Milestone is about the fallout of a night-shift truck driver Ghalib who has recently lost his wife, has to compensate to his in-laws, has a terrible backache, has to train a new intern, has to shoulder his friend who has lost his job, and (I am not done) is in danger of losing his own job. So basically, Milestone is a 90-minute art movie about the mental and physical struggle of a broken man who is lost in the wake of tragedy.
When I watched this film on Netflix, it reminded me of the peak era of Bollywood’s parallel cinema of the 1970s and 80s when the directors like Shyam Benegal, Mahesh Bhatt, Mrinal Sen, Goutam Ghose, Govind Nihalani, and many more were producing the best of art films. Or maybe this is some homage or tribute to their works.
It is a slow-burner and may not buy the mainstream audience or perhaps even the sensible viewers. But for those who are keen to watch some really good artwork, Milestone is that product to ask your 90 minutes.
There is no music, no songs, no entertainment, simple and on several occasions very thought dialogues. Direction and cinematography are unusual. The film clearly shows that the filmmakers were serious to present quality work.
Yes, I won’t miss my usual and favorite part of the review at all, writing/screenwriting. See the story is frankly about a few days of man after the tragedy. The real piece of work is in screenwriting. Some impressive detailing and camera shots made this film sublime. The director stretched pretty much time on a few scenes that may demand attention. For example, there is a scene in the truck when the intern asks Ghalib why he left and he responds if he knows who Saddam Hussein was. The intern is blank and Ghalib stares at him. So the director exhausts the scene on the audience to understand the depth of agony and political tense when millions of Indians were stuck in the Gulf war and left in the early 90s.
Milestone has been screened in some international films festivals and has made some distinctions. This film is highly recommended to that sensible audience who are eager to watch some quality film in a 90-minute slow-burn. For me, this pretty much is one of the best films of the year.
Fahrenheit 451 is the first colorful and the only English-language film of François Truffaut’s illustrious directional career. Produced in 1966, the film is based on Ray Bradbury’s novel of the same name. For me, it is one of the strangest films I have ever experienced watching.
The film shows a fictional world where some totalitarian government controls general people’s life by dissuading them from books. For this purpose, this government employs a group of firemen who detect books from every corner and burn to ashes. Among these firemen, there is Guy Montag (Oskar Werner) who gets reading inspiration from his neighbor, a 20yo schoolteacher Clarisse (Julie Christie). Once he reads, he tries to motivate his wife and her friends. Time passes by and he begins growing hatred towards his book-burning job. When he becomes a book-burning rebel, the government makes an attempt to seize him and he tries to escape and survive.
On the internet, the general description or summarized explanation of the novel is a future American society where books are outlawed and “firemen” burn any that are found. For me, my theory and basic understanding towards the novel/film are broad. What inspires me is the theme and content of the film.
Generally what we see in the film is a foundation of the ground realities clouding our brain. The film does show you an oppressive future but questions numerous objects co. existing in the same sorry state universe. Truffaut made this film in the 60s but I see this way advanced to the-then existence. The plot is easily applicable today. We see many totalitarian governments controlling people’s life. Last century, the world witnessed the same style of leadership in Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, Saddam and II-sung.
Next aspect, the book is a source of objection by such government in the film. The firemen search everywhere to every length to dig the books; and when they find, they collect and gather all the materials and burn these all. In the film, exaggeration is tremendous. Firemen are shown digging books even in public parks, stopping people and checking their dresses. One fireman even checks shirt-pocket of an infant crying in the pram, finds a book and naively discourages the infant not to read books. This scene shows tremendous hatred and point of exaggeration where the director conveys his entire message in one shot.
There have been numerous book-burning incidents in the past. The one which particularly reminds me is from the McCarthy era when the books written by the authors favoring communism were disposed and burned under Eisenhower’s presidency. Bradbury has also stated his concerns about the above-mentioned events being the base of writing Fahrenheit 451.
