duydoan Reviews

Song lang (2018)

A film of moderate caliber

[6/10 · 19 August 2018]

The film is permeated by the vibes of cai-luong (reformed theater), a kind of traditional Southern Vietnamese folk opera. Here features a young guy who appears quite violent in action, quite muscular and rugged in build, and quite terse and monotonous in words. There features another young guy who appears meek and slim and naive and nice. They have the same childhood studded with memories of cai-luong troupes and activities. Yet as courses of their lives roll on, one strolls toward his fulfillment, and one along his perilous path and keeps that until the very end. Of course, on their ways, they have a brief pause to have a chance encounter followed by another chance one, extended by some spell of a prolonged conversation around art, life and even time travel. That's where the promising opening of the film is faded into hackneyed verbal patterns typical of ordinary situations in Vietnam. It's quite clichéd yet real.

Above all, I find the film most charming in its decent presentation of Southern Vietnamese ambience, mostly vividly expressed via minor characters, which feels so dear to me, who is also a native Southern. And it's the only big plus in my view of this film. Perhaps some people would mention its shots of beauty or exquisiteness or splendor, you name it, as an unignorable outstanding aspect, for good reason of their own. That is so exaggerated and not the case in my mind, as they are nothing more than some kind of mimicked and framed creation rather than revealing or creative one. I do find them beautiful, and only deem them as the spice of the film just as a variety of people portrayed here of life. After all, setting aside some over-romantic or over-hinted scenes and some faux coincidences, I'm left with a film of moderate caliber with few nonsensical happenings and verbalization which are usually a trademark for Vietnamese films.

The Imitation Game (2014)

A poor depiction

[6/10 · 28 January 2015]

Perhaps this is one of the most surprising films of 2014, because it has left me a great disappointment. I heard of the name of AlanTuring the first time around 5 years ago when reading a book named The Code Book by Simon Singh. This book dedicates a whole chapter to a encrypting machine called Enigma, including some of achievements of breaking down it done by Polish decryption experts in the period just prior to WWII, and achievements from the legendary Bletchley Park in Britain during WWII. Alan Turing is the most prominent figure at that time, no doubt. I also learnt about Turing afterward, and has taken some liking to him since then, a short-lived genius.

And Turing in The Imitation Game is quite different. It's a Turing who is dramatized terribly in a movie which is dramatized even more. To the extent of phoniness. Turing (the character in the movie) is described as a super-hero who engages in the most intellectually quintessential place of Britain at that time. Ignore the fact that the movie depicts Turing mistakenly and exaggeratedly, just mention the logic behind the plot. The story of Turing (the character) and his partners' achievements is similar to a tale of being hinted by some god in a summer night. So right in the beginning Turing (the character) rushes into sketching a machine which would be used to break down the Enigma, while during the movie progress there are no suggestions for us to know what is based upon or who he is inherited from in order to create that machine. There is only a mention of Polish in an early scene in the movie as smugglers who slipped the Enigma machine into Britain. And afterward, Turing (the character) and his partners act as God, just do it and achieve it.

The movie is overstated and inflated dramatically from the plot to dialogs, which easily arouse viewers' emotion, as a line in the movie spoken by Turing (the character), "it's because it feels good". But for me, also copying another line right after (spoken by Turing the character too): sometimes I can't enjoy what supposedly feels good, I have to think what is logical, which really and truly feels good.

About a mathematics genius, an alleged father of computer science and artificial intelligence, the movie just delivers some hollow feelings. Alan Turing, I would meet you only through words and books.

The Tale of The Princess Kaguya (2013)

A rare gem of modern animation, a masterpiece no doubt.

[9/10 · 4 January 2015]

Before this film, the last masterpiece by Takahata Isao at Studio Ghili is My Neighbors the Yamadas (1999). 7 years later, in 2006, he began a new animation project which is this film, and everyone had to wait another 7 years to see his work which was claimed prior to the release date by Nishimura Yoshiaki (a producer of the film) that this work is "the best and last" by Takahata. I completely agree with Mr. Nishimura. The film has a minimalist style taking some resemblance to My Neighbors Yamadas, but more colorful, more poetic and picturesque, and more artistically soaring in visual style. The plot is simple and beautiful. The soundtrack is awesome.

In his career at Ghibli, Takahata has made just 5 animated feature films for 25 years (including Grave of the Fireflies), roughly a half as much as Miyazaki Hayao's works (9 films), but as the more time went by, the better and the more creative Takahata has been in making his works. And with Kaguya, he has reached his highest peak in the life of creation. In my own opinion, this film is as excellent as Miyazaki's Spirited Away in general: less symbolic but way visually better than Miyazaki's work.

And like Grave of the Fireflies or Only Yesterday, Kaguya's ending leaves some melancholy in audiences' mind, though it is so predictable. Perhaps it's the melancholy not only about the film, but also about a rare gem in animation which has gone far far away and would never come back, like Kaguya.