Change Your Image
yogasuz
Reviews
Dare mo shiranai (2004)
Incredible
The performances of the children in this film are astonishing. I have NEVER seen a film which so accurately captures children's gestures and actions. The children appear caught up in every moment...giving them joy, but also a sense that they cannot perceive all that is happening to them. They are alone, accepting, capable, resourceful, helpless.
The plot is well conceived and carried out. I loved how many moments there are of simply watching the children play...but still these moments compel the movie forward.
I watched this movie several days ago and still it haunts me. It is so truthful feeling that it makes the story all the more poignant.
I would have given the movie 10 stars, but thought it could use just a touch of shortening. The last part of the movie drags on a bit. Even so, a fantastic film.
A Home of Our Own (1993)
I lived it!
I know a lot of folks talked about this movie being so heartwrenching, and at time a tear jerker, but this movie is as close to my childhood as I can imagine. We weren't quite as poor, but I really grew up in a half-finished house and we were pretty tight on money. We never finished our house, but my mom sent three kids to damn good colleges and private schools while supporting us on a teacher's salary.
And Kathy Bates nailed it just right. I think that this movie portrays a lot of things about people who are struggling to get by, and it does it in a way that is very evenly balanced. I mean, her character is mostly sympathetic, but she shuts people out too. She's proud to a fault. She wants so much to do it all on her own, that she doesn't seem to realize just how much help she needs. That sense that she is all alone in it; that's how we felt. I'm sure that's how my parents felt. I liked how she found friends who knew how to handle her pride and still help her.
I loved this movie but it is hard for me to watch!
I never got nails for Christmas, though!
I think the bit about the disclaimer that this is all fiction is just the standard CYA language the lawyers put in at the end of every movie. There's lots of novels that are "fiction" that are true.