing. Hitchcock would often enlist a colleague to whom he would tell a tantalising story in a loud voice while they were in a packed elevator. He would perfectly time his exit just before the punch line and then bow politely to the eavesdropping, frustrated passengers. His targets were often people he had privately identified as “phonies” and “big heads”. Pompous guests would be invited to dinner parties where he would slip whoopee cushions on to their chairs before they sat down. Sometimes, the food would be served in the wrong order, starting with dessert. At one lavish meal, guests were disturbed to find all the food laced with colouring. They found it hard to eat blue soup, blue trout, and even blue peaches and ice cream. Hitchcock was fascinated to see how they would react.
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If he really disliked strait-laced non-drinking guests, he would ply them with strong liquor and watch them come apart. Actors and actresses were often targets. He sent 400 smoked herrings to one star. He had a horse delivered to the dressing room of actor Sir Gerald du Maurier (father of Daphne) just to see how he would react to inconvenience. When a cameraman boasted about his elaborate new all-electric kitchen, the man returned home to find two tonnes of coal delivered to his doorstep with a receipt marked ‘Paid by A Hitchcock’. Actresses were often the target of his ‘jokes’. Elsie Randolph revealed her fear of fire to Hitchcock and he later played an elaborate trick on her, getting a technician to pump smoke into a telephone box after the door had been surreptitiously locked. All sorts of theories have been aired to explain his behaviour. Some suggest he was damaged as a child when - at about the age of five - he was sent by his father William (a greengrocer) with a note to a local police chief, who locked the little boy in a cell. After about 10 minutes, the policeman released Hitchcock, saying: “That’s what we do to naughty boys.” Hitchcock later said he could never forget the fear of such a humiliation. There have even been academic disagreements about whether the pranks demonstrate that he was repressing sexual feelings towards men. There was certainly an element of bullying. Assistant cameraman Alfred Roome had been the target of one of his jokes but exacted revenge by putting a fake smoke bomb under Hitchcock’s car. “You never saw a fat man get out of a car quicker,” he recalled. “Hitch never tried anything on me again. He respected you if you hit back. If you didn’t, he’d have another go.” Perhaps he was just an unaccountably strange man. It’s telling that he was a fan of black satirical cartoonist Charles Addams - another man who liked practical jokes - and Hitchcock himself called it the “humour of the macabre.” He believed it was simply a typically London form of humour, and used to say as an example: “It’s like the joke about the man who was being led to the gallows, which was flimsily constructed, and he asked in some alarm, ‘I say, is that thing safe?” He was never really pressed in interviews about his behaviour. Asked on a TV once in 1972 about his pranks, the 72-year-old Hitchcock (who died in April 1980) became rather defensive, saying that he had never meant to “harm” or “denigrate” anyone. His wife Alma (with whom he had a long but mostly celibate marriage) admitted his practical jokes made her “apprehensive”.
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His ill-treatment of Tippi Hedren during the filming of The Birds is well documented - using live birds to attack her, and himself behaving like a sexual predator - but he extended the odd behaviour to Hedren’s six-year-old daughter and future actress, Melanie Griffith. He gave as a gift a painfully accurate wax doll figure of her mother in a miniature coffin, dressed in the same costume she wore in The Birds. Years later, a grown-up Griffith said of Hitchcock: “He was a mother------, and you can quote me.” One practical joke absolutely soils Hitchcock’s reputation - and it’s worth bearing in mind he was a man who was fastidious about his own cleanliness and prided himself on leaving bathrooms “spotless”. In Donald Spoto’s excellent 1983 biography of Hitchcock, The Dark Side Of Genius, the following tale is recalled: “Hitchcock bet a film’s property man a week’s salary that he would be too frightened to spend a whole night chained to a camera in a deserted and darkened studio. The chap heartily agreed to the wager, and at the end of the assigned day, Hitchcock himself clasped the handcuffs and pocketed the key - but not before he offered a gener-
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ous beaker of brandy ‘the better to ensure a quick and deep sleep’. The man thanked him for his thoughtfulness and drank the brandy, and everyone withdrew. When they arrived on the set next morning, they found the poor man angry, weeping, exhausted, and humiliated. Hitchcock had laced the brandy with the strongest available laxative, and the victim had, unavoidably, soiled himself and a wide area around his feet and the camera.” http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/film-news/9470343/Alfred-Hitchcock-asadistic-prankster.html
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PSYCHO (1960) After 50 years, is there anything new to see or hear in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho? A landmark in film history as well as a monument of cinephilia, it has evolved from the cause célèbre that shocked its initial audiences with a murder that upended expectations laid out by its narrative's first 45 minutes to a creation whose details—its quick production utilizing Hitchcock's TV show crew, the storyboarding of the shower scene by "visual consultant" Saul Bass, composer Bernard Herrmann settling on strings-only "black-and-white" orchestrations so his brilliantly effective score could match the gothic monochrome of the visuals—have been recounted to the point of mythologizing the movie's birth. Both credited and blamed for the ensuing five decades of slasher and torture-porn thrillers whose clinical mayhem make Psycho's look quaint, the saga of solitary motel manager Norman Bates, perfectly embodied by the boyish and sympathetic Anthony Perkins, and his domineering, hidden-from-sight mother, would have long ago lost its capacity to be reconsidered and re-watched if its fascination depended solely on its carefully doledout jolts of terror (three or four, by most counts). Beneath Hitchcock's conjuring of fear and dread via calculated exploitation of the spectator's assumptions, the themes and vision of this seeming funhouse exercise in what the director termed "pure cinema" are bleak, tragic, and in keeping with the great critic Robin Wood's appreciation of Psycho as "one of the key works of our age." The film’s first half-hour, through which the audience is thoroughly enmeshed in the point of view of Phoenix real estate office staffer Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) and her flight from the city after absconding with $40,000, establishes the motifs of voyeurism and imprisonment that continue at the Bates Motel and beyond. Marion and her lover, Sam (John Gavin), are discovered, with a series of dissolves inexorably closing in on a hotel window, in the wake of a furtive lunchtime lay, and the dominant mood is desperate, not erotic; he’s paying alimony and the debts of a dead father, she longs for marriage and “respectability” as their affair seems at a dead end. Upon Marion’s return to work, a leering millionaire client waves his roll of 40 grand at her in the midst of a horny boast about unhappiness: “I buy it off. Are you unhappy?”
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Once she hits the road with the cowboy's bankroll, Marion is trailed by a highway cop whose sunglasses peer at her with pitiless judgment; when she trades in her vehicle with suspicious speed at a used-car lot, the episode ends with cop, salesman, and mechanic all staring after her in a tableau of joint accusation. Leigh, frequently in silent close-up (save for Herrmann's anxious violins) as she determinedly motors on, is both vulnerable and steely. Her nerves, resolve, and mischievous smile when she imagines the discovery of her crime all linger after she's departed. Given Hitchcock's much-quoted cheeky remark that "actors should be treated like cattle," it's perhaps fitting that the underappreciated fulcrum of Psycho—which lays the groundwork for transferring the audience's empathy from Marion to Norman—is the beautifully played and paced scene in the parlor behind the motel's office, where the Boy Scout-polite young hermit treats his newly arrived guest to a sandwich, and they slowly discuss their demons; obliquely in her case, forthrightly and with spasms of disturbing distemper in his. As David Thomson wrote in his recent book on the film, Perkins plays this tightrope-precarious role with "a startling balance of camp and pathos." Hitchcock accepted and encouraged the actor's input in bits of business like Norman's munching on candy corn (one of the movie's plentiful bird references), and he and screenwriter Joseph Stefano give Perkins most of the sly laughs, as when Norman, amateur taxidermist and peeping Tom, bristles that the dampness of bedsheets has "a creepy smell." In the supper scene, Norman's lines about the universality of "private traps" and the futility of struggling against them ("We claw, but only at the air, only at each other") are
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as close as Stefano comes to telegraphing a message, but Perkins's guileless delivery sells the moment. The imminent, brutal turn of the plot in Cabin One's bathroom is the film's most celebrated fillip, but this quiet, subtly ominous dialogue between Leigh and Perkins enriches the film's texture and raises its emotional stakes.
Once Marion's plans to return to Phoenix and make amends are ironically snuffed out, Psycho becomes Norman's story with his fastidious, workmanlike cleanup of Mother Bates's horrific deed. Perkins remains riveting as he mops, stows the body and evidence in a car trunk, and feverishly nibbles at his fingers at the edge of a swamp— another tour de force of editing and allusion, as Hitchcock plants retrospectively unmistakeable clues as to what's really up in that Edward Hopperesque house on the hill. Perkins only has one more compelling scene with another actor (his evasive cat-and-mouse interrogation by Martin Balsam's private detective), but Norman grows darker in spirit and apprehensive of new guests as Sam and Marion's questing sister Lila (Vera Miles, impressively severe) collaborate to locate the vanished thief. Some complain of a letdown in Psycho's second half, but the audience's knowledge that Lila, Sam, the detective, and the local sheriff are all wet in tying Marion's disappearance to the stolen money amplifies the scenario's fatalism; the truth eludes them because they can't conceive of a motivation beyond cash, certainly not of the baroque psychosis in residence at the isolated motel. Intercut with
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Lila's climactic exploration of the Bates house, a subjective-camera Freudian uncovering of a harrowing mother-son history, Sam conducts his own boneheaded questioning of Norman based on possession of the loot. Gavin's superficial resemblance to Perkins works in favor of seeing the two characters as twinned figures, and his macho stiffness renders Norman as the more instinctively appealing one. (In the frequently derided penultimate scene, when Sam asks the allknowing psychiatrist "Why was he...dressed like that?," the practical necessity of supplying a prosaic explanation for Norman's madness is perhaps best understood by thinking of a typical 1960 moviegoer as John Gavin.) Coming off a plush, comedic entertainment Cadillac like North By Northwest, Hitchcock subverted his profile as a classy purveyor of suspense with Psycho, which, in laying bare sexual and scandalous grottiness kept more delicately vague in pop culture to that point, alienated a significant number of mainstream critics. (As the film and its closely related follow-up, The Birds, were big hits, it's likely Hitch didn't mind.) As its notoriety wore off with the heightening of graphic violence in mainstream cinema, the film lent itself to close scholarly reading, with the multitudinous cuts accompanying Marion Crane's demise irresistible to students of montage; a book of frame enlargements published in the mid '70s even made shot-by-shot analysis of Psycho feasible before it appeared on tape or disc. Felt in the full impact of a theatrical screening (with the pleasure of seeing patrons reflexively kick or stiffen at the sight of Miles startled by her mirrored reflection), its power is not just that of a showman's calibrated scare machine, but of a somber fugue on the trapped 20th-century creatures who inhabit its world, clawing but never budging an inch.
„It’s not like my mother is a maniac or a raving thing. She just goes a little mad sometimes. We all go a little mad sometimes. Haven’t you?“
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A CLOCKWORK ORANGE (1971) One of the great criticisms heaped against A Clockwork Orange is that Stanley Kubrick glorifies a certain kind of amoral violence, presenting it to the viewer in a spectacular, operatic, colorful, and exquisitely photographed manner. Malcolm McDowell, at the top of his game as Alex the thug, gleefully narrates his way through the ultraviolence his character commits in the first third of the movie. A particularly obscene atrocity is when he and his gang of droogs rape a woman and brutalize her husband while gallivanting about the house singing "Singin' in the Rain." Alex throws himself into the act with giddy exuberance, but does anyone honestly believe that we're meant to laugh along with Alex's joie de vivre as he behaves like a savage? Certainly, no punches are pulled in this queasy home invasion sequence. The thugs wear creepy Halloween masks and, in their white suits with elaborate codpieces and bowler hats, are positively grotesque. But before we see Alex unleash his dark side, our first glimpse of him—in the opening shot of the movie—has him looking straight into the camera, toasting the audience with a glass of milk at the Korova Milk Bar. He's seen as handsome, charismatic, and while he's completely unaware of the vast discrepancy between his buoyant narration and his workaday acts of thievery, brutality, and deviancy (speaking directly to the audience as if he were the young hero of a Charles Dickens novel, even referring to himself as "your humble narrator"), he casts a spell over the viewer as if to say, "Come along with me, little ones." He is, in effect, inviting us to enjoy, as we do when we tune in to reality television shows and tabloid newspapers, watching debasement as entertainment. It's a nasty recognition of the distance one has as a spectator, laughing at another's expense. If you watch Clockwork Orange and see that this is the game Kubrick is playing with us, giving us an avenue into understanding a corrosion of society, the film may be appreciated as his finest masterwork in a career full of them. Certainly, it's his most human film, right next to Lolita in its refusal to judge its central character's sickness. That's the job of the audience. Anyone who doesn't feel up to that job might throw up their hands and accuse Kubrick of being immoral, when in fact the sense of being a morality play is hard-wired right into the structure of Clockwork Orange.
