3.0 --
LE GRAND SOIR, Benoit
Delépine & Gustave Kervern
[reviewed
by Nancy Snipper]
Two brothers who are completely insane capture our hearts
and imagination. One is the oldest punk in Europe who begs
along with his sidekick canine companion; the other is a seller
of mattresses who gets fired. That infuriates him. This pair
is a Laurel and Hardy modern duo. When the older brother (the
salesman) loses it and starts destroying everything in sight
while shouting insults at the world, the parents who own a
Pataterie tell them they do not share the same father. In
fact, mom doesn't know who the father is of either. This is
a totally absurd film that puts two brilliant comedians (Benoit
Poelvoorde and Albert Dupontel) in front of the lens to act
out their hilarious antics in a setting of modern mediocrity:
small-town Belgian life that is big on big brand-name stores.
These brothers are rebelling against it all. The actors' flare,
impeccable comedic timing and expressions in talk and walk
are totally entertaining. At the same, time each of these
boys makes a great statement about the meaninglessness and
boredom that inflict us all caught up in keeping up with the
status quo. The brothers' rebellion is raucous and wonderful.
3.1
-- MUSEUM
HOURS, Jem Cohen
[reviewed
by Nancy Snipper]
The real scene stealer in this captivating movie is the Kunsthistoriches
Art Museum in Vienna. Like Anne, the leading lady in this
film, I would go every day to soak up the stunning monumental
art displays of eternal beauty in this great museum's labyrinthine
wings and floors and halls. The work of great artists from
antiquity to the present illustriously hangs there, inspiring
all who see it. This film is an obvious tribute to this art,
in particular the work of painters Brueghel and Rembrandt
-- as much as it is to the guards who spend their entire lives
there reflecting on the intentions of the artists while surmising
the thoughts of the onlooker. Anne is poor and comes to Vienna
to sit by the side of her cousin who is in a coma in a hospital
in Vienna. (By the way, if you ever have to get sick, do it
in this city. Their latest supremely slick huge hospital that
I happened to visit is the most effectively run place for
treatment and attention in the Western World). Back to Anne:
with not much to do or money to spend, she heads for the famous
museum and while there, befriends Johann, a dedicated guard
and lover of art. He really understands what he sees. He introduces
Anne to several painters, and they spend time together, getting
to know one another and sharing their observations about the
wintery grey days marking the cityscape of Vienna, and their
comments about art are stimulating to us all. The camera brings
us close ups of these two characters in a way that is wholly
natural and gentle. The performances of Montrealer Mary Margaret
O'Hara and Bobby Sommer were remarkably authentic. They were
well cast and worked most comfortably together. This movie
was relaxing and informative. It also gave us a rare glimpse
into the mind of some artists as it took us on a tour of the
paintings that adorn the walls inside Vienna's most prestigious
museum. I liked the fact this award-winning film (2012 Art
Cinema Award in Locarno) was devoid of conflict of pretension.
Ah Vienna . . . it looks wonderful from every perspective
-- no matter the angle you view it from in any season.
3.1
-- PARADISE:
LOVE, Ulrich Seidl
[reviewed
by Nancy Snipper]
Teresa and a herd of fifty-something Austrian women go on
an all-inclusive package to Kenya. These are the 'sugar mamas'
-- lonely fat women looking for a good time in the sack with
handsome young men who are only to eager to oblige -- provided
the woord woman forks out money for his sister, mother, uncle,
cousin and anyone else he can conjure up. Most are married.
but they keep that a secret. Such is the case for trusting
Teresa, who is shy to follow her friends' example of picking
up a boy toy. But she decides to give it a try with one man
named Mingu who never lays a hand on her until she prompts
him to in a dingy room he has led her to where she shows him
how to caress her. Soon however, she wakes up to his true
intention as he leads her to his sister (AKA his wife), the
hospital director and a school all the while insisting rather
aggressively that she give money, It's never enough. Unfortunately,
Teresa sees him on the beach holding hands with his sister
(AKA his wife), and she goes after him, hitting him in the
water with her big baggy purse. She seems to have fallen for
him. Teresa doesn't give up easily; she gets hooked on these
paramours, and one by one she tries to find something special
in each: tender sex with love. But the same scenario keeps
popping up; they give her a tease and then bring up money.
Teresa is a slow learner. A woman teetering on a final shred
of hope, she has nowhere to turn to look for long lasting
satisfaction. So she turns to her daughter, calling and leaving
phone messages for her. But she never calls back. Lonely and
despairing, Teresa's joy of life is always ready for a party.
