Spoiler warning, natch.

In AMC’s ‘Breaking Bad’ – arguably the greatest show airing on television at this moment in time – much of the tension centres on the cat-and-mouse chase occurring between chemistry teacher-turned-meth cook Walter White and his cocksure DEA agent brother-in-law Hank Schrader, with the viewer’s assumption being that the truth will finally out as the show nears its conclusion. Needless to say, the proverbial doo-dah is expected to hit the fan in the most distressing fashion. Add to the mix Walter’s precarious, uneasy partnership with his calculating and frequently murderous boss, and you have yourself two boiling pots of tension that continue to bubble and burst, threatening to blow up at any moment.  However, at both the beginning of the show and  Walter’s beginnings as a meth cook, one key tension that is not currently present provided much of this drama’s sense of jeopardy. This jeopardy was created and sustained through the many ways in which Walter would attempt to conceal his double life from the apparent benefit of his family, most notably his wife, Skyler. Not one to drag out a goldmine until it runs dry, the show’s creators – led by the visionary Vince Gilligan – had Skyler confront Walter in the finale of Season 2, eventually leaving him and having the show’s audience presume that the pair would be going their separate ways.

Thankfully, this has not turned out to be the case. At the close of Season 3 and throughout much of Season 4, Skyler has slowly but surely come around to the gains of Walter’s misdeeds whilst casually glossing over the losses (until it’s too late, that is). Using her business credentials to assist her husband in the criminal art of money laundering, what could have easily been a messy break-up between the couple has indeed transformed into a mutual business relationship, seemingly tightening the bonds between them while not altogether eliminating the distrust and paranoia. In effect, Walter has brought the business aspect of his life into the home environment where initially he thought it too dangerous to share with, let alone involve, his other half. And yet, this development is not without consequence; for where Walter strikes up business relations with his wife, he thusly brings marital drama out of the household environment and into the workplace wherein it takes the form of a distrustful affiliation with his other partner, Gus Fring, an affiliation that is destructive to not just themselves but to everyone around them. In this sense, the cancer that is Walter White has formed together with another element, the two of them of threatening to envelope more lives in misery and tragedy through their eternal conflict.

In the midst of this maelstrom  lies the soul of a child once innocent, once blessed with the gift of life and not the curse of living. From the very start of the show many presumed – just as with the trajectory of the Skyler-Walt relationship – that the dark secrets and increasingly hostile environment of the show both inside and out of the White household would impact badly on Walter Jr., ending in both horror and regret for his father. Indeed, one would presume that Skyler’s initial abandonment of Walter would tear the adolescent apart. Walter White’s symbolisation of the embodiment of cancer on the lives of everyone around him strongly suggests this, and Walter Jr. could still be hurt from this treachery, but that remains to be seen and time will surely tell. For now, the most vulnerable child in all of this (that’s not dead, of course), the one soul who is collapsing beneath the unbearable strain of two authority figures at war with each other, is Jesse Pinkman.

In this article by Chuck Klosterman, it is argued that Breaking Bad is such a unique television drama in part to its characters discovering the boundaries of their morality as they go along, as opposed to other high-end dramas such as The Wire and Deadwood where an individual’s moral code and ethical conduct is conditioned through the context of their surrounding environment. Klosterman cites the extraordinary example of Walter White going from timid school teacher in Season 1 to a black-clad, brooding Heisenberg in Season 4. In contrast to the decision-making Walter, I believe that Jesse is helpless in configuring his own moral identity. He is the lone child caught between an invisible war between Walter and Gus, impacted and shaped each of their swipes toward one another. Jesse has long been trying to convince himself that he’s the bad guy since the first episode, but as seen with his concern towards children in the show, he does indeed possess a good heart and the potential to one day redeem himself.

This potential for Jesse is ruined forever in the closing moments of Season 3 when he is left with no choice but to shoot Gale – Walter’s intended replacement as meth cook for Gus – point blank in the head. This is the pivotal moment in which Jesse’s innocence is destroyed forever, and the point of no return. The downward spiral continues in Season 4, whereby Gus increasingly wins over Jesse’s loyalty by manipulating his actions and ultimately turning him against his former ally. Where Walter had made Jesse murder a defenceless human being, Gus would later attempt the same; the marriage between Walter and Gus so volatile that it impacts the youth caught in the crossfire whose very future rests on their differences either being settled or leading to further bloodshed. With the finale upon us this Sunday night and tension mounting at an alarming rate, Season 4 looks to end the family unit once and for all, for better or worse.

How could Danny Dyer hate a face like this?

On Monday 3rd October, the film-faithful of Leeds took a stroll down to that beautiful palace of independent/arthouse wonder – the Hyde Park Picture House aka The Greatest Place on Earth – to witness BBC Radio 5′s resident film critic Dr. Mark Kermode wax lyrical about Zac Efron, Danny Dyer and ‘Sex and the City 2′, amongst other things. Promoting his latest book ‘The Good, The Bad and The Multiplex’, Kermode took to the stage to deliver to us the crux of his book’s conceit, complete with a question and answer session. The baffling, sweltering heat of October’s beginning had me wondering just how the good doctor could bare to adorn his formal black jacket and tie; further admiration was indeed reserved for his immaculately modelled hair (which, he conceded, is substantially inferior to Zac Efron’s).

The last time I saw Kermode speak in this venue was approximately two years ago for a special edition of Radio 5 Live’s Film Review Show, where Simon Mayo was also present. This night’s event was a lot less formal and allowed for freer banter between Kermode and the audience. I had not read his new book before this event save for a lengthy excerpt posted on the Guardian website, but even much of that was repeated in his initial forty minute talk. Kermode argued that the standards of cinema exhibition are dropping considerably with every passing day, blaming lazy projection, 3D films and rocketing prices among many factors. His vision of a not-too-distant future in which simultaneous distribution of film through television, mobile phone and cinema was not as fraught with cautiousness and pessimism as one might expect; rather, he firmly believed that should this new distribution model result in a fall for overall cinema attendance, it is the multiplexes and not the independent cinemas that will suffer. Simply put, faithful cinephiles that wish to view cinema as it is intended are more likely to visit a local arthouse that cherishes the artform in the same way they do, possessing competent exhibition standards and quality control. The audience seemed pleased that he ultimately deemed it up to them, and not the critics, to decide the future of cinema, in what was an empowering and uplifting message to send the everyone home with. While I agreed from the outset that his final point was a valid one, my realist nature took on another perspective at some inherent naivete resting within the positivism.

