Since this college semester is coming to a close in a few weeks, I’ve decided to post my current Top 10 films list for a two part blog, giving reasons and a video showing a clip from each film.  Now, I won’t go and call myself the best film critic by any stretch of word and there are still plenty of movies I have yet to see.  But I figure there’s no harm in constantly updating your list and for a good while, this has been what the top has looked like.  So here it is, part one:

10. Forrest Gump

This is definitely a clear contender for a most popular film list; and with good reason.  Many scenes, characters and lines have been mentioned, quoted and spoofed countless times, but this is all the more reason it’s such a great movie.  Sure, we’ve all seen it only a billion and a half times already, but it never loses its charm.  Although Forrest might not be the brightest apple on the tree, he’s one of the most naturally good at-heart.  A big part of what makes this such an easy film to follow is how Forrest’s adventures and, at times, struggles are a fair representation of what many common Americans go through.  The film has recently been criticized for having a constrained view on some of these moments but this is more a misconception than anything.  What Forrest deals with and notices are intended to be passed off from his view, which is as neutral and unbiased as you can possibly get.  Some might think the film struggles with its message(s), which it doesn’t but this is only more reason the film relates so easily to us (multiple messages and some not being so clear at first).

“What’s my destiny, Mama?”

“You’re gonna have to figure that out yourself.  Life is a box of chocolates, Forrest.  You never know what you’re gonna get.”

9. Stand By Me

I’ve become a fairly big fan of Stephen King in the past couple years.  I feel that he’s (mostly) offered some of the best stories out there, whether they detail strong characters or have striking scenarios, he’s almost never left me underwhelmed.  And despite how much I might praise his other works; I think the story that hits home the most for me is the film adaptation of Stand By Me.  The plot is very basic and gives us little more than the little journey that our four main characters go through.  But this simplicity gives the film a lot of room to detail the characters and we definitely get a strong dose of that, namely from Gordie and Chris.  The relationship between all four characters feels natural and realistic, with great agreements and sometimes bitter arguments sprouting out.  Anyone who’s seen the film unedited knows that it doesn’t try to sugarcoat anything but you’re not getting morbid or depressing images either.  It’s a kind of film that can easily to speak to anyone because of it cleverly maintaining a mid-ground mood.

“**** writing, I don’t want to be a writer.  It’s stupid.  It’s a stupid waste of time.”

“That’s your dad talking.”

“Bull****”

“Bull true.  I know how your dad feels about you.  He doesn’t give a **** about you, Denny was the one he cared about and don’t try to tell me different.  You’re just a kid, Gordie.”

“Oh, gee!  Thanks, Dad!”

“Wish the hell I was your Dad.  You wouldn’t be goin’ around talkin’ about takin’ these stupid shop courses if I was.  It’s like God gave you something, man, all those stories you can make up.  And He said, ‘This is what I got for ya, kid.  Try not to lose it.’  Kids lose everything unless there’s someone there to look out for them.  And if your parents are too ****ed up to do it, then maybe I should.”

8. Letters from Iwo Jima

This might sound blasphemous to some, but I’m pretty late to the Clint Eastwood party.  In fact, this and Flags of Our Fathers were my introduction to his work.  But as we all know Mr. Eastwood has seldom missed the mark and he definitely did a great job with Flags of Our Fathers.  Then there’s Letters from Iwo Jima, which trumps its American sibling in every conceivable way.  Despite telling the tale from the Japanese point of view, this film actually hits home harder than Flags of Our Fathers.  Giving us an idea of what the conditions were (probably) like for the Japanese soldiers who worked, fought and died on Iwo Jima is one of the film’s strongest aspects.  And it’s carried out throughout the entire runtime with pure excellence, giving us strong performances from the entire cast (especially Ken Watanabe) and dramatic moments matched by a solemnly peaceful score.  War has taken many forms and become the inspiration for a wide variety of films-this is one that gets my utmost recommendation for even the remotely curious.

“If our children can live safely for one more day it would be worth the one more day we defend this island.”

7. The War

Don’t be confused, this isn’t that forgettable film featuring Jason Statham and Jet Li.  Instead, this is a picture from 1994 staring Kevin Costner and a young Elijah Wood playing part of a dirt poor family in 1970.  I will say I’m definitely biased towards this film mostly because it hasn’t gotten much recognition and has thus become more of a cult favorite.  The synopsis doesn’t sound terribly interesting on paper and the happy-happy-joy-joy DVD cover indicates a very bland film.  However, this is a movie that, like most of the films on my Top 10 list, hit close to him simply for its characters.  The relationships are mostly believable and the acting is solid all around.  This leads to a real shame about the film: only two (three if you count Lucas Black) of the actors made it.  Many of the supporting characters were filled by people who looked like they had plenty of potential yet only Wood and Costner hit it big.  A number of messages are told throughout the film and although they aren’t emphasized quite to the extent of, say, Forrest Gump, it helps keep the film from feeling like it’s preaching.  I’m sure most who are reading this haven’t seen the film and likely won’t find it at their local video store.  But I highly urge even buying it since it can very easily grow on you and a number of scenes contribute to give it plenty of re-watch value.

“I hope you know them’s the kids who just beat me up.”

“I know who they are, son.”

“Then why’d you give them Ma and Lidia’s cotton candy?”

6. Schindler’s List

Of all the films on my Top 10 list, this is the one that I can never bring myself to watching multiple times.  I’ve only seen the movie one time, but that single viewing alone leaves such a mark on you that it’s almost impossible to forget the details.  This is a very different film for Spielberg which turns out to be a wonderful shift and only makes me wonder why he hasn’t done more dramas.  On the flip side, part of what helps Schindler’s List work so well is that we haven’t gotten very many films that even come close to hitting the serious mark it has.  Those who haven’t seen it should be aware that this is a very unapologetic viewing which, given the subject matter, is very important.  What’s best is that we get this inspired tale of a single setting in the Holocaust and it never loses the tight grip in the three hour runtime.  Schindler’s List very clearly deserved its Best Picture win at the Oscars for a number of reasons, including how unrelenting, convincing and absorbing it is.

“I could have got more out.  I could have got more.  I don’t know.  If I’d just…I could have got more.”

“Oskar, there are eleven hundred people who are alive because of you.  Look at them.”

“If I’d made more money…I threw away so much money.  You have no idea.  If I’d just…”

“There will be generations because of what you did.”

“I didn’t do enough!”

“You did so much.”

“This car.  Goeth would have bought this car.  Why did I keep the car?  Ten people right there.  Ten people.  Ten more people.”

“This pin.  Two people.  This is gold.  Two more people.  He would have given me two for it, at least one.  One more person.  A person, Stern.  For this.  I could have got one more person…and I didn’t!  And I…I didn’t!”

Director: Clint Eastwood
Starring: Ken Watanabe, Kazunari Ninomiya, Tsuyoshi Ihara

This excellent review by The Picklebot of a great site called Like the Cast of a Fellini Movie

PLOT

The World War II battle for the strategically important island of Iwo Jima, told from the Japanese perspective. Focusing on the stories of General Kuribayashi (Ken Watanabe) and young conscript Saigo (Kazunari Ninomiya) as the assault rages about them.

REVIEW

The terms brave and important have been attached wantonly to this picture, and considering it is an American film made from the perspective of the Japanese during a World War II engagement, that seems justified. Clint Eastwood famously realised during the making of Flags of Our Fathers, that there was a vital story to be told about the opponents of this assault. The question is, was this that story?

Enormous attention to detail went into this film, as is always the case with Eastwood’s movies, and it was extremely refreshing to find the whole film in the Japanese language. The script was based on works of non fiction, and the story co-written by the Japanese screenwriter. It felt authentic, and its success in Japan proves the point.

In Eastwood’s hands, the drama is taught throughout, characters are given personal battles to fight before and during the assault, with satisfying conclusions. There is a sense of the classic war movie, without the action degenerating into the glamourisation of post war, propaganda pictures. But this also presents one of the films flaws.

As with The Changling, despite the factual basis of the film, it feels too cinematic. There are overt story arcs, which, while drawing us in, taint the piece by presenting history as a framing device to a personal tale. Like The Thin Red Line, there is a great sense of the foot soldier being passed from pillar to post with little understanding of what is actually happening. But there is too clear a journey for Saigo, as he attempts to get from A to B.

If his path through the war zone had been the main focus of the film, it may have worked, but we also see a great deal through the eyes of General Kuribayashi. The plot strands of the two characters intertwining a little too often.

There is also great effort to humanise the Japanese forces, necessary if we are to root for them in the way Eastwood wants us to. But then we are suddenly presented with scenes to remind us that, actually, the Japanese were baddies – only the characters we are meant to like are acceptable, and then, only because they disagree with the ethos of Imperial Japan.

Each of the main characters are clearly shown to be rebellious and disenfranchised, but nonetheless patriotic to a fault. This need not be the case, Downfall dealt with the very tricky subject of the core of the Nazi party, and succeeded in portraying Hitler and his associates without making us complicit in their beliefs.

Letters From Iwo Jima is a notable stride forward in the American perception of the world beyond its vast borders, and worth watching. However, while featuring engaging performances and excellent photography, it fails to tell us anything new about the conflict that a short documentary on The History Channel could not.

I stayed up last night to watch Letters from Iwo Jima directed by Clint Eastwood and got to bed about 2ish (aargh, why did they have to put it on so late? I need my eight hours sleep!) But I’m glad I did because the film was amazing. My tv was too far and I was in bed, so I couldn’t really read the subtitles in English, but the Japanese script was understated, powerful and poignant. The film had an all Japanese cast headed by Watanabe Ken and Ninomiya Kazunori (who is band-mates with my other favourite Matsumoto Jun from Gokusen) with some American soldiers appearing towards the end of the film.