She celebrates her birthday with a surprise given to her by
her women friends in her hotel room. They have hired a young
stripper placing bets on his sexual prowess. These women are
greedy, desperate and finally pathetic. This film was funny,
disturbing and rather insulting to the older women of Austria
and their treatment of the young African male. Their search
for fun and maybe even love leads down a nowhere path on a
severely guarded beach where bad intentions darken white sands
that once were pristine and pure. Inge Maux was marvelous
as lovely-hearted, free-spirited Teresa. She bared it all
-- soul and body together. I think women of a certain age
ought to see this movie. Pride, dignity and self-esteem are
a woman's greatest allies at every age. Such virtues should
never be sacrificed no matter how intensely seductive the
sun, sea and sensuality prove to be. Formidable fantasies
are imaginative mirages that almost always disappoint -- disappearing
as fast as the Kenyan sun sets over shark infested waters.
3.0
-- A RESPECTABLE
FAMILY, Massoud Bakhshi
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
Since the film is Iranian, we know from the outset that "A
Respectable Family" is anything but. What begs our curiosity
is in what way, and if the ways and means translate into a
credible narrative. Arash, after a 22 year absence, returns
to Iran to deliver lectures at the university. But when it
comes time to leave, the authorities delay the return of his
passport. Stepping up to the plate is his overweening nephew
Hamed, who advises Arash that his father is dying. But Arash,
for reasons which only become clear later on in the film,
wants nothing to do with his father. Another nephew has just
been buried in the Martyrs Cemetery: the hysterical mother
blames her husband -- one of Arash's brothers -- for the young
boy's death. When Arash's father dies, his mother wants nothing
to do with the huge fortune and won't sign the transfer papers.
The fault lines are as extended as the family is divided by
greed and conflicting views on the Iran of Khomeini and Ahmadinejad.
Within the family are the devout and those for whom devotion
is an expediency, a means to advance. With a nod to Kafka,
Arash finds himself ensnared in a web of family intrigue and
a corrupt system. With papers waiting to be signed, he is
mysteriously kidnapped and then released. Out of the blue
his passport is returned. Will he leave the country for good
or follow the dictates of his conscience to join the street
protest? Bakhshi has confected a tightly woven, suspenseful,
complex film that shows how corruption and the abuse of power
are able to flourish under the banner of religion and divine
rule. If "A Respectable Family" falls a bit short of
the excellence of Farhadi's "A Separation," it makes
for compelling viewing and is a natural companion piece to
the latter.
2.5
-- THE LAND
OF HOPE, Sion Sono
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
In fictionalized O'Hara, a small town near Nagashima (substitute
Fukushima), a terrible earthquake strikes, causing a tsunami
and the nearby nuclear plant to melt down. The government
enforces an evacuation within a 20 mile radius. Families and
community are divided, those outside the radius can remain.
Does radiation recognize arbitrary borders? Yoichi and his
wife Izumi are forced to leave the family home by Yoichi's
father, a dairy farmer who says he is too old to be concerned
about the effects of radiation, but he fears for his children
and Izumi's yet to be born child. "The Land of Hope" shines
a confrontational light on disaster management, the lies and
deceits and bogus information disseminated by the authorities,
and the psychological devastation caused by the invisible
enemy: radiation (cesium). The Geiger counter is ever present,
always beeping. Is the broccoli safe to eat, do you buy a
mask, a body suit, how far away is safe? Nothing is ever the
same ever again. The film suffers from a dreary middle section,
lapses into melodrama, and blatant disregard for subtlety
regarding the film's message, but it effectively tells the
story of the hopes and fears of everyday people with nowhere
to hide and skeptical of discredited authority. The film excels
when the camera lays bare the extent of the damage caused
by the tsunami: no sets required for those eerie, real-irreal
shots which remind us that it's one thing to read about a
disaster and altogether something else to have to live it
. And finally, the film asks the much larger question about
the utility versus the risks of nuclear power. In 1986 there
was Chernobyl, in 2011 Fukushima, where next?
2.4
-- THE END,
Hicham Lasri
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
The film is presumably about the violent and corrupt legacy
left by Morocco's King Hassan, who, in 1999, is on his deathbed.
But the plot is dwarfed, massacred, can't compete with the
style. Arrestingly shot in inky-wet, black and white (the
camera is both gymnast and acrobat), we are introduced to
the tall and gangly Mikhi-the-mute whose job is to denverboot
overparked cars. Chained in one of the cars is Rita, the demurring
disheveled bride. From close-ups that turn the skin's pores
into open craters, we see that Mikhi and Rita have fallen
in love. But her brothers, the local goon squad, steal her
away. Joining the freak show is Daoud, a police chief who
likes to slap everybody in the face, but he gets his comeuppance
and in turn avenges his humiliation. And then there's his
wheelchair bound wife Naima, whom the good cop injects with
heroin to help her get through the day. The scenes are whacked
together like an unruly collage -- a rocky marriage of the
gross and carnivalesque -- while the syntax owes its pacing
and interval to whiplash and electric shock. Some of the scenes
and sets are exquisite, but the overall effect, perhaps by
design, is totally disjointed. First time director Hicham
Lasri is trying too hard to be original, weird, off-beat,
bizarre and avant-garde; sometimes he gets it right, sometimes
he doesn't. Heads you win, boken neck you lose sums up a film
of disparate parts that confirm that hell is people with power,
human nature is ugly and squalid and that the laws of entropy
are alive and well. "The End" couldn't come soon enough.
