Yogi's Movie Consumption Blog

The famous bio-pic of one of the most astounding man ever to live. It's been a while since I've watched the film, but what most lingers in my mind are the breathtaking visuals, the enormous scene at the funeral and Ben Kingsley's absolutely fantastic performance. Sometimes a film maker has everything at the right place: a great script, a fantastic lead, and an absolutely astonishing locations to set the story in. This is one of those cases. I consider writing a good biopic one of the hardest things to do. Especially in the case of Gandhi, the biography is so rich and full of details, it takes a master surgeon to disentangle the many possible strands the plot could follow. Attenborough chose to focus on the bizarre stubbornness of Gandhi. The first couple of scenes keep repeating that theme on less important incidents, but throughout the story Gandhi's will to perservere is gradually exemplified at increasingly difficult situations. Although there is the dange...

The former court composer Salieri has gone mad as he accuses himself being responsible for the death of the genius composer Mozart. The trick of the film is to have the audience accept that Mozart killed himself, by indulging to the powers of writing a requiem. And it manages to do that - although it felt a bit long at one of two points, until that important revelation and connection between Mozart's inner working and his physical condition is established. The most intriguing thought for me was how Salieri arrives at the conclusion that not he himself kill Mozart, but he managed to cheat god into killing him. And his madness depends about the upholding of this mental construct. There are many other aspects of the films which fascinated me: the scene where Mozart dictates the composition is quite amazing, also from a musical point of view. That little deconstruction and analysis of that little part of the requiem reminded me that there are few things as gratifying as studying ...

Three decades of military transform the rebellious young soldier into a conservative, tired general. Unfortunately, I enjoyed this one the least of the Powell/Pressburger collaborations so far. Quite possibly, the patriotic overtones and the fragmented narrative structure annoyed me a bit, as there was no central conflict even within the main character. The love story feels a little forced upon but there are some beautiful images and lines in there. There is a beautiful poetic moment, when the general returns to the ruins of his house to watch the water tank and then remembering what he said to his wife just before they had moved into that house. Also, Deborah Kerr really made the screen sparkle with her many appearances.