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Monday, Nov. 25, 2024
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‘Blinded by the Light’ ain't nothing but tired

By Jake Winningham · Tuesday, Sept. 10, 2019

Gurinder Chadha’s new film “Blinded by the Light” is marked by an artificial joyfulness that is infectious in the same way that the common cold is. Like the Bruce Springsteen song from which it takes its name, the picture has some passages that are thrilling in the moment — but seem hazier the second you turn away. Protagonist Javed Khan (played with genuine charm by newcomer Viveik Kalra) is a repressed teenager living with his Pakistani family in Thatcher-era England. On top of dealing with all of the fiscal and discriminatory struggles such a situation entails, Javed must also contend with his own father’s expectations — namely, for him to put down his beloved poetry and focus on a ‘real’ education like economics. As pressure mounts on all sides, Javed begins to wish he were someone else, somewhere else. In other words, he wants to change his clothes, his hair, his face. If only he could stumble upon a songwriter who knew a thing or two about that.

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Almodóvar's vision shines in ‘Dolor Y Gloria’

By Jake Winningham · Friday, Sept. 6, 2019

Almodóvar’s interplay between Salvador’s youthful innocence and the pained reservations of his older age closely resembles Federico Fellini, his greatest antecedent in the pantheon of world cinema. Fellini’s classic “8 1/2,” also about a struggling film director, is an obvious influence on Almodóvar here — though the homespun feel of the growing-up scenes in “Dolor y Gloria” recall the Italian director’s under-seen 1973 film “Amarcord.” The true power of “Dolor y Gloria,” is not in its similarities to other great films, but how it cements Almodóvar in the highest echelon of the directors who make them.

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