3.1
-- RHINO SEASON,
Bhaman Ghobadi
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
There is no shortage of Iranian films, most of them of high
merit, that take issue with the injustices and systematic
repression in Iran since the fall of the Shah and the Islamic
Revolution (1979). They are typically low-budget, realistic
or symbolic films, shot under difficult circumstances or outside
of the country. Many of the directors have had to go into
exile, fearing both censorship and incarceration. Bhaman Ghobadi's
"Rhino Season" makes a complete break with Iranian realism
thanks to a big budget and the backing of Martin Scorsese.
Based on a real life story, the poet Sahel is sentenced to
30 years in prison for his political views; his wife Mina
is sentenced to 10 years. They are allowed one conjugal visit
during their incarceration, but they have to remain hooded.
Akbar, Mina's former chauffeur, fiercely jealous and in love
with her, interrupts the love-making and rapes her. She later
gives birth to twins. In order to win over Mina, Akbar tells
her that Sahel is dead, which is a lie. When Sahel is released,
he goes to Turkey (where the film was shot) to find her. But
the story is only half the movie. Its lush cinematography,
its dreamlike sequences, its haunting landscapes and brilliant
colour dissolves are what make the viewing nothing less than
hypnotic: the last scene by itself deserves an award. Throughout
the film the colours are so thick and saturated we can almost
touch (à la synesthesia) what we see: the stony cold, damp,
lightless place that is the prison. Without ever speaking
of it, the specific gravity and inky drip of the greys and
blacks tell us to what degree the protagonists are held captive
to their pasts and respective guilts. The unspoken recriminations
and regrets are so heavy they take on the weight of water,
as in watery grave or an instrument of torture. And then there
is the magic realism: turtles fall out of the sky; Akbar takes
a run at a herd of rhinos with his car. The facial expressions
of Monica Bellucci, in the role of Mina, and Yilmaz Erdogan,
as Akbar are worth the price of admission, as each in her/his
own brooding fashion tries to make sense of the accidents
of life that have left them both life-weary and disconsolate.
"Rhino Season" is a film for all seasons.
2.7
-- INORI,
Pedro González-Rubio
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
For the first time in human history, 50% of us live in cities.
In Third no less than First World countries, hamlets and villages
are disappearing "not with a bang but a whimper." Pedro González-Rubio
wants to make sure that when no one is around to even remember
Kannogawa (Japan), it will have an after-life, the kind which
substantiates the notion that only art is immortal. As such,
the film "Inori" (which means prayer) is an attempt to save
the village of Kannogawa from oblivion. It is at once a poetic
rendering and meditation on the interconnectedness between
man and nature. Working closely with producer Naomi Kawase
("The Mourning Forest," "Hanezu"), we expect nothing less
than a reverential relationship between lens and landscape.
Kannogawa, surrounded by pristine mountains, is set in a valley
along a winding river. Almost daily, mist pours into the valley,
all but obscuring the village, auguring its fate. Wistful,
resigned, but uncomplaining, the old villagers continue to
go about their way of life very much in step with their ancestors.
In stark contrast to the landscape shots, the camera assumes
a low-profile for the interviews and conversations. The young
have left, the old are dying off, and one by one the ghosts
are coming through, to join the broken-hearted few. One broken
heart into inner resolve best describes the art and purpose
of González-Rubio. "Inori" is a triumph of the human spirit
and homage to the dying institution of the village and the
precious relationship between man and nature it nourishes.
2.4
-- CLIP,
Maja Miloš
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
One of the questions (and there aren't many) "Clip" asks is
it clip-worthy? The coltish and sex-obsessed Jasna and her
high-school mates (the wild bunch), for whom excess is de
rigueur, indulge their rebellion and vices more for the camera
than their pleasure. Kinky bod and sad eyes notwithstanding,
we don't like Jasna who has a huge attitude problem. She's
pathologically self-absorbed, doesn't listen to her mother,
or speak to, much less care for her gravely ill father, and
likes to party and sniff cocaine. Since she's too young to
have experienced or witnessed the horrors of the Bosnian genocide,
how do we account this untamed youth? Are we to believe she
embodies the digital age, Sarajevo style, gone terribly wrong?
