Netflicking
Aug. 8th, 2005 06:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annuinWe watched some Netflix rentals this week, for the first time in quite a while. We ended up watching The Pianist and Girl with a Pearl Earring.
** Some spoilery bits **
The Pianist
Starring Adrien Brody and directed by Roman Polanski.
It's set in Poland and follows Jewish pianist Wladyslaw Szpilman during World War 2 in the ghetto of Warsaw, Poland. In a way it's a very passive film, because you follow Wladek, and he's not a particularly active character, you just watch him endure the war more than anything else. It's not like he joins up with the resistance or goes off and does stuff... stuff is done to him, other people are the ones helping him out while he generally waits. However, this doesn't make the film boring or uninteresting, and it's with much credit to Adrien Brody. But then he did win the Best Actor Oscar for this role.
I had a hard time watching the early parts of The Pianist to be honest, especially the parts where they show the systematic brutality and degradation perpetrated against the Jewish population. There's an especially horrific scene in which the Szpilman family watches a Nazi raid on a house across the street from them while they're living in the ghetto, it was just gutwrenching.
Watching scenes where Wladyslaw is struggling to survive was also hard, and the scenes where he's in hiding in a house that has a piano is very poignant indeed.
All in all a very worthwhile movie to watch, but it's not necessarily the happiest movie you'll see. Adrien Brody is excellent in his role, as are the entire cast really. I also really loved the cinematography and use of colours.
Girl with a Pearl Earring
Based on the novel by Tracy Chevalier, about the painting by Johannes Vermeer. Starring Colin Firth, Scarlett Johanssen and Cillian Murphy.
I've never read the book, so I don't know how faithful it is, but as a movie it works well. It presents a theory as to how Vermeer's famous painting might have come into existence.
The story follows, and is seen from the perspective of, Griet, a peasant maid who goes to work for the master painter Vermeer in the city of Delft. She strikes up an unusual bond with Vermeer being that she is the only person around him who really understands his work, the colour of the light, the nuances. This bond results in Vermeer's wife being jealous, and one of his children who dislikes Griet goes out of her way to cause trouble for Griet and to get her fired. Griet ends up being put into difficult situations because she's a housemaid who is supposed to be doing chores, and the fact that Vermeer keeps wanting her to help him with various painting related chores. All of this heightens the taut relationships in the house.
Also Griet has to fend off the advances of Vermeer's patron van Ruijven, who is ultimately the one who commissions the work. As a side plot there is also a budding romance with Cillian Murphy, who plays Pieter, a butcher's son. I wish they hadn't given him red hair, it didn't work too well.
I liked the movie, even though it's a bit odd, and I can't put my finger on the reason why. It also gives an interesting look at life in 17th century Delft/Holland.
The girl who plays the obnoxious daughter rubs me the wrong way... there's something about her. She was also in The Others, and something bugged me about her then too, I don't know why. I guess in both she plays girls that are kind of obnoxious.
Nice cinematography, I liked the use of light, which is something that's a key element in Vermeer's paintings... so to have that used effectively in the movie is a nice touch.
Well worth seeing.
** Some spoilery bits **
The Pianist
Starring Adrien Brody and directed by Roman Polanski.
It's set in Poland and follows Jewish pianist Wladyslaw Szpilman during World War 2 in the ghetto of Warsaw, Poland. In a way it's a very passive film, because you follow Wladek, and he's not a particularly active character, you just watch him endure the war more than anything else. It's not like he joins up with the resistance or goes off and does stuff... stuff is done to him, other people are the ones helping him out while he generally waits. However, this doesn't make the film boring or uninteresting, and it's with much credit to Adrien Brody. But then he did win the Best Actor Oscar for this role.
I had a hard time watching the early parts of The Pianist to be honest, especially the parts where they show the systematic brutality and degradation perpetrated against the Jewish population. There's an especially horrific scene in which the Szpilman family watches a Nazi raid on a house across the street from them while they're living in the ghetto, it was just gutwrenching.
Watching scenes where Wladyslaw is struggling to survive was also hard, and the scenes where he's in hiding in a house that has a piano is very poignant indeed.
All in all a very worthwhile movie to watch, but it's not necessarily the happiest movie you'll see. Adrien Brody is excellent in his role, as are the entire cast really. I also really loved the cinematography and use of colours.
Girl with a Pearl Earring
Based on the novel by Tracy Chevalier, about the painting by Johannes Vermeer. Starring Colin Firth, Scarlett Johanssen and Cillian Murphy.
I've never read the book, so I don't know how faithful it is, but as a movie it works well. It presents a theory as to how Vermeer's famous painting might have come into existence.
The story follows, and is seen from the perspective of, Griet, a peasant maid who goes to work for the master painter Vermeer in the city of Delft. She strikes up an unusual bond with Vermeer being that she is the only person around him who really understands his work, the colour of the light, the nuances. This bond results in Vermeer's wife being jealous, and one of his children who dislikes Griet goes out of her way to cause trouble for Griet and to get her fired. Griet ends up being put into difficult situations because she's a housemaid who is supposed to be doing chores, and the fact that Vermeer keeps wanting her to help him with various painting related chores. All of this heightens the taut relationships in the house.
Also Griet has to fend off the advances of Vermeer's patron van Ruijven, who is ultimately the one who commissions the work. As a side plot there is also a budding romance with Cillian Murphy, who plays Pieter, a butcher's son. I wish they hadn't given him red hair, it didn't work too well.
I liked the movie, even though it's a bit odd, and I can't put my finger on the reason why. It also gives an interesting look at life in 17th century Delft/Holland.
The girl who plays the obnoxious daughter rubs me the wrong way... there's something about her. She was also in The Others, and something bugged me about her then too, I don't know why. I guess in both she plays girls that are kind of obnoxious.
Nice cinematography, I liked the use of light, which is something that's a key element in Vermeer's paintings... so to have that used effectively in the movie is a nice touch.
Well worth seeing.
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Date: 2005-08-09 01:25 am (UTC)