Letters from Iwo Jima opens with the discovery of a cache of letters buried in one of the many caves dotting Iwo Jima and follows the Japanese army’s last stand against the American navy. The letters belong to the soldiers left behind to defend the volcanic island, and we find out about the lives and fears of these soldiers, most of them very young, afraid and disillusioned as they try to fight for their emperor and country.

I knew this would be a sad film, as all war films are, but I didn’t expect it to be beautiful. There was a quiet diginity to the main characters in the film, although there have been some criticism regarding the authenticity of some of the viewpoints (and the fact that the most sympathetic characters had visited America prior to the war and therefore had a soft spot for their enemy). A lot of the Japanese fanaticism was toned down, barring a few characters, but what I thought was the strength of this film lay in the human-ness of the characters, especially the young private Saigo played by Ninomiya Kazunari. He wasn’t a blind fanatic, he didn’t want to fight, he hated the dreaded Kempeitai, Japan’s secret police who stripped his family of their livelihood, and just wanted to go back to his wife and child whom he was yet to meet. In fact, he was more like the young men my Japanese grandfather used to speak of when I questioned him about the war for my school project. None of the men he knew went to their deaths with ‘Banzai’ on their lips, but they all cried out for their mothers.

I’ve seen quite a few Japanese war dramas and was impressed that Eastwood tried not to stick too much to the general stereotypes prevalent in the genre. The characters seemed more real to me. In one scene Eastwood shows Saigo receiving his conscription paper and his wife begging for him to be spared, only for some of her patriotic neightbours to state that they too have all lost their men to the war and that she would just have to bear it and do her duty to her country. There is fear, uneasiness and a quiet chaos in Eastwood’s film.

For me, it was enlightening to see a different kind of film emerging. Just as in the West, as the years pass, we can look at the events of WWII with new eyes and discuss what happened in new ways, trying to understand the events without censoring ourselves too much.

Yup, we seem to be having a Japanfest on Channel 4/Film 4 recently. I saw Flags of Our Fathers directed by Clint Eastwood a couple of years ago and thought it was OK, but not great. I generally like Eastwood’s movies such as Unforgiven and Million Dollar Baby but Flags of Our Fathers didn’t really do it for me.

However, I was really excited about seeing Letters from Iwo Jima, it’s sister piece, with an almost all Japanese cast led by Ken Watanabe and Kazunari Ninomiya. But, as usual, I didn’t get round to it (movie turnovers are so quick these day) and finally, they are showing it on telly! So Sunday night, I’ll be glued to Channel 4 at 11:35pm watching Letters from Iwo Jima with a box of tissues as I know it’s going to be very sad.

Have you seen it? What did you think?

“Letters From Iwo Jima” is the companion piece to “Flags Of Our Fathers”. But make no mistake, you do not have to have seen one to enjoy the other. “Letters” is the stronger of the two films. This is a dark and brooding film about what it is like to be facing imminent death. Knowing that you can not win but fighting and dying for honour. This is the battle for Iwo Jima from the losing perspective.

Ken Watanabe is General Tadamichi Kuribayashi, the man assigned to defend the island by training a rag tag infantry that is insanely ill-equipped to fend off an invading force. His plan is to dig tunnels under the island, to surprise and ambush the Americans. But he is no fool. He knows that the odds are not in their favour.

The rest of the cast are unknowns who give some of the best performances of the year. Each man has his own story on how he arrived on this island. One involves a former government police man who was reassigned after refusing to murder a poor families dog. Another man was taken from his wife and his unborn child. We even get glimpses of Kuribayashi’s history as well. Turns out he spent some time in America, and has fond memories of riding in automobiles. This is the achievement of Eastwood’s film. It manages to put a human face on the Japanese troops, as opposed to the other film, which portrays them as the faceless enemy.

The first act of the movie depicts these men as they work in the mud, fight dysentery, barely eat or drink, and talk about home. The second act is when the battle starts. Their strategy is to let the American’s fill up the beach, before they begin to attack. Once the battle starts it is clear who is going to win. But the Japanese will fight to the death because that is what they have been taught. When it is clear they will lose, one of the commanders orders his troops to commit suicide in the name of their country. This is one of the most harrowing scenes as each soldier pulls the pin on his grenade, blowing themselves to pieces.

The last act involves one of the soldiers burying the letters that they have written during their time on the island, as well as Kuribayashi’s final moments. This is powerful cinema, and shows yet again, that Eastwood has come in to his own. He has a steady hand and is in no rush to tell his story. Clocking in a two hours and twenty minutes, this is like a countdown in hell. What is most amazing is that Eastwood can direct an entire film in a foreign language and still manage to create something authentic and real.It is rare today to see a movie about a battle from the losing end. Especially about a foreign people told from the perspective of an American. This is a strong and powerful film that will be remembered come awards time

There have been a number of movies that focus on the current war on Iraq.Of those I’ve only seen Paul Haggis’ In The Valley of Elah and Kimberly Pierce’s Stop Loss. The former’s strength comes from a great lead performance, while the latter is trash. So, Kathryn Bigelow’s is easily the best movie about the war in Iraq yet.

The movie follows one team in Iraq who is responsible for disarming bombs. Most of the focus is on Sergeant James (Jeremy Renner), who is the guy that actually goes out there and cut the bombs’ wires. He is a seemingly fearless individual who loves doing his job. He has a family, but he really doesn’t think about them. Then There’s Sergeant Samborn (Anthony Mackie), who is pretty much the voice of reason, and Specialist Eldridge (Brian Geraghty), whose job is to protect Sergeant James, but is already traumatized. They are shown doing their job from when they only have 36 days left in their tour of duty, to about the second to last day. We see them celebrating, afraid, and trying to keep their cool under stressful, life or death situations.

This is only the second war movie that doesn’t take a stand on whether the reason for being there is right or wrong (the other being Letters from Iwo Jima). It is just about the men that sign up to be soldiers and what the type of danger they face. There are few scenes of them talking about their lives back in the the US, which shows how focused they have to be to do what they have to do.

As a whole, the movie is great. It has an interesting story and a well written script. However, it is not an action movie or a thrilling movie, like some of the ads led me to belief. Rather, it is a slow-burning, dialogue-driven, character drama. There are some action scenes and explosions, but their sole purpose is to show the danger in Iraq, not just to keep the people entertained. What kept me entertained was the tension created by Kathryn Bigelow. From the moment the quote in the beginning shows up, it is her movie. There is not a bad shot, bad performance, or filler thanks to her. Her work here is definitely one of the finest directing jobs of the decade.

Thanks to her, Jeremy Renner gives a great performance. He plays a driven and fearless character, and there never is a false note. Near the end, where he is becoming more human, he could have been over the top, but he wasn’t. Like his character, he made the right choices under extreme tension. Mackie and Geraghty give strong performance, but they don’t come close to matching Renner.

As I said, it was nice to see a war movie that doesn’t take sides, but tells a story about the men who fight the war, without making them seem crazy to join the army. Although it is not perfect, it is a great showcase for Bigelow and Renner’s work. Hopefully their work will be remembered come awards season.

First of all.. I’m going to fill you in on my oh-so-exiting holidays.

I’m actually sort of happy with how much I’ve gotten done. Sort of. I’ve worked on all of Chem, revised Search for Better Health up to what we’ve covered in class, made Geo notes for all topics (except Ecosystems at Risk – Ms Wratten gave us awesome stuff), done a pile of MedEntry/F2F papers. Replaced my additional text for Belonging and rewrote the bits on The Crucible from scratch, then started my Module C essay. Found an additional text for 3u (I’ve used the same one in each essay, then got owned when I did another one) then rewrote my 3u essay (actually, it sucks – gotta do that again ==’).

I haven’t actually learned any of my notes yet, or started memorising essays. I’m wondering if I should bother memorising them – I always do better when I just walk into the exam with 8 or 9 points and make it up. Hmmm.

After I finish this blog and eat lunch, I’ll draft my Reflection Statement for 4u, then maybe write my 2u and 3u stories. Bludgey English stuff. Maybe do the second volume of UMAT practice questions.

I haven’t done any work for the last two or three days. I sat down to do my Module C essay on the sofa downstairs.. and then my sister started watching the Battlestar Galactica miniseries. The next time I looked down at Hughes’ poetry, three hours had gone by and I had a sentence on my laptop. I’m too easily distracted xD

And that concludes my boring holidays. Apart from going to Parra once, I haven’t gone further than a suburb away from my house. It’s also the first holidays in the last five or so years that I haven’t gone to the city.

I’m looking forward to these summer holidays. I don’t feel like I’ve had a relaxing summer for ages – in Year 8/9 holidays, I spent every day on maths because I was freaked out about what everyone said Ruse was like. I was actaully ranked in the 40s that half-yearly *beams*. Not to be egotistical, though – my rank’s in triple digits now, so it makes me feel better about myself xD

In Year 9/10 holidays, I was all motivated for Olympiad. I actually refer back to the notes I typed up then for HSC Bio. Year 10/11 holidays was studying for the ANU camp. Year 11/12 holidays was studying for Monash.

But this summer.. I plan on relaxing. Maybe camping in front of the TV watching ABC Kids or something xD Reruns of The Bill, Law and Order and whatever else is on in the middle of the day.

But I’ll probably get bored and fat(ter) and then go off to do something constructive.

Anyway!

Forrest Gump.

