I confess that I was a little afraid to watch ‘The Yellow Tie‘, the film by Serge Ioan Celebidachi. Writing a biography or making a biographical film about one’s own father, a dominant personality not only in his field but also in his personal life, is an act of courage that assumes the inherent risks of subjectivity. The result can be polluted towards idolization or – there have been such cases – towards demonization. ‘The Yellow Tie‘ elegantly assumes this risk and minimizes it through meticulous documentation and a total adherence to the artistic truth that was the supreme goal of the life and career of the superb musician that was Sergiu Celibidache. In addition, unlike other biographies of great musicians (the genre is very fashionable in recent years), the emphasis in this film is placed on the art of music. In this way, I believe that ‘The Yellow Tie‘ manages to capture the essence of the musician’s personality much better, rehabilitating in my eyes the genre of biopics of musicians, somewhat compromised by several recent productions of Romanian and not only Romanian cinema.
‘The Yellow Tie‘ is built from two parallel narrative threads. The musician in the last years of his life continues to be active as a teacher and as a father. The relationship with his son tries to compensate for the difficult relationship that the great conductor had with his own father, who opposed his musical career, leaving the young man who did not want to abandon his vocation to manage his career and life alone in the tumultuous years of the interwar period. The great conductor’s career is nearing its end, but some of his obsessions continue to accompany him: the aspiration for perfection, the preference given to truth over superficial beauty, the belief in the spontaneity and uniqueness of the musical act resulting in the refusal to record on discs. The main milestones of his career are captured – his studies in Berlin during the Nazi period, the war, the great chance to rebuild and conduct the Berlin Philharmonic immediately after the war, the meeting with his great love and especially the first return to Romania after decades of exile. There is no lack of idealizations, but the emotion is permanently present.
Of the two actors who play Sergiu Celibidache, I preferred Ben Schnetzer – handsome, passionate and expressive in the role of the musician between ages 20 and 55. With all due respect to John Malkovich, I think that his role in this film is not one of his best and his acting seemed one-dimensional to me. The rest of the cast is well selected and led with a sure hand. The reconstruction of the various historical periods and geographically dispersed locations where Celibidache lived and worked is done carefully and the results are credible. The stronger parts of the script are exactly those that risk being of less interest to viewers who do not know the details or who do not vibrate with the music or the feelings displayed on the screen. The issue of exile, increasingly present in recent Romanian films, is here exposed from the perspective of a great artist, but the moving scenes of the return risk going unnoticed by less involved viewers. It is precisely the two father-son relationships, located at opposite behavioral poles, that have the potential for universality that will attract more viewers. And finally, the music. Appearing on the screen, if I counted correctly, are six great orchestras, which Celibidache conducted at different periods of his career. Six contemporary Romanian orchestras play the ‘roles’ of these orchestras and do so with authenticity and nuance. As in the case of many cinematic biographies of musicians, the music raises the artistic and emotional level. Despite some simplifications and clichées that have not been completely avoided, ‘The Yellow Tie‘ also holds its own cinematically, not just musically. In Romania, the echo is strong and deserved (including healthy controversies). Perhaps it would have been even stronger if the scenes that take place in Romania had been spoken in Romanian. Let’s see how the international film market will react.
Scarlett Johansson has starred in films directed by some of the most remarkable directors (including female directors) of our time, from Sofia Coppola and Christopher Nolan to Robert Redford and Woody Allen, in her more than twenty-year acting career. She studied them, secretly ‘took notes’, ‘stole’ their secrets, and now she has made her feature film directorial debut with ‘Eleanor the Great‘. The first thing to admire is that the actress-turned-director did not hesitate to tackle a difficult subject that promised to be controversial, and it was. The script for ‘Eleanor the Great‘, written by Tory Kamen, combines two difficult topics – the testimonies of Holocaust survivors and the struggle with grief. Scarlett Johansson was probably fascinated by the Jewish theme (the film would find its place in any Jewish film festival), and the way the script addresses the issues and questions it raises are not easy at all. Even if the success in confronting these topics is not total, I think the film manages to be interesting and sensible and to ignite discussions and reflection. It is a remarkable debut, even if we did not know who the director is.
There are small lies and there are big lies. There are bad lies and there are good lies. Those who have never lied of any kind may not read further. The rest of us know that from time to time we get away with a little lie, and that sometimes we have to lie in order not to upset or to help others. Eleanor, the heroine of the film, enjoys lying. Most of her lies are small and innocent. When her friend, Bessie, dies and she is left alone in the house they shared in Florida, Eleanor does not really know how to face the new situation. She returns to the Bronx, where she lived in her youth, falling on top of her daughter and grandson, each busy living their own lives and facing the specific problems of other ages. Looking for company at the Jewish Community Center, she stumbles upon a group of Holocaust survivors who share their traumatic experiences in order to confront old age, but especially to fight forgetting. Forgetting themselves and those around them. Invited to speak, Eleanor tells a story. What she shares is true, but is it her story? Is Eleanor lying, or is she recounting a true episode of history that needs to be told, but which does not belong to her? And why does she do it? When young student Nina, who had also gone through the trauma of the recent loss of her mother, joins the group, the two women, separated by decades in age, find understanding and support in each other. Nina, a journalism student following in the footsteps of her famous TV star father, spreads Eleanor’s stories. Things get complicated.
