The PhiLL(er)

Archive for the 'Movies' Category

Oldboy

Thursday, April 28th, 2005

More a visceral excercise in disorientation than a plot-driven action thriller, Park Chan-wook’s Oldboy combines the psychology of color with the subtlties of revenge tragedy to achieve a remarkably dense filmic experience. Jagged, expressionistic set designs and frenetic cinematography evoke the paranoia of Park’s psychically tortured protagonist Oh Dae-su, channeling the spirits of Terry Gilliam [...]

Spamalot

Sunday, March 20th, 2005

Monty Python’s Flying Circus always exceeded the sum of its parts. Their debut, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, was as much a landmark in renegade filmmaking as it was an achievement in inspired silliness. Six young educated men with everything to prove, a scant budget, and yet seemingly not a serious care in the [...]

Before Sunset

Tuesday, November 30th, 2004

The visual coda to Richard Linklater’s acclaimed 1995 film Before Sunrise was a brief series of shots recollecting the various corners and streets of Vienna in which its two young characters had just spent a glorious night together. A quiet bench, a ferris wheel, a bridge, a pitch of grass in a park become lovers’ [...]

Voices of Iraq

Monday, November 8th, 2004

For nearly three decades, the citizens of Iraq were subject to the despotic rule of Saddam Hussein and his fascist whims. Outcries of protest from the people were silenced by censorship, imprisonment, and medieval torture. Removed from power by the War in Iraq, Hussein’s absence has restored to the Iraqi people the freedom of expression. [...]

Moog

Sunday, September 26th, 2004

It Rhymes with “Vogue”
At least three times in the new documentary Moog, Dr. Robert Moog tries to convey to the camera his belief in the possibility of a connection between man and machine that is neither tactile nor scientific, but mystical. He is quick to qualify that by “mystical” he does not connote “religious”, but [...]