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Upstream Color (2013)
Man vs Nature: What We Must Overcome to Instead Find Harmony
In a sentence: I believe this movie is about the societal treatment of human beings as commodities such as hogs and cattle as mused by Jean Jacques Rousseau.
Very little about the world of upstream color is explicitly explained, but it can be inferred that Thief and The Sampler are employees of an exotic plant company that sells flowers bloomed into rare colors. These plants are cultivated by, and stick with me here: drugging an unsuspecting victim with a psychedelic/hypnotic maggot that makes you extremely suggestible. The worm enters the bloodstream and spreads throughout the body. While hypnotized for multiple days straight Thief liquidates their bank accounts and ruins their lives. He takes away their sense of self as they lose their job, friends, home etc... In essence all victims become a part of the worm "hive-mind". After full liquidation The Sampler then uses his sound/vibrational device used to unearth worms to lure the mindless victims to him, at which point he surgically removes the worms and performs a blood transfusion between a victim and a pig. This is the film at one of its most metaphorical moments, so my interpretation is that their very soul is transferred to the pig. One scene that comes to mind supporting this theory along with the "greater societal greed issue" is the scene of Kris at the doctors office where they refer to what I believe is her missing soul as a cancer that has been removed. The pigs with human souls are all herded in one pen on a farm. When two pigs find each other in the pen, at which point their counterpoint humans find each other and do the sex (or vice versa), the prospective piglets are taken and drowned in a stream. These dead piglets release a dye that gets into the water supply, and thus the pretty exotic flowers which are then cultivated to presumably be sold. That's about it.
The movie is about two victims finding themselves again by connecting with each other and nature, which we should be a part of, not separate from. They do this by using the works of Henry David Thoreau as dialogue. Kris eventually finds and kills The Sampler, then the victims all come to renovate the farm into a sanctuary, where the piggies are loved and cared for. I was not expecting such a hopeful ending.
Upstream Color didn't really resonate with me in the way Primer did, but Primer is in my top 10 favorites of all time.
Blade Runner 2049 (2017)
A lonely boi movie of the highest regard
In a word, this movie is excellent. In my opinion the main thing keeping it from being a "perfect" movie is the climax, where we get a nebulous threat from our villian played by Leto to Deckard/Ford: "I have ways to make you talk off world".
After which our protagonist K/Joe intercepts them on the way, setting the stage for the final superhuman android fight taking place. I will fully admit that this isn't much more than a nitpick, but from a storytelling standpoint it feels weakly motivated compared to the rest of the film.
Other than that, other notes I have would literally be nitpicks so no need to mention them, Amazing cinematography, very good storytelling, 9/10.
Infinity Pool (2023)
Infinity pool has depth, but lacks cohesion
To quickly summarize the plot and themes, infinity pool is a peek into the lives of rich people on holiday in poor countries. They outright disrespect and abuse everything around them, from the culture and customs of the country they're in to the other tourists, and they never face consequences.
Specifically, while on holiday in a military guarded compound, Gabi (Mia goth) and her husband decide to toy with our protagonist James (Skarsgard) and his wife by giving them a taste of their specific brand of debauchery. It's made clear that James and his wife are in a loveless relationship, which makes it easy for him to slip up. Hard drugs, swinger parties, killing locals, kidnapping officials, cloning themselves for the purpose of watching those clones get murdered... there's also themes of gentrification and appropriation.
The cloning process mentioned above is actually the "punishment" for the crimes they commit, but by the end it's quite clear that they more than enjoy it as they kill multiple clones throughout the movie.
In the end, James is in too deep into the world of abundant sin without fear of repercussions. The rich characters easily transition back to their normal lives at home once the vacation is over, leaving him to rot with the trauma they caused and the beast they awakened in him. James ends up going back to the resort during the rainy season alone.
This might be a reach but my final observation is that there's also something about confronting and "killing" your weakest self in order to get out of a rut?
An interesting concept with solid themes and great visuals, but in my opinion the execution was lacking and flow was a problem. Often times things were just happening, without any cohesion between adjacent scenes. The inciting incident itself is quite jarring: at about 30-35 minutes in, James is the perpetrator of a hit and run where he's caught shortly after. Then all of the sudden an official just comes in and matter of factly explains to him that as punishment for murdering a local he's being cloned, and that clone will be murdered in front of him. If Brandon tightens up the storytelling juuuuust a tad, I could see him becoming one of my favorite modern filmmakers.
The Pale Blue Eye (2022)
ISO: Tension, Characterization
I was looking forward to watching The Pale Blue Eye. One of the great character actors of our time is back in one of my favorite genres, horror-thriller. But in the end, I honestly found it quite boring (before you harp on this take, know that Haneke is one of my favorite directors. Checkmate). It was really just a noir version of your generic buddy detective movie where the characters are nothing more than entirely too clever.
I believe this film fundamentally failed the philosophy of "show don't tell" by narrating to us just about every detail of its characters. From the outset where we're told Landor's motivations through not-so-subtle dialogue, to the dueling monologues at the end where they describe to us how they solved this intricate mystery with the sheer will of their massive genius. In fact there is a resounding lack of characterization in general, everyone's defining feature is Shakespearean wit. Actually interesting characters more often than not are those that feel like they could be real people.
I also felt little tension leading to the underwhelming climax, in fact I paused the movie at just over an hour debating if I should finish as nothing was really hooking me in. The final revelations were interesting, with Bale and Melling giving it their absolute all, but I don't think it was worth the slog it took to get there.
Both leads gave solid performances, and the cinematography was beautiful at times, the story just didn't do it for me. 5/10
With all that being said, I'll go ahead and out myself as somewhat of a hypocrite. Despite also having most of the tropes I just described, I rather enjoyed the first Knives Out. I feel that they built tension properly, and while characters were definitely charicature-ish they were much more interesting.
Speak No Evil (2022)
The Spiritual, Albeit Less Effective, Sequel to Funny Games
The inverse of a home invasion film: where the victim family goes to the bad guy's house willingly for him to continuously torture them.
How long can the villains wage overt psychological warfare on our cowardly guests until they get the hint to leave the house? How long can I the viewer endure the torture of a seemingly endless first act which continuously edges me with the possibility of the actual confrontation? Is this actually a clever, funny games-esque assault on the fourth wall and my expectations on what to experience as a filmgoer? It's very clearly inspired by the Haneke twist on the home invasion film. Both involve set up after set up that the filmmakers purposefully don't pay off.
But, what made Funny Games work is the added layers of turning every common film trope it could think of on its head, using plot devices to create the illusion of hope for both victim and viewer. Speak No Evil replaces this idea with the excruciating fecklessness of the victims (more specifically the husband). His inability to first see the growing bouquet of red flags shown by the hosts or stand up for his family amid escalating verbal abuse, then his inability to escape the villains even though given ample opportunities. In my opinion that didn't work quite as well. Instead of dread with a sliver of hope, I would find myself instead with the feeling of my eyes rolling to the back of my head.
Not a bad flick, good acting, good cinematography, solid subtle score. To me, the core idea of it all just got tiring.