Occurance At Owl Creek Bridge

"why won't you die already?"

     I’ve always inclined myself to watch the Cannes, Berlin, Sundance or Academy award winners because I’ve always wanted to see how good a film is. On Friday, this short film, 'Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge' was certainly that, it was a Cannes film festival winner. So I thought, I hope it doesn't let me down like when I saw 'hurt locker', a film oh-most-well received by critics, but I didn't know what the fuss was about. Besides, I’ve seen a lot of short films, and most of the short films, whether using simple stories or overused stories or just plain fantastic stories are somehow good in my perspective. I think it may be the compressed potential in almost every short film that isn’t in many feature length film. Maybe it's because it's short and they are straight to the point.

     It started off with a poster that if someone were to mess with the railroad tracks would be hanged, and then it slowly transitioned to this man presumably did the crime, who was going to be hanged. A slow paced movement from the troops with guns, the choreographed drill, the facial expression of the convicted man while the rope was tied to his neck, and the numb expression of the troops, all seemed to build tension before the convicted man gets his execution. Then the convicted man goes to his flashback, when he saw his lover/wife and kids. Now, during this moment, I felt a chill in my body, because I have a fond for slow-motion techniques, and it executed this scene nicely.

    The other part of the film, when he fell to the river instead of him hanged to his death, and the subsequent scenes, I felt that the director purposely wanted to say, "This is the expectation". I did felt puzzled at first, I thought how stupid that the rope was that long, or that why wouldn't he die already, but no story comes without a twist or a very abrupt ending. The scenes after this I was busy looking at the wonderful sceneries. It wasn't about the story now, it was the cinematography. For example, the scene where he ran across this infinite road and there was only a light at the end was breathtaking. And the use of, I may say, a dolly or a steadicam, was superb.

      When his wife came out of the house and smiles while he ran I thought that the director was trying to preach an idea, because I noticed some of the shots were played over and over again, I thought the director was trying to say, "there, you try to get it, but you can't, because it's an infinite trial", it’s similar to the reflection of life. "Never give up", they say, or "if life gets you down, you get back up", but really, aren’t we just going in a loop? I thought it had a very deep meaning, but instead, when he touched her, he was really hanged. It reminded me of those Malay essays some of my classmates wrote for his exam, that it turned out to be a dream.
    
       Putting that aside, this short film proved to me that masterpieces can be forgotten, at least for me. It was good, no doubt, but it's not worthy to be remembered forever. I felt it was just like those other 'good' films.

"good, but worth forgetting"

Atonement

I recently saw this movie three days ago. I felt that i wanted to see it since it was in the book '1001 films to see before you die' by Steven Jay Schneider. I scratched my head when 'Juno' was not in it but films like 'The Curious Case of Benjamin Button' and 'Atonement' have made into the list. Well, i guess he has a different taste. It's a good book actually, and a nice list too.

Atonement, not many films that i've watched in my life have the same genre as this one. I was in the mood for something romantic and sad, so i popped in this one. My first impression, "wow, it's going to take me somewhere", I'm a fan of Saoirse Ronan, i think she's an excellent child actor, and she proved me right in this film. Although her lines weren't many, and that it wasn't her playing the older version of 'briony tellis', she did stand out than Kiera Knightly or James McAvoy in this film.

Putting her aside, the first part of the film was quite good, and it's the kind of feeling when you want to know something memorable's going to happen. i had the same feeling intially when i saw 'juno'. As we go along the film i noticed bits of pieces that i felt were a bit awkward at times and that feeling when you get by 'too cheesy' lines like ''just look at me, look at me, i'm here", a scene when Robbie ranted out at Briony, and Ceceelia calmed him down by saying those words. i did felt a bit turned off by that. 

but there were time in the film when i thought were pretty good. like the continous scene near the beach, with a steadicam, walking across the beach and seeing more than 300,000 people waiting to get home.

it was supposed to be a sad film, but i didn't feel it that way. overall i'd give this film a modest 2 out of four stars