West Beirut

Bayrut El Gharbiyyeh; war drama, Lebanon / France, 1998; D: Ziad Doueiri, S: Rami Doueiri, Mohamad Chamas, Rola Al-Amin, Carmen Lebbos, Joseph Bou Nassar, Liliane Nemri

Beirut, 1 9 7 5. Teenager Tarek studies at a French school, but then sees the Christian Phalangist militia shooting Palestinians in a bus, which marks the start of the Lebanese Civil War. His neighborhood, the Muslim West Beirut, is separated by blockades from the Christian East Beirut. Tarek and his friend Omar want to develop their Super 8 film, but the shops are closed. When Tarek falls in love with a Christian girl without a father, May, he argues with Omar even more. Shootings are heard daily, and Tarek hides inside a building which turns out to be a brothel run by Oum Walid. His mom wants to leave Lebanon, but the patriotic father refuses to be a refugee, even though he lost his job. When the father plays a song, Tarek cries hiding behind a wall.

How would you react if your city was engulfed by war? A fascinating anti-nostalgic autobiographical reconstruction by director Ziad Doueiri of both his childhood and the Lebanese Civil War, "West Beirut" shows the bad luck of youngsters growing up during a conflict, and how they try to remain sane through jokes and fun (the teenage protagonist Tarek is at first happy that he doesn't have to go to school due to war), but slowly the bitter reality catches up with them. Doueiri creates a vividly colorful collage full of little details, transmitting to the viewers how it was to live in Beirut during that time—the episodic structure, a lack of character development for May, and a few clumsy scenes don't really corrode the high impression. One of the most insane moments, worthy of a cult movie, is when Omar throws a boot at the "demarcation" line separating west and east Beirut, and immediately a sniper shoots at it, but Tarek heard from a Taxi driver that by holding a bra anyone is given free access to traverse to the famous brothel, as some sort of universal signal of neutrality, so Tarek asks May to give him her bra, and then he, May and Omar simply safely walk across the street to the other side. 

The madam of the brothel is a feisty character who laments in front of Tarek: "Is this a public house or a headache house?" and "The clients are already bringing the war with them here! One Christian didn't want to sleep with a girl in the same bed that was used by a Muslim before!... Does a bed have religion?!" The movie shows the wide effects of a war on a society, and how it is fragmented into several warring factions, enhancing aggressive behavior. This is bitingly summed up in the sequence where people are standing in line in a bakery, but the baker can only give them one bag of bread per person due to food restrictions, but then a paramilitary cuts through the line and demands 20 bags because he is "protecting the neighborhood", but the baker doesn't want to give him more than ten, so the paramilitary beats him up. Tarek's mom wants to leave the country, which leads to an argument with dad: "Do you know what they call us in Switzerland? Luxury refugees. In London, they send dogs to sniff us. In America, they call us sand-niggers." The movie deliberately gives no context for the complicated Lebanese Civil War to show it from the kids' perspective, since they themselves didn't know who is fighting whom, except that Christians and Muslims are on opposing sides. In a comical sequence, Tarek and Omar randomly find themselves inside a protest and start chanting what everyone is saying around them: "With our spirit, with our blood, we'll remember you, Kamal!", but then Tarek and Omar have this exchange: "Who's Kamal?" - "No idea." This outlines the movie's theme: the war doesn't stop to be PG for kids; and people sometimes fight without knowing why, but just want to join the trend of their group—only later on will they realize the consequences of tribalism around them.

Grade:+++

The Seed of the Sacred Fig

Dane-ye anjir-e ma'abed; drama / thriller, Iran / Germany / France, 2024; D: Mohammad Rasoulof, S: Soheila Golestani, Missagh Zareh, Setareh Maleki, Mahsa Rostami, Niousha Akhshi

Tehran. Lawyer Iman is at first happy to hear of his promotion to an investigating judge at the country's Revolutionary Court, but just then nationwide protests erupt after the death of a girl, Mahsa Amini, in police custody for not wearing a hijab, and he is shocked to find out his superiors expect him to simply sign any verdict sentencing accused people to death, before he can even research a case. Iman thus clashes badly with his wife, Najmeh, and their two teenage daughters, Rezvan and Sana. Rezvan's friend, Sadaf, joins the protests and is injured. When Iman's gun, given to him by the government for protection, cannot be found, and his personal info is leaked on the Internet, he drives off with his family to a secluded house in the countryside. He locks up Najmeh and Rezvan in two rooms to force them to confess taking the gun, but Sana has the weapon and hides outside. She locks up Iman in a basement, and releases Najmeh and Rezvan. Iman escapes and chases them around an abandoned ancient city. He approaches Sana, she shoots with the gun at the ground, which collapses and Iman falls down to his death.