Audiences may show their preference toward independent cinemas when times are hard for the industry, however these places are not the insitutions that are setting the overall agenda. Looking at this from a business perspective, it’s clear that whatever pain the multiplexes suffer through first will inevitably trickle down onto the picture houses that stand as the alternative, because the multiplexes are seen to be indispensable in contrast to their smaller, independent counterparts. Whatever tribulations the mulitplexes go through, the distribution tactics that machinate to save their skin will surely work in their favour and to the detriment of the local arthouse. It would be foolish to assert that these small venues of exhibition can control the tide; nevertheless it may be too early to tell, and the world is still wading through the grotesque quagmire that is the 3D profit experimentation – we are essentially deciding the fate of that drawn-out saga, too. Kermode does seem to have faith in us, in his continual reiteration that mainstream audiences are not as stupid as Hollywood perceives them to be. If you say so, Mark.

One other thing that hit me like a pin prick amongst the tedious uninformed whimpers of the Q&A session was one query out of left-field that enquired about the future of the Western. Having written a dissertation on this topic, I listened keenly as Kermode checked off such notable academics as Philip French and Christopher Frayling before ultimately declaring his faith that the Western will endure. I fall in line with this to the extent that the Western genre does indeed ‘continue to resurface’, as Kermode attested, but in the context of this talk that revolved around Hollywood trends, I would have to assert – and it is plainly obvious to anyone who notices mainstream trends – that the Western film industry abandoned the Western as a cornerstone genre and commercially viable product long, long ago. The Western is now firmly in the hands of the auteurs, who have in recent years shot past the subversion of conventions that transformed the genre in the latter half of the 20th Century, and gone back to utilising the core iconography of the years long past to communicate about our contemporary society. Paul Thomas Anderson, Andrew Dominik and the Coen Brothers are a few examples of these auteurs.

So where does the Western’s ideology now reside? With patriotism and obnoxious imperialistic attitudes still thriving in the United States and an available audience ready and willing to consume a rightwing ideology submerged in formal sheen, there must be a place for the subtext that once lay under the conventional iconography of the Western genre to now reside. The answer lies in the superhero picture, of course, and I have previously touched on this connection in my article about the cinematic abortion, ‘Kick-Ass’. Violence in the name of peace, committed by warriors who firmly believe that their ends justify the means and see their actions constantly attacked by the media, permate the comic book movie. The genre itself is already witnessing an early subversion of its conventions with Chrisopher Nolan’s Batman saga, which sees the filmmaker keen to examine the almost neo-conservative nature of Batman’s vigilante operations and their subsequent moral ambiguity.

This notion of ideology hidden underneath the cover of genre is key to what Kermode has been speaking about. He stands firm in his belief that we as an audience are more intelligent than Hollywood believes us to be, and cites ‘Inception’ as an example of a recent film that got the mainstream audience wearing their thinking caps for more than a brief moment. Ordinarily, we settle into our seats and bare witness to a Western blockbuster in its entirety, take the ideology fabricated into the fictional world to be true, and think little of our implication in the events onscreen. If Mark Kermode truly believes that the mainstream viewer is the salvation of the film industry, then this viewer needs to be active one-hundred per cent of the time, and not just when Mr. Nolan demands it. We need to constantly be thinking in the dark, and not fall prey to the complacency of watching all films simply for entertainment.

One audience member asked Kermode if he still got a thrill when he sits down to watch a film. He replied yes, stating that he holds out hope for every film, for the possibility that Michael Bay might finally make a good feature, and that it’s time to pack it in as a film critic when you no longer have that feeling inside you. I’ll state for the record that I do get this same thrill when sitting down to watch any movie – even the terrible ones – but for a similar albeit not totally different reason. When one watches a Michael Bay film, they should ideally be aware of its ideology and how Hollywood uses the conventional Western aesthetic to present this as wholly natural. When one does this, they have the potential to be the saviour of the film industry. When one does this, they realise that entertainment can still be derived from considering their own implication in the viewing process.

Sitting down to watch a Michael Bay film non-ironically – that’s where we have a problem.

Next: Breaking Up the Family – Destruction of Innocence in ‘Breaking Bad’

Comic book fans are a funny bunch. Predispositions about our kind (and I say that in the least alien way possible) dictate that we commonly possess an intolerance to either milk or gluten; a tendency to spout blood from the nose without warning; a perpetual, helpless state of virginity; and, perhaps most damning of all, an inability to socially interact. I fall into none of these categories, and yet I can’t blame the populace for adopting the stereotypical view of comic book readers as what they have so regularly been defined. This is mainly for two reasons. The first is, likewise, a common belief that most human beings have the capacity to assume a shallow perspective on the lifestyle choices of others. The second is, realistically, an acceptance on my behalf that many comic book readers are overweight, of ill health and indeed eternally lonely. Whether this has been sustained by the imagery of their kind by popular media is a question worth asking, but it is safe to presuppose that a section of society that feels rejected and disillusioned with the bigoted, small-mindedness of others can find solace in the blissful escapism of a Captain America book, inside a landscape where the world as we know it is ostensibly inverted and aggression toward numerous foes is categorically justified in moral and social terms through the unreal strength of a Man of Steel. Comic books – at least in the mainstream sense of the term – typically revolve around seemingly invulnerable characters that embark on repeated crusades against a tyranny that threatens the world.

We fully acknowledge that the ideology that permeates these tales is one of militarist intent, of heroes that police the world through acts of soft yet fantastical violence and justify their action through concern for the greater good. Yet, despite these aspects – and despite independent comic books offering a broader range of theme and genres – there is still much to admire about the superhero comic. The art style, for one, can save a mediocre piece of writing. Likewise, a compelling story arc can distract from a particularly jarring visual choice. Yes, comic books have their niche audience, and the audience comes to the store each week fully aware of the product it is consuming and the enjoyment derived.

Cinema is a different animal altogether. Whereas a comic book need only tick a few boxes to earn its seal of approval, a film consists of a multitude of complex layers that each deserve intense scrutiny. As a cinephile, it is hard to defend the spate of comic book films that have arrived within the past decade. Some of the Marvel offerings may be entertaining, a large majority of them may be boring. One thing we can be sure of is that there is no considerable aesthetic apprecation to be had for, say, any of the X-Men films in comparison as to how one might receive the art style displayed in the franchise’s monthly book instalments. As each comic book film arrives, one can’t help but notice how the formula begins to retread itself so lazily, and the crime of repetition is somehow greater than that of the comic book artform.

