Reviews

We hardly watch silent films and also black and white films. I have ever watched some monochrome films, and they are so-called masterpieces like Casablanca and Roman Holiday, so I was excited when I watched the opening because it reminded such great films.

The story is simple as the direction. The film does not need any effects to tell the story to us like computer graphics, complicated story unfolds and even the words. The characters' expressive faces and their realistic acting are enough to make us be fascinated into the story. However, actually this film uses sounds efficiently. From the beginning to the end, music is played, and we hear sound effects sometimes. Finally the characters dance to the up-tempo music. They help us to understand the situations.

The silent film was new for me. I usually watch films that are color, and use computer graphics, and I thought that old films were monochrome because of technical problems. However this film told me that black and white film is not old.

The story runs with great strength, and an atmosphere of tension runs through the film. The story is about the former president of Uganda, Idi Amin. He is known as a dictator, and was feared because of his government by terror. This film describes him from a view of a young Scottish main character, Nicholas Garrigan. He works as his doctor and also adviser.

I'm satisfied with the story because it describes Amin not only his terrible character but also his charisma. Nicholas was fascinated by his charismatic character as the Ugandan citizens were. I watched some films about Amin, but all of them are just only about his terribleness. However this film describes his personality well – he likes joking.

Nicholas is dragged into the turbulent age of Uganda that is caused by Amin. The story goes at a terrific speed, and we are drawn into the story. This film is good to enjoy watching and also to know about the president Amin.

At the beginning of the story, Bruce Willis who acts as the main character refers to the secret the film has, and says that do not spoil it. Even it makes our expectations rise, the ending exceeds them. It is just fantastic.

It is a horror movie. However it describes human relationships just like a human drama story. Each character has distress, and the film describes how they solve their torment and how they help each other. That is the reason this film fascinates us. It is not just a scary film.

The framework of the story is polished up well. Before we know the secret, we enjoy the story and finally we are surprised by it. Even after we know the secret, we can watch the film from different points of view, and notice many things we cannot notice before we know the secret. We can enjoy watching it many times, and we will be touched each time by the well-polished up framework.

What make lives happy are adventures and trifling inventions. Tim Burton directed a touching story. This film has two stories – father's story and his son's one. The son does not like his father because he always tells incredible stories. He talks about his past stories, and in the stories, something unbelievable often appears like a giant, woman who has two heads, werewolf, witch and village called Specter. All of his stories are interesting, but it is little bit hard to believe them because of such characters, and his son also does not believe the stories. He wants his father to tell the true stories, but he never changes his talking style even he is dying.

A big fish in a small pond must go out of it, and go to a big one. The fish may drown, but a story which has tail and fins will swim. The last scene, the father dies in a ward. It is just common. However, in his story, the way he died is really touching and dramatically beautiful. The story must be talked about long into the next generation. The big fish is still swimming.

This film describes problems that the Republic of South Africa has from the view of the main character, Tsotsi. South Africa has many serious problems like high crime rate, HIV, and high unemployment rate. Tsotsi is one of the people who suffer from such problems, and he needs to commit crimes to live. He takes up arms, and attacks people by force.

However, one day he finds something stronger than force. He cannot wound the baby and the woman who cares his baby. Tsotsi had not been loved, but he finds he wants to love somebody. He regrets what he did, and finally he tries to make up for his misdeed with his all possible efforts.

His look changes dramatically after he found the baby. At the beginning of the story, Tsotsi was just a delinquent boy, but he changes a man who can love somebody. All of actors, especially Presley Chweneyagae who acts Tsotsi, put on splendid performance. They and awesome story make us be moved.

This short film describes a development of the main character, Sara who is a little girl. She tries to buy a cigarette for her father who is dying because of serious sick. However she encounters obstacles over and over again. All of the characters, even her father are her enemies, and harass her. However, finally she overcomes all difficulties, and takes back happiness for her family.

She struggles with her conscience. She knows that cigarettes are really bad for her father, and her mother scolds her severely when she buys them, but the father wants them. She does not want to buy cigarettes for him, but she wants her father to be glad. She is in difficulties.

Finally she gets a cigarette, but she finds that she does not need it to make her father happy. We are moved by the last scene. The little girl knows how to make her parents happy.

This film has two successful points. The first one is its mysterious beginning. It begins with a doubt. The wail of some ambulance sirens sound, and people on streets fall down flat on the ground suddenly. We cannot understand completely what happened, so we gaze intently at it. The beginning wins the hearts of an audience.

Sound effects also work very well. The sounds of siren casts suspicion on the story, and the sounds that golf balls make express how the main character is under pressure. When he is freed from stress, the sounds of thunderous cheers also express his feeling. He does not say anything, but such sound effects and his look tell us what is on his mind very clearly.

