Tiago's brain dump

If, a few years ago, someone told me I would be absolutely mesmerized by a movie set entirely inside a sandpit and revolving around only two characters, I would have laughed at their faces. Also, if I were also told I would prefer the director's cut, 147-minutes long version of that movie, in which the story is unfolded ever more slowly, I would have said they were drunk. Yet, here I am with nothing but good things to write about  Woman in the Dunes . The story revolves around a man ( Okada Eiji ), who ended up stranded in the desert while looking for a rare variant of tiger beetle. Convinced by the local villagers to spend the night in the hut of a woman ( Kishida Kyōko ), located at the bottom of a sandpit, upon waking up he finds himself unable to leave: he has been trapped into helping the woman fill buckets of sand to prevent her house from being buried by the dunes. " If I fall behind, my house will be buried. Then the house nextdoor would be the next. [...]...

Zhang Yimou is by far my favorite Chinese director. Even though he seems to be losing steam since Hero (2002) IMHO, he has never lost his eye for creating beautiful shots, be it with modest budgets ( Ju Dou -- 1990) or huge ones ( Curse of the Golden Flower -- 2006). Raise the Red Lantern , however, stands tall as his (and Zhao Fei 's, its cinematographer) crowning achievement. I don't remember ever having watched a movie so visually stunning and yet so devastatingly sad. Raise the Red Lantern chronicles a year in the life of Songlian ( Gong Li ), who, at the age of 19, was compelled into marrying a rich man. Her new world is, thus, comprised of the labyrinthine estate she shares with her husband and his three other wives, each one with a house of his/her own. Every day, the Master chooses one of his wives to spend the night with, and the chosen mistress has red lanterns lit in front of her house, gets a foot massage and has the privilege of selecting the follo...