Loved it. I was actually itching to use it as an additional text, but then realised that I was already doing a film for both 2u and 3u And my 2u one also has Gary Sinise, so I’ll look like such a fangirl xD

I think I really loved the..epicness? of the movie. I’ll try not to spoil it, in case anyone hasn’t seen it (or is as deprived as I am).. but I liked how it just has the most ludicrous moments. I guess it’s because I detest most ‘teen movies’ – you know, the sort where you can predict the entire plot from the first five minutes.

I guess I’ll spoil it if I say anything else. Sorry. I’ll just settle with.. Tom Hanks is awesome =D
And I’d say that it was one of the better movies I’ve seen^^

Letters to from Iwo Jima (sorry about the typo in my last post ><')

I didn’t really know anything about this movie before I watched it. I knew it was ’some war movie’ directed by an American but set in Japan, so I assumed it’d be about how Americans valiantly won a battle or something. And I knew it had Ken Watanabe and Ninomiya Kazunari.. but I assumed Nino had a small role, because he was always listed second.

I was completely wrong.

The film’s entirely in Japanese, showing the Japanese perspective of the battle. It’s meant to be the companion to ‘Flags of Our Fathers’, another Clint Eastwood film, which shows the American view (thank you Wikipedia). And Nino pretty much is the main character, playing Saigo

..and most of you don’t have a clue who he is. Well, he’s actually from Arashi, who featured in this post. He’s the guy in the bottom right hand corner of the last video.. with considerably more hair than these photos. He’s the first person from Johnny’s Entertainment to turn up in a Hollywood movie =D

Anyway. I’ll keep my fangirling to a minimum. But honestly, his acting was awesome. I think he was cast well for the role – he’s someone who naturally comes off as honest, someone who… tries hard without being a tryhard? Blergh, can’t explain it well ><'

Anyway, the movie’s mainly from his point of view, with flashbacks from other characters. Overall… I liked the structure of the movie, and how it presented the battle. But… I wasn’t a huge fan of some parts. I guess there are some things that you expect in a war movie, but I just didn’t like them. No, not the violence and blood, that’s ok. I didn’t like.. how the the movie tried so hard to show the concept of war.

That made no sense. OK, I’ll try again.

*spoiler warning*
Skip the next two paragraphs.

There’s one part where a few Japanese soldiers attack a defenceless American. But then of course, when you next see an American soldier, you know that someone’s going to save him. And of course, the Japanese soldiers will suddenly realise that he’s really just like them, and that he has a mother and a family too, and that Americans aren’t that bad after all. Then some Japanese soldiers will go try to surrender, and then some American soldier will further reiterate that war brings out the worst in people, and go shoot them.

I guess it was unavoidable, considering that Eastwood was trying to show the battle from both sides. Maybe I can’t judge the film, because I have gaping holes in my WWII knowledge, lack of experience with war movies and I haven’t seen Flags of Our Fathers. But personally, the movie started to lose a bit of its appeal there. It felt a bit like watching kids shows now, you know, the ones with oh-so-subtle messages on how we need to protect the environment.

*end spoiler warning*

That being said, overall, it was a good movie. There were a few cliche lines, but nothing overdone. I found some of the subbing a bit strange – they never seemed to translate ‘ikuzo’ (sp?) and a few other words, and they literally translated ‘urusai’ to ‘it’s noisy!’ – I know that’s what it means, but I think that might’ve been one of the times to translate it for the context. Wouldn’t an English-speaking audience just find that weird? And I was a little shocked when they said ‘raifuru’ – according to Wiki, that wouldn’t have been that common back then, so I wasn’t unjustified. Ego +1 xD

But it was pretty good. I haven’t seen many war movies, but I think it’s one of the better ones. Despite my criticisms, it was well-crafted and believable. And some parts were just awesome.. like when Saigo gets saved by the pot. Epic.

Oh crap. Just realised I could have used it for Conflicting Perspectives. Meh. If anyone wants to do it, go ahead. It’d be good for the module.

I’ll leave you with a video of Nino’s solo from some Arashi concert. I’m assuming this was a fair way into the concert.. hence explaining why he’s pouring sweat -_-’ I’m not sure if he actually wears glasses though. This comes with Chinese subs (I think?), if that helps anyone.

Actually, here’s some more random videos.

Tackey & Tsubasa’s video with random dancing curries. Are they trying to pull off curry dancing in the chorus? I swear Tackey looks like he’s about to try bhangra in one shot. I can’t work out why this song was a success.

The reason I did no work for the last two days was actually because I bothered listening to more stuff by Asian Kung-Fu Generation. They were actually the first Jap band I liked – you might remember then from their FMA (original series) opening, Rewrite.

It was the first time I bothered looking up a song by a Japanese band. But I didn’t bother getting many – I had about four, as of last week. Somehow Haruka Kanata was in my files, and I haven’t watched Naruto.

But anyway, I came across this song. Love it Supposedly they’re influenced by bands like Weezer?

I don’t think the clip has anything to do with the song. No, I can’t explain the lobster thing. Mind you, they have weirder clips – try the first 30 seconds of this one.

But I love the song – lyrics, vocals, bass, guitar, drums =D

Hmm. Better go eat lunch. Woah, 1500 words D:

Enjoy the end of the holidays!

LETTERS FROM IWO JIMA av Clint Eastwood (2006)
Med Ken Watanabe, Kazunari Ninomiya, Tsuyoshi Ihara, Ryo Kase, Shidou Nakamura, Hiroshi Watanabe, Takumi Bando, Yuki Matsuzaki

VISS SPOILERVARNING

I miniartikeln Om skådespelartalang i avdelningen Sidor här på Kinematografi redogör jag för Bellis maxim, som utgör en användbar metod för att avgöra om en skådespelarinsats är lysande, bra eller dålig. Letters from Iwo Jima utgör ett oväntat och fantastiskt övningsexempel för nybörjaren, eftersom två manliga berättarröster löpande läser upp manuskriptet, inklusive dialogen, genom hela filmen. Samtidigt som berättarrösterna beskriver vad som händer i bild, får vi alltså se vad som händer i bild. Rösterna går så långt att den ena av dem till och med beskriver hur Warner Brothers logotype före förtexterna ser ut.

Det här greppet är sällsynt originellt. Det måste vara första gången i filmhistorien något sådant görs. Och det till och med fungerar. Därför kan man tycka att det är lite synd att det trots en halvtimmes letande på nätet inte går att få fram namnen på berättarna, som såvitt jag kunnat finna inte listas någonstans. I filmen läser den ena av dem bara upp namnen till eftertexterna och jag hör bara det ena av dem – James O’Hara. Det andra är för otydligt uttalat. Om någon kan leta upp namnen på de här båda berättarrösternas ägare – och för den delen namnet på den kvinna som gör ett kort inhopp som berättare – och posta dem i en kommentar vore jag tacksam. Att nätet som vanligt är odugligt förvånar mig föga, men trist är det.

För det är nu en gång så att halva skådespelarinsatsen består av rösten. De här berättarrösterna gör filmens halva skådespelarinsats, åt samtliga skådespelare. Det här – att rösten utgör halva skådespelarinsatsen – är det främsta skälet till att dubbning, som man frenetiskt ägnar sig åt i Tyskland och Italien, är enbart av ondo. Stora skådespelarinsatser går till hälften förlorade. I Letters from Iwo Jima är förhållandet ett annat, eftersom filmen är inspelad med berättarrösterna pålagda redan från början och skådespelarna därför är medvetna om det. Greppet är lysande och beror förstås på att skådespelarna talar japanska och det här är en amerikansk film.

I själva verket är den systerfilmen till Flags of Our Fathers. Letters from Iwo Jima handlar även den om slaget om Iwo Jima, men ur de japanska soldaternas synvinkel. Filmen skiljer sig mycket både i anslag och intrig från Flags of Our Fathers och kretsar återkommande kring det stränga, japanska hedersbegrepp som bland annat kräver att man ställd inför ofrånkomligt nederlag förväntas begå självmord i stället för att kapitulera. För en västerlänning förefaller det bisarrt, för japanerna självklart – om man får tro filmen. Eller i alla fall nästan självklart, eftersom den japanska fasaden krackelerar. Det är inte alla soldater som begår självmord och ett par till och med kapitulerar.

Även på andra sätt förefaller Letters from Iwo Jima vilja berätta för västerlänningar inte bara om slaget vid Iwo Jima ur japansk synvinkel, utan med avstamp i den berättelsen också ge inblickar i japanskt tänkesätt och i japansk kultur, som verkligen är mycket främmande den västerländska. Frågan är hur bra filmen lyckas. Den är visserligen skriven av Iris Yamashita, som dock avslöjas av sitt förnamn – hon är japanskättad amerikan. Inte japan. Och jag ställer mig undrande till hur rättvisande Letters from Iwo Jima är, eftersom den ärligt talat verkar bjuda på fler västerländska klichéer om japanskt tänkesätt och kultur än på äkta inblickar.

Det som ändå imponerar är just den mycket originella berättartekniken, med berättarrösterna som högläser manuset. Och det faktum att den här filmen inte faller över randen och därför till skillnad från Flags of Our Fathers dels inte blir för blodskvättande, dels inte stereotypt berättad även om några av gestalterna även här känns stereotypa (den tjusige olympiske idrottaren som nu är ädelt befäl, den lille livrädde soldaten med hjärta av guld som betraktar alltsammans, och så vidare), gör den till en film som i sig ytterligare onödiggör systerfilmen. För medan storproduktionen Flags of Our Fathers är en stereotyp, i och med slutet amerikansk patriotfilm, är den lilla produktionen Letters from Iwo Jima i alla fall ett försök till inkännande betraktelse över ett antal soldaters och befäls reaktioner på vad de i det närmaste i förväg vet är ett förlorat slag som kan komma att leda till att deras hemland invaderas av fienden.

