Only too often the term "Masterpiece" gets thrown about willy nilly, but in respect of "The Cranes are Flying" it is absolutely deserved. Superb storytelling, stunning editing, cinematography and locations, but it's the director's crowd work and pace that gripped me throughout Monday's screening.
What a moving, beautifully shot film. A stark illustration of the horrors of war for those at the front and those left behind. The final, anti-war speech should be played to all world leaders.
Breathtaking, dizzying, amazingly contemporary cinematography. Glorious on the big screen.
Beautiful and haunting. I love the contrast between the absurd comedic moments and the gut wrenching montages when our characters experience their world falling down around them. Images and sequences from this will be burned into my memory for the foreseeable future
Mesmerising, heartbreaking, devastating, but beautiful through and through. A masterpiece.
Tonally quite different to Western horror. The ghosts aren't vindictive but surprisingly human. I loved the use of noise/silence throughout -- it was very haunting to suddenly hear the strings of a biwa or the resonance of a flute, or for the only noise to be the sudden stirring of the wind or rain. Gorgeous set design! And the whole painting sequence in the Hoichi story felt strangely emotive despite using nothing more than a camera pan over still images.
Epic and beautiful - a perfect fit for the Embassy screen. Impressive visual effects for its age and filled with ambitious, theatrical flair.
Who doesn't love a good ghost story, and this time it's four to give you the chills. Each had their own unique aspect, but i will look twice when I take my next sip of water...
I went in with a dread of a 3-hour screening. BUT the set design, the costumes, the lighting and cinematography truly got me immersed and kept me wanting to know what the next story was going to do!
The Woman of the Snow horizon stares not unlike the WFS eye projected huge and staring at all of us just before the movie starts—wooing—hypnotising—brainwashing—a cinematic experience.
If I had a dollar for every time I discovered Hollywood's new weird-but-compelling director made their name with an incest-based psychological horror, I'd have two dollars. Which isn't a lot but it's weird it happened twice. (Sorry, Ari Aster, you have company!)
I felt a horror that is also present in the dark, against big dogs, and while suffocating. One of the few times I must remind myself that these are fictional characters, this is fiction; they are actors. Amazing.
A disgustingly uncomfortable watch, only heightened by the theatrical experience. Lanthimos creates a world of bleak absurdity, at times comical, and at others a nightmare. There's two very different films here, almost defined entirely by whether the people around you are laughing at the incorrect use of words and the strange games they play. Ultimately, the nightmare wins out.
Is it all a big metaphor or just a nasty unpleasant watch? Might depend how empathetic the viewer is. Count me out.
A black and white cat gave me a jumpscare walking home from this film and that's how I know it entered my psyche.
Original and inventive representation of Hotere and his art. Very good!!!
I love how this documentary and how it's filmed is just as unique as Hotere's paintings, and how the film is a piece of art in itself. I was very pleasantly surprised and ended up thoroughly enjoying it.
Loved it! My first screening as a filmsoc member -- what an incredible debut.
Ko te mea pai o tēnei whakaaturanga ki ahau, ko te puoro, tautito, Māori, rakapioi hoki me te hononga ki ngā mahi toi e tītohu. Ataahua rawa atu.
A wonderful documentary that is as much about the general creative process and spirit as it is about the subject of Ralph Hotere. His lack of interest in speaking about his work, or in fronting the camera, no doubt forced the director’s hand. And we’re all very lucky about that as a result
Funny and sweet with enough underlying darkness to really leave an impression. The lighting looked absolutely stunning on the big screen - romance works so much better in black and white.
An excellent thoughtful and well crafted film. And a great example of the joy of shared viewing in a cinema - awesome to be part of the collective gasps and chuckles.
One of the most entertaining scripts ever written, I wasn’t bored for a second! Billy Wilder never misses and Jack Lemmon is hilarious with his delivery. A perfect movie.
5 stars for being a perfect film but, more importantly, 5 stars for any film where the moral is 'don't trust HR or senior leadership'
Wow! What a romp! The pace of the action, and the quality and humour of the dialogue was head spinning. The cool guys were the baddest of baddies. Hong Kong looked sexy and scuzzy all at once. The brotherhood between the gangsters and undercover cop, Ko Chow, was more loving than his relationship with Hung. Imagine how many cigarettes she has smoked while she waits for him in Hawaii.
A christmas movie ahead of next week's new years movie (The Apartment)! Lovely programme sequencing.
I really like a movie that pretends to be dumb when, really, it is brutally profound.
Chow Yun-Fat is more expressive with a cigarette than many actors are with their entire bodies.
Neon lights? Smooth jazz? Moral ambiguity? Wildly irresponsible police work leading to the unnecessarily violent deaths of crooks, cops, and bystanders? Christmas (Michael Mann's Heat) has come early. What a movie.
Thank you! As stunning, sensory and mysterious as when I first experienced the film as a kid decades ago. Supremely spellbinding and disturbing, it keeps opening new pathways of meaning each time I visit. Wonderful to see those Aussie actors toward the beginning of their careers on the big screen again and sure enough, I am still in the thrall of Rachel Roberts.
Breathtaking. The sequences on the Rock, especially those swirling, disorienting camera pans designed to envelope the viewer in the monolithic forms, were stunning. The pan pipes will ring in my ears all week!
A great opening night film - very glad to have my first viewing of it be in a full Embassy theatre (with thanks to the WFS staff for managing the large numbers so well!)
The gothic atmosphere, the cosmic pull of nature, the institutional rot ... instant all-time favourite.
Like a Merchant/Ivory production got lost in the Australian bush. There is undeniable romanticism, here, gauzy and pre-Raphaelite, but it is obvious how much it doesn't belong in the country it has invaded.
