Wim Wenders’ latest is one of those films that’ll be miscategorized as “simple”, “light” or even “boring” to those that watch it casually or on a surface level. But beyond the time-filling hobbies and Jeanne Dielman-esque day to day routines of the film’s main character lies a heavy story about regret and making peace with the past.
Putting aside the excess baggage and semi-ambiguous family drama of the film’s main character, I find myself wanting to live the life of someone like Hirayama. He’s a simple man that takes pride in his job, loves music on cassette and spends his free time taking photographs of trees. Having outlets & serious hobbies other than your job/work/career is incredibly important to one’s sanity. I can personally attest to this. My obsession with digging for things like music & movies keeps me sane. Hirayama’s love of photography, trees, physical media and cozy local bars keeps him sane. If he didn’t have those things he would be left alone with his thoughts of loneliness and the strained relationship with his family (it should be noted that his niece does make an effort to have some kind of a relationship with him).
Under a different director, the character of Hirayama would be a cartoonish iteration of Robert Crumb or Harvey Pekar. A curmudgeon that hates his own hobbies and prefers to be alone due to his hatred of most people. But Wim Wenders shows the positive side of niche hobbies and spending time alone.
Interestingly enough, Perfect Days is a film that plays in to my personal hobbies and healthy obsessions. On one hand, this is very much Wenders’ own movie but it also serves as a love letter to one Yasujiro Ozu. There’s lots of visual comparisons to be made form this film.
Autumn Afternoon / Perfect Days
of course Ozu's Spirit looms largely over the movie - Wim Wenders, Tiff.net
Tokyo Story / Perfect Days
I saw TOKYO STORY, and I stayed for the next three shows [of Ozu's films] that day until I stumbled out of the theatre late at night. I'd never seen anything that had so much shaken my world - Wim Wenders, AnOtherMagazine
Late Spring / Perfect Days
Late Spring / Perfect Days
A Story Of Floating Weeds / Perfect Days
Late Spring / Perfect Days
Equinox Flower / Perfect Days
Late Spring / Perfect Days
Good Morning / Perfect Days
Late Spring / Perfect Days
Tokyo Chorus / Perfect Days
Late Spring / Perfect Days
Good Morning / Perfect Days
Good Morning / Perfect Days
I’ve never taken Wenders for a Tarkovsky guy, but this particular moment from Perfect Days (on the right) feels like an homage to the highway scene from Solaris (also shot in Japan).
Solaris / Perfect Days
There’s even a coincidental connection to Wenders’ former mentee Jim Jarmusch (I like to imagine these two guys exist in the same universe)
Paterson / Perfect Days
Perfect Days feels timeless with tons of replay value and is slowly becoming my go-to movie to put on when I can’t think of anything else to watch.
I went in to this with low expectations and came out pleasantly satisfied. Rose Glass’ sophomore feature didn’t break any new ground but it’s certainly a solid popcorn movie. I think some people are eager to make this out to be something more than it is due to the sexuality within the film but at the end of the day it’s nothing more than a fun crime story. And that’s totally fine. Contrary to what a lot of critics try to push nowadays, some movies exist for entertainment and/or a momentary escape. Everything isn’t some radical or political statement. On a surface level, Love Lies Bleeding rests somewhere between the cinema of Nicolas Winding Refn and a more polished/mimicked iteration of early Gregg Araki. I was eager to compare this to stuff like Wild at Heart & Thelma & Lousie but Glass herself made a point to avoid tapping in to those films. Also, making that kind of comparison is like calling something that’s slightly weird; “Lynchian”. It’s cheap.
Speaking of cheap and things being incorrectly labeled as “Lynchian” – there is a shot of a dark road at night in Love Lies Bleeding so I’m sure some critics jumped at the chance to compare it to Lost Highway.
