Bombay Film Review

Bombay

     Bombay is a popular Bollywood musical from India. It was released in 1995 under the direction of Mani Ratman. The film follows the lives of a couple in India as their existence is rocked by religious riots. Shekhar, a Hindu man, falls in love with Shaila, a Muslim woman. Shaila originally dismisses his love, but eventually she too falls in love and they get married. Their marriage is not taken very well by both their families, as it is seen as dating out of your religion. At this time, there are daily riots going on in parts of India, which is actually based off of true events. These riots cost many people their lives, destroys cities, and divides the country. These riots are also particularly difficult for Shekhar and Shaila, as well as their children who are raised with a mix of both religions. It all culminates in a heart wrenching and heartwarming final chapter that will keep the viewer watching.

     Religion is probably the biggest theme in this movie because it serves as the real conflict. Any antagonism or antagonist that appears in the film is because of their religious views and what they feel they must do with them. Acceptance of religion, another theme, directly ties into this. The entire world is very diverse and everyone should be accepting of each other. We are all human and we all share planet Earth. Another theme in the film is love. The film demonstrates many forms of love – love for yourself, love for your family, love for strangers, and love for ones country. The characters in the film obviously care very much for their own safety and the lives of the family members that they love. There is a scene towards the end that demonstrates the other two forms of love. Towards the end of the riots, citizens in India stand together and save each other. They say that they are all Indians and that should come first. This instance shows the love for each other as humans, or more particularly Indians, and the love for their country.

     I was very skeptical going in to watch this movie. I am not a big fan of musicals, mostly because I think they’re kind of weird because singing and dancing just happens out of nowhere. I do respect other people’s opinions that differ from mine. It’s just not my genre of movie. I was pleasantly surprised with this film because it wasn’t over the top with the musical aspect. I think it had only maybe two or three numbers. That was bearable. The plot was really good because it gave a real sense of danger, especially when the kids were involved. I felt so bad for the kids! Although I did think it got a little monotonous when they would get lost again every ten minutes. I definitely enjoyed this film more than some of the other films we’ve watched in class. Just goes to show you can’t judge a book by its cover.

Dreams Movie Review

Dreams

     Dreams is quite the interesting movie. It’s very experimental. The movie shows 8 dreams that the man has had throughout his life. Each dream tells a different story and showcases his views on a subject and what is going on in the world at that time. Akira Kurosawa created this Japanese film in 1990. The first two dreams, Through The Rain and Orchard, are about the man’s views on respecting and protecting nature. The next dream was about a blizzard, and Tunnel is about the war Japan was in at the time and how he felt about all the meaningless death. Crows is about art and experiencing nature, while Mount Fuiji in Red is a dream about how man threatens to destroy art and nature. Weeping Demon is a nightmare about what’s left after man screws up the last time, while Village of Watermills is about the hope that is still left over that things may change.

     Nature is the biggest theme in Dreams. It is present in every dream except Tunnel. Akira’s clearly demonstrates his unhappiness with the way nature is treated and his hopes that things could change before it’s too late. Orchard, Mount Fuiji in Red, and Villiage of Watermills are the dreams which clearly show this. Orchard shows how upset he is when a peach orchard is chopped down. Mount Fuiji in Red shows how a whole country can be destroyed by messing with nature. Village of Watermills shows his hope for the future in the way that the dream has no electricity and the village runs clearly off what the land provides.

     The next theme displayed in Dreams is war. It’s obvious that the man does not think to fondly of war. In Tunnel, he takes the role of a captain of a troop of soldiers. He knew they would not win the battle he threw them into, and is now dealing with the guilt of his own survival. He encounters his troops while walking through a tunnel and their ghosts don’t know that they are deceased. He is heartbroken over this fact and successfully convinces them to march back into the eternal slumber that awaits them. Weeping Demon briefly touches on the war as it hints at aspects of World War II. The deformities of the demons can be compared to the side effects many Japanese people had after the bombs were dropped on their country.

