The Adventures of Baron Munchausen

The recreational impulse to tell lively tales improvisationally immersed in exotic wonder, effectively drives so much interactivity as days slowly pass and nights stall and linger.

There are so many rules to strictly follow that sensational stories encourage emancipation, being able to fly or breathe under water miraculously motivating agile daydreams.

For children ensconced in unknown consistently reimagined otherworldly lessons, many of which wildly champion imagination the fledgling instincts to revel cathartic. 

Yet balanced with practical reasoning the traditional realities corresponding to our species, birds fly and fish breathe under water while chipmunks and squirrels don't want to be pets.

Distressing unsettling to be sure as one soulfully seeks corporeal independence, to leave the confines of the body behind and transform into pure energy like they do on Star Trek.

Evolution acclimatizing piecemeal as centuries pass and eons articulate, the gradual biological attunements so subtle and microscopic they matriculate unnoticed.

Atemporally speaking still like fresh miracles the remarkable adaptations made to environments over time, many of which seem to have been accompanied by desires to collectively transform and easily acquire nutrients.

The slow passage of time ingenious in its bearings logically enables evolutionary traction, diverse environments habitually gathering sly multivariable communal constructs.

It's not to say to let dreams slowly fade and stoically embrace painstaking millennia, at night and on weekends the transmission of narratives creatively subsists to generate pause.

To fruitfully exercise unorthodox peculiarities through artistic invention and ludic lullaby, makes for less dull invigorating pastimes as things progress, revert or stagnate.

To recklessly play with constructed reality with poorly thought out alternative designs, if in a position of power and gaudy influence has destructive abrasive effects.

The disastrous ways in which the Second World War cacophonously devastated so much of the world, effortlessly critiques ambitious yearnings which ruthlessly seek what isn't for sale.

To remember the difference between fantasy and reality upon embarking on mature expeditions, doesn't mean the former can't be referenced but also encourages logic and reason.

Logic and reason are much more preferable day in and day out as the seasons pass by.

And cooler heads manage things through fact and instruction.

Without worrying about comment and headlines. 

That Christmas

Awkward alternatives bravely manifest upon a far off inventive seaside stage, where newfound bold uncharacteristic reimaginings strut and flutter in this day and age.

The Christmas season immersively configureights as local residents stride and muster, parents and innovative children alike emotively adopting seasonal levity.

But the routine quotidian yet fascinating happenings are soon traditionally cast aside, as a furious blizzard startlingly descends and the village is cut off from the outside world.

Not only that, but a group of parents suddenly finds themselves stuck off the side of the road, with no cellphone access residually roughing it their children forlorn and ever antsy.

Although they don't dwell on their parents' disappearance after Santa provides them with ideal gifts, and they calmly engage in festive shenanigans improvisationally utilizing the awesome presents.

Meanwhile, a lonesome youth whose father has forgotten about the special day, mournfully seeks the maladroit accompaniment of a local school marm since his mom has to work.

They dig in deep and courageously construct fortuitous memories for when she returns, as bucolic mischief and communal courtesy cerebrally celebrate felicitous feeling.

Another reason to fight global heating, to help ye olde England recover its bearings, a snowstorm may be present within the film but it's nothing compared to that received here in Canada.

In fact just last week 5 adamant feet of challenging snow diabolically descended (no exaggeration), and we were once again reminded of the pioneering spirit that legendarily engineered the development of our land.

If we can fight off global heating and turn the terrorizing tempestuous tide, winters will return to normal across the pond, and their films may once again inspire rugged confidence.

Santa nevertheless is indeed filled with such inclinations, as he braves the "storm" to generously give sought after gifts to the anxious young ones.

It's a cool take on St. Nick who uses his omniscience to choose perfect gifts for the children, and brilliantly leaves them something luminous and cherished before once again departing for his next destination.

A thoughtful shout out is gallantly given to freeform turkey kind in That Christmas as well, as the resident birds at a lacklustre barn are valiantly set free to avoid mealtime melees.

A chill hyped-up account of just how different Christmas might be if the alternatives bear fruit.

And even more innate goodness emerges throughout the season. 

Cool Christmas film embracing festive change.

Doraibu mai kâ (Drive My Car)

The active life sustaining supple harmless interactive thought, consoling quirky consternation adept immersive ingenuity.

The calm and patient holistic vision stoic steadfast solemn varsity, pertinent adaptable expansive sizzle earmarked voltaic latent pressure.

But his (Hidetoshi Nishijima as Yûsuke Kafuku) loving partner (Reika Kirishima as Oto) suddenly passes when perhaps he could have intervened, or said something to swiftly alter the dismal moribounding hemorrhage. 

Psychologically deconstructed he gradually jukes and jets and jigsaws, slowly reimagining amenable principle through lighthearted chill experiment.

At one time he reflexively envisioned daunting twists tantalizing turmoil, without pause or critical reflection the plain and simple erudite schism.

But his wife first found the idea, after which he quickly improvised.

The working relationship romantically inclined freeform forgiveness inveterate l'amour, a rare gift celestially insatiable prolonged compression distilled adrenaline.

A common goal remarkably productive intermittent rowdy regenerative horseplay, benefits accrued conducive clutches laidback lax alert consistency.

Not one to overlook novelty, he notices his new driver's (Tôko Miura as Misaki Watari) abounding with pluck, somewhat forlorn yet still observant eager to multidimensionally disperse.

In possession of secrets so much distraction inanimate disconcerting dalliance, inopportune exported rationed irrevocable hardwire harrowing husk.

Kafuku winds up working with a young actor (Masaki Okada as Koji Takatsuki) who had an affair with his wife, the two awkwardly engaged through mutual love lost shin limitless lugubrity.