The film tackles several delicate themes. The most problematic is the one related to the veracity of the testimonies of Holocaust survivors, but it also captures complex aspects related to confronting old age, loneliness and the way each of us copes with the loss of a loved one, the persistence of memory and the role of journalists and media institutions in education. It does so with the tools of family drama and melodrama, tools that debutant director Scarlett Johansson seems to master with the self-aasurance of a professional with many films in her career. The choice of actors is also excellent. On this occasion, I got to watch two exceptional actresses: June Squibb, who plays Eleanor at the character’s age and admirably manages to make us understand the struggles and motivations of a person who makes mistakes and who is not always likeable, and British actress Erin Kellyman who fits perfectly into the role of Nina, the young aspiring journalist who is fascinated by the meeting with Eleanor and decides that the story of a Holocaust survivor deserves to be shared and known by as many people as possible. I liked less the fact that the script, after raising interesting and complex issues, moves towards a predictable resolution that tries to reconcile everyone. I was also bothered by the excessive musical background of tender piano accompaniment of dramatic confessions. This kind of soundtrack may work in documentary films, but for a fiction film with such ambitions (and successes) in addressing a difficult issue, I think a more appropriate music could have been chosen or composed. Despite these setbacks, ‘Eleanor the Great‘ is a film that deserves to be seen, and not only in the context of Jewish or Holocaust film festivals, and I will be looking for Scarlett Johansson from now on as a director and not just as an actress.
Dino Risi‘s 1960 film ‘Il mattatore‘ (or ‘Love and Larceny‘ in the English distribution) belongs to a period in which comedies that were popular with the public and quality films were not disjoint categories. At a time when French cinema was embarking on the Nouvelle Vague and in Italy Michelangelo Antonioni was experimenting with translating existentialist solitudes onto the screen, popular cinema filled the halls with great historical productions and comedies. Along with Toto and Alberto Sordi, Vittorio Gassman was among the most successful actors of the genre. ‘Il mattatore‘ is inspired by a television show in which the popular actor (who nevertheless came from the classical drama theater!) had fun and entertained the audience with impersonations that sometimes made him unrecognizable. This is what he does in the film, but using the pretext of the biography of a con man who uses his acting talent for all kinds of deceptions, some spectacular. It was the first of about 15 films that Dino Risi would direct with Gassman in the cast. The film was a success in its time and its title became the popular actor’s nickname.
The narrative thread is rather thin, providing the pretext for a series of episodes written by several of the genre’s talented Italian screenwriters, including Ettore Scola. Gerardo is a former actor and former con man whom his wife Annalisa seems to have brought back to the honesty path. When a swindler knocks on his door trying to rob him, Gerardo immediately recognizes the ruse and after recovering his loss, he tells him about his past marked by increasingly daring acts. In all of those he used his talent as an actor and impersonator to play various ‘roles’ from the son of a rich man from Bologna or a Polish immigrant to a telephone technician or an aviation general. It is, of course, the opportunity for Gassman to let loose by transforming the film into his personal show.
Not all the episodes have stood the test of time and the comic impact is certainly different nowadays from that of 1960. Scenes that probably then raised laughter in the halls, now perhaps only elicit a smile. Gone is the actuality element of social satire, replaced by interest in situations that have become historical and especially by the retro charm of an actor of the power and versatility of Vittorio Gassman. My favorite scene is the one in which Gerardo, having arrived in prison, entertains his fellow inmates with a personal stand-up version of Shakespeare’s ‘Julius Caesar’. Meeting Gassman (again?) makes it worth the time spent watching or rewatching this film.
‘À nous la liberté‘ – René Clair‘s 1931 film – is often mentioned in tandem with Chaplin’s ‘Modern Times’ from 1936. The central theme and anti-capitalist message are shared. In the perspective, the direct filiation is obvious. At the time, the producers of the French film filed a plagiarism lawsuit against those of the American film, but René Clair never joined this legal action, considering it a compliment that Chaplin was inspired by his film in making his masterpiece. In my opinion, René Clair‘s film is of the same caliber as Chaplin’s and perhaps the best film of the French director. In addition, it also owes many ideas and comic formulas to Chaplin’s films and the other classic American comedies of the silent film period. The two great directors, who also became good friends, influenced each other. René Clair demonstrated with this film that he was an inventive and courageous director, socially committed and a master of visual means of expression as well as of sound and music, just three years after the introduction of sound in cinema. The irony of history is that three decades later, René Clair became the target of criticism from the young wolves of the French New Wave. In fact, around 1930, he was as disruptive and inventive as Truffaut and his colleagues would be around 1960.
