Hotel

Jessica Hausner - 2004
Alright, back to film, and not quite as exciting, but still the work of a master (ess?). The camera keeps a lot more still, apart from some looming horror film moves (and some crack-cuts, with sound) in, that, as in 'Lovely Rita', one feels Hausner is taking the piss out of more than anything. Still using a lot of eyeline matches, there is also a repeated move where we see watching a corridor, than go behind, so at first glance she seems to be watching hereself; a trick of SRS, and rather disquieting.
The again elliptical editing should also be noted. And also the fact that this is starting to really resemeble 'Lourdes'; thematically with religion, the use of nightclubs, conference rooms, people listening to music, but also on the vivid blocks of colours set against pale, uncluttered walls. The lighting here is very different from 'Lovely Rita', back, quite hard (and colourful), side stuff too; this is a film, shot in film. It is still utterly fascinating, gleeful, cock-eyed, deliberately obscure in its refusal of clear genre.

Lovely Rita

Jessica Hausner - 2001
This film could prove so important for me, for images that move across a screen.. it looks absolutely disgusting. Video is disgusting, it just looks crap, to modern eyes. Hausner doesn't seem to use artificial light, the colours of the wall make the faces, it just looks shit. It is quite remarkable. It is the anti-Murnau, this is at the moment my ground zero of illusion, the complete destruction of a cinema of poetry and illusion, of film stock in itself as artistic means. We have people in an ugly world, looking ugly. This is a film of pure destruction, almost Nietzschean, of glee, real twinkle-eyed wickedness in the destruction. I kept thinking of 'Filme Socialisme'. The actions are almost entirely stupid, pain inflicting; a brutal deconstruction of the everyday lie of this life, which is yet more positive than anything; for it posits, as a negative, a better world.
It is built largely, almost entirely, off quite close-ups and eyeline matches. Hitchcock yes, but I though more of Bresson (who would use video); no clear space, just physicality, the physicality of video, the feel of dirt, the blemishes on a face. Saying this, there are a few hints of the 'Lourdes' to come; a predeliction for slightly off-centered framing, and bright block colours on clear, nondescript backgrounds.
Hausner's editing is elliptical in the extreme; no shots to explain something, we just fly across. And each shot is so well judged. The nightclub scene; possibly the most disgusting sex scene ever, perfectly held for that duration.
I still can't quite cope with the zoom-ins here. But the idea is interesting. I agree with Pedro Costa that we have to tell Mr Panansonic to go fuck himself with the idea of throwing our digital cameras around, but pure stillness and artful playing with light is really just saying that you want to use film.
Video is the pure current of economics on art. Why does Hausner use video? Because she can't use film. But the video here is key to the art. Art as economics, real art I mean; and all real art is socialism; this is perfect.

Funny Games

Michael Haneke - 1997
This, probably, is formally not as interesting as the two Haneke I have seen before, 'Hidden' and 'The White Ribbon', at least on the level of the camera and so on. We have a lot of close-ups, with, compared to say 'Hidden', a pretty quick cut rate. The film is shot so that the inside is pretty dark, but not excessively so. There are signs of what Haneke will later develop, most noticeably in the pretty audacious huge lonbg take after the two boys leave for the first time; the long, long duration of the mother and father stumbling, unbroken for a good few minutes; this is pretty harrowing duration, which I remember well from 'Hidden'. As is famous, the violence is pretty much entirely offscreen.
The structure of this film is really a focus on the bourgeois family; our interrupters seem almost a formal point of divine violence. Haneke seems almost more interest in what happens after; perhaps due to discomfort showing the violence. This discomfort is most obvious when we are turned to and, three times if I remember, asked to confront the fact we are really taking quite a relish in the violence. This is way ahead of most films, but at the same time I felt a touch underdeveloped; Haneke seems more uncomfortable in a vague way with us seeing violence, but still chooses not to exise it.
We are asked what side we are on, and we have to ask what is really going on here? Is this a youth in revolt film? Destruction of the bourgeois? Anatomy of screen violence? All of the above. As in 'Hidden', there is an element here where I feel Haneke is taking us through a formal exercise, making his points like that, rather than investigating the image. Nevertheless, it is a fascinating investigation and, yes, riveting to watch.

