夢 (Dreams)

Directed by Akira Kurosawa
1990
Japan



I Saw a Dream Like This...

Since the beginning of time, men have grappled with one of the most mysterious facets of their lives: dreams. Nobody is exactly sure what they are or why we have them, but they are an essential part of the human experience. Few have been as obsessed with the realm of dreams as the artist. For centuries, dreams have inspired some of the most controversial and unique works of art that mankind has ever produced. Works of literature like Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (1818), Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886) and Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Kubla Khan (1816) all originated from dreams. The paintings of William Blake and Salvador Dalí adhere to dream logic and imagery. And, finally, many works of cinema found their roots in the dreams of their creators. Prominent directors such as Andrei Tarkovsky, David Lynch, and Federico Fellini created films based off their dreams. At the very least, they were modeled after the imagery and atmosphere of their respective dreamscapes. But in addition to these cinematic luminaries, there is a curious work by another great film icon that demands attention. This movie is Akira Kurosawa's Dreams. A strange work, it reconstructs eight actual dreams by the legendary filmmaker. Taken from various parts of his lifetime, his eight dreams offer a penetrating glimpse into the inner workings of one of the most important artists of the century.

But before I delve into the film itself, it is important to establish a cultural frame of reference from which to approach these dreams. Ancient cultures had different ways of interpreting dreams. The ancient Egyptians believed that the gods revealed themselves in dreams in order to either demand things, give warnings, or take part in dream rituals. The ancient Babylonians believed that there was a strong religious meaning to dreams. Good dreams were sent by gods while bad dreams were sent by demons. To the Assyrians, they were omens. To the Romans, they revealed the wishes of the gods. But to the Japanese, dreams had a very different purpose. Studies have shown that during the prehistoric Jomon period, dreams were believed to be part of reality. Later, it was believed that dreams were vehicles wherein ancestral spirits made visits and answered pressing questions. However, as time went by and foreign influences increased in Japanese society, dreams began to lose their value as mystic couriers of otherworldly insight and/or advice. However, dreams still have an important part in Japanese society. A prime example is 夢十夜 (Yume Jūya), or Ten Nights of Dreams by Natsume Sōseki, a collection of dreams that take place during the age of the gods, the Kamakura period, the Meiji period, and the future. After reading part of this collection, I noticed several intrinsic Buddhist, Confucian, and even Shinto values and themes woven into the text. This reflected the Japanese zeitgeist of the Meiji period when it was written. Obviously, dreams still held an important place in the Japanese mindset.

So how should we approach the eight reconstructed dreams in Kurosawa's Dreams? It is probably important to remember that while Kurosawa frequently worked with modern themes such as post World War Two reconstruction and the search for the Japanese identity in the modern world, Kurosawa was a director who frequently returned to the past for inspiration. Much of his finest work, such as Rashomon (1951), Seven Samurai (1954), The Hidden Fortress (1958), Yojimbo (1961), Kagemusha (1980), and Ran (1985) took place in the past. Therefore, it would be safe to assume that he identified with many of the values and beliefs held by the characters in his historical epics. Since this included a deeper respect and appreciation of dreams, it can only be determined that Kurosawa saw dreams as more than just the excess electrical spasms of sleeping brain tissue. With this insight established, now we can investigate the episodes that make up Kurosawa's Dreams.

The dreams can be divided up into three categories: 1) folktales, 2) stories concerning modern society, 3) nightmares. Each category of dreams demands inspection. Therefore the rest of this review will analyze each one separately. There are three dream folktales. Interestingly enough, they are also the first three dreams of the movie. The first is Sunshine Through the Rain, which concerns an old Japanese legend that when the sun shines through the rain, the kitsune (foxes) get married. One day a young boy witnesses a kitsune wedding procession. He is spotted by the kitsune and flees home. However, the spirits have already been to his house. His mother says that they left him a knife to kill himself with. Now, he must try and find the kitsune and beg their forgiveness. The dream ends with him running into the mountains. The next is my personal favorite among the folktales, The Peach Orchard. The plot is rather simple. In Japanese society, Hina Matsuri, the Doll Festival, takes place when the peach blossoms are in full bloom. One boy's family has chopped down the peach trees, so the boy feels guilty during the festival. He spots a girl running out the front door of his house. He follows her to the old peach orchard where his sister's collection of dolls come to life. Since they realize that he truly loved the peach blossoms, they allow him to see them one more time while they perform a slow and heartbreakingly beautiful dance set to etenraku, or music brought from heaven. The final folktale is a retelling of the Yuki-onna Japanese myth. Entitled The Blizzard, it follows four mountaineers who encounter a yuki-onna, or snow woman, while they try to return to camp.

While all three folktales are original stories, they are all based on established parts of Japanese culture. Sunshine Through the Rain deals with native folklore. The Peach Orchard deals with Japanese holidays and spirits. Finally, The Blizzard concerns itself with legendary Japanese creatures and spirits placed into modern day society. I have always supported cinema as a method of cultural expression. Movies have the ability to transmit great cultural stories and values. Kurosawa is no stranger to this. Movies such as Seven Samurai and Yojimbo have entered the Japanese zeitgeist. While tales of kitsune and yuki-onna may have derived from poems, stories, or legends, they all share a common distinction of being established centuries before the advent of cinema. Here in Dreams, Kurosawa has created new stories concerning these subjects that could easily pass as ancient legends or myths. That is one of the reasons why I believe that Dreams is such a powerful movie: it creates stories that could one day be accepted into traditional Japanese society. At least, that is my opinion.

The second category of dreams concern modern society. Village of the Watermills concerns a young man, who may or may not be Kurosawa, coming across a peaceful village. An old man explains that this village rejected modern technology a long time ago. This has led to the entire village having greater spiritual health. The young man then witnesses a joyous funeral procession for an old woman. When asked why they are so happy during a funeral, the old man answers before joining the procession that it is proper to celebrate a good end to a good life.