Det ryktas att Clint Eastwood kom på att han skulle göra den mycket mindre produktionen Letters from Iwo Jima när filmteamet redan befann sig på ön för att spela in Flags of Our Fathers, och att filmen till stora delar spelades in på helger och andra lediga stunder.

Om det stämmer kan Clint Eastwood dra en värdefull slutsats av utfallet.

Fast han kanske också skulle fundera på om det inte är både ansträngt och rätt misslyckat politiskt korrekt att försöka uppväga en amerikansk patriotstereotyp film med en film om Japan och japanskt tänkesätt som i stora stycken känns lika autentisk som äkta, amerikanska souvenirer i småstäder i USA som är stämplade med “Made in China” på undersidan.

Kör hårt,
Bellis

Director: Clint Eastwood

Cast: Ken Watanabe, Kazunari Ninomiya

Genre: War

‘Letters from Iwo Jima’, is a film which depicts the Japanese view point in the Battle of Iwo Jima. The American viewpoint of the same battle is captured in ‘Flags of Our Fathers’, which also has been directed by legendary Clint Eastwood.

Saigo, played by Ninomiya, is humble baker who is called upon to serve his country during the war. However, Saigo feels extremely depressed about leaving his family and going to war, in order to defend an island Iwo Jima. During the course of the war, he sees that… it virtually is a point of no return. The Japanese army is outnumbered and reinforcements are denied and the few soldiers who have survived the course of the war, are asked by the headquarters, to die like a soldier for their country.

However, with hope and little luck aiding to his side, thanks to a merciful general Kuribayashi, played by Watanabe, he survives the war, by simply trying to stay alive.

The film is quite high on violence, which isn’t out of the ordinary for a war film,but every shot has been caught in an aesthetic and prosaic manner. The film will keep you involved and intrigued despite of its slow paced storyline. The suttle moments of battle, the scene in which Saigo’s original regiment commits  suicide , the Americans killing the two surrendered Japanese soldiers, Kuribiyashi asking his aid to behead him certainly do kindle thoughts about the gruesome things the war can bring upon certain individuals.

I haven’t had an oppurtunity to watch ‘Flags of Our Fathers’, but that one is certainly now going to be a top priority.

I would give this film 8/10.

Not gonna lie – I’m not a fan of war movies.  Granted, depending on my mood, I might be persuaded to sit down and watch a couple bloody hours of awesomeness.  Most often, a boy toy convinces me to watch one and I do all I can to spend the entire time making-out with him rather than actually watching to movie.

Now that I’ve laid that down, in honor of Memorial Day I’d like to give special attention to those movies that actually made me stop the tongue dance and watch the action (on the screen…not under the blanket).  Here’s my (very uninformed) list of the 10 greatest war movies:

The Patriot: Lots of blood and guts, but the costumes make this movie a hit for me.  Plus, Heath Ledger is pretty awesome as an innocent boy who just wants to fight for the country he thought we should have.  Thanks, fictional homie.

Schindler’s List: This is  a must see on any movie list and should probably be your first reference for war movies.  Aside from the incredible performances and intricate plot, I’m lovin’ the black and white effect in this one.  And Liam Neeson?  Very yummy in his day.

The Big Red One: I saw this one while going through a Star Wars phase (…which may or may not still be going on), since it stars a young Mark Hamill [Luke Skywalker]  as a member of a famous heroic band of men.  It’s gritty, bloody, and emotionally satisfying.

Gone With the Wind: I’m gonna include this one because it shows the other side of the war – the home front.  It’s a masterpiece, from the incredible acting to the sweeping score.  I very much enjoy the costumes in this one as well (there might be a trend here…).

Tropic Thunder: So maybe this movie isn’t actually about a war, so much as a movie about a bunch of guys trying to make a movie about a war.  At any rate, there were guns and blood, so it counts.  Plus, it was funny and if you can make a war movie funny then you’ve got some talent, my friend.

Letters From Iwo Jima: I. Love. This. Movie.  It just yields so much win.  This may be because it shows a side of World War II that I’ve never seen before (the Japanese side) represented in a relatively non-biased way or it may be because of all the hot Asian dudes in uniform.  Either one.

Good Morning, Vietnam: I like my funny and I definitely like some rebellion, so Robin Williams really delivers for me in this movie.  As an added bonus, there are some pretty sweet war sequences to get your heart rate a-going.

Braveheart: So this doesn’t actually involve Americans, per se, but I think we can all relate to the basic themes of suppression and rebellion (Revolutionary War, much?).  And the kilts aren’t bad, either.

Pearl Harbor: I’ll say right now that this is one movie where I preferred the fight scenes to the so-called story line of the rest of the movie.  Being as the movie was poorly scripted and very corny, I’m gonna say bring on the guns!

The Pianist: Get the tissues out right now.  Adrian Brody takes us through all levels of WWII, from being a top musician down to starving in the crumbling remains of the Jewish ghetto.  Hope you didn’t like your heart in one piece, because it is so broken after you watch this movie.

What are your favorites?

Che ci fa Walt/Eastwood con una gang hmong-americana? – Come dire “che ci fanno un ebreo, un messicano e un cinese…” (se non ricordo male la battuta di Walt/Eastwood al bar, con gli amici). Fin dall’inizio è tutto molto facile e molto chiaro: un uomo anziano, alto, un duro inflessibile, rigido e “vecchio stampo”, ringhia alla vista dei nipoti; una famiglia che pensa solo ai beni materiali, un funerale, quello della moglie (niente di più semplice per mettere in luce i tratti da duro di Walt); il disprezzo per i vicini hmong. Sputa per terra come Josey Wales in The outlaw Josey Wales (1976, Il texano dagli occhi di ghiaccio). Una serie di cliché, se si rimane a questi dati, potrebbe procedere come una commedia americana con anziano, alla Dennis the menace (1993, Dennis la minaccia, con Walter Matthau). Ma a Walt/Wales/Eastwood questo non è mai interessato. Lo si capisce fin dall’inizio: non è la famiglia il film, l’inserto “commedia” del figlio che telefona perché vuole l’abbonamento ai Lyons, o quello del figlio con moglie che va dal padre anziano per convincerlo a ritirarsi in una casa di riposo. Non è questo il film, e finora abbiamo parlato di inserzioni dall’esterno.

Walt sembra avere un unico scopo nel film: difendere la sua proprietà dall’invasione di stranieri. Si potrebbe fare subito un discorso sociale: nel film, alla fine, si contano solo stranieri: Walt Kowalski polacco, il barbiere italo-americano, hmong, ispanici, afro-americani, la dottoressa cinese ecc. Non ci sono, e ci sono solo, stranieri. In effetti questo è vero, ma lo è soprattutto perché Walt non ha nulla da impegnarsi nella difesa della sua proprietà: gli hmong vicini sono gentili, la gang non colpisce lui ma Sue e la sua famiglia. Dalla difesa della sua proprietà, e dunque della sua individualità, Walt passa alla sicurezza sociale.

Scioglimento del western.

Josey Wales

C’è un altro discorso che passa oltre a quello sociale: il discorso politico. E con discorso politico non s’intende “la politica” ma il genere western, che è da sempre, specie per quello che Deleuze ha definito Grande Forma, discorso di filosofia politica. È una probabile ipotesi di lavoro: certo bisognerebbe scartare quasi tutto il secondo John Ford, buona parte dei capolavori di Sturges, rivedere Bud Boetticher, sfumare Anthony Mann ecc, e non considerare come “politici” quei western che fanno di tutto per sembrare politici come Giù la testa, certamente il western meno politico di Sergio Leone.

Che cosa c’entra il western con Walt? Western e poliziesco, nel cinema di Eastwood, sono distinguibili sulla base di un ragionamento sullo spazio, non sulla base di un ragionamento sul discorso, sull’espressione o sulla forma. È chiaro che Walt è la dichiarazione di resa dell’ispettore Callaghan. Questo lo si capisce facilmente alla fine. Il discorso sociale interviene: “Eastwood dichiara l’importanza della giustizia sociale, della Giustizia”. Ma, attenzione, Walt/Eastwood ci prova a fare l’ispettore Callaghan: non si dà certo per vinto.

Walt Coogan

E così in Gran Torino non si assiste che, dall’inizio alla fine, al lento sciogliersi di ogni possibile via “western-poliziesco”. Walt Kowalski è tutto il contrario di un altro Walt, il Walt Coogan del capolavoro di Don Siegel Coogan’s bluff (1969, L’uomo dalla cravatta di cuoio): si prenda la scena della festa in casa hmong, e la si confronti con la scena in cui Coogan entra nella discoteca hippy. Con Sue e con le donne, Walt Kowalski è il contrario di Ben Shockley di The gaunlet (1977, L’uomo nel mirino): basta confrontare la scena in cui Walt parla con Sue nel furgoncino con una delle innumerevoli scene di fuga dello stizzito Ben con la prostituta Gus Mally. Walt Kowalski assomiglia a Nick Pulovski de The rookie (1990, La recluta) quando il primo ha a che fare con Tao e il secondo ha a che fare con David. Poi, per infondere a Tao più coraggio, dà lezioni alla Highway di Heartbreak Ridge (1986, Gunny), ma ammette che Tao gli è simpatico – cosa che Highway non avrebbe mai osato fare – e i suoi insegnamenti sono insegnamenti di vita, insegnamenti impartiti da “un modello” di vita, non per combattere in guerra. Infine, ed è ovvio, Walt Kowalski diventa Lo straniero de The high plains drifter (1973, Lo straniero senza nome), dato che deve difendere una “comunità”, quella dei suoi nuovi amici. Ma – ed è una differenza radicale – non per compiere la sua vendetta.