The scene that opens ‘À nous la liberté‘ takes place in a prison. The film’s heroes, Louis and Émile, are inmates working on an assembly line that manufactures toys. They prepare their escape, which they only partially succeed in. Only Louis manages to get past the prison walls, while Émile, who is left behind, holds the guards in place. A few years later, Louis is the owner of a gramophone factory, his success due to the application to industry of the assembly line work methods learned in prison. The metaphor is obvious. The supposedly liberating work brings profit by applying methods specific to the prison space. Émile, also released from prison, reunites with his friend who has become an industrialist and falls in love with a girl who works in his factory. However, the love is not shared and the prison past risks catching up with the two friends.
René Clair wrote the scripts and directed his films, making auteur cinema decades before this term was invented. He was perfectly synchronized and in dialogue with the cinema of the time, especially with the American one. The visual gags and especially the chases in ‘À nous la liberté‘ would find their place in any of the great comedies of the silent film period. The couple of friends resembles the one in the films with Laurel and Hardy, the character of Émile (played by Henri Marchand) being a combination of Charlot and Stan Laurel. Lazare Meerson‘s formidable set design takes some of the ideas from ‘Metropolis’, but processes and refines them, creating a direction of industrial anticipation specific to dystopian films up to the ‘The Matrix’ series. Georges Auric‘s music was composed especially for this film. The musical theme became a classic hit, and the way the music is combined with the visual dimension brings it closer to Brecht’s theater than to American musical comedies. The cinematography is also worth watching. Cinematographer Georges Périnal uses the mobile camera four decades before it was taken up on their shoulders by the filmmakers of the New Wave. Several visual scenes are anthological – the assembly lines of course, but also the scene that opens the film or the festivity scene at the end of the film that will be quoted many decades later by Milos Forman in ‘The Firemen’s Ball’ and which ends with the image of the top hats rolled by the wind. ‘À nous la liberté‘ is a delight for classic film lovers and a cinematic box of jewels.
Rian Johnson‘s ‘Wake Up Dead Man‘ uses a format that is already familiar to us. A cast that brings together enough stars for three other successful Hollywood films. A ‘whodunit’ mystery following the solution of a crime committed in a closed enclosure, with a number of characters equal to the number of suspects. Even if Agatha Christie is not the author of the novel that inspired the film, her name cannot be omitted as a source of inspiration (and is even mentioned in a subtle quote). Rian Johnson has specialized in recent years in writing scripts and directing films that have as their main hero the infallible detective Benoit Blanc. Daniel Craig has jumped ship from one series to another with great pleasure, that is, from the role of James Bond to that of Blanc. I confess that I was not enthusiastic about ‘Knives Out’, the film that opened this series, but now, this third film has made me a declared fan. ‘Wake Up Dead Man‘ is a film that gives the actors with big names in the cast the opportunity to play interesting roles and that manages in many moments to avoid clichés and cheap parodies, saying something authentic about both the characters and the world that surrounds them.
The story takes place in and around a Catholic church in a small town in the mountains of New York State. Jud Duplenticy – a young priest, a former boxer, with a past marked by violence – is in his first post in a parish led by the charismatic Jefferson Wicks, an older priest who arrogates the title of Monsignor. Around him and the faithful Martha, the church administrator, are a handful of parishioners who seem ready to follow the priest in whatever he does and says. The young priest’s attempts, convinced of his mission to open the church’s doors to a dialogue that will attract more parishioners, are viewed with suspicion by the Monsignor and his flock. When Wicks is murdered right in the church, during the Good Friday service, the main suspect is Jud. The innocent priest addresses the Most High and his prayers are rewarded with the appearance of Detective Blanc, a convinced atheist, who will discover in the small community a past marked by tragedies, with complicated relationships and enough reasons for anyone around Wicks to have wanted to kill him. What follows becomes for everyone involved – including Blanc – reason to evaluate their own convictions and beliefs, as well as the relationships between the natural and the supernatural.
