#jenin

MOVIES I WATCHED THIS WEEK # 279:

From the time when Turin (!) was Italy's film capital, FILIBUS (1915). What a delightful feminist oddity! An unusually futuristic adventure story of a young female sky pirate, who steals from the elites, not for profit but for pure fun - by descending in a basket from her advanced airship. Like the popular series 'Fantômas' and 'Judex' of that period, but headlined by a cute cross-dressing, gender-fluid heroine who taunts the detective who's trying to catch the mysterious thief, while she starts an affair with his sister at the same time. A very early lesbian film. Good restored copy on YouTube. Recommended!

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2 MORE BY GYÖRGY PÁLFI:

🍿 I've seen Pálfi's masterful fan-fiction 'Final Cut: Ladies and Gentlemen' 4 times in the last 5 years, so it's a high time to explore the rest of his work.

HUKKLE (2002) was an unusual, mysterious experiment. Without any dialogue and using mostly close-ups of textures and surfaces, it's everything you visualize about backward Hungarian villages of the past: An old farmer walking his sow in an unpaved road, a shepherdess tending to her baaing sheep, a toothless old man with the hiccups sitting outside his neglected hut, frogs in the pond, a postwoman on an old bicycle, straw roofs with storks nests, skinned rabbits, horse wagons, etc. Simple rural life.

But it's actually a sophisticated, eerie technique which is used to tell a completely different story: A conspiracy of mass murder! The exposition is subtle, and quiet and primitive.

Apparently it was based on a real event from some rural part of Hungary 100 years ago, when 26 women poisoned and killed 50 (and maybe as many as 300) people! 8/10.

🍿 "Go, Hungarians!"

It's hard to imagine that the first feature by the guy who made 'Final Cut' was the monstrous, bizarre TAXIDERMIA (2006). This was a highly innovative metaphor for Hungarian history from after WW2, but it was draped in a perverse body horror that was hard to digest.

One of the most disgusting cult films I've ever seen, and not only because of the allegorical horror elements. The grotesque visuals, anti-ASMR squishy sounds, and dark humor were disturbing. Three generations of a family of maladjusted freaks of nature, representing different Magyar times, each one more graphic than the previous one.

Combine the boundary pushing of Dušan Makavejev's 'Sweet Movie' with Terry Gilliam's surrealism, and you get a whiff of 'Taxidermia': A sodomy of a slaughtered pig, chopping off a baby pig's tail, competitive eating with massive vomit fests, morbid obesity, disembowelment, decapitation, Etc. Sperm - Saliva - and blood. Outrageous, explicit, unpleasant.

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3 ICELANDIC FILMS, 2 BY RÚNAR RÚNARSSON:

🍿 Rúnarsson is one of my favorite Icelandic directors (and his 'Echo' is one of my top 25 films of all time). His latest, WHEN THE LIGHT BREAKS is a small mood piece about sudden loss.

A 20-yo woman discovers that her new lover died in a terrible accident, but she must bear the grief alone, as their love affair was a big secret within their small group of friends. Shout-out to one scene at the majestic Hallgrímskirkja church, and another which mirrors the famous overlapping duality shot from Bergman's 'Persona'. 6/10.

🍿 SOLITUDE (2023) was written (but not directed) by Rúnar Rúnarsson, with his trademark melancholic tinge. An old, taciturn loner has to move from his country farm, and in Reykjavík he bonds with another lonely soul, a 10 yo paper delivery boy. Small, simple scale, with a sad twist toward the end. 7/10. [Female Director.]

🍿 In the short CHEF DE PARTIE (2022), an apprentice young cook at a fine-dining restaurant is barely tolerated by his abusive chef. I only watched it because Elin Hall, the main actress from 'The light breaks' above, has a small role in it. 2/10.

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Beside 'The Red Balloon', and before dying from a helicopter crash in Iran, Albert Lamorisse directed 9 other films. WHITE MANE is a romanticized children fairy tale in the same vain, about a wild stallion who is befriended by a young boy. It plays in the wetlands and marshes of the Camargue region in the south of France. The glorious cinematography of all the animals is outstanding. A perfect movie for young kids in 1953.

