These are the releases that hit movie screens this January 26:
By Jordi Batlle Caminal
To date we had a memorable Baxter in our film imagination, the faint-hearted C. C. (pronounced Sissi, like the Empress) Baxter immortalized by Jack Lemmon in The Apartment. Now we have two thanks to the happy arrival of Bella (pronounced Bela, like Lugosi) Baxter, a prodigious name and a prodigious character, capable of adhering to the marrow of memory and remaining there until the day of final judgment, in the company of Scarlett O 'Hara, Margot Channing or María Vargas. There is not even an atom of exaggeration in the statement. Of the greatness of this creature we must praise the sublime composition of Emma Stone, whose large eyes radiate an authentic and very ancient glamour; She is the inheritance of Bette Davis's eyes, Loretta Young's eyes...
Bella Baxter is the protagonist of Poor Creatures, an explosive cocktail of eccentric comedy, fantastical story and feminist vindication. Bella is not an ordinary girl, but a laboratory product conceived by a very disfigured mad doctor and eunuch (formidable Willem Dafoe), who keeps her locked up in his mansion until she becomes curious about what lies beyond its walls and, above all, , the discovery of sexual appetite from her most candid naivety will push her to live a crazy adventure abroad. The celebration of sex (female in this case) is the core of the fable. Sex understood as a free, pure and innocent practice like the one that Pasolini preached in his Trilogy of Life. Bella's sexual journey through the world is full of picturesque episodes.
Visually, the film is incredibly baroque. The black and white scenes clearly refer to the Frankensteinian classics. The colored ones, with their magical sets (a genuine dip in the cinema of the marvelous), are a chromatic feast with echoes of Fellini, Gilliam, Michael Powell or Coppola's Dracula. Poor Creatures, the best Lanthimos after The Favorite, constitutes an irresistible experience, although perhaps a slave to its own brilliance and immediate effect: this critic can attest that, on a second viewing of the film, the enthusiasm cools considerably. What doesn't cool down, not even in the snowy scenes, is Bella's ardor.
By Salvador Llopart
In the not-so-distant review of The Three Musketeers: D'Artagnan asked that the sequel - because we knew it would continue - have as much action, intrigue and swashbuckling adventure as the one displayed in the previous one. Hoping that the announced reunion with the characters created by Dumas's pen in the 19th century, and revitalized by French cinema a little less than a year ago, would be something like a comfortable return.
We wanted more of the same, and that, alas, is what we get with The Three Musketeers: Milady. But without the initial surprise and, as a major defect, with greater narrative confusion. So that can be disappointing. Because “the same”, in this case, could have left us with a certain taste of shed tears, which Saint Teresa said for the answered prayers, if it were not for the hypnotic presence of Milady de Winter, who gives the title to Bourboulon's new film. . A Milady played with conviction, strength and nuances by Eva Green, who takes a leading role that she did not have before. Thanks to it, we enjoy a good dose of action and intrigue, essential values of the previous film, accompanied by a greater depth of drama and melancholy. The story is a labyrinth, but the characters have their moment. Thanks to Milady.
An epic adventure, in short, where the adventures of the plot are mixed with a State plot in the France of Louis XIII, played again by Louis Garrell with that mixture of innocence and cunning comparable to that displayed by Johnny Depp in his Jack Sparrow. The camera always moving, with a sense of greatness. Underlined by no less epic music. At the service of the battles and the adventures of the three musketeers, which, as is well known, are four. We are not going to repeat their names. Only D'Artagnan (François Civil) stands out, dismayed by the kidnapping of Constance, his beloved. Also to Athos (Vincent Cassel) and his troubled soul. And again to Milady (Green), of course. The film is yours.
Por Philipp Engel
Another horror movie for teenagers, although recommended for ages 13 and up in the USA. It adopts the polished forms of an Insidious-like franchise to talk about the integration of the Hindu community in the American suburbs: the daughter of a classic middle-class family (luminous Megan Suri) prefers to speak English, but her roots will not forgive her and Terror, a mixture of harmless genre tropes and unknown Hindu legends, will end up being the formula that will help her live as one of the others, but without denying her origins.
By S. Llopart
Rodeo has such drive that it makes you forget the confusion in which it moves. From the social nature it moves to the adrenaline of theft, with scam included. Julia, the protagonist, played with rage by the young Julie Ledru, with the strength of Béatrice Dalle and the sensitivity of Juliette Binoche, is crazy about motorcycles: about the little motorcycles of getting together with your colleagues, raising your nose and continuing to roll. Rodeo itself, in fact, is like a motorcycle at full speed, pure instinct, which accelerates when curves come (narratives).
Por P. Engel
Ana Polvorosa goes through the Madrid night like Griffin Dunne in Scorsese's classic, linking calamity with calamity. The loss of money, the rain, the diverse fauna, the taxi ride and even an avant-garde performance, everything is still there. In her debut feature, the comedian Eva Hache also draws on the cinema of Álex de la Iglesia, the film's producer, and demonstrates that she has a certain vision, although some interpretive dissonances and a soundtrack that is too thunderous (except when Los Chichos plays) prevent the complex proposal from be round.
By J. Batlle
After a promising (and tragic) prologue on a vacation yacht, the film takes as its central setting a lighthouse, an ideal space for the restlessness and unhealthy atmosphere (which Hernández fails to convey) and the place where the teenage protagonist suffers from her traumas. between a rosary of scenes with a supernatural accent and another of supposedly shocking dreams. Then the script goes crazy and from psychological horror we move to psychotic terror. There are many metaphorical jellyfish.
Por P. Engel
Not even the very fleeting presence of Clémence Poesy prevents the pathos of Pierce Brosnan, focused on looking 22 years older than the 70 he actually is (under a ton of makeup), from being really uncomfortable for us. Perhaps this seemingly real story about a D-Day veteran who escapes from the nursing home to finally face the ghosts of his past has given rise to an article with a few clicks, but on the big screen it is presented as a bland war trauma. macerated with an excess of good feelings.
