These films available anywhere? KG doesn't have them...

Oh, I actually don't know! Not sure if you (or anybody in TLC) will like them... These are pretty much movies I grew up with and it's part of any Swede's heart. They show them on TV and in festivals at countless retro perspectives on Molin so I never had a problem seeing them and I never owned as single one of them! Most are also made for TV so that's probably why some is harder to find than others...

Gyakushû! Satsujin ken (1974)

The Street Fighter's Last Revenge

This is actually the reason why I've sen the first two Street Fighters. There's 3 beautiful things joining forces in this third installment: Sonny Chiba as Takuma Tsurugi of course, Kôji Takada's writing and the star of Furyô anego den: Inoshika Ochô; Reiko Ike. This should add up to a Toei Company office party to beat all other parties into pulp. But... they don't.



This time they avoid using a comic sidekick which would be great considering how the first two movies featured the worst sidekicks ever. But they manage to make even that move worse... They made Sonny Chiba the funny guy. He's using Mission Impossible-masks to dress up as Dracula, falling into water and shit like that... C'mon... This guy is supposed to be a badass and not a bad ass. And when you got a villain dressed up as a Mexican shooting laser you should know you're not improving upon things...



At least they bring back Masafumi Suzuki for a moment to serve some fat karate and make Chiba his Ralph Macchio as he becomes his Miyagi. And the fighting scenes are all good - pretty much on pair with the last film and the way Chiba ends the last fight with the prosecutor is boner-ific. But the 3 beautiful things this movie had going for it is wasted: Chiba don't need to be funny to make us sympathize with his asshole-ishness, Takada's sensibilities from Yôen dokufuden hannya no ohyaku isn't present at all and Reiko Ike isn't used at all (except by Tsurugi who, for no reason, always grabs her breast - no matter if they fight or dance).

I dunno whether I will like them either, but I like having the opportunity
Maybe you could record some of them off TV, and rip them to KG? Or is that too much work?

Yeah, I think everybody should try it at least but it IS very Swedish...


Sadly, I don't have the equipment needed for that and I only upload my own movies (that I got the permission to do so with at least) as a rule. But if I stumble upon a place that got anything I'll whisper it in your ear! I really dig that you are willing to try anything - I wish more did.

Yoen dokufuden: Okatsu kyojo tabi (1969)

Okatsu the Fugitive

Fuck... I managed to see part 3 before part 2 (Yoen dokufuden: Okatsu kyojo tabi). It's not easy keeping track on what order to see these films considering they made 2 sequels to Yôen dokufuden hannya no ohyaku (the first Pinku) within the same year. Junko Miyazono is back as Ohyaku... No, wait... Her name is Okatsu here... and got a new pair of parents to avenge? So she's not the same character? But I guess it's just like Eastwood wasn't the same man without a name in Leone's westerns the themes and talent is what connects the dots here. So I guess my snafu doesn't ruin anything.



Junko get to use her sword a lot more this time around since she is much more of a badass now. She doesn't have to go through all the torments of sadistic shit men can do to realize she want revenge. That gives this movie a lot more flow and action but it takes a toll on what I liked with Kôji Takada's writing in the first installment. The revenge gets too... easy. A girl who can use a sword who's parents gets killed - it doesn't take a bearded wise man on a hill to figure out she's gonna use that sword somehow, does it? Still Takada manages to shine in brief moments when he turns the casualties of revenge in a new perspective (maybe not "new" but "interesting" sounds like I was scratching my beard nodding while watching).



This is also shot in color so it looks fantastic and the fights are better (helps that the main character actually uses a sword this time). There are some really impressive long shots of Junko cutting down men that tickled my fancy in the right way. I didn't think much of her before but here she's really a great action star (she's no Meiko Kaji - but who the fuck is?). The Pinku shit is kept to a minimum but I guess that's because they didn't know they made one, I guess. Good thing too. It's a great waste of time and I look forward to waste some more on the third film. I meant the SECOND film! For some reason the make up department is worthless. They managed to make real Japanese actors look as authentic as Dr. No.

