Monthly Archives: June 2019
“ANNA” a movie review by Gary Smolker, Movie and Value Critic
Feminism
Men and women feel strongly about feminism.
Men feel woman have taken over.
Women feel oppressed.
Feminism is a virulent phenomena, a revolt against male domination.
The movie “ANNA” is a true feminist take-charge-of-your-own-destiny movie.
What makes “ANNA” special are the moral lessons taught as the story unfolds.
The Mood of the Movie
In the opening scene we see ANNA’s head and a part of her upper torso.
ANNA is on a table on her stomach.
We hear sounds of a man enjoying having sexual intercourse.
ANNA is not enjoying the encounter.
The man is enjoying ANNA.
ANNA is trapped.
This scene sets the mood for the rest of the movie.
Empowering
As the story progresses, we see ANNA being taught how to empower herself.
From my old white man point of view what ANNA was taught as the story unfolds were wonderful life lessons.
Reset
Almost immediately ANNA goes from being a battered oppressed woman to becoming an Assassin for the KGB.
For her first assignment as a KGB agent, ANNA is told to assassinate a man while he is eating dinner in a fancy restaurant surrounded by body guards and to bring back his smart phone back to her handler in five minutes.
ANNA is told her handler will be waiting in an automobile outside in an alley at the back of the restaurant.
The First Lesson
We watch ANNA enter the fancy restaurant, approach the man she is to assassinate and shoot her pistol several times. Each time ANNA pulls the trigger, nothing happens. ANNA’s pistol was not loaded.
The man’s team of bodyguards attack ANNA.
Mayhem ensues.
In an intense six minutes of dramatic fighting ANNA kills all the bodyguards, kills the man to be assassinated and grabs his smart phone, to take back to her handler.
ANNA exits the restaurant 7 minutes after she entered.
She enters the alley behind the restaurant and sees her handler Olga driving away.
ANNA watches as Olga exits the alley.
In the next scene, five hours later, we see ANNA entering Olga’s office at KGB headquarters in Moscow.
ANNA hands Olga the assassinated man’s smart phone.
Olga tells ANNA:
- “You are late.”
- “You were supposed to meet me in the alley behind the restaurant five minutes after you entered the restaurant.”
ANNA responds:
- The pistol didn’t work.
- The pistol you gave me didn’t have any bullets in it.
Olga tells ANNA:
- You should check your equipment before you begin an assignment.
- Make sure you equipment works and will work before you need to use your equipment.
DRAMATIC TENSION Builds to Grand Finale
Near the end of the movie, ANNA is told to assassinate the head of the KGB by a member of the CIA and given permission to do so with encouragement by Olga, but this isn’t revealed until the end of the movie.
ANNA assassinates the head of the KGB while playing chess with him, the head of the KGB in, his office in Moscow.
All possible efforts are made by the KGB to apprehend ANNA while she is still in the KGB headquarters building.
We watch as ANNA tries to exit KGB headquarters in Moscow while KGB agents try to kill ANNA.
We aren’t shown ANNA escaping, ANNA existing KGB headquarters.
We don’t know if ANNA escaped alive from KGB headquarters until two scenes later.
CONGRATULATIONS
In the next scene we are shown ANNA’s CIA handler being congratulated by his CIA coworkers in New York for carrying out the successful assassination of the head of the KGB.
ANNA’s CIA handler doesn’t know if ANNA is alive.
He is genuinely distraught.
Drama
In the next scene ANNA’s CIA handler receives a text message from ANNA asking him to meet her in a specific park in Paris on a specific day at a specific time.
More Drama
In a later scene, we see ANNA’s CIA handler and the personal bodyguard of the assassinated KGB Director sitting at the same table together in the park in Paris where they are to both meet ANNA.
They both don’t know if ANNA will show up.
Hidden in the park are armies of CIA agents and armies of KGB agents.
All of them are waiting for ANNA to show up.
ANNA shows up.
ANNA sits with at the same table where both her CIA handler and the bodyguard of the assassinated head of he KGB are sitting together.
Final Life Lesson
Throughout the movie men told ANNA they are helping her as they used her for their own purposes.
At the end of the movie the audience watches ANNA outsmart both her KGB bodyguard and her CIA handler.
The Final Life Lesson: You have to take care of yourself, nobody else will.
Gary Smolker, Movie and Value Critic
© Copyright 2019 by Gary Smolker, All Rights Reserved
“White Crow” – a Movie Review by Gary Smolker, Movie and Value Critic
STORY
The “White Crow” is a dramatized biography of male Russian ballet dancer Rudolph Nureyev.
DRAMATIC INTENSITY
The high-point of the movie is when Nureyev defects to the West.
This scene takes place in a boarding area in the Paris Airport.
After being told by his Russian handlers he is being sent back to Moscow Russia instead of being allowed to board the plane to London with other members of the Kirov ballet group Nureyev refuses to get on another plane he is ordered to get on.
BUILDING TENSION
The scene in which Nureyev defects to the West is the longest slowest scene in the movie.
Nureyev tells a French male ballet dancer – who came to the airport to say good bye to Nureyev – that Nureyev will be killed if he gets sent back to Russia.
MOVIE CRITIQUE
A movie review may critique the way the story is told in a screenplay, the characters in the movie, the actors, the director, etc. etc.
This is a special movie.
All technical aspects of this movie are excellent: excellent screenplay, excellent actors, excellent acting, excellent director, excellent directing, etc. etc.
What makes this movie special is the stories told within the story – the story of what went on in the lives of each of the characters during the period of time the movie takes place.
Gary Smolker, Movie and Value Critic
Copyright © 2019 by Gary Smolker, All Rights Reserved
Gary S. Smolker 