A rare inside look at the Mahsa Amini protests, otherwise banned from being depicted in Iran's cinema, Mohammad Rasoulof's political drama "The Seed of the Sacred Fig" is a brave, noble, humanistic, ambitious and intelligent contemplation on gender apartheid in Ayatollah's Iran. It shows this clash through a family—on the one side, there is the female perspective, the wife Najmeh and the two teenage daughters, Rezvan and Sana (excellent Setareh Maleki), and on the other side, there is the male perspective, Iman, who on top of that works for the government court, signing death penalties assigned to him by the superiors. This way, the story presents the cyclic farce of the people who work for the system that suppresses the people, selling away their ethics in order to get a career promotion and climb up the hierarchy (Iman is promised a bigger apartment, which would be welcomed so that each of his two daughters has their own room), and explores their bad conscience. Remarkably, even the three female protagonists spend most of the film without wearing a hijab, at home, contrary to the dogma of Ayatollah's Iran's cinema.

The mother at first advises the daughters to avoid the protests, and has excuses for the death of Amini in police custody ("She died of a stroke. Is the government now to be blamed for anyone having a stroke?"), betraying her own gender, but with time has a character change and starts supporting the movement when Rezvan and Sana secretly bring their friend Sadaf, who joined the protests, to their home, and it is revealed half of Sadaf's face is badly injured because the police fired a shotgun at her. This leads to the best frame of the film, a close up shot of Sadaf's face as they are cleaning it and removing shrapnel from her skin, as later on the mother drops a dozen extracted metal shrapnel on the bathroom sink, with blood dripping from them. The movie is very good up to the last third, when it makes a disputable, questionable de-tour and becomes a thriller. The movie should have stayed with the injured friend, Sadaf. Instead, this finale disrupts the structure and tone established up to it, turning into a rather heavy-handed allegory on the idea that every man who works for the Iranian government eventually becomes radicalized and turns against his own family, which loses that subtlety from the first two thirds. 

Grade:+++

Flow

Straume; computer-animated fantasy adventure / art-film, Latvia / France / Belgium, 2024; D: Gints Zilbadois

A grey cat is watching its reflection in a lake in the forest when it is chased away by a pack of dogs. They in turn are all chased away by a herd of reindeer fleeing away from a giant flood. The flood engulfs the entire area, so the cat boards a boat with a dog, a lemur and a capybara. They flow through the ocean aimlessly, and the cat catches fish for food. On a patch of land, the cat is attacked by a herd of secretarybirds, but is saved by a good secretarybird who protects it. As a punishment, the other birds break the wing of the good secretarybird, which thus joins the cat and the others sailing on the boat. On a rock pillar, the secretarybird is beamed up in the sky, and disappears in the light. The water recedes, and the cat, the dog, the lemur and the capybara exit from the boat back on land.

An allegorical minimalist film without any dialogue or human characters, Gints Zilbadois' "Flow" is a raw, astringent and subconscious adventure that breaks the "animation monopoly" held by big budget studios by relying on a free and open-source animation software, thereby achieving a breakthrough on the field of the independent cinema. The storyline is strange and subject to several interpretations, since, by taking only the perspective of the animals, the viewers are not given any context. Is the sudden excessive flood, which covers the entire land surface, a symbol for sea level rise caused by climate change? It would fit with the world where abandoned buildings are seen, and the dogs and other domesticated animals roam freely, in a time where humans went extinct. Since the cat and other animals travel in a boat across this ocean, is it a meditation on the need for disparate groups to cooperate in order to survive during crisis times? And since they have no say in this water current, and their boat just follows the flow, is it a symbol for the voyage in life where everyone is just a pawn of destiny? Is it a meditation on the relativity of circumstances in life, since the flood at first hints that a small land animal like the cat will perish, and that big water animals like the whale will flourish, but when the flood recedes, the whale is stranded on land? All of them could be true. One certainty is that the cat overcomes its fear of water, when it learns how to swim and catch fish, through which the movie speaks about overcoming one's fears and learning to stand on its own. One sequence disrupts the movie stylistically (secretarybird being elevated by a beam of light) in a strange paranormal, religious (?) moment. Is it a divine reward for being good during dark times? "Flow" needed more ingenuity and creativity, since it is a little bit monotone after a while, yet it offers food for thought. 