Yoen dokufuden: Hitokiri okatsu (1969)

Quick-draw Okatsu

Okay, NOW I managed to see the 2nd film in the Legends Of The Poisonous Seductress-trilogy... And this time Junko Miyazono plays Okatsu, just like she did in the third film (but not in the first... it's a mess - I wont bother to go into details again). Technically it's on pair with the others (except the make up isn't as horrendous as in Yoen dokufuden: Okatsu kyojo tabi).



The main plot points are the same like in the other two movies: she gets her parents killed, tricked by some woman, brought to a brothel and then takes a savage revenge on everything in sight. Same, same but still very different. It sure proves something music proved a long time ago: you can do very much with just a few chords. And Kôji Takada plays them well (much better than in the 3rd movie).

Junko Miyazono is great but Tomisaburo Wakayama (with a big belly) and Reiko Oshida (with a smile) is better at making it look easy to open a can of whop ass. After watching the other two I don't have much more to add myself though. I could point out cool things here and there but I'll keep it down to one scene where director Nobuo Nakagawa goes all Tati on us and have this huge master shot on the brothel and stays with it... and first you don't think it'll pay off but then the mother fucker cuts back to it later and it's glorious.

Johan Falk: Vapenbröder (2009)

Johan Falk: Brothers in Arms (?)

I didn't flat out hate the last movie like I did with this. I actually gave up after about 40 minutes when NOTHING had happened and the main character actually says they should wait and do nothing "to see what happens".

Nu ji zhong ying (1973)

Bamboo House of Dolls

When the opening credits starts I was fooled to believe that I had an awesome movie experience ahead of me... It seems like it got it all; great production values, grit, quick zooms, lens flare overkill, propaganda, balls and blond Scandinavian chicks losing their clothes in endless chick fights. And Fu Ling Wang's music, the best music not yet stolen by Tarantino. Or is it? I have been re-watching (actually re-listened) to those opening credits over and over today and now I'm starting to believe that he actually HAVE stolen it but I can't find out when and where. It sure have that Kill Bill- or Death Proof-wibe to it. (If anybody know something about this: PLEASE let me know - it is driving me insane!)



But then the actual women in prison-film kicks off and I'm thrown off the donkey I thought was a horse. The first half of the movie is just setting up how awful that prison is but I think I got it by the first rape. I really didn't need that cross cutting sequence where all the main girls got raped one by one for ten minutes. Even Fu Ling's music sucked here and was completely off. And what makes this half of the movie even worse is... how good they shot it all. Russ Meyer once said "Nothing is obscene providing it is done in bad taste" and this... was obscene and in bad taste. It's kinda like if you take the few things that worked in Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS, the visuals from Joshuu sasori: Dai-41 zakkyo-bô and, perhaps, The Inglorious Bastards (1978)... and fails just a little with all of them but ultimately you end up with a mess of things that doesn't really makes a whole.



But THEN something happens! The donkey gets raped and killed and in comes the horse in the shape of a great escape film! The girls keeps their clothes on (well, almost), the suspense kicks in big time and Fu Ling gets his shit together again. It's elaborate, hardcore, jam packed with action and out of the blue swordplay and Kung Fu (or whatever). There is this simple but great 24-esque plot device (the "there's a rat among us"-trick) that made scratch my head and trying my best to figure out who it could be. Maybe it worked so well because of the horrible first half (opening credits not included of course)? I really, REALLY didn't want these characters to go back to that prison and whoever was the rat was such horrible person I wanted to watch her die...

Cruising (1980)


Okay, the set-up for this sounds tacky as hell: Al Pacino as a cop who got to go under cover to find a killer in... (drumroll) ...the gay community. There is way too many things that can go wrong with that premise if I were to list them. So I won't - I'm sure you all got that list made up already when you first heard of it - like I did. And a list of great things?



Well, besides Al Pacino dancing all seizure-like at gay clubs there is too many great things here as well... For starters there is great to see films featuring Al Pacino from back in the days when he still cared about acting and not wear his acting on his sleeve. And Paul Sorvino before he started singing goth rock. And William Friedkin making 70's Americana (I hate that term) before the 80's wore a yellow scarf in the left back pocket*. Freeze frame worthy inserts of hardcore gay porn during a stabbing scene. Hell, to see a movie where a man says "Don't worry Dorothy, there's nobody around" to pick up Pacino is a great treat... Oh, and how can Karen Allen be so hot when she got no lips? To sum it up: this could be the greatest film Brian De Palma never did.







