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A Genteel Black Hole

Tag: movie-review

  • Century of Cinema: Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans

    Ally

    Day 2 of Century of Cinema. Also day 42 of Project Glowing Rectangle, in which I try to divert some of my daily doomscrolling time back towards a more nourishing oblong: Cinema.

    Title: Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans
    Director: F.W. Murnau
    Writer: Carl Mayer
    Year: 1927
    Country: USA

    Format: Blu-ray
    Length: 95 minutes
    Seen: 6 March 2026
    Rewatch

    Picking a film for 1927 was tricky. This was the year that gave us the seminal sci-fi classic Metropolis, and the Oscars’ first Best Picture, Wings. But in the end I settled for the first American film by German Expressionist pioneer F.W. Murnau: Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans.

    A Man (George O’Brien) is seduced by a glamorous Woman From the City (Margaret Livingston), who persuades him to murder his Wife (Janet Gaynor). The Man takes his Wife out in a rowboat, planning to push her overboard. But as she cowers and pleads for mercy, he is stricken with guilt and cannot do the terrible deed. He begs her forgiveness, but can their fractured relationship be healed?

    Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans won three of the first ever Academy Awards. One was for cinematography, one for Janet Gaynor’s performance. Its third Oscar was in a category never since repeated: Unique and Artistic Picture. (I wish they’d bring that one back!) It’s almost a mirror image of another film I watched recently: Varieté. That film started with a man leaving his wife and ends in murder; this one starts with attempted murder and ends in reconciliation. I question whether reconciliation with a would-be murderer is really A Good Thing, but Sunrise is such a visually stunning piece of cinematic storytelling, I find myself swept along by it regardless.

    The film uses a variety of German Expressionist techniques to vividly evoke the characters’ emotional landscapes. There are too many enchanting images to count. I particularly love the shot of the Man surrounded by ghostly images of the Woman From the City, clinging to him seductively as he contemplates the murder of his Wife.

    Its use of sound is equally inventive. Despite being a “silent” film, it came with an early example of a synchronised soundtrack—no “talkie” dialogue, just music and occasional sounds effects. The music, like the imagery, overlaps different styles and tones to create complex sonic textures.

    Sunrise is an incredibly evocative film. Admittedly it has an uneven structure and a troubling central premise, but the sheer artistry of its construction kept me utterly beguiled.

  • Project Glowing Rectangle: The Life of Oharu

    Ally

    Day 32 of Project Glowing Rectangle, in which I try to divert some of my daily doomscrolling time back towards a more nourishing oblong: Cinema.

    Title: The Life of Oharu
    Director: Kenji Mizoguchi
    Writer: Kenji Mizoguchi, Yoshikata Yoda
    (based on stories by Saikaku Ihara)
    Year: 1952
    Country: Japan

    Format: Blu-ray
    Length: 136 minutes
    Seen: 29 January 2026
    First viewing

    It’s been a disruptive few weeks, but things have finally settled down enough for me to watch a film: The Life of Oharu (1952), a period drama directed by Kenji Mizoguchi. Kinuyo Tanaka stars as the eponymous Oharu, whose life is one of ever-increasing misery. We are introduced to her as a fiftysomething prostitute, walking the streets and struggling to find a client. She takes shelter in a Buddhist temple where the statues’ faces remind her of figures from her past. What follows is the heartrending story of how she fell from a life of nobility to one of such hardship.

    First an affair with a lowly retainer (Toshiro Mifune) ends with her lover executed and her family banished. Then her father sells her, first to a Lord as a mistress to bear him a child, and later to a pleasure district as a courtesan. From there things only get worse for Oharu, almost always due to circumstances beyond her control. But the film does end with the faintest glimmer of hope… at least if you subscribe to Buddhist philosophy.

    You’re bought and paid for. You’re no different from a fish on a chopping board. We can serve you up any way we like.

    This was my second Mizoguchi film: Ugetsu (also starring Tanaka) was a highlight of last year. Both films are beautifully directed, very gripping, and intensely emotional. But while Ugetsu is a spine-tingling, supernatural tale, The Life of Oharu is horribly realistic. Oharu’s suffering comes not from personal hubris or ghostly tricks, but from the cruel treatment of other people—mainly men. Throughout the whole film I found myself bristling at the sheer injustice of it all.

    Kinuyo Tanaka is brilliant in the title role. I’ve seen her in several films recently, each one displaying a different facet of her talent. (She was also one of Japan’s first female directors, so I’m excited to explore that side of her work too.) As far as Mizoguchi goes I definitely preferred Ugetsu, but I can’t deny this film’s power—it left my heart feeling, like a fish on a chopping board, rather battered!