The other modern day story is Crows. While it may not be the best dream, it is certainly one of the most fascinating. It concerns a young art student (wearing Kurosawa's trademark hat) who wonders into the world of Vincent Van Gogh's artwork. He eventually meets the artist who brushes him off saying that he needs to focus on his work. The dream ends with the student wondering through the universe of his most famous paintings. What makes this dream so interesting are the implications concerning the people involved in its production. Van Gogh is actually played by director Martin Scorsese. The visual effects were created by George Lucas and his special effects group Industrial Light and Magic. Those who know the history of Kurosawa's career will instantly recognize the importance of these directors. While Kurosawa was recognized as one of the greatest film directors of all time, he could almost never get funding for his later movies. It was only after American directors (who he had influenced) signed on as producers or supporters was Kurosawa able to make his films. For instance, one of the only reasons why Kurosawa gained financial support for Kagemusha was because Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas signed on as producers. The segment Crows represents a kind of cosmic return of karma for Kurosawa. His films like Seven Samurai and The Hidden Fortress directly influenced American directors. After they became popular, they were able to return the favor by supporting their sensei. As someone once said, “The circle is complete...”

But to really delve into Kurosawa's psyche, we must delve into the third category of dreams, the nightmares. There are three of them, and they are all devastating. Two of them deal with the nuclear bomb. Mount Fuji in Red concerns the meltdown of a large nuclear power plant on Mount Fuji. Millions flee into the ocean, but five survivors are left behind to face the realization that they will be dying from the radiation. The Weeping Demon concerns a man meeting an oni, or a horned demon from Japanese mythology. It turns out that the oni is a real man who had been mutated by nuclear fallout. He points out a pit where many other horned people writhe on the ground, doomed to suffer for eternity. But the nightmare that I want to focus on is The Tunnel. It concerns a Japanese army officer traveling home after World War Two. As he exits a giant tunnel, he realizes that someone is following him. He turns around to notice the ghost of Private Noguchi following him. Noguchi wants to return to his home because he does not know that he is dead. But the officer convinces him that he is dead and forces him to return back into the tunnel even though he literally can see his house. Horrifically, he then witnesses his entire platoon come out of the tunnel's darkness. They too want to return home and proudly report that they have suffered no casualties. The officer breaks down and confesses his guilt over dooming them all during the war. He tearfully orders them to about face and march back into the tunnel.

The Tunnel is a powerful story because it could become an actual folktale. I wish that Kurosawa had identified which tunnel it was inside the story. If he did, I wish I could visit it in Japan. I would expect to hear stories from the locals about a military man who had a vision over by the tunnel. That is the power of this story, and all of the stories in Kurosawa's Dreams. They transcend simple stories and become the prototypes for a new age of mythology. The stories here may one day enter Japanese culture the same way his film Seven Samurai did. Regardless of whether or not they do, Dreams remains one of Kurosawa's most intimate and personal movies. They explore his hopes and fears for himself, society, and his native Japan. While it may not be the most popular film that Kurosawa made, it is the most important for those who wish to understand the man behind the movie camera and what drove him to make masterpiece after masterpiece.

http://www.analysedreams.co.uk/DreamsInAncientCultures.html
http://library.thinkquest.org/26857/historyofdreams.htm
http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=3014621
http://allisonbryant.tripod.com/id12.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Nights_of_Dreams
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Etenraku
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreams_(film)

Changeling

Directed by Clint Eastwood
2008
The United States of America



Arthur Hutchins: 'Night, mommy.
Christine Collins: [yelling] Stop calling me that! I'm not your mother! I want my son back! Damn you!

The first time that I saw Changeling was with my father in a Regal 22 cinema. We were both excited to see it. Well, truth be told, I was excited because it was a Clint Eastwood production. My father needed a little convincing. But after I showed him another one of Eastwood's projects, a little Western named Unforgiven (1992), he consented. Two and a half hours later, we both emerged from the theater visibly shaken. I cautiously asked my father what he thought about it. “It was great,” he told me, “I'm glad that I saw it. But I never want to see it again.” I totally understood what he meant. Truth be told, neither one of us were expecting what Clint Eastwood had in store for us. It was a disturbing masterpiece. It was disturbing because it told the horrifying true stories of a woman being violated by an all powerful police department and one of the worst serial killers in American history. It was a masterpiece because every frame, every shot, and every scene was flawlessly and brilliantly executed. And yet, it was largely ignored. It received a couple of Academy Award nominations, but no wins. It was in the lead for the Palme d'Or at the 61st Cannes Film Festival, but lost because two of the judges refused to believe that such an incredible story was true. Critics didn't know how to handle it. Audiences didn't know how to react to it. And so, it was largely forgotten in the light of Eastwood's other 2008 project, Gran Torino. But it shouldn't have. Changeling was the natural successor to a long line of powerful Eastwood dramas like Mystic River (2003), Million Dollar Baby (2004), and his twin war epics: Flags of Our Fathers (2006) and Letters from Iwo Jima (2006). In all of those movies, the story centered on male characters. Even Million Dollar Baby was told from the point of view of the main male character. But not Changeling. No, Changeling focuses its story on a woman.



The woman in question is Christine Collins (played by a stunning Angelina Jolie), a single mother living in 1928 Los Angeles. She lives alone with her nine-year old son Walter. They share a difficult, but ultimately happy, life. Times are not easy for single women in this day and age, nor is it easy for their children, as Walter is picked on at school for not having a father. But they love each other and support each other as time goes by. Then, one day the unthinkable happens: Walter goes missing. She frantically calls the Los Angeles Police Department who tell her that it is protocol to not investigate missing children cases until 24 hours go by. Their reason is that the children usually show up on their own. But the day turns into months as Walter does not come home. Finally, one day, the police department, led by Chief James E. Davis (Colm Feore) tells her that they have found her son and that they will be reunited at the train station. This event is a perfect opportunity to score some good press for the LAPD, who has come under fire as one of the most corrupt organizations in America. As Reverend Gustav Briegleb (played by John Malkovich who at times seems to be channeling his performance as Tom Ripley from Ripley's Game) points out on his radio broadcasts, the LAPD is involved with gambling, prostitution, bootlegging, and extra-judicial punishment. By extra-judicial punishment, it means that they have a “Gun Squad” who has no reservations to ruthlessly kill anyone who gets in their way. So maybe it isn't any surprise that at the train station, the boy that they give Christine is not her son. Oh, the boy claims that he is her son and the police department claim that he is her son, but Christine knows better. He is several inches shorter than her Walter. Also, in one particularly poignant scene, she discovers that he is circumcised. Her Walter wasn't. But this means bad press, so Captain J.J. Jones, the head of the LAPD's Juvenile Division, pressures Christine to take him home on what he calls a “trial basis.”