Non c’è alcuna vendetta in Gran Torino. Ma, ancora una volta, sembra che questa sia la decisione di Kowalski. Una vendetta non corpo a corpo, come quella in cui s’imbatte Walt Wales, ma costruita, ordita come una trappola, una messa in scena della vendetta stessa alla Howard Hawks: “ci sto pensando”, dice Walt al giovane Tao che desidererebbe andare a far fuori la gang.

La riappropriazione del mito american man.

Lo straniero

Tutto un cinema che non si può più nemmeno definire in dissolvenza, tutto un cinema che si scioglie letteralmente una scena dopo l’altra, un’inquadratura dopo l’altra, come un “non si può più vedere”. Tutto uno scioglimento che avviene nel film e che si espande sul cinema, sia quello che crede di poter cristallizzare e ogni volta riproporre gli stessi codici, sia quello che crede nell’innovazione assoluta degli effetti speciali. Potenza di un vuoto, di un tornare fino alla virtualità dell’immagine, di un Eastwood (che tocca il culmine con Million dollar baby), di uno Spielberg con The terminal e Munich, di The aviator di Scorsese, di un De Palma (Black Dahlia), di uno Shyamalan (Signs, The unbreakable).

Eppure gli elementi erano pressoché gli stessi all’inizio: la proprietà, i fuorilegge, la recluta, perfino una comunità da difendere. Ma non c’è più il movente individuale, è l’individuo che si trasforma, che cambia, identità che passa letteralmente a un altro come Walt dona medaglia e Gran Torino a Tao. Non si tratta solo di un passaggio di proprietà o di eredità. La recluta Tao è diversa dalle reclute di Highway perché quello che deve imparare è il self-made-man materiale, da zero, ricostruzione del cittadino americano, nascita di una (nuova) nazione e di un nuovo cittadino americano.

Lo scioglimento del western è più radicale dello scioglimento di un genere o di una critica del mito. Gran Torino vuole compiere il gesto coraggioso di riappropriarsi dell’Uomo Americano: di fare invecchiare quello che era (Walt, gli amici, il barbiere, il capo cantiere), di volerne forgiare uno nuovo (Tao), di voler cambiare uno che può cambiare (il prete).

Changeling

Sciogliere il western, riappropriarsi dell’american man, dichiarare l’inconsistenza del cinema. Eastwood opera nei suoi film più recenti capovolgimenti davvero sconcertanti. Per es. in Letters from Iwo Jima, dove scioglie il film di guerra, riprende il tutto a partire dal grandioso inizio di Sam Fuller, The steel melme (1950, Corea in fiamme), che è tutto il contrario del film di guerra come azione dello “sparare”, ma è il langhiano “stanare la preda” sottoterra – sebbene poi Easwood conduca la guerra sulla via della scrittura, proprio nel momento della battaglia, il che è operazione davvero radicale nel cinema americano. O per es. il precedente capolavoro Changeling, in cui il film sociale è sciolto e letteralmente rovesciato nello sguardo femminile, nel primato del sentimento della donna, in un senso che si avvicina alla Duras de Il rapimento di Lola V. Stein, e che quindi è del tutto fuori dai consueti canoni di accesso della spettatrice al film.

Gran Torino conduce un’operazione ancora più radicale: a partire dallo scioglimento del western, cioè a partire dalla rinascita della nazione e della riappropriazione del cittadino americano. Questa operazione basta al cinema, e non è necessario leggerla in relazione all’era Obama, con enfasi ed entusiasmi propri del discorso sociale (anche se a chi manca la lettura filmica, la cosa può sembrare ambigua: e lo è ancora di più – se si vuole rendere ancora più complesso il procedimento – per il fatto che qui non si sta parlando di un linguaggio cinematografico o “metafilmico”, dato che l’operazione di scioglimento del western e la dichiarazione di inconsistenza del cinema procede in tutto il film, in modo davvero ovvio e fin troppo “evidente”).

In conclusione.

The company

Si capisce questa distanza dal discorso sociale se si prende un recente film, poco discusso (e non so se poco visto) del da poco scomparso Robert Altman, The company (2003), coraggioso e rischioso, anche perché sembra volersi allontanare da quella tenacia che contraddistingue fin dall’inizio i film di Altman, ovvero quel marchio del “film alla Altman”, davvero pesante. Ebbene, The company evita il marchio “Altman” proprio nel momento più rischioso e coraggioso, ovvero la ripresa dello spettacolo, della danza, in cui si ha davvero uno dei più grandi affronti alla televisione e allo spropositato numero di pseudo-musical da teenager volanti che impera nelle sale. In The company si tocca, in certi momenti, il punto di origine della danza, il piede e la spirale che esso traccia sul palco, come in un ritorno indietro al musical e alla diffusione della sonorizzazione al cinema.

È questo il tipo di operazione radicale di cui sto parlando, e che Eastwood compie in quasi tutti i suoi film degli ultimi quindici, venti anni: non uno stile d’autore alla Tim Burton, e non solo la critica del mito – come non può non farlo uno Spiderman 2, che però non può che ri-fare sempre questa operazione; ma la riappropriazione genealogica del mito, la sua riduzione all’inconsistenza, la ricostruzione per una sua rinascita. (leggi nuovo articolo)

Nếu trong Ngọn cờ cha ông, đạo diễn Clint Eastwood mô tả trận đánh giữa 20.000 lính Nhật Bản và 77.000 lính thuỷ quân lục chiến cùng 100.000 lính bộ Hoa Kỳ trên hòn đảo Iwo Jima của Nhật vào năm 1945 với góc nhìn từ phía người Mỹ, thì với Những cánh thư từ Iwo Jima, Clint Eastwood kể lại cuộc chiến này với góc nhìn từ phía những người lính Nhật. Những cánh thư từ Iwo Jima là những lá thư của những người lính Nhật mà phải 60 năm sau cuộc chiến, người ta mới đào bới và tìm thấy trong những địa đạo trên núi ở đảo Iwo Jima. Đó là thư của Saigo, một người thợ làm bánh buộc phải cầm súng ra trận để bảo vệ Tổ Quốc, gửi về cho vợ và con gái chưa từng thấy mặt của mình để tâm tình về nỗi sợ hãi cuộc chiến tranh; là lá thư của Shimizu, một người lính chán ghét sự tàn bạo của những người cấp trên lẫn cuộc chiến tranh, gửi về cho mẹ; là thư của người chỉ huy Kuribayashi, với những tư tưởng cấp tiến được học từ Hoa Kỳ và chạm trán với những cấp dưới bảo thủ trong việc tổ chức phòng ngự bảo vệ hòn đảo, gửi về cho vợ để tâm sự nỗi lòng anh… Clint Eastwood giới thiệu từng nhân vật một, về tính cách, về tâm sự của họ, cảm nhận của họ về cuộc chiến, về sự kiêu hãnh và lòng yêu nước. Nếu Ngọn cờ cha ông được thể hiện với thủ pháp hồi tưởng, bởi các nhân vật trong phim vẫn còn sống ngoài đời và bộ phim là một sự hồi tưởng về nhữn gì đã xảy ra trong cuộc đời họ, thì Những cánh thư từ Iwo Jima được kể lại như một câu chuyện đã diễn ra để người xem hiểu hơn về cuộc đời của những người đã khuất. Với bộ phim này, Clint Eastwood chứng minh ông là một đạo diễn tầm cỡ, bởi vừa phải thực hiện một bộ phim có quy mô lớn với nhiều cảnh chiến tranh hoàng tráng, những chi tiết nhỏ đắt giá và xúc động, ông còn làm việc với một đội ngũ diễn viên… nói tiếng Nhật trong toàn bộ phim! Hai bộ phim chiến tranh của ông cũng vẽ nên một chân dung toàn cảnh cuộc chiến được nhìn từ hai phía, để thấy rằng chiến tranh, dù ai thắng ai thua, thì đều là sự mất mát.

Letters from Iwo Jima (2006)

Đạo diễn: Clint Eastwood

Kịch bản: Iris Yamashita

Diễn viên: Ken Watanabe (Tướng Tadamichi Kuribayashi), Kazunari Ninomiya (Saigo), Tsuyoshi Ihara (Baron Nishi), Ryo Kase (Shimizu), Shido Nakamura (Sĩ quan Ito)…

MPAA: Rated R

Bài đăng trên Tuổi Trẻ số ra ngày thứ tư, 17.1.2007

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Trong số các giải thưởng quan trọng của giải Quả Cầu Vàng, đề mục Phim nói tiếng nước ngoài luôn được đặc biệt quan tâm bởi đó là chân dung của điện ảnh thế giới qua lăng kính của Hiệp Hội báo chí nước ngoài tại Hollywood. Năm nay, có đến hai trên năm phim của đề mục này là… phim Mỹ!

