blenderdumbass . org
Reviews
by Blender Dumbass
Aka: J.Y. Amihud. A Jewish by blood, multifaceted artist with experience in film-making, visual effects, programming, game development, music and more. A philosopher at heart. An activist for freedom and privacy. Anti-Paternalist. A user of Libre Software. Speaking at least 3 human languages. The writer and director of the 2023 film "Moria's Race" and the lead developer of it's game sequel "Dani's Race".
From 1 years ago.
Information or opinions might not be up to date.
6 Minute Read
Footnote originally הערת שוליים is an Israeli film written and directed by Joseph Cedar. The film is about a very strange dramatic bureaucratic situation, where two professors, a father and a son, are in the same field, and one of them gets a honorary award for his achievements. But the bureaucrats made a mistake and told about the award to the wrong one of them.
↩ Reply
This is kind of a dual character study. We have two professors obsessed with historic ancient Hebrew texts. The son Uriel ( Lior Ashkenazi ) finds in the ancient texts a sort of confirmation, to the contemporary orthodox teachings. While his father Eliezer ( Shlomo Bar-Aba ) sees the same texts as a sort confirmation that something along the way went wrong. And that the contemporary teachings are false as a result.
↩ Reply
It is not clearly stated, but there is a theme to Eliezer's character, suggesting that he might be autistic to some degree. He is annoyingly pedantic about every single word everywhere. He can't stand people that disregard certain words, or phrase themselves not precisely. This is, by the way, why he thinks the contemporary teachings are false. He was researching the field for many years with an incredible obsessive attention to every single word. And he just simply cannot hold the same opinions as religious Jews anymore.
↩ Reply
There is a sort of villain character ( if you want to call it that ) Yehuda Grossman ( Micah Lewensohn ) who is a kind of religious person in charge of the academia. Who due to, what seems like, ideological disagreements with Eliezer, denied Eliezer an ability to be recognized in any way. And on one occasion, personally, sabotaged Eliezer's own work.
↩ Reply
It seems like the film's thesis is something along the lines of: Religious Jews follow a broken telephone version of the real Jewish tradition. And therefor to be a proper Jew you have to be a different, better, person. As in, in a clever way, the film suggests a sort of denouncing of the orthodox way. But in another clever way, disguising itself as preaching the proper orthodox way. Which it doesn't actually seem to preach at all. Eliezer says that he thinks things are wrong. He says why thinks that way. But never tells the audience what is wrong specifically. So maybe the message is simply: Orthodox = wrong?
c:0 ↩ Reply
The movie ends strangely, as if to say, it fails to end properly. It could be said that whether Eliezer gets his price is not important as long as he knows the truth. Because the movie cuts before we know for sure. But then I think the real reason the movie ended this way is that Cedar, trying to make the film more realistic, wrote into the script the real names of the current Israeli politicians ( at the time ), which he teases, will be the ones handing the awards. But then he cuts. Because apparently he knew from the very beginning that he will not get the real politicians to participate in the movie. I was kind of waiting for Eliezer to get onto to the stage and do something stupid. There was a tension about it present in the whole ending. But then the movie just ends. What?
c:1 ↩ Reply
I do think Cedar tried to inject in that ending some profound ( or pretentious ) meaning. And it does feel like it is at the very least pretentious, teasing you, the audience, as being not smart enough to find it profound. It is not a kind of punch-line joke ending that I have in all of my films so far. It is not trying to entertain the audience. It is trying to make the audience stop and realize that they didn't get it. And then pretend to get it, out of fear of being found out as stupid.
↩ Reply
The film has very good cinematography by Yaron Scharf and a kick-ass musical score by Amit Poznansky that goes for a very Spielberg like John Williams like feel. And to top that off Cedar's direction is actually rather cool. There are shots in that film that I have never seen anywhere else, yet the shots work really well. For example the first time Eliezer tells his wife ( Alisa Rosen ) that he got the award, he leaves the room and the camera is on his headphones that he left. But then the camera flies on its own to that other room, where he talks to his wife, in a majestic camera move. Good stuff! And then toward the end as Eliezer comes into the ceremony building, everything just becomes so dreamy and surreal for a bit. Also good stuff!
↩ Reply
Writing-wise it feels like there are some loose threads that are never explored beyond the superficial initial encounter. At one point in the movie, somebody steals a bag with stuff ( including documents ) of Uriel. Yet, all the movie does with it is, it uses it as an excuse for the filmmakers to push Uriel though a comedic sequence leading to something he sees. Which is then promptly forgotten about.
