Krzysztof Mąkosa – Blog

Results for category "Cinema"

8 Articles

Margin Call by J.C. Chandor

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Krzysztof Mąkosa

When the Music Stops…

The first scenes of J.C. Chandor’s Margin Call, chilling as they may be, are mere prelude to a nightmare.

Imagine a busy Wall Street office. The camera follows two grim-faced women as they go down the hall. The women are on a special mission. Many employees of a huge financial company – eighty percent of the trading floor – are about to get fired. The Board has ordered a bloodbath at or near the bottom of the food chain.

Seth and Peter, young analysts in Risk Management, can see the firing squad and start to panic. If they could, they would disappear into some hole. One of their bosses tells them to calm down and go back to work. This seems like sound advice. Their situation, precarious at the best of times, depends on a thousand things beyond their control, so why panic? As it turns out, they stay alive, at least for now. Read More →

Footnote by Joseph Cedar

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Krzysztof Mąkosa

Chasing the Wind

Some people believe life is ruled by fate, which implies a predetermined order of things. Others say fate is just pure chance, suggesting we live in cosmic chaos.

Fate or chance?

No one has a clue, and no one ever will. But that’s okay. What matters is that sometimes the consequences of either are absurd.

So absurd that all we can do is watch and laugh our heads off. Read More →

Best Offer by Giuseppe Tornatore

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Krzysztof Mąkosa

Nothing Is What It Seems

Like many fine movies, The Best Offer (2013), Giuseppe Tornatore’s psychological thriller, is a variation on a well-worn theme.

He is rich, successful, sophisticated and, as his name (Oldman) suggests, past his prime. A great art expert, he can tell a forgery from the real thing because, as he says, the forger can’t resist the temptation to add some personal touch – an unsuspected stroke or an unimportant detail – by which he ends up betraying himself. In short, there is always something authentic concealed in every forgery.

If the greatest forgers can’t fool him, who will?

She, on the other hand, is mysterious, fragile, alluring, and young enough to be his daughter.

When it’s all over he changes beyond recognition. Read More →

Midnight in Paris by Woody Allen

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Krzysztof Mąkosa

The Art of Concealing Art

I’m sure you’ve noticed that a work of art, in order to be hailed as great by critics and academics (not that there is much difference these days), must be divorced from reality, involved, uninvolving and plain boring. Don’t you ever get the eerie feeling that the purpose of contemporary art is to punish us for sins we haven’t committed? Think of all the extraordinary, enchanting and exhilarating books on which you’ve wasted your time and money. Take contemporary classical music: Doesn’t it make you want to explore other kinds of music, or stick to the old masters for as long as you live? Contemporary painting? Oh no, not that again! Read More →

Nosferatu the Vampyre by Werner Herzog

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Krzysztof Mąkosa

The Most Abject Pain

Werner Herzog grew up in the Bavarian Alps without running water, a flush toilet or a telephone. When he was young he was eager to make movies, so he stole a camera from the Munich Film School, claiming he had some sort of natural right for a camera, a tool to work with. As a full-fledged artist he promised to eat his own shoe if his friend completed a film. Read More →

Barry Lyndon by Stanley Kubrick

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Krzysztof Mąkosa

Burning Like Ice

In this day and age of fast-paced living, why would you want to spend three hours on an adaptation of a Thackeray novel? What can you learn from the protagonist and the other characters, those bewigged puppets? What can they tell you in their quaint eighteenth-century English? Read More →

The King of Comedy by Martin Scorsese

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Krzysztof Mąkosa

You laughin’ at me?

The King of Comedy (1983) is among the least popular Martin Scorsese’s movies.

And truth to tell, there are good reasons for that. It’s not as spectacular as Mean Streets. Not as poignant as Raging Bull. Not as shocking as Taxi Driver. Or nowhere near as violent as Goodfellas.

Besides, its plot is banal and frankly ludicrous. Read More →