Journalism / English version of Revista Cultural Siete Artes / Since 2018, a digital magazine of Art Reviews regarding Movies, Music, Streaming & Stage
FILM REVIEW / «SILENT NIGHT» (2023, John Woo)
By Maximiliano Curcio
Score: 4
John Woo’s new film renews the local billboard and represents his return to English-speaking cinema since “Paycheck” (2023). Exactly two decades passed before we could once again enjoy a product made in Hollywood with the signature of a key director for modern oriental action cinema. A once brutal box office phenomenon from the ’90s, who, at 77 years of age, has managed to grow old and stay active. And although “Silent Night” is by no means a masterpiece, how many new filmmakers would want to film a couple of shots like John Woo does here?
Thanks to hits like “Hard Target” (2003), “Face Off” (1997) and even his very personal delivery of “Mission Impossible II” (2000), John Woo has patented an artisanal way of conceiving cinematographic art. Its capital importance in modern action cinema is, frankly, undeniable, having influenced contemporary examples such as the “John Wick” saga. Creator of his own language and patient creator of spectacular violence, the director of “Hardboiled” (1992) brings us here a premise very close to “Death Wish”, the remembered classic by J. Lee Thompson. Just a couple of camera movements and angles are enough for us to realize that we are in the presence of a filmmaker who leaves no detail left to chance.
Starring the Swede Joel Kinnemann, the film uses a plot anecdote (the protagonist’s inability to speak, the result of a personal tragedy) that serves as a perfect trigger to lay its conceptual foundations: over the course of almost one hundred and ten minutes there will be little the dialogues completely. For obvious reasons, the power of an image will take total control of the scene, in order to validate its deeply emotional message. That is why newspaper clippings and text messages serve as an informative guide. In addition, the plans should speak for themselves. In this sense, the work of a proven interpreter in the field is skillful, capable of transmitting the impotence and overflowing rage in an ordinary man, forced to become an angel of death, to avenge his son, who died in terrible circumstances.
Forming a highlighted aspect within a feature film with a perfect visual finish, and the director’s trademark, “Silent Night” knows how to make its visual tools elements that enhance its appearance of greater darkness and virulence. With no Christmas element in sight other than the time of year that sets it and in the chronological period that it will take to complete the mission, a father afflicted by his family’s grief will undertake a merciless massacre, setting in motion a veritable crusher of dangerous thug gangs that good old Woo will illustrate with his usual sequence shots, dizzying montage and slowed down effects.
This living legend of the action genre is someone who knows how to take care of aesthetic forms, and he does the same on this occasion, extending himself into hand-to-hand confrontations of a good choreographic level and causing expensive cars to collide in the middle of vibrant chase scenes. Sooner, the screen is stained with blood and black humor, added to the omnipresent soundtrack by Marco Berltrami. In times of vacuous superhero action cinema in digital format, Woo highlights his intentions with conceived for unconditional fans, although in its development, and victim of its own excesses, it will end up getting bogged down in an irremediable irregularity, distant from a beginning that seems destined for authentic cult cinema.
Strikingly, it should be noted, an author who wants us to connect emotionally with the troubled main character, will allocate a total of fifty initial minutes (exactly half of the footage) to meticulous preparation of revenge; a period of time that, by the dizzying standards of current cinema, is surprising and somewhat excessive. The contrast in tone does not favor, at all, the final balance of a film that towards its denouement becomes parodic, melodramatic, crude and extremely uneven.
As an attribute of an irregular nature to his already blurred identity, out of tune are the ethnic and cultural problems that a controversial Woo uses to justify the harsh and pure vendetta that the main character has undertaken, victimizing a series of massacred tattooed Latinos who stand in the way in the path of whom everything around him is capable of destroying, and only because of his uncontrollable thirst for justice. We wondered if such a level of pigeonholing was necessary. Strangely, in the closing credits, a large number of surnames of Latin origin are assumed to be contributors to this product. Striking paradox…
“Silent Night” ends up looking like a cyclothymic film, shot by a director who shows excellent visual skills of great inventiveness and, at the same time, an exasperating clumsiness in resolving the plot dilemmas it poses. In short, high doses of adrenaline are not enough to mitigate the harmful effects of a specimen that makes cliché its cannon fodder.
FILM REVIEW: «THANKSGIVING»
MASKED DEATH IN RED
Score: 5
The Thanksgiving Day sales, as an American cultural heritage and officially celebrated national holiday, appropriate the meaning and driving force of this film authored by the contemporary slasher master, Eli Roth. In reality, in Latin America, the original title (“Thanksgiving”) becomes “Black Friday”, whose commercial meaning adopted by these latitudes, also comes from the Northern Country, and functions as a plot hook. Time to kill and offers not to be thrown away…
Language differences aside, there is something eminently valuable on a strictly cinematographic level: the present is a feature film that has one hundred percent shock value in terms of entertainment. Throughout its more than one hundred minutes, Roth maintains a total level of cruising command over a product that exemplifies the characteristics of his artistic conception. Knowing how to preserve the aesthetic form that his cinema privileges (art design, music, photography), the director of “Hostel” (2007) and “Cabin Fever” (2011) conceives one of the bloodiest films of the year.
It is worth mentioning that the original idea of “Black Friday” dates back more than fifteen years, when the false trailer included in the extravagant film “Grindhouse” (2007), by Robert Rodríguez and Quentin Tarantino, became the present plot, where A ruthless serial killer unleashed panic in a peaceful community during a night in which a series of riots turned into tragedy. Focused on a particular target audience, viewers with a strong stomach are required to finish the substantial – although predictable – dish that horror cinema has in store for us as a farewell to the current year.
A mixture of absurdity and blood everywhere, traces of parodic comedy will end up making fun of the predictable to the extreme. With touches of social satire, divine vengeance will hover over the parameters of today’s consumerist society, and in the worst case scenario it will become constant: the director does not intend for us to empathize at all with the victims executed here. “Black Friday,” produced by Roger Birnbaum, entertains just enough
SHOW REVIEW / Enrique Bunbury in Argentina
THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING BUNBURY
by Jimena Coltrinari & Maximiliano Curcio
In a tremendous and triumphant comeback, Enrique Bunbury completed, on December 5, his long-awaited rebirth on stage at the Movistar Arena Stadium in Villa Crespo. Having overcome the uncertainty of the forced retirement that led to the suspension of the tour for his thirty-five-year career (the last concert was in May of last year, in Atlanta, USA), due to the deep discomfort caused by a smoke component (glycol) emitted by effect machines, the magnificent Aragonese singer, composer and poet dazzled an excited Buenos Aires audience.
Through two hours of show, and in the context of the official presentation of his newest album, «Greta Garbo» (published by Warner, with production by Adán Jodorowsky, last May), Enrique met on stage with his dear Holy Innocents (Álvaro Suite, on guitar; Jorge Rebenaque, on keyboards; Jordi Mena, on guitar; Ramón Gacias, on drums; Quino Béjar, on percussion; Robert Castellanos, on bass; and Erin Memento, on keyboards), after sixteen years of uninterrupted adventures and yet another example of their already proven chemistry together.
Buenos Aires has immense fortune, in being able to experience the resurgence of an artist at the apex of his conditions, exhibiting perfect physical and vocal form. Rock was deprived of one of its most fundamental standards of all time! Eclectic, magnetic and making his avant-garde art an inalienable precept, who sings in one of his most recent hits that ‘the day I least expect it I have to learn to disappear’, is back and looks radiant. Without a doubt, almost six years of absence weighed as a pending account, with the announced date of July 2020 having been suspended due to the restrictions resulting from the pandemic.
Always a perfectionist, charismatic and with a sophisticated style, the incomparable EB, a little bit of us and a little bit of everyone, shone with his own light, like a comet of dreams traveling through the universe. Willing to close the gap on that unwanted distance with the public during such a long hiatus, and clinging to his musical lifeline, the eternally thin man embarked on a new personal chapter in terms of shows, having overcome, perhaps, the most unsuccessful obstacle of his illustrious trajectory. At fifty-six years of age, one of the most phenomenal frontmen in the history of rock and roll (let’s not just talk about Hispanic rock), exercising a stage mastery at the height of his excellence, unique and inimitable, with impeccable wardrobe. -jacket and black embroidered pants in the mariachi style, hat and glasses- knew how to dazzle the sixteen thousand souls present in the venue. Because its essence is all magic.
Bunbury reviewed twenty songs from his extensive catalogue, and the beginning of the new tour left a setlist that featured a marked presence of the album “Expectativas” (2017, five songs included) to the detriment of some of his latest works (a only song from “Posible”, none from “Curso de Levitación Intensivo” or “El Puerto EP”, a triad released in times of confinement). Strikingly, an updated version of “Cualquiera en su Sanjo Juicio” slipped into the repertoire, in funky mode. In the midst of a high, a Buenos Aires audience that did not stop applauding those who feel at home in America, exploded upon hearing the first chords of the only two Héroes gems reviewed in the evening: “Entre Dos Tierras” and “Maldito Duende” . The chant was in unison: ‘Olé, olé, olé, olé…’
We must put into perspective what our eyes see: we are contemporaries of the Bunburyan era. And because the kick on the road made her privileged, Buenos Aires witnessed the world premiere of five of the ten songs that make up the brand new “Greta Garbo”, which is assumed to be a conceptual work that reflects an arduous emotional swing. Of course, there was no shortage of immovable classics, because there are songs like “El Extranjero”, “Que Tengas Suertecita” and “Porque las Cosas Cambian”, which represent an authentic declaration of principles for EB.
An international level setting had a giant screen in the background of the stage, through which we enjoyed successful visuals, while the display was completed with an outstanding play of lights and a huge catwalk, along which an always extrovert Enrique, visibly happy, dazzled with his millimetrically choreographed movements to the delight of a wild and hurricane field, on the verge of losing his sanity. How many are those who will continue to walk around in the end if they can stand? Yes, endurance is important…
In times of ‘more than ever betting on rock and roll’, in his words, Bunbury endorsed the right decision: the emotion of recovering the tribal ritual of live performances left the undoubted flavor of doing it in the right place. It was time to seize the moment… the communion and permanent connection of the rockstar with the public measured the level of mutual and passionate dedication. Not to mention the lucky ones who experienced the glory of having our legendary hero face to face in “Maldito Duende” and “De Todo El Mundo”, when he came down to the public sector. Memory keeps snapshots accumulated in our treasure. The respectable man roared like a ferocious animal… minutes later, ‘one more, and we won’t fuck around anymore,’ EB exclaimed, as if he were just another Buenos Aires citizen.
It should be noted that, on his return to Latin American lands, the creator of legendary albums such as “El Viaje a Ninguna Parte” (2004), “Las Consecuencias” (2010) and “Palosanto” (2013) will present five unique shows. calendar, visiting the cities of Bogotá, Santiago de Chile, Quito and Lima in the coming weeks, while, in the coming year, six announced stations await – for now: Mexico City, Guadalajara, Los Angeles, New York, Madrid and his native Zaragoza. And although the singer-songwriter warns that he has no intention of returning to the normality of concerts – that is, more extensive and demanding tours -, the before and after that represented the traumatic cancellation of the last tour and the great adversity that he had to overcome – perhaps climbing the Aconcagua, if necessary – seal the outcome of this story culminated with epic overtones.
FILM REVIEW: «NAPOLEON» (2023, Ridley Scott)
THE OBJECT OF DEBATE, by Maximiliano Curcio
Score: 7
Before arriving in streaming through the Apple TV platform, Ridley Scott’s version of “Napoleon”, a biopic of the maddened emperor and anticipated as one of the great tanks of the year, arrives in theaters at the hands of a prolific and versatile director , capable of tackling a wide range of genres with notable personality. Who made his debut on the big screen with the epic “The Duelists” (1977, based on the story by Joseph Conrad) and is currently filming the sequel to “Gladiator” (projected for 2024) releases a reduced two-hour version in theaters and forty in length, considerably shorter than the four-hour director’s cut that can be enjoyed in home format.
There are historical figures to whom cinema does not always do justice. Let’s think about the deficient Alexander the Great portrayed by Oliver Stone in 2005. Similar interest is aroused by Napoleon Bonaparte, an attractive character who was previously addressed in films such as “Waterloo” (1970, with Rod Steiger as the protagonist) “Desireé” (1972, with Marlon Brando as the protagonist), although it is probably Abel Gance’s colossal silent feat, released in 1927, that is the most remembered of all. Here, the British Scott, accustomed to stories of epic proportions, joins forces again with screenwriter David Scarpa, after “All the Money in the World” (2016), recruiting a cast led by Joaquin Pohenix (who returns to his command after “Gladiator”, 2000) and Vanessa Kirby.
An eighty-five-year-old filmmaker in prolific form, Scott establishes the notion of the classical creator par excellence. Placing the historical coordinates of the story between the end of the French Revolution (specifically, in the execution of Marie Antoinette, in 1793) and the death of the protagonist, exiled on the island of Saint Helena in 1821, “Napoleon” traces plot lines that move in parallel: the public man and the private man are scrutinized with precision, as the filmmaker unleashes his usual visual magic to create sequences that combine analog and digital effects. The “Napoleon” version 2023 takes on powerful spectacularity like a cannon shot: battles will abound on ice and snowy pines, bodies of soldiers will accumulate, sinking bloodied in the water, and from there it will move to the Egyptian desert.
Scott, who with great skill knows how to travel to the past (for example, in the failed “Crusade” or “Exodus: Gods and Kings”) and the future of humanity (read, “Blade Runner” and “The Martian”), On this occasion, he will omit Bonaparte’s conquests in Italian lands and must overcome the skeptical glances that hover over the witnessed story. This is not the first biopic to take notable historical license, only to be confronted by the more traditional critical current. Although the period adaptation makes the circumstances in which the story is set look credible (perfect technical aspects through), certain creative freedoms and anachronisms of the language take away some depth from the proposal. Without going any further, the age of the French soldier himself in the first sequence of events reported (around twenty-five years old) contrasts with Phoenix’s current age (forty-nine years old).
Ready to carry out a detailed portrait of the political leader, Scott navigates the ranks of power, not always adhering to the rigor of the facts; and it is in Phoenix’s immeasurable talent where the fate of the film rests. The volatile emperor, statesman and strategist, despot and insecure, prisoner of his excesses and traumas, is portrayed with solvency by an actor who knows how to veer from the contained to the explosive. In the shadow of his mother, because without her he will be nothing, Bonaparte intends to conquer the world and a female heart. Obsessed with fatherhood, he has brutal sex and eats compulsively. Blinded by ambition, three words are fixed in his mind and will be the last ones he will utter: France, the army, Josephine. The latter, played by a glorious Kirby, on whose neckline Scott seems to have a marked fixation.
Phoenix brims with dramatic layers in a breathtaking and enigmatic performance, revealing the inherent complexity of a personality as fascinating as it is contradictory. With his usual intensity, he intrudes into the darkness of a being moved by the rapt and uncontrollable desire to impose himself and dominate. In this sense, it is key to understanding the magnitude of his personal crossroads, the weight that the tortured and unhealthy love story with his promiscuous wife acquires on the story, a dilemma that marked – and fed back – his years of military dominance.
“Napoleon” does not skimp on real heavy artillery when it comes to capturing spectacular battle sequences, conceived on a choreographic scale of excellence. Brutal, immersive and ultraviolent, it was filmed over sixty-two days of filming spread between locations in Malta and Italy, during the past European summer, and its participation in the next Oscar Awards is anticipated, capturing the nominations for categories technicians. Using the omnipresent contribution of original music by Martin Phipps, Corsican choirs, popular songs of the time – such as “La Carmagnole” – and classical pieces by Haydn and Purcell provide a successful atmosphere. Never a stranger to controversy and making opulence her letter of introduction, she will know how to withstand the objections of scandalized biographers and historians willing to line up in movie queues and then look under the magnifying glass.
FILM REVIEW / «FALLEN LEAVES» (2023, Aki Kaurismaki)
LIKE GARDEL, by Maximiliano Curcio
Score: 8
Presented on the penultimate day of the Cannes Film Festival and then landed at the Mar del Plata International Film Festival, “Autumn Leaves”, the latest from filmmaker Aki Kaurismaki, arrives in local theaters. Habité of international circuits, a craftsman of austere and minimalist films, brings us here the story of two lonely souls destined to meet.
Through a total of twenty feature films shot to date, in forty years of travel, Kaurismaki, a reference in modern cinema, has perfected and deepened his sensitive episodic look at losers, silent and sad people, who usually move in closed spaces and decadent, in search of a reason to live. Addressing the terrain of dramatic comedies, tragicomedies or pure dramas, the Finn has pursued small variations on his ‘macro story in patterns’ to build a solid and enduring authorial body. His brand new opus is no exception.
Two stars of the Nordic industry, Alma Pöysti and Jussi Vatanen, play, respectively, a woman unfairly fired from her job, overwhelmed by reality, and a stubborn addict of drink, a chain smoker and a tough guy who doesn’t sing. They are both in their forties. Although lovers separated by chance events of destiny make up a classic convention in romantic fiction, “Autumn Leaves” reformulates it with exquisite good taste. Sorting through a bitter work and personal present, both characters will find themselves immersed in the precariousness and daily violence of a world where misery and inequalities prevail. With minimal gestures, the oppression of the lovers is portrayed through a shocking poetic flight.
Who made his debut four decades ago with a celebrated adaptation of “Crime and Punishment” (1983), confirms himself, in the maturity of his career, as an expert in plotting portraits of resignation and dissatisfaction. On this occasion, the personal drama unfolds, once again, on the shores of society. There where Kaurismaki usually find fertile matter for reflection. Current events place us in precise historical coordinates, because the social reality of the environment (Russia’s war with Ukraine) does not escape the level of analysis of this magical and sentimental fable. Generational portrait about two born losers and their possibility (or not) of meeting, in chance (a telephone number lost in the wind) lies the possibility of making their dull lives something better, together.
