The Exterminating Angel

"The Exterminating Angel" begins with the preparation for a dinner party; yet one of the first things we see are the cooks and servants leaving for some unexplained reason, the only one that's left is the waiter who dutifully stays for the duration. The guests arrive after attending the opera, they then arrive again in the exact same way. I must admit, when I first saw this film, and watching the scene when the guests arrive, I felt I was suffering from deja vu, but when I watched it again, I realized this was on purpose and my mind wasn't playing tricks on me; it was rather a subtle surreal moment that fits into the tapestry with the rest of the movie.

The dinner begins, but the hostess is upset that her servants are leaving with no good excuse, it's almost as if they know something no one else knows. The dinner is served without much annoyance, and it is a success; the guests soon adjourn to the living room. We observe the people in their surroundings as they talk to each other, most of it stays rather superficial and unimportant, it remains very high brow and pleasant. However, once might notice that throughout this polite conversation, there are slight underlining moments of cruelty in it all. There is mention of a woman who is dying of cancer, and pretty soon she will go bald, another guest says what a shame it is since she had such a nice set of hair.

Pretty soon the night is winding down and it comes time for everyone to leave, but they all seem to find reasons to stay in the room. Pretty soon, they end up spending the night, with some onlookers noticing how rude and presumptuous some people are by taking off their jackets and lying down on sofas. In the morning, the hostess feels inconvenienced, realizing she must now serve breakfast for her now unwanted guests, but by now it has become obvious; everyone is incapable of leaving, they are stuck behind some unseen barrier within the living room. What they really are is at the mercy of director Luis Bunuel who seems to have sprung a trap for them.

"The Exterminating Angel" is many things at once, it's a scathing satire on the social upper class, a survival story, a supernatural mystery, and a study on the decline of a civilized society. Luis Bunuel directed this film, and he always had a firm handle on biting satire and surreal moments, both of which are figured in perfectly with this film. Here Bunuel is at his sinister best playing with these people as if they were rats in a cage, but what he's actually doing is exposing them for who they truly are and stripping away the confines of their class.

As the film moves along, the mood suddenly changes to desperation and fear. Outside the mansion, a vigil is being kept, police are brought in to investigate, yet no one seems to be able to enter the home; whatever is keeping the guests in is also keeping the rest of the people out.

It's uncertain as to the time lapse the people spend in the living room, but we assume that the days turn to weeks as they get more and more agitated and paranoid. An axe is used to chop through the wall at one point in order for them to get to the water pipes, the older and weaker ones are starting to die off, a pair of lovers end up killing themselves in private, while others are turning to madness. There is an inventive dream hallucination sequence where a woman sees a dismembered hand coming out from a closet and attacks her; she tries to stab it, only to wake up realizing it's the hand of another woman. Pretty soon things turn to anarchy and mob rule as they plot to kill the host who they believe is responsible for everything.

There are a lot of films like this one in the sense that they show a once civilized class decline into such a primal nature, but Bunuel has much more sinister ideas in mind, he's not only exposing the social hypocrisy with the ruling class, but he's also attacking their way of life. The social etiquette which plays such an important ritualistic role in their every day world is the key behind the whole mystery, and the reveal when you think about it is such a darkly comic punchline.

But Bunuel does not let these people off the hook, probably because he's having too much fun at these their expense. Once the guests are freed from one trap, they inevitably fall into another one caused by their reliance on their own class rules. There seems to be a glee from Bunuel in showing this kind of hypocrisy where people follow a certain set of moral rules or obligations, yet when they are stripped away from them, they are shown with very little morality.

Luis Bunuel was one of the greatest filmmakers of all time, he started off with controversy with his first film "Un Chien Andelou", and also his follow-up "L'Age Dore". Both films he collaborated with celebrated surrealist Salvadore Dali, but both were also about this wanting to break free and embrace your own inhibitions. "L'Age Dore" in particular showed this type of discontent with everyday rules with a devilish sense of humour. "The Exterminating Angel" was at the height of Bunuel's powers, he was in his sixties, but he was never more popular or prolific.

I myself have only seen a handful of Bunuel's films, but I would argue those I have seen are all great some ranking among my favorites. I take great joy in a filmmaker such as Bunuel, who seems to expose life's phoniness and that freedom from these types of class structures can be liberating. You can't help but laugh gleefully at the end of "The Exterminating Angel", once the mystery is solved, the curse is broken, and all is revealed, it's one big joke, but it's such a satisfactory punchline.