↩ Reply
The movie has a kick ass tight script with very much attention put to words people say and write. And it has a lot of good payoffs based on those kinds of things. Yet some things feel like setups to something, while they are never payed off. Which is weird. It doesn't break the film. It is still rather good despite some of the things feeling random. But I couldn't help myself and think of various things that could be done with those setups.
↩ Reply
I will review more films from Israel. I'm trying to learn what I'm dealing with, as an Israeli film-maker myself. This was a good film. I hope the others will be good too.
↩ Reply
Happy Hacking!!!
↩ Reply
1
Find this post on Mastodon
Footnote 2011 is a suprisingly good Israeli film
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/he/thumb/5/58/Footnote.jpg/250px-Footnote.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 14 ❤ 1 💬 99
Footnote originally הערת שוליים is an Israeli film written and directed by Joseph Cedar. The film is about a very strange dramatic bureaucratic situation, where two professors, a father and a son, are in the same field, and one of them gets a honorary award for his achievements. But the bureaucrats made a mistake and told about the award to the wrong one of them.
#footnote #הערתשוליים #JosephCedar #LiorAshkenazi #Israel #film #review #movies #cinemastodon #jews
Transformers 5 is Too Good to be Good
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/26/Transformers_The_Last_Knight_poster.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 92 ❤ 1 💬 1
There is this satisfaction when it comes to animation, that I know from personal experience where the longer you work on a shot, or a sequence, the more details there is in the animation, the more satisfying it is to later just watch this insane level of effort simply wash over you one frame after another.
#transformers #MichaelBay #film #review #movies #cinemastodon #kingArthur
Hollow Man 2000 takes the horror trope of not seeing the monster to a whole new level
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/e/e1/Poster_Hollow_Man.jpg/250px-Poster_Hollow_Man.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 12 💬 1
Before Kevin Bacon played a much more complex man with a psychological sexual abnormality in 2004's The Woodsman, he played a man with a psychological sexual abnormality in 2000's Hollow Man. Where the fetish is voyeurism and the crime is ghostly rape. You kind of know it is a Paul Verhoeven movie from this description.
#hollowman #paulverhoeven #film #review #kevinbacon #movies #cinemastodon
Anna 2019 is Luc Besson at war with Christopher Nolan
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/f1/Anna_film_poster.jpg/250px-Anna_film_poster.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 46 💬 2
Christopher Nolan was developing his spy movie Tenet for decades before its release in 2020. In 2014 Nolan already was fully in the writing process on the script. While the general public didn't know much about the project, other filmmakers, including the French director Luc Besson probably could know something about it. And so trying to beat Nolan at his own game, Besson quickly wrote and directed his own spy movie with a palindrome title: Anna.
#Anna #LucBesson #SashaLuss #ChristopherNolan #CillianMurphy #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Piranha II 1982 taught James Cameron how not to make sequels
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f1/Piranha_II_-_The_Spawning_%28movie_poster%29.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 28 💬 1
We all know that James Cameron is a master when it comes to making sequels. His films like Terminator 2, Avatar 2 and Aliens are extremely good examples of how to make a sequel right. Unlike Steven Spielberg that avoids sequels. Steven avoided doing the second Jaws movie. James Cameron goes for it and wins. Speaking of Steven Spielberg's Jaws, not only sequels from that film were produced. Rip-offs, like the 1978 Piranha by Joe Dante also were produced. Those were parody material B-movie exploitation films. And so writer / director James Cameron decided to take the project of making a sequel to that Jaws rip-off, with his 1982 Piranha II: The Spawning.
#Piranha2 #JamesCameron #horror #movies #review #film #cinemastodon
Predator: Badlands 2025 is like Avatar 2009 but Horror
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/9/90/Predator_Badlands_Poster.jpg/250px-Predator_Badlands_Poster.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 5 ❤ 2 🔄 1 💬 5
Predator: Badlands is Dan Trachtenberg's third Predator movie after Prey 2022 and Killer of the Killers 2025. And strangely enough non of these movies have any kind of connection to one other. They are not sequels. They are stand alone films, different in style and tone. Telling different stories and having different structure. The only thing that binds them together, so to speak, is the fact that they are all technically a part of the Predator franchise.
