[glow=red,2,300]***** SPOILER ALERT *****[/glow]
boy, how many previews can they pack, in there? i think we had six... well, i got to see mark ruffalo and ethan hawke, so i cant complain too much... but, boy...
DGD, i will say, like hercule poirot,
not french, belgian. but i see what you mean.
and i understand that you may have hated it. as much a i have to admit that, for example,
apocalypse now is a great movie, i hated it with a passion, because it brings us to a place in humanity where we don't necessarily want to go, but that truly exists: extreme emotional pain.
well, french, belgian, pan-european, or whatever a movie is, i wish american reporters and critics would make an extra effort to understand that all names in the world are not necessarily english.
they must know emmanuelle béart is FRENCH, that she has a FRENCH accent, they should understand that her character's name is NOT JANET but JEANNE, its written on the damn JACKET - ever heard of JEANNE MOREAU, "movie critics"?
even IMDB got it wrong. geez louise.
;D ;D ;D
but, about the movie. great opening sequence, must have been great on big screen, that is true.
ambiance and story presentation: quick, subtil, perfect.
the humidity of
phuket (thanks, dgd) is almost palpable. the same "humidity" that took the litttle joshua is about to take his parents, you can just feel it.
as you can tell from the start that, if father paul is still hanging to dear life, trying to hold head above water, mother jeanne has drown already, it's her ghost going through the motions of everyday life, living in another world altogether. she is so dead that she makes old ladies freak out on the boat to burma, where, she thinks (
he does not, really) she will find her son back.
( i have to withdraw any nasty comment i ever made about emmanuelle béart. she is truly amazing as jeanne. )in fact, its not a coincidence if paul is wearing this red shirt in the second part of the movie. he ends up standing out in the land of dead where he is taken, because he is the only one alive. even the pirate (who is leading paul and jeanne on to get their money) knows he is dead, since he asks for a lantern to be lit for his own
vinyan, his own dead soul.
and as a living thing within a land of zombies, he does not stand a fighting chance.
all this is not explained but shown, particularly through sensitive and subtil interpretations from the leads. rufus sewell and emmanuelle beart both have eyes that speak, and they speak aplenty.
i will get to the point, i see only one problem with
vinyan.
and what is the problem? i wholeheartedly agree with sewell on this:
vinyan is
not a horror movie, and it was a mistake to sell it as such. unfortunately,
no one told the publicity department.as you can tell from what i report here, you just know that any reader of
fangoria or
horrorblips, who might be expecting the next
"saw", or another
"texas chainsaw massacre" must have been sorely disappointed.
then why was it ever sold as an horror flick? this is a psycho-drama if ever there was one, and a great one too. soaking it in blood will NOT make it gore.
why sell thIS movie in such a way that the proper audience will NOT watch it?
there is a lot of things this movie reflects upon. third world vs. the western world. loss and grief. the disintegration of a couple. our lack of grasp on what death means.
the only place horror lies is in the loss of this couple's child. how it tears you inside, how it can kill your soul. how the child never really dies, but lives inside of you until you want to rip your own bowels out. until a mother can come to hate her husband for
accepting the inevitability of death.
both paul and jeanne, early in the movie, start seeing the end of the story, getting vision of it coming down on them, because, really, there Is nothing they can do about it.
reference have been made to
apocalypse now,
jacob's ladder and
don't look now. to me, the main common denominator between these movies and
vinyan is that i will probably never see them a second time. the intangible horror/pain/drama they somehow succesfully depict are clear enough, you don't need to ever be reminded. those are movies that haunt your soul forever.
vinyan is one of the best movies i have seen in recent years.it is too bad that director du weiz lost track of the control over his work at some point, and got it sold someplace where it will not be bought.
it is really too bad. he has used history, photography, soundtrack, editing, acting, and made all these familiar element into one original and personal work of art.
god knows we need originality in cinema.
too bad this true creative success will be lost to so many cinephiles.
now for the
;D
as for the
promised by robbie, well, you can keep your hat on. brief partial view only, even if totally
. love the adorable gut too. ruf image at its best. but most of all, ruf's vocal performance in the "sex" scene will haunt me forever.
but seriously, need a bit of great rufus work to sink your teeth in? look out for the scene where paul gets drunk and screams at his son's spirit to "go home". if this does not stir your heart, nothing will.
and savour everything he does in the last 10 minutes of his performance (except, of course, the very last 30 seconds, when you might want to look away).
makes you wonder when the well deserved awards will start to reward the incredible talent he never fails to show.
;D