Early Summer

The films of Yasujiro Ozu are films I feel compelled to come back to again and again. They had a deep effect on me when I first viewed them in my early twenties, I was just out of college and had spent my life obsessed with movies thinking I had seen every type of film imaginable, but then I learned of Ozu. Ozu opened up a whole new world for me and not only influenced the way I look at films, but also the way I look at life. Over the years since I've discovered him, Ozu has become more and more relevant in the film world, and has even become a bigger part of the mainstream than ever before. His films were largely unavailable to western audiences until the 1970s, and since then his reputation has grown. Just recently his masterpiece "Tokyo Story" was picked number one in the Sight and Sound directors list of the greatest films of all time, and number three in the critics list right behind "Vertigo" and "Citizen Kane". I mention this only as a pleasure to know that Ozu's films continue to grow in stature and popularity, and as a fan of his, it's good to see his films are reaching out to further audiences than ever before.

Like all of my favorite directors, it is probably impossible for me to pick a favorite of Ozu's films, I see them mostly as a full body of work, that depict universal, and profound themes of family, marriage, loneliness, old age, and dying. Ozu in particular has created a form of composition that remained consistent throughout his films, as if he's dealing with the same motifs over and over again. This probably accounts for the one criticism brought up about him most often, that his films are all the same.

However Ozu, who's imagery remained subtle and delicate told a wide variety of different stories, but he usually revisited the same theme. Such is the theme of marriage, which Ozu came back to very often, and is at the core of his film "Early Summer". "Early Summer" came soon after another famous film about marriage by Ozu entitled "Late Spring"; that film dealt with the relationship between a daughter and her widowed father. In "Late Spring", the idea of marriage is brought up as a way to tear the father and daughter apart, neither wants to leave the other, yet the father knows if she is not married by a certain age, she will end up alone, and he is closer to the end of his life than the beginning.

"Early Summer" covers much of the same territory, the daughter is played by the same woman from "Late Spring", Setsuko Hara, who was Ozu's favorite actress, and in fact both characters have the same name Noriko. As in "Late Spring", Noriko is seen as getting on in years, and it is in her best interest that she get married soon. Yet, "Early Summer" is a far more ambitious film than "Late Spring" was as far as canvas goes. The family depicted in this film is a large extended one involving Noriko, her older brother, sister in-law, their two kids, and a mother and father. The film begins with every one living under the same roof, and there is the feeling of a real fully functional family going on. The plot element of Noriko getting married isn't even brought up until very much later in the film.

It's the family unit that gets the most attention, as we see how everyone is placed within it. The brother is a doctor, Noriko herself works in an office building, the wife looks after the kids, and the parents seem to be a pleasant retired couple. Everything happens organically, with what seems to be Ozu effortlessly keeping the story moving without ever pushing for something to happen. There is occasional chit chat of Noriko getting married, but not much is made out of it until half way through the film when the story takes that direction.

Noriko is then persuaded by her family to consider marrying a prospective bachelor, and even though there is a big age difference, (He is said to be 42 while she is 28) they think it's the best arrangement for her. However, we are never told of Noriko's own intentions, she is seen as a bit passive about this arrangement, nothing is said if she wants to go along with it, or if she doesn't, but then out of the blue she makes her own decision. Despite her families wishes, she decides to marry an old childhood friend, who has since become widowed and lives with his young child and mother. When the family hears about this, there is a deep resentment towards Noriko, they do not understand why she would choose a widower with a child, which would be deemed a lesser choice, to make matters worse, he has just been transferred out of town, which would mean Noriko would leave her family to be with him. Even Noriko's choice of this man is left ambiguous to the audience, we are left to wonder why she chose him and in such an impulsive manner. Unlike the loyal daughter in "Late Spring" who would never dream of leaving her father's side, this one seems to be making the radical choice for herself. But we aren't totally sure about Noriko's true feelings for this man she has picked for herself, there is talk of an admiration for him, and a genuine trust, but we are left unsure if there is a love there. Part of the reason she picked him might be because of the man's mother, who Noriko feels for and wants to keep company, and she above anyone else in the film is probably most excited to see them married.

But the fact that we don't get these questions answered is Ozu's own way of avoiding melodrama, he never goes for scenes of that matter, what he gets instead is pathos and a deeper understanding of how life works, and the little tragedies that sometimes come with it. Like "Late Spring", we never see the actual marriage of Noriko, instead, we see a bridal procession walk by her parents window which remind them of her. That is a perfect Ozu moment of subtlety, and minimalism, we don't have to see the event to know it's happened, it's not necessary.