Grade:++

The Trial of the Chicago 7

The Trial of the Chicago 7; legal drama, USA, 2020; D: Aaron Sorkin, S: Eddie Redmayne, Sacha Baron Cohen, Jeremy Strong, Alex Sharp, John Carroll Lynch, Noah Robbins, Daniel Flaherty, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Frank Langella, Mark Rylance, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Michael Keaton, Caitlin FitzGerald

Chicago, 1 9 6 9. Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, Tom Hayden, Rennie Davis, David Dellinger, Lee Weiner and John Froines are seven left-wing activists on trial for inciting a riot, which ended with a police crackdown. An 8th defendant, the African-American Black Panther member Bobby Seale, is lumped in together with them, even though he is not represented since his lawyer is recovering from sugery. The Chicago 7 are represented by lawyer Fred Hampton, but the judge Julius Hoffman, is visibly biased against them and hampers their proceedings. When Hampton dies under mysterious circumstances, Seale is tied up to his chair, and two jurors are eliminated by Hoffman, the Chicago 7 protest and ask for a mistrial, claiming they only traveled to Chicago for a protest against the Vietnam War. Judge Hoffman sentences them to 5 years in prison, but this is overturned in the appeal verdict. 

Screenwriter Aaron Sorkin was always interested in exploring political themes in his screenplays ("A Few Good Men", "The American President", "Charlie Wilson's War"), and thus chose wisely when he picked the rarely talked about real-life legal case of the political trial of the "Chicago 7" for his second directorial work. Sorkin has a knack for inspired dialogues, and thus his sophisticated sense for writing gives the static story a dynamic charge—there is no empty walk despite the long running time, since almost every scene seems important, and instead the viewers will actually feel the story is almost too short. Of the seven people on trial—or eight, if Bobby Seale is included, before his proceedings were separated from the rest—at least three feel only as extras, since there was not enough time to give everyone enough character development, but the four most notable defendants stand out with ease and cover for any omission, especially the two "hippies" with huge hair Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin, played brilliantly by Sacha Baron Cohen and Jeremy Strong. 

In one delicious moment, as the trial is about to commence and Abbie Hoffman's name is brought up, judge Julius Hoffman turns towards the stenographer: "And the record should reflect that defendant Hoffman and I are not related!", upon which Abbie looks at him from the bench and jokingly says: "Father, no!" Another fantastic moment is when a reporter and Rubin have this sharp exchange: "Why won't Bobby Seale let anyone represent him?" -  "You've posed that question in the form of a lie." Since numerous obstacles are artificially created during the trial, including that judge Hoffman is obviously biased against the Chicago 7, to such an extent that defense counsel Kunstler jokingly says that the judge has "been handing down rulings from the bench that would be considered wrong in Honduras", the movie contemplates about this legal malfunction and democratic deficiency in the US during the Vietnam War, when the government tried to intimidate and hush up the (left-wing) anti-war opposition, standing as a warning that these kind of mistrials can happen even in democracies. It is a very conventionally directed film, except for the neat gimmick that the riot is only presented later on in the film, yet it is ambitious, intelligent, noble and measured, a surprisingly quality experience.

Grade:+++

Les Misérables

Les Misérables; historical musical-drama, UK / USA, 2012; D: Tom Hooper, S: Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Amanda Seyfried, Eddie Redmayne, Samantha Barks, Anne Hathaway, Sacha Baron Cohen, Helena Bonham Carter

Toulon, 1815. Convict Jean Valjean, sentenced for stealing bread, is released from a harbor penal prison by prison guard Javert. Valjean needs to report monthly to his parole officer. When he tries to steal silverware from a church, the priest tells the police that he gifted it to Valjean, so the moved Valjean decides to help people from there on. In 1823, Valjean is the mayor of a town and owner of a textile factory, living under a different name. A fired worker, Fantine, finds a new job as a prostitute to pay for her daughter, Cosette, but dies from starvation. Valjean brings up Cosette. In 1832, Marius falls in love with the now grown-up Cosette. The Republicans start the Paris June Rebellion in order to try to overthrow the monarchy led by King Louis Philippe I, but the army crushes them. Since Valjean spared his life when he was caught as a spy by the Republicans, Javert allows Valjean and Marius to escape alive. Marius and Cosette marry, while Valjean dies.