Why books? In the film, this question will give you a lot of answers. Especially in one scene where the home of Clarisse’ friend is raided for an understood reason, the captain of all firemen (Cyril Cusack) spots a room full of books and gets some space of more than five minutes with Montag to present his hatred and forward his explanation/opinion about the literature. One of the lines the captain speaks to Montag in the film goes this way, “Go on, Montag, all this philosophy, let’s get rid of it. It’s even worse than the novels. Thinkers and philosophers, all of them saying exactly the same thing: “Only I am right! The others are all idiots!” This captain’s ideology hit me for a second and showed a different perspective for a book-reading habit. Is this an ego which turns you a writer and makes you think that people will avoid others and listen to you?
About fictional novel, the captain discourages the viewers that people in such books never existed but by reading, they tend to assume such characters leading their lives towards unhappiness by thinking that they can never live that life described in such books. I must admit, this lengthy scene was one of the best in the film.
Montag the leading character has another explanation that the books make the readers unhappy and anti-social! How come? Because according to Montag, books change the people, their ideology, their way of living and thinking; and them reading people tries to become better than the others. How true is this? If you really begin judging the reading habit from Montag and captain’s angle, you will think twice.
Truffaut’s depicted future-world looks highly realistic and fashionable. I am very impressed with the heavy detailing of Montag’s place of residency. The color of walls, interactive TV program, wall telephones, and furniture was outstanding. Then we see monorail which was not frequently watched in the films those days.
Last 20 minutes of the film takes the viewers to a different dimension. The dystopian state turns into utopian. Montag shifts from one world to the other. While escaping from the cruel book-burning world, he unintentionally enters the world of hope where people from different communities and walks of life are named by some famous books. These individuals are learning by heart and repeating every word of their books to spread the literature to the future generations and avoid ignorance. There is one striking scene where a dying old man is filling/feeding the words of Weir of Hermiston to his nephew.
From a religious point of view, it reminds me the time when knowledge was to overtake ignorance in the times of Prophet Muhammad PBUH with time by learning and repeating the verses of Holy Quran and his Sahabah(Prophet’s companions and disciples) by recording the testimonies what the prophet said. It is just my understanding from those particular book-people scenes.
The film overall is a wake-up call to save the books, the literature, the treasure of knowledge from various categories of books and defeat ignorance. Truffaut’s artistic direction is yet again the winner. Very very ostentatious and fascinating work! This is like someone presents a theory in cinematic format and brings the world to knees. The film is sci-fi in some sense but also very humanistic theoretically. But his work plays on you, hypnotizes and manipulates you. Although there are some differences and missing elements from the film as compared to the novel but overall I believe Fahrenheit 451 is easily one of Truffaut’s most impressive works.
Predictions can meet your opinions and social media brains can vow the lost words framed in the past. It is an emotional rectifying bond of unheard whispers with uninvited gunshots. So when the music is loud, you are at temporary betrayal of daunting hope…
Unheard of your cost, the weapons had its say and the case was dismissed in the court of shadows. When bad things happen, word of mouth has no protection. The reason why yours and mine opinion differ is because we use our own brains for the textures to follow, to the faith we believe and methods we retrieve. Same methods are voiced to the readers and listeners, they tweet you and become a league. From here, if brain was wrong that day, you cannot expect the league today has its ideal foundation towards the solution. It will certainly drive a wrong road. Non-classified u-turn is unhygienic for melting egos.
A Friday night of many thousands of travelers, visitors, spectators, musical ear-folkers, sports-addict and concertgoers met their horrors in major European city – Paris. Gunfire and blasts were heard and the terror was installed by night. A series of mass shootings and suicide bombings has so far caused lives of 130 civilians and gashed around 350 others.
Locations were;
1) La Belle Equipe – A very popular Bistro, which was of full capacity when the shootings happened and killed at least 12. One witness said that the shooting at this site lasted for three minutes!
2) Le Carillon/Le Petit Cambodge – Former is café-bar and latter is a Cambodian restaurant. Both are located directly opposite to 408-year-old Saint-Louis Hospital. So far at least 12 are reportedly dead.
3) La Casa Nostra pizzeria – at this location is reported that a man with a machine gun fired on its terrace and killed 5 people.
Sami Naik | Film Critic 