The concept is very simple, but this film expresses it in a very unique way. That's why we are fascinated by this story. We cannot foresee the way it unfolds.

This story is so sad but is also so beautiful. The theme is simple. It describes a feeling the main character, the daughter, kept entertaining in her breast very strongly but privately. Since the day her father went off, she had been hoping to meet him again, and had kept going to the riverside where he left each and every day. It is only an eight-minute short film, but it depicts her whole life. When he went away, she was just a little girl. She grows up and makes friends, falls in love, and then she has a family. She grows older and becomes old, but she continues going there. Time goes by without mercy but she never forgets him, and finally her strong long-standing dream made a miracle happen.

The theme is so beautiful, and its animation also helps to make this film beautiful. The animation describes the passage of time, so this film can condense her long lifetime even though this film has only eight minutes.

This story is simple and common, so everybody can enjoy it regardless of religion and race. The beauty and sadness this story describes across the language barrier must move us deeply.

This story describes family relationships. The main character, David, and his wife Keiko are strained by each other, and they, at least David, want children. They do not have any children, but one day a boy appears for David and Keiko. David knows the boy because he is one of his pupils, and he wants him as a child. Coincidently, the boy is half Japanese and half Western, like their child will be. The boy stays with them some days, I guess it must be three days, and finally the boy can patch up the strained relationship between David and Keiko. The situation this short film describes is not uncommon. We easily emphasize with the story characters. This film describes details so carefully and such scenes help us understand the situation easily. For instance, we understand that David and Keiko are strained because of the scene that David has breakfast alone. In the scene, Keiko is still sleeping. Such detailed descriptions express the characters' humanity, and I think that's why we enjoy watching this film.

Every morning people who are going to their offices are delayed by a jam. Queues of cars move forward very slowly, and the horns of dozens of vehicles reverberate noisily. A traffic jam makes everybody get annoyed. However, the main character of this film changes such discomfort time into a relaxing time. He commutes to work by boat. On a lake, nothing obstructs him and, there is nothing that produces tremendous noise. He goes to his office comfortably alone. The characters do not say anything, but the sound effects and their looks express its situation very well.

However, one day some people start to hinder his comfortable commuting time. The casts who act as obstructive people are very suitable. They express a feeling of displeasure perfectly, and distress the main character like the traffic jam. However he avoids the discomfort time again in an unexpected way. His rich imagination and bold action make this film enjoyable.

The topic is discrimination against black people, and this film insists that such thought will change easily. The main character is an old white woman. She misses a train. She needs to wait for a next one, so she goes to a restaurant and buys salad. She takes the salad to a table, and then she goes back to a counter to bring a folk. She turns back to her table, and then she finds that a black man is eating her salad. She complains that the salad is hers, but the black man does not care that and keep eating it. She finally gives up getting it back and eats it with him. He stops eating and brings coffee for him and also her. They look serene expression as a couple dates. She drinks coffee and leaves there but she finds that she leaves her bag. She goes back to the seat. The man has already gone, and she finally finds that she mistakes the table that she puts on her salad. The salad and her bag are still on the table. The black man shares his salad and treats her to give a cup of coffee.

The black man does not look rich, and the old woman shows her feeling of displeasure against the man. We see the fringes of the issue. However, her thought against black people changes because of his act. I was touched by his tolerance.

The most impressive characteristic of this film is its rich imagination. We completely cannot picture such a worldview from the words given like 'unicorn'. The film describes the future very beautifully. We see an underground and its station that is located very deep in the earth, and security personnel that are robots. These images are clear, and stir our imagination.

The box that the characters in the film carry is a key of the story, and has magical power. The story unfolds with a scramble for possession of it, and we gradually notice that the box has a mysterious and also dangerous power. When we see the last scene, we may not know the reason, but we feel something bad.

The film is clear visually, and the sound effects are also successful. They help to describe the future views and a very tense atmosphere. We enjoy its worldview and the curious story the box causes.

I like this film. The back ground music produces summerlike unhurried atmosphere, and there are unique souvenirs from lands of summer like Jamaica, Egypt, Miami and even Atlantis. The main character, the snowman wants to enjoy summer with them, but he needs to go out from the glass dome that surrounds him. He tries every way he can - he uses a hammer, cutting torch and TNT bomb. Even TNT bomb cannot destroy the dome, but the blast the bomb makes moves the dome, and it falls from a shelf, and then the snowman finds an emergency exit, and he can go out from the dome. He and his home fall into a fishbowl, and he meets a woman from Atlantis. However, the dome falls on him and captures him again.

If this short film is intended for children, I think it is not so good because his efforts are not rewarded. However I like the end.