Tom Hooper's film adaptation of Victor Hugo's famous novel "Les Miserables" is a musical-drama that, paradoxically, would have worked much better just as a drama. All the performances would have been great if the forced singing wasn't in their way—while some musicals have isolated singing numbers and then take a "break" and return to being a straight drama for the next 10 minutes, "Les Miserables" consist of almost non-stop singing, even during the most ridiculous situations (singing while fencing, singing while dying, singing convicts pulling a rope in the sea...), since all this feels too unnatural and artificial, which hinders the enjoyment value of the storyline. The whole concept is misguided, since Hugo's novel shouldn't have been transformed into a musical in the first place. Nontheless, Hugo's story still offers a rare depiction of the attempted "Second French Revolution", when the 1832 June Rebellion tried to overthrow the monarchy to again resume the French Republic, showing a complicated set of characters who are fed up with poverty and low life quality, which all serve as a catalyst to try to improve their society. Anne Hathaway is outstanding as Fantine, but shockingly underused—her character dies already 42 minutes into the film, with only 20 minutes of screen time, which is simply too meagre and narrowed down. Hathaway's highlight: the emotional "I Dreamed a Dream" song filmed in one 4-minute take, which is incredible ("...life has killed the dream I dreamed..."). Sacha Baron Cohen is also amusing as the swindler Thenandier, who feigns he is caring for Fantine's daughter, calling her "Colette", while his wife immediately corrects him: "Cosette". Despite flaws, high production values, great cinematography and an emotional ending assure "Les Miserables" is a good film, if the viewers can "adjust" to its musical format.

Grade:++

Black Box Diaries

Black Box Diaries; documentary, Japan / USA / UK, 2024; D: Shiori Ito, S: Shiori Ito

Tokyo. Shiori Ito recounts how in 2015 she had a dinner with the powerful reporter Noriyuki Yamaguchi talking about her potential new job, when she suddenly felt dizzy after a drink. A taxi cab drove them to a hotel. She fell unconscious, and woke up naked in a bed of a hotel room, with Yamaguchi naked on her. She left and filed a report to the police, but the indictment was withdrawn, possibly due to Yamaguchi's close ties with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Shiori insisted on the legal prosecution of her case for years, and wrote a book about it. As a journalist, she made recording of her conversations with an Investigator. Finally, the case arrives to a trial, and Yamaguchi is found guilty of rape.

A harrowing and disturbing documentary, "Black Box Diaries" is an unusual film where journalist Shiori Ito recounts and reconstructs her own rape, but does this with a journalistic distance which gives her some relief and objectivity to avoid (and contain) her own trauma. She secretly or openly films video or audio recording of witnesses (the taxi driver who drove Shiori and Noriyuki Yamaguchi when she fell dizzy; the phone call with the Investigator...), the clip of hotel camera footage of them leaving the taxi, or a woman reading Shiori's own testimony as a rehearsal for the trial (some 76 minutes into the film, which includes some graphic descriptions, such as the one where she woke up with Yamaguchi on top of her, and when she went to the bathroom, she noticed her "nipple was bleeding" and that she "had bruises") to combine them all into a chaotic, meandering, but honest and valuable testimony, creating a major catalyst for the advancement of prosecution of sexual violence in Japan. An especially unsettling moment is somewhere 57 minutes into the film, where Shiori reads an anonymous e-mail of a woman who berates her: "With the book, I am ashamed we belong to the same gender. Do you think you haven't done anything wrong? I was strictly raised to avoid such things." While this self-depicting approach is mostly just a primary source, it manages to create a fascinating film essay of the victim insisting on her rights and justice, exposing the often situation where an influential perpetrator knows powerful people, and is thus able to "cover-up" the incident, but not delay the trial at the end. It is a bitter and significant human rights work, and a one that shows Shiori's closure of this crime.

Grade:+++

The Paper Chase

The Paper Chase; drama, USA, 1973; D: James Bridges, S: Timothy Bottoms, Lindsay Wagner, John Houseman, Graham Beckel

James Hart is a student at Harvard Law School, specialising in contract law, but his Professor Kingsfield is very demanding and difficult to work with. Hart starts a relationship with Susan, but is surprised to find out she is Kingsfield's daughter, about to get divorced from her husband, so Susan doesn't mention Hart to Kingsfield. A student, Kevin, is so under pressure from studying despite having a photographic memory, that he contemplated suicide, so he quits Harvard. Hart and his friend Ford study for the final exam in a hotel room for three days. When he gets his test results in the mail, he makes a paper plane and throws it into the Ocean, unopened.

