To Live (1994) dir. Zhang Yimou

"My granduncle was a liberal arts professor (back then they called it 文学教授) in Fudan during the Cultural Revolution and had spent 10 years in prison between the age of 42 and 52. When I was younger, I visited him a couple of times in Shanghai and every time, he would tell me: "When you grow up, be a doctor. Everyone needs doctors. They will beat the philosophers, they will execute the budding politicians but they will never keep doctors locked up. They treat them better. They're useful. They save lives." I never wholly understood what he meant until today: where I managed to step into the tiniest fragment of what he experienced; an effete glimpse into the upheavals he's seen.

'To live' is such a pithy simple phrase. To them, waking up alive was enough to celebrate. Living without torment wasn't the bare minimum, it was an unattainable dream, for every day there descends a new devastation: friends die, children die, enemies shot, suicide, trials, starvation, accidents. Nevertheless, we get through life as it is, day after day, months into years into decades as decrees are gestated and meted out.

To overlook the tender reunions, hearty singing behind darting shadow puppets framed by mulberry paper, joyous occasions around dinner tables (however fleeting they might be) is to discredit the wonders life can harbour. The duality of hope and suffering, of luck and misfortune, light and darkness. "你不想活 也得活! We've been through the valley of death! You mustn't lose hope now." says Fugui. I think this interaction between him and Chunshan abridges the reverberating salient message Zhang advances."

There's perhaps such a thing as putting too fine a point on something, but Kramer's exploration of racial politics through the prism of the dominant white middle-class of America — what other prism is there, really? — though simplistic in today's terms, manages to grab at the essence of the issue, recognising it not just as a two-pronged problem but one that's generational and entrenched into the broader social and cultural history of America. In a time of social change and a supposed liberation, one family's ideologies are challenged when the reality of their revolution hits a little too close to home. At the heart of America is the continued prominence of race at every junction, love included, and Kramer perhaps challenges the overt optimism of a movement that notably hasn't moved the mark within the dominant middle-class and certainly has not had a generational effect.

What Guess Who's Coming to Dinner is and why it's so affecting in its plea for decency, change, and an upholding of love amidst differences is that it genuinely feels like the film not only advocates for a hopeful future but believes that it's right on the cusp of reality. Not only that, but Kramer's decision to point out the hypocrisy of middle-class liberals and the different shades of the race problem through intertextual means is one that's tactful and economic, if not, at least a little bit playful.

The casting of Katherine Hepburn as the parent figure hints to this allusion to the mile-a-minute romantic-comedies that she would typically populate, only that in place of Hepburn is Katharine Houghton, and in place of a figure like Cary Grant or James Stewart is Sidney Poitier, and the film begins as such, with Poitier dropped conspicuously into the setting of such a film, with the only thing giving away the illusion of normalcy being the stares and the hesitation from every character. Spencer Tracy then stands in as the other side of the old guard, but as the elder white statesman, symbolically standing in for the dominant system at hand, which is why, suitably, Tracy has the last say in the matter during the climatic conclusion of the film.

It isn't odd that when I say that Guess Who's Coming to Dinner often feels like an offshoot of a familiar Hollywood recipe, one where the giant elephant in the room is so conspicuously pointed out. Poitier then is the perfect point-man for the continued discussion of the black man in America. When Poitier navigates the ignorance of white privilege and the entrenched racial prejudice from both ends, he does so with such class and poise that's befitting of a character which has come to understand that the black man has to go above and beyond both intellectually and emotionally to possibly be accepted into the dominant middle-class society. Poitier's Dr. John Prentice has to bear the weight of the difference in his relationship with Joey Drayton, but it's more than that, he has to bear the weight of a martyr. 

That Kramer then doesn't just draw the distinctions between race but crosses them in light of gender is also significant to the narrative of the film. As is the black man in America, women are more than ready for change. In a bid for change, the film asks: what happens to men when they grow old, and what does one generation owe the next? The answer is bitterness and nothing, and the film clearly hopes to overcome it all.

