Come and See

A few months ago, I went through a few days of watching war movies. It wasn't intentional as such, but the cards just happened to fall that way. One of those films was the 1985 Russian WWII film Come and See (Idi i Smotri).

I'd seen a clip of this movie in a documentary about war films some months earlier, and it was praised for its reality, so I was looking forward to it.

It started slowly, with two boys digging in the sand for guns that were seemingly left behind after previous battles, then playing war games. Later, soldiers arrive at a small village and take one of the boy aways to the army, leaving behind his mother and siblings. The camera angles and close-ups and facial expressions were all disconcerting, seemingly weird for the sake of weird, and frankly it was not doing much for me.

After about half an hour of this, my better half decided she'd had enough and went to bed. I decided to stick with it -- for another half an hour at least.

And boy, am I glad I did. Maybe the weirdness subsided; maybe I merely acclimatized to it. Certainly as it progressed I felt there were certain Lynchian qualities.

There were many disturbing scenes, too, as one might expect in a gritty war movie. Not least among these is a burning-barn sequence. But several others are not much fun either.

The lead actor has pain and confusion etched on his face for almost the duration of the picture. And it seems clear at some point the confusion gives way to insanity.

Probably not for everyone, Come and See is a slow burn of a movie, and it runs a good 140-odd minutes. The camera is often very much in the thick of the action, adding to the feeling of horrifying claustrophobia. Some have spoken about its technical achievements, but I noticed that less than I felt a degree of technical imagination on the part of director Elem Klimov and his crew. It felt like they really wanted to get the film made, even if it might be a little rough around the edges here and there.

On the whole, I like to try to review movies reasonably soon after seeing them, since it is so fresh in my mind that I can go into more detail. But sometimes, a film needs to burn in your heart for a while, I think. Every once in a while since seeing it, I think back to it and want to see it again. One viewing is almost certainly not enough.

I give Come and See 82 points out of 100. Those who are interested, a decent article on the film and DVD can be found here.

Malèna

Giuseppe (Cinema Paradiso) Tornatore's film Malèna is a paean to the beauty of the eponymous Sicilian woman, played by Monica Bellucci. As such, it is also an ode to La Bellucci.

And that, my friends, is about all it is.

Plot (such as it is): Malèna is the town sex bomb, turning heads wherever she goes. Her husband is killed in combat. She starts seeing other men and is accused of adultery and shunned by the town's women. Young boy, meanwhile, like all the men, is obsessed with her and fantasizes of being with her.

The story is cute enough, albeit with a bitter, mean scene at the end of the second act that plays out like a bit from some cheap chicks-in-chains exploitation flick.

I mean, the film is wonderful to look at. That old nostalgic World War II Sicily vibe is great. Though I can't help but feel not enough is done to make you care enough for the characters other than Malèna herself. This is a shame, since we are reminded often that they are (misguidedly, maybe) supporters of Italy's fascist leader Mussolini.

Other than that, the film plays out like a farce. It's funny enough. But even at just 90 minutes (I saw the Miram-axed version, shorn of 17 minutes, apparently), it feels 40 minutes too long. The plot of the first hour could easily have been squeezed into 20 minutes -- and it would have been all the better for it.

Monica gets herself into various degrees of undress, though, and that, I fear is the only reason this film was bankrolled. But the thing is, you can see a scanty Monica in most of her films, so you really needn't sit through this one.

Tough to score, this one, because it was at least funny. (Funny to me, a non-Italian. My Italian wife was embarrassed by its depiction of her people... and by one of their own!) But it was also too long and too slight of substance. I'm gonna take a generous stab at 57 out of 100.

Black Book (aka Zwartboek)

Paul Verhoeven's first Dutch film in quite a few years, Black Book is a World War II tale set in the Netherlands and "inspired by real events". It concerns a Resistance movement, one member of which is a young girl who has witnessed the massacre of her entire family, among a boatload of Jews, while they were all trying to escape the Nazi occupation.

Events conspire to throw her into a conversation with the head of the occupying force on a train journey, and soon after she is asked by her friends whether she would sleep with him -- you know, for the cause. She accepts the assignment, and what follows is a treacherous and dangerous game for all involved.

What follows is also a crazy action ride! The "true story" tag has come to mean very little when attached to movies. I think the Coen brothers may have started (or at least revived) this trend of elasticating the truth when they used a short news story as the catalyst for Fargo. Verhoeven goes one better, with a script that has taken years to finish. At every turn of the the celluloid page there is another incredible piece of derring-do or another implausible case of coincidence. But the film is none the worse for that!

And let's not forget that Verhoeven, while he has put out a few duds in his time, is actually great at what he does. And the colours and sets and cinematography were all great, and Carice van Houten and Sebastian Koch (also seen recently in The Lives of Others) shine in the leads.

You know what I say? At its heart, this is a genuine, old-fashioned wartime picture, so suspend your disbelief, put on your arthouse action movie hat, and enjoy. Black Book is pure fun, and we all need some of that from time to time. I give this movie 73 points out of 100.