Danton-1983

Among the great Polish filmmakers—Krzysztof Kieslowski, Krzysztof Zanussi, Agnieszka Holland, Roman Polanski—Andrzej Wajda remains unique in the way he has explored in his films the tortuous path his nation had to take. The question of her national identity: what sort of Poland do the people want in the post war produced the Ashes and Diamonds [...]

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Orpheus film-mirror

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Orpheus-1950

Myth of the Immortal Singer The story of Orpheus and Eurydice, whether told by Apollonius of Rhodes, Virgil or Ovid does not age. It is not because of the story- teller but the story, and what it represents. Myths that associated with gods residing on the snowy tops of Mt. Olympus we may in these [...]

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La Ronde-1950

It is said ‘Love makes the world go round,’ and it is a merry go round in this case. We get to see some who are riding the painted horses of their libido and we know it is a cavalcade, a passing show of women at the lower end of the social class and men [...]

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Under the Roofs of Paris-1930

The film (Sous les toits de Paris in French) begins with a long crane shot panning along the rooftops and then descends along the street to linger on a group of people gathered around a singer, whose song (the title-song) gradually swells up on the soundtrack. The end of this film has this reversed. Sandwiched [...]

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La Belle et La Bête-1946

At the outset I must admit I am partial to make believe world, which is more than an escapism but transposing the imperfect world of our making into what might have been. In order to create what is perfect from what is imperfect one needs to put distance. So ‘Once upon a time’ is a [...]

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Hôtel Du Nord-1938

The Thirties saw two films with hotel as a metaphor for a world, where tangled destinies of disparate characters were  unraveled as events,- hyperinflation in Germany or the Munich crisis, were deciding the fate of Europe. Destinies of minorities, gypsies, Jews were affected from many chains of events as we look back, but the world [...]

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The Earrings of Madame de…-1953

(This is a reprint of a film appreciation posted in cinebuff.wordpress.com.b) In one of the three Guy de Maupassant–derived stories of Ophuls’s Le plaisir (1952), the rejected model jumps out of a window and winds up in a wheelchair. The artist, now forcibly married to her, and with plenty of time to work, voices the [...]

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L’Atalante-1934 in images

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L’Atalante-1934 in images

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