Director Patcharaphon Napapornpipat’s short film about a disabled young girl finding her voice is a sweet if short slice of life that really lends credence to the idea of music changing the way we live and interact. Lalita Srisuka plays a disabled young girl whose life is filled with stares and ostracizing from people around her, including her own classmates. The only time she’s capable of escaping is when she retreats to her music, which allows her to block out reality and lose herself in the world she creates.
Tag Archives: Foreign
The Raid 2: Berandal (2014)
Way too often have I invested time in a martial arts film only to find the sequel is pretty much just a repeat of the same beats from the original. Thankfully “The Raid 2” is a wonderful and seamless extension of the original Gareth Evans’ crime thriller. Evans returns to deliver what is now a much more complex narrative based around deception, the mafia, and a very elaborate revenge ploy that promises to bring down even the most valiant heroes in the story. Evans manages a very fluid timeline that makes “The Raid 2” a very good chaser for the powerful first action entry. Immediately after the massive raid in the first film, we find out that things never quite worked out too well for hero Rama.
Kindred (2014)
It’s pretty clear that director K” is ambitious and has aspirations to be so much bigger. Considering the budget and the limitations, “Kindred” is pretty fantastic and garners implications that could hopefully lead to a sequel sometime in the future. I was definitely sucked in to the world Nicholson and writer Josh Bryer unfolded for us and I just wanted to see more and where it was all leading.
“The Burka Avenger”: Fighting Ignorance with Knowledge
Knowledge is true power and Miss Jiya, a teacher for a local school in Pakistan wields her knowledge with the ferocity of the superheroine “The Burka Avenger.” In a world where heroines are sexualized, it’s interesting to see that the Burka Avenger primarily clothes herself from head to toe in a burka, which allows her a stealth and grace that make her a deadly opponent; but definitely not deadly in the violent sense, but deadly in implementing non-violence and her intellect to defeat her foes.
Cannibal Holocaust (1980) [3 Disc Blu-Ray/CD Combo]
What is it about Ruggero Deodato’s vicious masterpiece that continues to elude horror fans and film enthusiasts to this day? Surely, it’s a shocking film with immense gore, but “Cannibal Holocaust” is about so much more than splatter and bloodshed. It still holds a volatile resonance in a day and age where the world is obsessed with voyeurism. “Cannibal Holocaust” is still such an enormous master work from Ruggero Deodato whose own film has pretty much guaranteed to outlive its creator. As well, it’s inadvertently posed as the template for all of the found footage films currently storming the box office. It’s a film about the media exploiting and demoralizing a primitive culture for the purposes of entertainment. It’s a film about entitled young Americans intruding on a foreign soil to manipulate their civilization. It’s also movie about how humanity is often a destructive and vicious force of evil consuming one another for nefarious purposes without conscience.
Kill Zombie! (2012) (DVD)
Eventually the way film culture is progressing, every country, continent, and region in the world will have their own zombie film. The problem is that the great zombie movies are so few and far between that we’re left with a lot of really terrible wastes of potential. “Kill Zombie!” is the perfect example of great potential and no pay off. Granted, the concept is creative, and the surprise ending is ridiculously clever, but the movie is much too tedious and uneventful to really consider the aforementioned elements redeeming factors. “Kill Zombie!” is the Belgium set horror comedy about the zombie apocalypse that channels a lot of its favorite zombie movies.
The 400 Blows (1959)
Director Francois Truffaut’s picture about a young boy with absolutely no direction in his life is one of compelling storytelling topped by incredible filmmaking. Truffaut explores the aimlessness and joy of youth, as well as the ticking hands of time that accompany youth as our protagonist Antoine Doinel realizes all too early he’s becoming a man, and the innocence he’s savored for so long is doomed to come to a bitter end, very soon. Hence the haunting and enigmatic closing scene where he scampers on to the beach, one of his favorite locations in the world, and looks out on to what almost feels like a blank slate.