barni70 Reviews

Bitter Moon (1992)

Masterpiece about relationships - love and hate, desire, passion, betray and revenge.

[10/10 · 5 April 2019]

As a matter of fact I saw this movie 26 years ago in the cinema when I was 23. That time I was hard Polanski's movies fan, so every new release of the director was highly anticipated by me. And you know what happens when your expectations are high - they are rarely met - and that is what happened to me while watching later Polanski's movies, even including The Pianist (or rather especially, because of the very, very high expectations).

Until now I remember my feelings during watching this movie. And there were only few, in the nineties, that affected me as much as this one. After few first scenes of introduction I felt like the director was banging my head with a baseball bat. I had thrills all over my body watching this emotional rollercoaster. Some o my friends tried to argue that Louis Malle Damage was better thriller, but few years later they had to change their minds after watching the movie again.

The part played by Peter Coyote was just mind-blowing, in my opinion the best male performance of that year by far. Tom Hanks, Liam Neeson, Anthony Hopkins - neither o them was even close, because Peter Coyote was much better than Daniel Day-Lewis in My Left Foot and, taking into consideration the US release of the movie, he was, in my opinion, on par with Tom Hanks in Forrest Gump who had no competition that year.

I highly recommend this movie to people who are in stable emotional relationships.

Warsaw 44 (2014)

One of the best war dramas, if not the best one.

[10/10 · 8 October 2014]

This is the movie that can shatter your mind. It squeezes your throat and doesn't let go till the end. You get it under your skin and when you realize that's it's based on facts you're no longer the same. Although it's shot in a very bright and colorful manner, without visual effects achieved by obscure camera work, it's very dark at the same time. This is the story of a very young man Stefan who is responsible for his family after his father's death on the front of the Second World War. He's not interested in any conspiracy, but when he meets a girl whose name is Ala, by whom he's fascinated and then in love, decides to set himself free from his mother's arms and, against his will, he's involved in the Warsaw Uprising. At the beginning there is fun in the war, typical for immature men, and even in the presence of the first death Stefan shows off his bravery in front of the girl. Everything changes suddenly with the first bullet and with some very tragic moment which he has witnessed. Those two things turn him into a walking dead who loses everything and all he wants is vengeance. The director Jan Komasa pulls the spectator into his movie and with no mercy forces him to experience the real cruelty of war. I have never seen in the cinema such brutality in its pure form, exposed in so natural way and not hidden behind convention. The first scene of Saving Private Ryan comes to my mind when I try to compare the presentation of death during battle, and death at all, in this movie. However here we have one big advantage, Mr. Komasa absolutely deprived his movie of any pathos. This film is simply about death and war burning out feelings, dreams and humanity. It's very realistic, but very fresh in its form with great soundtrack and editing, with some symbolic scenes that may be controversial, mostly in Poland, because Warsaw Uprising is the national tragedy here. It's made on a grand scale without compromise, shot in wide perspectives with great designer production. Undoubtedly this is just a great movie. Maybe I'm a little biased, because I regard previous Komasa's film Suicide Room as the best psychological drama I've ever seen, but I'm just a spectator and this is what I want to experience while watching movies – real emotions.