The Age of Commercialism

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

best movie i've ever seen.

The acting in this movie is really good.

In this review, I thought I'd offer some insight to other viewers on how I understood this movie.Warning- major spoilers ahead.I feel there's two possible explanations for this movie.1. Sean is not really Sean. Sean's father was a tutor in the building and Sean hung around in the lobby while his father was working. He followed the woman to the park and unearthed the box containing the letters Anna wrote her husband, and through them discovered personal, intimate details that only Anna would know and was able to trick everyone into thinking he was Sean. When the kid saw Clara at the door, he wasn't taken aback because he recognised her as his past lover but as the woman he had followed who buried the box. Clara showing her dirty hands was the dead giveaway of this. It indicated that she had been digging in the park looking for the box where she had buried it and couldn't find it, and she knew he had the box. When Sean said "don't tell Anna", he was referring to not telling her that he is a fraud and had been deceiving Anna. As for whether he was intentionally deceiving her, he's a 10- year-old kid with a wild imagination and he happened to share the same name as the man Anna had addressed the letters to. It could be that he got carried away with the fantasy that he was Sean. The only inconsistency in this account is how he would know things like where Sean died or how he recognised his desk or the lady who told Anna there was no santa. We don't know how much Anna revealed in the letters and I suppose he could have come across some old newspaper clippings or spoken to someone who had informed him of where Sean died. The rest could be lucky guesses. I think the point of this account is how easily people can be deceived into believing the supernatural in times of emotional distress, grief and desperation. And as Sean's character indicated at the start of the movie, he doesn't believe in all that "mumbo jumbo" and is a man of science. Also, the point was that the kid was representing the idealised version of Sean Anna had carried around all these years, not the real Sean who was unfaithful. So maybe the fake kid Sean was metaphoric of the real Sean, who was also a fake. 2. Sean is really Sean. Sean was an ordinary, 10-year-old kid who was hanging around the lobby while his father was tutoring like on any other day. But then he spotted Clara, his lover from his past life and started to remember everything. Clara was his true love because he had probably hung around that lobby many times before and had seen Anna come in and out of the building but his past memories had not been triggered by her because she's not the one he truly loved. It was only when Sean saw Clara, who admittedly had not visited Anna in the past 10 years that his past life memories were triggered, and he followed her into the park. When he opened the letters that were previously unopened as proof he loved Clara more, he started to rediscover all the love he had for Anna, presumably before his affair with Clara had started. When Sean saw Clara again at the door, he recognised her and remembered the affair he had been suppressing since rediscovering his love for Anna and when he said "don't tell Anna", he was referring to not telling her about the affair. Although this is later contradicted when he doesn't recognise her and asks her who she is at her apartment. If he was the real Sean and he did not recognise Clara then what didn't he want Clara to tell Anna? This is a major plot hole in account 2 and makes me think the first account must be true and the kid is not really Sean. Unless he just had a moment of recollection and then suppressed it afterwards because it was too painful for him to admit to himself that he had betrayed Anna. Also, perhaps seeing Clara didn't trigger his past life memories because he really loved her but because deceiving Anna was the major regret in his past life, his "unfinished business" or "karma" that led him to Anna to ultimately help her see who he really was. When he came to terms with his past actions, he realised he didn't deserve Anna and decided to tell her he wasn't really Sean to spare her feelings and in a roundabout way of saying that if he really loved her, he wouldn't have betrayed her so he can't really be the person she thought he was to her, as described in the letters she wrote that he never opened. So Sean's purpose of becoming reincarnated was to allow Anna to move on with her life and let go of her love for Sean, something which would have happened anyway as Clara had planned to gift the unopened letters to Anna. However, ultimately both Clara and Sean were too cowardly to admit this to Anna and perhaps that is why she is seen distressed at the beach after marrying someone else, still unable to let go of Sean. Alternatively, perhaps the point of this second account was that Sean wanted to come back as a better version of himself and not make the same mistakes, hence his comment "I'm not Sean because I love you". What he meant by this is he is unable to face up to his past self and accept he was a person who could do that to someone he loved. And ultimately he ended up deceiving himself in his second life the same way he deceived Anna in his last, believing he was someone he was not just as Anna did.