"The Paper Chase" is one of those rare movies composed only out of pure intelligence. It is a static drama where the students just listen to the lecture of their Professor Kingsfield explaining contract law through the Socratic method, i.e. in the form of questions, answers and discussions with the class, but it is surprisingly fascinating to listen to, mostly thanks to the excellent performance by John Houseman (previously a theater and film producer) as the demanding Kingsfield. Whenever Houseman is on the screen, he brings down the house through his understated charisma, intelligence and stoic-elevated discourse. And he references real-life legal cases, such as Hawkins vs. McGee, where a boy had his hand burned by an electric wire, a doctor promised him a new skin, but he transplated it from the boy's chest, thereby causing hair growth on the palm of the hand of the transplated skin, using this as an example of the expectation damages rewarded to the plaintiff. 

Kingsfield and a student have exchanges such as this one: "What are the elements that could lead to a party being excused from performing his part of the contract, and yet not paying damages?" - "Well, suppose I were to agree to rent an apartment from you. An old apartment which you haven't visited in a while. And the time came for me to move in, and we discovered the apartment house has been burned down. That actually happened to me..." However, the rest of the film is a step below, since the main protagonist Hart and his love interest Susan are bland and not that interesting, and thus the movie starts to drag with them as the main catalysts of the story. Hart is introduced in the first sequence which already plays out in the classroom, when Kingsfield calls him out: "Now that you're on your feet, Mr. Hart, maybe the classroom might be able to understand you. You are on your feet?" - "Yes, I am on my feet." - "Loudly Mr. Hart! Fill this room with your intelligence!" Their later animosity culminates with this: "You are a son of a bitch, Kingsfield!" - "Mr. Hart, that is the most intelligent thing you've said today! You may take your seat." It is a pity there is practically no interaction between Hart and Kingsfield outside the classroom—considering Hart is dating his daughter, this could have been used to meet Kingsfield and find out more about his private life, but that never happens. Kingsfield is always formal to him. The inspiration falls a bit in the second half, where less of the movie plays out in classroom, but it has an interesting point where students just chase that paper which gives them a certificate that they achieved something in society—but Hart then just frees himself from this, in a very symbolic final scene.

Grade:++

Final Destination

Final Destination; horror, USA, 2000; D: James Wong, S: Devon Sawa, Ali Larter, Kerr Smith, Kristen Cloke, Chad Donella, Seann William Scott

Teenager Alex Browning and his classmates board a plane from JFK Airport to Paris, but just then he has a traumtic premonition that the plan will crash and walks out back to the terminal, accompanied by four of his friends and teacher Lewton. Later, the plane indeed explodes, killing everyone inside. Afterwards, one by one, the survivors die in mysterious circumstances, including Tod, Terry and Lewton, so Alex deducts that they "cheated" destiny by avoiding the flight, but that Death is now killing them anyway, to compensate. The flight seats give a clue who will be next. When Billy is decapitated, Alex hides inside a cabin, but then goes out and saves Clear at her home, when a chain reaction caused an electric cable to ignite gasoline. In Paris, Alex, Clear and Carter relax, but then another chain reaction of events happen, and a sign falls on Carter.

The originator of the famous horror film series, "Final Destination" is more interesting in its initial premise than in its execution, characters, story development or style. The premise that five teenagers and a teacher "skipped" death when they left a flight where everyone died, so now Death is killing them one by one to "fulfill their destiny", is intruiging, yet the director James Wong rarely makes anything more than a standard, routine, albeit solid horror flick out of it. The opening act is the best—Wong here manages to create a creepy sense of unease as the teenagers prepare to board the plane at the airport, where little details and slow camera drives slowly build-up suspense. The protagonist Alex knows something is "off", but cannot quite put his finger on it. When he has a vision that the plane will explode, he causes panic and is thrown out of the plane by the staff, creating mystery and uncertainty, and poses some questions about fatalism. However, these potentials are quickly squandered—the "accidental" murders later on are so ridiculous and silly that one cannot take them seriously. For instance, 35 minutes into the film, Tod accidentally slips in the bathroom, a rope is caught around his neck, but he cannot stand up because his feet are wet, so he strangles himself. In another, teacher Lewton accidentaly drops some water on the computer, it causes a short circuit, an explosion which catapults glass shrapnel into her neck, and then—in a series of dumb chain reactions—she trips, the kitchen is caught on fire, and as she lies on the ground and tries to pull a towel from above, a set of kitchen knives fall down on her. Or the banal clichee of someone stepping on the street, and then all out of a sudden a bus hits said person? Come on! These are not creative ideas, nor are they inspired, which makes the whole storyline feel forced, contrived and shoehorned.