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The scope of Clockwork Orange becomes wider when Alex is betrayed by his gang and captured by the authorities. Police and government officials, bullies all, begin to operate at a status level that's higher than young Alex's. The middle section of the film moves from individual acts of violence to more institutionalized violence. When he arrives in prison, his belongings and clothes are categorized as he is stripped of everything, and a police guard (the inimitable Michael Bates) shouts in his face a tirade of insults interwoven with threats if Alex doesn't behave properly. Quickly learning how he should pretend to behave, Alex immediately goes about working the system and, in order to get out of jail early, takes part in an experimental brainwashing procedure. He's made to watch films depicting violence while his eyes are pried open with wires and injected with drugs, which induce sickness and dry heaving at the very sight of sex and violence. Alex watches movies that depict acts of carnage in the spirit of the crimes he reveled in earlier, which may or may not have nauseated viewers of Clockwork Orange. If the violence portrayed earlier in the film is enjoyed, it's perhaps because one gets a kick out of the theatricality of Alex's behavior in the early going and the high art of Kubrick's pictures—each image a glorious painting, an elaborate tracking shot, or some other cinematic convention specifically created to inspire awe in the spectator. And now Alex is supposed to be getting a taste of his own medicine, and the viewer is perhaps circumspect. If there's a nagging sense of discomfort, it's because Alex is not being taught that these acts of violence are wrong; he's being brainwashed to have a physical aversion to that violence and the ability to choose between right and wrong has nothing to do with it. The authority figures are as bad, if not worse, than Alex. And unlike the way Alex is depicted in the film (handsome, funny, charis
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matic, and charming) they're mostly a gallery of grotesques. Even the prison chaplain (Godfrey Quigley), who is the sole voice of dissent saying that Alex has been stripped of his freedom of moral choice, is shown as a blustering, pontificating boob. When Alex is released into the world, his cure has rendered him incapable of defending himself against the vultures and scourges that are more than happy to avenge themselves upon him for his past crimes. This would all be intolerable if it weren't handled with the aforementioned sense of Kubrick's irony and pitch-black satirical comedy.
One of the finest performances in Clockwork Orange is by largerthan-life Patrick Magee as the wheelchair-bound subversive writer who captures Alex near the end of the film (he was the victim of Alex's infamous "Singin' in the Rain" beating, and his wife died one month after being raped). There's a painfully funny scene where he has drugged Alex's glass of wine and tries to goad him into drinking it, and as Alex does his best to play along, smilingly nodding his head and acknowledging the kindness of his captor, the writer speaks each of his lines of dialogue as if wincing through a diamond-splinter headache. "DO TRY THE WINE!" he says through fiendishly clenched teeth. Even the polite conventions of dinner conversation become an excuse for thinly repressed violence, and it's played with the timing of a Joe Orton comedy. Clockwork Orange can't be classified as one of those "angry young
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man" films that were so prevalent in British cinema during the late 1960s and early 1970s where the audience clearly was meant to identify with the hero and be inspired to shake up the system (though it invites the comparison because McDowell starred as the young rebel Mick Travis in Lindsey Anderson's O Lucky Man and If‌). Clockwork Orange shares with those pictures a certain kind of irreverence and lack of respect for authority figures. But the anarchic qualities of the film are less kitchen sink realism and political ideology than its taste for the ridiculous. Here's how: Kubrick's lenses are wide and slightly distorted; many of the costumes and sets are painted in vivid, eye-catching primal colors; and half the dialogue is done in a slang mixture of Slavic, Cockney, and Russian. It's all as delightful as reading Alice in Wonderland, and the aesthetic provides a necessary distancing device between the spectator and the acts of horror depicted throughout. And that distance isn't meant to shunt off the moral questions of the film, but to keep us engaged and, hopefully, contemplative about our own sense of morality. If there's an inherent problem in Clockwork Orange, it's that Alex's cruelty is depicted with such bravura cinematic technique and such harsh irony that there's a whole audience that tunes in just for the shock and awe. But I don't hold that against Kubrick's film, which in fact is about uninspired moral negligence, and about its hero tuning into violence as entertainment and institutions using violence and brainwashing as a means of control. It's Kubrick's most prescient work, more astute and unsparing than any of his other films (and he had more where that came from) in putting the bleakest parts of human behavior under the microscope and laughing in disgust. It was made right after his other high watermark, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and as he returns to Earth from his mind-blowing brush with the cosmic, it's a sort of sequel about our planet rotting away from the inside. As a drunk says to Alex right before taking a vicious beating: "I don't want to live anyway! Not in a stinking world like this! Men on the moon and men spinning around the earth, and no attention paid to earthly law and order no more!" One could say this was ripped straight from the headlines, only nowadays one could argue there's no attention paid to anything, be it outer space or earthly matters, just an endless feeding to audiences who have developed a voracious taste for, as Alex would say, "the [good] old ultra-violence."
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I SAW THE DEVIL (2010) Paskaičius šio filmo aprašymą joks save gerbiantis kinomanas nesusidomėtų. Jei jo kūrėjai būtų amerikiečiai, ko gero, šio filmo nebūčiau atradusi ir aš. Vis tik keli vienas po kito sekę atsitiktinumai lėmė, kad pastebėjau, jog filmo „I Saw the Devil“ kūrėjai yra korėjiečiai, filmas pasirodė didžiai gerbiamame „Kino pavasaryje“ ir šiandien aš rašau recenziją apie jį. Ir nors tokio tipo filmai, galima drąsiai sakyti, labai retai kada būna verti dėmesio, šis, kaip jau galima numanyti, yra išskirtinis. Kuo ? Tuojau pažiūrėsime. Filmo režisierius Jee-woon Kim, su kurio kūryba aš asmeniškai, neesu labai gerai susipažinusi. Iš garsesnių jo filmų galima paminėti komediją“ The Good, the Bad, the Weird“ ir siaubo filmą “A Tale of Two Sisters“. Pats režisierius geriau žinomas savo žemyne, todėl ir daugelį apdovanojimų yra gavęs būtent iš ten, vis tik neliko jis nepastebėtas Toronto, Malagos ir Milano tarptautiniuose festivaliuose. Kiek daugiau tarptautinio dėmesio jis sulaukė būtent po filmo „I Saw the Devil“.
Filmo siužetas iš pažiūros nesiūlantis nieko naujo. Serijinis žudikas Kyung-chul (Min-sik Choi) savo auka atsitikinai pasirenka specialaus agento Kim Soo-hyeon (Byung-hun Lee) sužadėtinę. Siaubingai nukankinęs ir galų gale nužudęs besilaukiančią merginą, Kyung-chul išmeta jos galvą į vieną iš vandens telkinių, kur netrukus ji buvo surasta. Ir nors serijinis žudikas tikėjosi, kad jokio atkirčio
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nesulauks, specialusis agentas, netekęs savo gyvenimo meilės nusprendžia išsiaiškinti žudiko tapatybę ir jam atkeršyti. Po kelių nesėkmingų paieškų Kim Soo-hyeon išsiaiškina serijinio žudiko tapatybę ir nusprendžia ne šiaip jį nužudyti, bet priversti jį išgyventi baimę ir siaubą, kokį išgyveną jo aukos. Įmontavęs sekimo prietaisą į Kyung-chul vidurius, specialusis agentas seka kiekvieną jo žingsnį ir, kai šis mažiausiai tikisi, pasirodo ir pasismagina fiziškai kankindamas. Tiesa, reikia pripažinti, kad filmas tikrai ne jautriems žiūrovams. Aš pati kelis kartus jau buvau pasiryžusi išjungti filmą dėl tam tikrų scenų šlykštumo ir nors džiaugiausi, kad to nepadariau, dar porą naktų ramiai miegoti negalėjau. Filmas perduoda labai nemalonę emocinę žinutę, kuri kaži ar kada palieka. „I Saw the Devil“ pabaiga žiūrovo irgi neišlaisvina ir nepaleidžia. Ir tai yra viena stipriausių šio filmo pusių. Filme vyrauja monologai. Europietiškai kultūrai kiek neįprasti dialogai gali atrodyti keistokai, tačiau filme jie puikiai dera. Labai smagu, kad nėra tuščiažodžiaujama. Pagrindinis veikėjas apskritai retai kada prabyla – ne vieno nereikalingo žodžio. Stebina žiaurumo scenų atvirumas ir tikroviškumas, priverčiantis prarasti bet kokį apetitą. Puikiai parodoma tamsioji žmogaus pusė, kai „gerasis“ veikėjas savo žiaurumu prilygsta „blogąjam“. „Aš regėjau šėtoną“ būtent ir stebina tuo precizišku, atviru, bet kartu ir labai tikrovišku žiaurumu ir groteskiškomis scenomis. Visą tai sujungus gaunamas tobulas keršto filmas.
Pagrindinius vaidmenis atliko neblogai žinomi aktoriai. Min-sik Choi geriausiai žinomas dėl filmo „Oldboy“, kuriame atliko pagrindinį vaidmenį. Simpatiškasis Byung-hun Lee dėl vaidmens “ The Good,
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the Bad, the Weird“. Abu aktoriai puikiai atliko savo vaidmenis – vienas šaltakraujis, tikras velnias, serijinis žudikas be sąžinės ir jausmų ir kitas skausmo vedamas, besikankinantis ir atpildo už mylimosios mirtį ištroškęs, toks pat šaltakraujis keršytojas. Tiesa, filmo pabaigoje galų gale parodoma ir kita, jautrioji „gerojo“ veikėjo pusė, kuri priverčia žiūrovą susimąstyti apie keršto prasmę. „I Saw the Devil“ susilaukė nemažai dėmesio įvairiuose festivaliuose, nors dauguma jų Azijos šalių. Iš užsienio šalių festivalių galima paminėti Austin Film Critics Association, kur filmas buvo pripažintas geriausiu užsienietišku filmu. Visumoje „I Saw the Devil“ yra puikus filmas apie tobulą kerštą, kurio metu lengvai manipuliuojama žiūrovo emocijomis ir apetito mažinimu. Tai filmas, kuris tikrai įstrigs į atmintį ir kurį pradėjus žiūrėti, verta pabaigti. Retai kada tokio iš pažiūros banalaus siužeto filmas yra išpildomas taip puikiai ir profesionaliai.
