And a Half

 Do not recommend - couldn't sit through the first 20 minutes of the film.

If 20 years ago (before I was alive), you told me that Polanski directed this film, I would laugh in your face. Perhaps his least stylistically recognizable movie ever, the work lends itself to an eerie sense of detachment. The aesthetic of the film is plastered by the faux-realism common in throwaway holiday films (even the hotel is CGI). Unlike Wes Anderson, the plastering of this film lacks coherency (granted Wes Anderson's films are perhaps overly coherent, but that is a discussion for a different day). The uncanny nature of the film proves the characters ethereal and ultimately not as comical as intended by Polanski. There's no good way to end this review but to say that it is unbelievably that we exist in a World where the Pianist and the Palace were directed by the same man.

 Even the boxer with the most wins ever succumbed to post-career maladies, as shown by Willie Pep in Featherweight . Lingering shots of the boxer's retired eyes looking into the distance expose that his life is passing by and he has no say in it. Even the documentarians don't listen to any of his directions to cut various scenes, he can't even control the people simply observing his life. Behind his eyes we slowly begin to see the internal workings of his mind - he is still psychologically boxing. A feature of his signature style (evasion) is omnipresent throughout the film's duration. Until the climax, Pep is always metaphorically dodging punches and living in the shadows of his career. This slow paced movie also dives into a father's psychology through the simple reality of its shots. The natural camera shake and lingering scenes past their logical conclusion immerse us in the retired boxer's world. As the bleak lighting reflects off his darting beady eyes, we...

 One of the central focuses of the film is its persistence of a dialectical structure. It is shot in black and white, there is a single opponent in judo, the older Iranian generation differs from the younger one, etc. The only possible solution, according to the film is similarly binary: either to give into pressures or to fight them entirely. This is precisely the thesis of the film - compromise in protest does not exist. Whether we agree or disagree with this theory is up to our own ethical convictions but the film is unabashedly proud of its somewhat radical nature.   One question which I reconsidered as the end credits rolled was why the title of this movie was Tatami? The tatami mat is of cinematographic significance itself; many shots pressed against the floor as well as perfect overviews are dispersed throughout the film. On some level, this film is about space, how it is portrayed, how it is fought over and most vividly, how someone is defeated in it. This notion ...

This film is my guess for the one which will win the grand prize at the Venice Film Festival. Despite its inevitable mass reproduction and advertisement, this movie offers higher-level structure that its contemporary counterparts often do not. First and foremost, this film is closely related to Christianity in an unintuitive manner – it neither rejects nor accepts its premises, rather examines the world as one which is inextricably linked to its intuitions. The general narrative structure follows one of the parable of the prodigal son – Emma Stone’s character leaves her father, expends her innocence and returns back to him. The picture takes the audience through a quirky yet beautiful world that we often fail to see in our own reality. Despite superb performances by Emma Stone and Mark Ruffalo, the screenplay lacks a depth that is necessary in approaching questions of maturity, prostitution and love. Even the most sensitive viewers can make it through the film without shedding a sing...

 One of the most brilliant works of art I have had the pleasure to enjoy in my life; a seminal work in every sense. This film will take years to be understood or even valued. As evidence, nearly half the audience walked out during its first showing at the Venice Film Festival. The "film" is a constant attack of terror on the senses and our expectations of cinema at large. Although difficult to describe, this chef-d'œuvre can be summarized as a virile skeleton of the action genre. The plot is so simply brutish and the cinematography so bare that it seems as though Harmony Korine is ridiculing the audience's intelligence. Indeed, the film has been reduced to nothing more than "action" in its most primal form. Infrared cameras portraying the most basal movements and dialogue lacking adjectives eliminate what we perceive to be important facets of cinema. Action films are nothing more than this film, they contain no further artistically substantive qualities. Unf...