Toilets and Film

Posted on May 3, 2007 in Film

The most memorable of the films that I have watched recently has to be Notes on a Scandal, notable for having a sympathetic villainess. There’s a fair bit of humor along the way in this tale of a art teacher who is doubly victimized by a fifteen year old boy and an older teacher who sees her job and her love life as matters of control.

Volver is a film by Pedro Almodovar for which Penelope Cruz was nominated as Best Actress. I’ve noticed in European films that they’re not afraid to show all sides of life. Sex is often mentioned in this regard, but directors also do not hesitate to take the camera into the watercloset for an obligatory “taking a shit” shot (which also happens in Notes. In America, we get the obligatory “push the bully back” shots which doesn’t happen all that often in real life, does it? When it does, we usually end up in jail for it.

Another Pedro Almodovar film that we watched was Dark Habits which was about a convent of nuns given over to rescuing desperate women and self-abasement which took the form of taking on odd names such as Sister Rat of the Sewers. The nuns like to shoot up with heroin or take acid so they can have visions. Not Almodovar’s best work, but amusing.

Michael Palin wrote the script for The Missionary which starred the former Monty Python star and Maggie Smith who, for reasons unknown, has never appeared on any list of prominent anorexics to my knowledge. Color Me Kubrick, starring John Malkovich, relates the true story of an utterly inept con man who passed himself off as Stanley Kubrick.

I liked Sweet and Lowdown, Woody Allen’s mockumentary about Emmet Ray, purported to be the second best jazz guitarist. Samantha Mortensen does a miraculous job of playing a mute who is probably less idiotic than people make her out to be. I don’t recall any toilet scenes which is surprising because Allen aspires to being a European style auteur.

[tags]film,Pedro Almodovar,Woody Allen,cinema,movies[/tags]