Absolutely astonishing. No movie has ever bottled up so much evil. Reminded me of some of my favourite Claire Denis movies in the way it reveals itself, slowly, sensitively, to be about something so dark. I wouldn’t be surprised if arch cinephile Scorsese checked this one out before making Killers of the Flower Moon, either - another film in which evil is rendered mundane by the spineless foot soldiers of imperial conquest.
For the uninitiated, the banner is entirely misleading…
They’re calling it pure cinema!
Like a lot of Jess Franco’s best films the ramshackle production and barebones plot of Pakeezah lend it an intangible, dreamlike quality. Though the pieces are in place for a more generic melodrama, nothing has been made before or since with quite this tone, literally out of time as the 14 year gap between the shoots is bridged. Kamal Amrohi deliberately shows you the stitches and seams, aware of the artifice of his own story…
Processes that the human race is on a one-way journey to fascism, self-immolation and geological disaster. Or rather, processes the fact that we all know this, yet feel our ions frustrated whenever we dare to even think about it. Happyend scales down its dystopia to stipulate towards larger ideas, but always in tandem with what is essentially a carefully observed coming-of-age film. Above all, it’s really refreshing to see a new director who puts the figuration of bodies in spaces at the centre of his craft. There’s also a great feel for time, the simple age of night and day, that makes the whole thing tick.
A movie I struggle with, probably because it’s so close to being something I can throw myself at. The glorious new restoration reinforces Monteiro as a skilful purveyor of the pure pleasures of cinema - have sunflowers ever looked so beautiful? - yet by refusing to interrogate any of the dynamics of power or labour in his phantasmagoria he comes up short in creating the sort of manifesto for the downtrodden I’ve heard others proclaim. The extensive Salomé sequence in particular is an indulgence too far - we have Rivette at home! Soars gracefully enough in its best moments to still get the like.
