Films and Feelings

              There tends to be a divide between horror fans and horror skeptics. As someone who, as I’ve mentioned multiple times on this blog, only crossed that divide in recent years, movies like  Train to Busan  fascinate me endlessly.               The movie follows single-father and businessman, Seok-woo, as he takes the train with his daughter, Su-an, to drop her off with her mother in Busan. The train leaves the station just as a zombie outbreak takes hold across the country, and the train is overcome with the ravenous undead. Seok-woo and Su-an are locked on the train with the zombies barely contained in the adjacent cars. Seok-woo has no idea how he’ll ever bring his daughter to safety, but if either of them are going to make it alive, he’ll have to rely on more than his own wits, he’ll have to learn to depend on others.       ...

      Coming up on ten years since David O. Russell's masterwork, Silver Linings Playbook , the film world is still waiting for Russell to unveil his next great offering. Given the seven years' build-up since his last attempt, there was some hope that perhaps Amsterdam would ratify his place in the conversation.      The film follows three comrades--Burt (Christian Bale), Harold (John David Washington), and Valerie (Margot Robbie)--whose friendship was formed in the heat of the first world war. Time and life eventually drag them apart, and "the pact" dissolves. Years later, Burt and Harold circle a conspiracy that also sees them framed for murder. Fate intervenes, and these two find themselves back in the company of Valerie, and together these three unravel a trail of corruption to clear their names and prevent the country from sliding into fascism.     Amsterdam is not bereft of skill or insight, but the film's many merits are buried in a s...

       I mentioned that I chose Brazil as my spotlight for this month because I wanted to immerse myself in the library of a country whose films I wasn't super familiar with. I was glad for to break this barrier, but this admittedly makes writing about my experience this month difficult because, unlike with my month watching Japanese films where I started with a base of knowledge for the films, my context for the films I viewed is somewhat limited.      Arguably the most famous film from Brazil is 2002's City of God , which I hit right at the start of the month. The film follows a group of boys growing up in the crime-filled streets a neglected community. The film received widespread acclaim for its visceral displays of gang violence and its effects on communities.      Reading about this topic is always interesting to me because filming a community's dark underbelly for commercial purposes is always a tricky game, especially as it relat...