*Apparently you like to pee on people in the gay community if you wear a yellow scarf in your left back pocket. Right pocket if you like to sing in the rain. Powers fucking Boothe told me so.

Sherlock Holmes (2009)


Never liked a Guy Richie film before but this was fun and I can't wait for a bunch of sequels... if they stop Richie by the studio gates. Even though he pulls back from his natural overuse of swish boom bang camera flippety flopping there's still too much of it. It serves no point and just pulls me out of what's actually going on. Give it to... Jon Favreau. Somebody who's fun without humping the camera cranes. The rest is enjoyable fun and even though the clue solving is of zero interest to me it's a fun ride. It's like 48 Hrs. and similar movies. I don't care what kind of info Eddie Murphy and Nick Nolte was going for in that bar but it was fun to see how they got it. Robert Downey Jr. and Jude "always the supporting actor" Law was fun, Rachel McAdams smoking and Mark Strong quickly forgettable in his "I'm playing the villain with my eyebrows"-performance.

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009)


Two Jude Law films in a row but it wasn't planned (who the hell plans things like that?) since I had forgot he was in it. I was just happy to see a new finished film by Terry Gilliam at the cinema. And it was a joy in almost every way except that he fumbled with his main character, Dr. Parnassus himself. And that I found myself staring with my jaw open of the visionary landscape of... Lily Cole. But I cant really blame Terry for that (none of those problems) because it's hard to make a film about yourself and come up with a suiting closure.

Okay, there was another problem with it too... it was too Tim Burtonish whenever they entered the Docs mirror and while it was still visually nice it was... beneath Gilliam.

And to sum up what everybody wants to know: Ledger was okay, Johnny Depp funny, Jude Law the best Ledger and Colin Farrell on pair with Ledger.

A Serious Man (2009)


Because I had seen two Jude Law movies before this I wanted to make a "Jew Law" pun here but couldn't come up with something.

Nice to see that the Coens still got it after the forgettable quirkfest that was Burn After Reading. All around a great cast with great quirks except for Richard Kind who is a funny looking but terrible actor. It was a treat. My main unfair problem with it was the ending that in it self was great but it also made the Coens come off as M. Night Shyamalan. Yeah, we know you can end your films however you feel like by now but don't do it again, please.

<3 A Serious Man much more than expected. I think -- not that I've read it -- the ending continues with the "Book of Job" narrative, but I wasn't entirely satisfied with it myself.

I've read it and didn't connect the dots until I read about that in imdb trivia an hour ago. It is a great ending in every sense (without connecting those two dots) but coming from the Coens it gets repetitive... and I know it's an unfair thing to get annoyed about - it's pretty much the 3rd time in a row they made an ending like that BUT if any other director shot the movie it wouldn't bother me. I don't lower any scores because of it but they set of some big "there will be a Coen ending"-alarms for me and their next film(s)...

The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call - New Orleans (2009)


This was really great and it was nice to see Herzog pulling of a movie that wasn't entirely set outdoors. It's been a rule of thumb for me that the guy just can't direct with a roof over his head. But overall Herzog never been a particularly good director. Don't get me wrong, the guy would make a top 20 favorite directors list for me but he don't know shit about setting up a narrative. What he got is a great eye for stories and finds them in the weirdest places. But to actually follow a plan? he's useless. He does well here but besides finding that unique Herzog moment here and there (most of them within Cage) the directing is on pair with... whoever directs Burt Reynold's cop movies (that's Burt Reynolds, by the way).

Overall nicely cast except for Eva Mendes who did a really fine job but I just don't believe her a prostitute and therefor never believe she's in any real danger. Just because of the casting I knew where her plot would go and it followed my predictions note by note. I know it's a movie about New Orleans but I still wished I could've been spared the voodoo shit for once. I like the original way more since I never felt they did that tongue in cheek like I did here now and then. It kinda made me think of Leone's The Man With No Name-trilogy and the Legends Of The Poisonous Seductress-trilogy the way it's the same plot and character but treated differently. I wouldn't mind seeing a The Bad Lieutenant: Coco Nuts in Hawaii or something next, with a new cast and director - just to see what would happen (and I doubt Herzog is the sequel kinda guy). How about Crispin Glover in the hands of von Trier? (Who would do a sequel like that just because it would be the "wrong thing to do.")

