Silence (Dir. Martin Scorsese, 2016)

(Reviewed 4/5 on letterboxd in April 2017)

Scorsese in his own words called this film as hoping to open up a dialogue about faith beyond the realms of organized religion and to show that doubt is very much a part of faith. This is an extremely rich film with beautifully portrayed characters; especially on the Japanese side, considering the nature of the story.  The last scene which has been subjected to a lot of discussion in previous reviews felt like a "Rosebud" kind of moment in it's enigma. I will definitely need a re-watch to appreciate all it's ideas however it was very helpful to listen to Scorsese share his intent behind making the film right after the screening at MOMI.

Welcome to New York (Dir. Abel Ferrara, 2014)

(Reviewed 4/5 on letterboxd in April 2017)

Feels even more relevant after the U.S. election. A sleazy billionaire in a position of power knows he can get away with pretty much anything. Ferrara makes the audience complicit (Pasolini style) by titillating it with the debauchery and later having the protagonist confess to his daughter that neither could she have made him stop nor did he have any intention to stop; then he looks into the camera and tells people to fuck themselves and ironically this does not come as a shock to us. "The irony is that no one wants to be saved", declares Depardieu's character to his psychiatrist, and you cannot help but agree with him.

Paterson (Dir. Jim Jarmusch, 2016)

(Reviewed 4.5/5 on letterboxd in April 2017)

People usually don't like films about genuinely nice people; I seem to prefer them. Paterson is one of those nice guys who also happens to be a poet. While his colleagues and friends keep complaining about their lives, Paterson can't ask for more. He has a beautiful girl friend who he says "understands him very well". He has his secret notebook in which he writes words that come to his mind. He prefers not to call himself a poet; he is only a bus driver. For his girlfriend though, he is a poet and she keeps entreating him to make copies of his poems lest they get lost. Paterson also shuns technology and refuses to even carry a smartphone. Jarmusch finds great possibility in this basic premise and through his character's keen eyes and ears, finds poetry in the most unlikely places of a mundane New Jersey town with no personality. Therefore there is poetry to be found in laundromats, curtains, bedrooms, bars, streets, matchboxes, water falls, buses and even in the blank pages of a notebook. As one of his character reveals late in the film - "blank pages reveal endless possibilities" and Jarmusch surely knows how to use them.