Birth gets my vote for most preposterous film ever created. There is a reason why most people have never heard of this movie. Imagine combining Disney's Freaky Friday (Lindsay Lohan) with Big (Tom Hanks), changing a couple plot elements, and having Ed Wood direct it. In a nutshell, that's what Birth is. I almost think that the writers, producers, and director made a bet to see if they could shoot this film and actually have people believe it is serious.Birth is essentially a pseudo character study with the two main characters being a 30+ year old woman and a ten-year old boy. It's the "grown adult in a kid's body" story that you normally expect to see in your typical light-hearted comedy film. But in Birth, it's changed up to take itself COMPLETELY seriously and rated R (for adult content in the U.S.). If they would have thrown in some jokes and slapped a Disney logo on it, I totally would have believed it was a straight-to-DVD kids' comedy flick. But that is not the case.The concept, in the manner it's portrayed, is just beyond ludicrous. The dialogue is just as bad and delivered SO seriously by the actors (who were AWFUL) that it's almost nauseating. One positive thing though is that this is one of those movies that's SO bad, you can't stop watching it. It draws the viewer in with the question, "How much worse can this possibly get?" I actually am considering re-dubbing this movie with a laugh track, and then it could possibly be 5-6/10 rating.Birth is one of those movies where the viewer is basically invited to interpret some facets in their own way, and what happens on-screen isn't completely defined as far as what the characters believe and experience. But the whole thing is so bad, I doubt most people will really care about taking it seriously. Much like famous director Ed Wood's work, the creators of Birth seem to really have believed they were shooting a stylistic piece of art with powerful dialogue and brilliant cinematography. Nothing could be further from the truth. It comes off more like a terrible B-quality soap opera pilot that never got picked up by a network and has been sitting in some dusty storage room for ten years.I do want to give credit where credit is due, however, and say that this film could possibly serve as a great how-to video for adolescent males who are trying to fulfill their ultimate fantasy by turning a grown woman into a pedophile and getting her to take a romantic interest. I really have to give the kid credit for that at least.

I've been hearing for a while now about the praise Nicole Kidman receives in Birth, and so I definitely saw it for her. She was magnificent, one of her very best performances and perhaps her best performance of the 2000s. However, I also found the film to be quiet effective. It has an ominous, wonderfully atmospheric tone and sensitive direction that sort of manages to cast a spell on you (the way Kidman's character perhaps is in the film). I do wish it was left more ambiguous, and there's still quite a few things that don't entirely make sense when you think about the "ending resolution". Still, surprised it got such a cold response from critics.

This is really going to talk about a lot of spoilers so don't read this unless you really want to know what goes on in this film.Now this was a great movie being the type of thriller one can watch over and over. The reason the movie was great was not just the acting, which was certainly good, not the cinematography which was magnificent, and the exceptional musical score.Instead this movie works because of the brilliant way Johnathan Glaser told this story.With this story you are first led through skepticism to a point where you begin to believe that the child who is claiming to be Anna's reincarnated husband Sean must be telling the truth. He answers intimate details on their life together, talks about things he would seemingly never know and eventually Anna herself believes.Then Glazer destroys all of that by introducing Clair, played by Anne Hect, as Sean's lover. He shows how the child took some love letters written by Anna to big Sean and read them thereby fabricating this entire tale. In fact, the child eventually comes to the conclusion that he can't be the dead husband Sean because he actually loves Anna and since he loves her there is no way he would be bothering with Clair. Therefore, since Sean was messing with Clair the kid figures he can't be Sean.This is what makes the film a masterpiece. The story isn't told simplistically and there isn't a clear cut answer given on the child in fact being the husband. There is no ghost providing instant recall.In the mythology surrounding reincarnation there are often tales that children remember past lives better but become desensitized as they become older. People also don't have a complete blueprint memory instead its kind of blurry and hazy.This is exactly how the film portrays the child's memory. When little Sean is first shown in the Apartment building Clair is walking out with Anna's love letters and she suddenly stops. She is looking away from where little Sean is sitting the whole time so she doesn't know he is there. She stops and she looks at the box of letters then she turns and looks at this kid. Hect gives a perfect performance in this scene showing that when she turns she is expecting to see Sean. But she sees this little kid and then as she turns away you see the confusion and uncertainty of the emotional tie.The movie is loaded with subtle clues to the reincarnation that are easily missed the first time you watch the film. In the above mentioned scene you only really understand that scene when you know what's in the box Hect is carrying.The film thrives because while everyone is telling Anna that little Sean can't be her dead husband he really is but the film doesn't just come out and say it. The characters are realistic and they laugh the kid off at first. They behave like real people would with skepticism and disbelieve.The kid is realistic too, at least if you accept someone could be reincarnated. He states his memories are like Deja Vu. He seems to identify people by actions, feeling and sight, not by name. In the scene where he tells the old lady "you are the one who told Anna Santa Clause wasn't real" this is proof positive the letters haven't a thing to do with his story. If they had he would of known her name. He also managed to know where Sean died. The letters written when Sean was alive would not give him either of these things.Yet, the way the scenes are shot leave a little doubt.Finally there is the love story. A lot of people whine because Kidman was doing this or that with a ten year old. But that's sort of powerful in itself. These two people were utterly in love when married to the point that Anne essentially gave up living. Clair too is a powerful addition to this love story which suddenly evolves into some sort of love triangle. Clair knows this is Sean but she lies to him out of hatred and spite to get him from Anna. Even after death Sean went back to Anna who Clair states he refused to leave in his previous life. Most of the definitive things pointing to big Sean and little Sean being one and the same are easily missed while your attention is focused to the sensible explanation. Far from Sean reacting to Clair's dirty hands when he said don't tell Anna, he is instead reacting to her saying I've moved, I have a new address. In other words little Sean is acknowledging the relationship. But the relationship isn't espoused til later in the story so you can't tie the address and what she says to him having knowledge. This is a masterpiece in the style of Stanley Kubrick. You have to watch this movie a couple of times.