Gerald Wright's Movie Coverage
48th NEW YORK FILM FESTIVAL 2010
(September 24 -October 10, 2010)
CARLOS
Directed by: Olivier Assayas
Running time: 319 min. (3 parts)
Genre: Drama, Crime, and Biopic in French & German with English subtitles
Distributor: IFC Films/Sundance Channel Presentations
Carlos is the dynamic, intelligent, and revelatory account of the career of the notorious revolutionary terrorist popularly known as Carlos the Jackel.
Edgar Ramirez inhabits the title role of Carlos with arrogant charisma. A myth in his own lifetime, this man is a central figure in history of international terrorism during the 1970s and 1980s. From pro-Palestinian activism to the Japanese Red Army, he was once both a figure of the extreme left and an opportunist mercenary in the pay of powerful Middle Eastern secret services. He formed his own organization, based it behind the Iron Curtain and was active during the final years of the Cold War.
This is a story of a revolutionary internationalist. He was both a manipulator of women and also manipulated by governments. The film follows him to the end of his violent career as he is relegated to the Sudan to the Islamic dictatorship. After protecting him, they hand him over to the French authorities.
I found part one of the film dynamic in content and part two held that same enthusiasm. However, part three of Carlos was whimsically troublesome in its execution and delivery.
FILM RATING (B-)
OKI'S MOVIE
(Ok hui ui yeonghwa)
Directed by: HONG Sang-soo
Running time: 80 min.
Genre: Comedy and Romance in Korean with English subtitles
This is a film comprised of 4 short films: A DAY FOR INCANTATION, KING OF KISSES, AFTER THE SNOWSTORM and OKI'S MOVIE.
The three main characters, LEE Sunkyun, JUNG Yumi, and MOON Sungkeun appear in all of the four shorts and have different but overlapping roles in each of them. The last one, OKI'S MOVIE is a story of a film student Oki who made a film about two men she dated; one young and the other much older. In her film, she makes a cinematographic construction of her experiences going to Acha Mountain with each a man just a year apart.
She juxtaposes her experiences with each man by paring them according to places on the mountain: the parking lot, the entrance, a small pavilion, the public toilet, the wooden bridge, and halfway up the mountain. We see the differences and similarities of the two experiences in details. And by this composition, we may feel that we are seeing an overall picture of Oki's relationships with the two men.
Toggling between the present and the past, and reality and fiction, this deeply felt work recounts the amorous and artistic adventures of a talented young filmmaker, his middle-aged cinema instructor, and the woman who loves them both.
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