The Wayward Cloud
Right, I am really struggling where to begin with this review.
If you saw it you know what I mean!
But, while I am finding it hard to talk about, it was still an interesting film.
Very well shot, this was a bit of a tour de force of sexual repression, sexual expression and, in a slightly twisted way, love.
The story revolves around a drought in Taiwan and the relationship between a young girl and a young guy who get drawn into a bizarre world through the guy being a porn actor without her knowledge.
There are strange musical numbers thrown in too, but I couldn't really tell why they were put in as they never really accomplished anything but they were enjoyable.
This is a very explicit, sexual film which could put people off, but if you see past the sex, there is a love story beneath.
It is nicely shot to a high standard and the acting is good, it's just all a bit confusing, especially whenever watermelons are involved. Which is a lot!
Overall though, I did enjoy it because it was something different, which is the whole point of a film festival.
Overall Score = 4*
Hunger
I would like to think that knowing the source material to this film might have helped to heighten the enjoyment of it, but I'm not 100% sure that would have added much really.
The film revolves around an out-of-work writer, struggling to find money to feed himself and find somewhere to live.
He manages to write what he feels to be his masterpiece and gets the offer of it being published as long as he rewrites it to be more suitable to a particular audience.
And that leads me into one of the major gripes about the film.
The character is just so vehemently unlikable.
At first he appears to just be a bit of an eccentric but as he goes on, he just alienates the audience by being, for want of a better word, a dick!
He is given money on a few occasions and each time gives it away or wastes it.
While that is quite a humane thing to do, it just means he has to do more annoying things to get money again.
And when he is asked to redo his article for which he will be paid quite well, he avoids doing any work on it in order to pursue a woman he keeps seeing in the street and then forcing himself on her.
He is just an irritating man and by the end I was lacking in any sort of sympathy for him because he didn't do anything to help himself.
The film itself was reasonably well produced. It was shot in the 50's but it seemed to have a vibe of old silent movies and films from the 30's, which may or may not have been intentional, but seemed to work well for the film.
If the main character was playing for unsympathetic, annoying guy then he pretty much nailed it.
Overall Score = 3*
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