Pelle the Conqueror

Pelle Erobreren; drama, Denmark / Sweden, 1987; D: Bille August, S: Pelle Hvenegaard, Max von Sydow, Erik Paaske, Björn Granath, Astrid Villaume

Denmark, 19th century. The 12-year old Pelle and his old father Lasse Karlsson arrive via a ship as immigrants from a Swedish town in search for a job. They are picked up at the harbor by a foreman and hired to work at a farm led by the rich Kongstrup. The two take care of the cows and the harvest, while Pelle is bullied in school by other kids for not knowing Danish that well and for being a "cuckoo's egg" because his father has a relationship with Mrs. Olsen, whose husband, a sailor, is presumed dead because he is missing for a year. When Olsen's husband returns one winter, Lasse's plans are again ruined. A worker, Erik, is bullied by the foreman and rebels, but is hit in the head by a stone attached to the well pump. Erik promises Pelle to escape with him to America in two years, but since Erik is injured, he is fired from the farm. Lasse doesn't want to leave the farm, and thus Pelle has to leave into the unknown all by himself.

The critically recognized adaptation of the first volume of Martin Andersen Nexø's eponymous novel, Bille August's "Pelle the Conqueror" is an ambitious, intelligent, cultured, elevated and patient film depiction of poverty, work exploitation and growing up of a Swedish immigrant boy working in a farm in Denmark, serving both as a chronicle of that era as well as a broader depiction of some universal traits in every generation (the confusion of growing up; kids bullying other kids in school; yearning for a better life and future). Defying the typical three-act structure imposed by Hollywood, August instead builds the film as a 'slice-of-life' story composed out of episodes, yet they all work as a cohesive set of bricks that build this storyline, and a lot of praise should be given to its two main actors, the young newcomer Pelle Hvenegaard as the title hero, and especially the veteran Max von Sydow as the hapless father Lasse who ultimately "gives up" and resentfully accepts his "life trap" as a man without a wife, without a good job, without a home, without any future: the actor gives this character more dignity than others would have. 

There are several interesting moments and dialogues which make "Pelle" engaging throughout, despite its running time of 2.5 hours: for instance, the comments regarding the rich farm owner ("He fathered children to every woman except his wife") or Lasse scorning the sick Pelle who jumped into the ice sea ("If he had drowned, I would have beaten him up senseless!"); or the illustration of the cheapskate foreman who prepares only an ordinary meal for a holiday for the over dozen workers—one worker, Erik, protests ("You could have bought us pork at least for Christmas!"), is expelled out by the foreman, but Erik then takes a harmonica and defiantly starts playing the song "Silent Night" in the snow, much to the amusement of the workers. It is not surprising that some film critics deciphered socialist themes in the story about the plight of these poor farmers. Everything in "Pelle" is done right, yet it somehow feels as if something is missing, as if it is too schematic. The story is conventionally great, the dialogues are conventionally great, the direction is conventionally great—but one wishes that some outburst of unconventional greatness would have happened in the film which would have made it genuinely greater.

Grade:+++

Enemies, A Love Story

Enemies, A Love Story; drama, USA, 1989; D: Paul Mazursky, S: Ron Silver, Lena Olin, Anjelica Huston, Margaret Sophie Stein, Alan King

New York City, 1 9 4 9. Jewish immigrant Herman is stuck in a puzzling situation, in an equidistant affair between three women: he cannot break up with his Polish wife Yadwiga out of guilt since she hid him in a barn and saved him during the Holocaust; he cannot break up with his mistress Masha since she says she is pregnant with him; and on top of all, his long lost wife Tamara, whom he thought died during World War II, shows up again, since she survived being shot at. He cannot say this to any one of the three women, and thus marries Masha. When Herman finds out Masha was lying and she was not pregnant, he decides to leave her. She committs suicide with pills because she wants to be burried together with her deceased mother. Herman disappears, Yadwiga gives birth to his daughter and raises her together with Tamara.