The person responsible for “The Man Without a Past” (2002) or “Le Havre” (2011), conceives a concise work lasting an hour and a half. With a theatrical and precise representation, the camera remains almost motionless, while a distinguished color palette and that friendly dog that is never missing in the Finn’s sober filmography, are assumed as the umpteenth example of highly recognizable authorship traits. Using its most playful side, cinephilia, cinema within cinema, makes its appearance, turning “Autumn Leaves” into a delight for lovers of the seventh art. Quotes from Luchino Visconti, Robert Bresson and Michelángelo Antonioni, signs and posters everywhere, plus a trip to the darkened theater to see the latest by Jim Jarmusch speak clearly to us about his fine palate.
With an omnipresent radio that takes us back to more romantic times and abundant intradiegetic music with sufficient metaphorical meaning, the story continues to draw, with parsimony, the silhouette of these two anonymous beings in the eyes of their peers. Two destined to lose, soulless from taciturn routine.
Anchored in a love that cannot shine, when it is time for autumn to bloom in the heart. “Arrabal Amargo” plays, by Carlos Gardel and Alfredo le Pera (1935). Then more Buenos Aires nods will come: a cafe called “Buenos Aires.” Where does Kaurismaki’s tango fascination come from? If we go back in time, we will remember that back in 2017 he maintained that tango, the citizen music of Argentina and Uruguay, is an invention of his compatriots.
On the other side of hope, this captivating love story, fun and depressing in similar doses, has the ability to make its audience fall in love from beginning to end. Profoundly humanist, the sixty-six-year-old director balances the balance with abundant passages of black humor, moving freely in an environment of icy spirit willing, paradoxically, to shelter two warm hearts. The kind that will seem not to be molded for happy endings, but rather to be prisoners of their own disappointments. Will they finally have revenge? Although, provocatively, Kaurismaki has expressed that ‘cinema is not an art’, the outstanding audiovisual exercise that he practices here could easily convince us of the opposite.
ROGER WATERS RELEASES THE FILM «THIS IS NOT A DRILL» (Live from O2 Prague Stadium)
By Maximiliano Curcio
Roger Waters, the most political of the members of Pink Floyd, returns to the stage with his farewell tour “This is Not a Drill”. Music and social commitment come together as a common denominator of a concert program called to meet their visual expectations, although certainly tarnished by the message of anti-Semitic hatred of which the renowned musician was the subject of accusations.
Part anguish, part political rant – in Waters’ own words, tinged with irony – the singer ended up being a victim of his own conjectures, not afraid to speak out against the ruling classes. In the eye of the storm due to the controversial statements during her show in Berlin -last May-, Waters put up a strong defense: <<My performance has provoked attacks of bad faith from those who want to defame me and silence me because I do not They agree with my political opinions and moral principles. The elements that have been questioned are clearly a statement in opposition to fascism, injustice and intolerance in all their forms. Attempts to present them as false are politically motivated. I have spent my entire life denouncing authoritarianism and oppression. I will continue to condemn injustice and all those who perpetrate it.
“This Is Not a Drill” is the English composer’s seventh concert tour, and successor to the successful “Us ¬+Them”. Originally scheduled to take place between July and October 2020, it was suspended after the advance of the pandemic, and rescheduled to take place in 2022. It began in various American cities, then moved to Europe, and stopped in Prague, at the gigantic Stadium O2 Arena. Particularly, said concert was recorded live and projected in more than a thousand movie theaters around the world. Shared direction by Waters himself with Sean Evans – the same tandem that was in charge of the last audiovisual project, released in 2019 –, the musical documentary has a duration of almost three hours, and the repertoire that we can enjoy there is the one that replicated Waters during a tour that has taken him through Europe, Oceania and America.
With a quadrant-style stage, giant screens projecting superimposed images and text, and a round-shaped audience configuration, the show began with an organ and voice version of “Comfortably Numb” (recently recorded in the studio), followed by “Run Like Hell.” Unforgettable melodies immerse us in the depths of the night, and this is how the classics “Shine on You Crazy Diamond”, “Sheep”, “Wish You Were Here”, “Another Brick in the Wall” and “Have a Cigar” follow one another. ”.
Midway through the concert, Waters sits down at the piano with “The Bravery of Being Out of Range,” from his 1992 solo album. He then improvises on an extensive, minimalist version of the previously unreleased “The Bar.” With a certain melancholy, he recalls compositional anecdotes in a duet with the late Syd Barrett, to whom he dedicates the current section. The air becomes more nostalgic when it comes to celebrating one’s own legacy, while Waters recapitulates the first contract signing by the band originally from London. In a later segment, he will be in charge of reviewing some of the songbook from his latest and celebrated album released to date: “Is This the Life we Really Want?” (2016).
Having just turned eighty years old, the timelessness of his work does not lose validity. Waters, who has announced his retirement from the stage after the conclusion of this tour, has just released the solo re-recording of the epic and conceptual “The Dark Side of the Moon”, on the occasion of its fiftieth anniversary. A review that promises to extend to other works co-authored with David Gilmour, Richard Wright and Nick Mason.
MUSICIANS ON THE TOUR:
Jonathan Wilson – guitars and vocals / Dave Kilminster – guitars and vocals / Jon Carin – keyboards, guitars and vocals / Gus Seyffert – bass and vocals / Robert Walter – keyboards / Joey Waronker – drums / Shanay Johnson and Amanda Belair – backing vocals / Seamus Blake – saxophone
THIS IS NOT A DRILL – song repertoire:
Set 1
“Comfortably Numb 2022″ / «The Happiest Days of Our Lives» / «Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2» / «Another Brick in the Wall, Part 3» / «The Powers That Be» / «The Bravery of Being Out of Range» / The Bar» / «Have a Cigar» / Wish You Were Here» / «Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts VI-VIII)» / «Sheep»
Set 2
«In the Flesh» / «Run Like Hell» / «Déjà Vu» / «Is This the Life We Really Want?» / «Money» / «Us and Them» / «Any Color You Like» / «Brain Damage» / «Eclipse»
Encore
«Two Suns in the Sunset» / «The Bar» (reprise) / «Outside the Wall»
FILM REVIEW: HYPNOTIC (2023, Robert Rodríguez)
By Maximiliano Curcio
I DO NOT BELIEVE YOU AT ALL / Score: 1
Ben Affleck and Alice Braga star in this brand new futuristic thriller, in which a detective finds himself strangely involved in a case related to the disappearance of his daughter. The poor “Hypnotic” is the clearest example that Robert Rodríguez has misplaced his talents, unable to come close to the heels of Christopher Nolan, whom he seems to aim to emulate.
As soon as the footage begins, we realize that this is an unsalvageable product. Rodríguez loses control sooner rather than later, getting bogged down in a series of frankly ridiculous decisions. It is better not to ask questions and rethink the fortuitous decisions that a porous narrative makes. A crack opens up in the constructed structure through which countless inconsistencies will leak, with impunity. As if that were not enough, this thriller mixed with psychic and paranormal elements uses, strikingly, crude special effects. Sixty-five million dollars have been thrown away.
Only because the mind works inconceivable wonders will we try to focus our attention…we immerse ourselves in the traumas of the subconscious that disrupt reality. Because, in truth, we are not in the presence of a futuristic thriller as advertised, but rather an exaggerated dystopian soap opera that is pulling its hair out. Throughout its ninety minutes of footage, “Hypnotic” is plagued with dialogues that cause embarrassment to others. Every now and then, it squanders potential. Over explanatory, it highlights the obvious and has the need to repeat the evidence. A force agent is executed with a bullet to the forehead. His colleague comes over and asks if he is okay. All that said, one button is enough for samples.
A film with aspirations to leave its mark at the box office, “Hypnotic” selects the wrong ingredients when combining mystery, sci-fi and touches of action. Cheap impulses of the slightest entertainment, pompous gesticulations, racist excesses and an almost criminal aesthetic crudeness, are made up of the dysfunctional pieces of a disorganized script, full of twists worthy of a shock of implausibility. Between runs and shots of simulated reality, it is uncomfortable to scratch the itch. The eyes burn and restlessness beats. How can a top director become so predictable and amateurish? The question remains unanswered.
A listless Affleck drags his feet when it’s time to pick up the pace; umpteenth example of a credible damaged. It is exhausting to see the former Batman suffer every second of one of the worst performances of his long career. We feel sorry for his suffering expression and we wish to see him return to his role as director as soon as possible. We would like to encourage him to run and escape as soon as possible from such a disaster… but, the poor man, he just wanders, perhaps remembering a similar stumble that occurred two decades earlier, with a similarly crafted mammoth: “Paycheck” by John Woo. The similarity applies perfectly, because this disappointing and sleepy experience applies as a movie made for streaming format.
Good old Ben is surrounded by a dozen performers who are victims of cliché and lazy actor direction, in keeping with a script for beginners. Prey to its own limitations, “Hypnotic” prefers a laughable resolution. The quagmire of ideas emerges in the most ridiculous way: a couple with hypnotic powers have brought into the world a girl condemned to a life as a victim of her abilities. Taking a page from the “Matrix” playbook, we inhabit a parallel reality of blurred factions. With sanity gone, we are encouraged not to believe what we see. But, in reality, what happens is something else. We are in the presence of the most absolute sophistication of mediocrity.
Such a diffuse approach ends up getting tangled in itself. Unable to come to fruition, “Hypnotic” opens multiple narrative lines that it does not care to delve into. He glimpses a small hope and then restricts it: when he glimpses a certain social scope (totalitarian control governments and systematic domination), Rodríguez chooses to go in another direction. Just another tenuous flirtation with some significance. He who covers a lot doesn’t squeeze much, the director of notable films like “El Mariachi” should know. However, it leaves the door open for a sequel. The idea materializes in a frankly regrettable post-credits scene, conceptualizing in the most crude way possible the usurpation of another’s body.
As if trapped with no way out, sitting in our chair in a semi-empty dark room, we had to face the bad news. “Hypnotic” is the height of confusion. Affleck knows it, but he increased his checkbook. Three, two, one…now use your illusion: it’s time to wake up.
FILM REVIEW: THAT CRIME IS MINE (2023, Francois Ozon)
By Maximiliano Curcio
THE ARMCHAIR OF THE ACCUSED / Score: 7
One of the most prominent European filmmakers on the contemporary scene releases his twenty-second feature film, closing a trilogy of light but profound comedies in the vein of “8 Women” (2001) and “Potiche” (2007). The prolific Francois Ozon returns to the big screen with a proposal drastically different from the last we saw of his vintage. In September of last year, in Cannes, it had been the turn to learn about the remake of “The Bitter Tears of Peter Von Kant”, by Reiner W. Fassbinder. Chameleonic and inexhaustible, the Gaul freely adapts a play written by Georges Berr and Louis Verenuil in 1934; a small forgotten piece that resonates strongly in the present.
With a luxury cast made up of solid and rising main actresses (Nadia Tereszkiewicz. Rebecca Marder) and luxury supporting actresses (Isabelle Huppert, Fabrice Luchini, Dany Boon and Jean-Christophe Bouvet), “That Crime is Mine”, a boulevard comedy from the crazy ’30s, could be understood, at first glance, as a subversive look at women’s liberation, but, if we look closely, we will find much more. Providing the laughter with an air of vaudeville, the story shows us a playful Ozon, who, however, has not lost his intensity. However, the change of record may have an impact, after dedicating the last five years of his career to investigating topics such as the consequences of war, pedophilia and euthanasia.
Hours after being implicated as the main suspect in the murder of a famous film producer, a small-time actress intends to prove her innocence by claiming self-defense. It is there when, together with her lawyer and personal friend, she joins forces to counteract their respective reputations that have been questioned; The blonde and the brunette are willing to confront the overwhelming patriarchy. Has the crime committed been the cause of unspeakable passions? Let’s take a closer look. Or is something else hiding behind it? The French author subtly suggests: a repressed lesbian relationship could exist between the two. With a sense of opportunism, and the urgency to escape from a terrible social condition, women try to carve out a life under equal conditions, in times where the female vote was not an acquired right.
Ozon rehearses a rude close-up and pounces on the object of desire: a performer of dubious reputation knows how to flirt and then profit. Submissive and under the orders of men, it is time to resurface and rebel from the harassment and abuse suffered firsthand. Or not? The -apparent- male violence is used to reach the desired pedestal; Sheet favors and double intentions are unceremoniously exposed. A two-man setup adulterates the crime scene, heading for profit at all costs, capable of devising the perfect strategy to buy a verdict. Young and pretty, Madeleine attends to her game. Will he be able to vindicate himself? In the manner of “Rashomon” (1950 Akira Kurosawa), various points of view reconstruct that fateful afternoon. The appearance of an expensive sum of money could be a faithful indicative clue…only, under the exposed circumstances, all that glitters is not gold.
Legal thriller that disbelieves in the human condition, the film exposes the trap at any price. The end justifies the means? In this satire on the demonization of patriarchy, money can buy status and peace of conscience. No one is saved here: manipulative women versus corrupt men engage in physical and dialectical battles. Without pause, but without hurry, the filmmaker scrutinizes stalkers, mythomaniacs, extortioners, ambitious people and climbers. Let him who is free from sin cast the first stone! Whether it is through marriages of convenience or lovers by turns in exchange for good pay, farce rules society decades after the advent of matriarchy. Because, temporal coordinates aside, it is necessary to climb, although to do so it must be simulated to emerge unscathed. Guilty until proven guilty, Madeleine’s ordeal begins…
The author of works such as “The Double Lover”, and who has seen enough screwball comedy by a race reference like Ernest Lubitsch, knows how to fit into this intrigue the determining role that a down-and-out actress who has not known how to adapt to the sound transition; one among many others mistreated by such a breakdown in the industry. Aware of her inferiority, the waning celluloid diva of yesteryear (Odette) yearns for something more than a simple supporting role through which to re-emerge. When you try to shine at any cost, tricks and resources will emerge to distort the course of events. Here, two guilty for the same crime. Youth, divine treasure?
As the footage progresses, the film is filled with nods to silent film emblems such as Abel Gance and Alice Guy, the first director of a fiction film, contributing to the foundations of cinematographic evolution. Also included is an explicit mention of “Mauvaise Graine”, a French foray by Billy Wilder and starring, in 1934, Pierre Mingand and Danielle Darrieux. That was not all: cinema within the cinema, a bloody version of “María Antonienta” is filmed. The historical parallelism is not random: Ozon empowers and then questions. Killing in self-defense to preserve integrity camouflages other intentions: to provoke and then take advantage. With sagacity, the author will not pontificate revenge.
“That Crime is Mine” flirts with clichés without falling victim to them. An artificial and vibrant mix of genres, it makes humor and fundamental misunderstandings allies. Sarcastic and ironic, although not a pamphleteer, she refrains from glorifying her women under the magnifying glass of the law. Nor will it be your intention to disguise the true intentions. Simulating sorority in line with the contemporary struggle, it exposes the prevailing hypocrisies in the midst of an environment where everyone seeks their own benefit. In truth, blackmail between women is the mechanism that makes the mystery possible, even if it is not due to a domino effect. The premeditated action exposes the sensationalist flow of a less free era, but not for that reason more puritanical.
An essential condiment, journalism echoes the black chronicle, while absolute scandal titles illustrate the news that is worth a newspaper cover. Because the world of showbiz rules from yesterday to today. Using an absurdity that sneaks, shamelessly, between lines of dialogue, the proposal acquires identity by ridiculing the solemnity of imposed slogans of inclusion in which it is difficult to believe. The French director satirizes his message of equal pay and professional aspirations: behind the facade appears the frivolity and cold calculation of someone who wants to either acquire a name for themselves or renew old laurels.
“That Crime is Mine” resonates with the present, and it is its merit to evaluate a distant chronology with today’s eyes, although with similar problems and dynamics. Proof of his intelligence and transgression, Ozon goes back almost a century to reveal perennial imperfections. Ultimately, the murder weapon has not been able to make a dent in bulletproof egos and amoral spirits.
FILM REVIEW: THE KILLER (2023, David Fincher)
By Maximiliano Curcio
DO THE RIGHT THING / Score: 6
Based on the graphic novel of the same name, authored by Alexis Nolen, “The Killer”, a new film by the always intriguing David Fincher, arrives on the Netflix platform – after a brief stop on the big screen. With a script by Andrew Kevin Walker (the author of “Seven”), the film stars German star Michael Fassbender, who returns to the film sets after a four-year hiatus. The premise tells us about the unexpected twist that the existence of a hitman suffers, following a mishap that will cause an unusual chain of violence. Over the course of two hours, we will take in the tragic events that unfold from their exclusive perspective. Welcome to an exploration of psyche and crime for hire.
We should understand this peculiar example of suspense as a long and endless voice-over narration. We are participants in the daily routine of this experienced hitman. His stillness is not like Dylan Thomas’s leisure, he is just waiting for the right moment to take action. In a very extensive introduction, he reflects internally about finitude, in the face of an absolute void. Develop theories and metrics of the world’s population. It converges in the meaninglessness of life. We have before us a misanthrope who is skeptical of the existence of his soul in the afterlife. It is only worth doing what you believe is necessary in the physical time that is given to you. Sometimes, the most difficult thing is to overcome the threshold of monotonous waiting. Exhausting dolce far niente.
In the middle of the street, we could easily confuse him. He seems like a guy like any other, a music lover who is a fan of The Smiths, a group he listens to incessantly. In the solitude of his room, he practices careful yoga postures. But, if we do not empathize, his fixed gaze, without blinking, freezes our soul. The murderer, who Fassbender composes with sobriety and coldness, listens to the voice of conscience to anticipate before improvising. With a firm hand, he executes his victims. Because he came to do only what he was paid to do. Because for him, completing his task is everything. And when something goes out of plan, you wonder: what would John Wilkes Booth have done? (in reference to the American actor famous for assassinating President Abraham Lincoln in 1865.
While we wonder what the new Netflix has in store for us, we take note of the uniqueness of this story: it is told through chapters that take place in various cities (Paris, New York, Miami, Santo Domingo, New Orleans). The first trademarks of the purest Fincher style soon appear: impeccable cinematography, a camera capable of creating a textbook street chase, and an omnipresent soundtrack by the effective duo of Atticus Ross and Trent Raznor. Obsessed with lenses, peepholes, other people’s privacy and windows, from time to time he performs a version that looks like a pure Brian De Palma. We wonder if, perhaps, there isn’t something voyeuristic about every elite assassin.