Import/Export

Ulrich Seidl, 2007, cultures, capitalism
This seems to be about the state of realism today
Noticeable for remarkably perpendicular framings; largely in long shot, but throughout
Gives sense of actors as in, rather than controlling environment. Few uses of off-screen space
Often all focussed pretty sharply
Danger of this becoming stylised is deliberately offset by some handheld work, but not character motivated
Both camera styles strive for objectivity; could barely be less involved with the characters (apart from the plot)
Usually light backgrounds, exposed fully, creates a washed out look
Dirty exteriors, air of a kind of hygenised grubbiness about the thing
Very downbeat, bleak picture of the desperate searches for jobs, money, anything
Clear thematic moments; the prostituition, the birth to death axis
And character comparisons demonstrate how this situation crosses boundaries
Exploitation, how the new poor live; no grandeur. Cross-boundaries take away any kind of direct responsibility, specifi country problem.
Air of constant violence, in a low key way
Certain framings accentuate feeling someone is always going to come in and look, dismiss
Not much analysis/ idea of how this has come about, apart from plain mean other characters (not the most successful part)
This kind of failure to find causes leads to a kind of absurdism, the closest we get to stylised moments
The parts at the end, where no so much hope as change occur, are glimmers of supposed life that we realise are put in their place
The pretty long takes and framings, along with the millieu filmed, clearly intended to at once expose and indite, but generally just give a hard-worn picture
The kinds of framings and atmosphere shared by various European releases in the realist tradition; this is a decent work, but doesn’t have the knife-sharp, piercing gaze of a ‘4 Months...’
This is a good picture; it perhaps overloads the bleakness, which is nearly a wallow, and the lack of context is a (political worry); but there has to be a place for this kind of cinema to be seen

Revanche

Recent (2008) movie from one Gotz Speilmann
use of frequent still shots, usually mid shots or three quarters
not much camera movement in these long pieces, though not excessively long (with movemtn usually pretty neutral reframing stuff)
low key lighting in a low-contrast, washed out locale
much talking of dark shapes, of shadows to obscure faces; fits tonal range of film
interesting conundrum; with this imposed, needs to fit two actors into a frame, yet show their alienation. Frequent use of actors on different levels, requiring a certain deep focus
usually, both in frame shows a connection; constant fight against this with different (often not all in focus) levels, with occassional reliefs when they meet
not a huge amount of blocking, really; stay pretty still
use of off centre framings to also show a deliberate unevenness; chickens out a little by filling the blank part of the frame later in the shot
use of door to screen left, narrows space as though we see the film through a black tunnel
for the content themes, we have a pretty simple economic narrative, cogar chomping capitalist, prostitute with a heart of gold, artist/ thief, caught in between, a good man but complicit
women in this film either to be perfect and unattainable (fetished photo) or just to annoy/ be chucked around to demonstrate the male thematics
clear readings of the lead taking his double's desire/ how to cope with the law, etc
the first half, with the floating commodity-signifier and the women, very much 'Bring Me The Head of Alfredo Garcia'
becomes pretty predictable after that, though at least stops when it realizes there's not much point going on
with all its faults, it is solid, nice evocations of the sex/money/death play

Cache (Hidden)