The rest of the movie details her struggle against the LAPD who see Christine as a threat. They send over doctors and specialists to confirm that he is, in fact, Walter Collins. All, of course, are under contract with the police office. Although they cannot come up with any reasonable explanations as to why Walter has suddenly shrunk and changed appearance, they are certain that he is Walter. But Christine doesn't back down. She checks with her son's dentist and teacher to confirm that this boy isn't her son. Even Reverend Briegleb comes to her aid. But the police will not tolerate her going to the press and exposing their mistake. So they have her committed to a mental hospital under Code Twelve. This is a system that the police have worked out so they can dump their “undesirables” into an institution where they won't be a liability anymore. It turns out that almost all of the women there are Code Twelves who happened to fall into the LAPD's bad graces. As fellow inmate Carol Dexter tells her, “The more you try to act sane, the crazier you start to look. If you smile too much, you're delusional or you're stifling hysteria. And if you don't smile, you're depressed. If you remain neutral, you're emotionally withdrawn, potentially catatonic.” Indeed, one of the film's most intense scenes is when she meets with the resident doctor who gives her a psychological evaluation. Everything she says is twisted by the doctor into a reason why she is crazy. Notice how early in the interview when he asks her questions, everything she says is met with a terrifying scratch on the doctor's notepad. The sound and motion becomes maddening as she slowly realizes that she is doomed. Such subtlety is rare in today's films, but Eastwood pulls it off with devastating power.

But Walter Briegleb and his church bust her out. In fact, with the help of the best attorney in the city, who decides to do the case pro bono, all of the women who were institutionalized under Code Twelve are released. And so they begin to fight back against the LAPD. But this isn't the only story being told. While Christine faces the horrors of the asylum, the film cuts to a ranch in Wineville, Riverside County where a young boy named Sanford Clark is arrested by the police. As he is being prepared for deportation back to Canada, he suddenly wants to speak to a police officer. He confesses that while he was at the ranch, his uncle, Gordon Northcott, forced him to help kidnap and murder around twenty young boys. From here on, a manhunt is launched for Gordon, leading to his arrest and trial.



The movie handles both plot threads with precision. But where it really shines is when the two collide in a brilliant scene that alternates between two court cases: the city council hearing of LAPD abuse against Christine and Gordon's trial. Because Gordon could be responsible for Walter's disappearance, Christine attends his trial while her own is in recess. The two trials operate in tandem: both present evidence at the same time, both reach verdicts at the same time. To reveal the ending would be to spoil the movie, but suffice to say it is difficult to classify. It isn't necessarily a happy ending, but it isn't a sad ending, either. But it does provide a measure of closure and finality that such a demanding movie entails.



I like to think that as directors age, their work gets better. I earnestly believe that Akira Kurosawa's Ran (1985) is his best film, even though most believe that Seven Samurai (1954) was his best. But when I watch Ran, I see the result of a master craftsman who has devoted his entire life to his trade. Each frame seems as inspired and perfectly designed as every brush-stroke from a Monet. In Changeling, we see a film that could only have been made by a director such as Clint Eastwood, who has been an actor for over fifty years and a director for over thirty. It is a testament to his power that some of the most devastating scenes are the most subtle. For instance, the scene where Sanford confesses to the police that he has murdered twenty kids. The officer hands him a group of pictures of various missing boys. Slowly, he begins to put down each one on the table. With each photo, the officer begins to grow paler. Crying, he ends up putting down almost all of the photos. He is responsible for them. A lesser director would have ordered a dramatic scene with a tearful confession. But not here. The boy just puts down the photos and whimpers.

There are many scenes that I have left out that deserve mention: Christine's preliminary examination at the institution, the chicken coup escape scene, Gordon's hanging. However, I am not sure if I could ever stop ranting about them. All I can say is that each of them are flawlessly constructed. That is part of Changeling's charm: they don't make movies like this anymore. Maybe that is why it didn't do very well in theaters. Maybe we have forgotten how to react to good movies. No, not good, but great movies. Because that is what Changeling is, a great movie.

Now, before I finish this review, I'd like to take a moment to talk about Angelina Jolie. I think that she is a great actor and her performance in this movie is exceptional. But I feel sorry for her. I feel sorry that she picks such bad movie roles. As I look at her screen credits on wikipedia, I am overcome by the number of cheesy action flicks that she has starred in: Wanted (2008), Beowulf (2007), Mr. and Mrs. Smith (2005), Alexander (2004), Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001), and Gone in Sixty Seconds (2000). There is a reason why she won an Oscar for Girl, Interrupted (1999): she is a genuinely talented actress. If she picked better roles, she could easily go down as one of the world's greatest actresses. One can only hope.....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clint_Eastwood#Early_work:1950s
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changeling_(film)#Reception
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changeling_(film)

Le Silence de la Mer (The Silence of the Sea)

Directed by Jean-Pierre Melville
1949



In early 1942, a novel was secretly published and distributed throughout Nazi-occupied Paris. It's author, a man who went by the codename Vercors, risked his life to bring these pages into the public eye. It was entitled Le Silence de la Mer, which translates to The Silence of the Sea. It told a simple story comprised of only three principle characters: an old man and his niece who are forced to share their home with an occupying German officer. They use the only tactic that they have at their disposal to resist against the officer: silence. They do not speak a word to him. This simple tale quickly became the blueprint for mental resistance against the German occupiers. After the war, the author Vercors revealed himself to be Jean Bruller, one of the co-founders of Les Éditions de Minuit which served as an underground publishing house during the occupation until the liberation of Paris on August 25, 1944. Since distribution of their texts was illegal, copies of their books had to be passed from person to person. In this way, novels like Le Silence de la Mer became unspoken classics amongst the French. So, with the end of the German occupation, it was obvious that these stories would be adapted into movies. But who should direct them, and how? Surely they are not meant for overblown Hollywood melodrama with the old man and his niece clinging onto each other with teary eyes as they sacrifice themselves for the Resistance. For a story of such quiet power, a filmmaker of the same caliber would be required. Thankfully, in 1949, Jean-Pierre Melville directed his own adaptation of Le Silence de la Mer, and the result was a film that would perfectly capture the spirit of the novel and the secret universe that produced it.