Barely having begun the footage and at full speed, the film patents its visual style from the sudden passage of the opening credits. The person responsible for hits like “Seven” (1995), “Fight Club” (1999) and “Zodiac” (2007) chooses to maintain the first-person narrator at all times: from the first moment, we are shared musings about the criminal life and a disastrous vision of the world. In a privileged front row seat, we are invited to their bloodthirsty raid, halfway between airports, heavy but restorative naps and changes of identity. With the exception of a hand-to-hand confrontation, which seems literally taken from another film, there are no traces of flashiness or choreography here that refer to the vacuous contemporary action cinema.
“The Killer”, with supporting cast participation by Tilda Swinton and Sarah Baker, undertakes a cocktail of styles that amalgamates Hong Kong action cinema, noir and pulp, taking implicit references from Michael Winner’s “The Mechanic” -and its remake by Simon West-, “The Silence of a Man” by Jean-Pierre Melville, “A History of Violence” by David Cronenberg and “Point Blank” by John Boorman. Fassbender, in the role of an impassive and elegant criminal, returns to the cinema after a prolonged absence (since “The Snowman”, Tomas Alfredson). His voice filters into our ears, as he repeats, over and over again, his incorruptible ethical code of conduct. The cinema was losing a great actor!
The director, in command of his ship, intends a course radically opposite to the mainstream effect; and how well it does. Throughout the plot, the viewer will encounter macro conflicts that, diversified into chapters, reconstruct the latent tension. Fincher uses refined images to conceive concrete ideas, even without approaching the most outstanding in his extensive career, far from it. However, in its simplicity and minimalism lies the share of the meager genius that a work with a whiff of a sequel exhibits. Although the result is not brilliant or as organic as expected in advance, the rhythm of segmented sequences, inherited from the novel, is validated as a structure that works in the audiovisual format, despite an absolutely anti-climax outcome.
ALBUM REVIEWS: «HACKNEY DIAMONDS» (2023, The Rolling Stones)
By Maximiliano Curcio
If we go back to the stone vintage of the last decade, we can find in copies such as the single “Doom and Gloom” (first of two singles included in “GRRR!”, from 2012, which on three CDs grouped fifty of the greatest hits of a prolific career), the covers album “Blue and Lonesome” (2016, covering other artists for the first time in his career) and “Living in a Ghost Town” (2020, song written, recorded and published in full pandemic). After a long silence without releasing their own album material, The Rollling Stones return to a high level with one of the most anticipated new releases of this year: “Hackney Diamonds”, by Polydor, composed of twelve tracks and released on the market on the 20th. October. The album was presented on Thursday night, with a surprise show in a bar in New York, for 500 select and exclusive guests. The band led by the very veteran Jagger/Richards duo – both of whom will turn eighty years old in 2023 – conceives the first work of unreleased songs in album format since “A Bigger Bang”, and the twenty-sixth of their extensive career. Stainless, and still overcoming the irreparable loss of Charlie Watts, the word retirement does not exist in their vocabulary. The Glimmer Twins did it again.
Tracklist: “Angry,” “Get Close” (feat. Elton John), “Depending On You,” “Bite My Head Off” (feat. Paul McCartney), “Whole Wide World,” “Dreamy Sky,” “Mess it Up” ”, ”Live By The Sword” (feat. Elton John, Charlie Watts and Bill Wyman), “Driving Me Too Hard”, ”Tel Me Straight”, “Sweet Sound Of Heaven” (feat. Lady Gaga and Stevie Wonder) and “Rolling Stone Blues” (by Muddy Watters).
(*): “The Glimmer Twins” is a pseudonym by which Mick Jagger and Keith Richards are known, who use it in the credits as producers of The Rolling Stones albums . appearing for the first time under this function in “It’s Only Rock ‘n’ Roll” (1974), without clarifying that it was an alias of their respective people.
FILM REVIEW: «THE KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON» (2023, Martin Scorsese)
by Maximiliano Curcio / A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE
Score: 9
Let us think of “Vesuvius VI”, a short film with which he made his directorial debut, as the most distant reference of his illustrious filmography: in sixty-four years to date, Martin Scorsese has not stopped. It is not in their plans, shortly after announcing future projects in film and serial format. One of the most renowned directors in history is also one of those who has remained active the longest; appearance in no way minor, at almost eighty-three years of age (he will turn next November). Written by him, and starring Leonardo Di Caprio, Robert De Niro and Lily Gladstone, “The Killers of the Flower Moon” comes to the big screen, one of the most anticipated films of the current 2023 season, inspired by a book by no- fiction authored by true-crime journalist David Grann.
Together with his faithful collaborator Thelma Shoonmaker, in editing, the multi-award-winning director returns to the fray with the bloody story behind the criminal plots launched against the native peoples of the American northwest, and the result is high-impact. The inexhaustible Scorsese co-writes a portentous script with Eric Roth (“The Insider” / “The Good Shepherd” / “Munich”), in a detailed portrait of the abuses and humiliations suffered by the enriched indigenous nation. This legendary Hollywood luminary, fond of works of caliber, attempts to unravel the dark truth behind the murders perpetrated against the richest per capita tribe in the United States: the Osage
The story takes us back in time: in 1870, to the time when the Osage had been expelled from their lands in Kansas and moved to a reservation in northeastern Oklahoma. Half a century later, one of the largest oil fields in the United States is discovered. The payment for the right to extract made them, immediately, millionaires. The laws of the time placed the white man under the figure of intermediary guardian, with the power to administer said assets, a direct passport to scams, plots and all kinds of lucubrations likely to unleash what in North American history is known as the ‘kingdom’. of terror’. The immense night hangs over the vast rural landscape, translating the echo of that native voice: a howl of unmistakable clamor.
The teacher continues to teach, like an excellent orchestra conductor. Responsible for gems such as “The Last Temptation of Christ”, “Silence” and “Kundun”, he does not lose his elegance when filming, disseminating elements in the shot that give aesthetic quality to the proposal, and effective in granting capital virtue to a work of impeccable technical areas: the sections of photography, costumes and makeup, as well as art and production design, stand out in particular. Excellence is enhanced by the intriguing soundtrack composed by the recently deceased Robbie Robertson, dictating the tempo of a mammoth story that simmers.
A luxury cast accompanies the protagonists, and among their ranks we rescue supporting characters such as Jessie Plemmons, John Lithgow and Brendan Fraser, a facet that only makes the proposal even more attractive. “The Killers of the Flower Moon” is a cinephile bite that is savored with great patience. Unmatchable realism and full immersion are combined in a secular story that captivates us from the first moment, making this magnificent exercise of the seventh art possible. Scorsese, with a good hand, knows how not to overwhelm us: passages of black comedy level the omnipresent heaviness of a time in which the age of innocence has definitively been left behind.
Prejudices and benefits inherent to skin color are interpreted as a vehicle of denunciation to show the durability of infamous and unjust systems in recent American history, speaking out against colonialism and corporate abuses, even as a warning signal to those who survive around of today’s world. Knowing that humanization does not equal absolution, the great Marty challenges the same miseries of the viewer, and does not mean that we empathize with the manipulative and extortionate practices carried out by the clan of ruthless and conniving white men. In the interstices of the gray border of good and evil, vile money tempts the powerful landowners of the area. The wild ’20s are going on, the law is conspicuous by its absence and ambition breaks every moral limit. A black cloud of tragedy extends throughout the North American territory, because human beings can become the greediest of all creatures.
Scorsese is not concerned with investigating those responsible for the murders, but rather with how they came to occur. Taking the form of an epic condemnation of evil and human greed, the main goal of “The Killers of the Flower Moon” is to explore the most complex side of the conflict: what is the role played by those accomplices of convenience, essential for the success of nefarious and horrifying systems? Wolves disguised in sheep’s clothing, apparently kind, intellectual authors who move the gears of a perverse and flawed system. The film is understood, ultimately, as a perfect photo of the prevailing racism and segregation, in times when bloody massacres were carried out against the black population.
The narrative runs through the sieve of the white man’s gaze and the devastating effects of his actions. A specialist in portraying the bestial details each social aspect that describes such unpunished maneuvering; With a sense of agonizing tragedy, the New York native stages deceptions and bad intentions. Incorporating an abundant dose of malice in archetypes recognizable to gangster cinema, Scorsese mocks the caricature and madness of those blinded by power and ambition. Later in the story, he will get involved in the ambivalent role played by the incipient investigation bureau, a government body commanded by Edgar J.-Hoover (a character that DiCaprio himself played, in the film directed by Clint Eastwood, released in 2009).
Arduo turns out to empathize with the condemnable character played by a chameleon-like DiCaprio in Marlon Brando mode. Theirs is the absolute lack of judgment as is their irresponsible and cynical decision-making. Good old Leo puts on the clothes of a true faint-hearted man, and, as viewers, we are treated to the obtuse perspective of a being incapable of correcting his own course or of being emotionally or morally linked to the drastic consequences that his actions produce around him. On the other hand, the dark and devilish mentor played by a De Niro of ungovernable acting strength does nothing but fuel the depravity of an interpretive duel to remember. Who, for their part, coincide for the third time on the big screen, after «This Boy’s Life» (1993, Michael Catron-Jones) and «Marvin’s Room» (1996, Jerry Zaks).
Two absolutely fantastic works, from both DiCaprio and De Niro, steal the entire spotlight, delivering a pair of powerful performances deserving of every award there is and ever will be. This marks the sixth collaboration between Martin Scorsese and Leo Di Caprio (including «Gangsters of New York», «The Aviator», «The Departed» and «The Shutter Island»), although – strikingly – only the first in a decade ( since «The Wolf of Wall Street», 2013). On the other hand, “Killers on the Moon” represents the tenth project that brings together Scorsese and De Niro over exactly fifty years. Ten films, all of them magnificent, and to take into account: “Mean Streets” (1973), “Taxi Driver” (1976), “New York, New York” (1977), “Raging Bull” (1980), “The King of Comedy” (1982), “Goodfellas” (1990), “Casino” (1995) and “The Irishman” (2019). Without a doubt, one of the most fruitful duos in the entire history of the seventh art.
As in “The Irishman”, we could think of this product as a format template for a miniseries, perhaps extending over the last hour of footage. However, and without adhering to the rules of thriller or falling within those of melodrama, the balance is beneficial: “The Killers of the Flower Moon” is forceful cinematographic material that brings with it reminiscences of the Oscar-winning “Dances with Wolves” (1990), “Legends of the Fall” (1994) and “Bloody Oil” (2008). The number one favorite in early awards season predictions for the upcoming American winter, it incorporates numerous black-and-white image files from the era, as well as one of a radio drama performance that, although it considerably dilutes the climax of the outcome, saves for himself a cameo appearance that is as unexpected as it is celebrated.
FILM REVIEW: «SIMONE WEIL: A Woman of the Century» (2022), by Maximiliano Curcio
THE PEACEFUL REASONS FOR HER FIGHT / Score: 7
Simone Weil, French judge, philosopher and politician, who became president of the European Parliament, is the subject of the new biopic by French director Olivier Dahan. A survivor of the Nazi concentration camps where his family perished, Weil is a key figure in understanding the evolution of European social thought in the 20th century. Recognized for filming the biopics of Edith Piaf (“La Mome”, 2005) and Grace Kelly (“Grace of Monaco”, 2014), Dahan illustrates here the tragedies of this survivor of the horror of Auschwitz and the Nazism that destroyed her family .
The film, lasting almost two and a half hours, covers aspects of his life as if it were an autobiography, however, this is not an adaptation of the book he authored himself, “A Life.” In this sense, “Simone: the Woman of a Century” addresses, from the early origins of the thinker to the terrible experience she went through in the fields; also, to her actions in the territory of feminist thought, her promotion of substantial improvements in women’s prisons, her intervention in the conflict with Algeria and her statement against those who wanted to trivialize the Shoa.
A victim of the state during the occupation, Weil entered the political life of his country from the very hell of his life. Fighting for women’s rights and for the construction of European unity, in a valiant search for the guarantee of world peace, and influencing the sanction of the decriminalization of abortion (the Weil law). Facing his detractors, Weil avoided the disqualifying grievances of the prevailing conservative patriarchy. It is striking that someone who suffered so much dedicated his life to the suffering of others, for entire years to the tireless fight against discrimination, xenophobia and intolerance.
An impeccable soundtrack by Olvon Yacob accompanies this coming and going in time, randomly covering geography and familiar environments. With deep psychological depth, the film describes the inherent commitment of an extinct political and intellectual lineage. Her faith in human beings intact, she maintained a high volume of work and vocation, driven by an ungovernable inner fury and consistent with the desire for a united Europe. Defying the mandates of her time, because Weil did not intend to be her husband’s pet.
Starring Isa Zylberstein as a mature Simone Veil and Rebecca Marder as her younger self, “Simone: a Woman of the Century” won two César Awards, for Best Costume Design and Best Production Design. Weil, who in 1979 presided over the first European Parliament to arise from direct universal voting and in 2010 became the sixth woman in history to enter the French Academy, Weil was a woman absent of fear and full of empathy and humanity. Someone who was known to be a thorn in the collective memory, and raised the act of conscience to unite and resist any return of totalitarianism to their lands.
Brave and free thinker, she went through the worst of ignominy and horror. In this sense, the portrait that the film portrays is effective when it comes to depicting the difficulties of reconstructing oneself after going through a transformative experience, where human beings (and their female counterparts) are capable of becoming the worst of the monsters. This is how she learned to be tough and tan her skin, to the events that precede her. To honor his loved ones and his memory; the one that haunts the survivors, and makes us responsible for our future.
FILM REVIEW: «THE EQUALIZER 3», by Maximiliano Curcio
THE ORDER RESTORED / Score: 7
The relentless Robert McCall says goodbye to movie theaters with this third installment of pure adrenaline, as he overcomes the blows of a deep existential crisis. Denzel Washington returns once again to a role that has identified his last decade on the big screen. With incorruptible principles and by his own hand, the self-proclaimed vigilante endorses his credentials par excellence. McCall spells his last name with aplomb, piano, piano, turns on his watch and sets it to count down…because he who warns does not betray and announces what is about to happen. Now the gun (or fist) pointing in our direction is its own business. Denzel would not have wanted to come to these terms, but villains almost always invite him to lose his patience.
The new and final installment of “The Equalizer”, based on the television series “The Equalizer”, released in the 1980s, more than delivers in the audiovisual execution. A majestic photography, a soundtrack as an instrument of drama, a choice of shots and camera movements that enhance the use of closed spaces and a surgical montage, raise the artistic bar for an action product that surpasses – and comfortably – commercial and profitable copies of these times, such as the overrated “John Wick” saga.
Between camera shots designed to show us the magnificent geography of the paradisiacal Mediterranean town that sets the events, “The Equalizer” proves itself as an effective example of action, worthy of impact cinema. And although the action is not constant, its rawness straightens us in our spectator chair. Between sharp weapons and heavy caliber, the noise of broken bones and antagonists executed without mercy, the explicit overflows; perhaps we will be forced to squint. This iconic example of the contemporary action genre knows how to retain charm despite becoming noticeably more graphic than its predecessors.
With intensity, Fuqua makes violence and darkness two allies when it comes to displaying (and gloating over) a line of massacred bodies. The African-American director, responsible for films such as “Tears of the Sun” (2002), once again places himself behind the cameras, ready to satisfy those viewers eager for action in abundance. Sudden outbreaks of retaliation and a veritable river of blood guide the course of this dramatic thriller, sprinkled with flirtations with investigative police and terrorism. With a level of morbid and explicit sadism, ““The Equalizer”” dresses McCall in the clothes of a tormented guardian angel. Convalescent, he wonders if he is a good or a bad man, if he is setting a Christian example, if he deserves the trust of his neighbor. He does not know how to answer with complete certainty, and an experienced voice announces that doubt is a good sign. To provide a better response, problems will always know how to find you in the right place and time.
Keeping his on-screen magnetism intact, the enormous Denzel reunites with the director who consecrated him in “Training Day” (2001, a role for which he currently won an Oscar Award for Best Leading Actor). Nine years have passed since the first installment and four since its sequel, and the ruthless hitman who used to work for hire, faked his death to live a quiet life in southern Italy, but his compulsion to protect the innocent and reconcile with the A disastrous part of his past leads him to return to action. In a port destination near Naples, a picturesque town subjugated by the heartless Camorra, McCall will soon feel like one more. He is the American that everyone looks at… with suspicion at first, and then adopts him as a true savior. For this reason, he must clean his streets and purge all prevailing crimes. Facing an enlightened mafia clan with a certain pathos, a vigilante full of rage and desire for revenge reconsiders what he has done in life, but knows that duty calls. Punctual and unmatchable. The time has come, once again, to balance the scales of good and evil.
Willing to act as a hero, this retired marine sets out to compensate every innocent victim. Lethal in his task and seductive in his walk, however, the passage of time seems to be taking its toll on him. But, don’t be fooled, McCall is an old fox who knows how to recover from shootouts – and falls – and there is a prodigious Denzel to give him life, because his is the immortality of talents. The ambiguous character that makes up Washington is an American living incognito, who rediscovers European culture, and here Fuqua is overly concerned with placing the emphasis on the Catholic traditionalisms of the region. The parable drawn regarding the festivities practiced in the region and the biblical teachings that emerge from reprehensible human actions ends up leaving mixed fortunes, underlining the moral intentions of the message that the acts convey.
There will always be quality dialogues in Denzel’s mouth. One of the greatest actors of all time knows how to find the right point to veer from the brotherly and paternal to the frightening and psychopathic. Although “The Equalizer” decides not to explore its secondary characters in depth, it is pleasant to see Dakota Fanning reunite on screen with Denzel almost twenty years after the successful duo formed for “Men on Fire” (2004, Tony Scott). Although on this occasion, the time they share in scenes is insufficient to exploit the obvious chemistry. However, we know that quantity does not equal quality.
Heading towards an ending that will be abrupt and light, Denzel reflects sitting at a table and, about to take action, additional layers of philosophy flow from his lips. It is better not to want to anger someone who carries guilt like a sword of Damocles and seeks to find the niche of a peaceful space to which they belong. Because there are things that do not change, when doing the dirty work, McCall knows how to be skillful, relentless and brutal to put an end to those who terrorize a fervently believing and hard-working community. Because with bad arts or pure dialectics, Denzel continues kicking ass. Because twenty-two years later, King Kong ain’t got shit on him.
