As promised in one of my previous blogs, here are three movies that can change the way you look at movies
Majid - An Experience you should not miss
Language: Morrocan (Arabic)
Directed by Nassim Abassi
A simple tale about a son's urge to have a photograph of his parents and his efforts to get. The relationship between him and his brother, who aspires to grow up in life and his life revolving around his daily chores as a shoe shiner captures the eye of a viewer. A carefully narrated movie takes us to a different world in and around a small town Mohammedia, the director's hometown. Nassim Abassi, the passionate Moroccan director, weaves this simple yet beautiful story Majid (2010), is about a ten years old orphan boy called ‘MAJID'.
The story of MAJID, set in Mohammedia, revolves around a coming of age story of a ten years old Moroccan orphan called Majid who works as a shoe shiner in the town's streets. Following recurrent nightmares, he learns that he can't remember his parents' faces anymore and that there are no photographs of them apart from the charred remains of a family photo with his parents heads burnt away in a fire. With the help of his new friend Larbi, an eleven years old cigarettes seller, Majid decides to go on a quest to find a photograph of his dead parents. It's a journey that will take them to the big city of Casablanca where many dangers and adventures await them. The characters of the movie like the street urchin Hogra, the rich business man Zougi and his wife, who were his father's friends, and the people at the mosque all add to the spice of the movie. After you watch this movie, you do realize that we tend to forget the past so easily.
Nassim Abassi started writing MAJID fifteen years ago, during his studies at a film school in the UK and only finished it three years later. The situation of cinema houses in Morrocco is also bleak as per the director of the movie. Over the last few years more than half of Moroccan cinemas have closed down. In Mohammedia, with 300000 inhabitants, people don't have any cinemas anymore as the last one, Cinema Miami, was knocked down last year to make way for a new business. With the resources India has we ought to make better movies, at least watching this movie will kindle the art of storytelling in celluloid in the hearts of many.
Hottarake no Shima: Haruka to Maho no Kagami
(Oblivion Island: Haruka and the Magic Mirror)
Language: Japanese
Directed by Shinsuke Sato
A story which will put an insight in your minds – “whether to cherish the memories or forget them”. The beautifully animated adventure makes you forget the real world and takes you to another world of fantasy. The story is about Haruka, the 16-year-old high school student living with her father, who lost her mother at a young age. The father who tried to get over the grief of his wife's demise turns gloomy, which turns Haruka to be bickering and hence the relation between them gets strained.
The adventure begins when one day Haruka leaves to visit her grandmother in Musashino. On her way she stops by at a shrine where she sees, Theo, a little fox like creature who steals her trinket with keys. Theo carries anything and everything discarded by humans. Haruka sets on a chase behind Theo and in the woods, she finds a mysterious puddles. Lukewarm water in the puddle turns out to be entrance to the strange world of "Oblivion". An island without humans humans filled with all that has been discarded by humans in their lives. Haruka decides to search for a hand mirror which was given to her by her mother and once close to her heart. The adventure goes through many interesting twists and turns with Kotton a rag doll, Baron and his allies in the island and whole lot of characters. Watch it and you might start thinking about those yester years in your life.
Le scaphandre et le papillon
(The Diving Bell and the butterfly)
Language: French
Author: Jean-Dominique Bauby
Directed by Julian Schnabel
A movie that taught me how to think in celluloid. The pains taken by Julian Schnabel and Pathe movies, to communicate pain and distress, have been successful. A must watch if you think you like movies. The narrative might seem a bit slow, but come to think of it, the movie at least has some story behind it. Many a times, I watch movies till the end and still wait for a storyline to start. The movie is about a man who has reached the pinnacle of life loses it in an instant and his life thereafter. The desire to communicate in a person, and his thoughts when he is not able to express as he used to. His life and relationships post a tragic phase in his life.
On December 8, 1995, Bauby, the editor-in-chief of Elle magazine, suffered a stroke and lapsed into a coma. He awoke 20 days later, mentally aware of his surroundings but physically paralyzed with the exception of some movement in his head and eyes (one of which had to be sewn up due to an irrigation problem). The entire book was written by Bauby blinking his left eyelid, which took ten months (four hours a day). Using partner assisted scanning, a transcriber repeatedly recited a French language frequency-ordered alphabet (E, S, A, R, I, N, T, U, L, etc.), until Bauby blinked to choose the next letter. The book took about 200,000 blinks to write and an average word took approximately two minutes. The book also chronicles everyday events for a person with locked-in syndrome. These events include playing at the beach with his family, getting a bath, and meeting visitors.The French edition of the book was published on March 6, 1997. It received excellent reviews, sold the first 25,000 copies on the day of publication, reaching 150,000 in a week. It went on to become a number one bestseller across Europe. Its total sales are now in the millions. Bauby died two days after the book was published, on March 9, 1997, of pneumonia.
The movie tells us a story at the same time makes you think about the merits of what we have now and what we may not have in the next moment. A must watch
Enjoy the movies ...
- vaazhka bharatham -
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