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October 1998, Week 2

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Subject:
From:
Darryl Wiggers <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Film and TV Studies Discussion List <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Fri, 9 Oct 1998 09:06:31 -0400
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At 9:18 AM -0000 10/7/98, Tara Forrest wrote:
>>...what other directors have been strongly compared to Godard?
>
>Hong Kong director Wong Kar-Wai cites Godard as a significant influence
>(evident -in terms of editing and voiceover - in 'Fallen Angels' and
>'Chungking Express'). Wong Kar-Wai's use of voiceover however - while
>indebted to Godard - is of the cereal box (rather than 'deeply'
>philosophical) variety.  Wonderful wonderful films.
 
Of course not everyone shares this opinion. Here are some viewer reactions
to ASHES OF TIME that I recently discovered:
 
SS - (*1/2) The hottest names HK films futilely act away in this meditative
swashbuckler cum spaghetti eastern. Fans of Grain-O-Vision jerk-motion
photography and student film stylistic pranks will like this, a cyclical
story of swordsmen Cheung and Leung obtaining vengeance for the women in
their lives. You can see Maggie's eyes move back and forth as she reads her
final soliloquy from cue cards. Pretty awful.
 
CRWP - What this film really means, I'm afraid, is that Ingmar Bergman has
finally cracked the last culture that seemed immune to his "interior of the
mind" euro-brechtian influence. This is a pretentious Euro art movie about
"LOSS," that catch-all of the continental film sensibility and indeed, high
bourgeois culture of all kinds. It is exquisitely filmed and evocative but
it is
ultimately about self conscious camera placement and people gazing out
windows while rubbing significant objects against their cheeks. That the
objects happen to be ancient Chinese broadswords, helps, but does not
disguise the lack of emotional impact that defines this style of
filmmaking. Blech!
 
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