Born Jean-Pierre Grumbach, he adopted the name Melville as a tribute to his favorite American author, Herman Melville, author of the famous Moby Dick. His films, like his own name, were highly influenced by American cinema and culture. While critics applaud his early films like Le Silence de la Mer, Les Enfants Terribles (1950), and Léon Morin, prêtre (1961), he would gain international renown for his gangster and crime movies. But instead of mimicking the American crime films that he loved, he would invent his own cinematic language and style. Instead of sets, he was one of the first French directors to film on location. Instead of breakneck epics punctuated by intense gun fights, his crime films were slow-paced and focused on the nuances of criminal life. In Le Samouraï (1967) we are introduced to the main character, a professional hit-man named Jef Costello, laying down on a bed smoking a cigarette. Slowly, he gets up, walks to the door, and then pauses to make sure that his coat is immaculate and his hat is positioned perfectly on his head. We follow him as he goes about Paris constructing every aspect of his alibi. Then, when he finally makes his hit, it is not with a stylistic flourish, but with the precision of a surgeon. “What do you want,” the victim asks him. “To kill you,” he replies. A couple of quick shots with a silencer, and the deed is done.

Where other directors would embellish, Melville simply observes. I remember reading one review that likened Melville's directing as a series of meticulously constructed still shots. Perhaps so, but I always saw Melville as a director who obsessed over behavior. Let Varda and Akerman obsess over mise-en-scène, Melville is more concerned with his characters and what makes them tick. Perhaps this is what made him such a perfect fit for Le Silence de la Mer, because after you strip it of all pretensions and implications, it is a story of three characters fighting a battle of mind and willpower, not of body and bullets.

While the story focuses on the plight of the old man and his niece, Melville goes into greater detail in describing the German officer, Werner Von Ebrennac. He is a man of lofty ideals who holds a genuine interest in French and German cooperation. He does not look down on his benefactors. Instead, one of the first things he says to them is, “I'm very sorry, I...It was necessary, of course. I would have avoided it, if I'd been able. My orderly will do everything he can not to disrupt you.” Regarding their silence, he replies, “I have a deep respect for people who love their country.” Immediately we realize that this officer is not like the other Germans that the old man and his niece have had to deal with. He speaks perfect French, with a slight accent of course, whereas the soldiers who inspected their house before he arrived could hardly speak it. “They spoke to me in what they thought was French. I didn't understand a word,” the old man narrates. No, officer Von Ebrennac has obviously invested great time and energy in learning and mastering the French language. At least much more time than his fellow occupiers ever did.



The majority of the movie from this point on consists of officer Von Ebrennac coming into their study, warming himself by the fire, and talking. As they sit in silence Von Ebrennac talks about himself. It turns out that when he isn't wearing an officer's clothing, he is a composer. He adores German music. But he has one other passion: great literature. In particular French literature. During one evening, he stares at their library and remarks, “Balzac, Baudelaire, Corneille, Descartes, Fénelon, Gautier, Hugo. What a line-up! And I've only got to 'H'. Not as far as Molière, Racine, Rabelais, Pascal, Stendhal, Voltaire, Montaigne...and all the others. With the English, you immediately think of Shakespeare. With the Italians, Dante. With Spain, Cervantes...and with us, immediately Goethe...but if someone says France, who immediately springs to mind? Molière? Racine? Hugo? They're like a crowd at a theatre entrance. You don't know who to let in first.” Indeed, Von Ebrennac is a cultured man with cultured tastes. He sees France and Germany as two parts of a single whole, literature and music. My guess is that he also sees France as Europe's soul and Germany as Europe's strength. But whatever the reason, he spends night after night confessing his love of France and hinting that they should not hate Germany for what it is doing.



But why does he talk to them? Is it an attempt to break the ice? Does he want to justify his being there? My opinion is that he finally has an audience who will listen to what he has to say. For his thoughts are unbecoming of a Nazi officer of the Third Reich. These confessions are cathartic; they give him a chance to praise the country that he loves. But do not misunderstand, he does not apologize for his country's actions. “I don't regret this war. No, I think some great good will come of it...Out of great love for France. Great things will come of it for both Germany and France. I think as my father did that the sun will shine again on Europe.” Instead, Von Ebrennac sees the war as a means to an end: a greater, stronger Europe. Of course, the old man and his niece do not believe him, so night after night his confessions are met with devastating silence.

Of course, Von Ebrennac eventually learns the truth when he visits Paris. There, he learns about the true nature of the German occupation. His friends cheerfully tell him that they intend to destroy France, eliminate its culture, and rule over it as part of the Thousand Year Empire. He is devastated by the truth. He returns to the house where he informs the old man and his niece that he has requested a transfer to a fighting unit on the Eastern front. Knowing now that the Eastern front was doomed to fail and that the Soviets didn't usually take prisoners, we know that he is doomed to die. As he is about to leave the next day, he finds a book by the door with a paper inside bearing the words, “It is a fine thing when a soldier disobeys criminal orders.” He turns and sees the old man standing in a doorway, hands behind his back, staring at him. As Von Ebrennac gets ready to leave, a curious look engulfs his face. What is it? Understanding? Fury? Contempt? Who knows? He leaves for the Eastern front and the old man goes back to his old routine with his niece. Their resistance finished, their victory won, I like to imagine what they believed they had accomplished. Did they feel triumphant or were they sorry that this man that had confessed his soul to them was doomed to die? It is up for us to come to our own conclusions. Just as copies of the book were passed around in secret in the streets of Paris, so will the film Le Silence de la Mer be handed from film-goer to film-goer over the years. For those who worship Melville's crime films, it will remain an enigma. For those who study early French film, it will be a curiosity.

But to those who lived through the Nazi occupation of France, it lives as a testament of a bygone era. Consider, for example, Melville's relationship with Bruller. When Melville started filming Le Silence de la Mer, he did not have the legal rights. But Melville met with Bruller and told him that if he didn't like the film, he would burn the negative. All that needs to be said is that the film still remains to this day.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Silence_de_la_mer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_%C3%89ditions_de_Minuit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Silence_de_la_mer_(film)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Pierre_Melville
http://www.notcoming.com/reviews/lesilencedelamer/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0039822/trivia

D.O.A.

Directed by Rudolph Maté
1950



Frank Bigelow: I want to report a murder.
Homicide Captain: Sit down. Where was this murder committed?
Frank Bigelow: San Francisco, last night.
Homicide Captain: Who was murdered?
Frank Bigelow: I was.

