Mirror (2014)

Best movie of this year hands down!

Good movie but grossly overrated

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

Like in all Andrei Tarkovsky movies, the human emotions are being explored intensively; I would also associate the word "personal" to this movie... it's indeed very personal. I didn't feel I was watching an actual movie; maybe I somehow managed to penetrate the mind of a person (from the past apparently) and experience his memories, dreams and thoughts by projecting them on screen. A very eerie movie full of... human emotions; it may seem unstructured and plotless, but the conclusion provides a final purpose for the whole events; giving the movie a second chance would be a good idea. Of course, the visual compositions, sound effects, music and overall movie structure are perfect.

The Mirror is a film that touched me in a way no other film has. The cinematography and overall atmosphere draws indescribable emotion from me and takes my away. I can write an essay attempting to explain why it's a masterpiece and how it's an example of how movies don't have to be books with images to be great but words are just words and I'll fail to explain the emotions this movie makes feel. Just watch it and maybe you'll feel similar or maybe not, it's not for everybody. But for me it's everything I want in a film and more.

always, each film of Tarkovsky , for me, is a church. in few cases, a cathedral. and this gives to him the advantage to be more than a remarkable director or a wise teller. "The Mirror" is a brilliant example. fragments of life. in not precise order. absence of story. each scene - a picture from a lost place. mixture of lives. and suggestion. and, in a moment, the feeling to be fragments from your life. all is beautiful and bitter and strange and familiar. because it is the story of a century. and its confession. because it is just a basket with memories. defining purposes and needs and expectations and words. because all is touching. and far. because, long time after its end, I preserved from it only the image of the mother of Tarkovski. as the mother. because it is a walk on the water. using as steps the presence of Arseny Tarkovsky and his poetry. the image of Oleg Yankovsky. and the look of the boy in the mirror. a film for who the descriptions/ definitions do not works. so, see it. for a form of view with yourself.

The Mirror is a poetry of images and motion. It's the kind of film that probably needs to be seen several times to understand, but its enjoyable even the first time thanks to the imagery and atmosphere it can create. Instead of a traditional plot, this movie speaks through symbols, again much like a poem. Rather than following any linear story, the scenes are taken from various places in time featuring a handful of characters, and other scenes taken from documentaries spliced in between.One of the most interesting elements is the camera. It moves like a ghost throughout the movie- gently gliding across extended single shot scenes, and sliding across characters and their reflections. Interestingly it maintains this effect when its shown from the first person, and other characters are addressing the character whose point of view were looking from. This is why I said the camera is like a ghost, because most of the movie is filmed like this it's as if this character behind the camera is always there, which is even made possible because the camera is capable of walking across dream-like sequences as readily as real ones.One of the earliest scenes in the movie is of this time, and summarizes why this movie is so engrossing. After the scene of a house burning down in the rain, there is one of a woman washing her hair, which is ordinary on the surface but a very eerie atmosphere is created because of her very slow movements and the hair covering her face. The tension is brought up dramatically from the surroundings: walls scarred by flames but dripping with moisture. A connection is made to the burned down house from earlier, and later scenes in the movie take place in buildings with similar walls. Links such as these between disparate scenes of the movie create this impression of a poem, where all these separate elements where put in place to create a single meaning, but what that is is largely up to the audience to discover.There are many more examples throughout, but that is just a glimpse of the atmosphere that makes this movie so interesting to watch even the first time.