Change Your Image
woodandwood
Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
Ich bin dann mal weg (2015)
At least some sort of spirituality
I enjoyed the movie because I did not know exactly what the famous Jacob's way in practice was: an exceptionally long, but well-organized walk for pilgrims from France Pyrenees to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. For me it was a way to start thinking of organizing it, too, yet keeping in mind that a movie is a movie and reality is reality.
The movie is a rare occasion today to watch a story which has God in it. At least somehow. In fact, I thought that a pilgrim's Faith would be an obvious starting point. And yet, not only the main character, but all of them seen on the screen do not believe or fail to really make sense of God (Christianity was never mentioned), preferring to speak about "God" as a general term. It is true that the main character at one point towards the end claims to have found God, yet it is not clear what kind of effects this has got in his life. I also wonder what kind of meaning a pilgrimage has if a married lady has sex with a total stranger after expressing the statement that the walk must be conducted alone for a proper spiritual experience. Are we talking about a pilgrimage or a summer trek in nature?
I appreciated however both the acting and the pace of the movie. Devid Striesow gives a good performance. One cannot feel but close and sympathise with the character he portrays. He is gentle all over the movie and a simple, humble, good spirited yet down-to-earth person preferring often the comfort of a hotel and a bus trip to the hardship of the real pilgrimage, resulting in a very true and transparent person, which is I think the right attitude to start a pilgrimage, in the end.
Overall, I recommend this movie, which for once opens to the sky both literally with great outdoor scenes and spiritually for the meaning of life and the quest for God.
Native America (2018)
Biased, unhistorical, poorly researched
I am watching chapter II in the French translation. At one point this documentary states that in 1493 the Catholic Church wrote a document (at the origin of the " Discovery Doctrine" ) which allowed to kill and take as slaves the native people.
This is a huge mistake. The Church never allowed to kill nor to take as slaves the native people quite the contrary (see the Papal bull Creator Omnium of 1434 which is a defense of native people of the Canaries and an order to free them if taken as slaves.)
In that passage they show a document in Latin as "proof" but it is the Dudm Siquidem of 1493 which was basically setting a geographic division of the new territories between Spain and Portugal and an exhortation to train and educate the native population in the Christian faith, which was meant in the proper missionary way.
The mistake is even larger when one can study that in 1493 the Church wrote 6 other documents on the topic which never contains any order to kill nor to capture anybody. The misunderstanding is due to the author confusing another document, the Dudum Diversam which was written in 1455. This was about the war with the Saracens (Muslims) in the Mediterranean and yes, being a war, it was customary to kill and take slaves on both parts, logically (the Vatican being for century a state without a proper army to defend itself):
I can't believe that so gross a mistake can be made,
To end the comment, it's known that things got wrong for many reasons, individual behavior of soldiers, pandemics, ignorance, fear, greed, etc.
The other documentary series "Conquistadores" is much nearer to the real facts than this series, in my opinion.
Also read the newly appeared book "Madre patria" by Marcelo. Gullo Amadeo to read how things really happened.
Finally, the documentary shows the very famous "painting" (in reality an image impressed instantaneously on the indios Juan Diegos' jacket according to eye witnesses) of the Virgin Mary (Virgin of Guadalupe) but no word about it is uttered. A bit too much for not believing that this documentary is instrumental to spread falsehood on the Christian Faith.
The Midnight Sky (2020)
Not so bad, but the story is typical of the period we live in
The movie has potential...for another story. I don't enter the silliness of the scientific idea of (the usual) mankind populating another planet and other parts, but this is for me a typical story which portrays the years we live in. That is a time of environmental fanatics combined with day-after situations. The result is a message of total mistrust in man, of total desolation and lack of joyful future and where a superior Being is only mentioned once in over two hours movie...for cursing.
Keeping the Faith (2000)
Hollywwood religion: it doesnt believe in God
This is hollywood in its purest essence, or God as they want it: a toy among other toys. In practical terms, showing good feelings, using good words, funny scenes, cute and positive scenes, happiness for everybody...to stress God absolute irrelevance to man's own self.
These guys have no clue of what priesthood is really about. I guess the same is true for the rabbi portrayed in the movie.
Risen (2016)
Good starting point, much less towards the end
In my opinion the approach of this movie is excellent, that is narrating the resurrection from the eye of a contemporary roman soldier who witnessed it from a very special point of view: the one of an Roman officer who received the order to find Jesus's "stolen" body.
While for about 3/4 of the movie the plot is really convincing, as soon as we get closer to Jesus the less appealing the story becomes.
There are some clear problems starting from an ugly Jesus face (instead all who met him also in private revelations state that he is very handsome). Then his body is actually too fat on the cross and not so much hurt from the precedent flagellation. There is no water and blood coming out the wound that the roman soldier Quinto Cassio Lancino caused (and who became a Christian according to the Tradition)
The other points are even more important. Jesus does not talk in the movie, he is quite embarrassingly out of words, while in reality He is a sublime speaker at all level. The authors clearly don't know what to say.
The movie also makes a capitol mistake: the cloth in the tomb was folded and did not lay down. In the contemporary hebrew code of behavior that even children knew, this meant that "the master will return" as used at dining tables.
In short, there is not much historical precision concerning the Gospel reproduction, while there is an excellent insight of the daily Roman life of a soldier in the Holy Land of the time.
You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger (2010)
The story flows, the message is hopeless
I wonder why Dia decides to go with Roy to start with as there is no apparent appeal in him. It's not the actors' mistakes. They follow a screenplay. For the rest, well the story flows very well and it is also well performed. Probably life is like this for many who are..without other values. And of course, Woody Allen keep saying that marriage is just a joke out there. Nevertheless, I quite like this movie because it is a story well narrated and filmed. No boring moments and also a touch with surprises. The movie is entertaining and quite light, so to say. But only apparently. In my opinion, the actors are all good although they aren't always given the chance to develop their own character in a more convincing way especially for Dia, Cristal and the writer in coma
Lucy (2014)
How not to write a screenplay
It's a movie OK? But who wrote the screenplay? Why so many errors? Killing people in public and no police show up ever, daily life goes undisturbed? Entering a hospital with a machine gun, walking for a long way and nobody of the many people there notice anything? And Lucy is so much smarter than us but she doesn't even think about it and try to hide it? In Paris main center and full daylight a convoy of gunmen and again nobody really reacts even after a lengthy shootout? And what is the purpose of that bunch of bad guys, actually just ten or eleven, to escape from a city center and from France untouched after the noise they make? What is this? A kids game? Not to mention the end message of the movie and the ridiculous Darwin theory explanation. The scientists there look more like idiots...Please wake up to reality a bit.
A good example of how to turn a movie adrift...
To Rome with Love (2012)
OK, but
Woody Allen portrays a reality of the very rich, where resources, money and time are endless even for young people (who have for instance plenty of wine bottles at disposal). Life is an adventure without serious problems and people only need to think what to do and think. On top of that, adultery is perhaps seen too much as an innocent game. I gave the stars to the story which is at least well paced, a bit cliché too but also "cinema" which means dreaming and caricature but above all for the beautiful images of the city of Rome which for me is really (as a tourist) the most beautiful city in the world. I enjoyed the movie, but, on marriage, fidelity and values, I was left with the feeling of listening to the wrong teacher.