What is the saving grace of this genre? It is undoubtedly the phantom of the Western – the psyche of the rightwing, patriotic American ethos inscribed in the allegedly justifiable heroics of the action hero. Sure, we had action heroes a decade earlier in the form of Willis, Stallone and Schwarzenegger, but  in a world now consumed with fear over terrorism and threats to the security of the nation, Hollywood finds itself in dire need of a new breed of hero, a thirst that the bottomless well of budding heroes from comic book lore is only to willing to quench. The ideology that underlines the genre may indeed be infinitely more interesting to deconstruct than the films themselves.

Kick-Ass, helmed by the unremarkable Matthew Vaughn, is a misguided, clumsy attempt to shake some life into the genre through its assimilation of 21st century media touchstones (social networking in the form of MySpace gets a big nod here) and a curious contemplation of just how an ordinary citizen would fare should he or she dress in spandex and take to the alleys. Dave Lizewski (Aaron Johnson) is the stereotypical nerd in question guided by, as he puts it, ‘optimism and naivete’, but also the very best intentions. After all, most if not all superheroes are armed with the interests and security of their fellow citizens at heart. Dave’s psuedonym for himself is ‘Kick-Ass’, which one would probably be expected to respond to with stifled laughter, a sure sign that his best intentions are unquestionably admirable, but in the vein of all comic book nerds who have come before and will go after, he is literally a walking punchline, a hopeless endeavour.

No sooner does he find himself in too deep within the complex web of the crime syndicate than we are introduced to Hit-Girl (Chloe Grace Moretz) and her father, Big Daddy (Nicolas Cage), both seen by the film as more adept and skilled in the art of crimefighting than Kick-Ass could ever hope to be. All semblance of superhero parody and (apparent) satire is thrown out of the window with the introduction of these characters as the film descends into sequence after sequence of increasingly ludicrous cartoon violence that acts as a constant pinch in the arm to the audience – an opium for the people. The perennial barrage of bullets and blades forms a deafening alarm bell that ensures our consciousness is never switched off, even if our brains are showing no sign of life.

Hit-Girl has been conditioned in the art of – perfectly justified! – cold-blooded killing by the visibly unstable Big Daddy, whereas Kick-Ass has taken up his mantle through the influence of his comic book idols. This is a world in which he assumes no superheroes exists, and so his crusade is, in his eyes, a valiant, noble effort to fill the void and do what simply needs to be done. Both youngsters are therefore spurned into action by external forces that either encourage or take advantage of their childish guilelessness as opposed to the trajectory of the familiar superhero origin, in which lessons of responsibility and duty are acquired through more fantastical yet noble means.

Seeing a 13 year-old girl utter the c-word before slashing the throats of various hitmen in scenes of gratuitous violence may be disturbing to some, and sure enough these scenes have provoked the ire of knee-jerkers at the Daily Mail amongst others. Whether a film has any commitment to fulfil a wholesome moral image is a matter of personal preference, but Kick-Ass should not be dismissed for its bad language, and certainly not for the acts of violence alone. It is the context in which this bloodied, frenzied mess occurs that is the more immediate concern.

We have already learnt of the circumstances that lead to the creation of these superheroic alter egos. The narrative eventually leads us to a point where Kick-Ass considers – like all superheroes do eventually – stepping away from the crimefighting lifestyle. So soon, Dave? The civilised thing to do would be to settle down with his  girlfriend whom he has attained by a methodology that could only succeed within the falstities of Hollywood narrative (likewise, his substantially nerdier friend manages to cop off with another girl during a moment of panic, in one cringeworthy scene that resulted from the film’s resistance to leaving loose narrative threads dangling). Settling down is however out of the question for Kick-Ass. Hit-Girl needs his assistance after a turn of events that force the film’s so-far tone-deaf disposition to centre on slight emotional conditions. Kick-Ass needs to fight, and so we are once more drawn into the accepted ideology of the superhero genre as a morally justified violence for the benefit of the greater good. One scene involving a jetpack more than confirms Kick-Ass’ integration into the hardened, militaristic ideal that Hit-Girl and her father unquestionably embody.

However, the circumstances surrounding the violence have changed in this instance. Hit-Girl’s vendetta against the crime lords who are to meet their fate in the final act is one generated through personal hatred, and not one of social justice for the good of the people. For a film so bloodless (no pun intended), tone-deaf and utterly devoid of intended parody, it asks a lot of its audience to be emotionally invested in a tragic occurence that impacts on all key players so late in the film.

The butchery meted out by the heroes in the climactic showdown is carried out away from the public eye. Just as well, considering its graphic nature. What makes this episode of violence different from what has preceeded it is the context in which it occurs. In this instance, the key factor that has been accentuated is that of family. In a tit-for-tat  game of ‘my firepower is bigger than yours’, the battle between hero and villain escalates into a murky grey moral area in which both parties are indistinguishable amidst their insatiable bloodlust and thoughtless massacre of the other’s family. Do unto others as you would have done unto you is the order of the day by the film’s crimson-soaked climax; as the two apparent beacons of hope Kick-Ass and Hit-Girl stand triumphant atop a skyscraper with the sun beaming benevolently in the background, we are left with no question that they did the right thing – despite their actions positively reeking of reactionary aggression.

The ideology that lies within the fabric of Kick-Ass is one of mean-spirited, militaristic eye-for-an-eye callowness that recalls the actions of American soldiers carelessly bombing civilians and their families in the Middle East as a means of hasty retaliation over the death of their own loved ones in the September 11 attacks. Yes, some may argue we require comic book heroes to occupy the Hollywood landscape as a means of compensating for the climate of fear that currently consumes our world, but when they come as juvenile and hopelessly pathetic as the likes of Kick Ass, Hit Girl and Big Daddy, maybe we are better off without any guardians at all.

The primal instinct of the raging animal is to find as much food as it possibly can and devour it in a suitably grizzly fashion. Similarly, man’s first instinct when faced with such a threat is to bring out the big guns, and this is done post-haste with the arrival of hunters, armed to kill and ready for a fight.

The remainder of the film takes us away from the village and its colourful characters, and into the trees and mountains where a final confrontation with the beast that has been plaguing the lands is inevitable. The proceedings become less entertaining once the humans become capable of fighting back,with events swiftly devolving into a series of chase sequences in which the predator and prey are rarely seen in the same frame together. Twenty minutes of monotonous action and one cringeworthy explosion scene later, we find ourselves coming out of the other side wondering if we should have rooted for the boar to the very end. Some of the setpieces are wildly ambitious and often reminiscent of Alien, ensuring that this film has the potential to be big. Unfortunately for Chaw, bigger is not necessarily better.

