My introduction to David Lynch took place in early 2022 when I decided to watch Mulholland Drive. In hindsight that wasn't exactly the smartest choice I could've made because my experience with the film ended up being so intense that I had serious trouble falling asleep that night. Even after a couple of weeks, the film was still lingering in my mind and thus creeping me out.
For that reason I subconsciously took some time off from Lynch's other works.…
"You can go wherever you want. Yes, you can. However, you'll find nothing different. I learned this when I've wasted most of my life away. So I have to sugar-coat it. There must be a difference." - Wang Jin
There are films that one can point out to certain factors that make them great, even worthy of a masterpiece title or whatever. Then there are very, very few films like An Elephant Sitting Still that cannot, at least adequately, be…
I'm genuinely relieved and somewhat surprised to realize that my vision didn't, at least seemingly, suffer from watching this film's finale.
While the film looks and feels more international and technically very competently made for a Finnish production, Never Alone fails to portray the large implications related to the subject matter. Schindler's List's existence obviously makes it hard not to make comparisons. And even if the budget is massive for a Finnish film (4,100,000€), Never Alone still ends up being a rather small work in general, be it its short runtime, sparse emotional moments or a lack of wider perspective. A…
I respect Look Back being as short as it is since nowadays every film tends to be at least 90 mins, even if the story has barely enough material for a short film. Forcing the runtime to be under an hour is a bold move. We need to normalize shortish feature films! For its length Look Back is quite an impressive accomplishment of storytelling.
That being said, the film most likely would've been more emotionally resonant if it were longer.…
