Sound of Metal (2020) Powerful Performance By Riz Ahmed
What would you do If you lose something you love, which your life rests on, and it can’t be fixed? Sound Of Metal (2020) shows this reality rather than a melodramatic way. With a thought-provoking message, we usually don’t think but need to.
The film center’s Ruben Stone (Riz Ahmed), a heavy metal drummer, is sober for four years from his drug addiction. With his girlfriend Lou (Olivia Cooke), a singer and guitarist, he performs at concerts. Ruben’s world of music turns upside down when he begins to lose his hearing. He struggles to cope with the loss and tries to fix the damage that can’t be done. Susan convinces Ruben to join the deaf community to learn to adapt to his new situation.
Ruben has to face the biggest challenge in his life; he has to learn to live in silence and peacefully. And move on from what he can’t control. We all relate to Ruben’s journey to some degree. Its deeper themes like adapting to new life, desire, and finding hope when we lost something, in the end, finding harmony in silence, make this screenplay an astonishing one.
Sound of metal wouldn’t be observing and emotional without an incredible performance by Riz Ahmed. He learned to play drums and became semi-fluent in sign language. Ruben’s rage, suffering, tranquility, amazingly embodied by Riz Ahmed, definitely deserves an award nomination. The large cast from real deaf communities will immerse in the environment. The sound design will put the audience in Ruben’s shoes, like at the beginning of the movie; the sound will perish as Ruben loses his hearing. Sometimes it mutes as Ruben struggles or is delighted in the silence. It gives perspective to the audience of being deaf.
Conclusion: Ruben’s journey into stillness is profoundly involving and packed with a gentle yet thought-provoking message that we usually don’t think about but need to. The immersive sound design and powerful performance by Riz Ahmed makes Sound of Metal (2020) a loud triumph. my rating 8/10.
Director: Darius Marder
Genre: Drama, Music
Cast: Riz Ahmed, Olivia Cooke, Paul Raci
Promising Young Woman (2020) Wildly Entertaining With A Powerful Message
The story follows Cassie Thomas (Carey Mulligan), who is wickedly smart and strong. Due to her tragic past, she shuts down the world, drops from medicine, and works at a coffee shop during the day. At night she goes to nightclubs, pretends to be drunk, and frightens men who try to take advantage of women in their vulnerable drunken state. Now she got the chance of vengeance to justify the actions of men and women who did and supported the past’s tragic episode.
Emerald Fennell (writer and director) amazingly controlled the heavy subject with themes of romance, forgiveness, and revenge into a fun thriller and meaningful with her writing. Promising Young Women (2020) will amaze with its unpredictable screenplay. The last 30 min might be hard to digest for some audience. Still, it definitely stays with you days after viewing and puts a valid conversation. Debut director Emerald Fennell (actress of the crown), Within just a few minutes into the movie, she promises to the audience the movie going to be a hell of a ride with her direction, and it did
Carey Mulligan, from her breakout role in An Education 2009 (she was nominated for Oscar) to recent Wildlife (2018) known for her surprising roles and incredible performance, this movie is no different. In Promising Young Women (2020), Carey Mulligan is unbelievable in her role with her different shades; as a moody daughter, alluring girlfriend, and Harley Quinn to criminals while carrying Cassie’s dark past throughout the movie, she absolutely deserves an Oscar nomination.
Bo Burnham, Director, and writer of Eighth Grade (2018), one of the best movies of the year, plays a love interest to Cassie, who did charming work. The cinematography is vividly colorful. Sometimes the cinema becomes uneven while changing the tone from romance genre to thriller vice versa. The soundtrack helps the film get into the vibe. The usage of pop-cultural songs like “Toxic” by Britney Spears, “It’s Raining Men” by DeathbyRomy, “Stars Are Blind” by Paris Hilton in the background certainly sets and raises the mood of the film.
Conclusion: This dark comedy, revenge thriller is wildly entertaining with a powerful message and full of surprising turns—a stellar award-worthy performance from Carey Mulligan. my rating 7.5/10.
Director: Emerald Fennell
Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Cast: Carey Mulligan, Bo Burnham, Alison Brie
Bacurau (2020) Strangest Movie Of The Year
Bacurau (2020) is narratively daring. It mixes western, sci-fi, and thriller genres. The storytelling structure is not a fluid one to follow. Yet, it knits the links and keeps the audience oddly interested throughout the film. Set in the near future, Bacurau is a fictional small remote village in Brazil, where everyone knows each other. It doesn’t have minimum facilities like schools, proper medication and also facing severe water shortage problems because of the rotten politicians. In the meantime, villagers experience a series of strange events in the village. The village disappears from digital maps, a flying drone shaped like UFO chases a biker, telephone signals are jammed. They begin watching and are hunted by an unknown enemy. The citizens of Bacurau defend their town by themselves to survive.
I’ve seen a great movies this year about corrupt politics. The Trial of the Chicago 7, Never Rarely Sometimes Always, calling Bacurau (2020), is also a political film that feels strange. The message is buried in the bloody violence and surreal story, but it’s visible if you dig a little. The character Tony, a corrupted mayor, visits Bacurau for his re-election campaign, bribing the villagers with expired food, adulterated medicine, and misuse power by forcing women. He relates to rotten politicians in rural places in Brazil and also all the world. If you don’t know about Brazil’s president, TLDR Jair Bolsonaro is like a brother to Donald Trump.
The screenplay feels like two movies from different genres stitched together; somehow, it worked. While the first half is brilliantly introducing the people of Bacurau and their lifestyle with realism, the second half shows stereotypical generic antagonists. While the first half shows the authenticity of village sets and amazing grounded scenes with natural bright cinematography, the second shows the violent, intense, attention-grabbing surrealism. While the director maintains the level of suspense throughout the movie, the screenplay occasionally backs with lousy pacing and feels overly long.
Note: movie contains brutal violent scenes, unnecessary nude scenes.
Conclusion: Surreal but also a formulaic, attention-grabbing but unevenly paced, bloody entertaining but also spoke about corrupt politics. Bacurau (2020) is the strangest movie of the year. my rating 7.5/10.
Director: Juliano Dornelles, Kleber Mendonça Filho
Cast: Barbara Colen, Thomas Aquino, Silvero Pereira
Genre: Western, Horror, Mystery
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