War of the Worlds (Steven Spielberg, 2005): 4.0/5.0

This movie is such much fun that people tends to condemn it because of its abrupt ending. Spielberg tends to do travelogues ("Saving Private Ryan") so we can experience all the range of phenomena that the concept has to offer. Maybe he could be director of educative documentaries. In 2005, many of the things going on in this film looked ludicrous, such as the relationship between Ray and its son, but it seems pretty logical now, how people reacts to danger and some let its "patriotic" impulses to take over intelligence. Note that the aliens could have been attacked by guerrilla warfare, taking down one by one from the inside, by martyrs. Yep, its Baghdad all over again.

Berlin Alexanderplatz: Part 2

The subject of this chapter is about the things we must do in life to survive. In some period in German history, a lot of people needed to join the Nazi ranks, even in strange ways, to go by. This is probably the best interpretation of that phenomena that I have seen. Our hero simply sells Nazi newspapers, and is not very interested in the hatred they spill. Interestingly, in this chapter Fassbinder makes us sympathetic to somebody that "sells" himself to the worst political movement of the 20th Century and has a verbal fight with the communist sympathizers that were probably to be killed some years after.

"Grand Tour: Disaster in Time" (David Twohy, 1992) - 3.5/5

By now David Twohy should be a trademark. A kind of Spielberg for B movies. But it isn't. Not yet at least. This man has been directing consistently good genre films for some years now ("The Arrival", "Pitch Black", "Below", "Chronicles of Riddick") so when I found that its first one was still there unwatched, I immediately took to find the piece and give it a go.
What a nice story! Full of logical holes if you have mastered your Doc Brown technique, but what a nice tale nevertheless! Jeff Daniels plays an Inn owner that receives the visit of tourists from a strange place, that came just to be witness to a big event. That's enough information for you. Enjoy the tone of the story, its little town that looks from Capra seen by Spielberg or Dante, that nice orange-yellow glow that pervades so many 1980's films (despite this being done in 1992). Next Twohy movie, I will be in line at the theater.

Berlin Alexanderplatz: Part I

As it is, "The Punishment Begins" could stand as an excellent portrait of the first days in the life of a newly released prisoner, his attempt to stand up in its mind, to become a normal person again. Franz makes an oath to become honest, to make a life, finds a girl, and cut ties with its trouble past. At the end of this chapter Fassbinder trick me into despair, only to give Franz and the viewer a new glimpse of hope. I started watching this film with doubts, now I'm more hooked, as I was watching a similar monster film: Egdar Reitz's "Heimat".

The Punishment Begins

I started watching "Berlin Alexanderplatz". The title of the first chapter is funny. So the punishment begins, nice way of welcoming people into your 15 and half hour movie. Watched already the first hour. Why there are so many references to impotence? Is it how our hero feels? Impotent against society? Some camera movements are masterful, but I could do without that glitter on the screen (you know, the fuzzy look from the late seventies).

Red Belt (David Mamet, 2008): 3/5

A good first part act with potential to show the corruption of characters under the power of money gets squandered by unlikely conspiracies and a third act that belongs in the Rocky series. Fun and somewhat sexy, nothing else.

Crimson Gold (Jafar Panahi, 2003): Social classes in Teheran (Grade: 5/5)

As always, I leaned towards “Crimson Gold” with caution. Dozens of reviews told me that this film is excellent and that I should not even worry about the possibility of an overrated mess. Even when I know that some pundits are generally right, I still feel the lack of that overprotective marketing machine that covers us with millions spent in advertising for a mindless summer blockbuster. But I said to myself, lets watch some minutes, and if your mood today is not up to the task, we'll let this film for a later date. And then "Crimson Gold" started.

The first scene is nothing short of masterful, gripping the viewer into a tense stare of an unstoppable downwards situation. Hussein, the low-class pizza delivery-man, is trying to assault the smug jewelry store manager. As Hussein bland his weapon from side to side, we fear for the jeweler as we strangely (because we don’t know him yet) fear for him. The way in which he talks and the way in which the jeweler resists transports the viewer immediately to all those terrible assault denouements in crime-ridden cities around the world.

From there, we go back with Hussein to the lasts days of his journey, observing how the pizza man travels the roads between class divisions in Iran, controlled also by the morality police. Each episode brings him closer to the realization of his place in society. Is not that he did not know that he was poor, but by comparison with other people, he (and we) come to the conclusion that only a desperate act can extricate yourself from indignity. Hussein is far from being alone, and is loved by everyone around him. Everyone in his class, of course. It takes one slight act of disdain from the jeweler, a man that seems to think that he is above Hussein, to start the slow fire that will make his blood boil.

The last episode is frightening and coherent. Hussein is invited by a rich lad that came back from the US to eat with him in his apartment. But what apartment! From room to room, Hussein discovers all the luxuries he is denied, luxuries that are owned by people that are not even interested in enjoying them, and leave Hussein and his friends to deteriorate under a theocracy that could care less, except to forbid all kinds of life enjoyment (that yes, are related to activities shared with the opposite sex). And I still found myself frighten of Hussein, of a change in temper that would make him steal something to this guy or something worst (thus confirming the view of his class as a bunch of criminals). After all, Hussein received a masterclass in thievery earlier on.

But as his teacher in that conversation said: "If you want to arrest a thief, you'll have to arrest the world". Who is the thief in this story? As Hussein seems to have been robbed of his life, that question does not have an obvious answer.