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The Banshees of Inisherin (2022)
When Friendships End.
I watched this movie along with 3 family members. I appreciated it and although its ending is downbeat, I enjoyed it. My family members were more ambivalent about it. It does a great job of recreating the beautiful but claustrophobic atmosphere of a small isolated coastal island in Ireland, whose inhabitants have lived there and known each other all of their lives.
Colm and Padraig grew up together and have known each other their whole lives. But they seem to have very different personalities. Colm is a deep thinker, and values his privacy. As he grows older, he's questioning the whole purpose of his life, and wants to make his remaining time on earth mean something. He finds far more inspiration in music than in friendly but superficial conversation. Padraig, on the other hand, gets meaning for his life from his friendly but bland everyday conversations with Colm. Colm and Dominic are his only friends, and his social relationship with them gives meaning to his life. He's also very attached to his donkey, Jenny, to the point of obsession. (But this isn't too unusual. I know some people who feel that way about their dogs.) Padraig is a nice and friendly individual, but he is a bit dull, and often his friendly, well-meaning conversations come off as boring.
I suspect that Colm's irritation with Padraig's company has probably been brewing for many years, but up until now he's just borne with it for the sake of the longtime friendship. But now, in his old age and depression, he feels he can no longer bear it, and he seeks to terminate his association with Padraig. Padraig and he live close by, and in the confines of the island, Colm just cannot get away from him. Padraig, for years probably, has been stopping by his house daily to pass the time, and the pub is the only social outlet available, where Padraig also seeks out his company.
Eventually Colm cannot stand Padraig's company anymore, and he abruptly terminates the friendship. This is understandable. I myself am 70 years old, and have two old friends that I've known for over 40 years, who are also boring conversationalists. One of them talks ceaselessly about her physical ailments, her depression, and nothing else. It's the only thing she can talk about. My other friend's sole topic of conversation is to complain about the hardships of his life. They both carry on for hours and hours with this line of talk. They are now elderly, and have few friends remaining. They are both kind, well-meaning, considerate people. But spending time with them is exceedingly boring. I certainly am going to continue our friendship, and to interact with them. But I've reduced the actual amount of time I spend with them, because it's tiring and emotionally draining to spend a long time in their company. Since I don't live secluded on an island with them, I have no problem in avoiding them, except for the occasional visits that I continue to make. I value their company, but it's a relief when the visit is over. I suspect that Colm finally reached his limit. He cannot escape from Padraig's well-meaning overtures, and felt he'd no choice but to decisively end the friendship. Padraig doesn't understand this. The friendship is one of the most important elements is his life. It gives meaning to his life, and he just won't let it go, and he continually pushes the boundaries and invades Colm's solitude.
There's also an element of psychosis (maybe depression and paranoia) in both men. Colm's cutting off his fingers and Padraig's burning of Colm's house are signs of mental illness, not just normal everyday annoyance. Self-mutilation is a sign of severe inner turmoil. Padraig burned the house down after his beloved little donkey accidentally choked to death on one of Colm's severed fingers, very likely an attempt at some dark humor. This , as well as his sister's moving away and Dominic's rejection ,was enough to send Padraig over the limit.
The movie ends with both men encountering each other on the beach. They recognize that too much has happened, and their friendship is permanently gone. They will no longer ever be friends again. But they still respect each other as human beings. I think it was a realistic conclusion. I think my friends with rather have seen a more upbeat ending where the friendship is somehow resumed. But both men are very set in their ways, too much has happened, and I don't think that their was any way to regain the friendship. I'm also glad that no worse tragedy resulted. It was a sad ending, just as situations in life often are, but there was a mutual respect and understanding of each other, and hopefully they can each go on with their lives now. Colm will have his music for inspiration, and Padraig will have to get another donkey, or perhaps another animal to transfer his affections to. The real tragedy of the movie was Dominic's death.
One additional comment. In the confessional, Colm confessed his usual sins to the priest, including 'impure thoughts'. The priest a rather rigid, stern old-fashioned Irish cleric, asked him if his impure thoughts had any relation to Padraig. Colm was offended at this, and stormed out of the confessional. This scene I interpreted as more black humor. But afterwards, thinking more about it, the priest seemed to have been quite serious in making this query. I suppose on an isolated island, with neither man having any outlet for physical love with a woman, perhaps their close relationship did have a more intimate emotional aspect than Colm was comfortable with, and that could have been another reason for his wanting to distance himself from Padraig. One never knows.
