Blow Up
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Movie Reviews of Blow Up
Movie Review: It's a movie about SEEING. Stop analyzing and enjoy it
Summary: 5 Stars
I think it's a mistake the way some of the reviewers isolate individual factoids about what they see in the frame (empty cafes, a painter's knowledge of his own work....). They seem to miss the overall - which is that it's a movie with a beginiing, an end, and something strange in the middle. These poor souls need to remember why they watch movies in the first place. Some works of art withstand repeated assaults - but very very few are invincible fortresses, and a bit of restraint and finesse is required or you're libel to ruin your enjoyment of a perfectly fine movie simply by throwing rocks at it. Why apply super assaultative techniques on the initial viewing? The amazing thing about great art is that it does seem to withstand initial analysis. I'm not saying Blow up is great art - only that the analysis part comes afterward, not as the frames are rolling out of the projector for your first viewing. How can you possibly enjoy watching a movie if you are intensely weighing it against 30+ years of hype, reviews, and memory? And Resnais? And instead of guessing that a movie has a certain look because of budget why don't you give the director the benefit and ask if the movie looks a certain way BECAUSE HE WANTED IT TO LOOK THAT WAY? Blow up is hugely entertaining, and a fascinating examination of perception and reality - which may point to some of the other reviewer's questions. The painter's work looks strikingly like the blown up photos - which is obvious since this fact is delivered on a platter by one of the character's lines. You don't ask a painter what his work means; I learned this in art history. You ask a painter what he likes for dinner, what movies he enjoys. As soon as you ask him what his painting means, he's going to take you on a ride. So anyway, the point is, Blow up is well worth watching. It is beautifully shot, rewards with repeated viewings, and in that naive 60s way it rewards a gracious analysis with concepts and ideas that are neither pretentious nor flawed. It's a movie about SEEING. Watch it and enjoy.Movie Review: Interesting film, 5 Stars
Okay, here's the truth about this film. If you are not into slow-plot movies, then you won't like this movie. Sometimes while watching the movie you wonder whether there is a plot at all. I had read the short story "Blow-Up" by Julio Cortazar which this movie is based on before watching the movie. And I thought that the plot of the movie was minimized greatly to show quiet scenes. All one really remembers of this film is watching this good looking guy (Hemmings) wrestle around on the floor with a couple of naked models, Hemmings developing pictures and looking at them over and over again until he realizes what he has been looking at all along (a dead body)..and a bunch of mimes in the end playing tennis with an imaginary balls.Okay, so the first time you watch the movies it can be quite boring unless you are in the right mood. But the second time I saw it it was on DVD instead of VHS and the pictures and scenes are so fun to look at that you finally realize what director Antonioni was creating...A pituresque film...The plots become more interesting...
But here's the next thing..You should watch this film alone...This is not a good date film....Because you may be in the mood to watch it...but she might not...All I know is that this is a film you really have to be in the mood for. It can really make a date crumble...This should be seen with an sophisticated, intelligent person...
Julio Cortazar's story was mainly about a man who takes a picture and becomes obsessed with a woman he has photographed. After examining the picture day in and day out he finally realizes he has been staring at her because she seems to be staring at something...And then he realizes that she is looking at something laying on the ground some distance away...A body... Antonioni's film uses this plot in his film but expands on it with imagery and the story of this swinging 60s man.
Anyway, watch it, on DVD of course, cause it looks better, definitely worth owning if you like this kinda stuff.
Movie Review: The Artist as Detective
Summary: 5 Stars
Thomas is a vain and self-centered fashion photographer in London during the swinging sixties. But he obviously wants a life with deeper meaning--he poses as a factory worker to take gritty black and white photos. And one day he gets out of his Rolls-Royce (or is it a Bentley?) and wanders aimlessly through a park snapping photos.