„You already lost. You think you got me? Huh? Fuck you. I don’t know what pain is. Fear? Don’t know that either. There’s nothing you can get from me. So... You already lost.“
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THE SHINING (1980) Stanley Kubrick’s spellbinding foray into the realm of the horror film, is at its most gloriously diabolical as Jack and Wendy Torrance take the grand tour. They are being shown through the Overlook, the cavernous, isolated hotel where they and their young son Danny will be spending the winter as caretakers, supposedly without any company. Jack pronounces the place “Cozy!” But still everything in the Overlook signals trouble, trouble that unfolds at a leisurely pace almost as playful as it is hair-raising. Meticulously detailed and never less than fascinating, “The Shining” may be the first movie that ever made its audience jump with a title that simply says “Tuesday.” In the hotel, the Torrances find dozens of empty rooms, ominously huge windows, knives all over the kitchen and a maze on the front lawn. As it later turns out, there are ghosts and more ghosts, and one of the elevators is full of blood. The Overlook would undoubtedly amount to one of the screen’s scarier haunted houses even without its special feature, a feature that gives “The Shining” its richness and its unexpected intimacy. The Overlook is something far more fearsome than a haunted house--it’s a home. In “The Shining,” which opens today at the Sutton and other theaters, Mr. Kubrick tries simultaneously to unfold a story of the occult and a family drama. The domestic half of the tale is by far the more effective, partly because the supernatural story knows frustratingly little rhyme or reason, even by supernatural standards. Dead twins haunt Danny and then stop haunting him; a mirror reflects some things and not others; the ghosts aren’t quite subjective and they aren’t quite real. Even the film’s most startling, horrific images seem overbearing and perhaps even irrelevant, like Mr. Kubrick’s celebrated monolith in “2001.” Many of the film’s more bewildering nightmarish touches are ill-explained holdovers from Stephen King’s novel, upon which Mr. Kubrick and Diane Johnson base their shrewd and economical screenplay. Most of their alterations in the story, which has been changed and improved considerably, have the effect of letting it run deeper. Mr. King has an episode, for instance, in which Danny is terrorized by a spectre in one of the deserted rooms. After this, his father, Jack, returns to the same room to investigate.
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K I N O . M A N A S Mr. Kubrick, aside from changing the room number from 217 to 237 for mysterious reasons of his own, entirely transforms the scene. In the book, what Danny sees is explicitly described, and his father catches a glimpse of the same creature. The film’s Danny is silent after his encounter, which is not depicted. And his father, as the camera tracks slowly into the room in a frenzy of anticipation, is confronted by one of Mr. Kubrick’s most heart-stopping inventions, an image halfway between eroticism and terror. “The Shining” stands on the brink of a physicality that has been very much absent from Mr. Kubrick’s other work, and that would surely have been welcome here. This is the story of a man gradually driven to destroy his wife and child, and it stops just short of pinpointing his rage. The marriage between Jack (Jack Nicholson) and Wendy (Shelley Duvall) is a listless one, and it is revealed obliquely: through the raggedness and dowdiness of Wendy’s wardrobe, through Jack’s constant irritation at her, through the immaculate cleanliness of the Overlook’s bathrooms and kitchen, through the eerie way they turn this enormous building into something cramped and claustrophobic. This is as close as Mr. Kubrick has come to dealing with both female and male characters or to grappling with domesticity. There are occasional moments in “The Shining” when their union alone seems enough to drive Jack mad.
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The “Gold Room,” a clever amplification of the hotel ballroom in Mr. King’s novel, becomes the place where Jack’s rage about his fiscal and familial responsibilities is revealed. It’s also the place where the movie begins to go wrong, lapsing into bright, splashy effects reminiscent of “Clockwork Orange” (though the Gold Room sequences produce the film’s closing shot, a startling photograph of Mr. Nicholson). “The Shining” begins, by this point, to show traces of sensationalism, and the effects don’t necessarily pay off. The film’s climactic chase virtually fizzles out before it reaches a resolution. Mr. Nicholson’s Jack is one of his most vibrant characterizations, furiously alive in every frame and fueled by an explosive anger. Mr. Nicholson is also devilishly funny, from his sarcastic edge at the film’s beginning to his cry of “Heeere’s Johnny!” as he chops down a bathroom door to get to Miss Duvall. Though Miss Duvall’s Wendy at first seems a strange match for Mr. Nicholson, she eventually takes shape as an almost freakish cipher, her early banality making her terror all the more extreme. Danny Lloyd, as Danny, and Scatman Crothers, as the hotel chef who, like Danny, has psychic powers, both give keen, steady performances as the story’s relatively naturalistic figures. Barry Nelson is a model of false assurance as the hotel manager.
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Mr. Kubrick, using the works of various composers, has assembled another stunningly effective score. John Alcott’s cinematography is lovely, although “The Shining” seems intentionally less glossy than Mr. Kubrick’s other films. Like the characters, it has a certain ironic homeliness—as when Wendy sits in the hotel’s elegant lobby, propped before a television screen during a blizzard. She’s watching Jennifer O’Neill play the ultimate in sweetly mindless femininity, in “Summer of ‘42.” http://www.nytimes.com/1980/05/23/movies/052380shining.html
“Here’s Johnny!”
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THE GREAT DICTATOR (1940) Charlie Chaplin’s first talkie, made over a decade after the introduction of sound, stands as a brave and controversial piece of filmmaking. Entering production in 1937, at a time when many Americans saw Hitler as an ally rather than an enemy, the film was first released in 1940, prior to the United States’ entry into the Second World War. Satirising Adolf Hitler, Chaplin plays a dual role: firstly as Adenoid Hynkel, the great dictator of the title and despotic ruler of Tomainia; and secondly - in a stroke of genius - as an amnesiac Jewish barber, who returns from the trenches of the First World War to discover that his shop is now part of a ghetto presided over by thuggish stormtroopers. Playing on the coincidental similarity between Chaplin’s moustachioed tramp and Hitler himself, “The Great Dictator” was frequently criticised for attempting to turn the Nazis’ rise to power into comedy. Indeed, Chaplin claimed that he would never have tried to burlesque mass genocide once the truth of the Holocaust became known after the film’s release. Strangely, though, what remains so powerful about the film’s satire is its outright silliness. Exaggerating Hitler’s animated demagogic style at the microphone into complete absurdity, Chaplin’s childish satirical swipes work because of - and not in spite of - their refusal to accept Nazism as anything other than an outrageously bad joke. Ridiculing the anti-Semitic policies of the party (after the Jews, Hynkel promises to wipe out the brunettes; he, of course, is both) and demoting Hitler to the level of a clown, “The Great Dictator” exposes the farcical base of fascism, bursting the swollen bubble of reactionary pomposity with deafening finality. The result is an incredibly effective satire. No wonder Hitler, Mussolini and Franco banned it outright. „ I’m sorry, but I don’t want to be an emperor. That’s not my business. I don’t want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone if possible; Jew, Gentile, black man, white. We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other’s happiness, not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone, and the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men’s souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our
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knowledge has made us cynical; our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery, we need humanity. More than cleverness, we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost. The airplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men; cries out for universal brotherhood; for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world, millions of despairing men, women, and little children, victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me, I say, do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed, the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish. Soldiers! Don’t give yourselves to brutes, men who despise you, enslave you; who regiment your lives, tell you what to do, what to think and what to feel! Who drill you, diet you, treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines, you are not cattle, you are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You don’t hate! Only the unloved hate; the unloved and the unnatural. Soldiers! Don’t fight for slavery! Fight for liberty! In the seventeenth chapter of St. Luke, it is written that the kingdom of God is within man, not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people, have the power, the power to create machines, the power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure. Then in the name of democracy, let us use that power. Let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world, a decent world that will give men a chance to work, that will give youth a future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfill that promise. They never will! Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people. Now let us fight to fulfill that promise. Let us fight to free the world! To do away with national barriers! To do away with greed, with hate and intolerance! Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s happiness. Soldiers, in the name of democracy, let us all unite! Hannah, can you hear me? Wherever you are, look up Hannah! The clouds are lifting! The sun is breaking through! We are coming out of the darkness into the light! We are coming into a new world; a kindlier world, where men will rise above their hate, their greed, and brutality. Look up, Hannah! The soul of man has been given wings and at last he is beginning to fly. He is flying into the rainbow! Into the light of hope, into the future! The glorious future, that belongs to you, to me and to all of us.“
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THE GRADUATE (1967) The Graduate (1967) is one of the key, ground-breaking films of the late 1960s, and helped to set in motion a new era of film-making. The influential film is a biting satire/comedy about a recent nebbish, East Coast college graduate who finds himself alienated and adrift in the shifting, social and sexual mores of the 1960s, and questioning the values of society (with its keyword “plastics”). The themes of the film also mirrored the changes occurring in Hollywood, as a new vanguard of younger directors were coming to the forefront. Avant-garde director Mike Nichols, following his debut success of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966) with this second film, instantly became a major new talent in American film after winning an Academy Award for his directorship. The theme of an innocent and confused youth who is exploited, mis-directed, seduced (literally and figuratively) and betrayed by a corrupt, decadent, and discredited older generation (that finds its stability in “plastics”) was well understood by film audiences and captured the spirit of the times. One of the film’s posters proclaimed the difficult coming-of-age for the recent, aimless college graduate: This is Benjamin. He’s a little worried about his future. The two different generations are also reflected in other dualities: the two rival women (young innocent doe-eyed daughter Elaine and the older seductress Mrs. Robinson), the two California settings (Los Angeles and Berkeley) and S. and N. California cultures (materialistic vs. intellectual), and the division in Benjamin’s character (morally drifting and indecisive vs. committed). There was already a growing dissatisfaction with the status quo and middle-class values, and the breakthrough film mirrored that anarchic mood perfectly for America’s youth of the 60s during the escalation of the Vietnam War. However, in the final analysis, director Nichols actually subversively portrayed how aimless and unalive the disaffected young generation was (in the character of Benjamin) - and would become as they approached middle-age and worked in sterile corporate settings. [In the same year, it joined Bonnie and Clyde (1967) as one of the most popular films for the college-aged generation.] It was complemented by the music of the popular singing duo Simon and Garfunkel from their Grammy-winning The Sounds of Silence album (with songs composed earlier and previously-released except for “Mrs. Robinson”), with meaningful, haunting lyrics amidst koo-koo-kachoo sounds to enhance the film’s moods and themes.
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The film was adapted first for the stage (at London’s Gielgud Theatre), and then premiered on Broadway in early April of 2002, with Kathleen Turner reprising her role as Mrs. Robinson, along with Jason Biggs and Alicia Silverstone in the other major roles. Many viewers of this mid-60’s film were unaware that Harold Lloyd’s race to the rescue to prevent the wedding of a girl he loves earlier appeared in the silent-era film comedian’s influential film Girl Shy (1924). The film was nominated for a total of seven Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Best Actor (Dustin Hoffman), Best Actress (Anne Bancroft), Best Supporting Actress (Katharine Ross), Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Cinematography. The film won only one award - Best Director. The Oscar-nominated screen adaptation by Calder Willingham and Buck Henry (who appears as the hotel’s desk clerk) was based on the novel of the same name by Charles Webb (a recent graduate of the East Coast’s Williams College when he wrote his first novel). Warren Beatty, Charles Grodin, Robert Redford, and Burt Ward (the ‘Robin’ character of the TV series Batman) were all considered for the role of Benjamin, and Patricia Neal and Doris Day were considered for the part of Mrs. Robinson. Short-statured (5’6”) Jewish actor Dustin Hoffman had already been cast as Nazi playwright Franz Liebkind in The Producers (1968) when he bowed out and took the role of bumbling graduate Benjamin Braddock. His defection forced Mel Brooks to quickly recast the trademark role with Kenneth Mars. http://www.filmsite.org/grad.html
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Ben: I’m just... Mr. Braddock: ...worried? Ben: Well... Mr. Braddock: About what? Ben: I guess about my future. Mr. Braddock: What about it? Ben: I don’t know. I want it to be... Mr. Braddock: ...to be what? Ben: ...Different.
