A friend sent me this on Facebook, and it got me thinking.
- April Story (1998, Japan), written/dir. by Iwai Shunji. Cinematography by Shinoda Noboru. Starring Matsu Takako.
The most perfect arthouse film ever made, in my humble opinion. There is nothing that could be added to or subtracted from this film to improve it in anyway. A young girl moves from Hokkaido to Tokyo to begin university. April is the start of the school year in Japan, so that explains the title for those of you unaware. Why did she choose Musashino University? Just watch it, please. It’s only 67 minutes and the shot compositions throughout are immaculate. There’s also a musical motif on the soundtrack that is as charming as Matsu Takako’s character Nireno Uzuki. Just a wonderful picture. I find this infinitely relaxing but still contemplative. Somewhere between ultra-realistic but still an escapist fantasy. This was actually the first blu-ray I ever bought, from yesasia, and I’ve seen this film close to maybe 300 times, if not slightly over. Probably the only film I’ve seen more is Alien.
2. The Sting (1973, USA), dir. by George Roy Hill. Starring Robert Redford and Paul Newman.
If April Story is the most perfect art film ever, The Sting is the most perfect commercial film ever. The ragtime soundtrack, the pairing of Robert Redford and Paul Newman after 1969’s Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, the plot, oh my goodness the plot, but most of all, the pacing. At 129 minutes, not a second is wasted here. This film rewards not just attention but your viewing, because whether you can keep running with the characters or you get dragged along, the developments, how the characters go about their plans, and the pay off are so fantastically well done that if the film punched me in the face instead of having end credits, I would probably still watch it again and again. Why would I show this? Because it’s a simple good time. A roller coaster but without the risk of vomit (yours or someone else’s). What a film.
3. Christmas in August (1998, South Korea), written/dir. by Hur Jin Ho. Cinematography by Yu Young Gil. Starring Han Suk Kyu and Shim Eun Ha.
I love this movie so much. A deeply moving depiction of the beginning of a relationship; a photographer and a traffic cop begin awkwardly but warm to each other and… well, it’s maybe slightly more complicated than that. It’s obviously a romantic drama, but none of what people might consider the typical content of romance. There is no kiss, no hand holding, no overblown gestures or declarations of love. Two people meet, start to like each other, and do things together the way people who like each other would do, because that’s life. It’s realistic, but melodramatic, but the melodrama is there for a reason.
The film transcends romance and melodrama, it is more than anything a story of two people who are falling in love. It’s simple but complex, and it all makes sense once you watch it. I pick this for many reasons, but most of all the screenwriting. Catch the brilliant motifs involving photography, windows, and funeral portraits. The camerawork even mimics still photography in most of the scenes; static, almost evoking a fly-on-the-wall. I don’t know how this film isn’t used throughout film schools in America to teach students how to write, because this movie isn’t packed with overused tropes and doesn’t insult the audience’s intelligence. That’s why it’s so special.
So those are my picks, this time.
The Seeming and the Meaning 