奎里达情妇 LA Querida (2023)

库梅尔·南贾尼：夜间思绪

像我这样的爱情

我们这样，是爱吗？阿妹天生患有脑性麻痹，性格却异常跳脱乐观，闲时会约朋友踩板吹水，画画作乐，二十多年来一直努力不被身体耽误。可是过度保护的母亲坚决安排她进行子宫切除手术，阿妹努力建立的生活再次失去平衡，她的身体永远是不由自主的。在朋友推荐下，阿妹找到了一个专为残疾人士提供性服务的自发组织，并认识了义工Ken。这无私的相遇仿佛抚慰了两个受伤的灵魂，那日渐累积的情愫冲淡了道德与身体的羁绊，这样的关系，是爱吗？ 　　谭惠贞继《以青春的名义》（第14届开幕电影）后第二部长片作品，将爱情元素和身障者性权益议题融合，成就一个道德探索与自我寻找的故事。

等待方舟

　　Set in an underground dungeon inhabited by bundled, ragged human beings, after the nuclear holocaust. The story follows the wanderings of a hero through the situations of survival. People wait for the Ark to arrive and rescue them while their habitat falls apart.　　Delving deep into the dusty and long abandonded vaults of b-cinema in search of lost gems always leaves me with a bittersweet taste. On one hand the discovery of unexpected gems where no one would think them possible is a rewarding experience. On the other hand though it makes one wonder how many of these remarkable low-budget oddities, personal love affairs of directors never quite famous and now all but forgotten, have almost forever slipped from memory?　　n any case what we have here is a little post-apocalyptic gem from Poland that is really better than it has any right to. The dystopian near future of O-BI, O-BA finds a group of survivors of the nuclear war that ravaged the Earth inhabiting an underworld concrete bunker and biding their time as they wait for the mysterious Ark, an air ship of some kind that will come and save them. The Ark proves to be an elaborate hoax, carefully designed to give hope to the malnourished and desperate denizens of the bunker, while in the meantime the dome that separates their miserable existence from the nuclear winter outside is slowly caving in.　　What first striked me about the movie is the design of the bunker and the depiction of the survivors. The survivors are gaunt, filthy and terrible-looking penitents, dressed in rags and aimlessly wandering the neon-lit halls of the bunker like automatons. The bunker is a rundown, seedy place, with bright neon lights peering from all sides like the eyes of malignant beasts.　　On one hand it is a slightly 80's depiction of the dystopian future but the movie never stoops down to MAD MAX cheese. Instead it combines biting political satire with the bleak outlook of a world with no future, black comedy with barbs on apathy, religion and power. The survivors, for example, are fed some kind of flour dropping from a tube that hovers in the air - later on we discover the food supervisor uses books and the Bible itself as filler for this meagre meal. There are many such short symbolic touches, perhaps not life-changing or faith-restoring, yet playful, clever and inspired.　　One thing is for sure; O-BI, O-BA is not your run-of-the-mill sci-fi schlock. It overcomes its modest budget with creativity and has genuine artistic aspirations both from a writing and directing perspective. My opinion is that it should have been filmed in black and white instead of colour though. The director uses atmospheric light and shadow to great effect and it would have registered even better in stark black and white. The blue-green neon on the other hand outstays its welcome after a while. Just a minor gripe in an otherwise solid b-movie with its heart set in all the right places.　　Imagine a less bleak THE ROAD (Cormac McCarthy) being injected with the satire and humour of DR.STRANGELOVE and you're getting there. See it if you can find it.

异形怪胎

　　薇吉妮亚(布鲁克亚当斯)与老公(杰夫海恩嘉)为了想生个孩子，用尽了一切办法，在求教过一位专门治疗不孕症的专家(詹姆斯凯伦)后，最后终于如愿以偿地成功受孕。 原本满心期待当妈妈的薇吉妮亚，却发现自己的身体起了不该发生的诡异变化，当夫妻俩发现这个尚未出生的孩子竟是项疯狂实验的成果时，却为时已晚，薇吉妮亚腹中的「胎儿」已成了两人无法摆脱的恶梦…