The Hour of the Wolf, by Ingmar Bergman

It is evident that German expressionism and films from the Weimar period had a significant impact on Bergman when he made The Hour of the Wolf. The interest and fascination with psychology and the parallel worlds created by the mind were a concerned explored in German expressionism and revisited and re-explored by Bergman. The Hour of the Wolf seems to have a combination of elements from Nosferatu and The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari because it intertwined concept of the supernatural with the interrogative of insanity and obsession.

In addition, the aesthetic choices made by Bergman are in alignment with German expressionism. There is an extensive use of chiaroscuro where darkness predominates the frames while white and light are rare and very suggestive. For instance, Alma tends to be illuminated while the people around her are under dark shadows. This evokes the idea that she is different, pure, and sane. In addition, the use of key light creates pockets of shadows, morphing people’s faces into malicious smiles or perilous ravens.

Even though this film would not be necessarily classified as a horror film, it is definitely unsettling. The use of fast editing choreographed with sudden high pitching was very effective. In fact, it made me jump off my seat more than a couple of times. This is mostly evident in the sequence where Johan (the husband) kills the young boy. Distorted close-ups of different angles of the fight between the boy and Johan are edited at a fast pace combined with hunting and uncomfortable music. In addition, once Johan has killed the boy he throws him into the water, which is pitch black and denser than it should be, resembling a puddle of blood.

Even though this film might be significantly different from the rest of Bergman’s films, it has in common the strong presence of touch. This is a theme that is elaborated throughout the whole film. For example, there is the constant refusal of Johan towards Alma’s touch, and a common desire of the women of the castle to be touched and have contact with Johan. However, this theme reaches its ecstatic point towards the end of the film when Johan finds the presumably dead body of his life long obsession, Veronica Vogler. Through a close-up, the camera moves along Veronica’s inert and naked body following Johan’s hand. The interesting fact is that his touch is what seems to bring her back to life, delving into the ideas of resurrection, deception, and madness.

Rome Open City, by Roberto Rossellini

War films are not my favorite kind of films. It is difficult for me to connect and relate with the characters usually because the extensive scenes of warfare and gunfire tend to alienate me. This is why I was surprised by the fact that I felt so much and connected in such a deep level with Rossellini’s Rome Open City. Even though Italian films of the 20’s are well known for their attempts to portrait the world as it was, Rome Open City was the first of this series of films in which I truly felt as if I was following and witnessing real lives, feeling, and events. It appears be a documentary without loosing the qualities of a feature film.

The acting took the film to a complete different level. You can feel the characters’ emotions pouring out of their faces with such naturalness and sincerity that is hard to imagine they are actually acting. Thus, the connection and sympathy created between the audience and characters makes it unavoidable to be completely submersed in their story.

Nevertheless, I have to confess that I might be significantly bias when analyzing this film. My grandfather was a journalist part of the Italian Resistance (Partigiani). He used to tell me plenty of stories about the quests he and his friends would go through to print articles and flyers denouncing their situation. In addition, he would never miss on telling us the time he was taken by the German army and was extremely close to be shoot with other prisoners. It might be true that because I had all these stories in the back of my mind I was able to relate deeply with the characters. For example, I still remember vividly the scene in which Pina is killed in front of her son. It might be because Rome Open City echoes all the stories I listened to when growing up. Nevertheless, it cannot be denied that Rossellini mastered the editing, mise-en-scene, and acting.

The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, by Luis Buñuel

In this film, Buñuel examines and criticizes, once again, the higher class of society by revealing the absurdities they engage in to maintain proper appearances and manners. He does so by using a surrealistic course of actions delineated by dreams within dreams.

The interaction of the bourgeoisie with other social strata is ridiculous, resulting on the opposite outcome the characters were trying to convey. The social class that is looked down becomes their own instead of the one they were criticizing and trying to ridicule. For example, after they explain the proper recipe and right ingredients to make a martini, they invite their driver to have a drink with them. They give him a martini and stare at him closely to point out how little class and education he has given the way he drank it. However, it is evident for everyone, except the bourgeois in the film, that the driver nervously drinks up his martini as fast as he can only because he wants to give an end to such an awkward situation. In this scene, the camera moves quickly into a close-up of the driver’s face, so the audience is able to scrutinize his actions like the rest of the people in the room. Because this camera movement places so much emphasis and focus on the martini, it presents with certainty the idea that he has been given poison instead of gin. Drinks and poison are recurrent themes in this film. Another example is the Bishop’s story about the death of his parents who were poisoned to death. In addition, one of the soldiers, that opens up and relates events of his childhood, confesses that he poisoned his father following the wishes of his mother’s ghost.

