SantiagoDM1

It's hard to encapsulate what Memories of Murder stands for as a movie, but I would say it's a sorrowful, but human experience, portraying various emotional stages throughout a harsh story which we, the audience, are going to live with the protagonists.

Cinematographically mesmerizing, it makes the most out of the scenery of everyday life on rural South Korea. Rain, solitude, quietness, the vastness of the grassland, the depth of a tunnel, all tainted by sepia colored lenses.

In this film Bong Joon-ho proves that he not only is an incredible storyteller, but also master in composition and camera movement. One of the finest examples is the scene where a new body is discovered. Here, the director unfolds the situation with a long take through the grassland, taking us on a trip in the disaster that Detective Park Doo-Man is going through as reporters get into the murder scene, a tractor erases a footprint, police officials falling as they try to get to the place, etc.

One of the biggest achievements resides in its pacing, achieving a subtle and brief change of moods, the film takes its risks with the ludicrous methods of Detective Cho Yong-koo without making the viewer think that some particular scene is out of place. The chase scene inevitably comes to my head as another prove of Bong Joon-ho ability with the camera, as he doesn't abuse any resource, he sneaks it by switching between quick cuts and long takes.

Bong's films are always impregnated with a political background that includes class struggle, heavy bureaucracy, corruption & civil guard brutality. The Host, Mother, Snowpiercer, Okja are clear examples of this and Memories of Murder isn't an exception. South Korean police force is depicted as an inefficient and arrogant law enforcement political arm that isn't capable of accepting the case is beyond their capabilities and these feelings of discomfort and anger caused by the police's negligence are exacerbated by the political scenario South Korea was experiencing.

My final word on this masterpiece is the tunnel scene. It makes the film's final transition from what began as a crime thriller to an exasperating psychological and sorrowful cinematic experience as we grow fond with our desperate protagonist, in what seems to be his last try to see through the eyes of the number one suspect, which ends in a frustrated attempt to solve the case. This takes us to the ending of Memories of Murder, which I will say is one of the most powerful ever seen on film... as detective Park Doo-Man looks straight into the camera, breaking the fourth wall and sorrowfully starring at the audience, looking one last time for those indistinct murderous eyes within the average crowd.

10/10.

The Tree of Life presents an impressionist story of an American Midwestern family in the 1950s, which follows the vital course of the eldest son, Jack O'Brien by his formative growing-up period with his parents, and his two younger brothers, R.L. and Steve through the innocence of childhood until the disappointment of his mature years, in his attempt to reconcile a complicated relationship with his father. Jack finds himself lost in the modern world, seeking answers to the origins and meaning of life while questioning faith.

It is a rumination of life itself in the visage of human existence. A filmic discourse through the origin the universe, the birth and grow of life on Earth, in which an eternal flash-forward of the couple's grown-up son infiltrates surreptitiously in a visual and spiritual epic deeply compromised to resonate with pertinent questions full of intricate profundity.

The film is presented into two differentiated parts, the first one begins with journey through the cosmos, where Malick proposes a tour full of opulent images and admirable beauty. It is an introductory part to what comes next, a way to take us and prepare for the history of the family itself, which is already the second part of the film, and in which we can already notice a clear symbolism of what is relevant.

Malick's unconventional storytelling, poetic conception of the story and permanent use of hand held camera breeds special intimacy featured on past contemplative works like The Thin Red Line. As ambitious as it seems, the film succeeds to reach the viewers most profound sensibilities with powerful and etherial imagery of existence.

The Tree of Life is a remarkable and honest experience that subtly asks a lost soul of the modern world for the meaning of life. It's possibly one the best movies ever made, if not the best, as Terrence Malick proves to possess the key of a room few other directors have opened before, the key to the true nature of film.

10/10

Ghost in the Shell tells the story of Major Kusanagi, a member of Sector 9, a private defense organization of the Japanese government to investigate cybercrime. Most of all members of sector 9 have altered their bodies, and have cybernetic augments. Our protagonist has only his physical human brain, the rest of his body is synthetic, what could be considered an android. Other comrades like Batou have cybernetic eyes, with multiple uses, while almost everyone has intracranial radio implants to be able to speak without using a microphone.

The post-Third World War society that presents us with the world of Ghost in the Shell, combined with the use of this cybernetic improvement technology of the body for all of society, generates a new vision of humanity. These improvements range from simple implants, entire limbs or improvements to productivity. As for example extendable and quick fingers for the secretariat or stronger arms for weight jobs. These improvements generate the concept that human consciousness is "bottled" and refers to it as the "ghost", the spectrum.

The story itself narrates the investigation of a cyber pirate, called the puppeteer, who is wreaking havoc on section 9 and the government, assaulting the bodies and memories of the people. Without going too far into the spoilers, Major Kusanagi, in her quest to know who she is, develops an intellectual fascination for him.

This is the starting point for the reflections that the film proposes later, especially those focused on what defines humanity. Where the barrier between the synthetic, the virtual and the real diffuses. Everything that makes you be you may not be yours.

Kusanagi spends the whole film wondering who she is and, in the end, reborn between angel feathers and symbols of resurrection. We find nihilistic metaphors in the motif of the reflections, where Kusanagi tries to glimpse what the real world is and who she is. The film's own presentation is replete with these symbols. Kusanagi emerging from the water and merging with his reflection. This symbology reflects our inability to perceive what is real. Oshii gets the viewer to interpret the abstract as a possible world that appears as real to our eyes, the world we inhabit. As the puppet master explains to Kusanagi that only she can see him through a crystal, but with his fusion She will be able to see clearly. The crystal and the water, the reflections, are poetic expressions of the idea "we can not know what is real". They are visual symbols of the epistemological nihilism that appears continuously throughout the film...

Ghost in the Shell has left an indelible mark on our cultural history, planting the seed of many ideas in different creators. Perhaps the most important and well-known is Lana and Lilly Wachowski's Matrix, the number lines in green when entering the system, the puppet master can be compared with Agent Smith, with his existentialist reflections, aesthetics and especially the fact of that our minds can be part of a world made entirely of data and consequently stop feeling the "reality" that we supposedly perceive.

It is truly a feature film that is a visual marvel, but the best way to enter into symbiosis with Ghost in the Shell is to watch the film and be predisposed to our mind merging with the delightful images and transport us to another reality.

10/10.