Which non-indian film u saw recently has made u post here???

[kid-glove]

The Ghost Writer (Polanski, 2010)

Best English language film of the year to me, so far Better than Shutter as the 'Island' film of the year. Better than both Shutter Island and Inception (Nolan could learn a thing or two about efficient, economical architectural usage by Polanski) as a thriller. Neither emotionally cathartic as former, nor relatively insular, and elliptical as latter. Nor is the emphasis on unreliable protagonist, lest of all distorted information!

Polanski proves his formalistic eclecticism is always servicing the story, and never goes against it. Minimalistic soundtrack as usual. I said many times, Polanski is the living master of suspense. While no Hitchcock, you've got to hand it to him in his mis-en-scene and control of narrative in its tone & pacing. By the end of narrative, you'd have experienced something haunting, visceral and incisive - in both visual and aural form.

One of the sufficiently palpable climaxes I could remember from a Polanski film, as I think most of his scripts often loses the trick by its denouement. No cheap ellipsis in name of ambiguity here. Polanski is far too assured of his craft..

Given time, I'll probably choose this to be among his best works. It might not be a Noir classic like Chinatown, but still as a thriller it's a vast improvement on Frantic (which is still a gripping narrative for most part, about two third of the film to be precise!) and Ninth Gate (that's again tonally messed up by occult satanism & surreal overtones towards the end), as aforementioned the last act of these films spoil the prescient buildup. But The Ghost Writer is well etched out, and everything seems in place - especially the agoraphobic mood of the place and the inscrutable feeling the character goes through. And when thrillers could be emotionally accessible (admittedly, figuratively speaking, the impulsive feel isn't distorted as much as the 'informed' intellect), it's often a plus - I much prefer The Ghost Writer and Frantic over Ninth Gate in this regard. Overall, TGW over Frantic and Ninth Gate for me. Like how Rosemary's baby trumps both Repulsion and The Tenant in Apartment trilogy. Even if I'm not comfortable in rating it over Chinatown, Rosemary's baby and The Pianist (again a major work!) , I'd say it's at least on par with Bitter Moon, Macbeth (oddly revoked in The Ghost Writer through the Missus of quasi-exiled ex-Prime Minister), and Death and the Maiden. Among first person narrative and a neo-noir, this seems more in spirit of Chandler(and this is always good news to this noir fan) than Hammett and Cain

In conclusion, a fine film by one of the finest 'filmmakers' who deserves material like this (I sincerely hope he collaborates more with Robert Harris). It's often the written material that faulters. And yet, Polanski isn't one of the types who fall into what Mr.Peter Greenaway refers to as "105 Years of illustrated Text". I've never seen a bad film by Polanski including What?, Pirates and Oliver Twist. He's that good.