After the loud gnashing and screaming of that particular film, the still, snowy setting of North (Rune Denstad Langlo, Norway, 2009) gave an altogether different viewing experience. Jomar is a ski instructor who, after his wife runs off with his best friend, chooses to isolate himself in the mountains. One day, however, his cabin burns to the ground, and he is compelled to take a journey across the vast, empty landscape stretched out before him in a quest for self-discovery.

Along the way, he meets a wide variety of characters, including a small girl, a confused adolescent and a lonely old man. From each of these highly entertaining and touching encounters, Jomar learns something about himself and changes, and it’s fair to say that each person he meets changes at the same time. The foreboding yet welcome sight of the white mountains is captured beautifully, especially in one scene in which Jomar skis down an enormous slope; looking on from a distance, we watch all shades of grey disappear, leaving Jomar appearing as if he is falling through a blank canvas. At 78 minutes, North never overstays its welcome, and the journey is so contemplative and full of event that we feel as if we could remain Jomar’s companions for a while longer. An experience to savour.

Events take a few unpredictable turns; in part to the film’s insistence on keeping its cards close to its chest, you can’t quite tell where it will lead. Silence speaks louder than words in some cases, and even louder speak the slight, effective gestures of each character. The camera sits at the dinner table, a regular setting and one of both confrontation and neglect; we’re able to direct our eyes in between each character as circumstances change and the setting of dinner takes on a whole new meaning in each scene. With a calm, slow pace, Ander lets itself unfold gracefully and with a finesse to its storytelling that sustains our attention right to the end.

The pace is soon quickened in Slovenian Girl (Damjan Kozole, Slovenia, 2009), in which lonely student Alexandra is trying to make ends meet with a job in prostitution. When a German client has a heart attack and subsequently dies after a hotel room rendesvous, Alexandra’s ideal life becomes enveloped by fear as several parties attempt to track her down. Subject to manipulation from people both familiar and unfamiliar to her, Alexandra’s troubles force her to travel back and forth from the harsh city and the comfortable setting of her father’s home in a constant struggle to evade danger.

While the sense of fear and loneliness in this feature is palpable, it doesn’t quite hit with the bite that it intends to. I can’t help comparing it to Francesca, the Romanian film I viewed at the festival last week, which creates an ambience of helplessness and fear of relentless pursuers through its film form; the wide, static long takes allowing the emotions and drama to unfold before our very eyes. Slovenian Girl doesn’t utilise style in the same way, coming across as a quite conventional execution that while effective and visually competent, fails to stand out as well as it should. However, some of the concerns presented in the film are universal in spite of the concept, and speak wider truths about the world as a whole, although one can’t help but feel that even with such a striking portrayal of a youth in peril, the whole escapade feels distinctly average.

The festival awards have already been handed out by the jury, with the Golden Owl being the most coveted prize. The last film of the night, Puccini and the Girl (Paolo Benvenuti, Italy, 2009), did not take the gold, but it did receive a special mention equating it to second place. After viewing the film, I can attest that it certainly deserves this mention. If the jury are (hopefully) rewarding these features on the basis that they use film language to construct something of originality and worth, then maybe Puccini and the Girl deserves simply more than a mention. It tells the tale of Giacomo Puccini’s relationship with his maid and his composition of his opera, ‘La Fanciulla del West‘, all expressed through a sophisticated visual language that displays masterful, virtuoso technique.

As a testament to its visual exuberance, no words are spoken outright through the entirety of this film, with written letters being the exception, read out inside the minds of the characters. It all feels comfortably like a callback to silent cinema, and the void of silence is filled with a delicate piano track that plays over most of the film, lending it a classical touch and complimenting its themes and the many contemplative images of nature that pervade each scene. Puccini and the Girl is a prime example of the language of film being correctly utilised to tell a story.

The Golden Owl itself went to La Pivellina, which I praised a few entries back. A fantastic choice, I’d say, and even though there are films equally as strong, if not better, some of them have already achieved a level of recognition that La Pivellina deserves itself. Samson and Delilah and Dogtooth, for example, both won awards at Cannes and have aroused great awareness already. Bright Star and A Serious Man are already high-profile, critically acclaimed gems of filmmaking. Having yet to see the rest of the festival’s lineup, and obviously missing out on a great deal of films due to the schedule being so vast and plentiful, I can’t ultimately say that La Pivellina was the hands-down best offering of the past two weeks, but the decision to award it the top prize over the more obvious choices is a commendable decision on the jury’s part.

Less pleasing is the audience response to some of these films. Whilst it is certainly encouraging that Dogtooth has enamoured enough people to warrant extra screenings for those intrigued by its premise and widespread praise across the festival, less reassuring is the overwhelming response to saccharine slush Departures, which I notably condemned for its manipulative stylings. 142 of the response forms awarded Departures five stars, apparently the greatest response to a film in the festival’s 23-year history. Judging from all the crying women surrounding me in its screening, I’m not surprised, although I am disappointed. At a festival where the world’s finest examples of new, up-and-coming as well as veteran filmmakers are given exposure to showcase their grasp of the filmic language, it’s a shame to see a film take precedence that essentially – I’m gonna say it – cheats its way to an audience response. Departures doesn’t give credit to its audience, forcing them into a passive viewing whereby the response is more a forced reaction to being beaten over the head with as much over-sentimental rubbish as can be mustered. If crying your eyes out at music is the key to winning a coveted film prize, then I should have nominated Sufjan Stevens’ “For the Widows in Paradise” to take the Golden Owl.

Still, Departures isn’t even the worst film of the festival. That honour (so far) goes to Millenium: Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. That film made me lose my faith in humanity, a crime which cannot be forgiven so easily.

Saturday saw a film I’d been anticipating for quite some time, and one that arrived with a great deal of hype due to its popularity through the festival circuit this year. Love Exposure (Sion Sono, Japan, 2009), the four-hour-Japansese-indie-cult-sensation has been making waves with its hilarious depiction of teenage love, religious oppression and panty-snapping perversity. You heard that last one right.

Teenage Yu has a priest father who derives some level of enjoyment from scolding his son over the sins he has committed. Eager to give his father something to get angry about, Yu goes out of his way to achieve the greatest sins humanly possible. Before long, he and his friends have joined an exclusive club that teaches the art of taking upskirt photos. This scenario makes for a handful of scenes in which Yu and co take to the streets and begin flinging their cameras here, there and everywhere in search for the perfect, most perverse panty shot. It isn’t long before Yu’s exploits lead him to Yoko, a man-hating young girl who becomes his ‘love at first sight’, setting off a chain of events that become increasingly more bizarre as we work through the four hour duration.

