Gravity

"In space, no one can hear you scream." That's the famed tagline for Alien. It's also an apt tagline for Alfonso Cuaron's Gravity. After all, it's about surviving in the unsurvivable.

Cuaron is no stranger to the sci-fi genre. His last film Children of Men featured an unbelievably bleak dystopia that would rival anything Orwell wrote. With Gravity, Cuaron (which he co-wrote with his son) condenses the scale to a much smaller degree and amps up the terror.

Remember when it was announced that Sandra Bullock would be in Gravity and the internet let out a collective "WHAT?!" I wonder if those same people ate their words when they actually saw Gravity. I myself am not very well versed with Bullock's work but I can safely assume that this is her best work.

Apparently it's now a trend to release a film you simply must see in 3D. (Not complaining, mind you. Just a small thing I noticed.) Like what Robert Richardson and Claudio Miranda did with Hugo and Life of Pi respectively, Emmanuel Lubezki takes a predominately CGI film and turns it into art. (Especially when coupled with Steven Price's chilling score.)

Gravity is honestly one of those films that gets into your mind and you can't stop thinking about it. Thanks to the glorious combination that is Cuaron, Bullock, Lubezki and Price, Gravity may very well be up there as one of the best science fiction films ever made.

My Rating: *****

Y Tu Mama Tambien

The introduction to protagonists Tenoch (Diego Luna) and Julio (Gael Garcia Bernal) has them doing the very thing they constantly crave: sex. (They're teenagers. What do you expect?)  The rest of Alfonso Cuaron's enticing film shows the two trying to find themselves.

Tenoch and Julio, both temporarily free from their girlfriends for the summer, strive to do something memorable. But what exactly? Drugs? They do those on occasion already. Parties? Same. A trip? There's a thought.

Enter Luisa (Maribel Verdu), the wife of Tenoch's cousin. Think of her as a much sadder Mrs. Robinson. She is an independent woman but she doesn't (or doesn't want to) grasp it. She feels more comfortable when in the presence of a man. The reverse could be applied to both Tenoch and Julio.

Throughout their trek, secrets are revealed, those one would take to their grave. Cuaron's script ensures that the reactions to these revelations are honest, not overdone. Same could be said for the sex scenes. Cuaron makes sure that those scenes have a sense of meaning rather than being pornographic or mechanical.

Y Tu Mama Tambien is a very captivating film, much in the same sense as Almodovar's Talk to Her and Bertolucci's Last Tango in Paris. All three films focus on the characters' burning desires for others and how they use it to escape reality. It may be in Spanish, but nothing gets lost in translation here.

My Rating: *****

Children of Men

The unnerving thing about dystopian futures depicted in fiction is that it might become true.

Set in 2027, when no child has been born for 18 years and science is at loss to explain the reason, African and East European societies collapse and their dwindling populations migrate to England and other wealthy nations. In a climate of nationalistic violence, a London peace activist turned bureaucrat Theo Faron (Clive Owen) joins forces with his revolutionary ex-wife Julian (Julianne Moore) in order to save mankind by protecting Kee (Clare-Hope Ashitey), a woman who has mysteriously become pregnant.

Damn, this is a bleak movie. And yet, it continues to show optimism throughout. In some ways, it's a re-telling of the Nativity story (pay attention to people's reactions towards Kee). Owen and Moore give excellent performances, as does Michael Caine (who is almost unrecognizable). I'd be more pleased had Owen gotten more noticed awards-wise for his performance. The cinematography is breathtaking and Alfonso Cuaron's direction is outstanding. One of the best movies of its kind.

My Rating: *****