Banshees were malevolent spirits in Irish superstition, whose howls in the night portended death. I suppose they were equivalent perhaps to the Jewish Lilith, the female demon in the Jewish scriptures. They did indeed seem to haunt that island.
The Rising Hawk (2019)
Mongol Invasion of the Carpathians
I thought this was a decent 2019 movie. It's based upon an actual historical event, the Mongol invasion of the Carpathian Mountains in Eastern Europe , which I believe took place in the 1200s, and which isn't common knowledge to most TV viewers. It's an interesting part of history that most viewers are unfamiliar with.
If I remember correctly, the movie mentions the city of Kiev in its introduction. Kiev was the capital of old Ruthenia, and it was sacked in the mid-1200s by the Mongols, during their invasion of Ruthenia. And so we know that the villagers of Tukhlia, who reside out in the remote countryside in the movie ,are therefore Ruthenians, a Slavic people who became the ancestors of modern Ukrainians. The villagers also bear Slavic names ( Ivan, Maksim, Miroslava, etc. ). One discordant element of 'The Rising Hawk' is that these villagers are portrayed in the film as pagans, followers of the ancient Slavic pagan religion, which I believe is historically inaccurate, By the 1200s, the Ruthenians had long ago been converted to Eastern Orthodox Christianity. But the sets, props, and costumes all seem authentic, and the film does a good job of placing the events in their historical context.
The dialog is very basic, and doesn't really reveal much about the characters personas. And so they don't come across with much charisma. The cast is headed by American and British actors whom I'm unfamiliar with. The actor who played the boyar lord Tugar spoke with a pronounced Scottish accident ( very much out of place in the Carpathians), but I enjoy listening to Scottish accents, and I quickly got used to it. Quite a few of the supporting actors and actresses appear to be Ukrainian, or possibly Russian. And I believe that some of the leading Mongol characters were played by native Mongolian actors.
The storyline itself was pretty generic, villagers fighting invaders, a love-story, etc. Sometimes the plot was difficult to follow. For example, the motivation for the Ruthenian Boyar Lord Tugar allying himself with Mongol Khan Burunda isn't adequately explained. Evidently Burunda has promised to spare the rest of his district if Tugar aids in destroying the village of Tukhlia, but that part is so rushed that it's hard to follow.
The character of Ivan (the elder son) ought to have been developed more. It would have been interesting to see his relationships with his father, wife, son, younger brother, and with his enemies. As it was, he remained mostly a background character with little opportunity for development.
Some of the action scenes are also rushed. A few years ago in 'The Revenant', Leonardo DiCaprio was severely mauled by an attacking bear and left for dead, in a suspenseful scene, while in 'Rising Hawk', the young American actor playing Maksim slays an attacking bear in a blink of an eye with no problem at all, then quickly moves on to coming on to the girl whom he saved from the bear. Later on in the movie, the pulling down of the great pagan monolith-rock, which caused the dam to burst and drowned the Mongol army, was impressive, but it all happened so fast that we barely had time to understand why it was done, and the reasoning behind it.
Nevertheless, I appreciated the film for its historical validity in dealing with an interesting period in Eastern European history, and its scenes of life in a medieval Slavic village. The story might have worked better as a TV miniseries, as there would then have been more time for character-development and motivation, and more time for the story to have been set forth.
Delinquent (2016)
Conflicting Loyalties in Rural Connecticut
I saw this movie on the Streampix Channel, which is the channel where those of us who cannot afford the mainstream premium channels spend our time. The movies on here are mostly forgettable, but this was one of the better ones, and a pleasant surprise.
Excellent cinematography, recreating the atmosphere of small-town rural New England working-class folk. Excellent acting by all the actors and actresses involved.
The theme concerns a smart-aleck high-school kid (Joey) who goes along with his father and uncle (?) and participates in a night-time burglary which goes awfully wrong. The rest of the film deals with Joey's conflict in remaining loyal to his father while observing how the consequences of the crime are shattering the lives of others. The mutually troubled, confrontational relationship between Joey and his Dad is apparent, but also their intense devotion to each other.
The dinner-table scene where Joey and his father compete with each other for the respect of Joey's two little sisters is great. It came out just right, it wasn't over-acted or melodramatic, and it conveyed the family dynamic of restrained, but emotional passion, quite well.