It is interesting how Buñuel shows the high levels of awkwardness and oddity when the bourgeois are invaded by human instincts which do not make concessions across social classes. In this case, he uses sexual impulses to show how incongruous this social class is. They look extremely awkward when trying to have sex: they cannot take off their clothes and do not really know what to do with the animal instincts that were invading their bodies. Such instincts were considered so extraneous to their social class that, in order to fulfill them, they go through the trouble of sneaking out of their own house to have sex in the garden so their guests would not notice what they were doing.

Another interesting point made about the dominant role and differences of social classes is conveyed by the use of sound. Traffic noise mists up important conversations regarding economics and politics. This is a sharp criticism to the social system because it implies that this kind of topics, which affect every strata of society, can only be heard and discussed by the affluent. The rest of the population is kept in the darkness of confusing noises so that they won’t learn about the actions these people engage in, such as transporting and selling cocaine.

Wild Grass, by Alan Resnais

I wanted to watch this film because I enjoyed a lot Hiroshima Mom Amour and I was curious to find differences and similarities between these two films. However, I was mostly attracted to Wild Grass to attempt to discover whether or not Resnais’ geniality to manipulate and experiment with cinema’s conventions and boundaries could still be considered prominent and transgressive.

If I had to describe my impression of Wild Grass in one word, it would be perplexity. I think this is one of those films that you have to watch a couple of times to truly understand it. I was allured by the impression I was getting the meaning of the film throughout its first half to realize, however, that my interpretations were far from the actual meaning of the story. For instance, I had initially thought that George’s wife was his daughter, which significantly changes the understanding of their relationship and course of actions.

On the other hand, I was pleased to see Hiroshima Mom Amour echoed throughout Wild Grass. For example, there is an extensive use of voice over and internal monologues. The effects of these monologues in the viewer resembles the waves of the sea: they take us extremely close to the characters by entering into their minds to then push us away and alienate us as we loose track of the central meaning and sense of their dialogues. In addition, as in Hiroshima Mom Amour the characters’ faces are not shown to the audience only after a significant long time.

An interesting, and arguably obvious, difference between Hiroshima Mom Amour and Wild Grass is Resnais’ play with color. I could not avoid wondering how he would have used color in Hiroshima Mom Amour given the fact that its use and manipulation was so obvious in Wild Grass. Neon lights are present in almost every scene, tinting the whole frame with green, red, blue, and yellow tonalities. Color is meticulously present not only in the choice of lighting, but also in every mise-en-scene. For example, the color blue plays an important role throughout the film. It represents the sky, the only place where Marguerite Muir is completely fulfilled, free, and happy. In addition, blue signifies beginnings and endings, death and birth. George’s and Marguerite’s relationship becomes tangible within the confines of a blue-glass building. However, this newly born relationship fades away and dies, along with their lives, in the plain accident (once again, they were confined by the color blue). The presence of blue as a signifier of death and endings can also be found in the fact that the first and only time when George complains about his wife, confessing the precarious state of their relationship, is when he is painting his house blue. On the other hand, red represents, as usual, passion and desire. Marguerite has a fluffy and lion-like red hair, symbolizing a forbidden fruit and object of desire.

In this film, Resnais seems to incorporate in a serious yet ironical degree, different genre and film conventions. For example, the sequence in which George decides to leave the wallet he had found at the police station, seems a tribute to film noir. The combination of low-key lighting with window blinds that create horizontal shades of light and shadow are very characteristic of this film genre. As to make such resemblance more prominent, there are deformed shadows of people reflected in a glass wall. Another film convention Resnais plays with is the over-imposition of imaginary actions as the characters meditate and decide on their course of action. Finally, it cannot be ignored the apparent end of the film in which George and Marguerite embrace with an over the top, old-Hollywood style kiss while the word “Fin” flashes by.