Because so much of the DNA and ingredients of [Love Lies Bleeding] is so easily connectable to so many other films — Wild at Heart, Thelma and Louise, True Romance, anything with two lovers with guns and murder in extremity — I was wary about not wanting it to [revisit them] – Rose Glass, Hollywood Reporter
At this point, a movie like Thelma & Louise is so popular that you can’t avoid some type of subconscious influence but there’s no unique connection between the two films outside of the desert and two women kind of on the run…
I've never seen Thelma and Louise but that's so famous that even if you haven't seen it, you sort of feel like you have, so I'm sure it has an influence somewhere – Rose Glass, Theskinny.co.uk
Again – this feels like it was birthed from someone trying to pay homage to Gregg Araki with way more budget and a bit less grit. That may sound a little harsh but even with criticisms like that, I really did enjoy Love Lies Bleeding overall. I couldn’t find any interviews where Glass name-drops Araki as a source of inspiration but some of the similarities in the movie, intentional or not, are undeniable…
Doom Generation / Love Lies Bleeding
Doom Generation / Love Lies Bleeding
While the basic romance/crime story has been done before to some degree, Glass throws in things like female bodybuilding and random moments of surreality to try and stand out from other sweaty cigarette stenched crime capers (if you’re looking for a more direct comparison, Love Lies Bleeding is definitely a first cousin to something like Bound). There are a handful of scenes in this movie that seem a little random for the sake of being random but I’m honestly not mad at that.
This story is set in the 80’s and for someone not even born in that decade, Glass does an excellent job of not falling in to the trap of dressing all the characters up in neon windbreakers & rayban sunglasses. It seems like whenever a filmmaker wants to set a film in the 80s, the first thing they do is make everything neon & cheesy. The 80’s was not all MTV, Boy George & Madonna. I was born in 1981. My memory of the 80’s was a lot of cigarette smoke, ugly carpets (that trapped in all the cigarette smoke) and the color palettes were often browns & oranges as apposed to neon pinks & yellows. Again – Love Lies Bleeding has a bit too much sheen for a seedy 1980’s Reno, Nevada crime story, but there is a genuine attempt at trying to capture the 80s. The smells, the ashtrays, the faded jeans, etc…
The small handful of cinematic references that Glass openly pulls from are also a bit outside of the box. Instead of the aforementioned Thelma & Louise or Wild At Heart, Glass pulls from sources like Paul Verhoeven and 1960s B-movies. These influences are even more interesting to me because her first film, Saint Maud, pulled from folks like Bergman & Polanski (a lot of people claimed there was Tarkovsky in Saint Maud but according to Glass, she wasn’t very familiar with his work at the time).
Showgirls was just one of those films that I remember watching when I was probably too young to watch it quite late one night on TV - Rose Glass, The Hollywood Reporter
Showgirls / Love Lies Bleeding
Attack Of The 50 Foot Woman / Love Lies Bleeding
Contrary to what one might assume, the Refn similarities lie in the music and the random spurts of violence and not the fascination with trying to replicate the 80’s as some sort of Andy Warhol/David Lachapelle/pop art fever dream.
For those that don’t know - I’m not only from western Massachusetts but I’m a former classmate of Janet Planet director Annie Baker (not trying to name-drop. I just think it would be odd to not mention that). I don’t think my opinion on this movie holds more weight than anyone else who’s seen it, but I think I know the basic material more than the average person. Not the deeper coming of age story of an 11 year old girl and the close relationship with her quietly eccentric mother. But all the ancillary elements are very near & dear to my heart. It’s impossible for me to not feel nostalgic watching this. The first time I saw it I spent half the time pointing out to all the very real places I grew up in & around. Amherst is a very unique place. I know everyone with some kind of hometown pride always says that about wherever they’re from but people that aren’t even from Amherst that have spent time there have confirmed that it’s unlike anywhere else. It’s incredibly liberal (sometimes laughably liberal when compared to the rest of the world) and sometimes pretentious but well-meaning at the end of the day. I couldn’t imagine growing up anywhere else. Amherst is where I learned about weird movies and music which is a huge part of who I am today. I can confirm that this movie captures the vibe of early 90’s Western, Mass. The wooded areas, the architecture, the clothes, the aging hippies — all of it.
It’s just nice to see specific landmarks that you grew up with in a movie directed by someone that’s actually from where the story takes place. If you’re from places like Toronto, Los Angeles, Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago or New York City - it’s fairly common to see familiar landmarks show up in movies. That’s not the case when you’re from Western Massachusetts. We’re usually an afterthought or incorrectly attached to the other side of the state. So much of our personality is based on telling non-new England folks that we aren’t from Boston or that we’re different from Boston people. …At least that’s how it was for me post-high school (to be clear - we are very different from the people on the eastern side of the state in that we’re less aggressive and aren’t as angry).
