I have been trying to start this blog for awhile now, ever since starting at RVA Magazine. It has proven difficult only in that I wanted to figure out a structure for it. But now I've decided on more of a “what the hell” kind of approach. I am here to guide you--nay, school you--with the best, the worst, and the strangest of Netflix. Most of you know what Netflix is by now and swear by it as a great alternative to television, regardless of whether you’re a paranoiac assuming commercialism is there to control your mind (which is true, but less maniacal then you may believe), or you're tired of all the fucking reality television seducing you into manifesting your inner desires to create drama between you and your friends, or you've just already watched Firefly on the Syfy channel 30 times. Well, this day marks the first day of the rest of Richmond’s Netflix life.
For some of you, Netflix only exists so you can catch up on Lost or X-Files. While they are both great shows, the continuum of media you have at your disposal is much more expansive--to an outrageous extent, really. I only hope to help guide some of you to the greatness, and awful-greatness, and just plain weirdness, that scrapes past the public’s eye on Netflix. I will (hopefully) do this on a biweekly basis, so look for me every other week. Since there is way too much information on Netflix for me to encompass in one post, let's just start with foreign films. Here are the five foreign films you should be watching on Netflix right now:
1) Cold Fish (Japan)
When Syamoto's teenage daughter is caught stealing, a generous middle-aged man helps resolve the situation. The man and his wife offer to have Syamoto's troublesome daughter work at their fish store. The middle-aged couple couldn’t seem more perfect, but as the story starts to unfold, Syamoto soon finds himself dealing with a couple of psychotic serial killers. Sion Sono’s brilliantly realized Cold Fish is a dark, unsettling, and comical film which is more a danse macabre about social breakdown then a blood-and-guts serial killer film.
Warning: not for the squeamish or faint of heart.
2) Thirst (Korea)
Oldboy director Park Chan Wook tests religious values with his most mature film yet, Thirst. Sang-hyun, a Catholic Priest, finds himself changed into a vampire after a botched experiment to find a cure for a deadly disease. The blood he was transfused with, after losing most his blood from the disease, contained vampire cells, and thus his transformation begins. When Sang-hyun meets a friend’s dissatisfied wife, he falls in love. Soon after, his moral structure from a life in the church starts to deconstruct, as his thirst for lust and blood becomes impossible to thwart. This is a mad gallons of blood love story for any Vampire fanatic.
3) Girl on The Bridge (France)
Stylistically shot in black and white, Girl on the Bridge starts off with a disheartened young woman seriously considering jumping off a bridge because of her lifelong streak of bad luck, before she is talked out of it by a lonely knife thrower who needs a human target for his show. When not performing their act, they win a fortune gambling, but fate conspires to separate the duo, who find they need each other to maintain their lucky streak.The movie is an oddly amusing mish-mash of older films that have been wrapped up quite nicely. Girl on the Bridge incorporates themes of luck, fate, love, and telepathic powers to put together a great film questioning whether luck or fate really exist.
4) Dogtooth (Greece)
Three young people exist in a strange world of their parents' devising in this bizarre drama from writer and director Yorgos Lanthimos. Cut off from the world, homeschooled siblings create an idyllic alternate universe based off the ideas they create and the answers their parents give them when asked about the world. They have never left their yard and are told that cats live outside of the gates, which are explained to the children as evil and man-eating. When the father brings in an outsider to curb the sexual urges of his maturing son, the children’s image of the world is shattered. This profound Greek comedy/drama deconstructs and holds a up cracked mirror to properties of the modern family. It is as startling and disturbing as it is original.
5) Rubber (France)
If you haven’t ever watched this movie, about a tire named Robert who discovers he has psychic powers, then you should probably get on it. Those of you familiar with the musician Mr. Oizo may be thrown off to find out he is also a writer and director, and that he has a name--Quentin Dupieux. The film explores the relationship between spectators and entertainment while staging an adventure rooted in the film's strict "no reason" policy. If you're wondering what "no reason" means in this context, don't worry, the beginning of the film explains it all. Rubber’s clever premise is an original exploration into the absurd--not to be taken too seriously, but to be enjoyed. And enjoy it I did.
By Brian Charlton
Netflix envelope art by Garrett Miller