If there's a flaw in the movie, I think it might be the decision of the father and uncle to do away with Tara, which seemed to come out of nowhere. Their decision to kill her to keep her from talking to the police just didn't seem logical. She really didn't know any details of the crime, her threat to go to the police wasn't even directed toward them, and it didn't make any sense or seem to be in character for them. They were small-town crooks, not cold-blooded murderers.
I suppose they had to come up with a reason for Joey to betray his father and uncle, and so they came up with that. In spite of his complicated relationship with his father, Joey was intensely loyal to him, and it would take something very grave to cause him to betray his father's trust. Nevertheless, it seemed to me to be rather contrived, and not in keeping with the rest of the movie.
Still, the movie was a pleasant surprise in the great wasteland of today's television, and was a worthwhile experience.
True Legends of the West (2001)
An Absolutely Awful Movie
An awful movie. I'm surprised that it made it to television, even on an obscure channel. It's supposed to be a western comedy. It tries to be funny, mostly by using old timeworn cliches, They don't work, though. It's boring rather than funny.
If high-school kids in a film-studies class had made this film, I'd thank them for their efforts, give them a 'C' for the effort, but advise them to pursue a different line of work.
Chris Atkins was the only actor I recognized. I wonder if perhaps the other actors and actresses were amateur community theater people, who possibly made the movie just for fun. Chris achieved fame back at the outset of his career in "Blue Lagoon". That was a long time ago. He's still working regularly, each of his efforts on TV and movies over the years worse than the one before, and now it's come down to this. I don't think it can get any worse, though, this appears to be the bottom. I think maybe Chris doesn't take himself too seriously, though. By this time he's probably abandoned any thoughts of serious acting, and he just wants to have some fun and make some bucks. Maybe he did this film as a joke.
Fair Haven (2016)
Coming-of-Age in Rural Vermont
A quiet, thoughtful, inspiring story of a young gay man's coming of age and dealing with his sexual orientation in a small rural Vermont town (although I believe it may actually have been filmed in upstate New York). Previous reviewers have thoroughly analyzed the film's plot and theme, so I will only add a few of my own takes upon it.
The relationship between James (Michael Grant) and his father (Tom Wopat) was especially poignant. They both love each other, but are too emotionally reserved to express it. They are locked together in a terrible intimacy which words cannot penetrate. James' heartfelt desire is to attend Berkeley College of Music in Boston and to become a concert pianist, while his father's heartfelt wish is to pass the Fair Haven apple-orchard, which has been in the family for 4 generations, on to him. And so they are continually in conflict, though they look for ways to compromise. Eventually James and his father decide that for now he will help his father with running the orchard, and will take some courses at the local community college.
I believe that James' transition from struggling to live a heterosexual life to accepting his innate homosexual orientation is a bit too sudden and abrupt. By the end of his time in the anti-gay conversion therapy centre, James had made a commitment to strive to avoid the occasions of sin and temptation, and to live a heterosexual life, complete with wife and children. Dr. Gallagher and James pray together for the strength to do this. James takes this commitment very seriously.
Now when James accidentally meets up with his old boyfriend Charlie (Josh Green), he knows temptation when he sees it. James treats Charlie rudely and keeps his distance, as he'd been advised to do in therapy. He goes to church to pray the gay away, and is introduced to the minister's daughter, Suzie. He calls up Suzie (Lily Anne Harrison), and invites her out on a date. Suzie is a religious but open-minded young woman, and she clearly feels great affection for James.
At the beginning of the following week, having dinner with Suzie and her parents, although polite and friendly, James was quiet, withdrawn, and obviously uncomfortable. He was probably thinking about his previous date with Suzie. When he dropped her off at her house, they'd shared a quick attempt at a kiss. But the heterosexual physical feelings, which James had been led to expect during his therapy with Dr. Gallagher (Gregory Harrison) would kick in, never happened. James is probably concerned and worried about this, and agonizes over it.
