December 2016 book and film review part 2

FILMS, Contd

THE EAGLE HUNTRESS (2016) D- Otto Bell. (Docu) In Kazakhstan, a thirteen-year-old girl wants to hunt eagles like her father. Trouble is, this is usually men's work, and she faces problems from the outset in establishing herself in her chosen field of expertise. Fortunately for her, and surprisingly on the face of it, Kazakhstan has actually encouraged the equality of women since antiquity, and she is eventually allowed to, first, find her fledgling eagle (which requires something of an epic trek into to the snow giants of the Altai mountains) and then to train it to hunt.
           This documentary is a little deceptive in that it depicts her struggle for equality with men as more of a struggle than it really is, but its strength lies in its stunning depiction of the journey of its youthful hero "Aisholpan". Several moments are so powerful they had me in tears. There is nothing new in documentaries bending the truth to tell a good story: from Nanook of the North in 1922, right through to Saint David Attenborough today, documentary film makers have fucked about with the truth, and to my mind, if the story is good enough it doesn't matter that much. Or does it? Discuss.

THE JUNGLE BOOK (2016) D- John Favreau. Mancub Mowgli is living an idyllic life as the adopted child of a pack of wolves, but a local tiger doesn't like human beings and would have him for supper if he could. Time for Mowgli to re-integrate with human society? You'd think so, but it isn't as easy as that, obviously. Kipling' famous tale is remade nearly fifty years after Disney scored a big hit with it in 1967, and this new version owes a lot to the original animation. But here Mowgli is played by a real boy (a very good Neel Sethi) working around some of the best CGI animals I've ever seen. I said in an earlier blog that The Revenant marked a breakthrough in computer graphics, and here we see how the art has truly come of age. Great fun.

LIKE FATHER LIKE SON (2013) D- Hirokazu Koreeda. In Tokyo, a family with a six-year-old son learns to its horror that their baby was switched at birth with another boy-child, and that another family is bringing up their son, while they are bringing up theirs. The families get together and agree to a swap. But is really the right thing to do?
             Director Koreeda pulls this agonising story together with marvellous skill, depicting the pain of the protagonists in his own, unique, understated way, perhaps characteristic of typical Japanese families. The story really circulates about one of the fathers (splendidly played by Masaharu Fukuyama) and his heart-rending struggle with himself.
             Every so often, a truly great film emerges from Japan which helps us Occidentals gain a fresh insight into the workings of that usually impenetrable culture. This is one. Truly, this is a film of the stature of Tokyo Story or Tampopo. Wonderful.

JEW SUSS (1940) D- Veit Harlan. In 17th century Wurtemburg, a new Duke takes his coronet, but he is a vain, greedy and lecherous beast. He wants to set up a ballet company in Stuttgart, mainly so he can lust over the ballerinas, but the mingy town council, who hold the purse-strings of the city, won't grant him the funds. Enter Jew Suss, an evil moneylender, who offers to finance the Duke's schemes, on the promise the Duke will allow the Jews to re-enter the city of Stuttgart. And we know where that will lead...
            Soon the evil Jews are all over the city, levying taxes (with the Duke's blessing) and lusting after the gorgeous, innocent blond aryan women. Mein Gott! Where will it all end? Badly, thank goodness, for the Jews, who, at the last, are thrown out of Stuttgart, which can once again re-establish its racial purity.
            This film was commissioned by Josef Goebbels as a propaganda tool to spread the nazi's message and with its skilful direction, fine acting and lavish production values, it influenced a whole generation of Germans, over 20 million of them seeing the film in a two year period. Himmler decreed that every soldier in the Wehrmacht should see it, and his orders were always obeyed without question. Jew Suss is a very good film, and all the more terrifying for that fact. Like Birth of a Nation 25 years earlier, its highly dubious message (in the latter' state case, it was that the emancipation of the slaves had been a very bad idea) was swallowed by an audience anxious to justify their persecution of a minority group.
            After the war, all the main players were prosecuted at the Nuremberg war-crimes tribunals, though all were acquitted on the basis that they were working under duress. But their careers were destroyed. Perhaps the saddest case was Kristina Soderbaum, a highly talented stage and screen actress who really didn't want to be involved, but Goebbels insisted. She tried to work on the stage after the war, but was booed off the stage and had rotten vegetables thrown at her every time she appeared...