The hot talking point with this film is whether the length is indeed justified. During an intermission placed halfway through, I decided that the first part didn’t seem long at all, and while very little was actually achieved for the main story in these first two hours – which mainly consisted of exposition – the film did a capable job of introducing and setting up the main motivations behind each character, taking us through an adolescent journey that hits all the key points: relationships with parents, primal lust, seeing that person for very the first time, etc.

Things took a turn for the OTT in the final two hours – although not necessarily in a bad way – as the mysterious, omnipotent Zero Church makes its presence felt and turns Yu’s world upside down. What happens at this point isn’t detrimental to the themes of the film, but unlike the first two hours, these events don’t comfortably fit the prescribed length. We’re entering endgame, with the threat bigger than ever, and so the pace of the film gets inreasingly faster. More and more is thrown at the wall, expecting to stick. It was at the turn of the third hour that I really started to feel the length. The first half of the film had taken a long time to tell not an awful lot, and yet somehow the second half felt like it was taking little time to tell an too much, thanks to the frenetic pace and ever-changing circumstances. If it was 3 hours instead of 4, Love Exposure may have had stood a chance at being a little more cohesive. As it stands, its length isn’t justified to the same extent as some of those other lengthy masterworks (Satantango, Andrei Rublev) that take you in and make you forget time itself temporarily.

Love Exposure is however deliriously inventive, and contains many delights and truths that could tempt you into taking the plunge, maybe more than once. Despite the length, the many themes have an air of reality about them, channeled through an absurd world that cotinually places demands on our suspension of disbelief, whilst at the same time placing emphasis on recognizable thoughts and feelings. The popularity is deserved, and the future looks promising as far as a sustained cult following is concerned; leave your reservations about runtime at the door and see for yourself what all the fuss is about.

From epics to quickies: the 60-minute Stingray Sam (Cory McAbee, USA, 2009) is a miniature space western chronicling the escapades of the title character and his accomplice Quasar Kid as they traverse the galaxy with the aim to rescue a small girl held captive on a strange planet. Unashamedly daft, this feature is separated into six 10-minute chunks and keeps its audience occupied with musical numbers, cartoons and colourful history lessons fleshing out the expansive universe which McAbee has created for such a short feature. There’s even some underlying concern underneath the narrative; although the setting is physically removed from our planet, the anxieties of the Western world are still expressed with the archetypcal cowboy protagonists fighting their way through privatised prison systems and genetic research facilities.

The 60 minutes spent with this film were undeniably silly, but what was equally entertaining was the 30-minute talk with director Cory McAbee following the screening. He explained the motivation behind separating the feature into six parts (each with their own title and credit sequences), that people are now tending to watch their films online and in the case of YouTube sometimes in several parts. Discussing his work on the film, but primarily focussing on the changing business models regarding cinema, McAbee explained that this film was not only showing at festivals, but is also immediately available to purchase on DVD and most importantly the official website, in a number of digital formats, including iPod resolution. This is one filmmaker that’s clearly thinking about the future, contemplating the number of ways people can access his work in a way that is most convenient to them. Judging from the audience response to his presence and the film itself, there’s an undeniable cult following and widespread appreciation for the man’s work, and one can only hope he gets the funding he needs to continue work on his dream project, Werewolf Hunters of the Midwest. It’s all in the name of silly fun, after all.

Just when I thought I was out of Romania, they pull me back in. Carmen Meets Borat (Mercedes Stalenhoef, UK, 2009) takes us to the Romanian village of Glod (which translates in English to ‘Mud’ – unlucky), where we witness what I’m sure many would be interested to see: the reactions of the villagers to their depiction in Borat as rapists and prostitutes. Angered and upset, the villagers turn on the documentary filmmakers capturing events, refusing to trust anybody else holding a camera in their village. Luckily for them, a few lawyers show up and promise to help them exact revenge on Sacha Baron Cohen.

This documentary style is fused with a narrative strand that details the daily life of Carmen, a 17-year old Romanian girl. Carmen is concerned about the pressure to marry, and the her father’s insistence that she wed a young man named Cristi. Events unfold in a touching way, and when each person is shown to be overcome by their emotions, we realize we are finally being treated to a real glimpse of the human beings that were paraded around so wrongly in Borat. The film also exists as an insight into Romanian culture – as was its original aim before the filmmakers of Borat rolled into town – and we hear some interesting things of note, such as one man’s admittance that life was substantially better under Ceausecu’s regime, something Tales of the Golden Age would not have you believe.

When select Romanian villagers are flown to London (after initially being promised a flight to LA to disrupt Sacha Baron Cohen’s ‘Oscar party’) and are sent into the headquarters of 20th Century Fox armed with their legal documents and little knowledge of the English language or where they are, one feels that the lawyers ferrying them about are as much untrustworthy and useless as the suits from Fox who originally brought shame to the village. Unearthing the truth behind the lies of Cohen’s film, Carmen Meets Borat is a poignant examination of the true culture and the warm human beings that inhabit this underprivileged village in Romania, their hopes and dreams, whilst at the same time managing to exist as a damning indictment of plastic Hollywood. My faith in humanity: still missing.

No two shorts were exactly the same, although you could detect the aesthetic of some of the current films in a few of them. One noticeable difference from any contemporary Romanian feature I’ve seen was the use of a few surrealist elements, for example in Liviu’s Dream (Corneliu Porumboiu, Romania, 2004), whose title is fairly self-explanatory. The one short that stood out the most was Marilena from P7 (Cristian Nemescu, Romania, 2006), a fairly lengthy tale told from the perspective of Romanian children, eager to take a leap into manhood through relentless pursuit of the town’s prostitutes. This short was notable for its visual flair and delicate balance between the humour of childish fantasy and the harsh reality.

Thus ends my festival foray into the latest output from the current Romanian movement. I can safely say that amongst the shorts and three feature-lengths I’ve seen, there’s plenty on offer through several different approaches; here is a cohesive film movement with recognizable traits, whilst at the same time no films overlap negatively and infringe on each other’s aesthetic. It’ll be interesting to see where the movement goes from here, what the established directors produce next, and if the next generation can significantly build on its momentum.

It’s been ten years since the release of cult sensation The Blair Witch Project (Daniel Myrick & Eduardo Sanchez, USA, 1999), and its tenth anniversary was celebrated at the festival on Friday the 13th of November (spooky!), bolstered by the presence of the film’s producer, Robin Cowie, who stayed for a Q&A session after the film. He revealed some interesting tidbits that, along with the sheer amount of names and companies present in the end credits, make this feature seem like much more than a simple trip to the woods with a few cameras. Pre-production, we learnt, took an eternity, with auditions taking place almost up to a year. Despite its bare bones feel, a ton of work went into the planning of this movie, in the same way that a ton of post-production went into making Colin a watchable zombie romp.