     This movie is so weird that I wouldn’t change a thing! Tunnel was a little repetitive in terms of the dialogue, but aside from that it was crazy. I remember sitting in my seat thinking “What is this? What’s happening?” It was weird in a good way. It kept my attention because I was trying to keep up with it the whole time or waiting for something new to happen. I didn’t want to miss another random ghost dance scene, strange barking dog, or one horned demon. It was certainly entertaining and I would show it to other people, just so they could see what I saw! It was definitely a fun film to watch.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTRw66CnWLI

Eat Drink Man Woman

Eat Drink Man Woman

   Eat Drink Man Woman is a film about three very different sisters living with their father. It was directed by Ang Lee and released in 1994. It is a Taiwanese film, which we are watching with English subtitles. In the film, three sisters live in the same house with their father, a very popular cook in their town. The oldest sister is a career woman who is falling for a new coworker. The middle sister is a teacher who was burned by love in the past. The youngest sister is a college student who steals a coworker’s boyfriend. The father tries to keep the family together through the use of his great cooking while his health secretly deteriorates. The story that follows is how their lives are changed by growing up, find love, and eventually moving out.

   The most important theme of this film is obviously the love of cooking. The father used it as a way to bring the family together every weekend. It was also the way he made his living to support his family all these years. Cooking was so important to him that he would spend hours, maybe even a whole day, just preparing the meal. He showed a great passion for it. He tried to pass this tradition and passion on to his daughters, but they were uninterested. However, it does seem like his young niece has picked up this love for food.

   Other themes in the movie are love, responsibility, and breaking the mold. Everyone in the film had love for each other, and every character found love in someone new. Even the father was remotely enthralled by that viper lady. Each character also had an intense sense of loyalty and responsibility to each other. They felt so strongly that they had to remain home and not displease their father that it seems like they put portions of their life on hold. This obligation to him was shattered when they decided to break the mold and go on with their lives. It wasn’t easy and they were hesitant at first, but after they realized their father was accepting – they ran with it.

   Honestly, I feel like the movie could have been much shorter than it actually is. At points I felt like it was just a story about nothing. At points I felt that there were scenes added in with no point, just for the sake of reaching some sort of time standard. While everything was shot well and explained, I felt that there were some scenes where they were repeating themselves. This would have been a much better flick if maybe 20 minutes or so was shaved off. The repetition of the movie is my only complaint. Aside from that, I think the film was pretty good. I know it’s in some sort of trilogy series, but it didn’t move me enough to watch the other two. Eat Drink Man Woman was just good enough to me to watch once.

Not One Less Film Review

Not One Less

     Not One Less is a film directed by Zhang Yimou and released in 1999. Not One Less centers around a school teacher in a poor Chinese village. When the real teacher is called away because of family illness, the mayor replaces him with a 13-year-old, inexperienced girl. In the beginning she has a hard time keeping the class of near 30 students under control, but eventually the students lighten up and start to bond with her. All is going smoothly until one of the students goes into the city to earn money for his sick mother, and ends up getting lost in the huge city. She trails him to the city and goes on a two day search, where she ends up at a television network. After appearing on a news broadcast and begging her student to return, they are reunited. Not only does she find her student and return to him his village, but the surrounding towns are so moved by their plight for money that they donate tons of school supplies to the school. Money is also donated to the town, which is put towards building a new school.

     In this movie, poverty is obviously the biggest theme. It is evident in the way that the town operates. They have to replace a real teacher with a teenager. They are very limited with school supplies and the school itself is crumbling. Poverty leads into the theme of the caste system in some areas of China. It almost seemed like the city dwellers thought themselves to be better than the people from small villages and either ignored them or treated the very poorly. Another theme in Not One Less is the importance of money. No matter what was trying to be accomplished, money was a factor. The teacher needed to be paid. School supplies was expensive. They had to move bricks for earn money. A small container of ink and some paper cost the main character so much that after her bus ticket she had nothing left. She couldn’t even properly put up adds for her missing student because it could not be achieved without money. Money makes the world go around, but this theme made it look even more important when examining the urban vs rural sections of China.

     I enjoyed this movie. It was fun to watch the teacher start her job and be so awkward and nervous, and then steadily grow into disciplining students and being an authority figure for them. The film had a certain way of making you actually care what happens to the children and want the teacher to succeed so that she will get her pay. I thought the ending was going to be completely different than it was. I thought the mayor was going to come back at the end of her term as teacher and see how well she taught them math and physical education. I thought he’d end up giving her a permanent position. I guess that the ending that actually happened is more uplifting and happy than my original prediction. It was a good film that didn’t necessarily need good acting to drive the plot forward like Le Femme Nikita. I think they should make a sequel that shows what really happens to the money that was donated, because I don’t think I trust the shady mayor.

View the trailer below.
 

