The Fifth Seal, directed by Hungarian filmmaker Zoltán Fábri, was
a bleak, bitter and biting exposition on a draconian and oppressive political
climate marked by complete loss of personal identity and freedom, and where a
candid and rambling conversation even among acquaintances within a closed space
is shrouded with constant suspicion and can potentially lead to devastation
consequences for all. Set in Budapest during the final, and possibly most
destructive, phase of WWII, it begins with 4 friends with each representing
divergent personality types – sarcastic watchmaker Miklós (Lajos Öze), excitable book-seller László (László Márkus),
mild-mannered carpenter János (Sándor Horváth), and gregarious barkeeper Béla
(Ferenc Bencze) – having a casual chat over smokes and drinks at the joint
owned by Béla. A crippled and nervous fifth man (István Dégi) joins them as
their discussion, which veers between politics and philosophy, becomes
increasingly heated. A difficult question by Miklós, in particular, has all
rattled – their reactions during their stay there and more so after they leave
the bar, provided sharp insights into each of these people. But what happens
thereafter took the film from an disconcerting to a deeply disturbing zone, as
the fifth man, miffed at his idealistic, albeit insincere, response to Miklós’
question being summarily rejected, reports about them to the secret police. There,
after a grueling session of torture for apparently no reason, the 4 friends are
asked to do something that would earn them their physical freedom, and again
their responses there added further dimensions to this grim and haunting film.
The washed-out blue-tinged photography added sombre touches to the characters’
lives and the dismal times they reside in.
Director: Zoltan Fabri
Genre: Drama/Political Drama
Language: Hungarian
Country: Hungary
Chantal Akerman’s audacious magnum opus remains
a cornerstone for world cinema for its astounding formalism in terms of cinematic
time and space, and its feminist stance. At nearly 3 ½ hours long, it documented,
with uncompromising rigour, 3 days in the life of a lady, and in turn explored,
through subtle, minute and seemingly irrelevant quotidian details shot in real-time
reminiscent of Tarr’s works, the possible reasons for her shocking meltdown in
the end. It, in fact, heavily reminded me of Haneke’s The Seventh Continent and Chabrol’s La Cérémonie in terms of their stylistic and thematic choices. The titular Jeanne
Dielman (Delphine Seyrig) is a beautiful 40-something Brussels-based
single-mother who also doubles up as a prostitute. The 1st day
showed the incredible meticulousness with which she goes about her daily
activities, and perhaps represented the last day in her machine-like organized
life. From 2nd day onwards, however, almost imperceptibly minor things
start going wrong – she inadvertently overcooks the potatoes, regularly forgets
to switch off the lights while leaving a room, and so forth. In the 3rd
day the frequency and magnitude of deviations increase further – she mistimes
her visits to the local bank and her favourite coffee shop, prepares bad coffee
at home, etc., until the final digression, and the most significant one at
that, occurs while she’s with a client, and that serves as the tipping point. The
film’s austere tone, lack of background score, and a remarkably minimalist
visual style marked by long takes using a static camera, were brilliantly
complemented by Seyrig’s performance which effortlessly captured her
character’s monotony, loneliness, increasing detachment, and gradual
disintegration, and the patriarchal society she resides in.
Director: Chantal Akerman
Genre: Drama/Urban Drama/Avant-Garde
Language: French
Country: Belgium
Bullitt
was a smash hit crime thriller, and comprised of one of the most scintillating
car chase sequences ever filmed. That it also stressed on the dubious
relationship between police investigation and political interference, had a cop
as its lead who regularly challenges authority and due processes, and prefers
ends over means, and was imbued with a gritty and grimy urban feel, ensured
that it acted as a trend-setter for Hollywood in the years to come. Adapted
from the Robert L. Fish novel Mute
Witness by Yates for his first American movie, it had Steve McQueen, in one
of his most famous screen roles, as its eponymous protagonist Frank Bullitt, a
tough, taciturn and no-nonsense police detective. A seemingly routine job goes
awry when a witness for the State against the Mafia who he’s asked to protect,
is ambushed at his hide-out by professional assassins. Bullitt feels there’s
something amiss at the turn of events, and using his hunch he decides to
continue with his investigation on his own, and this earns him the wrath of an
ambitious politician (Robert Vaughn) for whom the witness was a key political
trump-card. That his detachment towards the dirt and violence around him is
making his stunningly attractive fiancée (Jacqueline Bisset) increasingly wary,
added a third, albeit minor, dimension to the storyline. Right from the stylish
opening credits accompanied by a fine jazz score, it kept me glued to the
screen. And that reached its feverish height during the near-10 minute chase
sequence where Bullitt, in his Ford Mustang, is madly following the antagonists
in a Dodge Charger all across San Francisco – the engine roar and screeching
tires of the muscle cars made for the perfect score for the segment.
