BIFF Movie # 2 - The Spirit of '45

I have a confession to make.  I am a super nerd.  What, you hadn't guessed that from all the gushing reviews of superhero movies and the fact that I take time off work each year and spend my holidays watching multiple movies per day rather than sunning myself on a beach?  Well if you hadn't already worked it out, I'm confessing it now after having it confirmed last night when I enjoyed "The Spirit of  '45" so much.  A documentary based on how England rebuilt the country and economy after World War 2, and what happened since.  This film will have another showing this week so if you like the sound of it, look it up and get along.

The drawcard for those not into economics and politics could be the fact that this is directed by the British director Ken Loach, who may not be well known here but is renowned in film circles for his 'social realism' style of movie making.  Which is appropriate, because the doco is concerned with the social impacts of real events around the end of the war and it is clear that the filmmaker is a socialist.

The message is all important in this documentary, which has kind of copied the Michael Moore approach where you take your view of an issue and then just put stuff on the screen which backs that up and don't worry about interviewing anyone with a different opinion at all.  Now I can say that and still say I liked the movie ok? The message here is "socialism works, unfettered capitalism doesn't" which is why I, a nerd with an Economics degree, found it really interesting. 

The theory put forward by all involved is that England would never have recovered from the great depression and overcome the malaise that could have occurred after World War 2 was won, had the people not elected the Labour Government which had a strong socialist policy and passed many laws to nationalise many industries and sectors for the greater good.  The employment, healthcare and housing this provided definitely looked to have been beneficial and the film spends a long time focusing on the "5 pillars" that were the key to England's revitalisation, and how the elderly folk they interviewed felt about it.  A short amount of time is spent at the end looking at how the structures created then began to be dismantled in the Thatcher era and continue to have been since, and links the decline of socialist policy with a decline in British society in general - rising unemployment, drug and crime problems, poor health etc.  Whether this is due to the privatisation of key industries and sectors in England or just a general symptom of the current global economy structure

Loach has constructed this documentary in a fairly basic style, which combines archival footage of people living and working in England from the 1930s to today with footage of political leaders of the time, intercut with current interviews from various folk reminiscing about the times.  The 'talking heads' are half ordinary people who lived through the time (or their parents/grandparents did) and half experts on the particular topic at hand, but nobody famous.  This ensures you are not distracted from the message.  The ordinary folk included have been well chosen, as it's just like hearing your grandpa talk about the olden days, and their memories and the smiles or tears they bring to their eyes give the documentary some heart and some humour.  Without them it would have been exceedingly dry.  With them, it's fascinating stuff for those with fairly liberal views of economics.

The only downsides to this movie were the inclusion of subtitles (everyone was speaking English and not hard to understand!) and to my mind, a lack of statistics and numbers.  I understand the focus was not on that, but I was fascinated by how the British Government had the money to undertake all the spending that is shown in the film, and where that came from.  This is not explored.  So, a little unbalanced and it definitely won't be everyone's cup of tea (get it?) but fascinating stuff and it may be quite instructional given the governments that most of the world are living under at the present time.

BIFF Movie # 1 - Outrage Beyond

Opening my account of BIFF 2013 was the new film from legendary Japanese director and actor 'Beat' Takeshi Kitano.  He is probably best known in Australia for acting as the teacher in "Battle Royale" but also for his earlier yakuza films such as "Boiling Point" and "Violent Cop".  He has explored different genres over the years but returned to the yakuza subject matter in the 2010 movie "Outrage".  This movie is the sequel to that, although I had no idea that it was a sequel to anything beforehand or while watching it (thanks IMDB).  The BIFF guide did not mention the film was a sequel and I think looking back now, it might have been pretty handy to have seen the first film.  Although this film made total sense on its own when I didn't know there was a previous movie, as it did mention past events, I think seeing both would deepen and enhance the appreciation of the second movie. 

As I understand it, Outrage Beyond starts immediately after events in the first film which from my reading seemed to concern rival Yakuza clans the Sanno, Otomo and Hannabishi.  There is a new head of the Sanno family and new young upstart 'executives' whose plans for changing the operation and making more money than ever are unsettling the old guard.  The Hannabishi have a pact not to start a war with the Sanno.  And the Otomo family is no more, with Otomo himself (played by Beat Takeshi) not appearing in the first few chapters of this movie but eventually being revealed to be in prison.  But a nosy, possibly corrupt cop seems determined to stir things up again by plotting and setting people against each other while trying to remain 'neutral'.  Will he succeed and what are his motives?

Anyone expecting full blown violent yakuza action from the get go could be disappointed with this, as it takes quite a while to set up all the characters and the conflict between them.  However, the final third of the movie does suddenly explode into gun battles, stabbings and torture although not as in your face gory as you may expect.  There is some very clever use of sound in these scenes.  The action is all pretty easy to follow but it does require some concentration in the dramatic scenes to remember who is who when a lot of them involve Japanese men of a similar age in similar black suits yelling at each other in non-descript offices and boardrooms. 

I enjoyed the themes of the film in relation to honour, forgiveness, brotherhood and the changing of the guard within the yakuza ranks.  This last item provides most of the few humourous moments.  However I have to say I didn't totally love it the way I have loved most of his other films I've seen.  This I put down partially to the very strange character of cop Kataoka and I think just to not having seen the first film so you are always playing a bit of catch up.  However it does work as a stand alone movie with all previous slights and betrayals explained.  For those who like serious Yakuza films rather than over the top Japanese craziness, you would enjoy this film.

 It's showing again this Friday 15 November at 9pm.