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Michelangelo Antonioni's L'ECLISSE //

Michelangelo Antonioni's LA NOTTE //

The second film in Antonioni's "trilogy of alienation" (or whatever you want to call it), and an improvement on the first, L'Avventura, in every way. The cinematography is more confident, the narrative energies more focused, the plot more salient, the characters more human, the emotional throughlines more legible. The ennui more palpable!

Tony Ching Siu-Tung's A CHINESE GHOST STORY //

Crudely made, but ultimately a winning sort of hodgepodge. It draws from Chinese influences (Taoist philosophy, Qing dynasty ghost folklore, and 1960s Shaw Brothers films) but enlivens these by adding liberal doses of elements inspired or outright ripped from US independent low-budget horror of the era (Sam Raimi, John Carpenter, and George Romero all lend more than a modicum of inspiration). Throw in some slapstick and some corny sight gags borrowed from who knows where and you are honestly most of the way toward having a pretty good stone soup. Sure, this film's reach exceeds its grasp in nearly every shot—and the frantic cutting ensures that there are a lot of shots—but it packs more energy, inventiveness, and heart into its 98 minutes than you might find in, say, an entire season of prestige TV of an ostensibly higher quality.

Park Chan-Wook's NO OTHER CHOICE //

Broadly speaking, I'm supportive of Park Chan-Wook's transition from a vicious enfant terrible to something more like a modern Hitchcock, turning out respectable, sturdily made, reasonably thoughtful thrillers enlivened by the occasional glimmer of nastiness. This new film is firmly in that latter mode, but it's one of the weaker entrants in his recent filmography. Part of the problem might have been the attempt to take this down a dark comedy route: at moments it feels less like a modern Hitchcock and more like a variant on Coen Brothers farce. Nothing wrong with that, except: it's not funny? Or at least I can't think of a moment the slapstick and mugging really pulled more than a chuckle out of me (didn't hear many laughs from the audience I saw it with, either). I don't know if it's just that Park doesn't have a knack for this style of farce or if it's a case of miscasting: Lee Byung-hun has a lot of gifts as an actor but maybe physical comedy isn't one of them? As the film winds along and the plot gets thicker, the comedy takes more of a backseat, and I found myself genuinely caught up in the story: by the time we got to the closing sequence (and the marvelous end credits?) I could honestly say that I enjoyed myself. But I wouldn't be eager to watch this again.