FILM REVIEW: «THE NUN 2»
THE DEAD LAUGHES AT THE DEMON-POSESSED MAN
Score: 1 / by Maximiliano Curcio
Included for the first time in the film «The Conjuring 2» (2016), the then chilling character of ‘The Nun’ became a fundamental protagonist of the mega cinematographic universe established by one of the most profitable franchises in contemporary horror cinema. James Wan seems to have found real buried gold nuggets…or are they two eyeballs on fire? The creepy woman of habit is back, with menacing black eyes sunk deep in the locker.
At first glance, and after the first few minutes, the panorama looks bleak for any lover of this type of proposal. This unnecessary spin off of an audiovisual machinery that does nothing but lose credibility, is constructed with the minimum of acuity and seriousness that a genre film requires. Heretical with the same principles of the religious terror of yesteryear, it accumulates painfully acted sequences, a lazy camera setting and spare resources, in order to generate genuine fear. The effect is the opposite extreme: an uncomfortable laugh. The inept Michael Chaves (responsible for the incredible “The Conjuring III”) oversaturates tricks, and attaches an unsustainable dramatic vein to the narrative, and then appeals to another frankly laughable mythological one. Not to mention the romantic ingredient and the pseudo moral message regarding the merit of punishments.
Dying with laughter, we contemplate the future of this insufferable sequel for no reason whatsoever. Laugh to not cry. ‘a blasphemous nun, adorned with thick white makeup, walks through an old convent in remote Romania; Maybe it’s just a mere hallucination, it’s those that justify certain scenes. A devilish goat goes up and down the stairs causing more surprise than panic. Nothing around here nothing around there. Curse!
The inverted crosses consummate the misfortune, a halo of light announces the evil one and the burning rosaries seek some symbology as a matter of analysis, but every attempt to bring this absurdity to a successful conclusion stumbles, in each frame, with its own mediocrity and absurdity. sense of cinematic aesthetics. There are phenomena that the Church cannot explain. Whether by the work of the evil one (was it necessary to emphasize?) or by mere creative limitation.
The carelessness in making this film is capital letter, and a feeling of boredom, barely averaged over, is assumed to be the most serious sin. Bad choice of shots, a series of scares already seen thousands of times and class B visual effects intended for mockery end up ruining the intentions put into the correct soundtrack composed by the expert Marco Beltrami. An illustrious name that clashes within such a fiasco. This collection of predictable ideas, resolved in a beginner’s way, denotes a lack of personality, good sense and charisma. A sacrilege no matter how you look at it
We wonder what motive leads the director of Asian descent to finance this type of projects, sinking his reputation in the repetition of completely disposable cinematographic acts. Perhaps, the fact of protecting a future incursion into the adventures of the Warren couple. To do this, stay tuned for the post-credits scene.
FILM REVIEW: «RED SKY» (Christian Petzold, 2023)
A SIGN FROM HEAVEN
by Maximiliano Curcio / Score: 6
«Red Sky», the latest film by the sought-after Christian Petzold, is presented to us as a simple but powerful cinematographic experience. A minimalist proposal that combines drama and comedy, as passports to reflect on love, sex, friendship and writing. After fascinating the specialized critics, and having obtained the Golden Bear (Best Film) and Silver Bear (Best Director) Awards at the last Berlin Festival, the film arrives at the local billboard, in order to endorse its scrolls.
Trilogies are not for everyone, and Petzold has given good proof of this. Just as the author himself defined his approach entitled «Love in times of oppressive systems», during the last decade he conceived three great films intertwined by a conceptual and aesthetic union: Barbara [2012], Phoenix [2014] and Transit [2018). Pursuing new directions and without resting on well-deserved laurels, with “Undinde” (2020) he began a different stage in his career, where he symbolically resorted to the fundamental presence of water. Here he does the same with fire, an element in which he finds enough poetic resources to be explored.
Set in a small holiday retreat next to the Baltic Sea, the linked story of four main characters (played by Thomas Schubert, Paula Beer, Langston Uibel and Enno Trebs) unfolds against a climatological backdrop: high temperatures generate uncontrollable fires in the forests and an atmosphere of danger surrounds.
With parsimony, the German author concocts another new story to tell. He is a solid narrator who knows the right tone when it comes to showing the gestures and bodily attitudes of his creatures in full tension. Because of so much fragility, something is about to break. Also, Petzold knows how to wax lyrical and quote Heinrich Heine. Because, at the end of the day, we are always talking about love, literature and death. The landscape becomes the omnipresent protagonist, while monotonous everyday life slows down the rhythms. There, photography makes its appearance: there are portraits that say it all, from the front or from the back. Then, suggestive looks and impulses that consummate homosexual love.
The burning sky of a hot and dry summer hovers over four characters that desire, measure, jealous and compete. In the forest, native animal species run to save their lives from the incessant flames. Inside the house, passions explode in the least expected direction. The diegetic sound weaves the action, resorting to insistent marks that make us literally perceive the discomfort in the body. The one who has a good time, almost always, is someone else. However, how well do we know our fellow man?
Parallel to this achievement of love affairs and disagreements – some more successful than others – a new book is born. Whoever writes seeks to do better this time; The leaves pile up on the seashore and the sun shines on the face. Another happy ending that strives to be inspiring. Perhaps, the future work will end up telling the story that we are seeing before our eyes.
FILM REVIEW: «HAUNTING IN VENICE» (2023, Kenneth Branagh)
By Maximiliano Curcio
Score: 6
The emblematic 20th Century Studios produces and distributes in Latin America a new approach by Kenneth Branagh to the great literary work of Agatha Christie, undisputed master of suspense.
Known by its original title «Halloween Party» (in Spanish translated «The Apples», and the reason is better understood by its literary version, however, this is a free transposition) was a detective and supernatural fiction novel, belonging to the late period of Agatha Christie. It was published for the first time in the United Kingdom, by the Collins Crime Club publishing house in 1969. In this way, Branagh focuses his interest on one of the least known titles of the British writer, but, for that reason, of less cinematic benefit.
Set in majestic settings from the mid-20th century in the city of Venice – a location of great moviegoing appeal, if we take into account the locations of «Menace in the Shadow» or «The Pleasure of Strangers», by Nicolas Roeg and Paul Schrader , respectively-, a halo of mystery covers the plot from beginning to end. Halfway between classic crime and horror, the pioneering whodunit author explores unusual terrain, from which Branagh’s fertile imagination takes immediate advantage.
Haris Zambarloukos’ beautiful cinematography sets the tone for this patented old-fashioned Hollywood entertainment. The ineffable detective Hercule Poirot, in the skin of the always solid Branagh, is placed at the convergent center of the story, directing himself, in another version equally melancholic, skeptical and witty.
On the eve of All Saints’ Day, a mysterious death forces the iconic detective out of self-imposed exile in the most glamorous city in the world. On a stormy night, he begins searching for clues in the middle of a seance in a palace inhabited by ghosts. The deaths will soon accumulate, enveloping the mustachioed character in a sinister web of family secrets. The lavish mansion becomes the epicenter of the tragedy and the atmosphere becomes oppressive; We place ourselves at the service of the hallucinated Poirot, trying to unravel the skein. We are in Venice and it is not carnival season. Who of all the suspects is the culprit? What are your motivations? ‘Give me a mask and I will tell you the truth,’ the incorrigible Oscar Wilde once said.
Who has already filmed twisted crime and love stories with panache such as «Dead Again» (1991) and «Frankenstein» (1994), dedicates himself to the construction of a pure strain of intrigue seasoned with supernatural terror – whose visual effects surpass the average of a genre in clear decline – does not fit, at first glance, into the canons of traditional British police. ‘What is most frightening about a horror film is its reflection in life itself,’ is shouted in the sumptuous hallways of the luxurious residence. And it may be true, although that does not mean that the film does not deprive us of including joking winks in order to relax us.
If previously, with «Murder on the Orient Express» (2017) and «Death on the Nile» (2022), an ambitious Branagh populated his cast with first-class stars, here the direction followed assumes a change of direction, with great presence international. The director, for his part, exploits the geographical attractions and films with emotion, tension and good aesthetic taste. Who has dedicated the last seven years of his career to projects that involve Christie’s literary work -with the exception of «Belfast»-, decides here to become an ally of the power of synthesis: with a duration of half an hour less than each of his films predecessors, the resolution of the mystery is considered abrupt and not very transcendental.
FILM REVIEW: «THE EXORCIST: BELIEVER» (2023, David Gordon Green)
By Maximiliano Curcio
FORGIVE OUR SINS / Score: 2
Released worldwide at the beginning of October, a new sequel to “The Exorcist” hits theaters, a key film in the religious horror genre, released in 1973, directed by the recently deceased William Friedkin, and script by William Peter Blatty, about his own novel of the same name, published in 1971. David Gordon Green, who has taken the reins of another classic like “Halloween”, with his recent trilogy undertaken between 2018 and 2022, is dedicated to putting his stamp on another intellectual property of a genre that he seems happy to tackle, while we wonder what became of the aspirations and explorations of the emerging independent filmmaker, responsible for films as valuable as “A Legacy of Violence” (2004).
Leading the cast, an incredulous and overacting Leslie Odom Jr. becomes the main face of a film that places Ellen Burstyn and Linda Blair as participants in a pitiful act of nostalgia. One of the most legendary sagas in the history of horror cinema, although also one of the most inconsistent judging by the quality of its different installments, and throughout which directors of the stature of John Boorman, Renny Harlin and Paul paraded Schrader returns to the big screen. Initially intended as a remake for a first installment, the project mutated and evolved until it became a sequel to the very original version. Four scriptwriters to write the same story is not usually a precedent, in itself, that is very encouraging when it comes to laying the foundations for a conflict that does not end up being taken advantage of. We wonder how much more a sequel can exploit the already known stereotype. Just glimpses that soon fade and go straight to hell…
After a first hour full of easy scares, the level of terror will not increase as the minutes pass. On the contrary, certain decisions will have the involuntary effect more akin to a comedy of absurdities. God save us from guttural voices dubbed into the local language. With little imagination, he appeals to the macabre recreation of possessions, and the incursion of dyes from various cultures and their respective demonology, leading to a final half hour where he stages – clumsily – a double exorcism. Overshadowing form and substance, and lacking in appealing to the divine grace that this type of circumstances deserves, “The Exorcist” comes face to face with its own limitations when it comes to wanting to innovate in an ultra-traveled section.
On the way to nowhere and generating a zero sensation of terror, the new reincarnation of “The Exorcist” throws away every possible noble intention, while resorting to the benefits of a fantastic original soundtrack (“Tubular Bells”, authored by Mike Oldfield), here reused as a leitmotif for an embarrassingly vague script. This modernized copy and paste of the first installment boasts an artificial exploration of trauma, in a forced revival mode ready to open the door to that which is incomprehensible. Although, in truth, the most incomprehensible thing is the proliferation of this type of products, capable of making the worst fear come true: the disappointment of an entire room in darkness.
Forgettable and with little reason for being, an excessive amount of footage (almost two hours long) is populated with scenes that caricature the reactions of an omniscient demon that corrupts innocent souls and causes slight shocks in the movie audience. And, what is worse, it underestimates their intelligence, inserting a social theme that seeks to impose a discourse of empathy, brotherhood and cultural diversity to end up consummating an outcome with clear racist overtones. Shattering the reputation of the once boom of religious-spiritual horror cinema, “The Exorcist” consummates blasphemy. Go retro, David Gordon Green!
FILM REVIEW: «THE CREATOR» (2023, Gareth Edwards)
WELL THINKING SIMULANTS, by Maximiliano Curcio
Score: 2
A film with original content, in times where Hollywood does not cease to rehash past successes wrapped in present mediocrity, would seem, a priori, an auspicious novelty for the local billboard. A genius of digital effects, the British Gareth Edwards, responsible for “Monsters” (2012), “Godzilla” (2014) and “Rogue One” (2016), sets out to elucidate the social and political context of an apocalyptic scenario that takes precedence following a current controversy that concerns us: the use of artificial intelligence. Produced through the major Disney Pictures, “Residence” aims to find beauty and depth in an anomalous example of the sci-fi genre. However, we must ask ourselves if just good intentions are enough… Here we have the improbable but rewarding cinematographic story of a double agent who seeks to infiltrate the robotic world, a decade and a half after the explosion of a nuclear warhead that threatened the survival of humanity and ended the lives of his family circle. The bomb dropped in the middle of the city of Los Angeles finds humanity – or what remains of it – fighting for survival, coexisting as equals with their robotic peers. Co-written by Chris Weitz (“Twilight”), along with Edwards himself, and starring the rising John David Washington, “Resistance” places us in the middle of a sustained war between the human race and artificial intelligences. Manager of an impeccable visual design and attentive to every detail of recreating the fictional world he conceives, Edwards appears as a modern and ambitious craftsman, however, he fails to reflect such ease in a narrative that is certainly arrhythmic and porous.
With influences from filmmakers Neil Blomkamp, Steven Spielberg, Ridley Scott and James Cameron, “Resistance” projects the unpredictable scope of a battle against time to prevent the destruction of the world, in a bloody war waged by the West (represented by the United States, what a coincidence! !) and New Asia (whose inhabitants are described with extreme thick strokes and a certain political correctness). Dystopian, the story interweaves the personal drama of its protagonist with the sequences typical of the sci-fi thriller. Powerful images accompanied by the omnipresent music of maestro Hans Zimmer, do nothing more than add seasonings to a visually stimulating enjoyment, worthy of the big screen; effective in keeping a class of consumerist spectator absolutely enthralled that he seems to want to retain. Set in a relatively near future, the palpability of the immediate danger draws our attention powerfully. How close are we to such a debacle? The morality behind artificial intelligence was previously questioned by the cinematographic medium, taking us back to films like “Ex – Machina”, where we discovered the great talent of Alex Garland. However, dominated by algorithm cinema and programmed clones incessantly seeking to please us, “Resistencia” can barely rear its head with dignity and new ideas, in the midst of a billboard packed with franchises and reboots that never end. Because? Because it is self-indulgent, and, in reality, the message it conveys regarding A.I. is clearly sentimentalist and sympathetic.
An overwhelming and spectacular staging (by the ILM studio) is supported by the qualities of an unobjectionable work of photography – at the hands of the creator of part one of “Dune” (2021), Greg Fraiser -, and not many more virtues in sight. Over the course of almost two and a half hours, the film is loaded with excessive emotion, an abundant dose of racism and an imposed epic sense, therefore, its plot ingredients are almost never administered correctly. What is Sergeant Joshua Taylor ultimately fighting for? What makes you get attached to a little robot? Why are certain lines highlighted in the mouth of the army that seeks to save it that do nothing more than ridicule the obvious? Metallic packaging without padding, “Resistance” boasts a striking space design and will have to make little effort to sweep several technical awards at the next Oscars. Creator of his own universe, Edwards divides his work into four chapters, executing a lackluster path of the banished and redeemed hero, out of time for the drama of classic science fiction that it evokes, and not without a certain honeyed nostalgia and a frankly painful development of the duel. and hilarious. Sensitivity to the maximum expression emerges as an evident quality in “Resistance”, a film that suffers from serious errors in verisimilitude; a flimsy and crude character design will be immersed in a melancholic-romantic tone that extends to the ridiculous. What can we say about a dangerously benevolent emphasis on one of the great threats that looms over humanity today?
Emerging protagonist of futuristic action (“Tenet”), the son of the immense Denzel Washington shows a lack of nuances when it comes to creating a forceful hero who must save humanity from the most latent of dangers. Although, at the bottom of the matter, is that what you want? Sergeant Taylor is an outsider who betrays the values of his country and decides to be faithful only to his feelings, no matter how ridiculous they may seem, under the latitudes of a bogged down script. It is not for nothing that we find it difficult to empathize with their actions. It will be because his deepest motivations arouse little credibility: when the African-American interpreter must appear moved, he does so late in reacting. Able to change his hairstyle with striking assiduity – from dreadlocks to a platinum mini afro, on a mission! – we have to wonder where the son of one of the greatest performers of all time lost his good judgment. With remote control, the control over the will of every animate being or inanimate object that surrounds the future robotic messiah takes on unthinkable dimensions. By mere mental control, power armed with a laser beam becomes impossible to counteract… «Resistance» is full of nods to cinematic science fiction («Blade Runner» is the most obvious) or literature (Sergeant Bradbury…unnecessary). When it comes to digging the depths of the uninspiring outlook it presents, it becomes an ally of its predictability: the warhead detonated in the mid-21st century was a human error captured by its ambition. Maybe it’s that robots finally have feelings and are not as bad as they seem – nor different from us humans – as we thought. Prefabricated doubles, ‘terminators’ with autonomy or simulated replicas that can emulate machines that revive just because, after dying in the most pathetic way.
In the vast territory of the new devastated demographics that it stages, “Resistencia”, a pamphleteering pastime, misplaces any intention regarding reflecting on the political motivations and desire for power that dominate a world (today or tomorrow) in complete chaos. and destruction. One of the most absurd nonsense of science fiction cinema in recent decades is deceitfully empathetic when taking a very serious issue at an extremely meager level of analysis. We do not fully understand the true paradigm that an inappropriate Gareth Edwards ends up proposing. If the fate of science fiction is in their hands, not to mention human nature, we should be talking about a genre in serious danger of extinction.
