BLIND WILLOW, SLEEPING WOMAN – ★★★☆

French animated film set in Tokyo, and based on short stories by Haruki Murakami. It was a bit weird to see an animation set in Japan, with French language, and English subtitles, but I got used to it. The film mainly focussed on vignettes along two story lines, one of a man whose wife leaves him following the Tokyo earthquake, and the other a salaryman banker who is visited by a frog trying to fight to stop another major earthquake from occurring. Nicely put together, and mostly entertaining. I’ve intended to read some Murakami for years, and it’s back in the reading list.

STONEWALLING – ★

Two and a half hours that I will never get back. Would have been my first walk-out for MIFF 2023, except I had several people either side of me in the row. I also incorrectly thought it was a 90-ish minute film, so the face that I was there for an hour long than planned made it worse. Chinese film about a girl who falls pregnant, and decides to keep the baby solely to give it away to a family her mother is indebted to. Very hard to understand the point or purpose of many of the scenes. Maybe lost in translation, but would have dearly loved to have had a nice coffee somewhere instead.

FOUR DAUGHTERS- ★★

Documentary about a Tunisian mother and her four daughters. Started strong, and I thought it was going to be enjoyable. Quickly descended into such layers of meta that I kind of lost track of the point of the whole thing, and the message it was trying to convey. It seems that they were trying to portray the matriarch as the protagonist, but it was possibly harder to succeed given her stories of beating up her (probably asshole) husband, beating her (probably innocent) children, and so on. Was glad when it was over.

TIME BOMB Y2K – ★★★

This was a fun film. A nice break from more serious topics that I’ve seen this year. It is not an important documentary by any means, but I was glad that it took a sensible direction around reporting the Y2K bug. As someone who was there, I saw the work that went into correcting systems before the new year hit. Lots of fun nostalgic interviews and reporting, and easily transportable into some modern tech issues such as AI and social media. And of course may help when it’s time to start planning around the Year 2038 Problem

MUTT – ★★★☆

A film about a young trans man living in New York City who is still going through transitioning. Over a roughly 24hr period, it shows a variety of interactions with his ex-partner, family, friends, and others. I think it will help those less familiar with the trans community get a better understanding, though at points it did feel a little bit like a checklist of what people might wonder in an “ask me anything”. Nicely done, and I think worthy addition in helping to make the world a better and more accepting place. Was glad to finish the day on a strong note.