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PICKPOCKET (1959) Jean Pelegri, one of the non-professional actors in Bresson’s Pickpocket, said of his director: “He knows what he wants but he doesn’t know why. “Nobody could be less dogmatic or more obstinate than he. He relies entirely on his instinct.” Most people think that Bresson, one of the few film-makers who has never had to compromise for commercial purposes, is an intellectual who knows precisely why he wants what he wants. Which is partly the reason why not everybody warms to his rigour and severity. But there’s no doubt that he is a great film-maker, and that Pickpocket is one of his masterworks. It is, at base, about self-fulfilment and redemption through love - a common enough idea in films. But this 1959 epic has seldom been equalled as a philosophical treatise on the subject. The point is that the film is as much a visual argument as a spoken one. Michel (Martin Lasalle) is a petty thief who, after being arrested and then released, starts discussing the rights and wrongs of crime with the police inspector. The only way he can find a place for himself in society is to engineer a head-on collision with it. It gives him a reason to live. In that way, picking pockets becomes an exciting, almost sexual adventure. It is a kind of pact with the Devil. But he has to leave France for London when the band of thieves he joins is arrested. And when he returns he is also caught. It is only when he is visited in prison by Jeanne (Marika Green), the girl who looked after his mother before she died and is now abandoned with a child, that he realises that his whole life could be changed by love. The humiliation of prison inspires him to a desperate act of faith. The story is told in the form of Michel’s diary, almost exclusively in mid and long shots with minimal camera movements and fade-outs as an alternative to editing. Only once does another way of working come into it when Bresson, who was fascinated by the methods used by pickpockets, describes the operations of a gang among the crowds at a railway station. He also pays great attention to the sounds of the city which resound in the small apartment in which Michel lives. The Longchamp races frame the story and one notable sequence follows another, so that the parable grips even at its most internal.
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Bresson is clearly not a film-maker for everybody, but he has pursued his own way remorselessly for the best part of 40 years and he has a very faithful audience. His literary adaptations - from Giraudoux, Diderot, Bernanos and Dostoevsky - are often merely points of departure. For him, “the most important ideas in a film are the most hidden”, so the watcher has to look hard to find them. It is not an easy process but it is a rewarding one since you feel he has a profound understanding of what he is talking about. His films have little or nothing to do with those of the French New Wave but a lot to do with his Catholic background and the fact that he spent 18 months in a German prison camp during the second world war. Prison also features Les Anges du Péché, Un Condamné à Mort s’est Echappé and The Trial of Joan of Arc. And most of his central characters seem imprisoned, if only in the soul, either through their misfortunes or because society has made it inevitable. If this seems a gloomy process through which to journey, there are always points in his films where redemption and exaltation prevent glumness.
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THREE COLORS: WHITE (1994) Three Colours White, the second part of Krzysztof Kieslowski’s trilogy based on the colours of the French flag and upon the precepts of liberty, freedom and equality, is the easiest of the three films to negotiate but by no means the least in weight. It’s the kind of comedy only a hopeful pessimist could have made and, if that sounds like a contradiction in terms, you don’t know Kieslowski very well. The film specialises as much in a kind of ironic gallows humour as in laughter pure and simple, but bitterness is also avoided - which is a small miracle in itself considering the subject matter and the setting. Its central character is a Polish version of the eternal little man, in this case a mild-mannered hairdresser (Zbigniew Zamachowski) whose work to establish himself in Paris is rudely aborted by his French wife (Julie Delpy) suing him for the non-consummation of their recent marriage. Divorce is inevitable after a stuttering court appearance and, with his credit cards invalidated, the hairdresser resorts to begging in the Metro. There, he meets another Pole who is apparently even worse off. He is willing to pay someone to officiate at a depressed friend’s own suicide, and will do a considerable favour to anyone acceding to his request. The promise is undertaken.
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Helping him to get back to Poland in a trunk by checking it in as his own luggage, his new friend now admits he’s the one who wanted to die and then recovers his will to live after being conveniently shot by a blank. Finally, he partners the hairdres ser in a shady land deal which sends one on the way to richness and makes the other his admiring henchman. Still obsessive about his wife, but now in a position of equality with her which he had never achieved in France, our hero finally thinks up a suitable plan to hook his delicate fish. He buys a corpse (Russian, of course) and has it buried as himself, leaving his money to his wife, who now arrives in Poland to collect. But love, though it conquers most things, isn’t as easy to achieve as money. The film, like most of Kieslowski’s which deal with Poles and Poland, is less headily stylish than Blue or Red, made in France and Switzerland respectively. But it feels somehow truer, as if the director instinctively knows how his characters should react and can thus afford a more direct, less elliptical approach. And it contains not only a superbly self-effacing but apt performance from Zamachowski, first as the damaged exile and then as the conquering entrepreneur at home, but also a strikingly deft portrait of post-communist Poland, where the most baleful kind of capitalism reigns and it’s every dirty dog for himself.
The combination of these two signal virtues rather outweighs Kieslowski ‘s other preoccupations, even if it doesn’t drown them out. The hairdresser’s struggle towards equality is essentially the same as the fight of the composer’s wife in Blue to find her personal freedom.
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But, unlike either Blue or Red, White can’t be accused of portentousness and it may well wear better in retrospect. It’s almost perfect as far as it goes - a bleak but ultimately hopeful comedy which, if it hadn’t got to be called White, might very well be dubbed Black. Kieslowski ‘s comedy, like the other two works in the trilogy, has a lot to say about the psyche of Europe now, just as the Decalogue spoke so eloquently of Poland’s a few years ago.
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SHUTTER ISLAND (2010) Drįsčiau teigti, kad neatsirastų žmogaus, kuris pamatęs šį filmą liktų abejingas. Tai vienas iš tų filmų, kurie sukelia susižavėjimą kiekvienam mėgstančiam gerą, kokybišką kiną. „Kuždesių sala“ – filmas, kuris įsimena ilgam, o kiekvieną kartą jį bežiūrint atrandi tai, ko ankščiau nebuvai matęs, todėl kyla natūralus noras filmą pasižiūrėti tikrai ne kartą. Maža to, pasibaigus filmui, kiekvieną kartą žiūrovą aplanko skirtingos emocijos. Būtent todėl filmas visada išlieka bekintantis mūsų savimonėje. Kino klasika – taip apibūdinti filmą galėtų tiek kino mėgėjas, tiek kino kritikai. Šį įspūdį suteikia ne vien filmo atmosfera, garso takelis, vaizduojamas laikmetis, bet visų svarbiausia – Alfredo Hičkoko stilistika. Martinas Scorsese, vadinamas vienu geriausių visų laikų režisierių, daugelio apdovanojimų bei premijų laureatas, 2010 metas į savo nemenką filmų sąrašą įrašė kino industrijos pasididžiavimą – „Kuždesių salą“. Pasakodamas apie savo sprendimą režisuoti filmą pagal to paties pavadinimo Dennis Lehane‘o knygą, Martinas teigė, esą jau skaitydamas scenarijų jis pajuto stiprų ryšį su pagrindiniu veikėju, kas ir paskatino „Kuždesių salos“ atsiradimą kino teatruose. Šio atsakingo darbo išpildymui režisierius pasirinko vieną geriausių šių laikų aktorių – Leonardo DiCaprio. Šis filmas taip pat yra jau ketvirtas bendras aktoriaus bei režisieriaus M.Scorseses darbas – sulaukė gausaus kino žiūrovų susidomėjimo ir palankių kritikų įvertinimų. Scorsese yra „pakvaišęs‘‘ dėl kino, kaip ir dauguma sinefilų , todėl jo filmai vis dažniau tampa savotišku kino istorijos žaidimu, formų ir žanrų tyrinėjimu, kuriame gali dalyvauti kiekvienas šiek tiek išprusęs kino gerbėjas. Žiūrovas pasineria į paslapčių narpliojimą, kuris sukelia malonumą - galimybę kartu su režisieriumi tyrinėti stiliaus, žanro ir kitų specifinių kino kalbos elementų ypatybes, atpažinti klasikinių filmų užuominas. Apie šį filmą sunku pasakoti, jį reikia tiesiog pamatyti ir pajusti jame vyraujančią įtampą bei emocijas. Jau pirmieji kadrai sukelia hičkokišką įtampą. Į saloje įkurtą kalėjimą-ligoninę pavojingiems nusikaltėliams psichopatams atvyksta du maršalai - Tedis Denielsas (Leonardo DiCaprio) ir jo naujas partneris Chucas Aule (Mark Ruffalo). Jie tiria išprotėjusios žudikės dingimą iš aklinai uždarytos kameros.
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Tyrimas sutampa su audra, kuri nusiaubia salą ir nepalieka jokio būdo palikti salos ar susisiekti su išoriniu pasauliu. Maršalai įkliūna tarsi į užburtą ratą, iš kurio nėra nei fizinio nei psichologinio pabėgimo. Denielsui vis daugiau įtarimų kelia ligoninės gydytojų metodai bei keistas kalinių elgesys. Pagrindinis veikėjas vis dažniau grįžta į savo prisiminimus - Antrojo pasaulinio karo metais išvaduotą vokiečių konclagerį, nusižudžiusį jo komendantą ir tragišką savo žmonos mirtį. Įtarimai, nuojautos, kad saloje vyksta kažkas baisaus, vis auga bei kelia vis didesnę įtampą. Naktiniai košmarai atskleidžia slaptas Tedžio baimes, kurios po truputį ima materializuotis. Tedis pasijunta įkalintas šiame baimių ir nuojautų labirinte, kuriame nebesugeba suvokti kas yra realybė, o kas jo pasąmonės sukurtos iliuzijos. Režisierius kuria kraupią filmo atmosferą atvirai pasitelkdamas klasikinių filmų elementus – uždaras erdves, ir, žinoma, muziką. „Kuždesių salos“ garso takelis - neįtikėtinai iškalbingas. Epochos dainos bei garsių kompozitorių kūrinių fragmentai pabrėžia Scorsese naudojamas stiliaus subtilybes. Nuo pat pirmųjų „Kuždesių salos“ kadrų muzika žadina prisiminimus apie Holivudo auksinio amžiaus filmus, pirmiausia, žinoma, Alfredo Hičkoko. Žiūrovas nejučiomis prisimena filmus - „Psichopatas“, „Svaigulys“ bei kitus, kino klasika tapusius filmus. Taip pat filme naudojama A. Hičkoką išgarsinusi technika – suspense (įtampa), nors filmas gana ilgas – 138min., tačiau žiūrovo dėmesys yra prikaustytas iki paskutinės filmo sekundės. Norint visiškai suprasti filmo mintį, žiūrovas turi domėtis amerikiečių kino istorija bei būti ganėtinai apsišvietęs kino indus-
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trijoje. Filme yra įpinta nemažai užuominų į kino klasikų naudojamas technikas, istorinių raidos subtilybių bei kitokių ženklų bei užuominų. Filme vyrauja dvi tikrovės - herojaus psichikos ir realybės. Režisierius pasitelkia dekoracijas: klaustrofobiškas erdves, salą, iš kurios nėra išėjimo, tamsą, kapines bei kitokius elementus. Taip pat filme netrūksta kontrastų - prabangi gydytojų svetainė oponuoja ligoninės pastatams, kurie primena siaubo filmus. Filmo veiksmas yra lyg mozaika tarp realybės, prisiminimų, bei košmariškų sapnų. Filmo paskutine fraze tampa retorinis klausimas – “Which would be worse, to live as a monster, or to die as a good man? (kas būtų blogiau - ar gyventi kaip pabaisai, ar mirti geru žmogumi?). Filmas baigiamas pagrindinio herojaus žingsniais link gyvųjų pragaro - lobotomijos (dešimtmetyje naudotas toks populiarus „gydymo“ metodas - smegenų operacija, kurios metu yra pažeidžiamos smegenų kaktinės skiltys). Pasibaigus filmui žiūrovas lieka pasimetęs, nes negauna aiškaus atsakymo. Tačiau siužetinė potekstė jokiu būdu nėra autorių neapsisprendimo ar nežinojimo kaip baigti filmą, išvada. Tai tik dar viena priemonė, pasitelkta norint manipuliuoti žmonių jausmais, emocijomis bei pozicijomis. Žiūrovas įpinamas į žaidimą ir filmo kūrėjai nori, kad žiūrovas tebežaistų filmui pasibaigus. Kiekvienas iš mūsų galime rasti skirtingą šio filmo pabaigą bei išeities tašką, viskas priklauso nuo to, kaip stipriai mes esame pasiryžę pasiduoti žaidimo manipuliacijai.