The production is extremely precise. Rian Johnson has written a story with rhythm and filmed it in such a way that the 2 hours and 24 minutes of projection pass like a breeze. The cinematography supports the atmosphere and the actors’ performance is intense and nuanced. It is obvious that Daniel Craig enjoys every moment he is on screen. Glenn Close bravely approaches a dramatic and somber role. Josh Brolin is more impressive than ever. Finally, Josh O’Connor brilliantly supports the main role of the young priest, a character who embodies many of the dilemmas of today’s Catholic world and its confrontation with the modern world. I would not be surprised if some of these actors received Oscar nominations and I think they would be deserved. ‘Wake Up Dead Man‘ is an excellent proposal for the end of the year – on Netflix or in theaters -, a film consistent with those that preceded it in the ‘Knives Out’ series, a successful combination of mystery and comedy, detective enigma and supernatural, which takes place in an authentic environment and which offers a gallery of well-differentiated and believably outlined and interpreted characters. Intelligent and quality entertainment.
Sunt un fan Murakami. Pentru cei din categoria aceasta, fiecare carte nouă a scriitorului pe care-l iubim este o sărbătoare. Nu face excepție cel mai recent roman al său, apărut în Japonia în 2023 și tradus în limba engleză în 2024 cu titlul ‘The City and its Uncertain Walls’. În același an a apărut cu proptitudine, în seria de autor Murakami a editurii Polirom și versiunea românească – ‘Orașul și zidurile sale incerte’ – tradusa de Andreea Sion. Eu am citit traducerea în limba engleză în versiunea paperback apărută la editura Vintage International. Citatele – în limba engleză – provin din această ediție.
Sentimentul de sărbătoare pe care mi l-a insuflat lectura acestei cărți a fost amplificat de faptul că este vorba despre una dintre cărțile cele mai frumoase ale maestrului prozator născut în 1949, în care revin și sunt dezvoltate câteva dintre temele principale care străbat întreaga sa creație. Precum în multe dintre cărțile sale, Murakami crează și aici o lume nouă imaginară, care reprezintă o variație a universului în care trăim. De fapt poate că ar trebui să folosesc pluralul – ‘lumi’ și nu ‘lume’ – deoarece acțiunea alternează între două lumi paralele. Fizica modernă ne oferă un model al universurilor multiple, cu posibilități infinite de diferențiere unele față de altele. Ceea ce oamenii de știință au descoperit cu instrumente sofisticate și ecuații matematice complexe, Murakami imaginează de câteva decenii încoace în proza sa de ficțiune. Lumea în care trăim este una dintre lumile posibile. Conceptul însuși de realitate se supune legilor relativității:
‘However, there isn’t just one reality. Reality is something you have to chose by yourself, out of several possible alternatives’. (pag. 423)
Murakami a considerat necesar să scrie un epilog la sfârșitul acestui roman, ceea ce nu face de obicei. În el, povestește că ‘Orașul și zidurile sale incerte’ a apărut dintr-o poveste cu un titlu aproape identic (diferența este de o virgulă) pe care autorul a scris-o și a publicat-o într-o revistă literară numită ‘Bunguku-kai’ la începuturile carierei sale, în jurul anului 1980. Conform spuselor sale, însă, nu a fost niciodată mulțumit de cum ieșise aceea proză, simțind că povestea are mai mult de oferit. Cu câțiva ani mai târziu, Murakami a decis să revină la ideea lumilor alternative din povestire, rezultatul fiind romanul ‘Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World’, publicat inițial în 1985 și care am impresia că nu a fost încă tradus în limba română. Cu toate acestea, chiar și așa, de-a lungul anilor, a simțit în continuare că povestea aceasta a rămas neterminată. În cele din urmă, în 2020, a început să scrie ‘Orașul și zidurile sale incerte’, folosind cei trei ani ai pandemiei pentru a-l rafina și finaliza. Romanul are trei părți. Prima revizuiește și dezvoltă tema inițială. A doua parte extinde ideea universurilor alternative. Finalul din partea a treia nu oferă o soluție, ci deschide calea spre explicațiile personale ale fiecăruia dintre cititori.
Protagonistul cărții are în prima parte 17 ani. După ce amândoi câștigă un concurs școlar de eseuri, băiatul se îndrăgostește de o fată de 16 ani așa cum doar la acea vârstă se poate îndrăgosti un băiat de o fată. O parte din această secțiune este scrisă la persoana a doua, ceea ce este în sine un procedeu literar interesant și puțin folosit:
‘I’d met you the previous fall, and we had been going out for eight months. Whenever we saw each other, we’d find some out-of-the-way place to hug and kiss. We never went beyond that, though. We didn’t have enough time to spare, first of all, nor a private place to take our relationship to the next level. But more than that, we were so wrapped up in talking that we were reluctant to take any time away from our conversations. Neither of us had ever met anyone we could talk to so freely about our feelings, our thoughts. It was close to a miracle to run across someone like that. So once or twice a month, we’d talk on and on, oblivious of the time. We never ran out of things to say, and when we said good-bye at the station, I always felt there was something else, something vital, that we’d forgotten to discuss.’ (pag. 7-8)
Fata îl ține la distanță pe băiat, spunându-i că adevăratul ei sine există într-un oraș dincolo de un zid. Împreună, își imaginează orașul în detaliu, iar băiatul notează totul. Într-o zi, fata dispare, iar băiatul nu mai aude de ea. Chiar și la vârsta adultă, băiatul continuă să tânjească după fată și nu este capabil să treacă de această despărțire rămasă fără explicație.