I want you to read the above quote again, but slower and with more emphasis. -Who was murdered? -I was. These are some of the very first lines in Rudolph Maté's D.O.A. Has there ever been an opening line that powerful before? It's blunt and straight-to-the-point. It immediately captures your attention. It's not everyday that you hear someone talk about there own death. But here he is, Mr. Frank Bigelow, reporting his own death to the police. What's even stranger is that the homicide captain nods his head, pulls out a file, and tells Bigelow that they have been expecting him. The captain asks Bigelow what happened, and what follows is one of the most fascinating stories that has ever graced the genre of film noir.



But why then am I writing about it? If it is a classic, people should know about it already! Well, my guess is that it isn't remembered because it doesn't comply with the modern day image of what a film noir should be. There isn't any piercingly clever dialogue as in Sweet Smell of Success (1957). Some of the lines are well crafted, but none are on the same level as such classics as “I left my sense of humor in my other suit.” There is some impressive cinematography, but none of it is as powerful or recognizable as The Naked City (1948). Finally, the lead actor, Edmond O'Brien, puts in an impressive performance, but he never gained the star power of film noir icons like Humphrey Bogart or Robert Mitchum. But don't make any mistake, D.O.A. is a film noir of the highest caliber. It's strength is its incredible story that keeps the audience interested and fascinated until the very last shot.

But before I get to that last shot, perhaps I should fill you in on the rest of the story. Bigelow is introduced as an accountant and notary public in his hometown of Banning, California. Tired and bored with his current life, he says goodbye to his lover (I'm sorry, this is the production code era: confidential secretary) and goes to San Francisco for a one-week vacation. It's obvious that Bigelow is tight-strung. Immediately after checking into his hotel, he is spirited away by a group of salesmen to a jazz club. The jazz is loud, the drinks are strong, and the energy is palpable. Bigelow couldn't be more out of his element. While the group around him get into the music, he gets jostled around and desperately tries to escape. He doesn't have much luck. When he sits down at the bar, he discovers that they don't quite speak English there. He asks the bartender who the blonde is over on the other side of the bar. He answers, “Oh she's one of the chicks that hang around here, she's jive crazy.” Confused, he slinks away. It turns out that this is one of the cinema's first representations of the Beat subculture, and he sure isn't with it, daddy-o.



He orders a drink, but when he isn't looking, a strange man swaps his drink with another one. He drinks it, grimaces, and says that it doesn't taste right. He decides to flee before anything else happens to him. It's too late, because as he finds out at a clinic the next day, he had been fed a “luminous toxin” that is guaranteed fatal because there in no antidote. He storms out of the doctor's office in denial to get a second opinion. In one of the film's best scenes, the second doctor holds up a vial filled with what we believe to be his blood. He turns out the light and it glows brightly in the dark. Yes, it is a luminous toxin. And no, he doesn't have long to live. Probably a day or so.

The rest of the film concerns Bigelow desperately tracking down his own murderer. It is a frantic search. His entire personality changes after he discovers that he is doomed to die. As Foster Hirsch said in this 1981 review: “One of the film's many ironies is that his last desperate search involves him in his life more forcefully than he has ever been before... Tracking down his killer just before he dies — discovering the reason for his death — turns out to be the triumph of his life." And what a triumph. Through the film, he will survive several shootouts, an encounter with a completely psychotic henchman named Chester played by Neville Brand in his first screen role, a couple of shocking discoveries concerning backstabbing wives and hardened gangsters.



The film has some breathtaking sequences. One of the very best is when he runs out of the doctor's office after being diagnosed as a murder victim. He sprints down a street with the camera speeding along capturing his every move. If it looks realistic it's because it is! It was a “stolen shot,” which means that a real city street was used with real pedestrians blocking his way. None of them had any idea that a movie was being filmed. It makes you wonder if any of them had any idea that Edmond O'Brien would be colliding into them that day. He finally stops at a newspaper stand where he tries to catch his breath. And wouldn't you know it, the racks are full of only one magazine: Life.

But at the center of this film is Bigelow: a simple man out to find those who have wronged him. It is a plot that is stunning in its simplicity. It is actually quite a refreshing change from the majority of film noir like The Big Sleep (1946) that have plots that are so labyrinthine that it leaves the audience confused at the end. D.O.A. represents the heart of film noir without any additional dressings: a good story, a strong central character, and of course, a plot twist that leaves you reeling.



Editor's Note: In the years since D.O.A.'s release it has fallen into the public domain. A free version is available for download here: http://www.archive.org/details/doa_1949

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D.O.A._(1950_film)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0042369/trivia
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0042369/usercomments

하녀 (The Housemaid)

Directed by Kim Ki-young
1960
South Korea



“Look at this. A man in Gimcheon committed adultery with his maid.”

Kim Ki-young's film 하녀, or The Housemaid, is about a middle-class family trying to establish a place for themselves in the world. It is the perfect nuclear family: a father, mother, son, and daughter. They have the ideal life, or at least they are getting close to it. And then, suddenly, it is all taken from them. Unlike most thrillers where the central characters are exposed to evil by accident or chance, The Housemaid is unique in that the characters invite their own destruction into their house. Everything that happens to them can be traced back to their own selfish desires and desperation to maintain their status in society. It is a frightfully complex movie. And yet, as the characters explain at the beginning and ending, it could happen to anybody...

The family's patriarch is Tong-sik, a music teacher, who alternates between leading choir practices at work and private piano lessons at home. The mother spends her time working at a sewing machine where she earns money for them to buy nice, expensive things: a television set, a piano, and other things that good middle class families should have. The daughter is crippled and has to walk around wearing arm braces. Unfortunately, she has to deal with the constant harassment directed to her by her younger brother, a cheeky little whelp who has no problem in calling her a cripple and mocking her when she can't make it up the staircase. They all live in a beautiful western two-story house in a nice neighborhood. It is obvious that they were not born into the middle class but had to work their way up to it. It is also obvious, perhaps even more so, that they want to improve their lot in life even more. They can be frightfully blunt, even borderline cruel, in their quest for upward mobility.

