barbudean
29Apr12
what to say about the ending? that scene will remain forever embedded in my head.
One of the best photography in film I've come across. A remarkable piece, which left some impressive images in my head.
Slow, yes, but rightly slow -- the last twenty five minutes or so of the film has so much power due to the way Tsai has developed the rhythms and the way the viewer has learned to watch it -- in particular the continuous return to the pool in the construction site. Norman Atun is absolutely amazing, as usual some of the greatest film actors are non-professional actors!
frustrating for awhile there. had me questioning why I watch things like this, but the final passages are so rewarding the rest recedes quickly into a memory. A movie dedicated to the intimate art of looking at the person next to you while they are asleep.
This could have been titled "All the Vermeers in Malaysia"- a series of interior tasks sublimely lit and soundtracked by the outside world via windows. It's one of the most beautiful films of the decade. Even if the resolution of the sexual crises at the end seems a bit pat, the characters suffered for it and the noxious mist gives the proceedings a mythical quality anyway, so it works.