Orașul din lumea de dincolo de zid ne devine familiar de la început din descrierile fetei. Este o lume în care dimensiunea temporală pare a fi fost redusă la un etern prezent. Ceasurile au cadrane dar nu și limbi care să indice unde ne aflăm în scurgerea timpului.
‘The town was surrounded by a well-built wall about twenty-six feet high. The wall had been there since long ago, painstakingly constructed of uncommonly hard bricks so that even now not a single one was chipped.
A single river wound its way through the town in gentle curves, dividing it almost equally into north and south. Three beautiful stone bridges spanned the river. Near the Old Bridge, an ornately decorated stone construction, was a large sandbank lined with tall river willows, their supple branches hanging down toward the surface of the water.
On the north side of the wall was a gate. There had been another similar gate on the eastern wall but it was painted over now, and tightly filled in. The north gate-the only way into or out of the town-was guarded by the brawny Gatekeeper. The gate was only opened twice a day, in the morning and evening, to allow the beasts to pass through. The taciturn, yellowish beasts with their single sharp horns would form an orderly line every morning to enter the town, then, at night, sleep together in their grounds just outside the wall. These legendary beasts could exist only in these environs, since the only thing they ate were the nuts and leaves of a special kind of tree that grew throughout the town. The beasts were beautiful to look at but lacked vitality. Their horns were razor sharp, yet they never injured any of the townspeople.
The people who lived within the wall could not go outside the wall, and people outside the wall could not enter. That was the rule. To enter the town, a person could not have a shadow; but in order to leave, a shadow was necessary for survival. The Gatekeeper was a resident of the town, so he did not have a shadow, but when his duties required, he was allowed outside of the wall. So he was able to pick apples from the apple forest outside and eat as many as he liked. If there were any left over, he generously shared them with others. They were delicious apples, and many people were very grateful to him. The beasts chronically lacked food, and though they were always hungry, they never ate the apples. Which was unfortunate, since their grounds outside the wall were near many apple trees.’ (pag. 60-61)
Într-o poveste paralelă și intercalată, băiatul este acum un bărbat adult care ajunge în orașul pe care și l-a imaginat împreună cu fata. Poate că o caută, căci ea îi mărturisise că adevăratul ei sine se află acolo. Pentru a intra în oraș, trebuie să se separe de umbra sa. În fiecare zi, bărbatul trebuie să meargă la o mică bibliotecă din oraș. Nu este o bibliotecă obișnuită. Pe rafturile sale nu se află cărți, ci vise, iar rolul său este să citească, să înțeleagă, să tălmăcească aceste vise. Ca asistentă a sa o are pe fata de 16 ani care nu a îmbătrânit nici măcar o zi, dar care nu-și amintește să-l fi cunoscut vreodată. Atunci când umbra bărbatului începe să moară, acesta decide să părăsească orașul împreună cu umbra pentru a o salva.
Atunci când ajungem cu lectura la partea a doua (cea mai extinsă) a cărții, au trecut aproape trei decenii din viața povestitorului. Eroul nu s-a căsătorit vreodată. Viața și profesia sa au fost totdeauna legate de cărți. Făcuse o carieră frumoasă într-o casă editorială și de distribuire a cărților. Obsedat de ceea ce a trăit în orașul de dincolo de ziduri și de dragostea sa pierdută, își dă demisia. În vise îi apare o bibliotecă la țară cu o beretă pe birou. Bărbatul își roagă un coleg de la vechiul său loc de muncă să încerce să-i găsească un post la o bibliotecă și ajunge să aibă un interviu de angajare la o bibliotecă privată dintr-un oraș retras, aflat adânc în munții din centrul Japoniei. Intervievatorul său este Koyasu, un bătrân excentric care poartă beretă și căruia îi place să poarte fuste. Personajul principal preia rolul de nou șef al bibliotecii și continuă să primească sfaturi regulate de la Koyasu, despre care află mai târziu că este o fantomă și a murit cu ceva timp în urmă. După ce și-a pierdut soția și fiul, Koyasu transformase o rafinărie de sake a familiei într-o bibliotecă. El crede că doar cineva ca protagonistul, care a fost în orașul de dincolo de ziduri, poate avea grijă de bibliotecă pentru el. O poveste de dragoste platonică cu proprietara divorțată a unei cafenele îi readuce în amintire iubirea pierdută din tinerețe, iar apariția unui adolescent care poartă mereu un hanorac cu submarinul galben din cântecul Beatles-ilor va avea o semnificație specială în destinul său.