As for the film itself, it’s debatable as to whether it still stands up to this day. While it may have set off a trend for first-person camcorder movies, the concept has grown bigger and louder in recent years, with titles such as Cloverfield and [REC] upping the production budget significantly and in turn, the impression on audiences. Watching this relic in retrospect, the whole thing comes off rather flat; I’ve never understood the hype myself, being merely 11 years old when the film came out, but what you see for the majority of the film is essentially three young adults being overly melodramatic, gasping and huffing and puffing. If you can buy into that, then this film has you in its claws. To be honest, nothing really hits home anymore, especially the underwhelming climax. Best seen as a nostalgic relic, an example of great internet marketing, and a testament to huge revenue from a tiny budget, The Blair Witch Project is becoming smaller and smaller as time wears on, in spite of its devoted following.

I enjoy a good horror movie as much as the next person, although some of the tired conventions often leave me yawning in my seat. Take Macabre (Kimo Stamboel & Timo Tjahjanto, Indonesia, 2009), for instance. Group of young friends drive through the night. Group encounters helpless woman in the road. Group pick up woman. Woman invites group back to house. Group meets strange mother. Mother insists group stay for dinner. Group hesitates. Group obliges. Chaos ensues.

Dubbed the ‘goriest film of the festival’ in its introduction, Macabre finds itself delivering on this promise for the last 45 mins, with each frame almost literally swimming in blood. If someone isn’t covered in it, chances are they’re trying their best not to slip up on it. Chainsaws, rifles, swords… every weapon you wouldn’t expect to find in a household is used to its fullest extent, with the bloodiest results possible. This relentless bloodletting is mildly enjoyable when it finally hits, but up to that point nothing in this film entirely convinces.

No atmosphere of fear or dread is sufficiently created to justify what happens next, so when the violence does finally hit it comes as more of a wake up call than anything. With the first half of the film proving to be an interminably dull experience, it’s up to the latter half to turn up the volume and really deliver on the goods. Indeed, volume is everything in this film, and the sheer volume of blood is one that audience members will be telling their friends about immediately following the screening. Whether they’ll remember the film in a few month’s time is another thing.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to watch Human Centipede once more.

4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, I am informed, had a ‘Tales from the Golden Age’ sub-title, because it originated from this particular portmanteau project before director Cristian Mungiu took it away and developed it into a full feature. What resulted was a harsh view of life under the oppressive regime, and while his masterpiece serves as a great companion piece to these five shorts, the tone is noticeably different.

Tales from the Golden Age observes this period of time with a wry, deadpan sense of humour, a peek into the lives of individuals and groups affected by the regime. While life under Ceausescu certainly can’t have been plain sailing, sometimes the best way to revisit and try to grasp some understanding of the past is to look back in a comical, ironic fashion, and this is what is achieved so efficiently in these shorts.

Troubles with pigs, gas leaks, merry-go-rounds and doctored photographs are all given a gentle jabbing, and yet the unavoidable seriousness surrounding the way of life under the regime is still felt in every frame, buried beneath the dry humour. With this cohesive collection of retrospectives, the bright young voices of Romanian cinema make another definitive, finely crafted statement regarding the storied past of their nation.

The writeup for El Arbol (Carlos Serrano Azcona, Spain, 2009) in the festival brochure describes the film as ‘produced by Carlos Reygadas’ (Yay!), ‘influenced by the Dardenne brothers’ (Yay!!) and ‘brilliant’ (Yay!!!); quite the ringing endorsement!

Santiago is a lost soul, roaming the streets of Madrid looking for some purpose in life. The Dardenne influence is immediately apparent, as the camera remains behind Santiago’s shoulder for most of his wanderings, as we follow him in his attempts to navigate through the concrete jungle. There’s some heavy-handed symbolism here with allusions to the freedom of nature, including one awkward moment involving some tree-hugging, and the imagery is noticeably ugly, but then again, when you want the city to appear as quite the opposite of alluring, that’s surely the best option. One standout flaw lies in the acting – there are some truly awful turns here, especially that of a small boy near the end who looks at the camera, shrugging, probably at the film itself. Azcona explained that this boy was a friend – as were all the actors – and he found him ‘undirectable’. This is all well and good, but his place in the story doesn’t appear to be necessary, so omitting him altogether would have been the best option, surely saving the end of the film from certain ruin.

Still, Santiago is most importantly the authentic character, and we learnt from Azcona that this was Bosco Sodi’s first acting role; the Mexico-born actor normally paints for a living. Not bad for a first timer. His aimless wandering through the city, aided by the floating, stalking camera, was oddly transfixing for me. This theme of urban alienation has been effectively explored by other directors – notably Tsai Ming-Liang, one of the great modern auteurs, with his trademark long takes and static framing – and yet the flustering, shaking camera technique utilised here, quite different to Tsai’s aesthetic, does well to reflect the hustle and bustle of the city rush hour.

When Azcona came to give us a Q&A session immediately following the screening, he explained that the idea for the film came from his past experience in London, feeling lost and isolated in such a huge, sprawling city. Being a country boy myself, and being used to the vast expanse of green grass in the north of England, I could identify with where he was coming from. For all my love of Leeds, it does tend to weigh heavy on me at times and I feel the need to escape to the country and just relax in the back garden. I couldn’t think of anything to ask the director at this point, aside from whether he would cite Tsai as an influence, but as I listened to him explain his ideas I began to appreciate more what I had just seen. For all its flaws and missteps that prevent it from being anything major, El Arbol is a deeply personal film, and with that in mind, if Aczona can dispense with the Dardenne influence and begin crafting his own personal aesthetic, he may just produce a ‘great’ film in the near future. Hell, with Reygadas on his side, he’s got a bright future.

With all these tales of modern alienation and oppressive regimes, the traditional fairytale of Bluebeard (Catherine Breillat, France, 2009) provided a nice change of scenery, taking the audience back to the days of castles and corsets. The framing device sees two young girls read from the book, narrating events as they occur. Inside the fairytale, we follow Marie-Catherine as she begins to fall for the much feared Bluebeard, or indeed his vast kingdom of wealth. Bluebeard comes across as a fairly sensitive figure despite his hulking physique and the ever-present rumour that he kills every woman he weds. Truth be told, I had never even read or heard of the plot to Bluebeard before this screening, so this entire story came to me totally fresh. Maybe I enjoyed it so much because I saw it as a new story and not necessarily an interpretation, who knows.