“You’re smarter than you look, Marshal. That’s probably not a good thing.” © Guostė Smaleckaitė
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INTO THE WILD (2007) Išvarginti kasdienybės ir rutinos milijonai žmonių kiekvieną rytą keliasi tą pačią valandą, važiuoja tuo pačiu keliu į darbą, dirba dažnai net nemėgstamą darbą ir vėl tą pačią valandą eina miegoti, šitaip nugyvendami didžiąją savo gyvenimo dalį. Darbas, karjera, šeimos kūrimas, visuomenės priskirtų vaidmenų atlikimas, aplinkinių žmonių lūkesčiai anksčiau ar vėliau užgriūna kiekvieną iš mūsų. Tiesa ta, kad dauguma leidžia monotonijai užimti, daugiau ar mažiau, kiekvieną dieną, su liūdesiu leisdama prisiminti apie kažkada svajotą visai kitokį gyvenimą. „Into the Wild“ tikra istorija, priversianti bent trumpam pabėgti nuo mums įprasto gyvenimo, kai ką galbūt net įkvėps, kai kam primins apie tai, apie ką buvo svajota, bet galų gale pamiršta. Filmo režisierius garsusis dviejų Oskarų laimėtojas Sean Penn, mums gerai žinomas iš tokių filmų kaip „Mystic River“, „I Am Sam“, „21 grams“, „Milk“ ir daugelį kitų. Dėl jo aktorinių sugebėjimų niekas negali abejoti. Filmas „Into the Wild“ parodo, kad ir jo kaip režisieriaus sugebėjimai pagirtini. Filmas buvo nominuotas dviem Oskarams, o „IMDB“ geriausių visų laikų filmų sąraše užima 160 vietą.
„Into the Wild“ tai tikra istorija, režisuota pagal Jon Krakauer parašytą to paties pavadinimo knygą. Istorija pasakojo apie iš tiesų gyvenusi jaunuolį Christopher McCandless (Emile Hirsch),
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kuris po universiteto baigimo susikrauna svarbiausius daiktus ir niekam nieko nepranešęs išsiruošia kelionei po visą Ameriką link išsvajotosios Aliaskos. Atsibodusi, vien tik materialių gerybių siekti skatinanti aplinka, galu gale iš proto gali išvesti kiekvieną, tiesa, ne visi išdrįstų leistis į tokią kelionę, į kokią išsiruošia mūsų herojus. Vaikinas yra pavargęs nuo visuomenės spaudimo kopti karjeros laiptais, uždirbti kuo daugiau pinigų, jam atsibodo aplinkinių abejingumas, nenuoširdumas, vien tik asmeninių interesų siekimas ir tėvų nesupratimas. Christopher‘is nusprendžia, kad jis neprivalo paklūsti kažkieno kito sukurtoms taisyklėms ir susikuria savo gyvenimo filosofiją, vadovaudamasis mėgstamų rašytojų idėjomis. Filmo idėja pasirodytų pernelyg naivi ir nereali, jei ne tas faktas, kad visa tai tikra, kad visa tai iš tiesų buvo. Šiek tiek pagražinta, tačiau vis tiek ne mažiau realu. Filmo herojus stebina drąsa, ryžtingumu ir stebėtinu optimizmu. Savo kelionėje jis sutinka daug įvairių žmonių, ne visuomet gerai nusiteikusių. Istorija parodo ne vien gražiąją tokios didingos kelionės pusę, atskleidžiama ir ne tokia romantiška dalis, šitaip suteikiant filmui dar daugiau įvairiapusiškumo ir realistiškumo pojūčio. Siužetas priverčiantis trumpam sustoti, apsidairyti ir susimąstyti apie savo gyvenimą, apie tikrąsias vertybes, galbūt net galų gale imtis kokių nors, nebūtinai tokių drastiškų, pokyčių. Filmo garso takelis pasižymi ramių, atpalaiduojančių dainų ar melodijų derinimu, kuri puikiai tinka prie bendros filmo nuotaikos. Filmas pilnas gamtos vaizdų, didelis dėmesys skirtas aplinkos grožiui, o tai skatina pažvelgti į tai, kas yra žemiška. Tiesa, tam tikromis filmo vietomis gali pasirodyti, kad filmas yra užtęstas, kažko galbūt galėjo ir nebūti, tačiau visumoje viskas dera ir įsijautusiems, atpažinusiems savo slaptas svajones, šis filmas tikrai neprailgs.
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Pagrindinis vaidmuo atiteko Emile Hirsch (The Emperor's Club, Imaginary Heroes, vaidino „Milk“ kartu su Sean Penn), kuriam teko atskleisti gan kontraversiškai vertinamą asmenybę. Viena vertus Christopher McCandless buvo drąsus, tvirtą vertybių sistemą ir gerą širdį turintis jaunuolis. Kita vertus, jis beširdiškai paliko nežinioje savo tėvus, vadovaudamasis kiek neaiškiomis idėjomis, kurios galų gale nepasiteisino. Vis tik Emile Hirsch, tikrai pavyko įkūnyti šią asmenybę, jam šis vaidmuo tiko ir, ko gero, bent jau kol kas, buvo geriausias kurį jis atliko. Filme buvo iš ties puikiai atskleistas herojaus dvilypumas – noras neturėti nieko bendro su kitais žmonėmis, mėgautis tuo, ką suteikia gamta ir noras truks plyš būti viso to dalimi. Vienas kitam prieštaraujantys jausmai būdingi kiekvienam mūsų, todėl ir filme parodyti jausmai nebus svetimi. Filmas buvo nominuotas įspūdingam skaičiui apdovanojimų, nemažai jų ir gavo. Visus juos vardinti būtų beviltiška. Tiesa, galima paminėti bent keletą jų. „AFI“ apdovanojo kaip geriausią metų filmą, taip pat gavo auksinį gaublį už geriausią originalią teminę dainą, „Gotham Awards“ ir „Palm Springs International Film Festival“ apdovanojo Sean Penn kaip geriausią metų režisierių, „Mill Valley Film Festival“ ir „Palm Springs International Film Festival“ Emile Hirsch paskelbė geriausiu kylančiu aktoriumi. Filmas tikrai neliko nepastebėtas. Filmas buvo nominuotas įspūdingam skaičiui apdovanojimų, nemažai jų ir gavo. Visus juos vardinti būtų beviltiška. Tiesa, galima paminėti bent keletą jų. „AFI“ apdovanojo kaip geriausią metų filmą, taip pat gavo auksinį gaublį už geriausią originalią teminę dainą, „Gotham Awards“ ir „Palm Springs International Film Festival“ apdovanojo Sean Penn kaip geriausią metų režisierių, „Mill Valley Film Festival“ ir „Palm Springs International Film Festival“ Emile Hirsch paskelbė geriausiu kylančiu aktoriumi. Filmas tikrai neliko nepastebėtas. „Into the Wild“ filmas skirtas pabėgti nuo rutinos, ieškantiems kažko naujo ir nematyto, filmo priversiančio susimąstyti, kuris gal net įkvėps ką nors pakeisti. Ir net jei tai tebus nusipirktas lėktuvo bilietas į kokią seniai svajotą aplankyti užsienio šalį, tai jau bus šis tas. Verta žiūrėti, jei atsibodo vartotojiška visuomenė ir pinigų iškėlimas aukščiau žmogiškąsias vertybes. Verta žiūrėti ir tiesiog išsiilgusiems gero, kokybiško ir kitokio filmo, nes jis vertas, kad kiekvienas mūsų jį bent kartą pamatytų.
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“Rather than love, than money, than faith, than fame, than fairness... give me truth.�
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IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE (1946) Kiekvienam iš mūsų pasitaiko tikrai juodų dienų, kai kam gal ir savaičių ar mėnesių. Dažnai būna sunku atrasti kažką teigiamo iš šviesaus pasaulyje, kuriame, atrodo, lieka vis mažiau gėrio. Taip įprantame prie tos besisukančios nuolatinių rūpesčių karuselės, kad nebepastebime smulkmenų ir detalių, kurios iš tiesų yra svarbios ir daro mūsų gyvenimui reikšmingus, net jei kartais atrodo ir atvirkščiai.“ It‘s a wonderful life“, tai filmas skirtas suaugusiems, pamiršusiems savo gyvenimo svarbą ar tiems, kuriems atrodo, kad viskas jau prarasta ir beprasmiška. Filmas pasirodė 1946 metais ir buvo iš kart nominuotas net penkiems Oskarams, tiesa, nei vieno nelaimėjo, todėl dažnai yra vadinamas kaip geriausias filmas, taip ir nesulaukęs įvertinimo Oskaruose. Tiesa, taip pat ir pats filmo populiarumas nebuvo toks staigus, kokio galbūt tikėjosi režisierius ir aktoriai. Vos pasirodęs filmas didelio pripažinimo ir žiūrovų susidomėjimo nesulaukė ir tik po kurio laiko, visiškai atsitiktinai parodytas per Kalėdas jis buvo prisimintas ir iš naujo pažadintas įvertinti, jei ne apdovanojimams, tai bent jau filmų mėgėjų dėmesiu.
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„It‘s a wonderful life“ siužetas pasakoja apie George Bailey ( James Stewart), kuris yra puikus brolis, šaunus sūnus ir visomis kitomis prasmėmis tikrai geraširdiškas jaunuolis, svajojantis apkeliauti pasaulį, pamatyti kuo daugiau ir galu gale tapti architektu. Jo visai nedomina tėvo sukurtas verslas, kurį pastarasis nori perduoti vyriausiajam sūnui. Tiesa, gyvenimas susiklosto taip, kad George‘s lieka gimtajame miestelyje perimti tėvo verslo ir atsisako savo svajonės. Nors darbas jam nemielas ir gyvenimas ne toks, kokį jis įsivaizdavo, George‘s sutinka savo meilę Mary (Donna Reed ), su kuria ir nusprendžia kurti bendrą ateitį. Tačiau ir vėlgi ,gyvenimas klostosi ne taip, kaip tikėtasi ir iškilusios problemos versle galutinai sugniuždo pagrindinį veikėją. Šis pasiryžta savižudybei. Štai čia ir prasideda pasakiškoji filmo dalis – į žemę siunčiamas angelas, kuris turi išgelbėti George‘s nuo tragiškos klaidos. Angelas nusprendžia parodyti verslininkui koks būtų buvęs gyvenimas, jei šis niekuomet nebūtų gimęs. Siužetas, nepaisant tam tikrų fantastikos motyvų, iš tiesų labai subtiliai perteikia pagrindinę filmo mintį, kad kiekvienas esame reikšmingi mums supantiems žmonėms, kad kiekvienas atliekame vaidmenį, kurio niekas kitas neatliks ir, kad dalykai, kurie mums atrodo nereikšmingi ir neverti dėmesio, iš tiesų yra esminiai mus mylintiems žmonėms. Ir nors kiekvienam iš mūsų iš dangaus angelai leistis nepradės, šis filmas leidžia pamąstyti ir iš naujo įvertinti savo reikšmę šioje žemėje. Pagrindinis filmo vaidmuo atiteko James Stewart, kuris iš senojo kino laikų daugeliui yra puikiai pažįstamas ir dar iki „It‘s a wonderful life“ buvo suvaidinęs daugiau nei dvidešimčia filmų. Tiesa, geriausiai jis žinomas iš vėlesnių vaidmenų puikiai įvertintuose Alfredo Hičkoko filmuose „Rope“, „Rear Window“ ir „Vertingo“, nors sakyti, kad kiti jo sukurti vaidmenys mažiau reikšmingi ar įsimintini, būtų tiesiog nuodėmė. Taip pat ir kabinėtis prie vaidybos. James Stewart puikiai atliko savo vaidmenį ir savo herojų įkūnijo kone idealiai. Puikiai derėjo ir jo veikėjui parinkta gražuolė Donna Reed, kurios tiek vaidybiniai sugebėjimai, tiek išvaizda atitinka pačius aukščiausius standartus. Ši pora kino ekrane puikiai derėjo visomis prasmėmis.