One young and blunt unwilling to hold back the thoughts which emerge to haunt him, the other sombre and much less eager to discuss such sensitive direct subjects.

Through these discussions a play takes shape as volatility blends with reason.

Only to ceremoniously fade.

Tragic rage.

Resurgent vellum. 

The Seagull

I've never given much thought to creating new dramatic forms.

I figured I'd just keep going and if something remarkably different popped into my head one day I'd share it and see what happens.

The Seagull examines an eager son's desire to impress his dismissive mother whose highly regarded literary partner has fallen for a would-be ingenue.

Her son loves her as well but the world is set to injure.

He writes an innocent play involving animals and the devil and boasts of having created a revolutionary form which is ridiculed thereafter.

The daughter of the family who manages their farm loves him, although he never notices, and an enthusiastic yet dull schoolmaster loves her, and she could sincerely care less.

An admirable doctor and a wise aged uncle (Brian Dennehy as Sorin) provide colourful commentaries throughout the film, which is based on the play by Chekhov, and contains characters who are generally engaging even if they're somewhat hedged-in.

He's a cad, she's a diva, he's seen better days, she's a dreamer, he's optimistic, etc.

But most (or all) plays lack the thousands of pages Proust had to consider his characters as they grew over the course of a lifetime, so I can't categorically fault an artist for introducing individuals prone to one trait or another, especially when they have so many clever and passionate things to say during so many meaningful exchanges.

Imagine no one ever spoke their mind or shared their point of view, their silence an attempt to preserve a sense of authoritative detachment when observing a discussion held between friends and relatives (they aren't bored), which often expresses either a lack of courage or adventure, if they truly have something valuable to say.

Someone could write a play where a modest youth consistently presents novel insights and ideas while surrounded by established personalities who refute everything he or she says through recourse to stereotyped vitriol and name it after The Logical Song.

Or call it Canonized.

The Seagull tragically blends innocence and maturity to warn artistic youths to beware of popularity and its influence as it unconsciously recasts everything it can control in its own marketable image.

It promotes novelty and difference but situates them within a covetous frame that scathingly materializes naive spirited dreams.

To mock itself, perhaps.

Perhaps not.

Birdman: or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)

Spiralling prosaic haunting indecision, contraction instigated, distraction, procured, a play must be performed, negative emotion dominating, that voice, that voice which collegially condemns, internally and externally, belittling, haunting, there are specific time limits, the exceptional exceptionally parades, tender loving affairs, perpetual motion, angst rehabilitated, worst case after worst case, coming together, working, in unison, taking things too far, hold tight, flip, perform, do what you have always done, resolve strengthens, misgivings matriculate, swoop, soar, Silencio, glide on the currents like a nuthatched pin cushion, Birdman, Michael Keaton, what happened to Michael Keaton?, he disappeared, I thought, it's bound to be sold out, it's starring Michael Keaton, just like the '90s, purchase advanced tickets, line-up like Batman, she makes out like she did in Mulholland Drive, the soundtrack's embedded, bejewelled, it can't be extracted, necrophonic needlework, the lines, the perfectly delivered palatial lines, discursive krypton, in motion, in constant motion, assert, lose it, discuss, advocate, temporally sketched to last a lifetime, impotency notwithstanding, harness the haunting perpetual motion, aloofly pepper with speeches and scenes all of which are capable of standing alone, united to etherealize commercial artistic bedlam, for applause, for fortune, if I were Tennessee Williams I'd orgasm, Birdman, Birdman, Birdman, syntheses within syntheses, a kind word, still a movie, it's still a movie, it never loses sight of the fact that it's still a movie for entertaining, mesmerizing, a kind of charming magical cinematic awareness simultaneously celebrating and criticizing the medium, without appearing sentimental or confectionary, I shouldn't have used the word magical, a failure, I fail, flotsam flickering and flailing, taking note, sprawling to capture this ingenious tenure, this incomparable sight, this modest, coy, Birdman: or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance), in the act of creation, it reacts anew.

La Vénus à la fourrure (Venus in Fur)

Ceremoniously shifting from breaking wave to breaking wave, cast adrift to buoyantly submerge, the surf submissively dominating, an exacting cyclical shock, one young playwright, fascinated by insubordination, jostling the erotically profane, is interrupted, is, slowly, commodified, undeniably secure in his misplacements, subdued emphatic gusts, assured of their tidal pertinence, to enact the derailment of triumph.

On its own terms.

Ambiguity/ambivalence beguilingly solemnizes the dialectic, the exchange, a protracted piecemeal purge, sensuously persuasive, overpoweringly contained.

As the page turns.

A reading.

Precision.

Opportunity.

Mesmerizing mythical lambasted seduction generously vouchsafes its domineering obsequiousness, in Roman Polanski's crippling La Vénus à la fourrure (Venus in Furs), existentialism be damned, fiesta.

My favourite filmic adaptation of a play with a small cast and minimal setting is Sidney Lumet's Long Day's Journey into Night, but La Vénus à la fourrure now firmly occupies second place in my thoughts, due to Emmanuelle Seigner and Mathieu Amalric's powerful performances.

Opulently humble.

The ending was a surprise since it makes a definitive suggestion, although ambiguity remains, only a vestige however.

I would have faded with him tied to the cactus.

There must have been passionate arguments here.

Perhaps the definitive suggestion makes for a stronger ending.

I admit to being a sucker for critical controversy.

Not that there isn't plenty of critical controversy in the film.

You could argue that it's about the aesthetics of critical controversies themselves.

The whole night through.