Sunday, 6 April 2008 02:23 pm
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deckardcanineNow for a review of a movie that's still in theaters: The Band's Visit.
You may have heard that it was pronounced ineligible for the Academy's Best Foreign Film award because it had too much English. The funny thing is, except for the singing, it's all subtitled. And half the time, I needed the subtitles to cut through the accents and grammar. (The transcribers took some liberties, sometimes using commas where periods or semicolons were more appropriate. And I wasn't the only one who noticed they used the wrong spelling of "bear" once.)
My sister probably enjoyed the film the most of anyone in my family, seeing as she's been to Israel and could pick up some of the Hebrew and maybe Arabic. She even recognized a couple parts of the airport.
The basic plot outline is that the Alexandria Police Orchestra (an embarrassingly long name in any language) accidentally goes to the small town of Bet Hatikva instead of Petah Tikva, where they will have a concert the next evening. For most of the film, they're just spending the evening in town, interacting with the townsfolk in the lingua franca of English.
Perhaps it is out of deference to the story's basis in reality that the pacing is slow and not much happens. But it's not boring. There are changes of character happening ever so subtly, such that the unintended visit may have benefited both the citizens and the band members.
It is partly a drama, especially when the colonel finally loosens up, but the comedy gets first priority. An awkwardness pervades the film from start to finish. Not the over-the-top kind, but the quiet kind that gradually builds up chuckles in the audience. The impromptu rendition of "Summertime" is an excellent example. No, I won't describe that. It has to be heard to be appreciated.
Most of the movies we previewed looked like maybes, but I don't have high hopes for Chaos Theory. I came to realize that whenever a trailer is set to "In the Hall of the Mountain King" (this applies also to the remakes of Funny Games and How the Grinch Stole Christmas), it looks singularly unpromising.
Ironically, the same tune is whistled in the movie I saw on DVD today: M. And that one is actually great. But I don't feel like reviewing it.
You may have heard that it was pronounced ineligible for the Academy's Best Foreign Film award because it had too much English. The funny thing is, except for the singing, it's all subtitled. And half the time, I needed the subtitles to cut through the accents and grammar. (The transcribers took some liberties, sometimes using commas where periods or semicolons were more appropriate. And I wasn't the only one who noticed they used the wrong spelling of "bear" once.)
My sister probably enjoyed the film the most of anyone in my family, seeing as she's been to Israel and could pick up some of the Hebrew and maybe Arabic. She even recognized a couple parts of the airport.
The basic plot outline is that the Alexandria Police Orchestra (an embarrassingly long name in any language) accidentally goes to the small town of Bet Hatikva instead of Petah Tikva, where they will have a concert the next evening. For most of the film, they're just spending the evening in town, interacting with the townsfolk in the lingua franca of English.
Perhaps it is out of deference to the story's basis in reality that the pacing is slow and not much happens. But it's not boring. There are changes of character happening ever so subtly, such that the unintended visit may have benefited both the citizens and the band members.
It is partly a drama, especially when the colonel finally loosens up, but the comedy gets first priority. An awkwardness pervades the film from start to finish. Not the over-the-top kind, but the quiet kind that gradually builds up chuckles in the audience. The impromptu rendition of "Summertime" is an excellent example. No, I won't describe that. It has to be heard to be appreciated.
Most of the movies we previewed looked like maybes, but I don't have high hopes for Chaos Theory. I came to realize that whenever a trailer is set to "In the Hall of the Mountain King" (this applies also to the remakes of Funny Games and How the Grinch Stole Christmas), it looks singularly unpromising.
Ironically, the same tune is whistled in the movie I saw on DVD today: M. And that one is actually great. But I don't feel like reviewing it.