CLIP REEL<\/span>: Quick notes on some movies I\u2019ve seen recently.<\/p>\n Brothers<\/span><\/span>: This is the 2005, Danish version which got an American remake. When the responsible brother is missing, presumed dead, in Afghanistan, the layabout brother becomes a surrogate father to his kids\u2013and maybe something more, to his wife. This is a brutal, heartbreaking story with incredible acting. Some kind of tragedy is inevitable from fairly early on, but the specific nature of it is the result of choices by the characters. The daughters, in their grief and anger and attempts at solidarity with each other, are very realistic kids. I\u2019d definitely recommend this if you are up for two hours of feeling awful.<\/p>\n Apartment Zero<\/span><\/span>: Lurid, politicized thriller, very well done despite many cliches. A serial killer is on the loose in the aftermath of the Pinochet regime. Is it the paranoid man in Apartment 0? <\/p>\n There\u2019s a Tragic Transvestite, which is a trope I could really do without, but other than that this movie actually uses its genre\u2019s inherent insouciance about actual human psychology to great advantage. This is about as reliable a guide to mental illness\u2013or post-conflict reconciliation, for that matter\u2013as The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari<\/span>, but it hits the right emotional notes. Fans of The Talented Mr. Ripley<\/span> might also check it out.<\/p>\n Death and the Maiden<\/span><\/span>: A vastly more serious post-South-American-dictatorship thriller than Apartment Zero<\/span>, and a vastly worse one.<\/p>\n Sigourney Weaver plays a torture victim who believes that the man she has trapped in her home is her tormentor. Ariel Dorfman\u2019s script is overwritten and often cops out; Roman Polanski\u2019s direction sexualizes Weaver\u2019s character in a way which really feels like the movie exploiting her rather than the character making choices; Weaver overplays to the point that she sounds like Katharine Hepburn\u2019s character pretending to be a gun moll in Bringing Up Baby<\/span>. She\u2019s just way too chop-licking. If you want a look at the intersection of sexual violence and political torture, Closet Land<\/span> is much, much subtler and better. The best thing about this movie was the Schubert.<\/p>\n