Ultima parte a cărții ne readuce în orașul de dincolo de ziduri. În buna tradiție Murakami, totul pare la fel însă diferențe subtile ne indică faptul că suntem într-o lume care se schimbă în ritmul și după legile sale. Zidul însuși, inexpugnabil și perfect sudat fără ciment sau mortar, pare a se fi mișcat. Chiar și într-o lume în care timpul pare a sta în loc, schimbările sunt inevitabile. La fel și moartea, desi semnificația ei este alta decât cea pe care o cunoaștem.
Câteva dintre temele și simbolurile recurente din alte cărți ale lui Murakami pot fi regăsite și aici – de exemplu folosirea visului ca vehicul de comunicare și chiar și de transport între lumi. Apar și fantomele, personajul cheie al domnului Koyasu fiind ‘viu ca o fantomă’. Alte procedee sunt însă inedite. Unul dintre ele este relația dintre om și umbra sa. Personajele acestei cărți au mai mult decât o singura identitate. Ce reprezintă umbra? Un alter-ego. Un simbol al vieții? Al identității? Majoritatea personajelor din carte nu au nume, inclusiv povestitorul sau fata misterioasă care îi apare în ambele variante de Univers între care el oscilează. Descrierea realistă este permanent învăluită într-un voal de magie:
‘On Monday, when the library was closed, I had Mrs. Soeda draw me a map, and I went to visit the cemetery where Mr. Koyasu’s grave lay. I carried with me a small bouquet of flowers I’d bought at a florist’s near the station.
As I walked down the nearly deserted street, I felt like I was no. longer the person I am now. As if, for instance, I was seventeen on a clear holiday morning, on my way to see my girlfriend, bouquet in hand… It felt like that. A strange feeling, as if I’d strayed from present reality and wandered into a different time and place.
Or maybe I was just pretending to be myself, but really, I wasn’t. The me looking back from a mirror might not really be me. Maybe it was someone else who looked just like me, and exactly copied my every movement. I couldn’t help but feel that way.’ (pag. 244)
Cititorii care cunosc și iubesc cărțile lui Murakami vor regăsi în ‘The City and Its Uncertain Walls’ combinația dintre ordinea și liniștea ceremoniala a vieții japoneze și filonul de fantastic. Scriitorul japonez este maestrul din Orientul Îndepărtat al realismului magic. Nu doar că găsim în paginile cărții ecouri din Proust, Borges sau García Márquez, dar cei doi din urmă sunt citați explicit. Prozatorul ocolit (deocamdată) de Premiul Nobel pentru Literatură intră în dialog direct cu marile sale modele. Pasiunea pentru cărți este materializată în cele doua biblioteci care sunt adevărate personaje în carte: cea din orășelul de munte, cu cărți, instalată într-o casa bântuită de fantome și cea din orașul de dincolo de zid, cu rafturile încărcate de vise. Visele nu sunt însă explicite. Așa cum sta bine viselor, ele sunt de multe ori confuze, și doar cei dotați cu puteri speciale le pot descifra. Prezentă aproape permanent este pasiunea pentru muzică (jazz, clasică), care aproape niciodată nu lipsește din lumile și viețile eroilor lui Murakami.
Haruki Murakami are aproape 77 de ani. Îmi doresc, precum toți admiratorii sai, să mai fie o vreme și în lumea aceasta și să ne mai bucure cu cărți noi, să ne poarte în universurile alternative ale imaginației sale. ‘Orașul și zidurile sale incerte’ este una dintre cărțile sale bune și una dintre acele cărți magice care reprezintă cel mai bun răspuns la întrebarea ‘De ce citim?’.
‘The Marriage Circle‘ from 1924 is one of the first films of Ernst Lubitsch‘s American career. The Berlin-born film director brought to American audiences a style of romantic comedy that he would develop after the advent of sound in talking films and especially in musicals. His influence as a director and producer would grow over the next two decades, setting one of the main directions of entertainment movies produced in Hollywood. ‘The Marriage Circle‘ already hints to many of the hallmarks of the director’s style (‘the Lubitsch touch’) and is a film that I have enjoyed despite, or perhaps precisely because of, the 101 years that have passed since its making.
The story takes place in Vienna, but it is an idealized Vienna, a Lubitsch space rather than how Vienna must have looked like in the years after World War I and the fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. At the center of the story are two wealthy couples who live in magnificent houses. Professor Stock suspects – and perhaps with some reason – his wife Mizzi of being unfaithful to him. He hires a detective to follow her and provide enough evidence for a convenient divorce. Dr. Braun and his wife Charlotte are newlyweds and very much in love with each other. Things get complicated when Mizzi sets her sights on the handsome Dr. Braun, while Charlotte is coveted by Dr. Mueller, her husband’s friend and professional partner. Will the two marriages resist the intrigues and temptations of illicit relationships?
