Saturday, June 28, 2008

Cherries / Yingtao (China, 2007)



Cherries (Yingtao) is a Chinese film by dicrector Zhang Jiabei.
It's a simple though very beautiful film about a mother's love for her child. In this film we will follow a mentally ill woman who is chasing children most of her time in her attempt to offer them cherries. wants to have a babyand finds an abundant one, a girl, in the woods. It should be realized that this movie starts in the '80s of the past century, a time when the birth control policy affected parents choices to abandon their child when it was a girl.

How difficult it is for this mentally ill woman to raise a child, but she manages. In the following part of this film the child reaches an pre-pubescent age. She starts to feel embarrased about her mother and is finding it difficult the way her mother shows her love, sometimes very inappropriate.



It's a movie about the love of a parent for her child. And it's not just a movie, it is a very good one! Zhang Jiabei catches the perfect mood. The cinematography is fantastic, beautiful landscapes and a slow pacing movie which style seems to be a bit like The road home. The acting of Miao Pu (who plays the mother) is almost beyond belief. She is disturbingly authentic in her role as a mentally ill mother. And maybe the most beautiful thing about this film, the thing that really makes it a bit more special, is the music. The music catches the emotions perfectly! Most of the time it's traditional 'Erhu' music, which fits perfectly!
Most of all 'Cherries' is a beautiful small, emotional film about the love.

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Freeze me (Japan, 2000)


'Freeze me' by director Takashi Ishii can be seen as a revenge or a survival movie.

The story is about a girl (Harumi Inoue) who is raped by three man and it is captured on a videocamera. This girl leaves her home to go to Tokyo. 5 Years later, when she is planning to marry a colleague, the rapers find her again, one by one.
From this moment on the wants her revenge and yes...it has something to do with a freezer.

It could have been a very harsh movie, an exciting one or a very emotional one. But in my eyes it is complete failure. It just won't work... the movie is cold (maybe that is why it is called 'freeze me'), never gest really exciting/interesting and it doesn't make sense at all. Maybe it's because I don't quite know Japanese culture very good, but I doubt that as well. To me this movie wasn't convincing at all.

To be honest, I did like the poster of this movie!