Ba bộ phim của Tây Ban Nha (Volver – Trở về, đạo diễn Pedro Almodovar), Mêxicô (El Laberinto del Fauno – Mê cung của thần đồng áng, đạo diễn Guillermo del Toro), Đức (Das Leben der Anderen – Cuộc đời người khác, đạo diễn Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck) phải cạnh tranh giải Phim nói tiếng nước ngoài với hai phim Mỹ, Letters from Iwo Jima – Những cánh thư từ Iwo Jima (phim nói tiếng Nhật) của đạo diễn Clint Eastwood và Apocalypto – Tận cùng một đế chế (phim nói tiếng Maya cổ) của đạo diễn Mel Gibson. Mỉa mai thay, giải Phim nói tiếng nước ngoài thuộc về phim… Mỹ của đạo diễn Clint Eastwood, người luôn có mặt tại Oscar và Quả cầu vàng trong vài năm trở lại đây

Nếu ở tuổi 76, các đạo diễn khác đều mệt mỏi, bỏ lại sao lưng trách nhiệm nặng nề với những phim lớn để bắt tay vào làm những phim chậm chạp, rề rà và có chiều hướng… giảm chất lượng thì Clint Eastwood hoàn toàn ngược lại. Năm nay đã 76 tuổi, Clint Eastwood không chỉ còn giữ phong độ của một đạo diễn, ông còn khiến giới làm phim sửng sốt vì cường độ làm việc đáng nể với hai bộ phim chiến tranh cùng ra trong một năm: Flags of our fathers (Ngọn cờ cha ông) và Letters from Iwo Jima (Những cánh thư từ Iwo Jima). Những chiến thắng tại giải Oscar trong vài năm gần đây trong cương vị đạo diễn của Eastwood cho thấy ông sẽ vẫn tiếp tục có mặt tại giải Oscar năm nay, nhất là khi một mình ông chiếm 2 trong số năm đề cử Quả cầu vàng cho đề mục Đạo diễn xuất sắc nhất năm nay.

Không ngừng học hỏi

Sau thành công lớn tại giải Oscar 2004 với bộ phim Million Dollar Baby (Cô gái triệu đô), Clint Eastwood chọn đề tài chiến tranh thế giới thứ hai để thực hiện cùng lúc hai bộ phim về cuộc đổ bộ lên đảo Iwo Jima ở hai góc nhìn đối lập trong cùng một trận chiến. Ngọn cờ cha ông xoay quanh sự thật phía sau bức ảnh huyền thoại về một nhóm lính phất ngọn cờ Mỹ trên đình đồi của hòn đảo này. Letters from Iwo Jima xoay quanh câu chuyện hai người lính Nhật kết bạn và chiến đấu bên nhau trong trận chiến tại hòn đảo Iwo Jima. Được quay tại Mỹ, Iceland và Iwo Jima, hai bộ phim khiến Clint Eastwood già hơn nhanh chóng vì phải làm với khối lượng công việc khổng lồ do thể loại phim chiến tranh đòi hỏi nhiều đại cảnh hoàng tráng.

Kể từ sự trở lại chiếc ghế đạo diễn hồi năm 2003 với phim Mystic River (Dòng sông bí ẩn), Clint Eastwood nhanh chóng được đánh giá là một trong những đạo diễn thành công bậc nhất của Hollywood. Làm sao Eastwood có thể giữ phong độ của mình ở cái tuổi mà hầu hết các đạo diễn khác đều chậm lại, mất đi sự sắc sảo của họ hoặc đơn giản là nghỉ hưu? “Về căn bản, tôi không biết” – Clint Eastwood nói “Cha tôi luôn dạy rằng con phải luôn luôn học hỏi, không ngừng vươn xa hoặc con sẽ xuống dốc cách này hay cách khác. Tôi luôn tâm niệm điều đó”.

Ông già cường tráng

Dàn diễn viên trẻ trong Ngọn cờ cha ông – gồm có Ryan Phillippe, Barry Pepper, Adam Beach và Jesse Bradford – nói rằng họ vô cùng bất ngờ trước sự cường tráng và dẻo dai của ông đạo diễn già hơn họ 40 tuổi đời. Pepper kể rằng Eastwood đã trong phòng tập thể hình của khách sạn để tạp luyện suốt mọi đêm sau những ngày quay mệt nhọc tại Iceland. Beach nhớ có lần Eastwood kéo anh lên một con tàu với sự nhanh nhẹn của một vận động viên thể dục, máy quay phim thì ông đeo trên vai. “Không ngờ ông ấy dẻo dai như thế. Ông ấy như thể thanh niên 30 tuổi, đeo trên mình máy quay phim lớn mà như không” – Beach nói. “Tôi không nghĩ mọi người biết ông ấy khoẻ ra sao, mạnh thế nào”.

Eastwood khẳng định ông chưa có ý định về hưu và sẽ làm việc cho đến tận hơi thở cuối cùng, tương tự như John Huston, nguyên mẫu tạo nên cảm hứng cho nhân vật mà Easwood từng đóng trong phim White Hunter, Black Heart. “Dù ông ấy bệnh tật đi nữa, ông ấy làm việc và bộ phim cuối cùng của ông ấy khá tốt” – Eastwood nói “Ông ấy phải dùng đến xe lăn và bình dưỡng khí torng khi thực hiện bộ phim cuối cùng. Tôi may mắn hơn vì vẫn còn khoẻ mạnh. Tôi biết nhiều điều hơn 30 năm trước. Sẽ có một ngày tôi sẽ quên nhiều hơn ngày hôm qua. Nhưng giờ đây, tôi đang tận hưởng vai trò này, tôi kiên nhẫn hơn, và thấy vui hơn khi ngắm các diễn viên đóng và theo dõi những diễn viên trẻ trưởng thành”

Chiến thắng giòn giã

Clint Eastwood đã thành công trong sự nghiệp đạo diễn của mình kể từ năm 1992 khi bộ phim cao bồi Viễn tây Unforgiven (Không khoan dung) đem về cho ông giải Oscar Đạo diễn và phim xuất sắc nhất cùng đề cử cho Nam diễn viên chính xuất sắc nhất. Hàng loạt phim sau đó tiếp tục thành công và ghi dấu ấn trong lòng khán giả như phim tình cảm ướt át The Bridges of Madison County (Những cây cầu ở quận Madison), phim hình sự tội phạm Absolute Power (Quyền lực tối thượng), hay tâm lý xã hội Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil (Nửa đêm trong vườn thiện ác).

Năm 2003, bộ phim Dòng sông bí ẩn của Clint Eastwood làm đạo diễn đem đến hai giải Oscar Nam diễn viên chính và phụ xuất sắc nhất cho Sean Penn và Tim Robbins, đồng thời bộ phim cũng nhận được đề cử cho giải Phim hay nhất và đạo diễn xuất sắc nhất. Phim kế tiếp, Cô gái triệu đô, với bi kịch của một cô gái có lòng đem mê quyền anh đã đem đến thành công lớn hơn khi nhận giải Oscar Phim hay nhất, đạo diễn xuất sắc nhất, Nữ diễn viên chính (Hilary Swank) và Nam diễn viên phụ (Morgan Freeman) xuất sắc nhất.

Năm nay, với hai phim ra cùng một năm, Clint Eastwood nhận liền hai đề cử Quả Cầu Vàng cho đề mục Đạo diễn xuất sắc nhất. Những cánh thư từ Iwo Jima còn nhận thêm đề cử ch Phim nói tiếng nước ngoài xuất sắc. Trước đó, bộ phim này đã nhận giải Phim hay nhất do Hội bình phim Los Angeles bình chọn.

Nhỏ nhẹ và lặng thầm

Dàn diễn viên của Ngọn cờ cha ông nói rằng Eastwood luôn đạt được những gì ông cần chỉ trong một hai lần quay. Pepper và Bradford cùng nói rằng Eastwood muốn các diễn viên phải tin vào bản năng của họ và đi đến tận cùng. Khi Eastwood nói, ông luôn nhỏ nhẹ và nói rõ ràng điều ông muốn, và mọi người đều lắng nghe. “Khi Clint muôn nói điều gì, giọng nói nhỏ nhẹ của ông khiến mọi tiếng ồn ở phim trường đều lắng xuống. Mọi người đều lắng nghe đểu biết được họ cần làm gì kế tiếp. Eastwood không lên giọng hay to tiếng, và khi ông nói xong, mọi tiếng ồn quay trở lại” – Pepper nói.

Trong Ngọn cờ cha ông và Những cánh thứ từ Iwo Jima, Eastwood không xuất hiện với tư cách diễn viên. Kể từ Dòng sông bí ẩn, một phim mà ông không tham gia trong danh sách diễn viên, Eastwood đã nghĩ đến việc chỉ ngồi sau ống kính. “Thế rồi bất ngờ kịch bản Cô gái triệu đô đến tay, trong đó có một vai quá tuyệt cho nhân vật ở tuổi tôi, nên tôi đã chọn đóng vai này”. Vai diễn đem đến cho ông đề cử Nam diễn viên chính xuất sắc. “Vì thế, tôi sẽ không bao giờ nói không bao giờ, vì sẽ có những vai tuyệt vời đến sau nay, nhưng tôi không tìm kiếm vai diễn cho mình nữa”. Một vai diễn mới mà Eastwood không thể cưỡng lại chính là Harry Callahan, nhân vật trong phim Dirty Harry gắn liền với tên tuổi của Clint Eastwood một thời. Lần này, ông tham gia lồng tiếng cho nhân vật này trong trò chơi điện tử cùng tên Dirty Harry. “Tôi sẽ trở lại thời trai trẻ” – Eastwood thích thú khoe “Hãy đón chào thời trẻ của tôi”

(Theo Eastwood revisits WWII with two films đăng trên Newsweek)

Bài đăng trên SGGP T7 số ra ngày 30.12.2006

The final film in the Filmspotting World War II Marathon, #50!

Screenplay By: Iris Yamashita
Directed By: Clint Eastwood

I have found that more often than not it is a sign that you are watching a great movie when the most ugly and disgusting of scenes can look beautiful and almost breathtaking. There are many such scenes in Letters From Iwo Jima, it is a testimony to the skills of director Clint Eastwood and cinematographer Tom Stern that there are such scenes. Eastwood’s direction combined with Stern’s images and color selection create beauty on the screen and it just so happens that the beautiful imagery is of disgusting and vile acts. There’s a feeling when watching Letters From Iwo Jima of being overcome by the immensity of it all. One can only look on in awe when Saigo is on a possible suicide mission to dump a shit bucket and stumbles onto the sight of the American armada. The beautiful imagery and daunting visuals like the armada outside the beach leave the viewer at a loss of breath over what they are witnessing.

