Those who have followed me for a while, will be aware of the fact that I haven't posted about movies for ages. I used to do so quite a lot, under my @vincentnijman account, but then I started focusing on different content. That doesn't mean that I stopped watching films though.
In fact, I recently installed my movie projector in my current place and got back into the habit again.
After loads of classic Disney movies ( as Christmas cooking background and to enjoy my niece, nephew and other visiting kids ), the last couple of nights have been filled with my choice of 'adult' cinema.
And talking about adult cinema, some days back I got quite a surprise...
while watching a Japanese film titled Underwater Love, that I expected to be some kind of weird sci-fi like story, I ended up seeing a mix between musical, fairy tale and soft core. Hadn't seen that coming ( pun not intended ).
I managed to sit it out though and even enjoy ( you can fill that in for yourself ).
Having studied film, I have had my share of weird movies but this one would probably end up in my top 50 of weirdest ever, in the company of films like David Lynch's Eraserhead.
And, now I think of it, there would probably be at least a handful of Japanese movies in that list haha. Possibly Tetsuo, Hausu and Zebraman, to name a few.
I also managed to watch the entire flick with Portuguese subtitles, one thing I do to improve my Portuguese ( living there since 2018 ). It was quite a challenge but I understood most of it.
Then, today and yesterday ( split out over two nights ), I watched a 1980s film from Taiwan that appeared to be way better than I expected. In fact, it got increasingly better towards the end, it seemed.
The Terrorizers (1986), directed by Edward Yang.
You can find the trailer here: https://mubi.com/films/the-terrorizers
and if you're interested in watching the entire thing, let me know and I can send you a link to watch it for free.
I tend to not talk about a movie's story / plot, when I review it, as I find that kind of boring and there's so much more to a film than just what is happening with the characters. Suffice to say that it's about a writer's life and reality mixing weirdly with other characters. I enjoyed it in many ways, including the way it was shot and the acting.
It's well worth watching.
Oh, and before I forget, for those interested, here's a trailer to the weird one: Underwater Love: https://mubi.com/films/underwater-love/trailer
As you might have noticed, both films can be watched on MUBI, a streaming platform with alternative, arthouse like cinema ( for weirdos like me with an acquired tasted due to having watched 1000s of films and analyzed as many ).
If you like what you see, I can send you a referral for a free trial.
And in case you were wondering, no I'm not hired by MUBI to write this stuff.
TO BE CONTINUED(?) ( if you enjoy this content and let me know and if I do indeed feel like writing about movies ). You can expect me to share lesser known titles, as writing about mainstream stuff doesn't interest me. Someone in a discord chat group once called me a 'film snob' and I wear that title with pride haha.
both pictures are screenshots taken from my Mubi account