This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.
CW: upsetting material in the movie and I talk about it
Great movie for a chill Saturday afternoon. Florence Pugh knocks it out of the park. It's a subtle and effective choice to show so little of Christian's face in any kind of close up, even compared to his friends, throughout the first half to 2/3s. Generates emotional distance, and by the time his face does take up more of the shot later on, he is either heavily drugged or…
The Christmas Epic for the year. Powerful. Its most substantial departure from Lear is thematic: it's a family drama still, but the children are cruel in equal measure as political actors; they represent violent, anarchic states as much as they do sons. This, along with Hidetora's preoccupation with the horrors he inflicted as a younger man, makes Ran also a war movie. The tragedy becomes broader: Hidetora isn't just a fool who misunderstands his sons and wishes to be coddled…
I didn't like it when the cop dog tortured a cat with water and said that "this was how they do things downtown." His boss told him that it was "not an acceptable interrogation technique" but he kept doing it anyway.