What I found very interesting in ‘The Marriage Circle‘ is the role that music plays in a movie from the silent film era. To compensate for the lack of sound, Lubitsch attributed the film’s heroes a passion for music and even indicated with scores on the screen at some points which pieces of music they are playing. A few years later, when the era of sound films began, Lubitsch would be one of the pioneers of musical movies, adding the dimension of musical soundtracks to the romantic comedies in which he specialized. Even this film would have a musical version a decade later, but the 1924 original surpasses the remake in the qualities of the narration and the actors’ performances. Among those present on screen, I was particularly impressed by Marie Prevost, a beautiful actress with great comic and dramatic expressive talent, who had an all-too-short career and a tragic fate. Viewers interested in classic comedies and those who want to study the origins of the productions that would make Hollywood and its studios famous will enjoy watching ‘The Marriage Circle‘.
We live in the midst of collective anxiety created by the dangers of robots and Artificial Intelligence. Jobs are disappearing or are under threat, AI applications and robots are increasingly present in our lives and not only do they threaten to become smarter and more powerful than us, but it seems that we have developed or are about to develop an addiction to them, even more so than the addiction to the phone screens that have already taken over our lives. What better way to fight these anxieties than with laughter – that is, comedy and satire? ‘A Wonderful World‘ (‘Un monde merveilleux‘ is the original title) by French director (debuting in feature films) Giulio Callegari manages to relax us for 78 minutes without detaching from the problems of the day, which he treats with lightness and humor.
We are in one of the possible near futures. In France (but apparently not in Spain or Portugal) robots have replaced humans in most productive or service activities, from school teachers to elderly care workers. The exception is the police work where only humans are hired. Almost everyone has a robot that takes care of their personal health and well-being, their children’s lessons and their diet or cooking. An exception is Max, who is a kind of anti-robot anarchist who, after losing her job, is forced to resort to… stealing robots together with her daughter Paula to survive. Paula is taken out of the robotized school and her mother takes care of her education – from math lessons to stealing food or petrol. As bad luck would have it, a robot stolen from a nursing home is an old model (T-zero, hence his name Théo) that can no longer be resold. Théo is nice, full of goodwill, but a bit naive and a bit clumsy. When Théo is caught stealing from a supermarket, the authorities decide to take away Max’s maternal rights. Max and Théo will embark on the road to find and recover Paula. Between the robotophobic anarchist and the robot who is ready to do almost anything to make her happy, the relationship evolves.
The script – which Giulio Callegari is a co-author of – succeeds better in terms of details. The comic situations and funny lines keep the audience’s attention constantly awake. The narative thread is quite predictable, however, and I had the feeling that I had already seen similar variations of the story about the interactions between humans and robots in at least ten films. Callegari and his colleagues, however, had the good inspiration not to unnecessarily lengthen the movie. The 78 minutes that ‘Un monde merveilleux‘ lasts are at the lower limit of the duration of a feature film these days, but they are a consistent 78 minutes. The director chose not to use computer effects in order to bring to screen the robots, so the role of T-zero/Théo is played by an actress. I don’t know if the reason was low budget or ideology, but the result is more than satisfactory. Théo is funny – in the tradition of R2-D2 – and in the end he manages to create emotion. Blanche Gardin, for whom the role of Max was apparently written, is excellent. I read that she is a specialist in the roles women in depression – here she has the chance to fight back. ‘Un monde merveilleux‘ is a small and effective film, which manages to amuse us and to make us think without forcing the score in any direction.
‘Avignon‘ (2025) is one of those films that I can’t help but love despite some obvious shortcomings. Johann Dionnet, the film’s director and co-writer of the script, is probably known to you from other French films in which he played mainly supporting roles. ‘Avignon‘ is his feature film debut and he also cast himself in a supporting, but quite an important, role. The film is a romantic comedy belonging to the ‘feel-good movies’ category, but its main quality derives from the location in which the story takes place. It’s Avignon during the festival which every summer brings together the audiences interested in cultural tourism (this term had no negative meaning for me) and theater and entertainment groups from all categories: from the most vulgar boulevard comedies to the classics of French or world theater in lavish productions. ‘Avignon‘ is an opportunity for Dionnet and his team to tell a few truths about theater and the entertainment industry. It does so with a light-hearted approach that will delight fans of comedies with a soul and theater lovers. I include myself in both categories.