https://www.justsaying.asia/planet-of-the-apes-kingdom-review/

Unlike Einstein’s theory of relativity, quantum physics puts time in a special position. The definite direction of time, however, does not exist even in quantum physics, unless you deny the unitary evolution of the universe. In other words, if you are given two videos played in forward direction and backward direction, you cannot choose the one with the right direction, in principle. Yet, the order of events, or the reasonable arrangement of events, exists and can be justified by the fact that some progressions of events are much more probable than the ones in the opposite direction. The director, Kevin Lucero Less, demonstrates exactly this feature in the film Boundary of Time (2022). It is a short three-minute film displaying the ink dispersing through the warm water. The process is very similar to cloud tank shots, a non-CGI special effect that was popular among earlier films to emulate the flow of the atmosphere. However, the reversibility of time is not a uniquely quantum feature; on the contrary, the example of the ink dispersion is more macroscopic and classical than microscopic and quantum. I do not see the logic behind including this film on a Quantum Shorts shortlist, but then again, everything can be explained by quantum physics, right? The bigger problem is, ironically, that this mechanical evolution betrays the very premise of the film: the arrow of time. Due to the time-reversal symmetry of the universe, even if the film is played in reverse, there is no guarantee that the direction of time is truly inverted; they might have just captured the most improbable event imaginable. In other words, for sceptics like me, this visual demonstration is a perfect example of the impossibility of establishing a definite direction of time.

A more convincing argument for the arrow of time, or a more profound caveat of the time-reversibility, is revealed in Leonardo Martinelli’s If the World Spinned Backwards (2018). The narrator recites the script, as if it were poetry, speculating about a world where time flows from the future to the past. This time, it is not just about ink becoming more concentrated or the sun rising from the west. The film delves into the intricacies of perception and memory. In the narrator’s, and thus the film’s, naïve imagination, memory does not accumulate but decumulates; people perceive the flow of time, albeit in the opposite direction. However, would this be the case?

Henri Bergson posited the concept of duration to combat the mechanical worldview that physics (including quantum mechanics) entails. According to him, duration is dynamic, “imbued with an intrinsic directional flow-character” . Hence, our experience is not a collection of slices of an instantaneous moment; instead, it is inherently a continuous and indivisible process. In Bergson’s words, “By allowing us to grasp in a single intuition multiple moments of duration, [memory] frees us from the movement of the flow of things.” So, what would happen if we cannot have this usual function of memory capturing the flow of time? Would we be bound to merely witness the individual snapshots and not be able to experience them as an indivisible whole? Unfortunately, the film does not really explore this direction, at least not in its script.

The use of music in Martinelli’s film, however, is interesting in this context. The entire background music sounded as if they were played in reverse. Unlike visual imagery played backwards, where we can still discern what is happening and appreciate what is presented aesthetically without much difficulty, the music loses all its beauty when its temporal order is disrupted. Perhaps, in a world spinning backwards, that would be the experience we would have: random signals coming into (or going out of?) our brain.

Both films fail to deliver more intriguing visuals to support their arguments. Using spreading ink as a visual metaphor for an irreversible process is somewhat of a cliché and, as a result, not very surprising, although the shots in Boundary of Time do have certain aesthetic appeal. If the World Spinned Backwards merely stitched together rather arbitrary pieces of images played backwards. Some of these clips, I am not even sure if the filmmakers shot themselves or used stock videos, as each shot appears rather disjoint, and its style is also inhomogeneous. Films, fundamentally, take snapshots of actual events, and editing is the art of arranging them in different ways. These two films have chosen the most obvious way of depicting the flow of time, namely arranging the snapshots in forward or backward order. Hopefully, in future editions of Quantum Shorts, we may encounter more creative editing techniques that explore the relationship between the flow of time and the medium of film.

dir. Hou Hsiao-hsien

Genre: Drama, Romance, History

Country: Taiwan, France

(this was meant to be a personal entry but i hv nothing else to share...)

Our ways of loving change with the world around us, but love itself is so enduring despite the infinty of time...

this film is such an intimate and real portryal of this truth. one couple, set in 3 different decades in Taiwan show us how our loving are moulded by the world around us, and how the world around us moulds our loving. “communication” is the recurring motif. Fundamentally, we do things to connect with the ones we love. This is the unchanging constant. Yet HOW we do so is what changes with time. which brings me back to my very first sentence. 

Letters, mass transportation, the internet for the respective eras. Letters in 1910s because it takes weeks to travel on ships where i long to talk to you. Mass transport in the 1960s because though letters would suffice, it is much easier to be by your side after our industrial revolution. And in 2000s where people see each other so regularly, I’d rather text you testaments of my love because I relish in the rarity of absences. Taiwan’s tumultous history is such an apt stage for such a story to be told, the everchanging sociopolitical scene can be seen in small details like the language the characters use in each decade, to the bigger picture such as the fates of their romances. 

The 3 acts are well timed and the framing of the shots to capture different levels of intimacy is something that stood out to me. I thoroughly enjoyed the details of each set to reflect their respective zeitgeists. This film entwines history and romance in ways I did not think of even though I think of both so often. Personally I have a soft spot for Taiwan because it reminds me of Singapore in its foggy identity as a result of their histories of belonging here and there which might as well be nowhere, but of course the former faces still, more uncertainty. so in film they establish a recognisable identity. Taiwan films have a sharp edge to them like a teenager. I think this is such an intersting watch because you aren’t stuck with storylines but THREE! like a buy 1 get 3 you know. This film was meant to be a compliation of three shorts, just using the same lead actors. But I believe in soulmates and perennial reincarnation, and that in this tiny life this movie is something worthwhile. 