Payday (1973)


After watching Nicolas Cage rip it up, all I can say now is: fuck that very entertaining tongue in cheek actor. Rip fucking Torn shows how you truly rip thing up in here! There's nothing he wont fuck, smoke, drink, alienate or throw a shit eating grin at. I'm floored. What this got, that The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call - New Orleans don't, is genuine characters and not just things to bounce Cage against and a director that doesn't just underline the freaky sides of things. There is so much more going on here besides the leading man and it keeps surprising me, through out the entire running time what what will get to me. Like a naive groupie saying she never had an omelette!



Only negative thing I got to say about this is that I have no idea what Crazy Heart is about but this just filled this year's quota for "awesome actors doing country singers"-films for me by a mile. This could be my all time favorite road movie...

Agora (2009)


I bet this is as historically correct as George Bush Jr.'s view on his time as a president, something I'm fine with BUT then I'm surprised that they bothered to stuff so much exposition into the film when they could've just let go completely. But in all fairness I needed the first half of almost lecture like exposition to fully grasp the drama. I know the world isn't flat and spins around the sun in a "circle" but when and where these ideas were born I'm at loss.

Alejandro Amenábar is a talanted director so I was at first let down by his plain visuals but I should blame that on HBO and Rome for spoiling me. The toned down look, borderlining to being a TV-film, actually adds to his narrative here and when he punctuates it with some awesome shots, underlining Hypatia's theories, and placing the pettyness of the believes in a bigger perspective. I mean, they are talking about religion and philosophy and BAM: Amenábar cuts to a shot of Earth seen from space. Damn, we are nothing.

Rachel Weisz delivers and is as beautiful as always but my admiration have to go to Max Minghella (whom I never seen before) as the film's C3PO, the slave who witnesses it all and grows from being a boy to a man - maybe not the most original part but he had me fooled to believe he would never mature. Good job... whoever you are.

Engelen (2009)


In the first shot we see Maria Bonnevie, one of the most beautiful women in the world, in a dirty bathroom, bruised, naked from the waist down with a heroin needle sticking out of her ass. She then goes to see the kid she put up for adoption after failing as a mom and instead succeeded as a prostitute and drug addict. It's not a feel good film and Bonnevie manages to make a great performance, speaking Norweigen (if she pulled that off I don't know) and she isn't alone in the cast to make scenery chewing characters come to life. Gunilla Röör plays her mother and I've never liked her in dramas before but here she pulls it off with the help of the always great Antti Reini playing her abusive boyfriend. The way he says "sorry" after beating up Röör is really moving and I think we are supposed to dislike this character...



The movie tries a little bit too hard to kick you in the gut and while I can't blame them since it's based on discussions director Margreth Olin had with a woman who did all this for real... but I think she forget to ask that woman if she ever had fun or even smiled at something. The constant darkness numbs me in the audience. Really good and every time Norway beats us Swedes in our own game I get happy. I guess I think it's because we no longer deserves the attention any longer.

White Material (2009)


I really loved everything technical about it and the acting is flawless - not surprising when Isabelle Huppert is around but I did raise an eyebrow when Christopher Lambert didn't shop somebody's head off. But all thee 80's hasbeens seems to pull talent out of their asses these days. The editing was what got me the most but it's also the cause of one of the things I have now, a few days later, decided to be a problem. It made the movie predictable. Why I couldn't decide if the movie was predictable until AFTER I saw the movie? Well, it was predictable while watching too but I didn't get the feeling Denis tried to surprise us and that it wasn't about if they will make it or not but how. What made me decide it was a problem now is... why the fuck should I not complain when Denis does it when I do it with any other director? It turns her film into a "I told you so"-story. Okay; nobody really likes to say "I told you so". When somebody is about to make a mistake and you warn them and they do it anyway... you feel bad saying those words. This film is like that all the way through, the main characters doesn't only get warned a hundred times about the dangers (I would have been fine with that) but we as an audience knows how it will end already thanks to the editing. So whatever horrible things the characters have to go through I don't really care... it just makes me wanna tell the screen "I told you so..."