FILM REVIEW: «STRANGE WAY OF LIFE»
By Maximiliano Curcio
FIRE AND REMORSE
Pedro Almodóvar returns to the big screen, and he does so with a medium-length film, the second of his recent crop since “Voz Humana” (2021), in a format that he has decided to explore frequently towards the maturity of his career, leaning towards a more compact footage that allows you to develop certain kinds of stories that would be conditioned in a feature-length film. Inexhaustible, Pedro writes non-stop, and the least thought of events end up becoming key triggers for future stories; the original seed of fictional plots that he writes with feverish impetus and end up in a drawer to later come to light, sometimes in the form of a film script, sometimes in the form of a story within a book that compiles them. “Strange Way of Life”, produced by Saint Laurent and exclusively released in select theaters in our country, can be assumed as a queer western. An exercise in style, with influences from Raúl Ruiz and Manoel de Oliveira. Filmed in Almería, an emblematic site of spaghetti westerns of the golden era, the present is unlike any western we have seen before. Because Almodóvar wanted it that way. The filmmaker knows the classic cuts of authors like Peckinpah, Ford, Eastwood and Leone like the back of his hand. Remember mythical scenes and sequences with photographic memory, although not only that; takes a look at the present – during portions of the interview that accompany the screening of the film – and provides an authentic lesson on the current state of the genre, fully exemplifying Taylor Sheridan’s non-revisionist intentions.
From start to finish, the film is a lesson in audiovisual framing. The camera focuses on the body of one of the lovers and out of focus we see the bed beyond. Without showing the nudity of his actors or the sexual act itself – a previously pending debt that was already settled a while ago -, Pedro is guided only by suggesting the absence of underwear that will later be searched for in a drawer. From there, the contact of bodies and gazes will denote sexual tension. Unsustainable even in the gesture of a hug, and because in “Strange Way of Life”, the drives of its two male protagonists collide with each other. These are two contrasting characters: one is sentimental and passionate, while the other clings to the law and denies. The author from La Mancha populates the scarce footage with abstracted and literary dialogues, increasingly closer to a notion of form and content that ends up fitting him perfectly. It causes us a certain strangeness from a linguistic point of view, but after a few minutes we see the authorial imprint of the native of Calzada de Calatrava, who, like a great craftsman, interweaves generic registers with total wisdom: intrigue, action and drama are combined in half. hour long. It passes so quickly that it is hard to believe how it is capable of putting so much intensity and emotion into it. The saying goes, if it’s brief, it’s twice as good.
In “Strange Way of Life”, the story takes place around the 1930s, conceiving a period film that is unpublished in the filmography of the creator of cult works such as “Átame” (1990) and “La Flor de mi Secreto” (nineteen ninety five). Using a central anecdote as a trigger (the reunion of two lovers after twenty-five years apart), Pedro elucidates the beginning and end of a microcosm that addresses the bond of two gay cowboys in a way that Hollywood never usually films. Not in vain does the premise remind us of the Oscar-winning “Brokeback Mountain” (Ang Lee, 2005). Pedro Pascal and Ethan Hawke are two old lovers, now facing both sides of the law. In the full maturity of life, an unexpected reunion will unleash passions, memories and extreme consequences. Because pain and guilt become the worst condemnation of desire. Don Pedro addresses the classic genre par excellence, but stripping it of the mythical characteristics of the Wild West. In thirty minutes of duration, the dramatic climax is condensed to make us wish that the magic did not end so soon. The director of “Madres Paralelas” (2022) offers his usual good taste in costumes, incorporating bright and cheerful colors. Inside the inhospitable ranch, paintings by the painter Georgia O’Keefee decorate the walls. The outlandishness of the man from La Mancha adapts to coordinates that are somewhat more arid than usual, as an instrument of a magnificent visual exercise, accompanied by superb musical pieces directed by Alberto Iglesias. However, the original musical leitmotif that we hear during the first minutes of the screening corresponds to the homonymous song performed by Caetano Veloso, in 1986, for “Fados”.
The autobiographical element of bonding relationships traces one’s own footprint through the immense desert. Past and present come together, heading to the starting point that sealed their fate: the grim sheriff and the handsome outlaw they confront today were two emboldened young men kissing in an authentic wine orgy. Minutes later, the Almodovarian gaze will never spare room for surprise: a triad of newly polished pistols flood the shot that will settle the fate of the protagonists, incorporating a triangular element: the bandit son of one of them. Family drama, hand-to-hand confrontations and a notion of moral tragedy amalgamate in the cinematographic conception of an artist willing to demolish every possible genre canon. The duel in the sun will require a Solomonic decision, and, minutes later, an idyllic ending will contrast with the climate of violence previously incited. Towards the denouement, a group of wild horses floods the scene, running across the dusty ground; The sun sets behind the mountain. Ethan Hawke’s character looks out the window with a certain melancholy. Pedro Pascal has already washed his wounds and tells him about an old saying. What two things can a couple of loving adult men do immersed in absolute solitude? Take care of yourself, he answers himself. In front of the cameras, Pedro wonders where the lovers will end up, and, perhaps, in some corner of his film-loving memory, the answer is already archived.
As a passport to her first feature film shot in Hollywood (the announced and still late “A Manual for Cleaning Woman”, starring Cate Blanchett), “Strange Way of Life” is assumed to be an exquisite copy of the author, destined for release in streaming channels for the MUBI platform.
REVIEW: USE YOUR ILLUSION II (Guns n’ Roses/1991), by Maximiliano Curcio
The simultaneous release of “Use Your Illusion I and II” shocked the American music scene. At midnight on September 17, 1991, a diptych of albums that would become two of the greatest rock creations of all time went on sale on Tower Records. Two double discs contained around thirty songs. Demented for these times where the physical format perishes. Some of them were longer than eight minutes…one of those gems that are no longer made. The sonorous magnificence, the long duration and the style by which both products had been conceived made them belong to an era that today seems nostalgic to us. They could have messed around with some classic Led Zeppelin, Queen or Black Sabbath LPs, and not clash at all. Precursors of a new era or intimate enemies remote-directed towards collapse, they made their way in the middle of a musical map that witnessed the proliferation of grunge. Rock Ain’t Dead, let’s buy the hope for the new millennium.
None of the four original members (Axl-Duff-Slash-Izzy) had turned thirty. These precocious geniuses were on the pedestal of world rock. They had shaken the rusty structures of the old school. They were willing to continue kicking ass and not owing anyone a cent. The blue and purple cover replicates the visual intention of the first volume. This perfect modern rock machine integrates heavy metal, blues and hard rock content. Slash is a semi-god of the guitar who marvels us with his prodigious fingering and Duff is a hero of excess who proudly displays his punk roots (and scars). This was the last album with the participation of the brilliant lyricist Izzy Stradlin, a vital link in the group’s scaffolding. Steven Adler had already been replaced on drums by the ultra-efficient Matt Sorum, from The Cult. The wayward Adler, before leaving, would record percussion for “Civil War”, a song with deep social commitment, a wild painting of the most turbulent seventies North America, released two years later on the EP “The Civil War”. The myth about every big gang willing to swallow each other was about to be fulfilled, for the umpteenth time. Guns wrote the prophecy about his own inverted big-bang.
As the albums climbed the charts, Guns got tired of playing singles on the radio. They were the glorious years of the MTV network at the height of the music video boom and GN’R was a luxury guest. Axl continued with his cinematographic vision, providing aesthetic and conceptual quality to the audiovisual architecture behind “Estranged”, an emotional see-saw of almost ten minutes as a therapeutic regression in which W.A.R. He buries the ruined traces of his last love failure. While, in “14 Years”, Stradlin predestines the future gunner silence of more than a decade, in “Yesterdays”, Axl offers his most melancholic look at a past of taken weapons and withered roses.
Although the world falls on our backs, we are not going to abandon the illusion. In “You Could be Mine”, GN’R becomes the OST of “Terminator: Judgment Day” and in “Pretty Tied Up” the band signs those types of incorrect lyrics that could no longer be released today. In the spiritual ode “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” he makes a Bob Dylan classic his own and in the highly original “Get in The Ring” he attacks, with fury and disdain, the constant siege of the upstart tabloid press (outlaws?) (Mick Wall!) and genuflexes (Circus Magazine!?). A ribald Axl dresses as an improvised rapper and wields a rifle: he shoots offensive epithets and never bites his tongue. Very brave.
UYI II offers us the alternative version of “Don’t Cry”, a master act by Rose at his creative peak, sealing one of the most moving lyrics. It’s a shame that he didn’t give us any live version of this song. “So Fine”, a hidden gem, is a heartbreaking and self-referential story about a broken man, examining the remains of his own history in ashes. The sonic summit of this album is made up of the colossal “Locomotive” and “Breakdown”. Here, Rose’s wide vocal spectrum ranges from melodic purity to the portentous rehearsal of a primal scream. His brilliant poetics examine the harms and benefits, perhaps winners and losers, of his own erupting volcano. The frontman is a profane narrator who expels anguish, rhymes the words, plays with double meanings. He fought for his own dream and managed to take it as far as possible. Any mortal who signs the lyrics and melody of both songs would have guaranteed passage to the musical Olympus of all time. It was done by Axl Rose, an enigmatic, volatile and misunderstood genius. If living legends exist, here is one of them…let’s stand up.
REVIEW: USE YOUR ILLUSION I (Guns n’ Roses/1991), by Maximiliano Curcio
Strange case of Guns n’ Roses. Just five years condenses the entire discography released by the original core of the band, made up of the Axl-Slash-Izzy-Duff quartet. Within that period of years, they released, under the Geffen Records label, a total of fifty songs. Thirty, more than half, are displayed in this double album of majestic composition. Three years had passed since their last studio adventure, the EP “GN’R Lies” (1988). From that time to this point, Guns had known how to place himself at the center of controversy: the xenophobic and homophobic lyrics of “One in a Million” lit the eyes of the press on the figure of Axl. A mistake that the singer regrets to this day. Years later, the group was willing to show much more than just complying with the proven recipe for the typical sex-drugs & rock and roll pose. The recording of both albums had been marathon, chaotic. The first echoes of the revolt within Gunner were being felt. They looked into their own sidereal abyss. Soon, the group’s chemistry would explode through the air… Meanwhile, the collective image had grown to unthinkable limits. Having become a cult phenomenon, the boom had not yet reached its apex in our lands, landing in Argentina at the end of 1992. On the edge of the precipice, hung an illusion ready to take a somersault.
The first volume of “Use Your Illusion” combines shades of red, orange and yellow, replicating a section of the fresco called “The School of Athens”, the work of Raphael. It was created by the artist of Estonian descent Mark Kostabi. Obtaining multiple awards such as platinum, gold and diamond records, a tour of its eclectic sound architecture takes us to a deep dive through the imposing and sublime conception of rock that Guns n’ Roses held. A talented human group that seemed to have no creative ceiling, after all, the war of egos in which they ended up immersed, became the main obstacle and triggering factor for the next separation. As a novelty, the band incorporates keyboards. The brand new Dizzy Reed brings to the group a new sound variant that enriches and expands possible harmonies, clearly in line with the new musical orientation that Axl was pursuing. In addition, it features special appearances by true all-stars of the rock universe: Michael Monroe (harmonica in “Bad Obsession”), Shanoon Hoon (vocals in “Don’t Cry”) and Alice Cooper (vocals in “The Garden”).
Rose’s turbulent love life becomes the fuel for many of the lyrics that structure this great creative act. The epic “November Rain” is rescued from an old demo from the “Appetite for Destruction” era, consisting of a total of…25 minutes! Axl composes a new version, reducing it by almost a third: the result is epic, bombastic and sentimentally timeless. It is the synthesis of his influences in songs by Elton John, Procol Harum and Todd Rundgren. Starting point of the famous trilogy turned into a video clip, it was inspired by the story “Without You”, authored by Del James (personal friend of the Gunner leader and tour logistics coordinator). The greatest ballad in history has its perfect reverse: Guns can sound thunderous, angry and at full speed. “Perfect Crime”, “Garden of Eden” and “Right Next Door to Hell” are conclusive proof of an Axl Rose about to fly through the air. The singer and alma mater is not afraid to sign misogynistic lyrics worthy of ‘parental advisory’ like “Back Off Bitch”, in a boldness that today would sacrifice him on the bonfire of vanities. Nor, to give a last warning to bad company in “Double Talkin’ Jive”, shouting anger and bad manners. Some of the best versions of these songs can be heard on the live CD/DVD “Use Your Illusion World Tour”, a publication that compiles the mega tour developed between 1991 and 1993, ending in our country.
Guns has always been known for reversing songs at an excellent level (listen to “The Spaghetti Incident” and you’ll get an idea). Paul MacCartney could be satisfied with such a cover of “Live and Let Die”, from his time in The Wings. Meanwhile, the Rose-Stradlin tandem gives us an everlasting pearl: “Dust n’ Bones” advises us on those women whose appearance can be deceiving. Every fan of the band has wondered why Axl is reluctant to play more songs from this album live. Deciding to rotate, for years and years, around timeless classics, has deprived us of listening to authentic masterpieces, such as the authentic personal manifesto “Don’t Damn Me”. “Bad Apples” deserves no less praise, a stinging painting from a profane and marginal time. Incorrigible, Axl exorcises his demons in “Dead Horse,” although some things will never change. As a versatile corollary, in UYI I we will never get tired of listening to “Coma”; vocal prowess of Axl dazzling us with his multiple registers. From heaven to hell in nine minutes, from its initial beat to its final sustained note, we understand the loss of innocence when awakening from the nightmare: our earthly paradise has been devastated. Existential, tragic and metaphysical, it is the sum of the parts that bring together the entire musical capabilities of a pharaonic band. To be appreciated IN THIS LIFETIME.
Streaming Review: «YOU» (Netflix Series)
Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley) has enough charisma to become the favorite assassin for TV series marathons. A solitary New Yorker, voracious reader of classic references of contemporary literature. An ace up his sleeve that the elusive Joe will use as a weapon of seduction. So obsessive and brilliant, he will take advantage of his technological knowledge to find out the romantic past of his online conquests. Stalker in the shadows in times of hyperconnectivity, you will know the most intimate details of your next romantic target. Although, in reality, Joe’s silent strategy hides other intentions. “You”, based on the novel “Hidden Bodies”, presents us with a serial killer tailored to Ted Bundy. There is something mysteriously attractive in the psychological profile that is drawn about an ambiguous and tortured being, unable to escape his past. Also something monstrously beautiful: that magnet that awakens these types of absolutely perverse minds. Joe, however, is not alone.
Starting in the second season, he must share the criminal raid with his romantic partner. Gender equality seals their blood pact. “You”, produced by the creators of “Riverdale” has the virtue of finding a creative way to relate the daily life of a disturbed sociopath, doing so in a friendly way. It humanizes the murderer until he is corroded by guilt: we come to empathize with his dark inclinations. The series uses a wink of literary palate such as the interior monologue. Joe gives us his deepest thoughts. He ponders and shares with the viewer his plans, his dilemmas, his mental labyrinths. Using intelligent humor and never being solemn, she gains followers to look modernly terrifying. Although it repeats the narrative tone throughout three seasons, it does not worry about innovating. It disguises the lightness of certain lies and somewhat implausible alibis, through an intriguing exploration of family traumas and the toxic bonds we foster. Addictive and entertaining, the continuous plot twists make it frenetic. This twisted stalker is a criminal torn between healing reinvention and the temptation to realize his most abject instincts.
FILM REVIEW: «BOTH SIDES OF THE BLADE» (2022)
Score: 9
By Maximiliano Curcio
Veteran French director Claire Denis has directed thirteen films in total to date. As an author’s brand, its characters are certainly marginal beings that move in a hostile territory. Denis, seventy years old and with total poise, portrays the complex mechanisms that characterize human relationships and the omnipresent sensuality in his view of the world is another unmistakable trace of his filmography. All these variables come together in his most recent work: “Con Amor y Furia”. The dimensions that a domestic matter reaches that involves a third party in discord describe the emotional abyss to which a middle-aged couple enters. A melodramatic twist in the best Douglas Sirk style bursts into the plot, framing the return of a shadow from the past, and a magnificent tour de force of sensations by two living glories of world acting.
Two acting titans such as Juliette Binoche – who stars alongside Denis for the third time, after “Un Bello Sol Interior” (2017) and “High Life” (2019) – and Vincent Lindon lend intensity to this powerful bonding drama. The past comes back, always. «With Love and Fury» -adaptation of the novel by Christine Angot, «Un tournant de la vie») tells us about the recognition and acceptance of the impulses (and the respective consequences) that move us. The confused feelings of the main couple are mixed up in a skein of deceit. The author’s point of view rests on her, a fifty-something woman who decides to be true to herself and find out what she feels. Insecurity seems to overwhelm her, she envy the ex-wife of her current partner. Although at present ‘she’ occupies the role of the woman from the street in Amsterdam, and lives comfortably in its structures. He contains her and solves almost everything.
Until an old love returns to the city that tangentially involved their respective lives ten years ago. The waters in which Sara is about to immerse herself are no longer calm as in that first shot of the film. Now it is she who repeats his name (that of ‘the other’) in silence while going up in the elevator, oh, mon amour! With his hands he squeezes his own chest and that physical contact (longing) says it all. Theirs is a fight of body and soul against self-repression. His private life is on the verge of self-destruction, while, irrepressibly, he regains his sense of tears and skin. Everyday life is disrupted when attraction becomes inevitable. The examination is moral: whose hand do we hold? Who do we say we love by looking in the eyes? Who do we choose to share life with? Can we love two people simultaneously? «Con Amor y Furia», filmed in times of pandemic -an aspect that fiction is in charge of highlighting- leaves us with immense questions, as it takes on the body of a very powerful drama.
Ah, those nights of love and fear are back!, of shaking waiting for the call, of getting wet and talking on the phone secretly under the sheets. That’s what she tells us, while looking in the mirror, naked. Infidelity is so old that it explains myths and legends. Here, it implodes on the dynamic of a mature couple. The balance is usually fragile and far from the idyllic postcard of the first minutes of footage. There are societies that should not be better…fortune in business becomes its obverse in matters of the heart. Denis raises the issue with extreme complexity and subtlety. Does the spousal agreement amount to prison? Is it about serving that sweet sentence? Who is a recluse, after all? What old scores are about to be settled? As viewers, we won’t have all the answers and there are two sides to the coin. Obligation or dispersion.
