To truly revere a land as incomprehensibly vast and complex as Africa is to feed a connection to one’s own soul, and yet as Out of Africa absorbs us into Baroness Karen von Blixen’s bubble of romantic bliss, Sydney Pollack also develops a poignant metaphor that keeps her greatest love as distant as her nostalgic reminiscences.
The perfect synthesis of art and action in Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters is just as essential to Paul Schrader’s formal representation of Yukio Mishima as it is to the nationalistic writer himself, seeing the latter’s life and novels coalesce into a vibrant portrait of a traditionalist born out of time, as he rigorously pursues the reconciliation of aesthetic and spiritual beauty.
For all of Akira Kurosawa’s jaw-dropping historical battles staged with colourful splendour and imposing characters that fill out Ran’s immense narrative, at its core is a seething bitterness towards humanity’s existential isolation, propelling the dramatic power struggles between three jealous brothers in feudal Japan.
Four days on from the passing of Polish lawyer Antek in No End, his ghost still haunts his widowed wife and final client, forming the metaphorical basis of Krzysztof Kieslowski’s solemn eulogy for a defeated political movement that spiritually unites its mourners, and whose death carries demoralising implications across multiple levels of society.
The very structure of A Zed and Two Noughts is marked by a symmetry that Peter Greenaway is compelled to tease all through his colourfully ostentatious mise-en-scène, centring a pair of twin zoologists whose disturbing studies of life and decomposition mirror the film’s own taxonomical obsessions.
The Purple Rose of Cairo is just as much an ode to the world of movies as it is a fable warning against the temptation to use them as a replacement for living, though it is through Woody Allen’s intelligent, enthusiastic screenplay and one of Mia Farrow’s most touchingly sweet performances that it beautifully transcends its simple yet imaginative premise.
As absurd obstructions and diversions continue to stack up in one man’s simple goal of returning home after work, Martin Scorsese drags us through his oppressive, Kafkaesque narrative, aiming his subtextual critique right at the soul-sapping forces of corporate America.
Terry Gilliam’s construction of a futuristic Britain is visually daunting, but Brazil never shies away from the dark comedy of a government desperately out of touch with reality, brilliantly constructed through surreal, absurdist set pieces.