"Micki + Maude + Masha" would be a fitting description of "Enemies, A Love Story", a humorous drama about a love rectangle revolving around a man having an affair not with two, but with three women simultaneously. The director and screenwriter Paul Mazursky crafts this unusual story at first as a "collateral" consequence of the Holocaust, since all of their relationships are an indirect result of it (Herman cannot break up with Polish woman Yadwiga out of guilt since she saved him by hiding him in her barn during World War II, whereas he is shocked to find out his long lost wife Tamara (excellent Anjelica Huston), presumed dead, actually survived the war, and thus he is now in a "marital limbo"), but later on he plays it as "straight" as any given "normal" situation that can happen to any man if he is dishonest and full of betrayal, torn between more love interests. It is disappointing that after this concept is set up, the storyline fails to differentiate into something more, settling only for the standard, conventional and predictable route of Herman constantly going from one woman to another, never knowing what to do, always stalling. Sadly, the writing is hardly more imaginative or inspired than what described at face value, and the dialogue is strangely thin for Mazursky. Some of the best moments are when Mazursky invests some spark into these characters and gives them something unusual to do: for instance, upon hearing about Herman having affairs with two other women, his "presumed dead" wife Tamara actually offers to help him and be his "manager", whereas Herman and Masha have this one inspired dialogue when he finds out she lied to keep him ("You swore to me on a holy oath!" - "I swore falsely"). With a running time of 120 minutes, "Enemies" is too overstretched and features too much empty walk, not quite managing to fill out this tantalizing concept to the fullest.

Grade:++

Housekeeping

Housekeeping; comedy / drama, USA, 1987; D: Bill Forsyth, S: Christine Lahti, Sara Walker, Andrea Burchill, Anne Pitoniak

A small town in the mountains. Little girls Ruth and Lucille are dropped off at a house of the grandmother by their mother who then drives off with her car into the sea, committing suicide. A decade later, Ruth and Lucille are teenagers raised by their grandmother, but then their eccentric aunt Sylvie shows up to take care of them. Local people are puzzled by her unusual behavior, as she sometimes takes a nap on a bench in the park or collects a house full of newspapers. After an argument with Ruth, Lucille leaves the house to live with someone else. Ruth and Sylvie remain living alone in the house. One night, when the Sheriff insists that Ruth should live with him and his wife, Sylvie sets her house on fire and flees with Ruth across the bridge with the railway tracks, aiming to take any train out of there.

Bill Forsyth's first US movie, "Housekeeping" is a peculiar comedy-drama that cannot quite be pinned down as to what it is, which is a reason many didn't understand it during its premiere. Using a minimalist style, with quiet, low-key scenes that depict the slow pace and uneventful mentality of this desolate mountain town, Forsyth crafts an unassuming little film that contemplates about the difference between a settled-planned existence and an aimless, elusive existence embodied in aunt Sylvie (excellent Christine Lahti): one cannot quite pin her down because she represents the random life itself, which cannot quite be pinned down or directed regardless of all the people who pretend otherwise. The opening act, where the mother drops off her daughters at the grandmother's house, has clever dialogues (one of the girls narrates: "Lucille would remember one thing, and I another, until we pieced together the whole journey. We tried so hard that we ended up not knowing what we really remembered from what we only imagined."), and in the next sequence the mother is seen sitting on the rooftop of her car, stuck in the mud in the countryside. Three boys show up and help her push the car out of the mud. She gives them her purse, as one of the boys hesitates to take it, not understanding the gesture. The mother then drivess off from the cliff with her car into the sea, to her death. She could not take the randomness of life, but her sister Sylvia can.

