RebeccaPopova Reviews

The Lost Daughter (2021)

Greek vacation

[8/10 · 23 February 2022]

This movie is not only about the difficulties in accepting oneself as a mother and the difficulties in continuing stoically to be a good mother for many years to come.

Besides this movie is about the fact that when we come somewhere to rest, we are forced to communicate in this resort with all the ill-mannered, impudent and arrogant people, since we are not able to isolate completely ourselves from them. These people are very noisy, and so we have to watch how loudly they talk about their stupid topics, how they scream all over the beach, how they flirt. These narrow-minded people are really sure we should sympathize with them. They impose their company to us, considering themselves charming and interesting and depriving us of the right to our privacy. But they are not at all worthy of sympathy. And sometimes our rejection of these cheeky, narrow-minded people finds its way out in our seemingly strange deeds.

Assassination Attempt (1981)

35 years between Tehran and Paris

[9/10 · 10 May 2021]

This film combines both a touching story of the communication between the man and the young woman and an action-packed intrigue concerning historical events.

It stars a very charming pair of actors - Igor Kostolevsky and Natalia Belokhvostikova. Their faces, facial expressions, shades of voice are set off by touching music with the song of Charles Aznavour. Marie is pronouncing some very deep and sincere words and watches Andre's reaction, and he listens to her attentively - he glares at her and literally eats her with his eyes, and the viewer wants to do the same. And all this takes place in the scenery of the eastern city with its flavor and with the interiors of its junk shops, cafes, shabby hotels and opium dens.

This subtle, intelligent acting duet is set off by the figure of the actor Armen Dzhigarkhanyan, whose bright and expressive acting, like a magnet, always, attracts the audience's attention in the frame.

The film also features Alain Delon - a cult French actor for millions of Russians in the 80s of the twentieth century.

And thus, brick by brick, the missing links of the intrigue of a political detective are gradually being built.

Last Year at Marienbad (1961)

This smooth male voice

[8/10 · 27 February 2021]

"I was walking towards you along these endless corridors, along these too wide stairs, on carpets that absorb the sounds of footsteps ..." A man insinuatingly says something to a woman, a little secluded together with her from the rest of the respectable audience with their measured respectable amusements, and the woman, first with amazement, and then with polite interest, listens to his words, either smiling slyly, or in a flirtatious fright, a little picturesquely moving away from him while asking him to stop talking and leave her. The words endlessly repeat themselves, each time from a slightly different angle, from a slightly different point, just as the camera is capturing the hotel's interior, overloaded with the ponderous decoration of the "other century", from a slightly changed angle, just as is capturing views of a formal, usually deserted park with frozen sculptures .. And as a result of these repetitions, a moment comes when the viewer seems to dissolve in this incessant sound of the organ - so solemnly cold and so detached, adding to everything that happens some otherworldly note and making the heroes themselves - man and woman - look like forever frozen statues in the park. And now, towards the end, the whole situation with unswerving impetuosity turns out at first to be something that is sometimes called "adultery", and then, after a few moments, it is "irrigated" by the presence of a pistol, after which the quiet words of a woman lying on the bed in a white peignoir , trimmed with feathers, that she felt cold and therefore will not go to the evening performance, no longer seem so unambiguously coquettish and intended only for a quick meeting with her lover.

Contagion (2011)

This movie no longer seems fantastic after 2020

[9/10 · 1 February 2021]

It is amazingly insightful in its details and very well made film. It shows both the fate of individual ordinary people and the problems of moral choice of government officials, as well as the degree of risk of those who are at the forefront of the fight against danger. In the end, life will win anyway, the film says.

Shine, Shine, My Star (1970)

Reasoning on the theme of theater

[9/10 · 20 December 2020]

Chapter divisions, 60s music, and illustrations give the film a visual style.

One of the layers of the film is reflections on the purpose of the theater, which are illustrated by Oleg Tabakov's monologues (in general, this film can be called a kind of benefit performance of Oleg Tabakov). For example, the question is considered whether a creative person should make compromises.

The song performed in the bath - the same that gave the title to the film - with the words "If I die, then you over the grave .." gives the story a tragic note and serves as a kind of omen.

The civil war is portrayed not as tragically in the film as the Great Patriotic War is usually portrayed, although the invaders - the officers of the White Army - are as inventive in their evil as the german fascists.

Lucky Number Slevin (2006)

Movie with cinephile conversations

[8/10 · 19 December 2020]

I enjoy re-watching movies, half-forgotten, since somewhere in the middle of the screen time, my heart sometimes gets stuck with a sweet presentiment - a memory, and this very nerve-teasing uncertainty gives the viewing a special charm. Bruce Willis and Morgan Freeman are busy in their typical roles. Lucy Liu looks pacifying in her schoolgirl skirt as she sits in the kitchen and painstakingly spreads another peanut butter sandwich, gracefully constructing various detective hypotheses - apparently, it was after this role that Lucy Liu was taken to unravel the puzzles for the position of Dr. Watson in the series "Elementary". Also add a few more cinephile conversations, allowing the viewer to test their erudition and modestly hinting that this film will eventually become what the cinephiles will talk about.

Serendipity (2001)

I do not advise to re-watch this film a second time

[7/10 · 19 December 2020]

After the first viewing, this film remained in my memory as something very touching, beautiful and romantic, but I was very disappointed when I wanted to watch this film for the second time with a break of several years. I found that although this film has an interesting idea and plot, but rather boring and trite dialogues to the taste of a sophisticated viewer. I felt sorry for wasting my time and stopped watching.

