3096 Days (2013) @ 3096 Tage

How much weight did Antonia Campbell-Hughes lose to play a paedophile's muse? Apparently he kept her malnourished so she'd look more like daddy's little girl.

The real Natascha Maria Kampusch

At a glance:

3096 Days (2013) by Sherry Hormann (Desert Flower, 2009) is based on the 2010 autobiography of Natascha Maria Kampusch, the Austrian woman known for her abduction at the age of 10 back in 1998. Kampusch was held in a secret cellar by her kidnapper Wolfgang Přiklopil for more than eight years, until she escaped in 2006. The lass has gotten worldwide attention since and she's some kinda celebrity activist now, takin pics with Sri Lankan kids and whatnot.

Bad news on the doorstep:

Since the movie is based on her account of the harrowin events, we get a decent technical runaround e.g. the renovated dungeon and other physical details of the incarceration. However, while Antonia Campbell-Hughes really gives her all as Natascha and Thure Lindhardt makes a memorable villain, the little emotions are absent in this screenplay and her terrible ordeal -- one that you would expect to be riddled with desperation, reflection and total anguish -- seems as if it wasn't even a true story. Guess what? Maybe it isn't. There are plenty of documented instances where Miss Kampusch was caught lyin about the details and you can read online the many competin theories as to what really happened durin those 3096 days. See, some people think she's not so much a victim as she makes herself out to be. Apparently, she even cried when told about the fate of her abductor. All the speculation is infinitely more fascinatin than the movie proper, so do give it a Google. Read the IMDb boards, if you like. It would surely go some way towards explainin why these characters seem so one-dimensional. There simply isn't enough goin on here to convince the viewer than Natascha was bein held against her will.

"Fuck. I'm gonna miss prom night."

Perennial wonderment:

Maybe if the renowned German filmmaker and director Bernd Eichinger didn't die with his unfinished script, we'd have a better movie. After all, he did option her book and wanted Kate Winslet for Natascha, you know? Couldn't been like The Reader (2008), maybe. Anyway, this movie is apparently also based on his unfinished script.

Thirtysomething Antonia Campbell-Hughes playing a thirteen-year-old girl?
It would've been illegal to cast someone true-to-age, perhaps.

Home but never alone.

Reminds me of:

A bit of Trade (2007) and The Reader (2008) but those were well above average movies. This one's more like The Seasoning House (2012) if you're talkin about how hollow it feels.

I can't remember if I cried:

The sight of Antonia Campbell-Hughes in all her frail nakedness invites disgust and some sympathy but it's hard to invest in her character because we don't get to see what makes her tick. Some sequences in this drama approach art but somethin just ain't right with the whole setup. By the way, extended scenes of the girl in the nude do serve as one of the few ways by which we can feel some force of realism behind the turns of events, so you're pretty much completely shortchanged if you're watchin anythin less than the 1hr50min cut.

Most memorable line:

None. However I would like to mention that the dubbed British English dialogue is rather strange and off-puttin. Did they manage to go as far as they wanted to with this production idea? One reviewer I read remarked that you get Irish and Danish actors, playin Austrian people who talk with German accents.

Some of them want to use you.
Some of them want to be of use.

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A follow-up movie oughtta be interestin. One that disputes her version of events. It would've been a more meaningful endeavour that would've been taken seriously if little Amelia Pidgeon played the girl throughout the whole show, without an older actress supplantin her. Meanwhile, we can all watch Michael (2011) or go kidnap our own pre-pubescent chick to see for ourselves if it really is this easy to keep a girl in your cellar for 3096 days and take her out shoppin once in a while.★★
Bonus material:

So this is what Miss Kampusch does with her time these days.

The Inheritors (1998) @ Die Siebtelbauern

Sophie Rois and Simon Schwarz get fresh in a pig-pen for The One-Seventh Farmers.

At a glance:

"Hooray! We now own the shit we work on!"

