Review of Stolen Kisses (1968) by Reginald R — 01 Aug 2008

[size=2]Bela Tarr's [b]Damnation[/b] demands a lot from the viewer. There is hardly any story. The film is a slow string of moments - carefully planned long tracking shots - connected by a unifying setting and perspective. Stagnant, slowly panning shots of bleak men and women in a run-down eastern european backdrop.

Audio-visually Damnation is excellent. The shots feel more like photographs than like scenes in a movie, the dialogue serving as a lyrical description of each image. A couple of times the text succeeds in this task brilliantly, but a lot of the time the words are not as well written.

Motion being so restrained, the role of sound in conveying moods and atmosphere from the screen to the viewer is amplified. Natural sounds - like the sound of rain - are used a lot, but always with a thought. Music is scarce and used with consideration, but is notably good and very fitting, often serving as a wonderful contrast to the film's status quo stagnancy, and in this way lighting up the scenes with enchanting complexity.

If all this is sounding pretty good so far, you may well be wondering about the lowish rating. Damnation demands a lot from the viewer, and that means serious business. My predominant thought during the first half of the film was that I've seen all this way too many times in way too many boring films Later on, the film won me over, but there was clearly in the air the chance that it might not have, had the circumstances been less favorable. It's anything but easy getting into the mood Bela Tarr wants you to be in, and sure enough, he offers no shortcuts in this tour into his - rugged, yet beautiful; ordinary, yet strange - world. He makes no pretention of anything new, or different from what you see, being hidden somewhere and served secretly to the pious viewer. What you see is what you get.

If you're willing to take the effort, Damnation is a rewarding, thoughtful film that may leave you transfixed if the mood is right.

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[b]Eastern Promises[/b] has enough accurate reviews written about it. It has everything you'd want from a good, harsh yet heartful, russian mafia story. If you didn't know you wanted male nudity, you were wrong as hell. Cronenberg captures a great palette of expressiveness on film from several actors, but foremost from the subdued lead man Viggo Mortensen who gives the most charismatic performance of his career.

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[b]The Soft Skin[/b] is, to me, second rate Truffaut. A very cliched story of middle-aged adultery. Nonetheless, apart from not catching my interest, I can find no flaw in it's execution.

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[b]Stolen Kisses[/b] is just pure trademark light and breezy Truffaut. Jean-Pierre Leaud as Antoine Doinel is now 24 and displays his deadpan charm that shines bright, particularly in the most comedic sequences. A romantic feel-good movie.

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[b]That Night in Varennes[/b] by Ettore Scola is not a recent viewing, but deserves to be rated on account of being excellent. Surprising to see Harvey Keitel in a French-Italian period piece. Marcello Mastroianni is fantastic in his role. Smart text, good plot, gorgeous camerawork. The film is all talk and lots of class, but on no occation does it leave you bored in your seat. I feel bad for not having a better review for a very reviewable film.

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