年轻兼职生的味道

职业拳击手神山英次在菲律宾试图东山再起，却始终未能获得比赛机会，转眼已至不惑之年。就在此时，长期失联的女儿桃子突然造访，命运的齿轮由此转动。失去母亲后无处可去的桃子，漂洋过海来投奔父亲。 　　异国菲律宾的屋檐下，这对父女开始了生涩的同居生活。血缘的羁绊难以轻易填补十余年的空白，两人笨拙地摸索着亲子关系的形状。 　　女儿身上总带着“另一个自己”的影子，这段充满磕绊却暗藏温情的日常，让曾经视野狭隘的神山逐渐学会环视周遭——塬来注视着他的，不止是桃子，还有更多人的目光…… 　　当比赛机会奇迹般降临，英次为赢得属于他们的容身之处毅然踏上擂台。这部以拳击为背景的作品，最终讲述的是关于“父”与“子”共同成长的生命物语。

　　小有名气的建筑师埃文·韦伯（基努·里维斯 Keanu Reeves 饰）事业有成，生活美满。他住在洛杉矶一套亲手设计的别墅中，妻子凯伦（伊格纳西·阿尔曼德 Ignacia Allamand 饰）美艳动人，一双儿女杰克（Dan Baily 饰）和莉莎（Megan Baily 饰）乖巧可爱。某个假日，凯伦驱车带着孩子们外出度假，留下埃文一人在家中工作。瓢泼大雨之夜，艾文突然听到了敲门声。来者是被淋成落汤鸡的女孩贝尔（安娜·德·阿玛斯 Ana de Armas 饰）和吉妮丝（洛伦扎·伊佐 Lorenza Izzo 饰），他们迷失方向，请求埃文提供帮助。两个女孩就像善解人意又诱惑媚人的小妖精，让埃文多少有些把持不住。　　色字头上一把刀，世间哪有从天而降的美食和便宜……

　　Set in an underground dungeon inhabited by bundled, ragged human beings, after the nuclear holocaust. The story follows the wanderings of a hero through the situations of survival. People wait for the Ark to arrive and rescue them while their habitat falls apart.　　Delving deep into the dusty and long abandonded vaults of b-cinema in search of lost gems always leaves me with a bittersweet taste. On one hand the discovery of unexpected gems where no one would think them possible is a rewarding experience. On the other hand though it makes one wonder how many of these remarkable low-budget oddities, personal love affairs of directors never quite famous and now all but forgotten, have almost forever slipped from memory?　　n any case what we have here is a little post-apocalyptic gem from Poland that is really better than it has any right to. The dystopian near future of O-BI, O-BA finds a group of survivors of the nuclear war that ravaged the Earth inhabiting an underworld concrete bunker and biding their time as they wait for the mysterious Ark, an air ship of some kind that will come and save them. The Ark proves to be an elaborate hoax, carefully designed to give hope to the malnourished and desperate denizens of the bunker, while in the meantime the dome that separates their miserable existence from the nuclear winter outside is slowly caving in.　　What first striked me about the movie is the design of the bunker and the depiction of the survivors. The survivors are gaunt, filthy and terrible-looking penitents, dressed in rags and aimlessly wandering the neon-lit halls of the bunker like automatons. The bunker is a rundown, seedy place, with bright neon lights peering from all sides like the eyes of malignant beasts.　　On one hand it is a slightly 80's depiction of the dystopian future but the movie never stoops down to MAD MAX cheese. Instead it combines biting political satire with the bleak outlook of a world with no future, black comedy with barbs on apathy, religion and power. The survivors, for example, are fed some kind of flour dropping from a tube that hovers in the air - later on we discover the food supervisor uses books and the Bible itself as filler for this meagre meal. There are many such short symbolic touches, perhaps not life-changing or faith-restoring, yet playful, clever and inspired.　　One thing is for sure; O-BI, O-BA is not your run-of-the-mill sci-fi schlock. It overcomes its modest budget with creativity and has genuine artistic aspirations both from a writing and directing perspective. My opinion is that it should have been filmed in black and white instead of colour though. The director uses atmospheric light and shadow to great effect and it would have registered even better in stark black and white. The blue-green neon on the other hand outstays its welcome after a while. Just a minor gripe in an otherwise solid b-movie with its heart set in all the right places.　　Imagine a less bleak THE ROAD (Cormac McCarthy) being injected with the satire and humour of DR.STRANGELOVE and you're getting there. See it if you can find it.

　　A family whose daughter is seemingly possessed; their prayers seem to make matters worse. What sin did they commit?