Die Siebtelbauern (literally: The One-Seventh Farmers) is a most unusual film and I don't mean unusual like Being John Malkovich (1999) or Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975). Directed by Stefan Ruzowitzky (the Anatomie movies) and set in early 20th century rural Austria, it tells the story of how seven very poor farmhands work and toil on a miserable valley farm daily until one fine day their landlord is murdered and their lives are changed forever. The dead proprietor was heirless and surprisingly left a will which detailed pronounced insults to all his constantly mistreated workers, yet bequeathed them the said property! The other villagers and land owners are shocked and angry while the lucky seven tries to make sense of their newfound status. Instead of sellin it, they voted to keep the land and work on it themselves. This bold decision disrupts the rigid social order of the village and many people are unhappy. However, as events unfold it becomes apparent that there is more than meets the eye and a dark family secret could hold the key in settlin all affairs. Sounds like an entertainin story, no?

Simon Schwarz

Bad news on the doorstep:

I saw this many years ago but I remember bein disappointed. For that premise, it could have been a grippin drama but it was rather borin and confusin instead. Not sure what the director wanted the audience to derive from the story. It was too subtle to suggest there is a political message underpinnin it and yet too elaborate for one to think that there isn't. However, I enjoyed the Alpine backdrop very much and the scenes of mud-wrestlin in a pig pen or reapin crops from the field added a necessarily authentic rural feel to the movie.

"Nobody can beat me up anymore, right?"

Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?

The actors did alright by most standards and I particularly liked all the scenes at the dinin table where they discuss what to do next. Enjoyed this film in patches but not too impressed by it generally. With some nudity and sex, it's rated R in the States, whereas in the UK, the DVD release is rated 15. It runs 95 minutes and the disc contains a short cast filmography. Apparently this DVD is now out of print in the UK. Anybody wants to make me an offer for my copy? Actually I might give this a rewatch tonight since I was quite young when I first saw it.★★1/2

The Fisherman And His Wife (2005) @ Der Fischer Und Seine Frau

A fish veterinarian, the real McKoi.

At a glance:

What does one do when a woman outdoes a man in just about everythin? Relivin the 19^th century Grimm fairytale, the ageless issue between money and happiness is tackled with delightfully contemporary angles in The Fisherman And His Wife @ Der Fischer Und Seine Frau (2005). When fish vet Otto (Christian Ulmen) meets girl-next-door Ida (Alexandra Maria Lara) on a business trip to Japan, it was love at first sight and they tie the knot instantly. As Ida moves up in life with her brilliant idea of launchin a koi-themed line of clothin, the simplistic Otto refuses luxury or any sort of material improvement in life. Otto can’t understand why a big home is better than a smaller one, no more than Ida can how a man can stay so content with only the simple pleasures in life as comfort. As Otto refuses to do more lucrative fin transplants for the high-society collectors (he says it isn’t good for the fish), Ida’s koi apparel makes it big and her stardom as a fashion designer beckons. All the time, a pair of tategoi (‘maybe-fish’ that might change into an expensive variety as they grow) narrates their marital frustration with casual comic takes.

Love at first sight.

Bad news on the doorstep:

If you look at the visuals, it looks as if they're all from different movies. Yes, it's dissonant cross-cultural adventure that's probably serves a tourist fodder better than box office collection. Naturally, the Germans brought this in for a film festival in Malaysia.

Perennial wonderment:

Koi-themed clothes. For real.

Did you know that koi means love in Japanese? Neither did I but it’s not true anyway. Koi is a homophone for love, in Japanese. No surprise then that the oriental carp is a long-time token symbol of affection to the Japanese, just like Mandarin oranges (“kam”) are gold to the Chinese.

Reminds me of:

Alexandra Maria Lara & Simon Verhoeven.

Director & scribe Doris Dörrie

All the arguments I've ever had with so many women on rejectin material success. I wish I could sit them down to watch this. The Fisherman And His Wife is invitingly poignant without enforcin too much cod philosophy on a general audience, if you'd pardon the pun. Punctuated by catchy English-language songs, it feels like watchin any other Hollywood rom-com, only that it is clever as much as it is colourful. Losin passion is the bane of any marriage and rediscoverin that element is key to keepin a conventional relationship alive – but to have it told in various fish-related analogies (is a bigger aquarium always good?) gives any viewer so many easy anecdotes to amuse oneself with.

Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?
Doris Dörrie’s little gem is a winner. Much like its S&M dominatrix outfits and koi-motif scarves to the snobbish elitists and wacky fish doctors, The Fisherman And His Wife is the kind of assorted comedy that provides for anybody with some semblance of a funny bone. How should any fishy story end? Always swimmingly. ★★★1/2
Bonus material:

Looks fun, whatever that is happenin here.

Anatomy (2000) @ Anatomie

"Hi, stud. Do you know the strongest muscle in a woman's body?"

At a glance:

Anatomical obscenity, anyone? Stefan Ruzowitzky German slasher was apparently big bucks back home and did well enough to get an English-dubbed release Stateside. It's a decent premise at first really. A promisin medical student gets the chance of a lifetime to attend the prestigious Heidelberg Institute for physicians and surgeons. She befriends a fellow student and a terminally-ill drifter on the train on the way there and they get accustomed to life on campus. Horror of horrors, the two girls are shocked to find the drifter on the dissectin table in one lecture. As events unfold, we are shown the possibility that there might be a sinister conspiracy goin on in the institute.
Bad news on the doorstep:
Suspenseful but not the kind of terror that lasts years after you've seen the film. The story disintegrates into a shock-value number in the last act as we are shown some rather unimpressive twists, included no doubt to convince us that this isn't another thoughtless run-of-the-mill gore fest. I knew about this film only because of Franka Potente, the lead actress from Run Lola Run (1998).

Perennial wonderment:
Don't we all love traditional FX instead of CG crap? The special effects here are pretty good. You can read on IMDb that the models of preserved human bodies are so well-done it has been offered up for real life medical teachin.

"I knew it. I should've just studied Accounting."

Reminds me of:

I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997).

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Less blood than Saw (2004), more story than Scream (1996) and just about the same durability as The Skeleton Key (2005) or The Descent (2005). Two and a half stars. The DVD release I got is loaded with extras - deleted scenes, interviews, featurettes, storyboards, filmographies and even a very sexy Anna Loos music video of the track My Truth. Come to think of it, the soundtrack is quite alright and was released as an album, I found out. If you like it, you can consider movin on to its sequel - Anatomie 2 (2003.

Trailer for the curious:

Bonus material:

Japanese poster for Anatomie (2000). Neat, no?

The Reader (2008)

"Will you read to me?"

At a glance:
Easily the weakest of Daldry's three features, this muted, half-baked examination of German guilt does however come off as more accessible compared to the rest - well, maybe not Billy Elliot. Clockin in over two hours, we're taken on the psychosexual scandal-soaked sexcapades of one Michael Berg, who chances upon an older woman named Hanna Schmitz one summer and subsequently experiences an affair most 15-year-olds never get. The jammy bastard. Years later, he ends up an aspirin lawyer in court, listenin in to the case of his one-time lover, now bein tried for war crimes. A fleetin love story just as much as it is a study of shame and guilt.
Bad news on the doorstep:
Wanted this to win Oscar for Best Pic but it was the least watched nominee. Malaysian theatrical release was painfully cut up.
Reminds me of:
Illiterate whore I knew. Needed help with instructions on her meds.
Watch out for:
Oscar-winnin perf from Kate Winslet, one of the finest Brit actresses I've watched. Impossible to discuss this film without creditin her fragile yet angry, womanly countenance, a precision in actin that elevates the film to another level of cinematic delight. She has done better (Holy Smoke, Sense And Sensibility) but her intense, annoyed portrayal of an older lover is arrestin. The castin of young David Kross (who learned English for the movie and was afforded a special schedulin arrangement so that his sex scenes could be filmed when he turned 18) is creepy because he looks so much like Heath Ledger. However, together with soulful Ralph Fiennes as the old Berg and other peripherals like timeless siren Lena Olin, it was always a line-up that seemed to be built around Winslet's stellar performance, although it obviously wasn't meant to.
Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?
Disappointed with Daldry's inclination to understate things in his direction, despite the apparently successful partnership with screenwriter David Hare to adhere to Bernhard Schlink's source material. The greatest triumph of this movie is the humanisation of Hanna Schmitz as the SS guard. A wonderful and completely plausible explanation on how ordinary people could do horrendous things when we're outside lookin in. Had my hopes too high, though.★★★