Grade:+

Spider-Man: No Way Home

Spider-Man: No Way Home; fantasy action, USA, 2021; D: Jon Watts, S: Tom Holland, Alfred Molina, Willem Dafoe, Zendaya, Jacob Batalon, Benedict Cumberbatch, Jon Favreau, Jamie Foxx, Marisa Tomei, Andrew Garfield, Tobey Maguire, J. K. Simmons

New York City. After the previous events, the whole world now knows that Peter Parker is Spider-Man, which begins to also influence the lives of his friends, Michelle MJ and Ned. Peter thus asks Dr. Strange to conjure up a magic spell for to erase everyone's memories, but it goes wrong and instead brings Spider-Man's enemies from alternate dimensions: Osborn / Green Goblin, Octavius / Dr. Octopus, Dillon / Electro, Dr. Connors / Lizard, and Marko / Sandman. Strange wants to return them back to their universe, where they will die in battle, but Spider-Man rebels, traps Strange in a different dimension and takes his ring away, and then proceeds to try to cure the villains in an attempt to save and reform them. Spider-Man reforms Dr. Octopus, but Green Goblin kills aunt May. Two more Spider-Mans from alternate dimensions appear and help Spider-Man defeat Goblin and inject him with a cure. Strange returns and erases everyone's memories of Peter Parker.

Tom Holland's fifth film as Spider-Man, "No Way Home" is overlong and overburdened with too many subplots, but it gives a rather satisfying conclusion to his saga, becoming remarkably emotional in the finale. The alternate universe setting tends to obfuscate the plot in several Marvel movies, yet here it even works to a good degree since it offers an alternate / changed outcome for characters from all the previous Spider-Man movies, Raimi's trilogy ("Spider-Man 2", "Spider-Man 3") and Webb's duology ("The Amazing Spider-Man", "The Amazing Spider-Man 2"), including villains Dr. Octopus (Alfred Molina) and Green Goblin (Willem Dafoe), which gives it a certain metafilm awe. The gimmick that Peter clumsily wrecks Dr. Strange's magic spell, and then even goes on to capture Dr. Strange in an alternate dimension so that he can try to reform the villains on his own, feels highly contrived and shoehorned, but the film has charm and humor (albeit often corny one: "Oh, a torture rack!" - "That is a pilates machine."), and feels energetic enough to carry this strange storyline. 

One of the best moments is when Spider-Man 2.0 from an alternate dimension (Andrew Garfield from Webb's duology) enters our dimension through a portal, but MJ and Ned don't believe him because he is played by a different actor, so they order him to prove it. Spider-Man 2.0 then jumps and holds himself to the ceiling of the house with his hand, but MJ is still not convinced: "Crawl around." - "Why do I need to crawl around?" - "Because it's not enough." - "This is plenty." - "No, it's not." - "Yes, it is. How do I stick to the ceiling?" But then eventually gives in, and walks on the ceiling, upside down. Later on, even Tobey Maguie from Raimi's trilogy appears. Unfortunately, they both appear very late, some 92 minutes into the film, and are strangely underused. When you have a crossover of two or more characters, it better be damn well used since they may never have time to interact again. The only truly great moment is when Ned approaches the lab and asks: "Peter?", but then all three Peter Parkers respond with: "Yeah?" - "Peter Parker?" - "We're all Peter Parker." There should have been simply more of these interactions between Maguire, Garfield and Holland. Despite a typical CGI overkill in the action and battle finale, there is a cathartic post-finale segment which is surprisingly mature and grown up, meditating on the themes of death, decline, new beginning in life, fatalism and accepting loss, which gives it more weight than expected. 