Winner of the Best Director award at the latest edition of the Berlin Festival for this feature film, filmmaker Denis draws on recognizable personal traces. The dizzying urban gaze and the social cutoff that rests on aspects such as immigration and racial minorities will be present in the film, finding alternation – more or less uniform – in the middle of a story that focuses its attention on the love triangle described. The role of women is examined without concessions, passions move her characters and the author’s gaze pivots between the masculine and feminine conventions that she addresses and then dynamites. Can Sara play two ends right under Jean’s own nose? Should Jean hand over her precious trophy on a silver platter just because her confidence is boundless? Will Francois know how to seize the opportunity and pounce on the most obvious bait that has landed before his very eyes? His ex now fulfills the role of lover…
Victim of confusion and swinging in the imbalance that resides in her days, the character of the exceptional Binoche, giving us one of her most intense performances in a long time – which is not an understatement – describes a woman who puts her consolidated structures before her. the fact of feeling desired and seeks to reach its truth that cannot be postponed. Although for this he lends himself to play a dangerous game. Even to manipulate and hurt, seeing in her partner the need to control that he provides temporary excuses for her; She projects onto her partner the internal contradiction that overwhelms her. Although, in truth, she is betraying herself. He says he needs time to think and catch his breath, between prayers and prayers. But there are already two yelling at each other without listening. Because there is nothing more to talk about. And in seeking to justify themselves they get bogged down, until Jean (the formidable Lindon) places words in his mouth that Denis bravely approves, completely resignifying the film. bitch, prostitute The scene gives us goosebumps. He shows his genuine love and has little else to do on this runaway train. Without credit card in hand, but with dignity intact, the exit is through the front door. Father’s duties await, out there in life… and there is a world that is falling apart. Or several. What party do we take?
FILM REVIEW: «THE YOUNG LOVERS» (2021)
Score: 8
By Maximiliano Curcio
The origin of the fiction told here can be traced to the personal story of the Icelandic director Solveig Anspach, who died in 2015, at the age of fifty-four. A script inspired by his own mother was the original seed of this investigation into love, the finitude of life, illnesses, the passage of time and physical deterioration that, paradoxically, found its conclusion in the early departure of its creator. For her fourth feature film, the outstanding director Carine Tardieu, more than five years later, returns to this idea about the ‘love story of our parents’ as a mirror in which to see ourselves, providing an emotional tribute. Deconstructing the budding plot, reinterpreting the main characters and bequeathing us the return to the close-ups of one of the great French actresses of all time, he conceives a sensitive and empathetic work.
Delicious and detailed, the story told begins in Lyon, in 2006, and then moves to Paris and Dublin today. From city vertigo to the bucolic setting of a country house, we are submerged in the change of seasons, which also function as a metaphor for a romance that grows by recognizing the thorns on the roses themselves, in proportion to the fact that a family bosom cracks as a result of a parallel relationship. Quickly, the years have passed and we have forgotten to feel. We look in the mirror and notice that this body has changed. We become aware of our own finitude. Excuses will know how to make their appearance to favor an appointment, because destinies are ready to intertwine. The factor of chance also plays its role and knows how to rediscover two who are looking to discover each other. Opportunely, it will also fill the horizon with absences, questions and suffering; time will know how to be cruel.
The symbolisms multiply in hourglasses, hands clasped under the table, train journeys, withered flowers and not very encouraging medical diagnoses. With precision and great aesthetic taste, Tardieu models an art of loving endowed with warmth in close-ups of faces and hands, eyes that glow in the dark, mouths that breathe, bodies that move, face to face -and no longer through of the telephone-, once the pair of lovers consummates the postponed physical encounter. The one carried out here is also an exploration of family ties, the maturation of the couple, the dreams of growing old as a couple and the duty of being a father and mother. Lovers share fleeting moments; the flame is fanned inside the apartment and the obligations of routine life call outside. Then, Ardant’s character reads us a moving poem by Silvya Plath, That Suicidal Heart!, written shortly before her tragic death.
If we remain attentive we will capture the enormous richness in nuances that this story of love against the opposite direction exhibits. The melodramatic intensity in the rain will not miss the appointment in this mixture of drama and romance whose aesthetic composition bequeaths us, in addition, an exquisite soundtrack (by Éric Slabiak). Tardieu shifts points of view, at times focusing on the devastating effect that the affair produced within the home of the happily married doctor. It is difficult to find the authentic meaning of the word plenitude, but there is a rediscovery that produces profound reconsiderations. The resolution is not easy; Limitations will appear everywhere and none of them will be pleasant. There is so much at stake, and so much to lose. Fanny resigns herself and contributes her share of experience, beauty is seen through different eyes. Instant love is an instrument of tenderness, but also of self-knowledge. It hits us at the least expected moment and produces abysses in the soul and earthquakes in every fiber of our body. “The Young Lovers” is a nostalgic, twilight revelation of desire in the autumn of life. Solid in the acting cast that accompanies the eternal Fanny, the film offers us intense performances by Melvin Poupad (whom we saw shine in the recent «Little Flower» by Santiago Mitre) and the extraordinary Cecil De France (a regular of François ozone). Key pieces of the story, they provide quality and elegance to two extremely demanding roles. Ardant, immersed in a moving physical and spiritual transformation, brings us her powerful acting art in the final moments. We inhale deeply; That new air that we will breathe is the same that we will share until the final moment.
STREAMING REVIEW: ADAPTED SERIES OF NOVELS BY HARLAN COBEN
The fever for adapting novels by American author Harlan Coben does not go out of style: his mystery works are so addictive and effective, full of twists that they fit perfectly with the tangled thriller that works so well on serial platforms. In eight years, ten fictions have been made based on his successful literary works for servers such as Amazon Prime or Netflix.
By Maximiliano Curcio
THE INNOCENT: Eight episode miniseries based on a novel by popular author Harlan Coben. Nine years ago, the life of Mateo (Mario Casas) took a drastic turn when he was involved in a street fight with a tragic ending. In the present, and after going through a criminal sentence, his existence will be shaken again when he discovers the true identity of his sentimental partner. Such a plot premise is the one adapted by Orio Paulo, a Spanish filmmaker subscribed to Netflix thanks to commercial products such as «A Contratiempo» or «During the Storm.» Considered a specialist in the genre, he offers us here a main course in a thriller format seasoned with a maelstrom of crimes, extortion and false appearances that coexist in an underworld dominated by the cruel face of power, so corrupt, marginal and grotesque. Each chapter chains the perspective of a key and decisive character for this authentic narrative puzzle that has the DNA of the always addictive Coben: constant dramatic twists and mentioned peaks of intrigue that seem to push his conception of entertainment under the mandates of the genre to the extreme of plausibility. . Never afraid of being ambitious, in the Iberian filmmaker the coup d’état pays off
IN THE FOREST: In 1994, an adolescent camp ends abruptly: two of its participants die gruesomely and mysteriously in the woods, while two others remain missing for twenty-five years. This police intrigue, adapted from the novel by Netflix favorite Harlan Coben (author of the novel «Don’t Tell Anyone», made into a film by Guillaume Canet in 2006), becomes an attractive miniseries whose plot takes place in the city of Warsaw, where a shrewd prosecutor must tie up the loose ends of that tragic event. Solid and intriguing blockbuster, with notable artistic flair, the proposal complicates the human relationships that surround a mystery frozen for decades. His conception of the police genre looks so captivating, making exquisite use of dialogues and temporary ellipsis, carrying out narrative traps that sow suspicion about the true motivations of his characters. Discovering the truth about what happened and the monstrosity inhabiting those responsible will not be a mere matter of time in the course of the chapters: it will demand the viewer’s maximum attention and his inexhaustible capacity for wonder.
DO NOT TALK TO STRANGERS: What would you do if they told you that your whole life has been a lie? Such a question would seem to challenge each viewer of the series. Harlan Coben’s new novel adventure, brought to the domestic screen, places us under the skin of the long-suffering Adam, a peaceful family man whose world falls apart due to the mysterious disappearance of his wife. Discovering inconceivable secrets about the true personality of the mother of his children and companion of a lifetime, Adam will undertake a futile search for his lost trail. This superbly crafted British exemplary carries out a formal exercise in the psychological thriller genre, providing equal doses of intrigue throughout eight marathon episodes. He builds the police investigation with patience and craftsmanship, involves in the development the ambiguity of certain characters motivated by frankly amoral interests (pay attention to the enigmatic portrait provided by the Irishman Stepen Rea), also the participation of adolescents cruelly dealing with the loss of innocence. Die-hard fans of Coben’s extensive fictional work will delight in this twisted family story, which weaves its ties with its natural heir “Safe”, placing the point of doubt within the confines of a well-to-do residential neighborhood.
SAFE: The disappearance of a teenager, daughter of a renowned surgeon (the always effective Michael C. Hall, whom we saw excel in «Six Feet Under» and «Dexter») arouses suspicion in the demure environment of a residential neighborhood. As dark secrets come to light, the true identity of each member of the luxurious neighborhood will be revealed to us as spectators, as well as the tragic outcome of a present story that ties fine threads with a macabre past. Subtly orchestrated in the mind of novelist Harlan Coben, «Safe» insightfully portrays the despair of this man living a true nightmare, on the elusive trail of his eldest daughter. Intricate and fast-paced, it helps us discover the motivations of this copy that drinks from the sources of the British criminal thriller, in the best style of the whodunit patented by Agatha Christie. Doubt sets in to never abandon us.
DO NOT TALK TO STRANGERS: The author Harlan Coben is a favorite of the Netlifx platform and Daniel O’Hara knows well how to adapt it, since «Safe» (2020). This miniseries starring Richard Armitage, Jennifer Saunders and Stephen Rea engages in non-stop intrigue. The true criminal identity remains hidden, the pieces in the puzzle do not end up fitting. Pretend is everything. Coben, never timid when it comes to surprise us, will always keep a secret to discover as an ace up his sleeve, examining an infected community and guilty of crime. Here, the most recognizable (and twisted) elements of his plethora of best-sellers abound. A specimen much more successful than the mediocre «Quédate Cerca».
STREAMING REVIEW: «THE GOOD NURSE» / «CAPTURING THE KILLER NURSE»
HORROR ASSISTED WITH DIABOLICAL PERSIMONY
By Maximiliano Curcio
In the area of hospital intensive care, the deaths of terminally ill patients accumulate, something indicates that it is not a coincidence. Behind the events there is an even more disastrous explanation, which will take years of investigation for the police to confirm: Charles Cullen was injecting those in his care with lethal drugs to cause death by overdose. Released on Netflix, the latest true crime film, an inexhaustible source of interest for the platform, is titled “The Good Nurse” and its veracity makes our blood run cold.
In 2006, Cullen (1960, New Jersey), nicknamed the «Angel of Death», was convicted of murdering about thirty patients while working as a nurse at various medical facilities in the states of Manhattan and Pennsylvania. However, there is speculation that it may have been responsible for hundreds of other deaths, yet to be determined. Devastating tale of madness and cruelty. How do you explain his unpunished maneuver? As The New York Times investigated, the sadistic nurse had fired from former work residences, evading capture for years and earning the trust of his colleagues.
To avoid the death penalty, he pleaded guilty to first degree murder and was sentenced to eleven consecutive life sentences. The black police chronicle would make him one of the most prolific serial killers in contemporary American history. The interesting documentary approach that is offered via streaming, entitled «Capturing the Killer Nurse» tries to shed light on dark areas and complements the premiere of the film starring Eddie Redmayne (nominated for Best Supporting Actor for the Golden Globe Award, for this role). , “The Good Nurse” (2022, Tobias Lindholm), a true psychological study, recounted in absolute detail.
Authored by Charles Graeber, the true-crime book that serves as an adaptation for the film compiles testimonies about his crimes and reveals the perverse face of the person who, with extreme knowledge of the medication he administered, decided on the lives of defenseless patients. Her shyness and delicacy when speaking and moving suggested that she was a person of a fragile nature, in need of protection and good care. The poor corporate practices of the health system and Cullen’s manipulative personality converged to help keep his behavior established for more than a decade. The chilling will never exhaust our capacity for wonder.
STREAMING REVIEW: «ECHO IN THE CANYON»
NO DISTANCE ECHO, PURE SONIC POWER
By Maximliano Curcio
Directed by Andrew Slater, in 2018 the documentary «Echo in the Canyon» was released, a superb audiovisual piece that we can enjoy through the Netflix platform. Produced by Eric Barrett and hosted by Jakob Dylan (Bob Dylan’s eldest son), this true treasure for music lovers takes us on a journey back to the nostalgic golden era of the ’60s and ’70s. The geographical concentration in the place called Laurel Canyon, bohemian redoubt par excellence, and which represented one of the most interesting phenomena to analyze, in line with the development of musical progression on the North American west coast.
In the vicinity of the emblematic Troubadour (the club founded by Doug Weston in 1957), in the vicinity of prestigious recording studios, miles from the Hollywood epicenter. Laurel Canyon was within reach of it all. In the middle of nature, inserted in the Californian forest, it was the cradle of hipsterism and counterculture. A habitat chosen by characters that would be important for the birth of folk rock and the Californian sound. Illustrious neighbors forged the legend of the neighborhood located in the heart of the Hollywood Hills; an inexhaustible source of inspiration, it was the destination chosen by Brian Wilson, The Eagles, Jim Morrison, Neil Young, Gram Parsons or Joni Mitchell, among others. An oasis was born in the midst of the fast-paced day and night life of L.A..
The thriving west, towards the beginning of the 20th century, receives the cinematographic novelty. More than half a century later, the cozy and warm climate does the same with the emerging rock. The documentary is brought to life through interviews with Tom Petty, Brian Wilson, Stephen Stills, David Crosby, Graham Nash, Michelle Phillips, Jackson Browne, Ringo Starr, Eric Clapton, Roger McGuinn, John Sebastian, Lou Adler, Norah Jones, Beck , Regina Spektor and Cat Power. Valuable testimonies recreate those years in incessant brilliance. Times of fertile creativity, the United States was a magnificent musical laboratory. Inbreeding is taboo. Halfway between ‘the summer of love’, the ‘English invasions’ and the first Woodstock, the Beatles, The Byrds, Cream, The Doors, The Mammas and The Papas sound. The wild chronicle was written about strong winds of freedom. The story was just beginning…
METALLICA LAUNCHES “M72 WORLD TOUR” IN THEATERS AROUND THE WORLD
By Maximiliano Curcio
From Arlington, Texas, Metallica’s M72 World Tour burst onto the big screen worldwide, through a broadcast that allowed us to enjoy one of the most transcendental bands in heavy metal history. An unprecedented cinematic event, where the California-based group, founded in 1981 by Lars Ulrich and James Hetfield, tackled two completely different set lists, reviewing the highlights of their four-decade career. From their 1983 debut album, the visceral «Kill ‘Em All,» to the brand-new 2023 release, «72 Seasons,» a sophisticated nearly 80-minute long album.
The overwhelming «Lux Æterna», the first promotional single, became the first world premiere of the eleventh studio work, the axis of a journey that began on April 27 of this year, and whose conclusion is announced for September 2024, at the Mexico City. Currently underway across America and smashing records in its wake, the ambitious M72 tour features a bold and eye-catching circular ring design that relocates the famed Metallica Snake Pit stage so fans get a full 360-degree view. degrees.
The Metallica formula is undeniable: galloping riffs on Kirk Hammett’s fingers, Robert Trujillo’s bass lines like a machine gun rattle, Hetfield’s cavernous vocal flow commanding with destructive power and the violent drum accompaniment in the hands of Lars. Ulrich. Throughout a set that lasted two hours of intense duration, between premieres of the new album and classics sung as an anthem, the double evening at AT&T Stadium left us accurate samples of the forcefulness exhibited by an intact band. longevity, tracing its umpteenth tie with the film industry, after the successful premieres of “Trough the Never” (2013) and “Metallica & The San Francisco Synmphony” (2019).
In the busiest cinema chains in our country (and more than a thousand theaters around the world), during the nights of August 19 and 21, we became part of the monumental M72 World Tour, an ambitious tour of concerts in support of from the band’s eleventh studio album, released last April. With a state-of-the-art multi-camera configuration, the privilege of enjoying this event in a dark room encourages us to participate in an invaluable musical experience; an audiovisual show that places us in the center of the action, between popcorn and headbanging, witnessing the overwhelming presence of a band of legendary lineage.
FILM PREMIERES: «Asteroid City» (2023) / Wes Anderson
PHOTOGENY, QUARANTINE AND PAROXYSM
Score: 5
Wes Anderson is an author identifiable with the forms of his cinema, to which he has known how to mold the dramatic, romantic and comic value of his stories. His fictional micro universe is part of an aesthetic delimited to perfection: we have before us a filmmaker who imposes total control and dominance over the body of actors, the movement of the camera and the photogenic aspect of the image. It is not the exception of “Asteroid City”, his most recent work, capable of taking his comforted notion of beauty to the extreme.
Gathering an extensive gallery of great stars inserted in this magnificent choral story -an aspect that his films usually boast-, Anderson chains a dozen minimal stories in the heart of the North American desert, in an uninhabited area of the state of Colorado. A fictitious city, called Asteroid City, is located there, where a children’s contest, a series of nuclear tests and a scientific convention are held; although, in reality, the daily representation of the arid moor corresponds to the rehearsal of a play, consisting of three acts and an epilogue, which, in turn, are narrated by an external narrator in a TV studio.
«Asteroid City» unfolds through a narrative mechanism of those that the cinema always likes to resort to: a precise framework of metafiction in superimposed layers. A subgenre with its own entity in the history of the seventh art. Once again, the Texas native filmmaker returns here with two faithful allies: the sound section is in charge of Alexander Desplat, while the authorship of the story is divided in half with Roman Coppola (son of the great Francis Ford). Performers of the stature of Jason Schwartzman, Scarlett Johansson, Tom Hanks, Jeffrey Wright, Tilda Swinton, Bryan Cranston, Edward Norton, Steve Carell, Matt Dillon, Willem Dafoe and Margot Robbie, make up a compendium of eccentric characters, functional to a story that sins of excessive whims.
Visually, this is an unobjectionable film. Strict compliance with the three-thirds rule and a marked obstinacy with the vanishing points within the frame, represent for Anderson a textbook ABC. Its authorial character is radicalized in symmetries, tracking shots, saturated lighting and an unbreakable harmony of pastel colors. Putting these strict aesthetic precepts first, “Asteroid City” pays an obvious homage to the old Warner advertising cartoons, offering a very particular visual characteristic. Throughout its hundred minutes, the footage is populated with pictorial references to Edward Hopper, the most representative visual artist of mid-century American realism, and this is how Anderson portrays exterior and interior landscapes, capturing the artificial nature of the creatures that inhabit it, even giving us a frontal nude by Johansson.