Ken Watanabe has long been a favorite of movie goers, and thirty seconds after his entrance into Letters From Iwo Jima he has already reaffirmed why he is such a fan favorite. Watanabe imbues his Gen. Kuribayashi with a quiet reserve, a stately nature but more importantly an eye on the facts as opposed to history. From the onset Kuribayashi knows he has been sent to die, he knows all of his men will die, all he can hope to do is to last as long as possible. I was surprised to discover that Kazunari Ninomiya, Saigo, was a pop star and not an actual actor. Ninomiya is superb as the Japanese every-soldier, the opposite of the steely reserve all soldiers love to project. Saigo doesn’t want to die, but he knows just like all the other soldiers that he is trapped on Iwo Jima with no hope of ever leaving.

Letters From Iwo Jima is a very decided movie, and by that I mean it it a movie about the lack of hope. It has been decided from the moment that Letters From Iwo Jima flashes back to 1944 that all these Japanese soldiers will die, they have no reason to hope for anything but a quick death. In that way the island and not the Americans becomes the true enemy of the Japanese. Iwo Jima is an island of death, an island from which there is no escape.

Letters From Iwo Jima isn’t about the pointlessness of war, it’s about the pointlessness of the individual in war. The soldiers in Letters From Iwo Jima just happen to be fighting for the Japanese, they are not all that different from their American counterparts. In every way imaginable their participation in the war is pointless because a big part of living is integrating your individuality into your societal whole. Letters From Iwo Jima asks what the point is of sending boys and girls off to war when the individualism they fight for is stripped away until nothing is left but another nameless, faceless foot soldier.

Letters From Iwo Jima is a stirring and powerful film delivered by a director who has developed a reputation for great film making. I will not deny that Eastwood’s films aren’t for everyone and he does have his fair share of detractors. However, I am firmly in the pro-Eastwood camp, and when people ask me why all I need do is point to a movie like Letters From Iwo Jima. With this film you can see the great effect Eastwood’s minimalist direction can have, his ability to work with actors and his ability to adapt to different situations. I am not a fan of labeling films as masterpieces, but I will label a film as such from time to time. I have no qualms putting the masterpiece label on Letters From Iwo Jima, because it is that seminal of a work of art. How often will you find a World War II movie made by an American director, in Japanese, that treats the Japanese soldiers as the human beings that they are? The answer to that is simple, not very often. Just like it isn’t very often that a movie like Letters From Iwo Jima comes around.

Rating:

****

Cheers,
Bill

With two new films playing in Australian cinemas it seems only right that Cinema Autopsy should dedicate an entire post to the iconic actor and great filmmaker that is Clint Eastwood.

1. He is The Man With No Name

The Italian director Sergio Leone, famous for his “Spaghetti Westerns”, made six truly great films and three of those stared Eastwood as The Man With No Name character. The first of these was A Fistful of Dollars (1964), a western remake of Akira Kurosawa’s samurai classic Yojimbo (1961). A Fistful of Dollars established Eastwood’s steely gaze, witty one-liners and capacity to burst into action at any moment. His seductive, unpredictable capacity for sudden violence means that you can’t take your eyes off him. Eastwood dominates the screen and continued to do so in For a Few Dollars More (1965) and then The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966), the film that leaves no doubt about the greatness of Eastwood and director Sergio Leone.

2. He became the urban John Wayne

Along with Leone, Eastwood often credits director Don Siegel for being an early inspiration to his career as a director.  Siegel directed Eastwood in 5 films, including Coogan’s Bluff in 1968. In Coogan’s Bluff Eastwood is a cowboy hat wearing Deputy Sheriff from the Arizona desert who is brought to New York to extradite an escaped killer. Siegel established Eastwood as the classic lawman type from the Western genre but over the course of the Coogan’s Bluff relocates him into a contemporary urban setting.

Eight years later Siegel directed John Wayne’s final film, The Shootist (1976). Wayne plays J.B.Books, an aged, legendary gunfighter whose past glories are behind him. Books is dying of cancer and The Shootist would be Wayne’s final film as he himself died of cancer three years later. The Shootist is about the old cowboys dying off, leaving the stage for the next generation to take over. It is an ode to Wayne’s legacy and the end of the classic Western.

Coogan’s Bluff took Eastwood out of the desert and put him in the city. The Shootist was the death of the old school gun slinging Western. Between these two films Siegel made the film that established Eastwood as an urban lawman with the attitude and temperament of the type of Western hero that Wayne would have wanted to share a whisky with.

3. He is Inspector ‘Dirty’ Harry Callahan

Harry Callahan is still Eastwood’s most recognisable character and the original Dirty Harry (Don Siegel, 1971) is a brilliant and gripping film about an unorthodox cop who has little time for formal procedure and less time for the rights of the serial killer he has been assigned to track down. He is dry witted, a crack shot with his beloved .44 Magnum and portrays a demeanour of cool that is beyond comparison. Despite its dubious demonising of the 70s San Francisco counterculture, the politics of Dirty Harry are not nearly as clear-cut as many would argue. Many saw it as a rightwing attack on a justice system that was increasingly regarded as more concerned with the rights of the criminal than the right of the victim. Certainly the inferior, yet still highly enjoyable, sequels offered little more than the vicarious violent thrill of seeing Harry mercilessly trample over anybody who gets in his way, but the original Dirty Harry is a far more ambiguous film. The shot in the football stadium when Harry tortures Scorpio is a dramatic pull back up into the night sky as if the audience are hastily being pulled away from the horror of the moment in recognition of Harry’s brutality. The film also ends with Harry throwing his badge away in disgust, in homage to Fred Zinnemann’s High Noon (1952), a film known for its strong liberal politics and anti-blacklisting allegories.

4. When he reinvented himself, he made a masterpiece

As far back as 1976 Eastwood starred in and directed The Outlaw Josey Wales, a terrific Western that depicted vengeance as a soul-destroying act. It wouldn’t be until 1992 that Eastwood would return to these ideas to fully explore the devastating results of revenge and violence, which had otherwise mostly appeared in his films as entertaining spectacle. The result was Unforgiven, his best film to date as director and actor, and one of the all time great Westerns. With echoes of John Wayne in The Shootist, Eastwood plays a lone aged gunslinger who reluctantly goes into battle once more and obliterates whatever humanity he has left. It is a meditation on the impact that violence has on a person’s conscience, the mythology of the Western, redemption and sacrifice, the treatment of women and aging. It is both a classical Western and a revisionist Western. Unforgiven is Eastwood’s masterpiece.

Many of the films Eastwood directed after Unforgiven continued to explore some of its various themes. A Perfect Word (1993) demonstrated that the difference between what constitutes a good guy and what constitutes a bad guy is rarely clear-cut. Mystic River (2003) showed how devastating, destructive and misguided revenge can be, Million Dollar Baby (2004) confronted issues concerning death and quality of life and Changeling (2008) depicts a society where women are treated with contempt. Gran Torino (2008) is in many ways a suburban Unforgiven but with a more hopeful message of redemption.

5. He made two of the best ever war films

Depicting the World War II Battle of Iwo Jima in two different films, one from the point-of-view of the Americans and one from the point-of-view of the Japanese, was a bold move. Nevertheless Eastwood succeeded in making two incredibly powerful films that each stand on their own. In Flags of Our Fathers (2006) Eastwood contrasts the scenes of young men dying on the battlefield with scenes depicting the cynical and exploitive propaganda machine that waited for them once they returned home. In Letters from Iwo Jima (2006) the Japanese soldiers are fully developed characters, many of which are bewildered, frightened and having trouble identifying with the nationalistic rhetoric fed to them from their home country. Eastwood vividly depicts the chaos and carnage of war without ever falling into the trap of making the graphic scenes into entertaining spectacle. Unlike so many films that claim to be antiwar because they depict the causalities on their own side, Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima are true antiwar films. They show the loss of lives on both sides of the conflict to be equally tragic.

Clint Eastwood has been a part of some of the best war films, cop films and Westerns ever made. He commands your attention when he is in front of the camera and he thoughtfully crafts every moment of a film when he is behind the camera. He makes the kind of films that he wants to make with the conviction that only a truly talented filmmaker can get away with. He is compassionate, socially conscious and not afraid of controversial subject matter. Finally, you always know that no matter how old he is he is always capable of kicking your ass. There is something eternally reassuring about that. 

© Thomas Caldwell, 2009

Ken Watanabe

Thursday, Dec. 13, 2007

KEN WATANABE
‘What is Hollywood anyway?’

By DAVID McNEILL
Special to The Japan Times

Ken Watanabe’s latest film opens with an image of a polar bear resurfacing into the brilliant spring sunlight after months living underground. It’s tempting to see the scene as a metaphor for a career that has alternated between stretches of intense, highly acclaimed work and long periods of hibernation.

The 48-year-old was famously forced into semiretirement by a leukemia diagnosis in 1989, just two years after NHK’s samurai television series “Dokuganryu Masamune” launched him to fame. He fought the disease into remission, but it returned in 1994, leaving another five-year hole in his resume.

Watanabe is now re-emerging, blinking in the media spotlight after another year away from the cameras — this time self-imposed — following a string of high-profile Hollywood performances that have made him perhaps the best-known, most respected Asian actor on the planet.

In “The Last Samurai” (2003), “Memoirs of a Geisha” (2005) and “Letters from Iwo Jima” (2006), Watanabe brought charisma and depth to roles that in less capable hands were ripe for stereotype: a recalcitrant warrior in the dying days of feudal Japan; a middle-aged businessman in the runup to World War II; and the doomed Pacific War Gen. Tadamichi Kuribayashi.

