Properly Screened

This film was directed by the same filmmaker who gave us sweeping, visually stunning epics like Lawrence of Arabia and Dr. Zhivago , so I came in expecting grandeur. What I got instead was fairly ordinary. Brief Encounter (1945) leans heavily on exposition, with Laura, a reserved and introspective housewife, narrating much of the story through voiceover. Too often, it tells us what she feels rather than trusting the strength of Celia Johnson’s acting to convey it. But isn’t the first rule of effective screenwriting: show us, don’t tell us? By today’s standards, the central affair is tame. I understand that 1940s British social norms demanded that personal desire take a backseat to marital duty. But the film could learn a thing or two from Wong Kar-wai, who perfected the restrained, unconsummated affair in In the Mood for Love . He demonstrates how longing, tension, and emotional depth can make a story riveting. The film avoids total collapse thanks to Celia Johnson. Every emotion is ...

This might be my favorite discovery of the project, so far. A friend and I saw this for the first time and both fell for it immediately. Neither of us knew anything about it going in, apparently unlike everyone else, since the show sold out a 232-seat theater at 4pm on a Friday. Set in 1960s British Hong Kong, it follows two neighbors in a crowded apartment building who suspect their spouses are having an affair with each other. What grows between them is quiet, restrained, and heavy with feeling. Wong Kar-wai keeps the dialogue sparse, letting music, color, and close-ups --- hands, hips, glances, clocks, doorways, cigarette smoke --- do the talking. It took a bit of research to realize how many films and shows I love trace back to this one, including A Everything Everywhere All at Once , Moonlight , and Mad Men . Sofia Coppola has spoken about In the Mood for Love (2001) as a key inspiration when writing Lost in Translation , most notably in her Oscar acceptance speech for Best Origi...