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L’Ivresse du pouvoir (The Comedy of Power)

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This Italian comedy of manners has all the worst of its genre with clichés, a lack of credibility in terms of plot and characterisation and some lame jokes.  Yes, it has a certain Italian nature and there are truths that reflect the Italian society today.  Nevertheless, this is like a fairly mediocre telefilm which gives you the odd laugh and little more.  Not really bad but absolutely nothing original or special.  Enough said.

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The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada

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One more on the topic of Palestine and the Israeli occupation.  This time the setting is a Palestine house in the Gaza Strip, which is taken over by the Israeli army.  The family whose house it is stay in it and are obliged to put up with a much reduced part of the house, the absence of any visitors and constant gunshots and other bellicose activity.  The situation is a microcosm of the actual occupation of Palestine and the famiy represent in their own way, the different points of view on the Palestinian side of the conflict. In that respect it is a rather contrived metaphor.  There are some good scenes which convey the sense of siege, especially one when the younger daughter gets locked out in a curfew and traumatised by the event.  The other interesting feature is the idea of the look – looking your enemy in the idea, looking out from a hiding place, having your perspective widened or narrowed and the unspoken looks between husband and wife, parents and children.  Saverio Costanzo handles this well.  I found the grainy filming to be most effective, if a little tiring, because it also conveyed the conditions in the house.  Acting is fine but by the end, the film peters out and we are left a little deflated and with a sense of frustration that it didn’t go for a little more.  Acceptable, engaging but only so far.

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Triple bore more like it!  Eric Rohmer is one of those old masters of cinema that you can’t help respect.  At 84 he has been a prolific filmmaker and has some excellent titles behind him even if many involved dithery spinsters and nothing much happened.  He still managed to say something interesting and create a few memorable scenes.  This ‘historical’ work recreating the late 30’s in France and a Russian who is acting as a triple agent ends up being INCREDIBLY boring in parts largely thanks to too much talk and not enough action.  The actors are attractive and interesting but the plot and the situation just don’t go far enough fast enough to keep one awake!  We end up not really caring about the characters whose lives are probably a lot more fascinating given the time the film takes place than Rohmer suggests here.  Finally, the denouement is so impossible to predict that we could have just fast forwarded there and been done with it.

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A somewhat minimalist Mexican film about a dull Sunday spent at home – two fourteen year old boys, a sixteen year-old girl neighbour and a pizza delivery guy discover how to make time pass, some clues as to living life and growing up and ponder the meaning of life.  It is a quirky offbeat film, shot in black and white, with its own particular pacing and artistic style.  All this makes it interesting to watch but probably not entirely satisfying as a film.  Still, it gets some points for the humour, the credibility of the characters and the way that the messages come out.  Danny Perea as the girl, Enrique Arreola and his pizza philosophy, Daniel Miranda and Diego Cataño do a good job in Fernando Eimbcke’s multiwinning work.  Of interest.

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