8. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004, Michel Gondry)

Love... untangled

Joel wakes up on St. Valentine’s Day feeling strange, his head feels empty and his feelings enraged. He goes to work, but when he has to take a train to his work, he takes the one that takes him to a beach in Montauk… why? He has a feeling, he runs to it, as if he was called to it. Inside the train, he encounters Clementine, a girl with colored hair that laughs a lot and talks to him as if they knew each other from some time ago, which is strange, because he feels the same way. But, what if they did? What if they did have a relationship together, just that none of them remember it? How could this happen? Well, let’s enter with the science fiction aspect in this movie, they both erased each other from their memories, but how many times has this happened? The disjointed narrative in this movie confuses us and at the same time recompensates us with an original story, wonderful acting and spectacular dialogue.

 

7. The Human Condition (1959, Masaki Kobayashi)

Humanism as a way of life, but not in this life.

Kaji is japanese, and he’s not really proud of it, specially now with the Second World War. Kaji is a humanist, but even if he enforces the autorities to improove the situation of the workers at his commanding possition, they won’t do it. Kaji has a wife, but with time they will begin to feel distant. Kaji hates war, but he’s obliged to take decissions for the good of his country generals and officials, as if he were a mere soldier. Kaji avoids war, but encounters it when he works at a mine, when the workers are chinese war prisoners, with whom he has to talk and convince that he’s a man they can trust. Kaji trusts a lot in the man around him, but they betray him at every step he makes, every decission he takes gets backlashed, he finally gets some kind of love-hate relationship with those who he tried to protect and trust, they admire what he has made, but they criticise him for not doing it before. Kaji ends in this film as a man needing the compassion of his loved ones, but he doesn’t receive it, except from his wife; so as we watch him we feel the opression and the need of compassion, and we end up giving it to him. The kind of movies that make you feel this way for fictional characters are rare, specially on this level of thought and feeling.

 

6. Yi Yi: A One and a Two (2000, Edward Yang)

The common life of a Taiwanese family

Ah-Di, N.J.’s brother, is getting married with a obviously pregnant young woman; N.J. encounters by chance with a former school love; Yang-Yang, N.J.’s son, gets constantly hit in the back of his head by girls; N.J.’s Mother goes home, tired and saying that she’s old; Ting-Ting, N.J.’s daughter, befriends Li-Li, her neighbour, who has a boyfriend called Fatty; Min-Min, N.J.’s wife, plans to go to a religious temple for a season. All these lifes, connected, one with each other come together when Mother has a stroke and enters a coma. Everyone gets touched and everyone changes, everyone lives new lifes. Some of them will experience love, others knowledge or sadness, many times questions are asked and never answered. This is the story of a typical Taiwanese family, living their lifes with troubles and happiness, confronted with a country with economic recession and a loss of culture.

 

5. The Son (2002, Jean-Pierre Dardenne & Luc Dardenne)

This man does not look for revenge

Olivier works in a rehab center where he teaches young delincuents to be useful to society, through carpentry. During his normal routine he has to cut wood, carry ladders and do many other things to teach the kids how to do it, even if his back is sore. One day, he receives the petition from a new kid to be in his class, with fear and curiosity he rejects him and sends him to other teacher. Olivier follows him as he eats, works, sleeps… who is this kid, and why does he know him? His ex-wife goes to see him after work and tells him that she’s pregnant and will marry again.

 

4. Mulholland Dr. (2001, David Lynch)

Betty (left) helps Rita (right) to find herself, she has lost her memory

Betty’s just got off the plane that left her in Hollywood and we can see her delighted expression: happiness and hope. A woman has just survived a car crush and we can see her lost and frightened expression: she doesn’t know who she is. They meet each other in Betty’s aunt’s department, as the woman who had lost her memory went to hid there. The woman, that names herself Rita, carries more than one million dollars in her purse, along with a blue box that contains a mystery beyond understanding. Why did she carry that money? Meanwhile, there’s a film director that tries desperately to get his movie made, but he doesn’t want to be told how to do it, who to contract and when to do it. At the same time, two friends go to see if the stuff the dreams are made of is real, with frightening consecuences.

 

3. Haibane Renmei (2002, Various Directors)

This is Rakka, a Newborn Haibane, why is she here?

Rakka is a Haibane, a creature resembling an angel, who recently hatched from a giant cocoon. She has had a life before this one, and so all the Haibane, but they never remember anything, not even their names. Inside the cocoon, before hatching, the Haibane have a dream, if they remember it, they will be named after it. For example, Rakka dreamt about falling through the sky, so she was named 礫 (rakka; falling). Reki lives in a home for the Haibane named “Old Home”, where they take care of the little Haibane kids. They can only wear used clothes and buy old things, due to their condition. They also can’t go out from the town of Glie, nor touch the walls that sorround the city.

 

2. In the Mood for Love (2000, Kar Wai Wong)

They will play a game out of grudge... where it will end?

Mr. and Mrs. Chan move to a new apartment. On the same day, Mr. and Mrs. Chow move to the apartment next door. Obviously, many things get confused in the moving, but one thought that feelings and love would also change places. Mr. Chow and Mrs. Chan begin to suspect from their respective spouses are having an affair with each other. This is the time when both of them begin to go out in dinners, as they get to know each other. Someon would think they would end together, as a vengeance, but they say they will not end as their spouses.

 

1. The Man Who Planted Trees (1987, Frédéric Back)

Desesperation, war and suffering. Viewed from the eyes of a shepherd.

Elzéard Bouffier is a shepherd that, for over four decades, was able to make a forest appear out of nothing. Some obscure facts from his past, associated with his late wife, has some repercusions in his way of thinking, and as he did, we do as we see this wonderful animated short.