My pick for best movie of the year, possibly the decade.
High Quality quicktime here.
The movie is undoubtedly technically astonishing. We're talking on a level that would make Gondry or Kubrick's head turn. The multiple unbroken continous shots that last up to seven minutes are astounding but more importantly they never you draw you out of the story. I don't think I've ever sat there stuck between repetitively thinking "holy fuck how did they do that" while at the same time completely engaged in story and what's happening.
Likewise, the film eschews radically and to some degree reactionarily pushes against the boundaries of what we've come to expect of movies. There's a certain safety to cuts. Camera movement is unmotivated by character. There are no real closeups in the way we've become accustomed to. There are extraordinary shots that are completely and wholly unlit by any filmmaking artifice. They're staggering to see in a movie. It will probably escape a lot of people's attention because they've made first and foremost a movie with such a gripping quality it will be easy to overlook the multiple levels of genius going on continually. Read this Manola Dhargis piece about one single scene.
Technicality aside I cannot think of a single film which so accurately compresses the experience of the start of the 21st century. It also rarely capitulates to any sort of extremist solution; in fact it's rather critical of those. Some people will have a problem with what they see as a mercilessly downbeat, nihilistic quality, but I'd disagree. It's about the nature of hope in general especially given what we're confronted with today. I think a person's ideological, social, political reaction to this film is a pretty good barometer of their feelings of the future. The film is flawed - but once the singular premise, one of the few things borrowed from the novel its based upon are set in order, is taken care of it becomes its own thing.
Alfonso Cuaron was in my estimation an amazing filmmaker in my book, but with this movie combined with his other work (the absolutely radiant Y Tu Mama Tambien, the Harry Potter movie I actually liked, A Little Princess) he's easily gotten himself a place in the "they're going to be studying this in film school" list.
Oh and here's a story about the cinemtographer Emmanuel "Chivo" Lubezki - easily my favorite DP for several years now. Previously for his work on The New World (the entire picture is worth that shot of actual, real lightning you get a glimpse of) and Y Tu Mama Tambien. He's also done such stylized heavyweights as Lemony Snicket's.
In film school we had Piotr Sobocinski visiting to lecture us in our shoddy classroom. He was a collaborator and cinematographer to the legendary Kieslowski. There was a strange man in our auditorium no one recognized. Turned out it was Lubezki, in London to shoot Sleepy Hollow. He'd actually come down to our film school and sat in the lecture hall to hear and learn from another master himself. I thought it was incredibly impressive and it made an impression upon me about the neverending search for knowledge. I know it sounds supremely silly, but I'm perhaps more excited by the fact I once shyly said hi to Lubezki in film school than perhaps all other filmmakers I've ever had the chance to brush by for a few seconds.
High Quality quicktime here.
The movie is undoubtedly technically astonishing. We're talking on a level that would make Gondry or Kubrick's head turn. The multiple unbroken continous shots that last up to seven minutes are astounding but more importantly they never you draw you out of the story. I don't think I've ever sat there stuck between repetitively thinking "holy fuck how did they do that" while at the same time completely engaged in story and what's happening.
Likewise, the film eschews radically and to some degree reactionarily pushes against the boundaries of what we've come to expect of movies. There's a certain safety to cuts. Camera movement is unmotivated by character. There are no real closeups in the way we've become accustomed to. There are extraordinary shots that are completely and wholly unlit by any filmmaking artifice. They're staggering to see in a movie. It will probably escape a lot of people's attention because they've made first and foremost a movie with such a gripping quality it will be easy to overlook the multiple levels of genius going on continually. Read this Manola Dhargis piece about one single scene.
Technicality aside I cannot think of a single film which so accurately compresses the experience of the start of the 21st century. It also rarely capitulates to any sort of extremist solution; in fact it's rather critical of those. Some people will have a problem with what they see as a mercilessly downbeat, nihilistic quality, but I'd disagree. It's about the nature of hope in general especially given what we're confronted with today. I think a person's ideological, social, political reaction to this film is a pretty good barometer of their feelings of the future. The film is flawed - but once the singular premise, one of the few things borrowed from the novel its based upon are set in order, is taken care of it becomes its own thing.
Alfonso Cuaron was in my estimation an amazing filmmaker in my book, but with this movie combined with his other work (the absolutely radiant Y Tu Mama Tambien, the Harry Potter movie I actually liked, A Little Princess) he's easily gotten himself a place in the "they're going to be studying this in film school" list.
Oh and here's a story about the cinemtographer Emmanuel "Chivo" Lubezki - easily my favorite DP for several years now. Previously for his work on The New World (the entire picture is worth that shot of actual, real lightning you get a glimpse of) and Y Tu Mama Tambien. He's also done such stylized heavyweights as Lemony Snicket's.
In film school we had Piotr Sobocinski visiting to lecture us in our shoddy classroom. He was a collaborator and cinematographer to the legendary Kieslowski. There was a strange man in our auditorium no one recognized. Turned out it was Lubezki, in London to shoot Sleepy Hollow. He'd actually come down to our film school and sat in the lecture hall to hear and learn from another master himself. I thought it was incredibly impressive and it made an impression upon me about the neverending search for knowledge. I know it sounds supremely silly, but I'm perhaps more excited by the fact I once shyly said hi to Lubezki in film school than perhaps all other filmmakers I've ever had the chance to brush by for a few seconds.
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