Our reviewers select and review the best independent and foreign films on amazon.com, cd universe, and netflix

Everlasting Moments (Sweden 2008, 131 min.  dir: Jan Troell, cast: Maria Heiskanen, Mikael Persbrandt, Jesper Christensen, Callin Ohrvall).

The passing of any technology leaves a mystery we do not question. Canals became railroads. Carriages became autos. Sewing machines became lazar stitchers. Photography becames digital imaging. Everlasting Moments is a time capsule for the magic age of film cameras.

Jan Troell creates a time of wonder where a simple black and white photo could release humans from the drudgery of their lives and lets them dream. Maria (Maria Heiskanen) is the working class wife of the drunken, brutish, but charming Sigge (Mikael Persbandt). Continually pregnant, working every waking hour as a seamstress, she finds a long forgotten camera tucked in a drawer. Her first instinct is to sell it.

But Sebastian (Jesper Christensen), the romantic who runs the photography store, suggests that she first try taking some picture. Maria’s fascination starts when Sebastian takes the camera lens and focuses the flutter of a butterfly on her hand. He introduces her the solemnity of the darkroom, and supplies her with film chemicals to try it for herself.

The yearning for passion in these two is redirected to their silent, side-by-side witness of the alchemy of the developer’s potion. The red darkroom light casts a sensual glow over them as they watch images emerge from nowhere.It is these scenes, and the simple, artful pictures from Maria’s camera that explain the mystery of film and photograph.

No historical treatise, no factual documentary can ever get as close as Everlasting Moments to giving us a sense of what it was like to experience technology past. And no modern photographer working with digital cameras and printers can understand the delight of those silent, dark hours alone in a small red-lit room with smelly chemicals and a pair of tongs.

The only sound in the darkroom is the rhythm of the rocking tray as developer sloshes back and forth over a piece of paper. Whiffs of black began to darken into clouds and then become a face, a tree, a cat: a special moment of life memory. These are the Everlasting Moments.

When you have any website with “Movie” in it, you’re fair game for totally irrelevant sites trying to build their Google search standing. “Movie” is so common a search word that all kinds of businesses hope to lead the innocent into their maw. If I search for “cable movies” I might land on CableTVProviders.net. If I search for “college movies” I might land on Bestonlinecolleges.com.

Or at least that is the hope. Galley slaves in obscure countries spend countless hours on computers searching and contacting sites like MovieWithMe.com  and suggesting articles like “10 Most Quotable Movies of All Time” would be “an interesting story for your readers to check out and discuss on your blog.”

What they seek is a link back that will boost their site ranking and give them an edge in search engine optimization. Google is continuelly fine tuning its search algorhythms to avoid this. The bigger question is why site owners pay good money for results that have bounce rate that is sky high (users go away as fast as they can click).

Of the two stories roseK112 and yelin.george thought would be interesting for us to check out, “10 Most Quotable Movies of All Time” is the most interesting, and most comprehensive. The movies are well chosen, even if if the quotes are not. Sample from A Few Good Men, “You can’t handle the truth.”   This is brought to us by CableTVProviders: a site that tells us channels and program line ups in our area.

“The 10 Most Overused Movie Quotes” on Best Online Colleges singles out the same “You can’t handle the truth” from A Few Good Men as one of the most over used. I would think a site that peddles college course info would suggests more than limp alternatives for overused lines. The suggested replacement for Jerry McGuire’s “You had me at hello” is “Stop talking, you won.” Is literature still taught in college?

My real curiosity is, who wrote these lists?” Where were they stolen from? Neither is credited to anybody. My disdain is reserved for the sites themselves. They are content farms with threadbare content. The more they impede our search objectives, the more frustrated and untrusting of search we become. Google is history. Intelligent search is the next big thing. I can’t wait

Title : Yaadein
Year : 1964
Produced, Directed and Acted By Sunil Dutt

Sunil Dutt, a lovable person, is fondly remembered by everyone not only as a film personality, but also as a kind, humble and thoughtful human who had a multi-dimensional career ranging from an actor-producer-director to a social worker-politician. However, it might be news for many that the thinking man was also the first person to make an innovative venture in Bollywood called “Yaadein” in the year 1964.

The film was a unique attempt since it was A SOLILOQUY act performed by Sunil Dutt, in the role of a worried loving husband, who is surprised to see his wife and children not at home one day as he returns from the work. Making his own assumptions, he starts imagining about the reason for their absence and in turn begins talking to himself about his own mistakes and regrets.

The attempt was and is still novel because it has only One Actor in the movie, Sunil Dutt, who talks to himself and his imaginary personalities throughout its nearly 2 hours of duration on only One Set. And that is the reason it is termed as A SOLILOQUY. Indeed a path breaking, Black & White experimental piece of art, which was also directed by the legendary Sunil Dutt himself as his directorial debut.

Apart from its solo act, YAADEIN is also a must watch movie for every student and lover of cinema for its brilliant use of imaginary expressions. Just watch out the way Sunil Dutt very intelligently uses the background music, various voices, photographs, cartoons, images and shadows to show the presence of the second person in the narration. In fact the film also introduces you to another form of visual expression -A SILHOUETTE, in which a black shadow is used to depict a distinct personality.

More on http://bobbytalkscinema.com/recentpost.php?postid=postid060411221240

The White Ribbon (Germany 2009, 144 min. dir: Michael Heneke, cast:Christian Friedel, Ernst Jacobi,Lionie Benesch, Susanne Lothar, Urlich Tukur, Ursina Lardi, Detlev Buck).

Director Michael Heneke is not good on conclusions. The Piano Teacher, Funny Games, and Cache are fascinating to watch but frustrating. So it is with The White Ribbon.

A small German town witnesses a horse and riser felled by a cruel trip wire, a woman falling to her death on a rotten plank, a man hanged upside down in the mill. What does it all mean? God’s warning about the war to come that will change life here forever? The scenes are brilliant, the intellectual postulations lofty. I only wish Michael Heneke would bevel his story with a finer corner at the end.

His trademark has become the fade out and credits while his audience is left to puzzle the meaning. You can’t but be caught up in the story, the setting, the characters and fine performances by all. As if to emphasize the small rooms and camped world of the story, Heneke rarely moves the camera. Take a look at the scene where Eva’s father (Detlev Buck) grills the school teacher (Christian Friedel) about his intentions to marry his daughter. We rarely cut between faces and reactions, but the charged emotions fly around the room.

Shooting in black and white adds to the period feel, as does the weary voice of the teacher as an old man (Ernst Jacobi) telling us his recollections of the events we witness.

I’d love to put Heneke in a room with a writer and see who comes out alive. It might be another hanging or garroting by trip wire.