Appearing deceptively innocent, the tale is for all intents and purposes quintessential Breillat, with a subtle sexual awakening taking place once Marie-Catherine moves in with Bluebeard, her new husband. Demanding her own room to maintain her virginity, she sneaks down the hallway at night to catch sight of her lover undressing in bed. There’s tension, alright. When the time comes for Bluebeard to hand over those dreaded keys, the framing device takes an unusual turn and Breillat’s vision starts to take flight before its sudden, brief climax. One of the finest contemporary French filmmakers delivers another solid piece of work, a cautious view of married life, opposing the conventional viewpoint of marriage that most Disney-esque fairytales would have you believe is one of idyllic partnership.

Time for something heavy. Encirclement (Richard Brouillette, Canada, 2008) is a near 3-hour documentary critiquing the dominant ideology of neoliberalism, featuring interviews with Noam Chomsky, the amusingly named Oncle Bernard and others. It’s not so much a documentary as it is a filmic essay, being comprised of 98% black-and-white footage of these talking heads, interspersed with text to break up the chapters and sum up the key points.

The film essentially argues that neoliberalism is a thinly veiled form of neocolonialism, and the arguments given from each contributor are presented in a well-spoken, persuasive manner, so as to highlight the dangers of a world where profit takes precedence over basic human need. 3 hours spent with this film leaves one reeling at what little hope there is left for this world when the banking elite is bleeding the weaker economies dry, and most of those unaware are too politically apathetic to even question the system, even indoctrinated enough to defend it.

Watching a 3 hour film comprised mostly of subtitles and white text on a black screen effectively equates the entire experience to reading a book – eliminating the need for a camera other than to see Chomsky’s saggy neck – yet I can’t help but feel that even at its length, this is a succinct, well-structured argument on a burning issue that will reach more people in film form than it would do existing as a crusty book sitting in between two other crusty books on a library shelf. Either way, the faith I lost in humanity during the Millenium screening has not returned. If you see it, make sure to let me know.

Bobby Paunescu began his career as a producer, with this being his debut directorial effort, but you can tell he’s learnt a few tricks from his contemporaries. Most scenes are comprised of just one shot, as the goings-on are given space to unfold freely and unedited, which effectively becomes a testament to the ability of the actors and also the director’s aim to mount drama and suspense without the need for quick cuts and theatrics.

The film’s aesthetic enables Francesca and her boyfriend to come across as actual people, and their looming threats seem all too real as well, so when the moments of sadness occur and remain uninterrupted in one single shot, we feel as if we are helplessly watching, from a safe distance, the continuing hard luck of these characters. Highly reminiscent of 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, although not as accomplished, Francesca is yet another victory for the Romanian New Wave.

The Australian Outback is closely examined in Samson and Delilah (Warwick Thornton, Australia, 2009), a rich, textured love story, unconventional in its presentation, an unflinching portrayal of an Aboriginal settlement. The title characters inhabit this landsape with their families, experiencing endless days of boredom, monotony and repetition that is reflected in the rhythm of the film. Samson is unable to speak, so he and Delilah communicate in other, physical ways, and as the film goes on, these methods of connection signify an understated affection between the two.

Thornton creates a futile environment for Samson and Delilah to live through, but when they finally escape the confines of their settlement and reach the city, they find their ordeal is far from over. The hostility they are met with is ever-present but never overemphasised, and so each instance speaks for itself.

With very few lines of dialogue spoken, the images are left to tell the story, and Thornton effectively evokes a feeling of unselfish love surviving amidst a hostile environment through poetic visuals and standout performances from two young actors. Almost hypnotic in its repetition of places and actions, this depiction of self-proclaimed ‘True Love’ is highly resonant storytelling.

Millenium: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Niels Arden Oplev, Sweden, 2009) had an even bigger queue than A Serious Man did the night before, which came as a total shock to me. Having not even read the synopsis, simply believing the title to sound ‘cool’, I was informed that the film was based on a popular book, so understandably people were eager to see how it had been adapted for the screen. That would explain the 152-minute running time.

The film initially concerns itself with two unrelated stories. The first follows reporter Mikael Blomkvist, asked to solve the disappearance and possible murder of a girl that occured 40 years ago, the case remaining unsolved ever since despite the best efforts of many to crack it open. Never mind, once our Mikael gets on board he manages to find the first solid lead in 39 years. Good job, Mikael!

The second plot revolves around Lisbeth – the girl with the tattoo from the title – a stereotypical ‘bad girl’ who is asked to collect information on Mikael through use of her expert hacking skills. At one point she asks for her legal guardian to buy her a PC capable enough to support her work. Agreeing to hand over the cash sum, the creepy bugger asks for something in return and does what any scary old man does in this type of film, proceeding to rape her. Following this, he gives her less money than she asked for; feeling short-changed, she strips him naked, slaps on the handcuffs and shoves a giant dildo up his backside. The scene immediately following this shows her happily playing at her new PC. The whole ordeal is given sugarcoated context much later in the film, but at the time this 10 minutes of sequential rape seemed highly irrelevant to the overall arc and for that, oddly amusing.

When Mikael and Lisbeth eventually find themselves on the same trail, the investigation starts to heat up, and before long the Biblical references come into play. Oh, I get it now. This is a Swedish version of The Da Vinci Code. And here I was hoping it was going to be a Japanese revenge flick! True enough, we’re granted little involvement and given no reason to wish to play along with the mystery. We’re simply forced to watch these two run around explaining their findings for the next 2 hours. Bobby Paunescu could teach this lot a thing or two about suspense.

I feel as though I should mention ITV’s Midsomer Murders at this point. Stay with me here. Midsomer Murders is, to me at least, enjoyable viewing because in every instalment it endeavours to create a sinister atmopshere within whichever village its set in, and everyone who inhabits that village or is implicated in the crime is always painted as mysterious-even-if-innocent, and so we yearn to find out more about not just the killer but the community at large. A good murder mystery will make you want to learn more about the dysfunctional relationships of all those involved in the tangled web. Millenium fails to engage its audience simply because the procedural is drawn out, dull and ultimately, most importantly, full of boring characters.

Alfred Hitchcock put it best when he explained the reason for never returning to a whodunnit after the only one he ever made, Murder! He stated that the key problem with the whodunnit is that it spends the majority of its time working around the machinations of the crime that it fails to create an emotional engagement with the audience. With this 152-minute cure for insomnia, he may have been proven right. Still, despite its shoddiness, the film received a hearty round of applause over the end credits, and I thought to myself, “if this was in English, starring Clive Owen and Liv Tyler, none of you would even consider seeing it.” (No offense, Clive Owen and Liv Tyler.) Then I thought, “well, hang on, aren’t these the same people that queued up for the Coen Bros. only yesterday?” Then I lost all hope in humanity.