Take, for example, their crippled daughter. The perfect daughter would not have such a disability. So, they want her to get better. In one particularly harsh scene, Tong-sik arrives home with a new pet squirrel. It is a present for his daughter. He holds it up to her and casually explains how when a squirrel is locked up inside a cage, it exercises to keep its legs strong. The girl stares blankly at the cage. With an empty look on her face, she replies, “You want me to exercise too, right?” Then, quietly weeping, she turns around and hobbles up the impossible stairs. This brings up another interesting point: why would the family buy a two-story house when they have a crippled daughter? In fact, why would they have such a huge house when there are only four of them? My guess is that they buy things that they think they want, not necessarily the things that they need.

One night, the mother breaks down from being overworked. So Tong-sik asks one of his students to find him a housemaid. When she arrives, it is clear that things are not going to be the same for the family. With girlish good looks, pigtails, and an extremely tight sweater, she quickly becomes the wife's sexual rival. In addition, she acts in a very disconcerting manner. She catches and kills a rat in the kitchen with her bare hands. She has an unnerving stare that she uses to examine the house and its occupants. The children are quick to distrust her. But Tong-sik keeps her employed. Unfortunately, forces are already in motion that will lead to her seducing him.



Earlier in the film, one of his students gave him a love letter. He quickly reports it to her boss at her factory. It becomes apparent that Tong-sik did so because he was trying to avoid scandal which would inevitably lead to him losing his job. Unfortunately, the student did not take it well. She kills herself in grief. Horrified, he rushes to her funeral where her mother attacks him. When he returns home, he is beset upon by yet another student who loves him. She threatens to go to the police and say that he raped her if he doesn't sleep with her. He shoves her away. It is at this moment, when he is at his weakest when the maid seduces him.



Things only continue to get worse from there as the maid discovers that she is pregnant. Now she poses a threat to the social standing of the family. So the mother takes drastic steps to keep her family intact. In one of the film's most chilling scenes, she confronts the maid. We don't hear much of what she says, but we can only expect the worst. She leaves the maid standing at the top of the staircase and goes down to meet her husband. She assures him that everything will be taken care of.

“What happened?”
“Everything will be taken care of soon.”
“Thanks.”
“We can't let our precious lives be destroyed now.”

We see them walk away from the stairs where the maid is standing at the top. They walk behind a door. There is a crash and a horrible scream. They go back in where they find the maid sprawled on the floor. He carries her back upstairs where the maid desperately grabs him.

“Don't go. Your child is dead. I did as your wife told me. I'll die too. I'll die!”

We then cut to a group of doctors walking down the stairs. In a moment it becomes clear: she has had an emergency abortion. Now everything starts to unwind. The maid threatens to go to the police and say that they murdered her child. Desperate to avoid scandal, the family allows her to control them with an iron fist. She walks into Tong-sik's bedroom at night and demands that he sleep with her. His wife is powerless to stop her. She cruelly kills their son with rat poison. She thinks that it's only fair. After all, they killed her son, so she had the right to kill their's. Once again, the couple refuses to go to the police. Things only keep escalating out of control until she convinces Tong-sik that they should commit suicide together...

The Housemaid is sinister in its implications of middle class psychology. There were many times when the family could have gone to the police to get help, but they choose not to in order to avoid scandal. One would think that after their own son was murdered that it would be the final straw, but they continue to bow to the maid's will. They adore their lifestyle with their big two-story house. In fact, the house itself becomes an important symbol. Normal families wouldn't need a two-story house. So, the second story represents the luxury that the family desperately clings to. Observe what goes on in the different floors. The emergency abortion takes place upstairs where the maid's room is. Later in the film, the mother also gives birth to a son. Her delivery is downstairs where their bedroom is. The piano room is upstairs. Later in the film, it becomes a source of psychological torture as the maid is heard banging on it all throughout the day (and late at night) as the family unravels. It is upstairs that the maid poisons the son. We see him die as he plummets down the stairs.

If the second story represents their unnecessary lifestyle, then the staircase becomes a constant reminder of their decision to bend to the maid's will. So many important things happen on the staircase: the maid throws herself down them to induce a miscarriage, the boy falls down them to his death, and the girl is forced by her parents to walk them in order to strengthen her legs. They become a tool through which the family destroys themselves.



The film itself is a masterpiece of atmosphere, composition, and pacing. It shares the same sense of dread as Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) yet moves along at the same pace as The Honeymoon Killers (1970). As the story evolves, the house seems to undergo a metamorphosis from a spacious home into a claustrophobic dungeon. Not only is The Housemaid a disturbing film, it is also an incredibly brave one. At a time when Korean cinema was chained to realism, director Kim Ki-young's was willing to delve into themes such as psycho-sexual drama and the post-war middle class values that drive Tong-sik's family towards destruction. While it was a hit at the box office, the film was crucified by Korea's critics. Now, over forty years later, it is recognized as one of the three greatest Korean films of all time. Hopefully one day it will gain its proper place as one of the greatest thrillers that mankind has ever produced.

Editor's Note: Many thanks for the World Cinema Foundation for restoring this priceless work of art. According to the website:

Hanyo (The Housemaid) has been restored digitally by the Korean Film Archive (KOFA) with the support of the World Cinema Foundation. The original negative of the film was found in 1982 with two missing reels, 5 and 8. In 1990 an original release print with handwritten English subtitles was found and used to complete the copy. Unfortunately, this copy was highly damaged, and the English subtitles occupied almost half of the frame area. So far the restoration process has included flicker and grain reduction, scratch and dust removal, color grading, etc. and has turned out to be very complex. The final removal of the subtitles is expected by the end of the year.

This film can be seen free of charge at http://www.theauteurs.com/films/2039

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Ki-young#The_Housemaid
http://filmbrain.typepad.com/filmbrain/2004/11/upstairs_downst.html

Zelig

Directed by Woody Allen
1983
The United States of America



Leonard Zelig: I've never flown before in my life, and it shows exactly what you can do, if you're a total psychotic!

I wonder, at times, what it would be like to be Woody Allen. It must be nice to be one of the greatest comedic geniuses of the 20th century. But in earning his accolades he has become his own punch line. He consistently plays one character in his movies: himself. His comedy is always about two things: himself and how messed up he is. His movies are always about three things: himself, how messed up he is, and how hard it is for him to fit into society. Notice a pattern? Certainly, many comedians rose to fame with self-deprecating humor. But whereas comedians like Rodney Dangerfield and Richard Pryor end their shows with a smile and a bow, Allen always seemed to frown and shuffle offstage. It makes one think, “How much is he actually joking?” The man has been in psychotherapy for over thirty years. He has had several turbulent relationships that always result in scandal. When he says, “Life is full of misery, loneliness, and suffering – and it's all over much too soon,” we get a feeling that he truly believes it. Maybe Woody Allen is not a great comedian. Maybe he is the world's funniest nutjob.

