DVD Review: 3-Iron

By Utpal Borpjari

Directed by Kim Ki-duk, one of Korea’s most-acclaimed filmmakers, 3-Iron is a complex tale of two persons and their longing for love. An off-beat film that requires some patience to watch for its slow pace, it has one trait that all of Kim Ki-duk’s films boast of – a vibrant visual quality.

The director, whose cinema encompasses wide-ranging styles and subjects – take the extreme violence of Bad Guy or a re-evaluation of the Buddha’s philosophies in Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter . . . and Spring – this time tries telling his story through two central characters who barely speak with each other.

An unlikely love story between a house-breaker and a battered housewife, the film has been praised for its fantastical yet meditative take on relationships.

3-Iron; Korean; Dir: Kim Ki-duk; Rs 349; Shemaroo World Cinema

(Published in Deccan Herald, www.deccanherald.com, www.deccanheraldepaper.com, 13-06-2010)

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/74951/dvd-reviews.html

DVD review: Voyages

By Utpal Borpujari

A deceptively simple film, Voyages by Emmanuel Finkiel, is a deeply-moving film about mental scars, search for an identity and hope. The  French director, a former assistant to masters like Krzysztof Kieslowski as well as Jean luc Godard, shows his grasp over the medium by structuring his story around the Nazi holocaust, but without directly depicting the tragedy.

Rather, he has looked at how such tragedies can create irreparable agonies in the minds of the victims, and does so through three seemingly thinly-connected stories. Shot in Poland, Paris and Israel, the three segments use three women in search of lost memories and family members to tell his story.

Finkiel’s evocative imagery speaks more than the spoken words in the film, showing his grip over the medium. Like all holocaust films, this too is about the triumph of the human spirit, but unlike many others, it does so in almost a spiritual manner.

Voyages; French; dir Emmanuel Finkiel; Rs 349; Shemaroo World Cinema

(Published in Deccan Herald, www.deccanherald.com, www.deccanheraldepaper.com, 30-05-2010)

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/72278/a-powerful-voyage.html