The Most Beautiful Night in the World (Sekai de ichiban utsukushii yoru) [2008] • Japan

It's all here. The reason for wars and other bad things is that people are not sexually satisfied. So, create a potion that will make everyone want to have sex all the time, all the unhealthy people will die from exhaustion, and then the world will be overrun with children. The march of civilization will stop but at least so will the wars and corruption. Interesting idea, but the acting and the storytelling in this nearly three hour film are so bad it can only work by virtue of a train wreck curiosity. It may become a cult classic. It's got full frontal nudity and a fifty persons naked orgy at the end. You can't take this film seriously but it does make a case for taking pity on it. It's bad, frighteningly bad, but it's shooting for being so bad it's good, hoping to create a pathetic charm. And it succeeds, to a degree. I admit to sorta liking this film after it was over but sitting through it had many difficult moments.

Michie Itô is great as the genius girl who breaks out in an allergic rash when she gets near stupid people, and who gives birth to a girl who has no bellybutton because she was born in an egg.

It's definitely not a pink film and I even hesitate to call it weird. It's more just earnestly underachieving. There's a wholesome quality to it too. It's strangeness isn't typical of Japanese weirdness, it's more like midnight-movie camp. It's structure is that of a fifteen year old girl (the one without a belly-button) narrating the secret of why her small community has such a high fertility rate: "It all started fourteen years ago when 'that man' came to our village", and then it takes its sweet time getting to the present. There isn't really an allure that something erotic might happen, although Michie Itô's character has a way of leading you to the edge every time she shows up, but there is a continuing implication that the story might unfold in an interesting and fulfilling way.

It's not Christopher Guest weird, where everyone seems to exist in their own orbit, and it's not Satoshi Miki witty weird, it's more like Godzilla ... with animated sequences from a third-grader thrown in. NYAFF Trailer @ YouTube

★★★

Mother (Madeo) [2009] • South Korea • Bong Joon-ho

It’s too bad that because this film is ostensibly about an old lady it must be considered a "smaller" film in Bong’s oeuvre. It’s not. It is every bit as brilliant, and as large, as Memories of Murder, in my opinion.

In many ways this is the natural, and equal, follow-up to Memories of Murder. It’s every bit the caper film that one was, and, although slightly more somber in tone, the film keeps unraveling in directions you don’t expect making it much more a plot driven movie than a character study. Kim Hye-ja is, however, magnificent as the titular (gawd I hate that word but I’m using it anyway) mother. There is a scene in this film where she tells the family of the victim her son didn’t do it and her eyes are so electrically charged it made me jump back from the screen. Mother fires on all cylinders. The direction, cinematography, script, and acting are all grade A. It’s one of those films where each of the secondary characters steals the show for a brief period. How ‘bout that cop who kicks the apple from Won Bin’s mouth? Bong does a remarkable job of populating the world of this film with real people and manages to give them depth and development in a very short period of time. I confess to having a little trouble tracking the other adult female characters in the film, but no matter. There is a scene (without spoiling anything here) where Kim Hye-ja asks the other ‘retarded’ kid if he has a mother and it's one of the most complex and heart-rending scenes in cinematic history. Hyperbole notwithstanding, just freakin’ WOW! on that one when you ponder just why she is crying.

I wasn’t sure where Bong was going to end up going as a film maker. Barking Dogs Never Bite was a reasonable debut. Memories of Murder, a masterpiece. But was it a lucky shot? I’m glad I don’t have to consider the dismal Antarctic Journal a Bong film if I don’t want to. The Host was lots-o-fun, but that’s the one that worried me. Maybe he was going to start making blockbuster type films. But now, after recently seeing his contribution to Tokyo!, and now Mother, I have every reason to believe he is going to kick my butt with interesting film for a long time.

★★★★★

Raise the Red Lantern (Da hong deng long gao gao gua) [1991] • China

Four women live in separate apartments in a beautiful castle. Three of them like to eat meat, one is a vegetarian. They're all married to the same guy, the master of the castle. Whomever the master chooses to stay with on any given night gets a foot massage and gets to call the shots at dinnertime, decide the menu. Seems like an environment ripe for jealousies and fighting. Seems like a season of Dallas but it's tweaked out to 1920s Chinese concubine culture. It's a beautiful film because the castle is beautiful. Gong Li is beautiful. But it's too easy to see where things are going, and an obvious girly cat fight isn't that interesting.

Or is it a veiled allegory against Chinese communist authoritarianism, or the culture of patriarchy? If so, we have to call it good. That's the rule. Damn chicks, allegorically speaking, should have banded together and thrown off their oppressors instead of fighting each other. The film, in foreshadowing irony, is divided into "Summer, Fall, Winter, Spring ... Summer", just like Kim ki-duk's so-called masterpiece that's beautiful to look at but banal in story. I don't understand all the love for this film (or Kim's film). Yes, they are both gorgeous but both are only seemingly profound.

★★★

If You Are the One (Fei Cheng Wu Rao) [2008] • China

This is [Edit: was] the highest grossing film of all time in China. Hard to believe, as it's not really a remarkable film, except for Shu Qi, she's remarkable. When she asks her date if he believes in love at first sight he responds "I loved the first sight of you!" It's a very pleasant film. Funny, slightly quirky, it's an intimate study of two people's vulnerability, and thoroughly Chinese. I'm sure some of the humor was lost on me due to the fact I don't speak Mandarin. And Ge You's Mandarin accent is as thick as syrup! He does a great job playing a forty-something guy who's made his lot in life selling zany inventions and now has a very specific set of criteria he's looking for in a mate to settle down with. This is a great 'date' movie.

★★★★