A personal journal of film and documentary reviews, and reviews of anything else that intrigues me.
Ari Folman, “Waltz with Bashir” (2008) Few movies about war must be as personal and intense as this animated film about an Israeli ex-soldier’s gradual acknowledgement of the…
Eastern European Films, Russian and Soviet Films
Alexander Dovzhenko, “Arsenal” (1928) Notable for its skilful use of montages of images to create and build tension, excitement, urgency and other moods, “Arsenal” revolves around an incident…
Sergei Eisenstein, “Alexander Nevsky” (1938) Unashamedly patriotic and stirring action-movie propaganda for the masses and the Soviet government under Joseph Stalin at the time of release,…
Martin Scorsese, “Taxi Driver” (1976) As a character study of a lonely and alienated man whose mind collapses under the strain of the life he leads…
Renny Harlin, “5 Days of War” aka “5 Days of August” (2011) Directed by Renny Harlin and financed by the Georgian government, this drama is a…
Mitsuyo Seo, “Momotaro’s Divine Sea Warriors” (1945) Japan’s first full-length animated movie is a World War II propaganda film aimed at children and centred around a…
Australian and New Zealand Films
Robert Connolly, “Balibo” (2009) Imaginatively constructed as three stories that initially fit into one another like Russian matryoshka dolls, of which two more or less spread…
German and German-language Films
Oliver Hirschbiegel, “Downfall” (2004) This is an incredible and masterly fictional dramatisation of the last 14 days in the life of Adolf Hitler over April –…
Alan Lowery and John Pilger, “The War You Don’t See” (2010) Last night (Sunday, 10 April 2011), I caught this documentary presented by veteran Australian journalist…