Director: Peter Yates
Genre: Thriller/Crime Thriller
Language: English
Country: US
Pearls of the Deep,
on hindsight, was a watershed moment for the Czech New Wave movement, as 5 of
its giants collaborated for this omnibus film. It can also be considered as an
alumnus meet for FAMU, as all the 5 directors associated with this project,
viz. Jiří Menzel, Jan Nemec, Evald Schorm, Věra Chytilová and Jaromil Jires,
had studied at the legendary Prague institute. Further, all the shorts were
adaptations of short stories by one of the most beloved Czech authors, Bohumil
Hrabal. Though rarely as politically charged as Czech New Wave generally was,
or like, say, the fabulous Romanian New Wave anthology film Tales from the Golden Age, it did bear
some of the hallmarks that were representative the former movement – alternately
bittersweet, darkly funny and whimsical humour, idiosyncratic characters,
absurdism and oddities, breezy tone, and oftentimes experimental narrative
styles. Menzel’s delectable Mr.
Baltazar’s Death focused on a death and racing-bike obsessed husband-wife
pair; Nemec’s The Imposters, the best
and the most heartwarming of the lot, showed 2 aged patients in a hospital
reminiscing about their pasts, using, as was later revealed, exaggerations to
embellish their personal histories and memories of themselves; Schorm’s The House of Joy, the most politically
charged of the lot and the only one shot in colour, concerned the futile
attempts of 2 insurance salesmen to sell their product to an eccentric painter;
Chytilova’s The Restaurant of the World,
unsurprisingly the most surrealistic of the lot, was about the aftermaths of a
suicide at a local café; and Jires’ Romance,
chronicled the chance and fleeting romantic interlude between a shy apprentice
plumber and a free-spirited Gypsey girl, and the associated social inequity.
Directors: Jiri Menzel, Jan Nemec, Evald Schorm, Vera Chytilova, Jaromil Jires
Genre: Drama/Comedy/Black Comedy/Surrealistic Drama/Political Drama/Omnibus Film
Language: Czech
Country: Czech Republic (erstwhile Czechoslovakia)
A Tale of Springtime
marked the beginning of Rohmer’s late-career ‘Tales of the Four Seasons’, his 3rd and final movie
series, and his distinctively Rohmersque examination of the frailties and
vagaries of the heart with the titular weather providing key tonal backdrops
for the respective films. Jeanne (Anne Teyssedre) is a beautiful, intelligent
and self-assured philosophy teacher at a Parisian school who’s looking for
temporary accommodation as she’s lent her apartment to a friend. At a party she
makes the chance acquaintance of Natacha (Florence Darel), an impulsive and childish
young music student in her late teens who immediately likes Jeanne and invites her
to stay at her place. As it turns out, Natacha’s divorced father, Igor (Hugues
Quester), a 40-something bureaucrat, is having an affair with 20-year old Eve (Eloïse
Bennett) who Natacha despises for various reasons, further fuelled by her
conviction that Eve has stolen an expensive necklace that Igor was supposed to
gift her. So, since Jeanne is ambiguous about her relationship, Natacha tries
to get her linked with her father. The messy family details that Jeanne becomes
unwittingly a witness to is compounded by the discomfort at Natacha playing the
cupid, and these provided the driving forces for the character and interpersonal
dynamics that the story focused on in order to reinforce its theme. As is
common in Rohmer’s filmography, the dialogue-heavy plot had its share of
coincidences, happy accidents and deux ex
machina to both elevate and resolve tension, and the aesthetics
were marked by a near-static camera and near lack of non-diegetic sounds. Though a
lesser work in his canon, the charming set-up, controlled
displays of emotions and the striking presence of the ravishing protagonist,
made it noteworthy.
Director: Eric Rohmer
Genre: Drama/Romantic Comedy
Language: French
Country: France
