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peter-jacobson-1
Reviews
La mujer sin cabeza (2008)
You know you want to endure me.
I'm really puzzled by the enthusiasm for this film. Like, what are some of you really seeing in this? I defy you to see this movie again. Seems like it went over best with American film buffs who want to prove they 'get' foreign film and can sit through anything or men who just like a blonde heroines.
I liked 2 shots of the motorbikes alongside car windows and perspectives splitting the door and inside of the woman's home. But if you were in this for THAT then watch 10 minutes of Douglas Sirk instead.
I am no stranger to South American literature and film but I found this painful and only barely intriguing. I like to think I'm reasonably intelligent. I watched every frame of this thing but I mean damn. So the goal here is make characters bland/uninteresting as possible, put them in barely memorable interactions/situations, no music to speak of, uninteresting exteriors and interiors...and then I'm supposed to be super-gripped that one of the boys didn't come in to work! Of course! Toe on the line of 'who cares'. Like why are we supposed to care about this woman? Her non-reactions are kinda interesting but there's barely an emotional connection to be had through a lot of this. Tell me I'm wrong. I didn't appreciate my 70s style art film punishment properly! The rewards of understand/recognition are so slight here.
You really look for these values in your high art? So you're absolutely sure this isn't in any way ..lazy? You really found this powerfully conceptual? This is from a whole swath of avant garde film/music/art that prides itself on, gee I don't know, hating the audience. It's contemptuous. Super tedious and played out and adolescent. The last scene where you see the woman at the gathering in among the other guests and obscured from a distance. The filmmaker is literally denying the audience access to the scene at hand. It's a perfect summation of the forced removal of this film. Obnoxious.
Holden's Times review is ridiculous. 'rain soaked'. Hardly. Two maybe three scenes with rain? "Maddeningly enigmatic puzzle" or just maddening? Just because something is super conceptual doesn't necessarily make it impactful or particularly meaningful. I liked some of the ideas in here about Argentina's history and indifference and bourgeois boredom but this was a bit too obtuse for me. So am I glad that I gleaned some meaning out of this? Only maybe. Holden's doing A LOT of explaining here.
This movie is kind of like art that's pleased with itself to do almost nothing for the eye and comes accompanied by a huge and detailed textual explanation/defense. Kinda yawn.