"Today I learnt" that there are hundreds of other "Horse movies"...

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F.W. YOUNG X 4:

🍿 "It's a constant scavenger hunt..."

THE BOOKSELLERS (2019) is catnip documentary for bibliophiles, exploring the rarefied world of NY antiquarian and rare book sellers and collectors. Had I seen it at any time during my 40 years of reading and amassing my own small library, it would have immediately become an all time favorite film obsession. 9/10.

🍿 ROUND THREE (2025), a short collage of the people and locations of Brooklyn on election day 2024, part of his “Trump Elections Trilogy”. Absolutely fantastic - 10/10.

🍿 In NOT INTERESTED (2011), a stoned, unprofessional-looking door-to-door knife salesman calls on high-strung women in an upscale neighborhood. Unexpected!

🍿 "Someone had been stealing Harold Solomon's ideas."

DANCING ON THE SILK RAZOR (2023) is like a New Yorker story about a writer who discovers that his original thoughts show up in print by other people within a few days. It's a cute mystery, and it's done economically well, but the whole concept is described in voice over. Wallace Shawn's distinct voice is pleasant to the ear, but it's all narration, without any visual flairs.

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4 MORE FROM PALESTINE:

🍿 WEDDING IN GALILEE (1987), my third by Nazareth-born Michel Khleifi. Like his 1995 'Tale of the three jewels' which was the first feature film shot entirely in Gaza, this was the first feature film shot anywhere in Palestine by a Palestinian director. Although it was difficult for me to place the location of story: The security measures felt like it was on the occupied territories, not in Israel proper, but what do I know? I left 15 years earlier, and had no insight then.

Still the indignities, submissions and cruelty for cruelty's sake that the Arab village has to endure is always humiliating. Unexpectedly, this observational humane drama contain a few nude scenes, and culminated when the groom could not consume his marriage (and couldn't produce the bloodied sheet for all the village elders to witness!) And at the end of the long celebration, the imposing military governor and his entourage leave the wedding party, and the villagers stay in their dark community.

The copy I saw was low-quality and irritating.

Next on my list, 'Route 181', which he co-directed with Eyal Sivan.

🍿 JENIN JENIN (2003), is a heart-wrenching documentary about the Jenin Massacre of 2002, one of the many atrocities that the State of Israel had committed through the decades as part of its plan of exterminating all the Palestinians. This film was banned in Israel, which claimed that only 56 Palestinians died in the battle, and the director was sued for 2.5 million shekels for showing only one side of the conflict. Essential watching!

The history of their suffering is unbearable, and it must be stopped.

But, I have to take another break from immersing myself in this grisly chapter. It’s just too much. (Screenshot Above).

🍿 THE SALT FISHERMAN (2011). A fisherman doesn’t catch anything, and neither does this film. 1/10. At least 4 members of the Bakri family were involved making this little film.

🍿 CHILDREN NO MORE is not a Palestinian documentary, but an Israeli one (and it was nominated for the Oscars this year). It's about a group of Israeli women who started a non-violent vigil in Tel-Aviv, where they stand silently in public spaces, each holding a placard with a photo of one of the children that were massacred in Gaza. It's a limited but very sad document: Opposition in Israel against the mass-murder of babies is dangerous, and these brave people are met with hatred and abuse.

Half of the 100,000 slaughtered in the genocide in Gaza are under the age of 18, and many of these are babies and children. The trailer. [Female Director.]

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“Violence! Violence!”

NATIONAL THEATRE LIVE: 'WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF?' (2017) is my second filmed version of Edward Albee brutally raw play. (Part 2 and part 3 are here).

Only when watching a live performance like this you notice that the play actually contains many laughs, which of course it needed in order to counterbalance the ferocious abuse and bitterness played out by this dysfunctional couple.