Thomas' desolate photos of the empty park show his loneliness and ennui. But as he develops the photos, he discovers that he may have photographed a man's murder. The dead man whose photograph Thomas takes in the park represents the deadness of Thomas' own emotional life. As he compulsively enlarges the photographs in search of the "truth" of what happened, a beautiful, mysterious woman, Jane shows up and demands the negatives. Jane also seduces him; this is a reversal of Thomas' usual exploitative relationships with women--she's turned the tables on him. Thomas, perhaps for the first time in his life, is truly emotionally engaged. But Jane takes off with the negatives and his prints and Thomas is left alone again, but now with a new capacity to feel. Where he goes with it is up to him. Of course, since this film is by Antonioni, it's visually mesmerizing and what "happens" is beside the point--Antonioni's films are always about a process of becoming. His characters have a way of never reaching their destinations. In Antonioni's films, the journey is the destination.
Blow-Up is also about the sense of time passing--Thomas and Jane are young and beautiful, but their youth is as elusive and fleeting as the mysterious images Thomas takes in the park. The dead man Thomas photographed is middle-aged; it's an omen of Thomas' future he has to face and accept. Antonioni's mod London looks quaint and dated today--but in a way that only increases the film's allure. Like all of Antonioni's films, it's a quirky masterpiece.
Movie Review: A great film from another era, an icon of the 1960s
Summary: 5 Stars
As a teenager in the sixties, I had already made my mind up to be a photographer, but this film influenced me into being comfortable in the profession of a photographic artist, which in turn has given me a wonderful life adventure on a creative rollercoaster. I hadn't seen this film for many years but upon review I find it dated for today's audiences, yet for me it still holds up as an icon of the 1960s.David Hemmings plays a photographer, a dreamer, a curious individual who lives the busy life of a high-flier, photographic artist, much like the popular London photographers of the time; David Hamilton and David Bailey. He treats his work as a part of everyday life, as with most artists, but he also has the arrogance of someone who is good at what he does, and knows it. The film is very European in many ways yet it became popular cultural in the London of the sixties.
The art of photography is about imagination and make-beleive, and so is the world of Blow Up where nothing is exactly as it seems. It is all manufactured, including the truth. Is it there? Yes. No it isn't, so lets make-believe it is, or lets make it happen. In this uncertain world the photographer suddenly stumbles on a mystery where he tries to uncover the elusive truth, but he then becomes unraveled by the enigma of what truth is. Is it there or not?
People have been trying to find meaning in this film for years but Blow Up is an ethereal romp where nothing is as it seems. So if in the end the meaning is meaningless, just enjoy the ride.
Sorry, but the commentary track is senseless. Don't know who did it but it comes from someone trying to find meaning. And that's his problem. Turn it off and enjoy the film.
Blow Up is a "FAB" film, definitely high on my list.
Movie Review: A fascinating enigma...
Summary: 5 Stars
Read reviews of "Blow Up" and you'll find a huge diversity of opinion. It's a masterpiece... it's rubbish... it's tantalisingly complex... it's hedonistically superficial... what happens in the film is "real"... nothing that happens in the film is "real"... and so it goes. Watch the film and take your choice, but the fact that it still generates such reactions is a testament to its enduring impact. So what does it have? Well, on the down side, a lot of the acting is weak, the musical soundtrack is too self-consciously "hip", and several of the scenes appear to have been inserted purely for effect - "we do nudity, drugs and rock & roll as well as making films". And on the plus side? David Hemmings acting is superb, the cinema-photography is brilliant, and the use of sound (and silence) to create atmosphere is stunningly effective. But beneath all that's superficially good & bad there's something much, much deeper. Firstly, a riddle that drives it and to which there's no answer - in simple terms, what's real and what's not? Antonioni poses this question throughout the film, from the heavily handed obvious (the play acting of the mime troupe), the subtle (the fact that Hemmings' character is never referred to by name), to the brilliantly tense darkroom scenes where his photos are "blown up" to levels that make interpretation of what he and we are "seeing" impossible. Secondly, and even more subtle, is this man's life simply play acting itself - has he become nothing by having everything - is he still "real"?
Deep stuff and a film that is, as a result, a fascinating enigma in its plot, its execution and people's reaction to it.