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Garso takelio prasme įspūdingų aukštumų tikėtis negalima, juk verta prisiminti, kad tai 1946 metų filmas, tačiau didelį įspūdį palieka filmo paprastumas šioje srityje. Išgirsime dainuojančius ir James Stewart ir Donna Reed , o tai suteikia filmui nuoširdumo, kurio galima labai pasigesti šiuolaikiniuose filmuose su daugiamilijoniniais biudžetais. Pastarojo filmo biudžetas siekė kiek daugiau nei tris milijonus Amerikos dolerių. Filmas nufilmuotas iš ties gražiai, nors šiuolaikinis žiūrovas visuomet gali rasti prie ko prisikabinti. Gal kiek vaikiškai atrodė pirmoji filmo scena, rodanti kalbančius angelus, kurie dabar atrodo neįtikinamai ir gal net kiek juokinga. Vis tik visumoje filmas puikiai išpildytas daugelį prasmių, o siužeto originalumas ir nuostabi aktorių vaidyba pavergia kiekvieną kinomaną. Kaip minėta anksčiau, filmas buvo nominuotas penkiems Oskarams (geriausias filmas, geriausias režisierius, geriausias montažas, geriausias garsas, geriausias aktorius), tačiau taip nei vieno ir negavo. Vis tik buvo įvertintas auksiniu gaubliu už geriausią režisierių, bet iš reikšmingesnių apdovanojimų tebuvo tik tiek. Taigi „It‘s a wonderful life“ puiki galimybė atkreipti dėmesį į kiekvieno iš mūsų gyvenimus, nepabijoti suteikti reikšmės, tam, kas mums
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atrodo savaime suprantam ir neverta vertinti. Tai puikus filmas tiek vaikams, tiek suaugusiems, kuriems šis filmas gali būti kaip netiesioginė, naivi padėka už pasiaukojimą vienoje ar kitoje gyvenimo situacijoje, nes kiekvienas pažiūrėjęs filmą galės kažką priskirti sau, kažkur atras save. Puikus filmas ne vien Kalėdų dienai, bet ir tuomet, kai pamirštame kokie svarbūs iš tiesų kiekvienas iš mūsų esame.
„Strange, isn’t it? Each man’s life touches so many other lives. When he isn’t around he leaves an awful hole, doesn’t he?“
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REVOLUTIONARY ROAD (2008) Kiekvienas turime savo suvokimą apie tai, ką turime turėti, kokie norime tapti ar ką privalome pasiekti tam, kad būtume laimingi. Daugiau ar mažiau, mūsų vaizdiniai skiriasi, bet visi anksčiau ar vėliau norime būti apsirūpinę, turėti mylimąjį ar mylimąją šalia, kurti kažką bendro ir gražaus kartu, stabilioje aplinkoje. Tačiau be viso to, mes norime būti ypatingi, išskirtiniai, patirti kažką naujo ir jaudinančio, kas suteiktų gyvenimui prasmės. Dar vienas žmogaus dvilypumas būdingas kiekvienam mūsų. „Nerimo dienos“ vaizduoja, atrodytų, tobulą gyvenimą, kuris iš tiesų slepia kur kas daugiau, nei gali pasirodyti iš pradžių. Filmo režisierius yra Sam Mendes, kuris geriausiai žinomas yra dėl filmo „American Beauty“, laimėjusiu net 5 Oskarus ir pagrindine mintimi giminingu „Nerimo dienoms“. Tiesa, dabar šis režisierius dar žinomas ir kaip naujausio filmo apie Džeimsą Bondą „Skyfall“ režisierius. Bet kuriuo atveju Sam Mendes puikiai įvertintas kūrėjas, susikrovęs daugiau nei dvidešimt įvairiausių apdovanojimų. Už tą patį „American Beauty“ yra gavęs Oskarą kaip geriausias režisierius, todėl jo kompetencija abejoti neverta. Ką ji jums pasiūlys „Nerimo dienose“ pastatytame pagal knygą „Revolutionary Road“, tuoj ir sužinosite.
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Filmas pasakoja apie Frank (Leonardo DiCaprio) ir April (Kate Winslet), gyvenančius maždaug 1950-ųjų Amerikoje, kurie atsitiktinai susipažįsta bendrame vakarėlyje, randa bendrą kalbą ir istorijai nutylint kaip būtent, bet galu gale sukuria šeimą. Iš pažiūros viskas puiku. Gražus vyras, graži žmona, puikus namas užmiestyje, nuostabūs vaikai, nauja mašina ir draugiški kaimynai. Tiesiog svajonės išsipildymas. Deja, deja, toli gražu. Už tobulos išorės slypi kur kas gilesnės problemos. Frank dirba darbą, kuris jam nei patinka, nei sekasi, o gimtadienio dieną leidžia naujos bendradarbės lovoje. Tuo tarpu April, kažkada svajojusi tapti aktorė, galų gale tapo namų šeimininke, kuri dienas leidžia nykioje užmiesčio atmosferoje, bendraudama su kaimynais ir tvarkydama namus . Vieną dieną April galutinai suvokia, kad nebeliko to ypatingumo jausmo, kuri kažkada dar jautė, kad jos gyvenimas nėra nei jaudinantis, nei įdomus ir nusprendžia pasiūlyti vyrui iškeliauti gyventi į Paryžių. Frank savo ruožtu iš pradžių dar kiek prieštaravęs, galiausiai sutinka ir iki išvykimo likus dar keletui mėnesių jų gyvenimas ima keistis. Nebejausdami jokių įsipareigojimų juos supančiai aplinkai, tikėdami, kad greitai jų gyvenimas kardinaliai pasikeis, jie patys pasikeičia atrasdami tai, ką jau buvo praradę. Tačiau nors gyvenimas trumpam ir pagerėja, nuojauta, kad jų planai vienaip ar kitaip žlugs, neapleidžia.
Nei Leonardo DiCaprio, nei Kate Winslet atskirai pristatinėti
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nereikia. Tai vieni iš tų aktorių, kuriuos žino bet kokio amžiaus žmonės ir net nebūtina būti kino mėgėjais. Šių abiejų aktorių pirmasis susitikimas vyko „Titanike“, kur saldžioji porelė susilaukė daug dėmesio iš viso kino pasaulio. Ilgai lauktas jų susitikimas antrą kartą buvo jau iš esmės kitoks. Herojai į kuriuos jiems teko įsikūnyti jau brandesnės asmenybės, įstrigusios rutinoje, bet reikia pripažinti, kad šiame filme ši pora daro kur kas geresnį įspūdį. Galbūt tai brandumo jausmas, galbūt kažkas kitas, tačiau abu aktoriai savo personažus įkūnijo tikroviškai. Tiesa, man asmeniškai, filmo pradžioje, pakelėje, įvykęs barnis pasirodė visiškai neįtikinamas, tačiau toliau besivistanti istorija tiesiog užbūrė. Puikiai adaptuota jauna šeima su žlugusiomis svajonėmis, nukankinta kasdienybės monotonijos. Tiesa, įvertinta buvo tik Kate Winslet, kas šiek tiek nustebino, mat, mano akimis, Leonardo DiCaprio šiame filme pasirodė kiek stipriau. Antraplaniu vaidmeniu išsiskyrė Michael Shannon, kuris suvaidino psichiškai nesveiką, bet galbūt būtent dėl to ir pasižyminti taikliomis pastabomis, Frank ir April kaimynų sūnų John. Šis veikėjas lyg ir nedera prie bendros aplinkos, mat yra laikomas tinkamai nefunkcionuojančiu visuomenėje asmeniu, tačiau būtent jis savo komentarais, vis pataiko į skaudžias Frank ir April vietas, šitaip priverčiantis susimąstyti ir žiūrovą. Filmo garso takelis nėra kažkas įspūdingo, tačiau jo reikšmė nėra jau tokia ir didelė. Skambančios melodijos tinka, neerzina, subtiliai perteikia pasakojamųjų metų nuotaiką. Herojų apranga žavi to laikotarpio mada, kuri keistai sukelia nepaaiškinamą nostalgiją. Techninė filmo pusė, ko gero, galima sakyti, nėra kažkuo labai ypatinga. Viskas atlikta kokybiškai, nekrenta į akis tai, kas nereikalinga. Atrodo lyg viskas būtų savo vietose – nei pridėsi, nei atimsi. Kaip sakoma, genialumas slypi paprastume. „Nerimo dienos“ buvo nominuotas trims Oskarams, tiesa, nei vieno iš jų nelaimėjo. Vis tik Kate Winslet sulaukė didžiausio dėmesio ir gavo auksinį gaublį kaip geriausia aktorė. Leonardo DiCaprio taip pat buvo nominuotas kaip geriausias aktorius, tačiau nelaimėjo. Užtat apdovanojimą už geriausią antraplanį vaidmenį gavo Michael Shannon, kurį jam įteikė „Satellite Award“. „Nerimo dienos“ nėra linksmai nuteikiantis filmais. Tai susimąstymus keliantis kūrinys, puiki knygos adaptacija, priverčianti pažvelgti į savo kasdieninį gyvenimą. Tiesa, filmas nesiūlo išeities, o tik parodo realybę, kurioje daugelis gyvena. Vis tik „Nerimo dienos“ yra neabejotinai vienas geresnių filmų, kurį verta pamatyti, nors pabaigoje palieka žiūrovą su nemaloniu, gyvenimiškai karčiu prieskoniu burnoje.
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„My old man worked at Knox. I used to sit there and think, `I hope to Christ I don’t end up like you. And here I am, a thirty year old Knox man. Can you beat that?“
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THE TREE OF LIFE (2011) Rašyti ir kalbėti apie šį filmą yra ypač sunku. Būtent šiame filme sutalpinta tiek daug visko, jog sudėtinga susivokti nuo galima būtų pradėti rašyti. Filmas savitumu, tai chaosu, tai harmonija, užburia nuo pirmųjų minučių ir nepaleidžia iki pat filmo pabaigos. „Tree of life“ tai vienas genialiausių šių laikų filmų, kuris, deja, bet daugelio liko neįvertintas. Vis tik tie, kuriuos filmas užkabino, niekad nepamirš emocijų, kurias sukėlė šis tiesiog genialus, gilus ir originalus Terrence Malick filmas. Bet apie viską nuo pradžių. Režisierus Terrence Malick vienas paslaptingiausių šių laikų kūrėjų, kuris apie savo asmeninį gyvenimą kalba kaip įmanoma mažiau. Apie jį tenka spręsti vien iš jo kūrybos. Galbūt taip ir geriau. Tiesa, faktas, kad režisieriaus jaunesnysis brolis nusižudė, nebuvo pamirštas, mat tam tikrų sąsajų buvo galima atrasti ir „Gyvenimo medyje“. Prieš šį filmą, Terrence Malick buvo geriausiai žinomas kaip filmo „ The Thin Red Line“ režisierius, vis tik „Tree of life“ visiškai kitoks filmas ir lyginti juos būtų neįmanoma ir, ko gero, visiškai nereikalinga.
„Gyvenimo medis“ prasideda nuo įžanginių žodžių apie tai, kad gyvenime mes galime eiti dviem keliais – prigimties ir nuolankumo. Šiuos žodžius taria viena iš pagrindinių veikėjų Mrs. O’Brien (Jessica Chastain), kuri yra pasirinkusi nuolankumo kelią. Jos vyras Mr.