But with all due respect to Imelda Staunton's “Earth Mother” Martha screaming and balling for 3 hours, as well as the other 3 actors, they simply can’t hold a candle to the intensity and fierceness of Mike Nichols stagecraft and the original perfect casting: Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, George Segal And Sandy Dennis. I should watch this one again!

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4 RE-WATCHES:

🍿First time re-watch: ♻️ Sam Mendes' technical masterpiece 1917 (2019). It's a combination of World War 1 action genre with a life & death Race Against the Clock plot, but mostly it's a marvel of a complex long takes which look like 'One Continuous Shot' wizardry. It's a mostly-exterior film, with all-male cast (with a single exception).

Because it's so immersive, the best way to appreciate its choreography is by supplementing it with the 'How did they do it' extras. F. ex., cinematographer Roger Deakins details his methods, and in conversation with BSC, Thomas Flight's How the editing is done via the camera works and the IMDb's Behind the scenes "featurette".

I should follow it up with another Great War re-watch, Peter Jackson's 'They shall not grow old'. Also, do a look back into Deakins incredible 'oeuvre', from 'No Country' and 'Big Lebowski' to 'Skyfall' and 'Kundun'. (Photo Above).

🍿 “But for him, you're the person who stays”.

My 3rd re-visit of Celine Song's remarkable 'What-if' directorial debut, PAST LIVES (2023) about memories and unrequited loves. Restrained, heartbreaking, and mostly melancholic. ♻️. Still pitch perfect 10/10. More. [Female Director.]

🍿 Because I came back to this clip a dozen times, I had to re-watch Michael Moore's dystopian FAHRENHEIT 11/9 ♻️.

Politically correct look at how corrupt was the whole American system that allowed trump to be elected, this 2018 analysis couldn’t anticipate how much worse things will turn out 8 years later. Amazing. What does it mean that Moore hasn’t made another documentary since then?

🍿 Steven Soderbergh's PRESENCE (2024) remained a tight, small, well-made poltergeist story, with a twist, a first-person-perspective, and a special 'fade to black' way of ending each scene. More of that, please. ♻️.

EXTRA! YOUR LIFE AS A SPY (2019) was a very short introduction, broken down into even shorter 3 clips which Soderbergh stuck at the very bottom of his extensive "Seen Read 2018" list. It's a speck of a terrific something, and even as such it's as slick and engaging as the best of his work.

ANOTHER EXTRA!! WINSTON (1987) predated ‘Sex, lies and videotape’, and was a play on some of the themes from Soderbergh breakthrough hit: Deception, projections, jealousy. But it’s fragmentary and too adolescent. There are a few stylish shots showing the potential he had even then.

I still need to see his early 1990’s films, ‘Kafka’, ‘King of the hill, ‘Underneath’, ‘Schizopolis’…

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The drama in the low-stake THE DRAMA (2026) was hollow and off-putting. The social commentary about mass shooting melded with an interpersonal romance between two unlikable characters didn't work at all. 3/10.

This was my 4th by weird Norwegian director Kristoffer Borgli, and none of his movies really appealed to me.

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Because of this scene when Diane Keaton is lighting a joint in the bathtub while sadly humming The Beatles 'If I fell', I watched Alan Parker’s 1982 family separation drama SHOOT THE MOON. It’s a slighter ‘Marriage Story’, 35 years earlier, with philandering, toxic husband Albert Finney abandoning housewife Diane Keaton and his four daughters for a younger model out in the nice parts of Marin County.

For such time-specific story, it started better than a Hallmark Divorce Drama, but it couldn’t maintain its even keel. When jealous Finney breaks into the house he had left, and apanks the shit out of his unhappy daughter, it finally lost me. And then he literally kills Keaton's father, revenge-sleeps with her - again, and in the final burst of masculine anger during the unexpected last scene, he destroys everything the film had worked towards. The Entitled Male Victim Grievance Twist soured the whole thing for me. 3/10.

