tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1137730880076755122.post1679522311076413391..comments2024-03-08T03:14:02.855+11:00Comments on This Island Rod: Lake Mungo (2008)Roderick Heathhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08107539379079558068noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1137730880076755122.post-79729398154420037862011-01-20T00:58:19.155+11:002011-01-20T00:58:19.155+11:00Very cool, Robert. You've seen and drawn out s...Very cool, Robert. You've seen and drawn out some things I didn't notice, and all. Perhaps the "scare" bit was unnecessary in some ways, but I loved it - the image of the mystery figure slowly drawing closer and then suddenly swooping at the camera was as effectively creepy a bit any I've seen in recent cinema, certainly compared to one you cite, <i>Black Swan</i>, which flailed about desperately trying to unnerve and failing. And whilst I have seen examples of such mirroring hauntings in tales, no, I've not seen one done that elegantly.<br /><br />Actually, I've never even heard of <i>Timecrimes</i>. One for me to search for now.Roderick Heathhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08107539379079558068noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1137730880076755122.post-8742048729424768442011-01-19T19:06:53.355+11:002011-01-19T19:06:53.355+11:00Just watched. Never such a communion between ghos...Just watched. Never such a communion between ghosts and skeletons as this! I don't usually go in for this kind of movie, but this was super well done. The one lone acting misstep, Dad's unconvincing telling of his "get out" experience, is made up for in spades by Mom's fully wait-maybe-this-is-actual-family-confession reading of the girl's diary. <br /><br />Three of the movie's lines resonated especially: again, Mom, when she says up top, "You have to believe you're to blame, or else there's nothing else to hold onto"; Dad, when he confesses "I wanted it to be someone else's kid, a runaway, someone else murdered", a sentiment unpacked like a math problem with a heartbeat in "High and Low"; and the subtly ironic emotional mini-twist when Mom says the *revelation of the hoax* equalled the "end of hope". It's statements like these, spoken so flatly, so long-ago consumed, that ring true and give the movie its validity -- even as much as the trusty push-in to grainy, freeze-famed home movie shots. <br /><br />Again, a balance in what bugged me and what surprised me... The "scare" moment in Alice's phone video was fairly superfluous (if technically right on) in a movie that grips us without such horror movie tropes. I thought of two things: the ending "scare" moment at the end of the already questionably enjoyable "Paranormal Activity" and the bizarre reliance on similar tactics in "Black Swan" -- in the latter case, made even worse by their employ as obvious psychology 101. But the balance to that: the intercutting of Ray's Alice tapes with his Mom tapes, connecting Alice's future-bound premonition with Mom's fluid present and past -- it's like a layer of haunting I'd never thought of before (forgive me if I'm unschooled in this genre) and which gave me the same shutter of happy revelation *briefly* that I felt for the entirety of "Timecrimes". (Hopefully you didn't hate that movie.)<br /><br />Thanks for prodding me into seeing this. It's rich in a way I didn't expect, esp., as you say, coming from a subgenre already on this end of the gimmick bell curve.Roberthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10667380722587782819noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1137730880076755122.post-54817510567708098382011-01-18T14:58:09.731+11:002011-01-18T14:58:09.731+11:00My praise was entirely designed to make you see yo...My praise was entirely designed to make you see your error.<br /><br />Also: Lake Mungo, just added to Netflix instant queue!Roberthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10667380722587782819noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1137730880076755122.post-59205481346533272542011-01-18T14:00:02.948+11:002011-01-18T14:00:02.948+11:00Thanks for the kind and invigorating words, Robert...Thanks for the kind and invigorating words, Robert, although I then had to go and notice the sentence you quoted had a word missing from it and thus proves to me that I need to spend more time proof-reading. In any event, whilst I of course understand entirely the problems of picking what movies one does and doesn't watch out of the great over-supply, I do hope you'll catch <i>Lake Mungo</i>.Roderick Heathhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08107539379079558068noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1137730880076755122.post-31024919005012083612011-01-18T11:21:04.302+11:002011-01-18T11:21:04.302+11:00I have to tell you, I'll read many of your pos...I have to tell you, I'll read many of your posts from beginning to end even if I'm pretty sure I won't be making time to see the movie you've described. (This is nothing personal -- just a time issue.) Your references educate (Blow Up, The Eclipse) while your literary turns of phrase please ("the stars rising and falling as communicating in some unknown code"). So many online "reviewers" sound like they're learning how to write AS they're writing their pieces. And it's excruciating. You are clearly a strong writer who happens to be writing about film. Sometimes I read just because you provide good sentences!Roberthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10667380722587782819noreply@blogger.com