But that is what makes the Woody Allen persona so endearing: we want to know what makes him tick. Thankfully, as I have already mentioned, he has been most gracious in diving into his own psyche in most of his movies. Many fans will point to Annie Hall (1977) and Manhattan (1979) as some of his most autobiographical work. They are both fine films, to be sure. But neither one of them explains his motivations for what he does. Oh, Annie Hall explains that he is neurotic because he fears relationships and so on and so on, but why? A bizarre childhood is mentioned, but it never seems to justify the destruction of his relationship with Diane Keaton. No, if you truly want to understand Woody Allen, I would recommend watching Zelig, one of his best and most under-appreciated masterpieces. Even though the film isn't about Woody Allen being Woody Allen, it explores his motivations as a person better than any other film he ever made.

The plot concerns a man named Leonard Zelig who has the great (mis)fortune to live in the United States in the 1920s and 30s. He becomes somewhat of an overnight celebrity for a talent that he picked up during his youth. Well, it's not so much a talent as a disorder. He has a strange ability to completely change his appearance to match those around him. I don't mean to imply that he is a master of disguise. He literally changes. When surrounded by two overweight men, he suddenly gains over a hundred pounds. When confronted by black men (or “Negroes” as the movie refers to them) his skin literally changes color. When he is around “Chinamen” his features become pale, his eyes stretch out, and he begins to act like one of them.

Zelig as a fat man, a "Negro", and a Scotsman.

These are not just physical changes. It affects his speech patterns and thought processes as well. While at a party hosted by F. Scott Fitzgerald, he begins to adopt upper class mannerisms and a Boston accent. When he is confronted by doctors, he assumes the identity of a doctor. During a session with a psychiatrist Dr. Eudora Fletcher, he actually begins to speak of mental diseases and patients that he must get back to (“I worked with Freud in Vienna. We broke over the concept of penis envy. Freud felt that it should be limited to women.”). Leonard Zelig is dubbed a “human chameleon.”

Zelig as a Native American

The remaining plot is fairly simple to work out: he is sent to a mental hospital where Dr. Fletcher tries to cure him (“I have an interesting case. I'm treating two sets of Siamese twins with split personalities. I'm getting paid by eight people.”). Money-hungry relatives spirit him away to Europe where they turn him into a high society freak show. They are tragically killed and Zelig is sent back to the States where he undergoes more therapy with Dr. Fletcher. They fall in love, Zelig is cured, and they get married. But people come forward to accuse him of crimes that he committed when he was still a “chameleon.” He tries to apologize and set things straight (“My deepest apology goes to the Trochman family in Detroit. I... I never delivered a baby before in my life, and I... I just thought that ice tongs was the way to do it.”) The pressure makes him relapse. He disappears. A nationwide manhunt is started for him. But he eventually shows up in the Vatican as one of the Pope's protégées, then as a high-ranking member of the Nazi Party. Dr. Fletcher goes to Germany, attends a rally, and finds Zelig seated next to Hitler. He recognizes her, they escape to a plane, and try to fly away. Unfortunately, Dr. Fletcher is knocked out, so Zelig transforms into an airplane pilot. He escapes from Germany and flies all the way back to the States while setting the world record for fastest trans-Atlantic flight made while upside down. Zelig is named a hero, and the two live happily ever after.

Zelig is a marked departure from much of Allen's other work. It is filmed as a documentary with a narrator giving us the details of Zelig's life. Interspersed throughout are interviews with people that Zelig “knew” back in the Twenties and Thirties. Most of the time we see Zelig it is in old newsreel footage, tattered pictures, and grainy voice recordings. Instead of re-staging historical events, Allen used state of the art technology to insert him into historical footage. The scene with Hitler was especially well executed as Hitler pauses during a speech and appears to look right at him. This was all done with old-fashioned blue-screen technology that took so long to complete, that Allen was able to film A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy (1982) and Broadway Danny Rose (1984) while the effects were still being finished. But it paid off magnificently. Allen was so perfectly inserted into historical films and pictures that not once did it seem fake or phony. For the scenes that were not based in historical footage, Allen used real cameras, lenses, and sound equipment from the 1920s to mimic the eras films. In order to properly age the film, the negatives were showered, stomped on, and even scrunched up. The result is a documentary that is so convincing that we frequently forget that we are watching Woody Allen. Well, almost.

Zelig with Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover

The one-liners are classic Woody Allen. And, of course, there are psychotherapy scenes. It is during these scenes that Dr. Fletcher is able to discover why Zelig transforms the way he does. “I want to be liked,” he moans during a hypnotherapy session. Therein is the key to Zelig, he transforms so that people will accept him and simultaneously leave him alone. Quite a paradox, to be sure, but as the sessions continue, it becomes clearer and clearer why Zelig is so desperate to fit in. During his childhood, he was a constant recipient of abuse (“As a boy, Leonard Zelig is frequently bullied by anti-Semites. His parents, who never take his part and blame him for everything, side with the anti-Semites.”). Never able to get the attention or support that he craved, his body developed the ability to transform so that people will no longer abuse him and instead accept him into the fold.

Now, consider the case of Woody Allen. He had a difficult childhood marred by a temperamental mother who frequently fought with his father. He grew up speaking Yiddish and going to Hebrew School before transferring to the public system. He earned the attention of his peers with magic tricks and comedic routines. His comedy began to reflect his pain. He once joked that at an inter-faith summer camp, he was “sadistically beaten by boys of all races and creeds.” At 19 he began to write for The Ed Sulliven Show, The Tonight Show, and even Caesar's Hour. After further developing his standup talents, he began writing for Candid Camera, then moving on to writing for The New Yorker, and finally penning Broadway plays. He starred in his first film, What's New, Pussycat (1965) and the rest is history.