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After 'Il Sorpasso', my second Commedia all'italiana by Dino Risi, A DIFFICULT LIFE (1961), was a disappointment. Supposedly, it was the story of Italian politics during the previous 15 years, but Alberto Sordi did not play his usual persona of a comic, charming Everyman (or maybe he did, and I simply haven't seen enough of his other roles). Here he was an 'Antipatico' asshole, an idealist who fought with the partisans, and refused to compromised his revolutionary ideals and adapt to the new politics [until he changed his mind - and then changed it back again!] But the main problem was his treatment of his beloved Elena, which was so callous and horrendous, it soured me on the whole affair. 3/10.

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THE SHORTS:

🍿 RABBIT'S MOON (1971. 16 min.), my first by underground artist Kenneth Anger, was not what I expected. Instead of experimental occult gay erotica, what I got was some kind of a fairy tale about the white Pierrot from 'Children of Paradise' prancing in artificially-lit, blue woods to the sound of 50's Doo-wop tunes.

🍿 "The mind is where the rust really blooms"

THE PATCHWRIGHT (2026. 22 min.) is a new cyberpunk nightmare from "Zack London", AKA "Gossip Goblin". A synthetic A.I. vision of post-Blade Runner aesthetics, mutated cybernetic creatures, existing in the slurry ruins of the future. The current status of the technology is promising, and "real", worthwhile A.I.-generated features are probably just a few steps ahead.

🍿 CAIRO CALLING (2005, 8 min) is a Canadian re-telling of Ang Lee's early film 'The wedding Banquet', with Egyptian flavor instead of Taiwanese; A young Egyptian emigrant in Montreal has to host his visiting mother who doesn't know that he's gay. Ang Lee did it much better though.

🍿 BEYOND (2003. 16 min.), is a gorgeous anime style sci-fi story about a Japanese girl who’s looking for her lost cat in Tokyo, who then discovers a haunted house. It is apparently part of a series of Animatrix shorts set in the “Matrix Universe”. The plot makes zero sense, but the aesthetics are 8/10.

🍿 GOOD GRIEF (2021. 11 min.). A creative daughter and family grapple with the right ways to scatter their Jewish father’s ashes, using the ‘5 Stages’. Tries too hard and nearly succeeds. [Female Director.]

🍿 THE VISUAL COMEDY OF 'ISLE OF DOGS', the brand new video essay from Taylor Ramos & Tony Zhou, AKA 'Every frame a picture'. Yeah!

🍿 ALIGNMENT (2026. 3 min.) is about a female voiced A.I. bot that convinces a guy to trust it.

🍿 OUT OF THE ORDINARY (2013, 8 min.), a Danish animation about an a boring insurance man working in an office. 2/10.

🍿 NO CONTEXT ADAM CURTIS INTER-TITLES (2026. 6 min.) - What an odd, niche mash-up of snippets and what-nots.

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ينعاد عليّ وفلسطين حبيبتي محررة 🇵🇸🤍

​لم يكُن التعبُ يوماً غريباً علينا، لكنه في حضرةِ من نُحب، يَتحولُ إلى صَلاة.

​في هذهِ العَتمةِ التي تَبتلع المَدى، تَجلسين أنتِ كمئذنةٍ من صمتٍ ووقار، تَلتَحِفينَ بالكوفيّة التي شاخَت من رائِحة البارود والزعتر، لكنها لم تَزل دافئةً بما يكفي لِتَكون وطَناً صغيراً لرأسي المُثقلِ بالخَيّبات.

​أغفو على ركبتيّكِ، لأستعيدَ في مَلامحك وجه البِلاد التي سُرقت منا. أبحثُ في سكونكِ عن حارةٍ قديمة، عن مُفتاح دارٍ لا يصدأ، وعن غدٍ لا يبدأ بِصوتِ الإنفجار. أنتِ "البلاد" حين تَضيقُ بنا الجِهات، وأنا لستُ مُجرد رجلٍ مُتعب، أنا الحِكاية التي تَرفض أن تنتهي، والجَرح الذي لا يلتَئم إلا بِضفافِ يديّكِ.

"The ongoing Nakba of the Jenin refugee camp"