The main plot revolving around the two girls, Ruth and Lucille, now as teenagers, being taken care by their aunt Sylvie, is full of little funny, comical moments: Sylvie randomly stands in front of a house to watch the TV program through a window; has quirky lines ("I met a really nice lady at the station. She was traveling all the way through from South Dakota to Portland to see her relative hanged.") and is totally unscathed by a flood in the house, with the water reaching 10 inches, as she prepares breakfast on the table in the kitchen. Forsyth also has some impressive shots, especially the one where the townspeople walk on the frozen lake in the winter, looking at a hole in the middle left after a train fell down from the bridge. The first half of the movie is somehow fascinating and hypnotic, but in the second half it loses itself in too much empty walk and overstretched running time where nothing much happens, and after Lucille leaves the house and only Ruth and Sylvie are left in the last third, the whole movie becomes even more uneventful. The whole second half becomes less funny and less interesting, until the viewers simply lose interest in the overlong running time of two hours that cannot sustain such a light set of scenes. Better editing and more concrete ideas would have improved this second half. Just like the unusual final scene, "Housekeeping" is a peculiar meditation on life without a guideline, yet it has enough good moments to engage.

Grade:++

Logan

Logan; fantasy action / road movie, USA, 2017; D: James Mangold, S: Hugh Jackman, Patrick Stewart, Dafne Keen, Boyd Holbrook, Stephen Merchant, Richard E. Grant

2 0 2 9. Mutant Logan "Wolverine" is wandering aimlessly through life in El Paso, Texas, taking care of his 90-year old mentor Charles Xavier in a secluded dome. A woman asks him for help, to transport the 11-year old mutant girl Laura to Eden, a sanctuary near the Canadian border, since they are persecuted by Reavers, a group of criminals led by Pierce and Dr. Rice. After the woman is killed, Logan, Laura and Xavier flee in a car towards north, and they discover that a corporation led a secret lab facility in Mexico City where they bred mutant children with special powers to be used as soldiers, but killed most of them, yet Laura is among those who  escaped. Logan also discovers Laura is technically his daughter, since she was created from his DNA. Xavier is killed by X-24, Logan's clone controlled by Dr. Rice. Logan and Laura reach an outpost with other mutant kids, but when they are attacked by Reavers, Logan intervenes and saves the kids, but dies in the process.

"Deadpool 2" hyped up Hugh Jackman's last appearance as Wolverine in "Logan" (before he returned to the role in "Deadpool and Wolverine") to such an extent that the viewers will be a little bit restrained through a reality check when they actually see the movie in question—it is good, yet still below all the hype that surrounds it. James Mangold crafts the film as a road movie about family in a quest for survivial, with a bizarre blend of emotional drama and bloody violence to give it more intensity, and Jackman is indeed excellent in the title role, yet the narrative is not always inspired to the fullest. They made three errors: firstly, it was a mistake that the girl, Laura, doesn't speak all until 100 minutes into the film, because this inhibits and reduces her relationship with Logan, considering their father-daughter bond was supposed to be the center of the story. There are some mute reactions from her which somewhat convey these missing links, but overall she should have communicated with him already from the start. Even that one sequence where Laura talks with Logan in "Deadpool and Wolverine" has more lines between them than we got here in the entire movie. 

Secondly, using the "RoboCop 2" theorem, it was misguided to have a child, the 11-year old Laura, perform several violent murders in the film, which looks freaky and ill-conceived. When the SWAT team-style Reavers go to get her in the hideout, she exits and throws a severed head of one of them on the ground, and then proceeds to use her Wolverine-style blades from her hands to stab and kill several other foes, screaming. Thirdly, it was unnecessary to have Logan's clone, X-24, appear in the story at all, since it is confusing and too fantastical, breaking the otherwise grounded plot based on gritty realism. The storyline is episodic, featuring at least one transparent ploy to have an excuse to exalt Logan as a self-sacrificing holy savior—the episode where a horse trailer is jolted away from the highway, the scared horses escape and are confused by the trucks driving fast pass them, yet Logan helps the family round them up again, so the family invites him, Xavier and Laura for dinner and sleepover at their house, only, of course, to be killed by the bad guys later on who followed them. However, this small segment has tow best lines in the movie—one is when Xavier talks about Logan ("I Wish I Could Say You Were A Good Pupil But The Words Would Choke Me"); the other when he talks to him before going to sleep ("You know, Logan, this is what life looks like. A home, people who love each other. Safe place. You should take a moment and feel it"). However, the dialogue is mostly bland and standard, when more finesse would have been welcomed, and less of violence used as some sort of art expression. The subplot involving a laboratory testing out mutant children reminds of "Elfen Lied", whereas the ending is touching and neatly ties it up with the finale from the classic "Shane" as a worthy conclusion to the Wolverine saga.