Woody Allen developed comedy as a means to escape his scarred past and get ahead in life. He turned himself into a giant joke and in the process gained wealth and success. He could disappear into films and created characters where people would pay to see him. By embracing fantasy, he was able to conquer reality. Or did he? After all, he's still in therapy. He still has issues. Unlike Zelig, he cannot disappear from the public eye. But like Zelig, he can tolerate the public eye by transforming. Zelig can transform. Allen can crack a joke. But really, it's all a front. As Allen once said, “My one regret in life is that I am not someone else.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zelig
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woody_Allen

Сталкер (Stalker)

Directed by Andrei Tarkovsky
1979
USSR



Stalker: The Zone wants to be respected. Otherwise it will punish.

Andrei Tarkovsky's Сталкер (Stalker) is a film of many questions, but very few answers. It concerns three men who journey to a place known only as the Zone, which may or may not be the site of a meteor strike or an alien spacecraft landing. They sneak past a military blockade that guards the Zone. Why did the military feel obligated to blockade the Zone? We don't know, and neither do the characters. But they are perfectly willing to risk being shot on their trek to the Zone. Why? Because the Zone, which may or may not exist, is said to be a room which grants the deepest and innermost wishes of those who enter it. How? We are not sure. But it is obvious that the influence of the Zone is beyond our understanding. It distorts the normal laws of physics and somehow seems to set deadly 'traps' for those who seek entry. Progress must be slow, for the slightest mistake could prove fatal.

They are led by a man named Stalker. They do not use the Russian word for stalker, but the English one. His profession is to lead people inside the Zone. He knows how to navigate it and avoid its traps. He brings along metal nuts tied to strips of cloth which he throws ahead of him in order to see whether or not it is safe to continue. Despite his dire warnings, the nuts always land harmlessly. But this doesn't seem to surprise Stalker. They are a necessary precaution, and to do without would mean certain death. This annoys his two clients, named Professor and Writer (Stalker insists that they not tell him their names). They both seek the Zone for reasons that are never truly explained. There are whispers that Writer has lost his inspiration and that Professor wants a Nobel prize, but there seem to be other motivations that they keep secret.



Stalker has traveled to the Zone many times, but he has never entered it. He explains that Stalkers can never enter the Zone. He recalls the story of a previous Stalker named 'Porcupine' who broke this rule. During his trip, he caused his brother to die in the Zone. After reaching the room, he won the lottery. However, he quickly hung himself afterwards. This raises more questions. While the Zone may grant our deepest wishes, do we even know what they are? Was winning the lottery Porcupine's greatest desire? Or could it be that his true wish was an unconscious one: the death of his brother? To that question we only have Porcupine's suicide as an answer. Yes, we realize, it is best if Stalkers stay out of the Zone...

It makes the audience wonder if we as humans are capable of knowing our greatest desires? Are we equipped to seek them out? What are we willing to sacrifice in order to achieve them? And, moreover, what happens if we are granted our greatest desires? Are they the key to true happiness or inner fulfillment? These are all questions that are constantly confronted in Stalker. Indeed, the film is inundated with uncertainty and philosophy: Stalker frequently quotes the New Testament. Stalker's wife recites a poem by Fyodor Tyutchev at the end of the film. Tarkovsky injects the script with quotations from his own father. What is the purpose? They certainly do not help explain anything happening in the plot. The three men's philosophical musings have no bearing on their journey. In the end, we are presented with a portrait of a group of men who are merely seeking something. Something which may or may not be there. Something which they may or may not even want.

Tarkovsky was always a master of making normal, everyday objects seem unreal. In his other great science fiction epic Solaris (1972), a few tracking shots of Akasaka, Tokyo are used to help transition between events on earth and events in outer space. In Stalker, Tarkovsky is able to transform scenes of industrial buildings and forests into still lifes from a nightmare. In one of the most famous scenes of the film, the three men break through the military blockade using a railway handcar. Up until this point, the entire film has been in tinted sepia But then as they finally manage to escape from the military, the environment explodes into color. 'We are home,' Stalker exclaims as Writer and Professor cautiously regard their new surroundings.



Key to the entire effect of the film is the cinematography by Alexander Knyazhinsky who re-shot almost the entire thing after it was discovered that the first draft was shot on corrupted film. Knyazhinsky continued Tarkovsky's tradition of long takes with slow camera movements. In fact, for a film that is 163 minutes long, it only contains 142 shots, averaging out to around one minute per shot. Many shots last for more than four minutes. In one of the most famous shots of Tarkovsky's career, the three men sit just outside the entrance of the room in the Zone. The camera regards them and then slowly zooms out, revealing the room to be a shallow pool of water. Suddenly, it begins to rain inside the room. It gets stronger and stronger and louder and louder until suddenly, it just stops. The torrent is reduced to a few solitary raindrops before finally dying out. And still, the three men just sit there.

The glacial camera techniques all lend themselves to the fulfillment of the three classical unities as written by Aristotle in his Poetics. The first is unity of action which states that a play should have only one main action. The second is the unity of place which says that a play should cover only a single physical space and should not compress the area's geography. The third is the unity of time which says that a play should take place over no more time than 24 hours. Tarkovsky, always a strident film theorist, wanted to make Stalker because he could finally make a film that conformed to these elements. And so, we have a film that does indeed realize the unities: there is only the search for the Zone, it takes place in its immediate surroundings, and it takes place over the course of a day and a night. By doing so, it creates an atmosphere that other filmmakers can only dream of creating. The Zone is a world unto itself. We regard it, but we never quite see it. We hear it, but we never quite understand it. We touch it, but we never fully grasp it.



It probably all goes back to a metaphor used by a character in the source novel Roadside Picnic by Boris and Arkady Strugatsky. The Zone is like the scene of a picnic. After the picnickers leave, animals emerge from the forest and find the refuse left behind: motor oil, flowers, matches, balloons, candy wrappers, etc. The trash is a tangible reality, but it is beyond the animals' understanding or comprehension. The Zone is the aliens' picnic trash: it is there, it is the source of some kind of power, but we can never understand what it is. We can only touch it and hope for the best. And so the Stalker must go on leading men into the heart of this bizarre world. Like a priest offering a prayer, the Stalker puts one foot in front of the other in an attempt to reach an entity that we may not understand, but we desperately want to touch. What is the Zone? Why is it there? What does it do? Do we even want its gifts? These are all questions that have no answers. But then again, that is probably the point. It is the journey, the search for the answer, that drives men forward into the unknown reaches of the universe and their own souls.

Editor's Note: The editor would like to thank Jonathan Cameron for suggesting this movie and birubirFilms for graciously providing it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalker_(film)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_unities