In which Icelandic cinema is completely snubbed

To start out with, I have to say that it is pretty good progress for me to be listing favorite anythings. As a small child I had an aversion to doing so, lest it hurt the non-favorite’s feelings. I would try and avoid it, or pick one that no one else picked. So if you asked me what my favorite color was in first grade, I would say orange. No one ever picks orange.

I no longer anthropomorphize colors, but I also attach less importance to the whole favorites concept. Now if you ask me what my favorite color is, it will depend on my mood. It has been blue, red, yellow, gray, and pink. I can’t remember if it has ever been green, but it hasn’t been orange, even though it is a perfectly fine color.

That being said, I can’t really give a top five foreign films that would feel right—I just need to break it down by country. Actually, it is more that I am breaking it down by country and language. There are a lot left out, because I usually remember movies that I want to see in groups, so in my rental queue there are long stretches of Japanese, Iranian, and Italian films coming up. Japanese and Iranian will be pretty new, but I have seen some Italian films already, and we will start there.

Italian – Il Postino.

It seems like most of my family there has a strong affection for Life is Beautiful, and I do too for that matter, but Il Postino touches me more. Oddly, the first three Italian films I saw were these and Pizzicata, and I started to wonder if I would ever see an Italian film where the man lives. Then I saw The Bicycle Thief. He lives, but it is infinitely more depressing.

Spanish – Mujeres al Borde de un Ataque de Nervios (Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown).

It is so funny, and colorful, and wow Antonio Banderas is young. Also, things work out pretty nicely considering how many complications get thrown in. That is actually breaking it down by language, rather than country, but is there a point in breaking down which of the two Argentinean films I have seen is my favorite? I think I have only seen one each from Mexico and Colombia. If we go by continents though, South America is Tango. It isn’t really a great film, because it is a dance movie and so the point is to get to the next dance number and so you sacrifice some things, but I really like the dance numbers.

French – He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not (À la Folie…Pas du Tout).

I need more people to see this one, because if you haven’t, I can’t talk about it without spoiling it. Suffice it to say that the first half of the movie is engrossing, and then you find out that the director has played a trick on you and it keeps getting more brilliant.

Chinese – Not One Less

I like the journey that it goes on. The heroine really does not start out sympathetically at all, but somehow things turn around and you get fully invested, and then you get a mega-happy ending. I saw Spirited Away and Rabbit Proof Fence on the same day, and in both cases you have young girls overcoming the odds primarily through persistence, and I thought there was room for a trilogy. I thought the third film might be Bend it Like Beckham, but then I saw it and it wasn’t. Not One Less is the right companion piece.

Truly for cinematography, there is no one that I admire more than Zhang Yimou, and this film is not really his showcase for it. For that, I can’t imagine a more beautifully shot and beautiful film than Hero, but this is a more personal film, and I think more relatable. After all, the movies that you admire and the ones you like are not necessarily the same.

Mentally, I know that Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is a better film than Iron Monkey, which was a little too slap sticky. However, the comic tone helped me feel that I had better odds of a happy ending, and the final battle on the poles with the fire is awesome. When they do the flying wire work I don’t believe it, so it takes me out of the movie. With that scene, I just bought it. I’m sure they weren’t really working over fire without safety equipment, but you shouldn’t be thinking that during the movie and during the movie I was only thinking “Wow.”

I guess that is it. I don’t think I really have a favorite Australian film (Rabbit Proof Fence is a bit of a downer), and if you do British, is that one or do you separate out all the areas? (England: About a Boy, Ireland: The Secret of Roan Inish, etc.) I will say this, I understand the point that they were trying to make with Strange Brew, but it was still a really annoying film, and if I ever decide to have a favorite Canadian film, it will not be that.

Anyway, Le Chiavi di casa should be arriving soon, but right now all we are watching are Christmas specials. I think I will review some tomorrow.