Grade:++

No Way Out

No Way Out; thriller, USA, 1987; D: Roger Donaldson, S: Kevin Costner, Will Patton, Gene Hackman, Sean Young, George Dzundza

Washington. Lieutenant Commander Tom has a relationship with Susan, but she is at the same time having an affair with Secretary of Defense Brice, who is married. One night, as he spots someone exiting the house, Brice is angry at Susan for sleeping with another man and in a fit of rage pushes her over the floor and she falls and dies on the ground. In order to deflect from the crime, Brice's assistant Pritchard misleads the Pentagon staff that a suspected Soviet spy Yuri is behind the murder, and hires Tom to investigate the case. Tom knows he is searching for himself. Two witnesses are brought to look for every employee to try to identify Yuri, while a blurry photo of Tom is being reconstructed. Tom finally confronts Brice with evidence that Brice bought a gift to Susan, confirming he knew her, yet Pritchard shoots himself in the office, and thus Brice puts the blame on the deceased as Yuri. Tom, though, sends the evidence to the CIA.

In 1987 Kevin Costner became a star thanks to two films: "The Untouchables" and "No Way Out", but the former is better and more deserving than the latter. Roger Donaldson directs "No Way Out" as a suspenseful thriller, but unfortunately it takes way too long to get to that point, since the whole first third is a messy, chaotic and overlong exposition. The editing should have removed some sequences completely for a faster pace (the unnecessary sequence of Tom and Susan getting intimate in the limousine, even though they just met at a party for the first time; Tom in Manila or on a ship during a storm). After Susan's murder at around 46 minutes into the film, the story takes off, kicking off a dynamic and tense thriller where the protagonist Tom is hired to practically hunt for himself since the Secretary of Defense Brice (Gene Hackman) wants to frame Susan's unknown lover for her murder, which creates a double-edged sword dilemma for Tom who tries to "subtly" sabotage the investigation from within. The best moment is when the investigators find two witnesses who saw Susan's lover and then tour them from office to office throughout the entire Pentagon to search for him, knowing he must still be there, and as they approach Tom's office, Tom deliberately spills some coffee on the table and then sits on it, feigning he has to change his pants as to have an excuse to leave the area, and even says to a guard at the entrance: "Don't let anyone pass!", before he hides in a ventilation shaft in another room. The storyline's logic isn't always plausible (especially that one person alone can simply invent a search for a possible Soviet spy to deflect from his own murder) and the twist ending doesn't work since it makes no sense and comes out of nowhere, yet "No Way Out" still has enough virtues to work.

Grade:++

The Ordinaries

The Ordinaries; satire, Germany, 2022; D: Sophie Linnenbaum, S: Fine Sendel, Jule Böwe, Noah Tinwa, Sira-Anna Faal, Henning Peker

In a movie world, the society is divided between the upper class (the leading roles), the middle class (the supporting roles) and the lower class (the outtakes). Paulina (16) is a supporting role who attends a school for leading roles, but her mother hides from her information about her missing father Feinmann, alleging only that he was a leading role who was killed. Paulina starts searching for him, and goes into the ghetto where the outtakes people live, who all have errors (their faces are black and white, their sound is off), and makes friends with Simon. Paulina discovers that her father was actually an outtake who left her mother disappointed that Paulina was also born black and white. After abandoning taking pills, Paulina's skin turns into black and white. Her mother gives her a make up to cover it, and Paulina performs at the school using an emotional monologue. When she reveals she is black and white, the crowd protests, but then other people also reveal they are outtakes and imperfect, hiding among the society. 