Mount Pollox Conservation Area, Amherst Massachusetts
The parking lot of the Hampshire Mall, Hadley Massachusetts
Tobacco barn in Hadley
Masonic Street Mural, Northampton Massachusetts
A huge chunk of this movie's personality is the result of watching & appreciating a wide range of cinema and paying homage to it. I mean that in a good way. There’s lots of visual references in this. It wouldn’t be out of line to program Janet Planet on a double bill with something like Fanny and Alexander or Welcome To The Dollhouse (a film that co-stars Amherst alumni; Eric Mabius). Annie Baker subconsciously borrowed from movies in that lane. That’s actually what I liked most about her film. If you’re familiar with this blog then this shouldn't come as a surprise. That's all I seem to care about with movies these days. This is very much her own unique vision but she’s been very open about her cinematic inspirations. I caught some immediately without having to do any research. Others I learned about through reading interviews and listening to Q&As. Some of the comparisons below might seem a little forced or vague, but I think I captured the ones that are most key/important:
Watching it gets you in touch with all the times you've felt horribly depressed and also overwhelmed by the beauty and color of everything around you - Janet Planet, Criterion
Documenteur / Janet Planet
I’ve seen this movie [Fanny and Alexander] more times than I can count. I think it’s the best movie about being a kid ever made. It’s a fairy tale and a nightmare and a totally believable portrayal of a Swedish family in Uppsala at the turn of the twentieth century, all at the same time. It has always reminded me of one of my favorite novels, Thomas Mann’s Buddenbrooks. It’s also a movie about the weird magic of theater . . . Both the opening sequence and the reading from Strindberg at the end kill me. And the way Bergman shoots inanimate objects . . . The statues and the toy angels and the clocks and the puppets and the lamps . . . They’re all watching Alexander, the whole movie - Annie Baker, Criterion
Fanny and Alexander / Janet IPlanet
Fanny and Alexander / Janet IPlanet
Fanny and Alexander / Janet Planet
I saw this when I was twenty-five or twenty-six and really confused about my work. I was so discouraged and had stopped writing, and this movie made me excited to start working again. Akerman was doing something with pace and composition and time that I'd always wanted to do but had been too chicken to acknowledge or go toward. Watching this made me realize that you should make the kind of art you want to see, which sounds kind of obvious but was a big revelation to me at the time- Annie Baker, criterion
Jeanne Dielman... / Janet Planet
Jeanne Dielman... / Janet Planet
growing up in Amherst, Mass., in the '80s and '90s, you see a lot of political puppet theater - Annie Baker, The New York Times
The Meadows Green / Janet Planet
The Meadows Green / Janet Planet
The filmmaker I would say my D.P. and my editor and I discussed the most was Maurice Pialat, especially his film "L'Enfance Nue." Another movie that is very important to me is [Victor] Erice's "Spirit of the Beehive." We also talked about [Abbas Kiarostami's films about children, and my sound designer Paul and I talked a lot about [Apichatpong] Weerasethakul, and went to see "Tropical Malady" together - Annie Baker, The New Yorker
I know this might not come off as the greatest endorsement or sell of a film, but Connor O’malley’s Rap World is all the good stuff from a Harmony Korine film (Trash Humpers & Julien Donkey Boy specifically), reshaped by someone with a much better sense of humor & creativity and zero cynicism (it is my personal opinion that Connor O’malley is one of the funniest and most talented people working today). This is absolutely the kind of movie that will be co-opted by the ironic vice magazine folks that like things ironically but I don’t think they were ever the audience in mind for this. I’m a fan of most Harmony Korine films but a lot of times his work comes off like it’s made by someone pretentious that thinks they’re bored and better than everyone. There’s nothing boring or pretentious or “ironic” about Rap World. It’s is loud, chaotic, energetic, disorganized, schizophrenic and I loved every moment of it. I know this sounds cliché but Rap World has that DIY spirit of picking up a camera, getting a small intimate crew of folks together and just creating something. That something is the darkly comical found footage tale about a group of suburban friends trying to record a rap album over a 24 hour period. And much like the car race in Two Lane Blacktop, the recording of the rap album seems to be least important thing in the story even thought it’s (supposedly) the focal point. Our wanna-be rappers find themselves getting distracted from the recording process at every turn...
