To get me refreshed for the next year, I decided to take a complete break from my mundane lifestyle. It was a going to be a long weekend for me so I decided to pick 7 DVDs from various genres ranging from fantasy to realism to horror. Some of them could hardly make it to my favorites list but this one did. It’s called Transamerica (released in 2005) which was released in 2005 starring Felicity Huffman in the lead role. Before I go any further, I must applaud Felicity’s performance and rate it as one of the best I have seen in American cinema. She deserved something more precious than just an OSCAR for the same.
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The Statement (2003)
It was time to renew the passion of watching movies. The sinister look of Michael Caine on the cover of this DVD intrigued me to pick it up. So for this week, I selected The Statement (2003). The story of the movie is about frenchman Pierre Brossad (Michael Caine) who belongs to the Vichy police, without whom the Nazis could never have murdered some 77,000 Jews in France. Brossad himself is responsible for murdering 7 Jews in a daybreak assault in a village called Dombay. He manages to evade justice by absconding and remains undetected under the protection of the clergy. However, a team of Jewish hit-men supported by some individuals in the seats of power are on his trail to avenge the killing of their brethren, 44 years later. A ‘statement’ proclaiming the justice and the avenging of the death of the Jews would be left on his dead body. Judge Annemarie Livi (Tilda Swinton) and Colonel Roux (Jeremy Northam) are assigned the task of reviving the case against Brossad for crimes against humanity and bring him to justice. Clearly it’s now the case of who-gets-him-first – the bullet or the long arm of justice.
Caine in his interview had said that he’s never played a character he’s disliked so much and it proves in the portrayal. He’s displayed the cunningness of Brossad who always seems to cover his tracks, with the same aplomb as the sick individual who clenches his chest in pain while moving around and shooting his predators. The movie, is based on a novel by Brian Moore and inspired from a real life incident.
Suspect Zero (2004)
Crime thrillers are my favorites and it takes little effort in selecting movies which deal in the subject, albeit of course staying away from those gory ones. Benjamin O’Ryan (Ben Kingsley) is gifted with telepathic qualities and is part of a secret government funded program called Project Icarus which looks into exploiting those qualities for military purposes. FBI Agents Thomas Mackelway (Aaron Eckhart) and Agent Fran Kulok (Carrie-Ann Moss) are assigned to look into the spate of murders in the country which O’Ryan is suspected of committing. The victims are all serial killers who are accused of committing various crimes. Mackelway and Kulok must find the real ‘Suspect Zero’ who wanders the country in a heavy truck and kidnaps children to his ranch.
A good plot but somehow, at the very onset of the film, it was difficult to piece together the puzzle and create a picture. Kingsley’s depiction of a man, trying to escape his extraordinary qualities which give him endless nightmares till the very end, is noteworthy. It’s unfortunately something which he was born with but couldn’t ‘shut it off’.