Sophie Linnenbaum's feature length directorial debut is a bizarre, but unusual and refreshingly different movie for German cinema. By setting this unusual concept into a movie world divided by hierachy into the upper class (the leading roles, living in mansions), the middle class (the supporting roles, living in residential buildings) and the lower class (the outtakes, living in ghettos), Linnenbaum crafts a metafilm satire that frequently breaks the fourth wall and contemplates about the meaningless divide between people in any society, when everyone has his or her own path, and about discrimnation. The outtakes people are a symbol for people living on the margins, and thus either have black and white skin or film errors (for instance, Simon constantly suffers from jump cuts inside the scene, meandering left and right inside the frame, while Paulina just sits there normally). Other metafilm jokes are also noteworthy—for instance, Paulina reads out the letter from her dad, and his voice is heard off screen, as a narrator, but then he just directly adresses her: "Since you can hear my voice, might as well talk with you, anyway. Please, skip this next scene"—cue to the next scene of Paulina going to a house, seeing her dad who formed a new family with someone else, and then just leaving disappointed. However, the movie feels a bit too artificial and schematic, focusing almost exclusively only on this concept, without much other "universal" ideas that the viewers can cling on to. One rare exemption is when Simon is throwing small stones at Paulina's window at night, but she just appears behind him, having returned from the city. "The Ordinaries" are overlong and overstretched, lacking some higher intensity or engagement in the finale, yet the story is clever, whereas Fine Sendel delivers a great leading role performance as Paulina, ironically the supporting role girl.

Grade:++

The Father

The Father; psychological drama, UK / France, 2020; D: Florian Zeller, S: Anthony Hopkins, Olivia Colman, Rufus Sewell, Imogen Poots, Olivia Williams

London. Anne takes care of her father Anthony, suffering from dementia, but his state is becoming a burden for her. Anne's husband wants her to send Anthony to a retirement home. She hires a caregiver, Laura, but she reminds Anthony of Lucy, hism other daughter who died in an accident years ago. Eventually, Anthony wakes up in a retirement home, and the nurse, Catherine, informs him Anne moved away to Paris with her husband.

Florian Zeller's film adaptation of his own play is an untypical and more creative depiction of the state of dementia, by presenting it through the point of view of its protagonist Anthony (excellent performance by Anthony Hopkins). The movie starts out by revealing to the viewers only small bits and pieces of information: in the first sequence, Anthony talks to his daughter Anne (Olivia Colman) about how he doesn't want to move out of his apartment, while in the second sequence Zeller deliberately startles the viewers by having Anthony stumble upon an unknown man in the apartment, who inroduces himself as Anne's husband Paul (a nice comical moment between them: "Do you know Anne?" - "I'm her husband." - "Since when?" - "Coming up for ten years." - "Ah yes, yes... Of course, yes, yes... Obviously" / "Aren't you separated?" - "Who, me and Anne? No." - "Are you sure?"), and then Anne shows up, but played by a different actress (Olivia Williams). In only this second sequence, Zeller managed to convey the feeling of confusion, disorientation and uncertainty of Anthony through constant change of context, until even the viewers are not sure anymore what is going on. Some of these "unreliable" mystery situations almost remind of Carpenter's horror "In the Mouth of Madness". Even Anne's husband changes from one person, Paul, to another, James; whereas even a painting by Anthony's second daughter suddenly "disappears" from the wall, while Anne's voice off screen tells him he is at her apartment, while the painting is at his apartment. Thanks to some comical dialogues ("Are you a nun?" - "No." - "Then why are you speaking to me as if I'm retarded?") and a restrained, calm and measured approach, Zeller crafted a surprisingly intelligent film far from the typical terminal illness clichés, thus avoiding the sentimental or melodramatic territory which these kind of films often fall into, except in the syrupy ending, the only weak part of "The Father".

Grade:+++