2024

ルックバック

Directed by Kiyotaka Oshiyama

To love something, to love someone, to love a passion, to love your work. But to love someone from your passion and talents, that’s something that’s not even once in a life time, but genuine pure luck, and to succeed? The idea that you’ll never be the best no matter all the work you put, cause someone works harder and better then you, and always will. To put that aside and love together and put that love not only into each other but into your passion. And then to loose it. For whatever reason it may be, you loose it. And how fucking detrimental it is. Never the end of the world but the end of one of the many lives you could’ve lived, right there in your fucking hands, slipping away. The way fujimoto and this film specifically tackles those topics and how it depicts it. It makes me want to go mad, I know those feelings I know every single one and I am so eternally grateful we got such a beautiful and emotional adaptation to what I believe is one of fujimotos greatest works if not his greatest.

having relatives who are assholes to you for no reason is a timeless part of the indian kid experience

In the latter half of the film, we cannot help but feel vindictive against the mother. The emotional neglect and frequent abandonment has left her only able-bodied adult child emotionally stunted and demure, constantly seeking approval from her mother (which there is none to be given) and constantly seeking to forgive her mother for her faults and mistakes (when she shouldn't).

However with our modern lens of the childfree movement, we might see a woman who begrudgingly accepted her role as 'mother' simple due to the prevailing social norms of the time, and whom society would not have bat an eyelid for prioritising their career over their children should they be male.

To me, the quiet power in this movie lies in how it bitingly illustrates the importance of childhood: as hapless children we yearn for the unconditional love of our caregivers (which we are all too often not provided) and our realities, identities and the way we relate to people in the future (among many other things) are either empowered or ruined by these 1 or 2 individuals.

“one thing I did understand: not a shred of the real me could be loved or accepted. I didn't dare to be myself even when I was alone because I hated what I was on my own.“

Is your war finally over?

It's May, 1947. Japan is still recovering from the effects of the war when Godzilla arrives in Ginza, Tokyo. The original orchestral theme plays in the background as it wreaks havoc on the city, helpless people crushed underfoot or by the rubble. Koichi loses half of his new-found family and screams in despair at the monster, his face tarred by black rain.

You know you've done something right when the human melodrama is the standout feature of a film about a giant sea monster, when it's treated like a prop, in stark contrast to its American counterparts such as Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (2024), which focuses more on raw action than the anti-war drama that immortalised the original in the first place.

It's important to remember that the original Godzilla films were never about a monster, but about the reactions to its terrifying presence as a symbol of the nuclear fallout, a metaphor for the immorality of nuclear weapons, the carnage they leave in their wake, and the self-reflexive post-war perspective that followed. That when it rears its ugly head from the sea as a result of us, there is no turning back, not from the death and destruction it causes, nor from its transcendence of the human nature of targeted warfare itself—an indomitable challenge to be overcome by the spirit of human cooperation, ingenuity and overcoming personal challenges. This is a return to Godzilla.

Koichi had set out to make up for his very human failings in shirking his war duties for a condemned war effort that haunts him every night, but anyone familiar with the themes of the films would know that he wouldn't end up satisfying the death grudges of the engineers on Odo Island that he torments himself with due to survivor's guilt. Professor Noda deconstructs the cliché of last farewells before a fight by choosing to value human lives; which ends up inspiring the rest of the citizen led effort to fight for the future where everyone lives instead, thus shattering Koichi's notion of the fight and his revenge. Not taking part in the war is something to be proud of, as is leading and carrying out a mission to save lives that does not require needless sacrifice, something he honours towards the end and is rewarded for in his tearful reunion. And so ends his own war, in which he is allowed to live, even with his family. Probably the best Godzilla movie I've ever seen and I'm glad I saw it.

I never felt more like a strong single momma of 2 kids than when watching the film.

The animation style used can be seen to be heavily inspired by the new animation style used in TMNT and puss in boots last wish compared to the overused Disney style. And it was nothing short of beautiful, with fantastic colours and world building.

Also the music was a BANGER, with the orchestra welling up in the background as the goose calls out "momma", you really feel like going out and becoming a robot and adopting two goose babies.

A powerful reminder of how familial bonds prevail even through the seemingly impossible, but delivered in a fun and family-friendly setting for all ages to enjoy.