This doesn’t fit the theme but I just wanted to use the opportunity to mention it and to ask people to watch it, as there’s nothing else like it. It distils everything he does into the most concise of his films but without losing anything. Right from the off you have this soldier that is looking directly at you, and that happens in a lot of his films. In Syndromes And A Century, one of the characters turns and looks at you, the viewer, and holds the gaze of the camera for about twenty seconds and it’s completely unnerving. Here, you have a director that can make choices that are so bewilderin,g but he’s in such command of the essence of it. There’s nothing flashy but it’s always the right choice. I’m almost loath to say poetry but it is the closest thing to poetry I’ve seen in film. This is the most complete poetry because it’s not just the shots, it’s the quality of the performances, editing, soundtrack. Just the texture of the film. You can’t really explain on paper exactly what it’s about but you feel it so strongly. He’s putting something on the screen that you can’t write about. There’re certain areas that there aren’t words for and I feel like this film is stepping into that territory.