Generating divided opinions within the cinephile field, the author of «Isla de Perros» (2018) and «La Crónica Francesa» (2021) takes the sense of the plot excuse to the extreme. Perhaps the mere pretext of the small stories linked here is precisely the complete lack of meaning. Because the plot background corresponds directly to the aesthetic formality, until it completely dissolves within it. Restricting the narrative value to its bare minimum, Anderson knows how risky it is to bet on embellishing a package. Once the magic trick is accomplished, it is inevitable to wonder if he has not taken his aesthetic principles too far, and by the mere act of showing off his most precious toy.
FILM PREMIERES: «Talk to Me» (2023) / Danny and Michael Philippou
NOT A HANDSHAKE FOR ANYONE
Score: 7
Co-written and directed by the duo of authors Danny and Michael Philippou, in what constitutes their film debut, «Talk to me» is installed as one of the most pleasant horror film surprises this season of releases. The professional trajectory of these Australian twin brothers, creators of a successful YouTube channel where they combine comical and chilling stories, is peculiar. Bringing such precepts to his first film, “Talk to me”, screened at the Adelaide Festival, breaks with the first of the prejudices beforehand: here we have much more than adolescent horror.
The act of conjuring spirits with an embalmed hand ends up going too far and unleashing dark forces, the kind that it is better to refrain from provoking. Unable to escape from the game they are playing, a group of young people will find themselves involved in the evil violence unleashed from the afterlife: the threat soon becomes corporeal and extremely disturbing. Framed within the code of the subgenre of horror films of contact with spirits (an entire entity in itself, let’s take the premise of examples such as «La Ouija» as a reference), the macabre nocturnal ritual that works as a plot trigger, actually serves as a as a metaphor to delve into issues of a social nature.
Visually dynamic and enveloping, “Talk to Me” is based on the force, surprise and impact that come with a series of bursts of horror that are difficult to bear from the seat. This kind of heightened terror manages to ally itself with the morbid and the unpleasant, as well as delve into registers that operate at a symbolic level on the underlying plot, exposing adolescent alienation, family grief, mental health and post-traumatic psychological stress, in an ostensible twist. conceptual over the predictable dream-hallucinatory cliché.
From the point of view of production and staging, the directorial duo undertakes an outstanding job, complying with the ABC’s of classic narrative. They resort to minimal elements of suggestion (taking into account the limited budget), managing to chain effective jumpscares with remarkable precision. The use of detailed shots and zeniths revealing the horror place in our power a degree of focus that gives us half a step ahead of the unfortunate protagonists of the story. The viewer knows in advance that the most shocking horror is about to appear, and yet it scares us just the same.
This independent horror hit, a phenomenal global box office success, comes directly from the ascendant and highly original A24 factory, which is exclusively distributing and announcing the launch of a sequel to hit theaters in the near future.
FILM PREMIERES: «The Night of the Demon: The Red Door» (2023)
By MAXIMILIANO CURCIO
THE SUPPRESSION OF HORROR / Score: 3
Produced by the successful Blumhouse and directed by Patrick Wilson, the fifth and long-awaited installment of the “Insidous” saga hits theaters. In the behind-the-scenes debut of one of the lead performers from the hit horror producer, the iconic James Wan officiates as producer. As a premise of «La Noche del Demonio: La Puerta Roja», we find ourselves with a character completely disconnected from his family ties and facing his own demons. In the process of grieving and unable to escape from a violent and traumatic past, ghosts haunt his daily life. The terrifying of the afterlife lurks…
The film takes advantage of the linking context of parts one and two to channel the present events. Unfortunately, its resources are reduced to total literalness. Lack of ideas, the resolutions offered, at a technical, plot or aesthetic level, seem like those of a beginning director. The screen is populated with weak elements that do not offer any kind of sustenance or authentic horror, while the narrative potholes seek to be alleviated with jumpscares that are more humorous than subtle. Nothing seems to instill genuine disturbance. Just a hint of out-of-focus shadows that put the characters in danger, but no kind of gadget to be exploited in a more decent way. The fiasco is huge. A mysterious painting comes to life and red saturates the screen. But, for some strange reason, we feel invited to the wrong function. References to artistic creation, and more specifically, to a certain feedback between art, darkness and unexpected places of inspiration, add some interest to the first moments of a film that quickly exhausts its potential. An extremely subdued photography (perhaps to justify the fear of the dark) wastes the oppressive potential of a plot that, except for the occasional wink, chooses not to delve into the stellar monsters and entities that made «Insidous» a trademark of a genre. in full free fall prior to his arrival on the cinematographic scene.
A pathological relationship between father and son is exhibited with the explicit reference to Goya’s painting “Saturn Devouring his Son”. High point of the curse that haunts the Lamberts, when gloomy and paranormal becomes more than evident. The torment suffered and a series of absurd astral journeys emphasize personal misfortunes with meager success. Wilson knows this and does what he can, because mainstream manufacturing rules. When memory is populated with memories to forget and evil beings try to take possession of the protagonists of this nonsense, a series of key scenes are taken to ridiculous levels. Emotional reconciliation will catch the outcome in the flattest and most predictable way. Chapter five is far from really scaring.
FILM REVIEW: «A DECISION TO LEAVE», by Maximiliano Curcio
CINEMA IN ITS PURE STATE
Score: 8
Selected by South Korea in its bid to compete for the Best International Film category, the long-awaited new gem from the master of oriental cinema Chan-Wook Park finally arrives in theaters. The director of «Oldboy» (2003), consolidated as one of the greatest authors on the international scene, addresses on this occasion the main characteristics of film noir, under the investigation of an ‘alleged suicide’ involving the wife of the deceased subject . A meticulous and dedicated detective investigates possible causes of the tragedy. Intentional crime, suicide or accident? Emotionally destabilized, his sentimental bond with the main suspect detonates the plot in unexpected directions.
The film develops the same archetype that we have seen a hundred times, but here coming to life thanks to the master hand of someone who decides to tell a story with absolute mastery of his art. Premiered in the 2022 Cannes edition, where the South Korean received the Best Director award, the film builds its identity through a paradigm of ambiguous morality and a common denominator of all self-respecting police officers. Inheritor of a certain Hitchcockian style, suspicion reigns everywhere. «The Decision to Leave» grows bigger by the minute, by virtue of the prodigious lens of an author capable of appropriating the generic formula of the American erotic thriller from the end of the last century. Virtuoso when it comes to placing emotions on stage, the director extracts superb performances from his two main actors (Tang Wei, Park Hae-Il).
«The Decision to Leave» focuses its interest on the turbulent relationship established by its two main characters. The chosen coordinates trace the dimensions of a bittersweet affective intersection. How do you live a forbidden love? What is meant by infidelity? Chan Wook-Park engages the viewer’s point of view and overloads us with information, while the film takes on a grandiose, fragmented and tangled structure. The author catches us off guard; confusion reigns. Before our eyes a magnificent and sublime work unfolds, where desire, love and obsession come together. The detective film slightly mutates its nature, to pair with a vigorously braided romantic melodrama. Valuable details seem to be hidden in each shot.
Whoever dabbled in the English-speaking drama with “Stoker” (2016) is a stylist of the image by the maximum way, he displays captivating visual capacities. With absolute authority, he operates perfectly controlled rhythms, complemented by the melancholic notes of his regular collaborator Jo Yeong-Wook. Exhibiting dynamism, his technique abounds in cinematographic transitions and ingenious and varied camera movements, functional to the primary contemplative intention. His visual purification allows him to create authentic continuous rhymes from the montage (an essential tool). An expert in exact framing, the aesthetic refinement in “La Decisión de Partir” covers a considerable spectrum, from handheld chases to static scenes. Such are the precepts that conceive an overwhelming staging and highly original implementation of physical spaces.
Elaborated dialogues that reflect the idiosyncrasy, the poetic cadence and the cultural brand of the East. Section by section, throughout almost three hours of footage, the psychological tension that borders on the corporeal, the erotic and the sensual covers the story with an intriguing atmosphere. Chan Wook-Park is extremely solid in his usual narrative strength as a trademark, printing script twists with great success. His extremely violent thrillers (“Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance”, 2002 / “Lady Vengeance”, 2005) took his film brand from East to West, but here he does it in reverse, appropriating an American genre par excellence. We have a full-fledged crime scene where the form conforms to the content, offering itself as an interesting reflection on love, life and death.
FILM REVIEW: «BEAU IS AFRAID», by Maximiliano Curcio
THE UNBREAKABLE TIE
Score: 5
Established as a great horror director with only two films to his credit, «Hereditary» (2018) and «Midsommar» (2021), New Yorker Ari Aster acquired cult author lineage almost immediately. Consuming the inexhaustible spell on his unconditional fans, he returns to the big screen with an extra-large Freudian hellish odyssey. After seeing its plan to be released at the last Cannes Film Festival cut short, “Beau Is Afraid”, produced by the ascendant A24, arrives at theaters not stripped of a certain skepticism. The present is a film conceived for die-hard fans.
Written in 2014 (previously titled “Dissapointment Boulevard”), it was intended to be Aster’s debut feature. Curiously, and due to the strange designs of the creation, the product ends up being finished almost a decade later. Inspired by certain atmospheres, ideas and visual rhythms from his short film «Beau» (released in 2011 and from which its outcome differs completely), Aster places a protagonist at the center of the overflowing story that shows anxiety, fears and very specific insecurities. Completely changing register with respect to his previous creatures framed in the genre of his choice, in his third opus he explores the world of dreams, penetrating the unconscious of his disturbed main character. In order to unravel his conduct and behaviour, we delve into the worldview of an author who goes beyond all limits and is not afraid of bordering on nonsense. At first glance we find the indelible imprint of the author present in the film. The maternal factor has marked, in an undeniable way, the brief but forceful work of the filmmaker; the female presence is assumed to be controversial and discordant in the portrait depicted here. Aster, wild by nature and the one who coined elevated terror in the most disturbing way, brings with him a couple of house brands: an elaborate staging and an overloaded symbology are the exact measure and mold of form adapting to content. A scathing and overflowing psychological analysis takes precedence in this black comedy seasoned with Kafkaesque touches.
Surprisingly, towards the second half of the footage, its form strangely mutates into a Fellinian absurdity that is most abstract and difficult to assimilate. At twenty-four frames per second, Aster carries out the realization of a gigantic and unbridled nightmare, depositing in the talent of the enormous and magnetic Joaquin Phoenix much of the luck of a film excessive by nature. The present of the protagonist of the story is frankly bleak: annulled by modern society and by the figure of his castrating mother, he takes refuge in the safety of his apartment, while outside, in the streets, crime, deranged people and violence reign. at ease. Outside of his comfort zone, adventures await him ready to haunt him sooner rather than later. Sexually frustrated, he establishes a complex relationship with his mother. The right premise to make fun of that character who pigeonholes: how far can mom’s affection go? Would he be capable of taking the life of the woman who gave it to him?Less is not more in the hands of the ambitious director; a host of good original ideas end up being victims of the same claim, because the victim who is always cannon fodder and Aster comes to meet her, to tear her apart. Until intellectual exhaustion, it spreads extreme fears and raised to the nth degree. Metaphors of overprotection and manipulation are the symbolist preference, throughout three hours of footage slipped between signifiers.
We witness the monumental physical and spiritual journey that the disturbed Beau undertakes, on his way to confront his worst threats. A psychological picture of paroxysmal dimensions, it resembles a probable cross between David Lynch and Darren Aronofsky. In the background, the painting reveals nuances of the gloomy picture of the situation of American society. The most disconcerting audiovisual work of the year unfolds before our eyes. Comic exaggeration is the register used when it comes to making visible the problems that a social misfit goes through on the way to embarking on the most sinister and deranged return home that we can imagine. Aster leaves no detail to chance, fulfilling his condition as an aesthete: visual paraphernalia is promoted as a backdrop to expose poor mental health. His developed artistic taste integrates animation with reality. Intuitive, he studies spaces brilliantly. You may end up giving a movie lesson and pulling off a practical joke at the same time. Maybe neither one nor the other. The result is a self-aware author’s piece of his whim, and that does not carry an instruction manual to be decoded.
STREAMING REVIEW: «WINNING TIME – SEASON ONE», By Maximiliano Curcio
The domestic screen examines the myth. PURPLE AND GOLD MAGIC IN HOLLYWOOD LANDS
Created by Max Borenstein for HBO and directed by the always sharp and incisive Adam McKay (“The Big Short,” “Don’t Look Up”), “Winning Time” takes us right into the heart of one of basketball’s greatest phenomena. preponderant of the American professional era. If the city of Los Angeles condenses all the glamour, ambition and illusion of grandeur at the foot of the California valley, the Lakers franchise created a model of infallible success, linked to spectacularity and excess in equal measure. Nor was it exempt from the gigantic obstacles that stood in the way of a path mined by egos. High octane offense on the field, sex, drugs and all kinds of temptation off it. Crowded and uncontrolled parties, who doesn’t want to be a jet setter? An explosive cocktail where Jerry Buss (played by John C. Reilly, the former magnate of the purple and gold franchise) is the center of a brutal scene. Outside, the city burns and it seems that no one sleeps, while, inside the corridors of the Forum, a dialectical war is brewing.
There’s Jerry West (extremely grumpy, under the skin of Jason Clarke), the showtime mastermind and wannabe coach (the ultra-demanding Pat Riley, in the shoes of Adrien Brody) and the future rising star of college competition. (Just Magic, finding Quincy Isaiah a reasonable facsimile). How to recover the lost prestige? How to turn this group of individual talents into a title-contending nucleus that aspires to jeopardize the dynasty of the arch-rival Boston Celtics? With great realism, the series immerses itself in the feverish competitive atmosphere with a view to capturing the coveted champion’s ring, and knows perfectly the ins and outs of the chaotic environment in which it enters. A grainy texture simulates an old VHS. One of those collectibles that preserve the Laker feat. In the end, winning at any price and aspiring to the Olympus that sporting posterity signs, is a battle willing to be fought only by those elite stars.
The Lakers exalted a flashy and fast basketball identity that elevated the league to a marketing phenomenon without a similar precedent, with a view to inserting itself into the modern age of sports practice. Magic, meanwhile, redefined the concept of a globally recognized superstar, patenting an imprint followed by phenoms like Michael Jordan and LeBron James. The Lakers, meanwhile, wrote the most glorious page of their mythical career. Every legend has its origin…
En el competitivo mundo de Pat Riley (1945, New York/USA), la palabra derrota simplemente no existe. El ambicioso Head Coach, que patentara la frase <<no rebounds, no rings>>, fue el encargado de reemplazar a Paul Westhead (1939, Pennsylvania/USA) como técnico en función de Los Ángeles Lakers, durante el primer mes de la temporada 1981-1982. Aquel año, ganaría su primer campeonato, cimentando su temprana leyenda. Había nacido el “Showtime”. El monstruo de tres cabezas, liderado por Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar y James Worthy, cambiaría la concepción moderna del básquet. Su éxito se amparaba, bajo total mérito, en el aporte de un cast de lujo: el incisivo defensa Michael Cooper, el escolta tirador Byron Scott, el rudo Kurt Rambis, el polivalente Jamaal Wilkes y el fiable auxiliar A.C. Green.
Protagonistas estelares de una década prodigiosa, esta noción de juego llevaría a la escuadra angelina a las instancias finales de competencia, durante siete ocasiones, ganando un total de cuatro campeonatos. El Showtime puso en práctica un espectacular sistema que hizo del “run and gun” su forma de vida. Colocando el peso de su éxito en el contraataque, proveyó un fértil territorio para el lucimiento de integrantes que hoy engrosan las filas del Salón de la Fama. El propietario de los Lakers, el emblemático Jerry Buss (1933-2013, Utah/USA), reunió semejante talento bajo el mismo uniforme con una fiel premisa: llevar entretenimiento a cada partido disputado en la meca de la industria fílmica. Las estrellas de Hollywood, desde Denzel Washington a Jack Nicholson, copaban las primeras filas, mientras las Lakers Girls (sus estruendosas cheerleaders) aportaron color y calor a cada evento. El Forum de Inglewood estallaba en magnetismo.
El Showtime se convirtió en un fenómeno deportivo, acaparando la atención de celebridades, fans y especialistas del baloncesto. En las gradas del recinto brotaba el furor, mientras el carismático estilo motivacional impartido por Riley -ejecutor de un estricto régimen disciplinario, impensado para las nuevas generaciones- se esparcía en los vestuarios. La palabra del gurú los guiaría hacia a la tierra prometida, y tes fundamentales estandartes encarnan a la perfección los preceptos de dicha cosmovisión baloncestista.
FILM REVIEW: «INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY», by Maximiliano Curcio
For the new version of «Indiana Jones», George Lucas and Steven Spielberg completely departed from the project, the latter keeping only executive producer duties, having directed all the previous films in the saga. The main challenge is to find a new man in command behind the scenes, and, finally, the chosen one is the highly experienced James Mangold. A safe bet, known for having directed films such as «Logan», «Le Mans 66» or «Walk the Tightrope» with a good hand. Mangold brings with him a stable reputation and a patience molded under pressure. The film finished shooting in February 2022, and from then on, the crew plunged into hours and hours of post-production.
At first glance, Mangold, a director with a stable career and reliable box office revenue, seems to establish himself as the one indicated: a craftsman of the genre, at the service of the studios. Little more could be asked of him to endow a saga with charm that has made, throughout its history, a cult of adoration for a past that does not necessarily reflect the honey in the present. During the eighties, and since then, «Indiana Jones» colonized the cultural unconscious of an entire generation of moviegoers, throughout a saga that expanded beyond expectations, even renewing its interest in 2008. , with “Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull”. After a decade and a half, the question became inevitable: how does a young audience that has grown up with hyper-realistic 21st century superhero films deal with this return to the sources?