Trash Humpers / Rap World
Trash Humpers / Rap World
Julien Donkey-Boy / Rap World
Rap World has the perfect amount of nostalgia that doesn’t work against it. Underneath the chaotic humor & alt-comedy, this film pokes fun a at very specific niche demographic that I’m very familiar with – underground suburban hip-hop fans. While the characters in the film are all white, small town suburban underground rap fans come in all races & genders. They spent a lot of time on internet rap message boards getting their hip-hop history lessons from the wrong outlets and always had a warped sense of reality. No offense, and I am a fan of these artists, but think early 2000’s anticon/sage francis/rawkus/def jux message boards and online battle rap forums. I’m all for poking fun at these folks no matter how mean-spirited that may sound.
The major difference here is that those internet message board rap fans were mostly teenagers while the characters in Rap World are full on adults (one is pushing 30 years old).
This archetype still exists. Again, not to be mean, but given that a lot of Connor O’Malley’s comedy is internet/youtube-based, I wouldn’t be surprised if he was poking fun at recent stuff like this:
Krispy Kreme is another possible reference point (although part of me thinks this whole persona is a "bit")
Krispy Kreme / Rap World
I'm pretty certain this movie sets out to be uncomfortable & alienating to some. Connor O'Malley isn't always the easiest comic to digest but fans of his work will feel rewarded watching this. I certainly did.
One More Shot joins that elite list of sequels that surpasses it’s predecessor. I wouldn’t exactly call it Godfather Part 2 or Aliens, or The Empire Strikes Back, but it is better than One Shot (2021). And to be clear – One Shot is great. It wound up on my best of 2021 list (and this will more than likely be on my best of 2024). But where the first film may have a had what some would consider "slow moments", One More Shot is just non-stop in the best way possible.
Thanks to films like Extraction, the newer Mad Max films and the John Wick series, there’s a place for fast pace action films that take little no breaks. Even when punches aren’t being thrown and bullets aren’t flying, the tension in One More Shot is so intense.
One More Shot / Extraction
There's a few tense moments early on in the film that borrow heavily from a scene in Children Of Men...
Children Of Men / One More Shot
Children Of Men / One More Shot
Tension is the unsung hero of this film. Director James Nunn pulls from his influences like Michael Mann & Steven Spielberg all throughout the film…
It was actually watching JURASSIC PARK in the cinema when I was 9 years old and I just fell in love with the idea of making movies and telling stories and bringing things to life - James Nunn, easternfilmfans.co.uk
Jurassic Park / One More Shot
Heat / One More Shot
One More Shot plays out like the most basic yet fun video game with multiple levels. It picks up literally seconds after the first part. There’s no pause or intermission. We’re thrown right in to the thick of it in the opening scene. The hostage from the first film has been secured but there’s another “level” our hero Scott Adkins must go through to get him and his family to safety. In addition to a lot more action and intense moments, the film adds Michael Jai White to the cast as the main villain. While White’s addition to the film is sparse, it’s still the high point. One More Shot succeeds because they use the formula of a lot of older action films where we get the final one-on-one showdown between the main protagonist and the main antagonist that’s been teased throughout the film. Michael Jai White is a varsity letterman when it comes carrying the final fight on his shoulders (see Skin Trade & Blood and Bone for further examples of this). And at this point, White & Adkins hove so much history & on-screen chemistry that it’s probably impossible for those two to choreograph a disappointing fight scene. White & Adkins use a combination of modern MMA (that they both helped popularize) from the John Wick films and the early MMA fighting style found in Bruce Lee films…
John Wick 3 / One More Shot
The Chinese Connection / One More Shot
The beauty of One More Shot is that you don’t actually have to watch One Shot first in order to enjoy things or know what's going on. I strongly suggest watching One Shot because it’s very good, but I almost prefer folks watch the sequel first and then treating One More Shot like a prequel.
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