Pain and Glory (2019)

The word "pain" is in the first place in the title

[7/10 · 15 December 2020]

Almadovar supplemented his biography with the missing strokes, where his sexual orientation came from. There are several touching moments - Salvador and Alfredo talk on the phone with the audience in the cinema, Alfredo performs in the theater with a one-man show and the final episode of Salvador staging a scene from his childhood. In the first place in the title of the film is the word "pain", and the viewer needs to drink this cup to the bottom, since the main part of the screen time is occupied by scenes of the hero's everyday life, including his "romance with heroin", and here the whole medical theme is especially painful when all these people in green suits talk carefully with the patient before doing something to him, and the viewer's heart beats especially anxiously and joylessly at this moments.

8 Mile (2002)

The typical life of MC

[6/10 · 15 December 2020]

This iconic film reflects the typical life of MC. In the last minutes of the film, the viewer feels goosebumps from the combination of extremely quasi-personal lyrics of the track Lose yourself with a not very logical stream of consciousness, as it often happens in rapper texts, with the feeling of that time and with that depressing atmosphere of that place.

La delegazione (1994)

Features of Russian national tourism

[9/10 · 15 December 2020]

In order to fully understand the driving force of Russian tourism, you need to take into accounteven in the most ancient cities of Russia there are no streets associated with such an ancient, and most importantly, with such famous and popular historical facts as there are in Europe.. And well educated Russians are very susceptible to this interest in history. Perhaps, our domestic tourists have a particular weakness for Italy with its majestic cities breathing history. And all this fascination, this intoxication may not even be quite understandable to the locals who parasitize on tourism - you should watch this movie to understand what I mean.

Salvation (VI) (2019)

A kind of real festival movie

[8/10 · 14 December 2020]

I saw this movie during Moscow International Film Festival. This film looks like a kind of real festival movie, the actors have impressive facial expressions, you want to peer into their faces endlessly, no matter what they say, some frames are so beautiful that it makes you want to take a screenshot on the sly, you want to shazam the music, and in the end you have to secretly wipe away your tears.

Sled (2007– )

Many successful episodes

[9/10 · 11 December 2020]

It's a very well-done show. Everything is thought out in it - replicas of the FES team among themselves, music, well-shot plans. The premise in the first seconds, even before the credits, is intriguing and then keeps in suspense. The plot is usually very thoroughly convoluted. Of course, some episodes are more successful, and some less. Some episodes were filmed at the level of a almost full-fledged thriller. I enjoy watching reruns of the series.

The Lobster (2015)

How to find your soul mate

[5/10 · 9 December 2020]

The theme of finding one's mate takes on the most bizarre and grotesque outlines in this film - sometimes comic, and sometimes on the verge of black humor. Funny situations are encountered based on a combination of something extremely sanctimonious and extremely sexually liberated - for example, that scene when a couple in love unexpectedly starts kissing more and more passionately during the visit to the parents of the "ringleader" girl and music performance. Or when at first they explain to the hotel guests with the help of funny sketches why a girl needs a man. in my opinion. Sometimes they overdo, for example, in a situation with removing the eyes.

School of Life (2005 TV Movie)

"Mr. D" is Norman Warner's will

[8/10 · 8 December 2020]

Unlike the multifaceted image of Matt Warner,always reflecting and doubting,Mr. D is a somewhat schematic, secondary, auxiliary character. For, as Dylan quite rightly believes, it was his grandfather - the great teacher the Terrible Norman Warner - who sent Mr. D to school in order to make his father - Matt Warner - the next great teacher. We never see Mr. D alone with himself, we always see him only through the eyes of others - most often through the eyes of Dylan or Matt. Essentially, Mr. D is Norman Warner's will.

The Vanishing (1988)

Journey to find his beloved

[8/10 · 7 December 2020]

Throughout the film, it seems to the viewer that it will be about some kind of banal, more or less inventive rape, or something like that, since this bearded murderer, most likely, did not receive some sexual sensations he needed in his exemplary family. From Rex's point of view, the intervention of higher powers leaves no doubt, because just at the moment when he doubted whether he should drink murderer's sleeping pills, thunder suddenly struck and a downpour began, and Rex found himself near the very tree under which Saskia buried her comic treasure. And this was, undoubtedly, a sign to Rex from the higher powers that he must continue his deadly journey in search of his beloved, no matter what it cost him. It is quite difficult for the viewer to recognize and correctly interpret the intervention of the Higher Forces, because in general the film was filmed in a rather mundane, deliberately everyday manner, and only these rattling organ sounds give everything that happens a little timeless and detached. I can confess that within a few seconds after the light at the end of the tunnel was shown and Saskia smiling standing there, I suddenly believed that this story had a good ending and Rex really found Saskia and was rewarded was rewarded for his loyalty and courage in this brave journey in search of his beloved, accompanied by a representative of the dark forces. After that, I involuntarily recalled that scene in the tunnel at the beginning of the film, when Saskia is scared, she tries to find a flashlight shouting to him: "Rex, don't go! I'm afraid!" And Rex calmly leaves, despite her screams. It seemed to me that everything that happened was a punishment for Rex for leaving his woman in a frightening dark tunnel.ney to find his beloved

Mulholland Drive (2001)

Really funny comedy

[8/10 · 7 December 2020]

Watching this movie for the second time,I interpreted it as a set of funny sketches. Lynch came up with the idea of showing the story of the trip to the address on Mulholland Dr. 2 times,and the second time the girl in this scheme is already different,and many details become clear from the final conversation at the table.But this plot action would take only about 40 minutes,so all the rest time Lynch fills with some kind of funny broken plot lines leading to nowhere-he deliberately places mysterious points during the film so that the viewer can rack his brain.