In 1959 a lot of people were killing time. Kit and Holly were killing people. It seems every creatively bankrupt director has at some time or another been flying between New York and Los Angeles, and in their boredom looked out the window and noticed a country going by. ‘Eureka!’ they say into their airline…
Tag: Movies
Bad Boy Bubby: Synopsis & Analysis
All he needs is love. As a rule, Hollywood portrays the mentally disabled as quaint, likeable, quirky and entirely benign people who occasionally say the wisest things. No wait, I’m thinking of Australians. Anyway, if you want to watch both conventions refreshingly shattered, see the Australian Indy legend Bad Boy Bubby. It may seem like…
Akira (1988 Anime) – Story Summary & Analysis
Neo-Tokyo is about to E.X.P.L.O.D.E. The entire genre of Japanese Anime is a cult unto itself. I hesitate in limiting the inclusion of Anime entries to a thousand films, let alone one. Anime’s following is so passionate that no selection is going to be good enough for its devotees. So before they come home from…
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across The 8th Dimension! – Summary & Analysis
No matter where you go, there you are. Like so many cult films, this 1984 production was initially considered a box-office failure. Its cult popularity grew by word of mouth and the advocacy of American ubercritic Pauline Kael. Essentially it’s the typical story of a scientist/rock ’n’ roll musician/brain surgeon/samurai who fights evil aliens named…
Pan’s Labyrinth – Story Summary & Analysis
Summary: It is 1944. Ofelia is uprooted and sent with her mother to a Fascist military outpost run by her stepfather, Vidal. Ofelia’s mother is pregnant with Ofelia’s brother, but the pregnancy is not going smoothly and Ofelia’s mother is sick en route. In order to cope with the loneliness, isolation and fear that characterise…
Closely Watched Trains – Summary, Analysis
Summary: Miloš Hrma, the youngest in a long line of layabouts, starts his first job as a trainee signalman at Kostomlaty train station a few kilometres outside of Prague during the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia in the early 1940s. The isolated station is headed by an inept and frustrated stationmaster who is more interested in…
Once Were Warriors: Summary, Analysis
Summary: Jake is an alpha male in a man’s world who engages in domestic violence as easily as he does a pub brawl. By reconnecting with her Maori roots his wife, Beth, finds the strength to break out from the cycle of violence and take her children away from Jake, but not before their teenage…
The Colour Of Pomegranates (1969) – Summary & Analysis
Summary: At the narrative centre of Paradjanov’s The Colour of Pomegranates is a biography of the Armenian poet-troubadour Arutin Sayadan (1712– 1795), known as Sayat-Nova, or The King of Song. The film traces different events in Arutin’s life, from earlier years till his death. Paradjanov structures his film as a set of narrative tableaux that…
Nosferatu (1922): Summary & Analysis
Summary: In the town of Wisborg, a demented estate agent called Knock sends his employee Hutter to a remote Balkan castle on a mission to sell a vacant property opposite Hutter’s house to the mysterious Count Orlok. In an inn, a book titled Nosferatu that warns of supernatural perils is left for Hutter by an…
Black Girl (1966 Movie) – Summary, Analysis
Summary: A young black woman in newly independent Senegal accompanies her employers to France to work as a governess. She imagines she will enjoy the comforts of bourgeois French society. Instead, she discovers her second-class status as an exotic outsider, leading to a crisis of identity and, ultimately, suicide. Analysis: Black Girl (La Noire de…