La Femme Nikita Movie Review

La Femme Nikita

     La Femme Nikita was written and directed by Luc Besson and released in 1990. The film is told through the French language along with English subtitles. In this film, Nikita is a junky who seems to have joined a gang of deranged men. While robbing a medical store for pills that could get them high, the police show up and open fire on the gang. Nikita survived, but in severe drug withdrawal, loses her mind for a moment and shoots a cop in the head. She is taken into custody by the police and put on trial to which she is sentenced to death. After she is euthanized, she wakes up in a white room, alive but disoriented. A man appears to her and informs her that the death was all an act and that he wants to train her to become a spy for the government. Nikita is trained in karate, beauty, dancing, speak, technology, and weapons, and is eventually let into the real world to live, but ultimately serve the government should they need her for a mission. Shortly after moving into an apartment, she meets a clerk at a grocery store and falls in love with him. The rest of the film tells their life together while Nikita does missions for the government and the struggle she endures both mentally and emotionally.

     The biggest themes in La Femme Nikita are the power of females, violence, corruption, and love. I think this film was trying to show that women aren’t the weak people that some men perceive them to be. Nikita was able to beat and kill men better than most of the henchmen or male agents could. As her beauty instructor pointed out, never underestimate a woman’s charm and beauty. Another obvious theme in this film is violence. There were so many bullets flying, punches throwing, and explosions that it could keep any action buff happy. Corruption, another central theme, can be seen in the way that the government works – fooling the public into believing something and then having that person knocked off when it seems most beneficial. The last theme I notices was love. Nikita was able to fall in love with the man training her, as well as the man she would eventually marry and go to Paris with. However, this may because no one has ever been nice to Nikita and she may not have known love before.

     I thought this film was pretty good. I had some idea of how it would progress because I’ve seen the American television series and bits and pieces of the American remake. I think that Le Femme Nikita is much better than Point of No Return. I liked the blue haze to the film and the music that accompanied it. The movie really did make me feel for Nikita and want everything to work out for her. The only thing I didn’t like was the abrupt end to the film. The scene with the freak out and then breaking into the man’s house was too fast and forced. This was another great film to watch and I would recommend it to anyone looking for an old action movie.

Look below to view the trailer!

Bad Education Film Review

Bad Education

     Bad Education is a movie directed by Pedro Almodovar and released in 2004. The story was told in the Spanish language with English subtitles. In this film, two childhood friends, Enrique and Ignacio, meet up years after they’ve left a private Catholic school. While at the school they fell in love, but were driven apart by sick Father Manolo. Enrique is now a popular film producer and Ignacio is an actor seeking work. Ignacio produces a script called “The Visit,” based on their real lives in hopes that Enrique will turn it into a movie, and give him the main role. The scenes tell the plot through three different tales – the past, the present, and what is being depicted while filming a movie based on their lives. They are all interwoven together. A series of twists and turns will keep the viewer watching and thinking. In this movie about passion and death, nothing is as it really seems.

     The two biggest themes in Bad Education are deceit and unwavering love. It seems as if every character in the film is deceptive, or has another motive for doing what they do. Father Manolo is obviously deceptive to his faith and followers at his church because he is pursuing a young boy. When he became older and was being blackmailed by a transgendered Ignacio, he was granted the loan he needed, but lied to Ignacio in hopes of pursuing his younger brother, Juan. Juan was playing himself off as Ignacio so that he could get a part in Enrique’s movie. Enrique knew this almost immediately, but pretended that he didn’t so that he could grow closer to Juan and find out what really happened to Ignacio. Plus, Ignacio lied to his brother and mother multiple times about entering rehab all the while stealing valuables from churches and johns at a hotel.

     The second theme, unwavering love, can be seen in a few places in the film. Ignacio’s mother loved her son, no matter what, and supported him when he became transgendered. Enrique loved Ignacio even after years and years of not seeing him, and loved him even after his death because of Father Manolo and Juan. Father Manolo and Juan even loved each other for some time, until a terrible scheme they put forth tore them apart. Despite being sick and twisted, Father Manolo loved Ignacio as a boy and still seemed to care about him somewhat even after being blackmailed by him.

     I enjoyed this film. I enjoy films that make you think. Hollywood is too predictable now adays, in my opinion. This is the first film I’ve seen in a while that kept me guessing. I certainly didn’t foresee some of the plot twists in the movie. I’m happy everything was flushed out well so that I truly understood what was going on towards the end of the film. I could have done without some of the graphic male-on-male scenes in the movie. I felt that, while they were important to the plot, they were just a little too graphic and overdone. Those scenes didn’t subtract too much quality from the film and I would still recommend it to other film members studying films from other countries.

To view the trailer for the film, please watch below.