Ozu has a way of developing his themes cinematically, and they are usually within his compositions which are always compelling to look at as if it were a real painting or photograph. Take one such scene in "Early Summer" where Noriko's family is upset with her for marrying someone they do not approve. In the scene, Noriko has not entered yet, the family is seen together in the living room; Noriko announces she is home, suddenly everyone takes their leave from the room, there is no contact with her whatsoever. Noriko notices this, she says nothing, she moves to the kitchen where she eats by herself, she is filmed from far away with Ozu showing the empty room and her isolation. A wide shot to show someone alone is commonly used in film to illustrate their isolation, yet Ozu is always able to take it a step further. I think it has something to do with the fact that we know why Noriko is alone, we have seen the reason why she is by herself at that very moment, and perhaps we are a little surprised that it has come to this, and it always seems inevitable that it would, it also helps when a scene such as this was expertly photographed, as if you are looking at the essence of loneliness.

To think of it, you might examine an Ozu film as very anti-mainstream, but I was surprised to learn that his films were widely popular to Japanese audiences. Ozu, like his contemporaries, Kurosawa, and Mizoguchi worked in there own Hollywood version of a studio system, which meant they were able to work with the biggest stars, and make their own sets on back lots. Yet the difference being that unlike Hollywood which was more Producer-centric, Japan was more director-centric, which meant a person like Ozu had more freedom creatively, he was able to take these themes and play with them, and he was able to create a full body of work because of it.

I've summed up my feelings about Yasujiro Ozu on this blog before, I treasure his films probably more than any other, there is something inherently calming about them. I wanted to add a quote about Ozu by Roger Ebert who died recently but who was the man who first introduced me to Ozu through his essays about him. In his review of Ozu's film "Floating Weeds", Ebert says "When you see his films, you feel in the arms of a serenely confident and caring master. In his stories about people who live far away, you recognize, in one way or another, everyone you know.

RIP Roger Ebert

It was kind of a surreal experience when I learned of the death of Roger Ebert. I was having lunch today and reading the newspaper, there was an article about Roger Ebert and how he was going to take some time off from his work as a film critic because his cancer had come back. When I came back to work moments later, I learned that he had passed away.

The last piece I read that Roger Ebert published, was his "Leave of Presence" entry in his blog, which I read on his website. In it, he mentions the return of his cancer, but also that he was going to do what he dreamed of doing which was only review movies that he wants to review.

It's somewhat fitting that the last film I watched before learning of Roger Ebert's passing was Yasujiro Ozu's "Early Summer". I was actually planning on the film to be my next entry for this blog, and since it was somewhat of a slow day at work today, I found myself jotting down notes about what I thought of the film. It was actually through Roger Ebert I first heard of Yasujiro Ozu and his films, and he has since become my favorite filmmaker. Ebert had written about Ozu's masterpiece "Tokyo Story" as part of his ongoing "Great Movies" series, and I was intrigued about how Ebert described Ozu's technique where he placed the camera three feet off the ground and barely moved it. I had not seen a film quite like it, and it started an ongoing love for Ozu's films.

I must admit, Roger Ebert was the main reason I started writing in this blog, it was through his "Great Movies" series I found a love of reading about movies we love and how they effect us. It inspired me to share my own thoughts about my favorites and through it I've found what I like and what I don't like about certain films. I also dug deeper than I ever did about certain filmmakers who I've always loved, it's like my own ongoing film school.

But Roger Ebert didn't stop there, before he lost his voice from cancer, he provided audio commentaries to some classic films. If you have a DVD or Blu Ray of "Citizen Kane", listen to Ebert's commentary on that and you'll understand even more why it's such a great movie. He also does commentary on "Casablanca" and Ozu's own "Floating Weeds" which Ebert has said was his favorite film from him.

Roger Ebert is the kind of person who cannot be replaced, I've been reading outpouring of condolences from other critics I read and admire and how they are all in indebted to Ebert for his contribution to film criticism. Above all else, Roger Ebert was a writer, he wrote all the time, it was a daily routine of me to check his website to see if he had a new blog entry or just a new film entry available. He's taught me that there's always something worth writing about, which is what I try to do every day. Even when I feel I don't have anything to write, I can always write about movies, and I don't see that slowing down any time soon. Thank you Roger Ebert for making me realize that.