Grade:++

Shortbus

Shortbus; erotic drama, USA, 2006; D: John Cameron Mitchell, S: Sook-Yin Lee, Paul Dawson, PJ DeBoy, Lindsay Beamish, Raphael A. Barker

New York City. Sofia is a sex therapist who never achieved an orgasm in her life, and senses her marriage with her indifferent  husband Rob is dissolving. Attending her therapy is a gay couple, James, a lifeguard, and Jamie, a former child actor. James and Jamie have a threesome with Ceth. James attempts a suicide by taking too many pills and jumping into a swimming pool at night, but is saved by Caleb, a neighbor who has been observing his through the window for years. Caleb and James have sex, and James allows for the first time to be penetrated. Dominatrix Severin slaps Rob's butt, who hides his SM side from Sofia, but Severin doesn't like relationships. At Shortbus, a sex club, Sofia has a threesome with a couple and finally achieves an orgasm.

John Cameron Mitchell's second feature length film as a director, "Shortbus" is an anthology of three stories revolving around sexuality and its role in human relationships. Its flaws are the shaky camera, chaotic editing, the messy episodic structure, a few misguided ideas and occasionally vague character development, yet it has enough virtues and intricate plotting to deserve its existence, and owes a lot to the brave and honest performance by Sook-Yin Lee in the leading role of Sofia. Her character arc is interesting, since she is a sex therapist who, ironically, never achieved an orgasm in her life—while talking with her friend, Severin, in a pool tank, Sofia admits: "I wanna be welcomed into the secret society of women". "Shortbus" is very direct, and thus only suitable for the open-minded, non-conservative viewers: in its opening act, it introduces its main characters through their sexual activity—Sofia has sex with her husband Rob, but only fakes her orgasm; James lies with his head down, and his legs and penis above him, so that after the masturbation he ejaculates into his own mouth, but then becomes depressed and cries, and quickly hides it when his partner Jamie enters the apartment, showing how he has personal problems. James becomes one of the most nunanced characters in the entire film, suffering from child trauma and how he had to hide his gay side in his bigoted small town. His two most memorable lines are when he confesses to Severin: "I look back to things that were when I was 12 years old. I'm still looking for the same things now"; and when he confides to Caleb who saved him from suicide, explaining his relationship with Jamie: "He loves me as hard as the people who treated me like shit". On the other hand, Severin is a pointless character, and the story meanders too much, since the finale is kind of more obfuscated than it is clear.

Grade:++

Comic Sans

Comic Sans; drama, Croatia, 2018; D: Nevio Marasović, S: Janko Popović Volarić, Zlatko Burić, Inti Šraj, Nataša Janjić, Miloš Timotijević, Alma Prica

Zagreb. Graphic designer Alan is so devastated when his girlfriend Marina breaks up with him that he starts taking cocaine after a business meeting in Ljubljana. He also decides to accompany his father Bruno on his car trip to the island of Vis, to attend the funeral of Alan's aunt Matija. On Vis, Alan meets his ex-girlfriend Barbara, who is now engaged, as well as tourists Anne and Sofie. A drugged Alan wakes up in a yacht, after he missed Marina's phone call, and is left together with Bruno alone on the Jabuka island. They are picked up and return back to Vis, where they attend the funeral, but wonder at the use of the defunct "comic sans" font for the tombstone.

Compared to his impressive directorial debut film "The Show Must Go On", but also compared to any other film genre, "Comic Sans" is an underwhelming, meandering drama which does not know what it wants to say, what its vision is, nor how to construct all of this in a better, harmonious way. The story is vague and episodic, setting up certain plot points which are in the end never resolved on concluded, leaving a rather incomplete feeling. It starts out with the protagonist's Alan's break-up with his girlfriend Marina, and then switches to his relationship with his father and their trip to the island of Vis, but this whole opening 30-minute act could have been cut without influencing the rest of the movie. Alan's relationship with his ex-girlfriend, Barbara, is also brought up, without being resolved in the end. Too much of all of this is arbitrary and overstretched. Yet, one humorous sequence is outstanding: figuring nothing really matters after Marina dumped him, Alan takes cocaine and then parties all night long with Anna, Sofie, and others. Cut to the next day when he wakes up in bed with Sofie, doesn't remember anything, but then looks at his mobile phone and spots he has a missed call from Marina, as Sofie says: "Your mobile phone rang, so I picked up the call. A woman called you, so I told her you were asleep". An angry Alan stands up from the bed, but then realizes he is on a yacht, in the middle of the Adriatic Sea, as the passangers tell him it was his idea to visit the remote Jabuka island. There is no signal, so he lifts his mobile phone up in the air to try to find it, but Anna shows up behind his back and taps him, causing his mobile phone to fall into the sea. A rare successful and comical moment from an otherwise poorly thought-out film.