Michel Haneke's acclaimed thriller/suspense, an expertly created, tight in all senses of the word picture that gets across its important thesis most strongly.
For all Haneke's observance and near obsession with the trickery, the artifice of the cinema, he is in truth an impeccable realist (rather perhaps because of his worries this is the case). We have our static cameras throughout, for the people and for the shots. We have minimal identification because of this, any that occurs would be thanks to the audience doing the entire legwork (this lack of sympathetic identification rather throws the viewer off, and is one of many challenged he presents to the bourgeoise audience). We like this style, Haneke lets the images speak (as far as his framings will, which because of the cloistered setting isn't an infinite amount), and for that deserves credit. He lets the viewer think.
As for the themes, Haneke's ideas are exactly what is in the air for your anti-capitalist critic, with dashes of psychoanalytic sympotmisation and repitition. Such intelligence is rarely shown on screen, and for that he deserves credit, although he doesn't do a huge amount more than repeat these ideas that can be read about elsewhere. The last shot, of the children, can be read as one showing maximum responsibility, or as one that is a bit hysterical.
Haneke proffesedly wants to challenge the cinema audience's voyeurism, and there are interesting ideas of disrupting our flow, through confusion of tape/P.O.V. and of violence, but this idea is not developed beyond a few (very effective stabs).
Haneke is questioning the bourgeoise mechanisms that have exclusion in their extension (we should probably ignore the fact that if they HAD taken Majid in he would have grown to be a nice little capitalist...), and how this process is unthinkly passed down. His characters, for all the excellent acting (Binoche and Auteuil) are symblos of a wider malaise. A film on a vital subject, well put put together.

M

The first sound film directed by the great Fritz Lang, it is an affecting, beautifully cinemagraphed, and intelligent work, that is obviously of its time but still worthwhile to see for pure enjoyment today.
The black and white images are beautifully rendered, the shadows and Conrad-esque aesthetic giving us a series of still images that remain in the memory. The use of sillouhettes, shadows, and of the droopy face of the tremendously acted killer give a sense of mounting dread and genuine fear, heightened by clever and innovative tricks of not letting the audience see precisely what is going on.
The story is a good one, told with a decent pace and a nicely ambiguos message, humanist message. The characters are well drawn. The script also works well enough, it is not overflorid or any such, and the voices of the actors come across well in a soundscape that is often silent, making the whistles and cries that do suddenly intrude shrill and contain a genuine sense of the sinister.
This is an expertly made film, which for its time would have been sensational. Now we may see a slightly lightweight plot, and rather odd uses of sound, but generally we can still admire the films power. Highly reccommended.

Lourdes

Certainly one of the better films we've seen this year, a fine consideration of miracles, faith, and our favourite subject, people.
This film is wonderfully ambiguos, perhaps in part because it needed the authority's permission to film, and partly because ambiguity is, well, the intelligent artistic position. It is over simplistic to read this as simply mocking the ridicuolousness of the Catholics and the shrine (though it does this at times). What it critiques (in an untterly non-polemical way) is the people who prove inadequate in their understanding, who miss the point. We are not quite sure if Lourdes does have some (very immanenent) kind of miraclulousness, and should be celebrated, or is the home of the phony.
The plotting rachets up the tension, keeping us grinding nails into palms in even the stillest scenes, as the almost unbearable tensions of the tiniest infringements become manifest. The film making is, in a good way, rather cruel and mean spirited towards the audience; in the most understated way possible it puts them through the wringer.
And understated this film in, with lots of long, still shots. These are beautifully choreographed, stunning images, terrifically framed and using colour in original ways. Take the tracking shot over the candles; done with grace and ingenuity to create great spectacle. Jessica Hausner is a fine director. Like the incredible 'In The City Of Sylvia' the camera stays on scenes when the 'action' has left, creating a spectral beauty. This kind of tactic only works when the mis-en-scene is beautiful and intelligently laid out, which is the case here. Marks also for the always-effective trick of placing characters on the sides of shots, so we don't notice them until the end.
Like 'Sylvia', we stay on characters faces/expressions so we are required to do thinking for ourselves, to make realisations for ourselves, that add untold elements of true 'audience interaction' to the film. A film for the intelligent.
The acting is faultless, the character of the mother-superior figure Cecille is a cold study of a masterwork, Madame Carre is unbearably pooignant, an elderly women in the movies who we care about more than just the usually centralised young.
All round, this a slow-moving, intelligent, often cruel (nearly to the point of a black comedy) and wonderful film.