Nevertheless, later that evening when he gives Charlie a ride home, it's only reluctantly that he agrees to meet up with him to hang out together on Saturday, as long as "nothing weird" occurs. But on Saturday morning, James is primping in the mirror, something that young men frequently do before going out on a date with someone they hope to impress, but seldom when going to just hang out with friends. He ignores a text message from Suzie. At the lake, while telling Charlie about his sojourn at the ex-gay conversion centre, James is introspective and pensive, but doesn't seem as agonized as he did earlier. But it's clear that it was a traumatic experience for him. Charlie gently places his hand on James' in a gesture of friendship and support, but he's also probably discreetly sending a signal that he'd welcome the resumption of their previous relationship. It doesn't take long before James grabs him and they begin kissing passionately. By nightfall, they can't wait to head for the barn and hop into the sack with each other. Dr. Gallagher would surely be freaking out.
It seems to me that James' transition from struggling to lead a heterosexual life, to accepting his gay sexuality, happens too fast. But it's probably due to the movie's time constraints.
I also felt that Suzie's reaction after inadvertently coming upon James and Charlie in the barn was a bit over-the-top . She was obviously shocked and upset. I'm not sure if her reaction was homophobic or not. She told James to stay away from her, called him "disgusting", and slapped his face. But maybe she'd have done the same thing if she'd encountered him with another girl. But I think that her reaction was a bit too exaggerated. Perhaps the film wanted to contrast James' fulfilling, happy physical relationship with Charlie with the future miserable relationship he'd potentially have with Suzie, if he didn't break up with her. But it presented Suzie as a shrill drama-queen, and glossed too smoothly over the real pain and distress that she must have felt.
The father's coming to terms with his son's gay sexuality at the end was also moving and poignant. His statement that he doesn't know if he'll ever understand it, but that he needs to be better at accepting it, covers it all. He realizes that in his own youth, he too hoped to leave the orchard, and head off to a more fulfilling career, somthing that never happened. He tells James that " the farm's not family, we are...." As they say goodbye at the end, and James and Charlie head for Boston, father and son hug each other. Life is strange, and full of unforeseen outcomes as it unfolds before us. Like the song says, sometimes love means holding on, and sometimes it means letting go. Fair Haven has done a good job of depicting this.
I saw Fair Haven on TV during a Showtime Channel watchathon. First time I'd seen Tom Wopat since Dukes of Hazzard, and first time I'd seen Gregory Harrison since Trapper John. Quite a bit of water has passed under the bridge since those days, and this movie was a worthwhile and different addition to their acting careers.
Dead Man's Curve (1998)
Nice Little College Mystery
Quite a good little dark-humored college mystery film, with an awful lot of twists, that leaves you a bit mind-boggled at the end trying to make some sense out of it. Don't try to take it too seriously, just sit back and enjoy it. Excellent acting and directing from all involved. The characters are all sociopaths, but it's all so tongue-in-cheek that you end up sort of identifying with them, instead of hating them. They did a nice job re-creating the 1990s college atmosphere. Some of the references will become outdated, but 20 years after it was filmed, they still mainly hold up. The dialog is great.
One nice touch was the interaction between chainsmoker Det. Amato and Dr. Ashley, who was trying to quit. It was already established that she wasn't going to reveal to the detectives any of her confidential counselling-sessions, but the animosity between herself and Det. Amato reinforced it.
Another nice touch was the scene where Tim cons Jimmy out of his $10, and poor clueless Jimmy goes "That Tim, he's a really nice guy". It then cuts to a scene of Emma, an ironic expression on her face, murmuring "He is.....isn't he ?" Foreshadowing what's to come, though we don't know it yet.
Edge of Winter (2016)
I expected this to be a typical movie about a bonding experience between an alienated father and sons, with a typical upbeat outcome. It turned out to be anything but.
A recently fired ne'er do well loser of a Dad has his two teenage sons dropped off at his place by his ex and her new husband who are departing on a cruise. The older boy is a sullen, whiny klutz, and the younger one is a scatterbrained brat (in other words, typical teenagers). None of them being very bright, the Dad decides to teach his kids how to shoot a rifle, and they drive up to a remote woods way out in the boondocks, even though a blizzard is coming on. The kids slowly drive their father insane (actually, he surely had some serious mental problems to begin with), a succession of calamities occur, the Dad has a psychotic break, and horror ensues.
Actually, not too bad a movie. It slowly draws you in, and you begin to understand the characters, who are fumblingly trying to connect with each other, and form a bond. The father-son & brotherly relationships are awkward but sincere. The ending comes quite suddenly and unexpectedly, and it isn't very pretty. The problems aren't resolved and there are a lot of loose ends, just as there always are in life. We all just have to keep on, and do the best we can.