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O’Brien (Brad Pitt) atstovauja prigimties kelią. Jau filmo pradžioje parodoma tragiška šeimos nelaimė – pranešama apie vieno iš trijų sūnų mirtį. Kaip vėliau paaiškėja tai meninės prigimties vidurinysis sūnus. Vis tik filmo centras yra pirmagimis Jack (Hunter McCracken ir Sean Penn). Filme rodoma būtent šio berniuko, o vėliau jau ir suaugusio vyro, charakterio vystymasis, blaškymasis tarp nuolankumo ir prigimties kelio, keliami klausimai dievui, brendimas. Jack‘as besąlygiškai myli motiną, tačiau griežtas tėvas savo gyvenimo filosofija skatina berniuką rinktis prigimties kelią. Prie to prisideda ir vienokie ar kitokie įvykiai gyvenime, priverčiantys Jack‘ą kelti egzistencinius klausimus dievui. Kai kurie berniuko pamąstymai savo nuoširdumu tokie taiklūs, kad jautresni žiūrovai gali ir pravirkti. Tiesa, filme parodoma ne vien šeimos istorija. Jame yra netrumpas įtarpas apie žemės susikūrimą. Nuostabūs vaizdai lyg iš „Discovery“ kanalo ir simfoninė muzika patiks ne kiekvienam. Tačiau tai yra aukščiausio lygio menas, kuriuo reikia mokėti mėgautis. Jei jau kalbant apie garso takelį, tai šis filmas gali pasigirti tuo, kaip vienu didžiausių pliusų. Muzika filme yra tiesiog užburianti, rami, harmoninga ir paslaptinga lyg iš kito pasaulio. Norisi klausytis dar ir dar. Tiesa, pats veikėjų įgarsinimas kiek tylokas, tad žiūrovas priverstas arba sėdėti įtempęs ausis arba didinti garsą, jei tam yra galimybė. O tai šiek tiek erzina. Taip pat filme palikta daug klaustukų, daug įvairių užuominų, asociacijų į bibliją, todėl suprasti filmą nėra lengva. Charakteriai išvystyti ne visi, tačiau tai lyg ir suprantama, pateisinama ir net puikiai tinkama. Visko centras vienas veikėjas, kuris mato tai, ką mato, bet ne visada viską supranta. Jessica Chastain, kuriai teko nuolankios, geraširdiškos ir gedinčios motinos, puikiai susitvarkė su savo vaidmeniu ir, man asmeniškai, tapo tikru atradimu. Jos vaidyba įtikinama ir pagirtina, per visą filmą ji nei karto nenuvylė ir puikiai įkūnijo jai skirtą heroję. Brad Pitt gavo ne patį pagrindinį vaidmenį, tačiau tuo, kurį turėjo puikiai pasižymėjo. Buvo įdomu matyti griežtą charakterį vaizduojantį moterų numylėtiną gražuolį aktorių, kuris šiame filme atliko, ko gero, savo brandžiausią vaidmenį. Suaugusį Jack‘ą epizodiškai vaidino taip pat puikiai žinomas Sean Penn, kuriam sunkumu su jam skirta užduotimi, neiškilo. Tiesa, sunku pasakyti ar pats aktorius suprato, ką būtent turi suvaidinti, bet vaidmuo jam teko dalinai pažįstamas dar iš „Mystic River“ už kurį jis gavo Oskarą. Šiame filme jis taip pat turėjo vaidinti netektį išgyvenantį vyrą, susimąsčiusį ir rimtą, tai tvirtą, tai prarandantį kontrolę.
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Kaip minėjau anksčiau filmas iš žiūrovų nesulaukė įvertinimo, kokio nusipelnė. Tačiau šiuolaikiniame kino pasaulyje tai jau nebestebina. Tiesa, „The Tree of Life“ kritikų nebuvo pamirštas - laimėjo auksinę palmės šakelę Kanuose, „AFI Award“ paskelbė jį metų filmu, daugybe festivalių („Boston Society of Film Critics Awards“,“ Australian Cinematographers Society“,“ Florida Film Critics Circle Awards“...) susižėrė apdovanojus už geriausią kinematografiją. „New York Film Critics Circle Awards“ taip pat įvertino kinematografiją ir paskelbė Brad Pitt geriausiu aktoriumi, o Jessica Chastain geriausia antraplane aktore. Ji taip pat „Central Ohio Film Critics Association“ buvo pripažinta geriausia aktore. Filmas buvo nominuotas Oskarams už geriausią režisierių, geriausią metų filmą ir geriausią kinematografiją. Deja, nieko nelaimėjo. „Gyvenimo medis“ tai filmas, kurį supras ne kiekvienas. Savo įspūdinga kinematografija, garso takeliu, aktorių profesionalumu ir siužeto gilimu dar ilgai šiam filmui bus sunku prilygti. Kodėl žiūrovų jis buvo sutiktas daugiau priešiškai nėra sunku pasakyti – masinė, vartotojiška visuomenė atprato, kad žiūrint filmą reikia mąstyti, suprasti, įsijausti ir išgyventi. Šį filmą vertą pamatyti, net jei po jo liksi nieko nesupratęs, tai kūrinys, kuris savo mintimis skverbiasi giliau į žmogaus širdį, nei daugelis kitų, kada nors sukurtų filmų.
„You let a boy die. You let anything happen. Why should I be good ? When You aren’t“ 50
500 DAYS OF SUMMER (2009) Standartiniai romantiniai filmai apie įspūdingąją ir tikrąją meilę išeina iš mados. Gyvendami nuolat visur skubančioje, vartotojiškoje visuomenėje, kai atrasti kažką nuoširdaus darosi vis sunkiau, o visos knygos, dainos ir filmai lyg susitarę skanduoją vieną ir tą patį apie tą vienintelį ar vienintelę, galų gale paklausiame savęs kiek tame yra tiesos. Deja, gyvenimas ne romantinis filmas ir labai dažnai neatitinka net kruopelytės to, ką girdime, matome ar skaitome kiekvieną dieną, mums primigtinai brukamose žiniasklaidos priemonėse. „ 500 days of Summer „ yra tiesiog kitoks filmas apie šių laikų meilę, kuris savo šmaikščiu taiklumu ir karčia realybe leidžia prabusti iš gilaus iliuzijų sapno, vis tik palikdamas viltį, kad vis tik, anksčiau ar vėliau, bus geriau.
Siužetas pasakoja apie jauną vaikiną Tomą (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), kuris dirbą ne visai mėgstamą darbą atvirukų kūrimo kompanijoje, svajodamas apie architekto karjerą. Vaikinas nuoširdus, mielas, draugiškas ir paslaugus, bei didelis grupės „The Smith“ gerbėjas, tikintis, kad žmogus laimingas gali būti tik sutikęs savo vienintelę. Vieną dieną, nuobodžiame darbe pasirodo naujokė Summer (Zooey Deschanel ) arba Vasara, kaip pažodžiui išvertė filmų platintojai Lietuvoje, kuri atstovauja daugiau žemiškesniam pasaulio su-
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vokimui. Ji simpatiška, draugiška ir stebėtinai racionali, palyginus su įprastomis romantinių filmų herojėmis, tikinčiomis vienaragiais, stebuklingomis pupomis ir gnomu, laukiančiu su puodu auksinių monetų prie vaivorykštės. Summer iš karto pareiškia, kad meilės nėra ir, kad ji tėra fantazija, todėl iš karto žiūrovas gali numanyti, kad kaži, ar iš esmės skirtingi savo charakteriu herojai bus kartu. Vis tik jie pradeda draugauti, tiesa, skirtingas suvokimas apie meilę ir įsipareigojimus po mažu skiria veikėjus vieną nuo kito. Tačiau pagrindinė filmo mintis nėra tai, kad veikėjai negali būti kartu dėl skirtingų požiūrių. Filmas daugiau pabrėžia mintį, kad ne visada tas ar ta, kuri manai esanti toji vienintelė ar vienintelis, iš tiesų tokie ir yra. „500 days of Summer“ parodo kaip nesiklausymas, ką tau sako tavo antroji pusė, veda į santykių pražūtį, kaip nenoras klausytis ir suprasti priveda prie didžiulio nusivylimo gyvenimu, meile ir santykiais. Tačiau filmas palieka laimingą pabaigą. Išmaudęs žiūrovą po lediniu realybės vandeniu, jis pabučiuoja prieš miegą sakydamas, kad rytoj viskas prasidės iš naujo ir galbūt bus geriau. Filmas palieka viltį. O tai ir yra svarbiausia.
Technine puse filmas išsiskiria savo garso takeliu. Tai vienas retesnių romantinių filmų, kuris gali pasigirti tikrai kokybiškai, originaliai ir taikliai parinktomis dainomis, kurias norisi klausytis ir pasibaigus filmui. „500 days of Summer“ skamba lyriškos Regina Spektor dainos, be abejo, garsieji The Smith, kurie filmo pradžioje ir
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suartina pagrindinius veikėjus, taip pat tikru atradimu, filmo pasirodymo metu, tapusi The Temper Trap daina “Sweet Disposition”, kurią tikrai norėsite klausytis dar ir dar. Visos dainos vienaip ar kitaip dera tarpusavyje, sudarydamas iš ties malonią ir jaukią atmosferą viso filmo metu. Filmo aktoriai Joseph Gordon-Levitt („ 10 Things I Hate About You“, dabar jau puikiai žinomas iš filmų 50/50 ir, be abejo, The Dark Knight Rises) ir Zooey Deschanel ( metai prieš „500 days of Summer“ suvaidinusi „Yes, man“ su Jim Carrey, dabar geriausiai žinoma dėl pagrindinio vaidmens seriale „New Girl“) iš tiesų puikiai atliko savo vaidmenis, nors tam, galbūt, tiesioginės įtakos turėjo faktas, kad šie aktoriai realiame gyvenime yra ypač artimi draugai. Pabrėžtina, kad tik draugai ir nieko daugiau. Internetinėje aplinkoje dažnai pasijuokiama, kad būtent todėl veikėjams nereikėjo labai stengtis, norint įsijausti į vaidmenis filmavimo aikštelėje. Daug ką pasako ir filmo susirinkti apdovanojimai geriausio siužeto kategorijoje. „FFCC“ apdovanojimuose laimėjo geriausio siužeto kategorijoje, taip pat ir„ Hollywood Film“ festivalyje kaip geriausias metų siužetas, tą patį ir Independent Spirit Awards, „Satellite Awards“ paskelbtas geriausiu originaliu siužetu. Buvo nominuotas ir kaip geriausias metų filmas, o Joseph Gordon-Levitt kaip geriausias aktorius komedijoje. Nedaug trūko, kad gautų ir „Golden Reel“ apdovanojimą už geriausią garso takelį. Nelaimėjo, bet tokia nominacija daug ką pasako. Taigi „500 days of Summer” stovi visa galva aukščiau už didžiąją dalį nupigintų romantinių komedijų, kurios savo bukinančiomis ir nerealistiškomis idėjomis, verčia naiviai aikčioti ir alpti penkiolikmetes paaugles, kurių dalis galų gale tampa besilaukiančiomis šešiolikmetėmis. Filmas savo realistiškumu ir kitoniškumu turėtų patraukti vyresnio jaunimo dėmesį, norintį pamatyti gyvenimišką filmą, kuriame tiek daug nuoširdumo ir ne visada malonios tiesos. Filmas yra graudus ir juokingas, skirtas kartais net pasijuokti iš savęs. Vienaip ar kitaip jis vertas dėmesio. Tiesa, esant įsimylėjus, filmas, ko gero, nepatiks arba liks nesuprastas. Tačiau besigydantiems meilės žaizdas arba tiesiog pavargusiems nuo tipinių romantinių filmų, „500 days of Summer“ idealiausias variantas.