#predatorBadlands #predator #ellefanning #DanTrachtenberg #horror #action #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Taken 2008 is Luc Besson's revenge for Man on Fire by Tony Scott
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/e/ed/Taken_film_poster.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 10 💬 2
On the surface, the 2008 movie Taken directed by Pierre Morel and written by Luc Besson ( he was busy directing Arthur cartoons ) is about how it is dangerous for little girls to be in the world. And about how awful the human trafficking is. And about how good, people who fuck up human traffickers are. But then, out of nowhere, it makes people cheer when a guy is buying an underage girl at a human trafficking auction. As if, it makes you think: Is Luc Besson just trying to show Quentin Tarantino that he is a master of corrupting the audience?
#taken #liamNeeson #LucBesson #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Ultraviolet 2006 is my guilty pleasure movie
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/3/3a/Ultraviolet_poster.jpg/250px-Ultraviolet_poster.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 14 ❤ 1 💬 3
With 9% Rotten Tomatoes score 2006 Kurt Wimmer film Ultraviolet starring Milla Jovovich cannot possibly be any good, can it? Well I re-watched it for this review and while I somewhat see where the critics are coming from, I also have enjoyed the hell out of it.
#Ultraviolet #MillaJovovich #KurtWimmer #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
The Island 2005 is Michael Bay's Minority Report
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/56/The-island.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 13 💬 5
As far as my speculation goes, I think, it is safe to assume, the following happened: In 1994 ( before doing Bad Boys ) Michael Bay signed a 10 year contract with Jerry Bruckheimer which expired in 2004 ( after Bad Boys 2 ). Knowing that the contract is about to expire, 2 years prior ( in 2002 ) Steven Spielberg, in an attempt to get on good terms with Michael Bay, added a small reference to Bad Boys into his film Minority Report. And then took Bay under his supervision for the next 10 years. Starting with the 2005 film The Island. And through the Transformers franchise. Bay returned the favor by showing a concept car designed for Minority Report ( Lexus 2054 aka Lexus Minority ) multiple times in the background of The Island. Still that's just a theory. I don't actually know what happened. But it seems plausible.
#theIsland #MichaelBay #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Flow ( 2024 ) deserves the Oscar
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/2/2d/Flow_movie_poster.jpg/250px-Flow_movie_poster.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 60 💬 2
I don't know if you know but Flow was in fact done using Blender. At the 2024th Blender Conference the head of the animation department on the film Silly-Pélissier Léo even presented a talk about this. ( available on PeerTube )
Let that sink in.
#flow #cat #cats #animation #blender #blender3d #b3d #oscars #GintsZilbalodis #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Alien VS Predator 2004 is a Predator 2 sequel
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/f7/Avpmovie.jpg/250px-Avpmovie.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 14
In my Predator 2 review I observed that the merger of Alien and Predator franchises was not a Paul W. S. Anderson's ( the director of AVP ) fault, since even that movie already had a lot of Alien references in it, including a Xenomorph scull. So it was almost expected by this point that the next movie in the franchise would feature Xenomorphs.
#Alien #predator #AVP #film #review #horror #movies #cinemastodon
Is Hancock 2008 about the tragedy of rejection?
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/c/c9/Hancockposter.jpg/250px-Hancockposter.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 7 ❤ 2 💬 3
Mary Embrey, the blonde woman played by Charlize Theron in the 2008 Peter Berg film Hancock, is surprisingly good looking. For the few people who read through the psycho-sexual analysis of me, you may know that for me in general, the name Mary, or the Latin version of it Maria, or the Russian version of it Masha, especially connected to a blonde, good looking woman, is very important. And yet, back when I saw Hancock for the first time. I didn't quite realize how important it is.
#hancock #peterberg #willsmith #charlizetheron #film #review #movies #cinemastodon
Red Heat 1988 is unintentionally funny for those who speak Russian
![[thumbnail]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/a/af/Red_Heat.jpg/250px-Red_Heat.jpg)
Blender Dumbass
👁 12 💬 3
Our main character Ivan Danko ( Arnold Schwarzenegger ) is introduced with a shot showing his magnificent muscular butt-cheeks, right before a fight breaks out between naked men in the snow, all trying to scream words and sentences in Russian, sounding utterly stupid doing so. That is how Red Heat, a 1988 Walter Hill movie, begins.
#RedHeat #WalterHill #ArnoldSchwarzenegger #film #review #movies #cinemastodon #action
Powered with BDServer
Plugins
Themes
Analytics
Contact
Mastodon