Reviews

From the moment I saw that cigarette lightning close-up and "Zadok the Priest" playing in the background at the very beginning I knew I'm watching a well-directed movie.

The story follows a nerdy college student (Oliver) who meets the "college super star" (Felix) who as always is portrayed by Jacob Elordi. After some tragic events that happened to the protagonist (portrayed by Barry Keoghan) he goes on vacation to Saltburn, Felix's summer home. The movie is not about Saltburn and what Oliver is going to witness during his stay at this nouveau riche family's home. It is about Oliver himself and how he interacts with this whole family.

I don't want to make any spoilers, but there is a major plot-twist which starts to unfold during the second-half of the movie and it is quite unexpected. The main message of this film is that when someone wants to go up the "social ladder" he can do anything possible.

P. S.: There are some disturbing scenes that almost made me vomit (no movie has accomplished that), but still loved its direction, the cast and the 4:3 ratio.

Yorgos Lanthimos comes once again with an original idea. I watched this after watching his masterpiece "Poor Things" and having watched the mediocre film "The Favourite". I believe that this movie is a must-watch.

The story follows David in a dystopian world (or maybe an allegoric representation of our own world!) where people who are single have to live in a hotel until they find a match. If they don't succeed they will be turned into the animal of their choice. In order to find a match you have to share one characteristic with the other person such as easy nose bleeding or short-sight. One of the many rules in the hotel is the prohibition of masturbation and that there are no "halfs", meaning that there is no bisexuality, no half shoe size numbers and that's all because the Hotel wants to have everything in "boxes". Outside the Hotel there is a group called "Loners", whom Hotel residents should kill during every hunt. Loners have their own set of rules: no flirting and no relationship between two Loners!

The world called "The Hotel" represents the conservative world we live in (especially in Greece), in which the society believes that having a partner is the most important task we have to accomplish as humans. The Hotel's belief system is not only conservative but also sexist as they think that a man is important for a woman to feel protected from other men who might attack her and men need a woman's company to have their life saved if they choke on food as it is shown during the Hotel's presentations. Furthermore, the Hotel transforms everyone into an animal (probably) so that they end up finding a partner after all for the same cause the Hotel believes we find partners as humans: Reproduction.

The Loners have created a world that is the exact opposite of the Hotel one, making the movie's Manichaeism more obvious. This represents the people who want to oppose to everything that society necessitates. This opposition though isn't always expressed in a nice way. Léa Seydoux's character represents the aimless revolutioner who wants to express their opposition to the Hotel's dictatorship by creating her own kind of dictatorship. We cannot deny that this might not only a social comment but also a political one from Yorgos Lanthimos as modern day politics are seperated in two worlds: Republicans-Democrats, Labor-Conservative, Left-Right. Therefore, this dystopian world is not that far from our own world.

P. S. I found both Colin Farrell and Rachel Weisz's acting amazing. Lanthimos' directing and choice of music (there were some Greek songs in there as well :) ) were incredible! Great song to end a movie (Ti einai afto pou to lene agapi)

Yorgos Lanthimos accomplished what no director could: He made a perfectly balanced (in terms of genre) movie. It's the first ever movie that has the perfect proportions of comedy, sci-fi and drama all together making a really beautiful film wrapped with an intriguing story.

The movie follows the story of Bella Baxter, an experiment-girl of Doctor Godwin Baxter (nicknamed "God" as he acts like a human-god: resurrecting people). Bella, having a brain of a child in the body of a 30year-old woman, was trapped inside God's house (grayscale) until a lawyer named Duncan Wedderburn wants to take Bella on a trip to meet the world (colour). When Bella gets out of her house the film turns from grayscale to colour (great trick there!). When the shots become colourful we can see some "Wes Anderson" colours in there, which made the film much more beautiful.

In terms of acting, I believe this is the best Emma Stone performance we've ever seen and she definitely deserves an Oscar for this role: playing a talking baby in the body of a grown-up. Willem Dafoe never disappoints with his incredible acting skills as always. However, I didn't like Mark Ruffalo's acting that much. I think he wasn't fit for this character. He was some kind of a... "comedic villain".

Regarding the story, it had many meanings and messages. Ethics (mainly bioethics) was one subject, the struggle of parenthood was another one, but the main purpose of the film is to show that "modern-day" people face the world in a very harsh way. One of the most stigmatizing movie scenes I've ever seen is the one in Alexandria when Bella realizes that the world isn't full of happiness and that people out there are dying unfairly. The moment she realized that, she wanted to help people lead happy lives and that's why she wanted to become a doctor. This is the way all people should face the world: with naivety, innocence and compassion. If a new-born child could speak to us about the world out there, it would say what Bella said to us through her story. She showed us that an ideal world of equality between men and women and a world of justice (where people get what they deserve in the end) is something quite obvious. So obvious that eventually this new-born child created this ideal world in her own backyard...

P. S.: No 10 stars because of too many sex scenes. Lanthimos could make the film more "edible" and shorter.

Wes Anderson started making these cinematic books-magazines with "The French Dispatch" and now for the first time ever we see a word-by-word-like movie adaptation of a book. The truth is that this is an entirely new genre invented by Wes Anderson, which makes this short film special. However, for me it was completely tiring. I was annoyed by the constant "I said", "he said", etc.