In “The Last Samurai,” Watanabe’s rich, soulful turn in Edward Zwick’s Bushido sword-fest outshone one of Hollywood’s brightest stars, Tom Cruise, and earned him an Oscar nomination for best supporting actor. He is the heart and soul of “Letters from Iwo Jima,” a movie widely lauded as a masterpiece. Even his phoned-in performance in the exquisitely packaged but slight “Memoirs of a Geisha,” and a cameo in “Batman Returns,” were noted by critics.

All of which made his next career move appear odd. Watanabe returned to Japan to make “Ashita no Kioku (Memories of Tomorrow),” a low-key yet grueling, distinctly un-Hollywood drama about an office worker’s descent into Alzheimer’s disease. And though he briefly made the headlines again when he married actress Kaho Minami, since then public sightings have been so rare that you feel he might be in hibernation again.

But here he is: Tanned, fit and impeccably turned out in a tailored Italian suit for our interview in a central Tokyo hotel. Where has he been?

“How can I explain this?” says the 48-year-old Niigata native, struggling for words. “With ‘Letters from Iwo Jima,’ then ‘Memories of Tomorrow,’ I reached a sort of turning point in my acting. I had poured so much of myself into those movies that I really had no idea where to go from there. Of course I was offered scripts, but nothing that moved me at all in the same way. A lot of people advised me to go ahead and make a movie anyway. In the end I didn’t make one for nearly a year.”

But the time off seems to have done him the world of good.

“I said to my wife, ‘I’ve haven’t done anything in a year, I wonder if it’s OK?’ ” he recalls, smiling. “But she said ‘What are you talking about, you’re living your life.’ And it was a kind of relief to realize that this is what life is: spending time with your family and doing other normal things.”

The project that brings him back from hibernation is the BBC nature series “Planet Earth” (titled “Earth” in Japan) by documentary maker Alastair Fothergill, the creative force behind the huge worldwide hit “Deep Blue.” A filmic plea to rescue the planet from environmental destruction, “Earth” opens with a haunting shot of that polar bear coming out of hibernation and searching for footing on melting ice.

Watanabe, who narrates the movie’s Japanese version, recalls what he saw when he spent a month in the Arctic filming on a different project, before he got the call from the producers of “Earth.”

“The first dawn after winter up there is supposed to be mid-February, but the sun appeared to rise two weeks earlier. When I asked the locals about it, they said there have been huge changes here in the last few years. The weather is changing here too. So when I was asked to do the narration, I thought ‘I’ve got to do this. It’s so important.’ I mean, mankind has lived for such a short time on the planet, and maybe we don’t have much longer to go. But we can still help by doing even small things. Using water and electricity carefully, for example.”

It’s a long way from Hollywood, but Watanabe thinks the older he gets, the more inclined he is to seek out work that “says something” to the audience. Though he says that a return to the small screen is a possibility, he denies that stardom has turned him against the lure of Big Movies.

“Not at all,” he says. “It depends on the production. If the script is good, the cast and director good, I’ll go anywhere. You have to ask, ‘what is Hollywood today anyway’? I mean, there is a physical place by that name and a different aesthetic and scale, but movies are no longer made there. There is so much collaboration now. The money can come from Japan, the movie might have a Korean director and be made in the U.S.; it is not about where you make the movie anymore.”

The big difference he says is how much waste there is on a U.S. set. “They shoot a lot more and then select the best material. But once you get to the set there’s not much difference between a Japanese or foreign movie. There are directors who like to do a lot of takes, and there are others like (Clint) Eastwood (director of ‘Letters from Iwo Jima’) who usually say one will do.”

A smart, erudite man, Watanabe is acutely aware of the dangers of cultural typecasting inside the Hollywood machine. In the DVD voiceover for “The Last Samurai,” director Zwick explains that his star worked so hard because he “knew in some fundamental way” that the images of Japanese actors for decades were “two-dimensional at best and often caricatured.”

As great an actor as he is, he has made his name playing roles within the very restricted Hollywood template for Asian men: warriors, generals, businessmen and sinister oriental bad-guys. Is it possible to break out of this template?

“Well, I’d like to play ordinary people too, and I’m always developing such scripts (with my agent, advisers and friends).”

Still, he acknowledges it is difficult to find roles that don’t condescend. “About half the scripts sent to me feature characters I just can’t identify with, particularly one-dimensional businessmen or, if it’s a comedy, some absurd 10-year-old Japanese stereotype, some role related to IT or business . . . There’s no point in getting mad about it; it’s just the way things are. But I want to positively challenge such stereotypes.”

That sometimes means challenging the director and the script, he explains, even after accepting a role. “Oh yes, there are things in scripts that you cannot let go by. In ‘Letters from Iwo Jima,’ there were times when I told Eastwood, ‘This is just not believable,’ ” he says, adding that he made daily suggestions and asked the director to make sure that costumes, props and sets were accurate. “The story had to be true, but Eastwood is not someone I had to fight with because he always listened carefully and respected my opinions, right up to the end of the movie.”

He says the most serious script dispute on “Letters from Iwo Jima” was the death scene.

“We discussed it for weeks and I disagreed with the original version. Some people felt he should have committed seppuku, but I felt that beautified his death. Being the man he was, having asked so much of his men, he would have fought until he had erased himself. When nothing was left, he would have accepted death. I felt that very strongly.”

Watanabe’s essential seriousness is perhaps one reason why he dismisses the idea that he might be a sex symbol.

“I never understood that tag,” he says laughing. “I have no sense of myself as a sex symbol at all. But the meaning of sex symbol might be a little different in Japan to elsewhere. The Japanese version seems to come with a stronger emphasis on a sort of grownup or mature male charm. And if that’s the case, then I guess I’m happy to hear it.”

Watanabe always chooses scripts “on instinct” and claims it has rarely let him down. He says he immediately knew “Letters from Iwo Jima” and “Memories of Tomorrow” were special, but once he accepted the parts he had to dig deep into himself, a process he found exhausting. “I can’t become another person, no matter how much makeup I wear. Something of your own past, your experiences and personality always comes out in the role and that makes acting very risky. You’re exposed. You always wonder if you can pull it off.”

Acting outside of Japan is made harder by the language barrier, despite Watanabe having studied English intensely for “The Last Samurai” and “Memoirs of a Geisha.” He says dialogue itself is not so difficult, but understanding the meaning behind the words and what the director and the scriptwriter want is a challenge. The burden of playing Kuribayashi after his part as Katsumoto in “The Last Samurai,” two signature roles loaded with historical and political freight and scrutinized in Japan like few films before or since, added to his exhaustion last year.

Watanabe has admitted that he was “nervous” about making “Letters from Iwo Jima” — “a film that was so important to my culture.” Though he undoubtedly worked hard for his role, some critics didn’t appreciate the movie. “Doesn’t have much to say, except that Japanese are human beings too,” wrote the London-based Independent, ignoring what an achievement that was after decades of hoary cinematic cliches and banzai-screaming generals.

Watanabe rarely discusses his illness, though those who know him say his on-screen intensity and stillness is partly a product of being so close to death, and knowing it could come calling again. He admits to mining his memories of fighting leukemia when filming “Memories of Tomorrow.”

“I don’t think you should show those experiences on screen because they’ll take over the character you’re playing. But when I was making the movie, I began to remember. When you’re sick, you’re not thinking 24 hours a day about your suffering, about dying. You want to talk and laugh and think about other things. In the midst of trying to live your life normally, the fear and dread, the realization that it might all end, rises up inside of you. That’s what I brought to that movie, although I didn’t intend to at the start. The director was good enough to listen to me and we changed some scenes.”

The actor who blurs the boundary between screen roles and the guy in the shaving mirror is of course something of a cinematic cliche. Watanabe, who has built a career playing proud, honorable and fatalistic men, seems closer than most to his cinematic persona.

He is reputed to lead a frugal life, and has a reputation for being scrupulously careful and honest. There is something almost Buddha-like in his stillness and thoughtful, considered replies. So is he, as some of his press cuttings suggest, a modern-day samurai?

“Well, I’d like to live like a simple samurai’s life, with few possessions,” he laughs. “But in reality you start to accumulate things in your life. I try to differentiate between what I need and don’t need. I talk to my wife and children before buying things. But I think the samurai sensibility goes deeper: respect for others; using your time carefully; keeping promises. I think those are qualities that Japan used to have but that it is somehow forgetting. They’re important to me.”

“Earth” is released nationwide in Japan on Jan. 12.

Source: http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/ff20071213r1.html

In Bruges

Into the Wild

Kill Bill, Vol. 1

Kill Bill, Vol. 2

La Haine

La Vie est Belle

Let the Right One In

La Escafandra y la Mariposa

Letters from Iwo Jima 

Little Miss Sunshine 

Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels

Lola Rennt

Magnolia 

Mononoke Hime

Natural Born Killers 

No Country for Old Men

Nueve Reinas

Old Boy

Million Dollar Baby 

Ponette

Ratatouille

Saving Private Ryan 

Sin City

Snatch 

Star Trek

Thanks Your for Smoking 

The Big Lebowski

The Bourne  Ultimatum

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

The Hangover 

The Lion King 

The Persuit of the Happyness 

The Green Mile

The Ring 

The Sixth Sense

The Wrestler

There Will Be Blood

The Prestige

Trainspotting

Twelve Monkeys 

Undergorund 

Unforgiven 

V for Vendetta

What Dreams May Come 

Wo Hu Cang Long

El Ilusionista 

The Butterfly Effect

Fracture

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