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Reviews
Unmade Beds (1997)
This film might be upsetting to some, but it is a fresh look at old problems, a study of human behavior, and under the guise of being a documentary.
Whether the story is entirely true or in some parts made up, as the director stated it is, is unimportant; the film covers the intriguing subject matter of how four single New Yorkers exist for a period of nine months, featuring the real lives of two female and two male actors who play themselves, concerned with getting older and still being single. Their single scene is provocatively portrayed as being sad and luridly comical. It is a film that highlights the problems that can be found in urban areas across America, as we bear witness to the plight of these singles trying to search for a mate through the internet and the personals, faced with agonizing loneliness and unresolved psychological problems. That these four are not particularly people that I can readily sympathize with, does not alter the fact that this is a very human story being told, one that has many implications on our culture, relating how alienated a people so many of us have become in this modern world.
Öszi almanach (1984)
An intensely intelligent film about failed relationships.
The occupants of a large apartment desperately try to relate with each other: fighting over financial matters, trying to establish their sovereignty, revealing their fears and their loneliness, grasping for love, all the while clinging to each other and hating themselves for it. To say that this a harsh tale, is to really note how bleak their lives are, how grim the large apartment is, and how unsatisfying is their love life and everything around them.
Tarr's camera is everywhere, under them, over them, close-up and panning the room. His choice of colors for the grim apartment is curious and provoking. This is a tough film to watch, but if you want to see something that is introspective, something that has a rawness to it that is uncompromising, then this existential-like film fits the bill, as it generates an uncomfortable and uncompromising tension that is very perceptive about the human condition. Above all, its message is, you must love someone, which is easier said, than done, as the filmmaker subtly asks the question, what is it that you believe in?