"...bitch."

A Single Man (2009)


I knew nothing about this going in, except for what I had seen on the poster and Colin Firth's Golden Globe nomination. Honestly: I booked this screening because I just picked a movie because it screened right after White Material... I recognized Tom Ford's name but couldn't place it and after the screening I looked him up on imdb and went "Huh? A costume designer from a Bond film? Seriously?". Then I looked deeper and went "Oooh... THAT Tom Ford." Nothing in this film says "first time director". It's a really great film, technically great and performances to die for.



During the opening credits I went "Oh, Matthew Goode is in it!" and then he was dead by the first scene and I went "What the fuck?!". I wasn't in the mood for a Colin Firth movie. I like him but I don't love him. He's a charming dull guy... but here, with gray hair and Marcello Mastroianni-glasses he rocks. I hardly recognized him... He's an AWESOME charming dull guy! It's his role through and through and I doubt he will get anything to match it in the future.



But Tom Ford is what impressed me the most. His use of muted colors to give it a 60's look but with higher contrast that saves it from looking like a kitschy era stunt. And how he semi-subtly cranks up the colors whenever Firths sees something he gave me goosebumps. Oh, and the way he reflect things in Firth's glasses... To my surprise this turned out to be my favorite movie this year at Gothenburg Film Festival and I hope to God Ford makes a shitload of movies now.

Die Voortrekkers (1916)

Seen with live music by Percussion Discussion Africa

Tricky to write notes about this because of 3 reasons...

1. The movie isn't as important to me as the viewing experience was. It was a special screening at Gothenburg Film Festival where a band from Uganda played African live music to three films dealing poorly with the Zulu people:
The Zulu’s Heart (1908)
- D.W. Griffith paints some white guys up as Negroes and have them jump around as monkeys, kidnapping poor defenseless white women but the innocent eyes of a young white girl melts the heart of a savage.

Rastus in Zululand (1910)
- A short gag about a black man (actually a black man!) who gets kidnapped by white men (actually evil white men!) and he ends up in Africa and caught by fine young Zulu... cannibals (jumping around like monkeys).

..and finally the feature (about 60 minutes long) Die Voortrekkers (1916)
- About a Zulu warrior who hears about Jesus from a missionary and therefor fails to kill the Zulu chief's baby (I guess it was a really late Zulu abortion method?), becomes a Christian and helps da man to fight the Zulu.


2. I know shit about music and have absolutely no vocabulary to describe a musical event even in Swedish. All I can say is that it was great and the contrast of the racial images and the African music was really funny. They didn't do stupid underlines to make the white man seem sillier - they didn't have to, the movies did that themselves. It was cool and not too "jungle drummish", it was funkier than that - I would love to see them re-score a blaxploitation film.


3. I'm tired.

Sebbe (2010)


Directed by a Babak Najafi, "friend" of mine (we studied at the Dramatic Institute at the same time but he studied directing for documentaries), who is a fun guy who made some fun documentaries and short fiction movies. And here he makes a feature film debut that is like a kick in the gut - gone wrong. It accidentally hit me in the nuts. There is no humor to be found here, each scene is taking things further and further down into misery. It's like Babak asks his main character Sebbe; "Are you laying down? Good." ...and then kicks him. Then invites friends to kick him. Then inviting his family to kick him. Then having hobos kick him. And his documentary like visuals and the superb acting just make matters worse. It just gets too dark for it's own good. I really hope I get to see at least a hint of the funny guy Babak can be in his next films. Don't get me wrong; I really liked the film but it's hopeless world view numbed me down in the end.

Poltory komnaty ili sentimentalnoe puteshestvie na rodinu (2009)

Room and a Half

This movie about Nobel prize winning poet Joseph Brodsky got me real furious when the end credits rolled. The first hour about his childhood and youth was amazing - it was vivid and playful and explored the imagination like no other biography film. It's like a Terry Gilliam movie but shares no visual connection other than that director Andrey Khrzhanovskiy is an animator as well. He really uses the young Brodky's curious look upon the world. I loved it!



But then, in the second half, Brodsky gets his Nobel Prize, gets old and... boring as hell. Khrzhanovskiy, it's not a sin to make old people interesting! Damn!