It is a good "bedtime short movie" to watch and enjoy not only because it is an intriguing story but also because it is beautiful (as all Wes Anderson films are). Wes Anderson's unique cinematography is perfect for short stories like this one.

The story might be intriguing in some ways as it talked about the true value of money but it was a bit cliché and boring for me. Therefore, I found the movie a bit "hollow".

P. S. Benedict Cumberbatch's acting made this short film ten times better than it would be. One star is just for this!

Guillermo Del Toro has given us many bizarre and surreal stories such as his Cabinet of Curiosities, his version of Pinocchio, Crimson Peak and more. After having watched all the forementioned Del Toro creations I decided to watch his Oscar winning film and I believe that it didn't deserve "Best Picture", because it's an 'ok' film.

The story is quite cliché with some changes that make it original: A mute protagonist who falls in love with an amphibian man/fish. What Del Toro tried to imply with this decision is that love has no boundaries and lovers can overcome every difficulty to be together. Even if these barriers include the danger of treason during Cold War era, lack of speech and completely different natures of the two lovers. Apart from this message, Del Toro tried to pass a message against racism and sexism through Michael Shannon's character, whom everyone hates from the first minute thanks to Shannon's great acting.

Speaking of acting, even if she was mute in the movie, Sally Hawkins did a great job and her acting was breath-taking. Regarding special effects and the whole narrative, Del Toro never disappoints.

However, I found the movie a bit boring and its love story a bit cliché. Del Toro tried to tackle so many issues (racism, sexism, homosexuality acceptance in the 1960s, the Cold War, the constant battle between the US and Russia to be more successful, spies, love without boundaries, mute people's struggle and more...) all in one movie of 2 hours. This "bombardment" of social issues in a surreal, dramatic, romantic movie made this a "cocktail" of too much stuff to process.

I watched this film right after watching "The Grand Budapest Hotel" which is considered as a more... "edible" Wes Anderson film. Wes Anderson revolutionized comedic adventure films with the forementioned movie and with "The French Dispatch" he revolutionized movie stories in general. He stepped away from the cliché and he made something original and yet... surreal.

The film feels like reading the magazine "The French Dispatch" because of the three writers narrating all the time. I believe that the whole film tries to prove the power of writing. If we were reading these stories, we would create images in our minds just like the movie did. So Wes Anderson actually got in our minds and created these surreal pictures just like we would.

Moreover, I consider the film to be satirical. The first story criticizes modern art (which cannot be easily understood by many) and those who take advantage of modern art for money. It's ironic though that this movie is in a way a form of modern art (which many people cannot understand), so that's why we can call this movie satirical.

Apart from modern art, with the second story, he criticizes young people's aimless revolutions and some young people's attitude of rejecting everything (I am referring to Juliette). Personally, I found the third story hollow and empty. There was no meaning and it was all set in a very surreal world. And why did they cast Willem Dafoe (this incredible actor) for such a minor role?

In conclusion, this movie is (like "The Grand Budapest Hotel") something to watch in order to relax with Wes Anderson's beautiful world, great characters and talented cast!

The Grand Budapest Hotel revolutionized Comedic Adventure films. The story resembles old Greek Finos Films movies (only Greek people will get this!) and we could say that it is a very basic fairy-tale storyline. However, the way this story is presented in this beautiful Wes Anderson colour palette and scenery makes it even more intriguing. Every single shot of this film can serve as your desktop wallpaper! Even if Willem Dafoe played a minor role in the movie, I believe that he was the best actor in it. This is a definitely a movie to rewatch if you want to relax and watch a non-dramatic, fun and beautiful movie.

Wes Anderson made it possible for an adventure film to be beautiful, cute and dressed in... pink!

I watched this film after watching "Loving Vincent", which I loved. Loving Vincent made me cry not only because of the moving story but also because of the way it was directed. The exact same thing happened with "At Eternity's Gate".

This time we had scenes with Vincent Van Gogh (who was the main character after all and not the son of a postman) and the way Willem Dafoe acted was breath-taking. Everyone could sympathize with the Vincent Van Gogh he played and we all felt sorry for the way people treated him.

In terms of direction, we can see some characteristics that made the movie special, such as the "first person scenes", when the camera was really close to people who talked with Van Gogh. This made you feel like you are the main character and got you in "Van Gogh's shoes". Apart from that, another feature that I liked was the repeated phrases echoing in Vincent's mind. This is something that many of us do when something shocking happens: we repeat the phrase we just heard many times so that we can realize what just happened. The scene I'm talking about is when Gaugin left Arles.

Furthermore, something that I liked about this film is the story. It didn't show us the 'conventional' story of Van Gogh killing himself, but the theory of him being killed by someone who bullied him and because Van Gogh was a man with a kind heart, he said he shot himself so the boy wouldn't get in any trouble. This last scene of him painting and the boys messing with him was deeply moving. He was a bullying victim because he was mentally ill. Therefore, Van Gogh was indeed born the wrong time...

After the ending of the movie, I actually started admiring Van Gogh's art and I realized how true is the quote mentioned in the movie: "Maybe God made me a painter for people who aren't born yet".