Relying on a classic-style narrative, an eminently retro sense adapts to the prevailing vertigo of the present, resulting in «Indiana Jones and the Final Call.» The mixture could not obtain the desired returns, half a step from absolute failure. Taking considerable risks, the production leans towards keeping the sense of nostalgic adventure above the outrageous action. The umpteenth nod is provided by the sensational soundtrack signed by the very veteran John Williams, perhaps his cinematographic swan song. Mangold carries out his task opting for the use of closed shots, resolving the most frenetic sequences in limited spaces. Aptly, he brings great inventiveness to a series of camera angle and movement choices.
The emotional blow is immediate from the first moments of the trailer: a young Indiana Jones takes us straight back in time. Harrison Ford’s face mutates with some strangeness, digitally rejuvenated. The Danish Mads Mikkelsen is guessed as a probable antagonist, adding to luxury secondaries such as Antonio Banderas and Toby Jones. With a great scenographic display, the film surprises us with a variety of locations that update the proposal. Analog effects, a la “The Mandalorian” are scattered throughout chases across the sky and ground, and this is just the beginning. Reaping the revenues of such an illustrious emblem, Indiana Jones forces his gaze, just a little more than necessary, towards an ancient past that refuses to die.
FILM REVIEW: «MASCHARADE» (2022, Nicolas Bedos)
LOOK BEYOND THE MASK / By MAXIMILIANO CURCIO
“La Farsa” (“Mascarade” is its original title), a furious social critic, is the author of Nicholas Bedos, one of the most interesting filmmakers on the current world scene. The French Bedos, responsible for films such as “La Belle Epoque” returns to a habitat that he knows perfectly well: the aristocratic classes and the world of acting; and he does it to dissect them with a surgical stroke. Because, not to be confused, this film is going to show you what you don’t see in the cinema, what love doesn’t define.
“La Farsa” has something of Almodóvar, another bit of Allen and as much of Bergman. But he is not indebted to any of them… with absolute personality, he carries out a phenomenal staging on the French Riviera, the one that fascinated and hosted Somerset Maugham, seeking to describe a series of manipulative characters capable of exposing their darker side. That pearl necklace shines with gold. Everything is false, everything is hypocrisy. Love is plastic and fake. Nobody feels anything, what weighs is the pocket…on the reverse of possession, jealousy does its part, devouring…Deception is sumptuous fantasy: the couple of boring and parasitic lovers swims on the surfaces of the banal. Everything is for interest and perfidious ambition. The bodies are interchangeable on the sheets; Not even the dust they throw down looking into each other’s eyes is true. Worse still, nor what is engendered and carried in the womb.
If we think about it, perhaps the only authentic thing here is the masturbatory act that the young woman pulls up her pants, until she finishes, on the emboldened boy who aspires to be a writer, but who has become a rich gigolo. Although not even, because the sexual impulse is not moved by genuine desire, but by the perversion of doing it inside the car of his aging partner on duty. Deep down, they are two unfortunate narcissists of the imposition, hosting the Peter Pan syndrome, living at the speed of modern life and spending on a checkbook that does not belong to them. And whoever has to pay the bill is probably the crepuscular movie star who is starving for the glory of the last century due to his dwindling status and whose ego is injected with pure hysteria and corticosteroids. “La Farsa” takes down from the wall that portrait of the apparent to become a bombastic essay on madness.
The cast is a delight. Marine Vacht (discovered by F. Ozon) was born to seduce, Pierre Niney (Ives Saint Laurent) is one of the most promising young French actors and the imperial Isabel Adjani seems to have managed to stop time. As if that were not enough, having luxury secondaries like Emanuelle Devos and Francois Cluzet makes the banquet complete. And Bedos, with total control over his art, opens parallel narrative lines, overlaps plots and temporalities, makes false truths and turns an erotic drama into a police intrigue.
REVIEW / Streaming: “McCartney 3, 2, 1”
By MAXIMILIANO CURCIO
TV miniseries (2021). 6 episodes. Producer Rick Rubin interviews Paul McCartney about his work with The Beatles, Wings and as a solo artist, including stories about the personal relationships that inspired his songs.
The following is one anecdote among thousands that make up the legend.
A boy gets excited about composing songs. The world is ahead of him, but in his face the taciturn daily life of a metropolitan city where pubs and football rule. The second of three brothers cultivated his incipient musical taste in the record stores of the time. At family gatherings, he surrounds himself with instruments and recites poetry. Hormones rage at 18 and he wants to attract the attention of girls, so he dresses in a French look, because he admires the French artists of that time. There is something sophisticated and distinguished in that preferably dark look. At parties, strategically choose the most unnoticed corner. He picks up his guitar and does what comes naturally to him. What he came to this world to do. But he sings in French. And the girls, yes, they went to him.
The fever was years away and he didn’t even dream of a tiny part of what fate would bring to him, to him and his friends with whom he got together to jam. It was just a game, and the longing to get there. But with your feet on the ground. He knew that the dream could end soon, because such groups were not meant to last long. If the thing did not work, it would have to go back to the factory. For almost everyone it was like that. There wasn’t too much of a surprise in it. But inspiration, the inexhaustible search and the desire to transcend usually bring good results. It all started testing ideas with the folds of a melody. They are the possibilities offered by a song. Diving below the surface beauty is extracted. It is the noble spirit of creating.
By the end of 1963, several hits and some unforgettable albums had already passed, but the young man was always characterized by providing his creative stages with overcoming challenges. And, as it was always a game, he went back to the beginning and to the humor of singing in French. What sentence is better? He thought mischievously, remembering an old love. And that’s how his guitar dressed the composition of “Michelle” with subtlety. Ma Belle. Trés Bien, the muses were on his side. At his fingertips only savoir faire and good French culture nurturing the crazy ’60s. Two more years would pass. The nod was perfect, laying the foundations of a stainless classic, the seventh and last track on side A of “Rubber Soul”, the sixth album by The Beatles.
The anecdote makes sense on a day like today. In Walton, Liverpool, Paul McCartney was born, 81 years ago. Musical icon, living myth and undisputed emblem of the 20th century.
FILM REVIEW: About MAXA, The Maddest Woman in the World
By MAXIMILIANO CURCIO
“Tell me, what do you intend to do with your one wild and precious life?” Mary Oliver.
Between silent tapes and stage performances, she was murdered 30,000 times and/or abused in more than 60 different ways. Between them:
strangled / beheaded / poisoned / crucified / stabbed / dismembered / burned / gutted / cannibalized
Paula Maxa (Dec. 1898) inscribed her legendary name in tragic borders for the history of the most remote horror cinema and theater. In the Grand Guignol in Paris, around the 1930s, the macabre machinery of torture was put into motion night after night. Death was smelled after the curtain fell, blood soaked into the seats, panic sprang from the protagonist’s eyes, a grimace of pleasure from her simulated scream, and the show offered was a spectacle that caused an orgiastic trance to the senses for everyone. the assistants. There was Paula, actress and gala star, survivor of her own trauma, victim of the singular success gestated as the object of such monstrous and vile mistreatment as it was necessary to be such a crude and provocative act of exposure for those years.
Imagine if it would be possible today, in times where we rethink certain practices, roles and models. Typecast, the collective memory almost completely forgot her. Discredited by her own family, she was buried in a common grave at her death in 1970.
An interesting reinterpretation of her story can be seen in “The Most Murdered Woman in the World”, an unnoticed film directed by Franck Ribière and available on Netflix.
FILM PREMIERES: MISSION IMPOSIBLE — DEAD RECKONING, Part One / by Maximiliano Curcio
PURE ADRENALINE
Christopher McQuarrie directs the superstar Tom Cruise, in the new installment of “Mission Impossible”, for a premiere that is at the top of the list of most anticipated films of the year, since its distant announcement in trailers during 2022. This is how Cruise, after venturing at full speed in “Top Gun”, once again puts himself under the skin of intrepid agent Ethan Hunt, enduring face of one of the most profitable franchises in Hollywood.
Stainless guarantee of success, “Mission Impossible” traces its origins to the TV series that CBS aired since 1966, in response to the success of the James Bond saga. In 1996, by the hand of Brian De Palma, he managed to make the leap to the big screen, to become the cornerstone of a cinematographic phenomenon that has survived from then until today, and with an Argentine label: the soundtrack composed by our Lalo Schifrin It still sounds just as magical. For the last of his incarnations, Cruise -officiating as producer- places infinite trust in the director and screenwriter McQuarrie, who has just directed the previous two episodes (“Rogue Nation”, in 2015 and “Fallout” in 2018). Together, they have previously worked on a number of successful projects, including “Valkiria (2008), Jack Reacher” (2012) and “Al Filo del Mañana” (2014). Decade and a half after meeting for the first time, the chemistry remains intact. For the courageous Hunt, there is no indecipherable code or key that holds a secret sufficiently. Dizzyingly, the first installment of “Sentencia Mortal” follows the narrative pattern that has become a guarantee of quality, in overflowing doses of action and suspense.
The classicism that has paid good dividends for almost three decades knows the shock that agonizing and phenomenal sequences must cause, surpassing the trite of the formula and the mere shortcut of a colossal leap into the void. Therein lies its eternal charm: we have seen the same outcome a thousand and one times, but the premise will never bore us. the complex task of keeping us hooked on our seats for almost three hours of footage, it is not exactly the most even, level and homogeneous copy, compared to previous installments. This mega blockbuster breaks down an excessive plot of espionage, cyber warfare and artificial intelligence threats, as an instrument of wicked power struggles and world dominance. Convoluted and complex, sinning with slight excesses and inconsistencies that almost make a dent in the credibility raised, it includes unexpected appearances for last-minute rescue. Aware of his bombast, and that good always triumphs over evil, he manages to be more effective when he does not intend to explicitly explain or underline certain narrative decisions.
The first part of the story takes us through sumptuous settings, going through a desert storm until flying non-stop to luxurious European destinations, plagued with choreographed action scenes, the kind that pay for a single movie ticket. A series of sequences of pure visual delight are captured with powerful impact and prowess in the air. Pure nerve, tension, drama and a pinch of comedy rests the fate of a film with a prodigious display, which is not afraid of exceeding the duration (and the disaster caused) of a chain of functional motorized chases to the sought-after main course. However, it is worth highlighting the risk taken in pursuit of the desired effect: spectacularity at any cost. Here, the action is a narrative tool that makes us vibrate in front of the big screen.
Although the seventh of the “Mission Impossible” series fulfills the complex task of keeping us hooked on our seats for almost three hours of footage, it is not exactly the most even, level and homogeneous copy, compared to previous installments. This mega blockbuster breaks down an excessive plot of espionage, cyber warfare and artificial intelligence threats, as an instrument of wicked power struggles and world dominance. Convoluted and complex, sinning with slight excesses and inconsistencies that almost make a dent in the credibility raised, it includes unexpected appearances for last-minute rescue. Aware of his bombast, and that good always triumphs over evil, he manages to be more effective when he does not intend to explicitly explain or underline certain narrative decisions.
Produced by Paramount Pictures, “Mission Impossible: Deadly Judgment — Part One” enjoys freshness as it continues the legacy. For his part, good Tom doesn’t need any digital effect, remaining eternally young at sixty-one years of age, displaying an agility and physical dedication that more than a thirty-something would envy. This is how he can undertake risky sequences that would daunt the bravest of mortals. Surrounded by an excellent cast, headed by Ving Rhames, Rebecca Ferguson, Hayley Atwell, Simon Pegg, Carl Elwes and Vanessa Kirby, the unstoppable Cruise gives himself one hundred percent, giving his life if necessary, just to entertain us, because he’s what matters most. It is the umpteenth sign of fidelity to a product from which today it is difficult to dissociate him, although the film sows certain clues of a budding replacement that could arrive in the short or medium term.
The savior of an industry bent on cramming the billboards with pasteurized superhero movies, Cruise resembles an endangered breed: making movies he believes in, leaving life on a movie set. Privileged in being able to do what he loves, he conceives his work as an unavoidable mission. He is a flesh and blood hero, a survivor in times of action superheroes projected on screens with a green background. A staunch defender of quality cinema, the projects in which he is involved encourage us to continue attending theaters in order to properly appreciate a certain class of cinematographic events that only occur infrequently.
FILM PREMIERES: “Oppenheimer”, Christopher Nolan (2023)
By MAXIMILIANO CURCIO
A TIME BOMB
The new film by director Christopher Nolan, who directs and adapts a story inspired by the literary work “American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer” (authored by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin and published in 2005), to focus on the rarely exposed historical figure of the scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer. In terms of premieres, there is no doubt that “Oppenheimer” has a large number of attributes to be an unavoidable invitation to be enjoyed in movie theaters.
Over the course of exactly three hours of footage, Nolan delves deep into multiple timelines to tell the ins and outs of a plot that spans three decades. Using a large number of audiovisual resources -among which stand out an alternating black and white photography, an exquisite soundtrack and sound mix, slowing down and acceleration effects, among other findings-, the director of “Dunkerke” and “Tenet” finds the right point to bring together the different registers that he addresses in the film: the biographical, the dramatic, the political, the family and the espionage. In this way, he knows how to play to his heart’s content with the structures of classic cinema and create atmospheres full of tension to shape a story of epic dimensions.
With robustness, the film undertakes an exploration of the life and work of an ambitious self-made man blinded by ambition, fanatical about the life of the stars and the laws of gravity. Nolan digs on a grand scale, exposing lights and shadows of a quantum physics genius. Who really was Oppenheimer? A modern Prometheus of Jewish origin, who intertwines his tragic destiny with the god of Greek mythology to whom the title of the reference work alludes. A scientist dedicated to his condition, and for whom the end justifies the means, on his way to becoming the father of the atomic bomb. Also a womanizer, chain smoker and committed to communist ideas. A potential killer…
Towards 1940, the theoretician is summoned by the high spheres of military power, enthroning himself as head of the Manhattan Project, work to which he devotes years of his professional practice in the construction of a gigantic laboratory located in the middle of the North American desert. With him in command, a race against time begins in the dispute over the latest technology for war weapons. There, the preparations for the launch of the atomic bomb will be carried out, which will later be replicated, destroying the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, recreated with an overwhelming visual force and whose devastating effects for life on our planet make us choke up.
The converging center of this hypnotic and disturbing political thriller, the astonishing physical transformation of Irishman Cillian Murphy perfectly captures the enigma and contradiction that inhabits the soul of a brilliant, haunted and tormented brain. The protagonist of the successful series “Peaky Blinders” has established himself on the current Hollywood map, giving one of the great performances of the decade, for a consecration role that, it would not be surprising, will bring him numerous recognitions for the next season. of awards.
Nolan enlists a terrific cast of actors to surround his lead actor, ensuring outstanding casting from some of the industry’s most notable performers. In brief but decisive appearances, stars such as Matt Damon, Gary Oldman, Kenneth Branagh, Rami Malek, Florence Pugh, Josh Hartnett and Jason Clarke shine. Pivoting as the central point of view of the story, it is necessary to highlight the great talent of a true acting chameleon like Robert Downey Jr., delivering, probably, his best performance in decades. In the same way, the talented Emily Blunt shines within the cast, in a story where the female characters have little weight.
One of the great filmmakers of his generation is outspokenly critical of America’s sense of patriotism. In great historical detail, it examines violent and turbulent times, from the looming denouement of World War II to the McCarthyite witch-hunt waged a decade later, against the backdrop of a brewing cold war. A perfect recreation of the period, added to the excellence exhibited in technical areas such as makeup and costumes, contribute to the precision exhibited by a colossal cinematographic machinery, shot in original IMAX quality and designed to entertain as much as to make us reflect on the nonsense of a catastrophe. unprecedented for the human condition.
Released in the midst of a winter blockbuster season that includes the hype phenomenon “Barbie” as well as new installments “Indiana Jones” and “Mission Impossible,” the haunting “Oppenheimer” ignites an ethical dilemma that peers into the darkest side of our existence, facing the irreparable effects of an event that forever transformed the course of history. The British Nolan confirms his condition as a brilliant cinematographic author with an immersive and visceral experience, a necessary call to raise awareness regarding the manufacture of weapons of mass destruction and the monstrous consequences that it could bring us.
FILM PREMIERES: “The Flash”, Andy Muschietti (2023)
By MAXIMILIANO CURCIO
Hollywood, from nostalgia to the multiverse
Announced nine years ago, the pronounced dilation did not diminish the expectations of the most faithful audience. «The Flash» emerged as one of the most anticipated novelties of the 2023 season. However, it could be said that the fastest character in the comic world arrived late in theaters. The Argentine Andy Muschietti directs an excessive adaptation of the comic «The Flashpoint», bringing to the big screen a film full of controversies, twists and turns. Finally, the semi origin story with action, humor, adventure and family drama takes on a heterogeneous nature and an urgent reality.
The DC multiverse once again captures all the attention of its staunchest fans. What can surprise us about a superhero movie? At the speed of light, nonsense travels between temporary loops and necessary paradoxes, in the best of ways. Absolute chaos reigns in two and a half hours of pure action. Ready to retrace new paths outside the horror genre, Muschetti, with an ascending career in English-speaking cinema, conceives his most ambitious film piece. A quick and intelligent humor accompanies the set logic. The director honors the personality of the characters portrayed here, with a script under the responsibility of Christina Hodson (known for “Bumblebee”, “Birds of Prey” and “Harley Quinn”).
The creative duo is surrounded by an opulent cast: Ezra Miller, Michael Shannon, Ben Affleck and Maribél Ver
dú are some of the many well-known faces that parade before the lens. At the cut of each shot, more cameos, surprises and winks await everywhere, because nostalgia is a trigger, as part of a narrative in which references to eighties popular culture will abound. CGI effects welcome a Batman rising from the ashes with open arms. The return to the past does not exempt the nostalgic wink of Michael Keaton.
Sequences taken to live action set the tone for what a superhero film should look like today. With a keen eye for creating blockbuster cinematic postcards, Muschetti knows well where to lead his designs. The bombastic workmanship suits you perfectly. “Flash” is a visual feast to fill in holes: special effects resolve 100% digital sequences. The always effective soundtrack composed by the historical Danny Elfman is coupled, with success, to the technical paraphernalia. On his way to directing “The Brave & The Bold”, the new Batman movie, the director of “It” impresses us with a succulent crowd pleaser.
Revista Cultural Siete Artes 