‘Avignon‘ is a film about theater and it is no surprise that at the center of the plot we find a theatrical device – the quiproco – well-known and broadly used for centuries in classical theater, especially in comedies. Stéphane, the main character, is an actor who has not enjoyed great successes or significant distributions and who is part of the cast of a boulevard theater play, one of the hundreds of performances during the Avignon Festival, with a troupe of enthusiastic actors, which is in a precarious financial situation. When he meets again Fanny, a charming actress-singer that he had previously known from an actors workshop, she believes that Stéphane is the lead actor in a famous troupe performing Corneille’s ‘Le Cid’. Fearing that he might lose her, Stéphane does not have the courage to tell her the truth, especially since Fanny is surrounded by a gang of arrogant actors who despise the boulevard theater. As in all comedies based on quiproco, lies hold water only up to a certain point.
In ‘Avignon‘ not only the main character lies but almost all the characters lie, but with the best intentions. Lies Serge, the owner and director of the show, who has invested his money, talent and life in the performance. Lies Coralie, his wife who is looking for an affair to take revenge on Serge’s public criticism. And when Stéphane tries to tell the truth, he risks losing his girlfriend. The love plot is resolved somewhat conventionally and predictably, but this is compensated by a few well-written and funny dialogues that comment on the differences in approach between ‘serious’ and commercial theater, translated into what looks like social class differences between the actors who play the two genres. The message conveyed without ostentation is that true theater means passion for the stage and the connection between the audience and the actors, regardless of the theatrical genre or the size of the theater hall. The other reason why ‘Avignon‘ conquers is the team of actors, all of whom are fun and talented, with special mentions for Baptiste Lecaplain in the lead role, his partner Elisa Erka who reminded me of Melanie Griffith in her youth, the formidable comedian Alison Wheeler together with Lyès Salem, and – last but not least – the actor-director Johann Dionnet himself. Theater lovers should not miss this film, which will bring back those who had the chance to be there during the Avignon festival and will give an idea of the magical atmosphere of the festival to those who did not have this privilege. Fans of romantic comedies and entertaining films will also enjoy it and – who knows? – maybe they will be charmed by the ‘spirit of Avignon’.
I haven’t seen the previous two films in Dag Johan Haugerud‘s trilogy, so I can’t comment on how ‘Dreams‘ (or ‘Drømmer‘ in the original version) fits in and completes the Norwegian screenwriter and director’s group of films. The Berlin festival jury considered it worthy enough to award it the Golden Bear this year. I respect their choice, although I have quite a few question marks about this film – a coming-of-age drama about a teenage girl in contemporary Oslo that addresses issues related to the search for identity and confronting first love in adolescence, and how feelings can be transformed into words and words into literature. Dag Johan Haugerud has chosen an original form of expression, in which words seem to have the same weight as images. The result, for me, was not very convincing.
The main heroine of the film is called Johanne. She is a teenager, a high school student raised by a single mother and a grandmother who is a writer. The character and the family seem typical of the Norwegian middle class and even the growing up crisis that the girl goes through is quite common. Under the influence of a book she read and of her age, Johanne falls in love with Johanna, her French teacher – a sincere love, which for her takes on the proportions of a cosmic drama. The bond that develops between the two women, teacher and student, is ambiguous. Is it about a teenager looking for affection and support and a teacher who gives her professional, moral and feminine support? Or about a forbidden bond between a mature woman and a minor teenager? Johanne keeps a diary in which the expression of feelings mixes reality and fantasy. Is this diary a possible evidence of crimes or the expression of an inherited literary talent, which may even turn into the debut book of a future writer?
The story written and brought to the screen by Dag Johan Haugerud manages to sensitively describe the teenage girl’s universe, the anxieties of the mother who fears losing touch with her daughter, the feelings of the grandmother who identifies her granddaughter’s talent while struggling with her own demons, leftovers of the passage of time. The main heroine is played by Ella Øverbye, the mother is Ane Dahl Torp, the grandmother is Ane Dahl Torp. They all act excellently. The dialogs between the three heroines precisely and often humorously trace the relationships in a family of women with distinct personalities, trying to help each other, but hindered as if by a set of social conventions that are not always visible. I found the character of the teacher played by Selome Emnetu to be somewhat less well-defined. The explanation in the conversation with the teenager’s mother at the end of the film, which somehow turns the situation around and contradicts the previous perception of the character, did not seem to align well with what I had seen until then. The main problem in ‘Dreams‘, however, was for me the excessive verbosity. It can be argued that this has a double justification in the fact that Johanne, the heroine of the film, reads from her own diary and that this diary written with talent can become a book. Some of the viewers and critics were enthusiastic about this permanent interplay between image and text. To me, the fact that about 80% of the film’s duration is accompanied by off-screen voice seemed excessive. But this is, of course, only my personal impression. I recommend watching and forming your own opinion.