In fact, most of today’s offerings were so strong that it pains me to have to begin by squeezing out a write-up for the first of the four films I saw on the seventh day of the festival, arguably the weakest of the bunch and one which I didn’t partcularly care for at all; nevertheless, a few things must be said.

Guidance (Johan Jonason, Sweden, 2009) most likely flounders because of the aforementioned strong competition it shares on this day; or maybe because it was so early in the day and I hadn’t fully woken up yet. Maybe it’s not my fault. The film is admirable enough, even if it is a little thin with its ambition. Guidance tells the story of Roy, an overweight layabout who can’t get out of bed in the morning, through lack of motivation and a very sore back. Determined to rectify this almost paralytic state, he finds himself agreeing to a getaway in the wilderness with a strange guide named Carl, all in a concerted effort to vastly improve his fitness and mentality.

Carl isn’t quite what he seems – didn’t see that one coming – and when we’re eventually let into some of his unsual, private talks in the dead of night, it becomes all to clear why he’s been acting the way he has, and where this story is going. Still, the camera keeps a close frame on its actors in these times of mental frustration, probing their anguish and capably bringing out the humanity of the moment. These are real issues, no doubt, but when the film reaches its conclusion at a mere 82 minutes, and we’re left with Roy’s smug face suggesting there’s more to consider – well duh, Roy – you can’t help but feel as if the film is being awfully smug; at the very least, it’s dreadfully slight and not quite as profound or lasting as it believes itself to be.

Yes, predictability is an ugly thing. Some signals can inform you of a film’s ending way before it arrives, leading you to a premature conclusion and possible oversight as to whatever strengths the film may possess. These were my thoughts in the opening minutes of La Pivellina (Tizza Covi & Rainer Frimmel, Austria, 2009), in which the mother of a travelling circus troupe stumbles across a lost, perhaps abandoned child in the middle of a playground. As she takes her home, comforts her and begins the bonding process, I felt a horrible sense of deja vu. How many films have we seen with this plot?

Looks are indeed deceiving, for ambiguity and nuance are among the achievements of this film, a moving family portrait that does well in proving my initial assessment to be dead wrong. Can you blame me? We’re so used to seeing this sort of story filtered through a saccharine lens that we become all too eager to throw away any values  it may leave us with. And yet, as this little girl settled in to her new family, as they began to share precious memories together, I became totally convinced. It felt as if the film was a collection of home movies strung together, so truthful did each moment feel. It’s hard to believe these people were actually actors and not a real family.

The young girl – who must be about 3 or 4 years old – never puts a foot wrong, so what occurs on screen seems as real as anything, and all the emotions ring true. After Wolfy left such a devastating impression on me the previous night, I was comforted to find that in La Pivellina I had found a film that served as a genuine display of human love and affection, allowing me to feel emotion instead of simply telling me to. The final scene is as inspired as the rest, right up to the final image, a shot which speaks for itself, refusing to place an end to a story that is much like life itself; ongoing, without a digestible three-act structure.

A different kind of emotion was expressed by the audience of Dogtooth (Yorgos Lanthimos, Greece, 2009), ostensibly one of pure laughter derived from the bizarre events occuring onscreen. However, what was working underneath the surface of this film – and indeed, what was felt beneath the laughter of we, the audience – was a disturbing portrayal of a household in which the children have been allowed to grow up physically, but not mentally; as such, the laughter is uneasy, in disbelief and in prepatation for what danger could ensue. The father is the only one allowed out of the house, obviously to earn a living, whilst the rest of the family stay inside and demonstrate to us the eerie effects of their overprotected upbringing. Apparently, a pussy is a type of light. A zombie is a small yellow flower. The small animal in the garden is the enemy and must be destroyed at all costs.

The laughs were consistent throughout the film, although as time wore on the sinister implications of this disturbed environment became apparent. The world – or house – presented to us appears to be a microcosm of our society in which a paternal authority is making the decisions for us in regards to censorship. Refusing to tell us the truth. Refusing to let us grow up, even if we are of age. Dogtooth won the Un Certain Regard at the Cannes Film Festival in May, generating a buzz that has stayed with it in the lead up to its screening at this very festival; a well deserved buzz indeed. Provocative, unsettling filmmaking of the highest order, it’s going to look mighty cute sitting next to Dogville on my DVD shelf; thank God I don’t own Dogtown and the Z-Boys.

A Serious Man (Joel & Ethan Coen, USA, 2009) had a queue snaking around the back of the picture house. A poster informing any wishful thinkers that tickets had indeed sold out. A flurry of cinemagoers desperately trying to find a good seat and having to eventually resort to sitting at the back. “Is someone sitting there?” “Yes.” Sucks to be me. The Coen Brothers are back, it would seem, and everyone – even you- is more than happy to see what they have to offer.

It’s 1967, in the suburbs of Minnesota, and Professor Larry Gopnik isn’t exactly having the time of his life. His wife’s leaving him, his son is misbehaving and he’s under constant pressure from all comers: his employer and his students causing him an unhealthly level of anxiety. Being a Jewish man, he wants answers from God as to why this is happening, what it all means and how he can change the circumstances. In a sense, this is a fable loosely based on the biblical tale of Job, who had everything taken away from him in a spiritual test that would determine the strength of his faith in God. Larry is a weaker man than Job; he visits several rabbis with several different perspectives in an attempt to gain some understanding into the nature of his misfortune, but none of them manage to give him any solace. The journey of his mischievous son runs in close paralel, as the boy is about to finally become a man and must soon face up to adult responsibility.

I heard prior to the screening that A Serious Man had an interesting ending, much like that of No Country For Old Men two years ago. It’s interesting because it provokes discussion as to how one will interpret it, and our own interpretation will entirely depend on how we’ve been following the narrative up to this point. A spiritual man will have a different view on events than, say, a man without faith. It should be noted that the Coens are not religious – or so they say – and with this knowledge in mind I choose to look at A Serious Man‘s ending as a bleak nihilistic statement, similar to the finish of No Country For Old Men, which incidentally can and has been opened up to supernatural readings in addition to its concerns pertaining to fatalism.

Despite their bleak outlook, the Coens still know to have fun, with the sharp, satirical script proving to be one of their funniest to date. The brothers sure know how to write, they definitely know how to direct, and through encouraging discussion over common, pressing issues through their deliberately ambiguous symbolism, they are opening up a deeper film language to the mainstream movie audience. For that they should be commended once more.