Grade:+

The Ages of Lulu

Las edades de Lulu; erotic drama, Spain, 1990; D: Bigas Luna, S: Francesca Neri, Óscar Ladoire, María Barranco, Fernando Guillen Cuervo, Rosana Pastor, Javier Bardem

Madrid. Teenager Lulu is infatuated by Pablo, a Professor and the friend of her brother Marcelo. Lulu and Pablo go to a concert, and afterwards go to his home and have sex. Pablo goes to the United States, but returns and then marries Lulu. They get a daughter. Lulu is interested in spotting tranvestites, and she and Pablo become friends with transgender prostitute Ely. Pablo persuades Lulu to a have a threesome and blindfolds her, but she is so angry when she finds out the third partner is her brother that she leaves Pablo and takes their daughter with her. Lulu is fascinated by watching gay men have sex on video, and then hires three to participate live. Lulu contacts pimp Remy to work for him, but is tied up in his underground sadomasochist night club and raped while two men paid to watch it, yet Pablo calls the police who save Lulu and arrest Remy's henchmen.

Bigas Luna's early work, erotic drama "The Ages of Lulu" works better in its first half, when it is focused on normal sexuality, than in its second, weaker half, proving that sexual violence generally doesn't work in Luna's movies. It's not quite clear what the story wants to be since it starts out as a teenage drama about the title heroine falling in love with an older man, Pablo, and loses her virginity with him, and then follows their marriage, yet in the last third this all falls apart when weird incest and sadomasochist themes are introduced which wreck the initial concept. In the opening act, Luna doesn't waste time and jumps fast to his erotic territory when Pablo has Lulu seated on a green armchair and shaves her pubic hair, after which they move to a sofa and have sex. Afterwards, Pablo tells her: "Sex and love are two different things. What happened tonight was love." In another sequence, Pablo embraces Lulu while she comments on using a vibrator for the first time: "It's weird, it's got nothing to do with a man. It's cold... And I must move it myself..." This segment is good because it has a certain sense for both their passion and infatuation, since they are such a good couple. But when Pablo blindfolds Lulu and has a threesome which includes her brother (!), this incest insertion is a major tonal shift which causes the movie to slip from its right tracks. Afterwards, the movie is not sure where it is going, as if it lost its thread, and thus fills out the remained of its running time with a pointless rape sequence in a S&M night club involving gay men: among them Luna's future actor Javier Bardem, with whom he would film the excellent "Golden Balls" three years later.

Grade:++

Conclave

Conclave; drama, USA, 2024; D: Edward Berger, S: Ralph Fiennes, Stanley Tucci, John Lithgow, Lucian Msamati, Brian F. O'Byrne, Carlos Diehz, Merab Ninidze, Isabella Rosellini

Vatican City. The Pope dies, so over a hundred Catholic cardinals from all over the world gather at the Sistine Chapel to vote for the next Pope. Among the candidates is Thomas Lawrence, Aldo Bellini, Tremblay, and others. The leading candidate, and a potential first African Pope, Adeyemi, is disqualified when a nun from the kitchen reveals she had a child with him 30 years ago. But when Lawrence finds out Tremblay had the nun flown from Nigeria, Tremblay is also disqualified. The candidates cannot agree if they should follow the hardline traditional or the more liberal way. A priest from Kabul, Benitez, is elected, and he becomes the first transgender Pope.

Despite high critical acclaim and numerous nominations and awards, "Conclave" is still a movie below all the hype, a rather standard, conventional and dry depiction of behind-the-scenes problems of a conclave. Its two main virtues are aesthetic shot compositions of the interiors and the strong performance by the always competent Ralph Fiennes as Thomas Lawrence, a cardinal who is having a crisis in faith, yet everything else is just as sufficiently good as it needs to be, and nothing more than that. An interesting perspective is that several cardinals try to sabotage each other in order to gain advantage for themselves for the votes for the Pope—which mirrors certain Presidential political campaigns and the fight for power—but it would have been better if "Conclave" had satirically explored even more of this dirty campaign, or if a murder happened which would have livened up this wait for the final vote. As it is, it flows smoothly, yet isn't particularly inspired, whereas the "plot twist" at the end does not feel that rewarding or worth the wait of 120 minutes. Some humorous touches give it intermittent spice, such as when it is shown how some cardinals smoke while another one is more preoccupied typing on his mobile phone than preparing for the election process.

Grade:++