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Summer: I just... I just woke up one day and I knew. Tom: Knew what? Summer: ...What I was never sure of with you.
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AMERICAN PSYCHO (2000) The devil is in the dentistry. Christian Bale smiles a newly even smile. Those suggestively vampiric incisors and the feminising gap between his top front teeth are gone. And it’s all the fault of an American psycho. “I liked my old teeth. I have a moulding of them on a shelf. But with Patrick Bateman, his physicality is much more important than with most characters. He deals totally in the superficial, and he’s incredibly narcissistic. I looked at myself in the mirror and it just wasn’t right. I was warned that if I got caps I could get a lisp, and you might still be able to tell in close-up. So I thought, I like my teeth, but I’m not so attached to them that I’m going to ruin this whole movie because I refuse to get them done.” He moves his arm and a still, buff bicep strains the knit of his tidy jumper. Preparation for the role of serial-killing 80s alpha-male Patrick Bateman in the screen adaptation of the Bret Easton Ellis novel required dumb-bells as well as braces. Just as Bateman’s bloodlust is the amoral mirror of his lust for things, so his bankrupt soul is the necessary continuum of his empty obsession with bodily perfection.
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“Working out took over my life,” says 26-year-old Bale in his nowhere English accent. “I became fascinated with talking about the body, and diet, and the gym. It made me very judgmental of other people’s bodies as well.” But it is that obsession with surface minutiae that defines the era and its most extreme literary personification, American Psycho. It was a role to perform, rather than understand, Bale insists, echoing his director Mary Harron, who says she believes that a degree of detachment was the only way to prevent a disturbing film becoming an offensive one. “He’s acting in his own life. On paper, of course, he should be hateful, but he’s incredibly entertaining.” Bale’s Bateman is a supremely confident confection, and entirely at odds with the engaging naturalism of his recent performances in suburban morality tale Metroland, and Todd Haynes’s Velvet Goldmine, in which he starred alongside Jonathan Rhys-Meyers and Ewan McGregor. Whether expounding the life lessons to be found in Whitney Houston’s The Greatest Love of All, or spinning into frantic despair at the sight of his fag friend’s better-looking business card, Bale offers a slicky modulated performance that distills the essence of Bateman, and the book. Published in 1991, American Psycho was Easton Ellis’s savage and bloody satire of late 80s extremity. The material fetishism and moral vacuity of the money-drenched, Manhattan-dwelling protagonists were gruesome enough. But it was the lovingly detailed scenes of obscene and often highly sexualised torture and murder (which may or may not have occurred in Bateman’s own drug-fuelled imagination) that whipped up a storm of controversy, resulting in accusations of misogyny and exploitation. The screen adaptation is far less graphic. It is the context, rather than the killings themselves, that creates the horror, argues Bale. “Bateman is neither an anti-hero nor a typical villain. There’s no resolution, and his only punishment by the end is his own existence. But the scariness comes from his whole crowd, from that society and their thought processes. Bateman’s very much an idiot, and much of the humour comes from the difference in perception between how he views himself and how we view him.” The basic theme of American Psycho is reason without heart, he says. “It’s like capitalism without any spiritual component. I think that given the correct situation everyone can drop to levels of extreme depravity. We train armies to adopt the opposite of the everyday moral code. It’s no wonder that in conflicts you get soldiers out of control, doing horrendous things, raping. These are ordinary people who, given the situation, become something else.”
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Perhaps like Bale himself - a personable presence who happens to enjoy the immersion of being someone else. And rather like his first film role as Jim Graham, a little boy making sense of a big war, in Empire of the Sun, Stephen Spielberg’s second world war epic. Watching the 13-year-old Bale as he battles for sense and self in a Japanese PoW camp, it is as though he fell to earth fully formed. It’s an astonishing performance, utterly fearless, wholly acted. Bale talks about the experience with the gentle confidence of a hurt resolved. “At an age when you’re supposed to be going out and doing things for the first time, making your mistakes, suddenly I lost that anonymity. Adults say you should know better, other kids are jealous, and you feel like a freak. I became pretty reclusive for a couple of years. For me, it had been a great experience, but it didn’t sum up my whole life. But it did for everyone else.” In 1992 he moved from England to Los Angeles, where he has worked quietly but consistently since, establishing himself as a versatile, if not entirely bankable, actor. There are two reasons why his transition from child to adult performer was so painless, he says. “I got a dislike for what small fame I had early on, so I attempted not to let it disrupt everything. Also, [Jim] was a very adult, complex part, that didn’t rely on my being cute. I didn’t get a shock when I got older and started getting hair,” he concludes, stroking a lightly bronzed chin that is destined always to look clean-shaven. He believes he is an instinctive actor, untrained he reminds me, who works on the principle that his job is to be unafraid of making a fool of himself. Talking about acting is one of the most boring conversations you can ever have, he adds cautiously. Engaging with the minutiae of Being Bateman, or talking passionately about his commitment to the role, is when he’s at his most interesting. But Bale is big on lack of pretension - and bigger on being seen to be lacking pretension. He is not an actor , he emphasises, as though it’s evidence of something unseemly, like ego, or ambition, or consuming passion. Still, he will describe Bateman as an ambitious role to take on. “I loved the fact that, firstly, people thought it was an impossible book to make into a film, and secondly, that they were telling me it was career suicide. I wanted to prove it wasn’t. I don’t want to slip into that celebrity factor of being scared of taking a role because it’s a nasty character.”Surrounding the making of the film is well documented: Harron cast Bale, project owners Lion’s Gate wanted box office friendly Leo DiCaprio, Harron protested and was replaced by the laughably inappropriate Oliver Stone. Only after DiCaprio bolted to make The Beach did the original team reconvene.
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It was an epiphany for Bale. “I wanted to get the film made to keep myself convinced that this was a profession where you could still be an actor. American Psycho became an issue for me of whether I still enjoy doing this craft and being in this business” How did it feel to be thrown over for the Titanic golden boy? “I was, of course, very grumpy. But I considered it a confidence boost creatively because Mary Harron put her own job on the line to make it with me.” Nevertheless, he must have recognised that it was potential ticket sales, not talent, that separated him from DiCaprio. “It was a little bit
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simple-minded of me to think that it could all be so ideal. There is a lot of money involved, and what happened woke me up a bit. It has made me much more in control of the business side. It’s important not to let that overtake everything, but it is my living.” He shows his newly even teeth. Nowadays he can smile for Hollywood.
“I can hide my cold gaze, and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours and maybe you can even sense our lifestyles are probably comparable... I simply am not there.”
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MATCH POINT (2005) Because Woody Allen’s early films are about as funny as any ever made, it is often assumed that his temperament is essentially comic, which leads to all manner of disappointment and misunderstanding. Now and then, Mr. Allen tries to clear up the confusion, insisting, sometimes elegantly and sometimes a little too baldly, that his view of the world is essentially nihilistic. He has announced, in movie after movie, an absolute lack of faith in any ordering moral principle in the universe - and still, people think he’s joking. In “Match Point,” his most satisfying film in more than a decade, the director once again brings the bad news, delivering it with a light, sure touch. This is a Champagne cocktail laced with strychnine. You would have to go back to the heady, amoral heyday of Ernst Lubitsch or Billy Wilder to find cynicism so deftly turned into superior entertainment. At the very beginning, Mr. Allen’s hero, a young tennis player recently retired from the professional tour, explains that the role of luck in human affairs is often underestimated. Later, the harsh implications of this idea will be evident, but at first it seems as whimsical as what Fred Astaire said in “The Gay Divorcée”: that “chance is the fool’s name for fate.” Mr. Allen’s accomplishment here is to fool his audience, or at least to misdirect us, with a tale whose gilded surface disguises the darkness beneath. His guile - another name for it is art - keeps the story moving with the fleet momentum of a well-made play. Comparisons to “Crimes and Misdemeanors” are inevitable, since the themes and some elements of plot are similar, but the philosophical baggage in “Match Point” is more tightly and discreetly packed. There are few occasions for speech-making, and none of the desperate, self-conscious one-liners that have become, in Mr. Allen’s recent movies, more tics than shtick. Nor is there an obvious surrogate for the director among the youthful, mostly British and altogether splendid cast. If you walked in after the opening titles, it might take you a while to guess who made this picture. After a while you would, of course. The usual literary signposts are in place: surely no other screenwriter could write a line like “darling, have you seen my copy of Strindberg?” or send his protagonist to bed with a paperback Dostoyevsky. But while a whiff of Russian fatalism lingers in the air - and more than a whiff of Strindbergian misogyny these don’t seem to be the most salient influences.
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The film’s setting is modified Henry James (wealthy London, with a few social and cultural outsiders buzzing around the hives of privilege); the conceit owes something to Patricia Highsmith’s Ripley books; and the narrative engine is pure Theodore Dreiser - hunger, lust, ambition, greed. Not that the tennis player, Chris Wilton (Jonathan Rhys-Meyers), seems at first to be consumed by such appetites. An Irishman of modest background, he takes a job at an exclusive London club, helping its rich members polish their ground strokes. He seems both easygoing and slightly ill at ease, ingratiating and diffident. Before long, he befriends Tom Hewett (Matthew Goode), the amiable, unserious heir to a business fortune, who invites Chris to the family box at the opera. From there, it is a short trip to an affair with Tom’s sister, Chloe (Emily Mortimer), a job in the family firm and the intermittently awkward but materially rewarding position of son-in-law to parents played by Brian Cox and Penelope Wilton. When “Match Point” was shown in Cannes last spring, some British critics objected that its depiction of London was inaccurate, a demurral that New Yorkers, accustomed to visiting Mr. Allen’s fantasy Manhattan, could only greet with weary shrugs and sighs. Uprooting a script originally set in the Hamptons and repotting it in British soil has refreshed and sharpened the story, which depends not on insight into a particular social situation, but rather on a general theory
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of human behavior. London is Manhattan seen through a glass, brightly: Tate Modern stands in for the Museum of Modern Art; Covent Garden takes the place of Lincoln Center. As for the breathtaking South Bank loft into which Chris and Chloe move, it will satisfy the lust for high-end real estate that has kept the diehards in their seats during Mr. Allen’s long creative malaise.
In this case, though, what happens in the well-appointed rooms and fashionable restaurants is more interesting than the architecture or the décor. Mr. Rhys-Meyers has an unusual ability to keep the audience guessing, to draw us into sympathetic concord even as we’re trying to figure him out. Is he a cipher or a sociopath? A careful social climber or a reckless rake? The first clue that he may be something other than a mild, well-mannered sidekick comes when Chris meets Tom’s fiancée, an American actress named Nola Rice (Scarlett Johansson), in a scene that raises the movie’s temperature from a polite simmer to a full sexual boil. (The scene also quietly acknowledges a debt to “A Place in the Sun,” George Stevens’s adaptation of Dreiser’s “American Tragedy.” The parallels don’t stop there. Mr. Rhys-Meyers’s hollow-cheeked watchfulness recalls Montgomery Clift. Which makes Ms. Johansson either the next Elizabeth Taylor or the new Shelley Winters. Hmm). What passes between Chris and Nola is not only desire, but also
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recognition, which makes their connection especially volatile. As their affair advances, Ms. Johansson and Mr. Rhys-Meyers manage some of the best acting seen in a Woody Allen movie in a long time, escaping the archness and emotional disconnection that his writing often imposes. It is possible to identify with both of them - and to feel an empathetic twinge as they are ensnared in the consequences of their own heedlessness - without entirely liking either one. But it is the film’s brisk, chilly precision that makes it so bracingly pleasurable. The gloom of random, meaningless existence has rarely been so much fun, and Mr. Allen’s bite has never been so sharp, or so deep. A movie this good is no laughing matter.
“It would be fitting if I were apprehended... and punished. At least there would be some small sign of justice - some small measure of hope for the possibility of meaning.”
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