She comes from a stable albeit poor family -- even the grandparents
are around -- she has a room of her own, so what ails her?
The film attempts to unravel the enigma that is Jasna but
the thin plot (to find money for the father's cancer treatment)
is constantly disrupted by one mostly degrading (misogynist),
passionless X-rated sex scene after another: story interruptus.
Jasna is attracted to Djole, who delivers his lines like a
medicated zombie (we never learn why). She'll do anything
sexual to please him: one scene has her crawling naked on
the floor wearing a dog harness. That Jasna, throughout the
film, is asked to assume a multiplicity of sexual positions,
which of course the camera licks up, forces the conclusion
that Maja Miloš, in her first film, isn't sure what she wants
to say or lacks the confidence to say what she wants, so she
defaults to explicit sex -- which is a shame. She's creative
behind the camera, and does a lot of things right. To great
effect she collates iPhone video into the footage of film,
and at the end of the day there is no denying the crazy, raw,
propulsive energy she puts out, but the film is simply too
long on sex and too short on story, which made it difficult
to find reasons to clap for "Clip."
2.5
-- SISTER
( L'ENFANT D'EN HAUT), Ursula
Meier
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
High up in the pie-filled sky it's a winter paradise for those
who can pay, but for 12-year-old Simon, already an accomplished
thief, the posh ski resort represents a steady supply of ski
equipment which he sells down below. However "Sister" is more
than the Swiss variation on the economic fault lines that
produce the haves and have-nots. Simon's parents were killed
in an automobile accident; he spends his days planning, plotting
and stealing in order to help his flighty, unemployed, very
attractive sister Louise pay for the flat they share down
in the valley. He wants her love and affection while she gets
her loving from her dead-beat boyfriends, so it's an unequal
relationship in every sense: he needs her love which isn't
returned, she needs his francs which he generously supplies.
With the camera effectively panning back and forth between
the mountains and the valley, the viewer eagerly accompanies
Simon and Louise as they go about negotiating two of life's
basic needs: love and the means to survive. Simon (Kacey Mottet
Klein) is in every scene and is the star of the film; he fully
inhabits his character as only a child actor can, with an
innocence and candour that is as real as real life. He is
so good we can already jump ahead 15 years and imagine him
selling junk bonds designed to fail in Wall Street. But Meier
does not romanticize Simon, our sympathy is provisional because
he is a treacherous, conniving thief who doesn't care a whit
for his victims. Meier also reminds us that there is no shortage
of 'respectable' people who are all too willing to purchase
stolen goods at a discount. "Sister" does not pack a punch;
it's a story that has been told on countless occasions but
it works because it touches on universals that remind us if
we don't concern ourselves with the plight of the Simons of
the world they will become our problem.
2.4
-- HERE AND
THERE (AQUI Y ALLA), Antonio
Méndez Esparza
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
After a long absence working in New York, Pedro returns to
his home and family in Mexico. His two teen daughters hardly
remember him, but Pedro is a good man and good father and
his dedication to his family quickly wins the day: family
outings are fun and a new child is on its way. Pedro is a
musician and forms a local band, but doesn't get enough gigs
so he has to work part time in the fields and in construction
to make ends meet. After the difficult birth of his daughter
who had to be incubated, whatever little money he had disappears
into the health system which the average Mexican cannot afford.
By this time in the film, there's no doubt why Pedro left
for New York in the first place, and why he is very seriously
thinking about returning again, despite the hardship the decision
will impose on the family. In the telling of Pedro's story,
"Aquí y Allá" wants to shine a sympathetic light
on the impoverished Mexican for whom El Norte is the only
credible option on the block. Despite credibly drawn characters,
there were too many scenes that were only peripherally related
to the story. The pacing was deliberately slow, lyrical if
you like, but at two hours it seemed to drag. The situations
brought up in the film predicted more than the flat (civilized)
speaking voices that stayed the course throughout the entire
film. Where was the anger, the outrage? Still, there is much
the director Antonio Méndez Esparza can take home from his
debut, just as there is much he can leave in the cutting room.
2.6
-- THE WILD
ONES (LOS SALVAJES), Alejandro
Fadel
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
Gaucho, Simón, Grace, Monzón, and Demián
were turned savage during their formative years, and then
treated savagely in an Argentine detention center before escaping
into the wild where they have to fend for themselves: savages
in a savage land. Their behaviour resembles that of a pack
of animals, but they don't bond or form a cohesive unit in
the face of adversity -- the lingering effects of broke down
families, They are overly fond of the abundant coca leaf which
doesn't help. One by one they die, or vanish. None of the
five is particularly likeable, their decisions are mostly
bad, but the director, Alexandro Fadel, with a nod to Terrence
Malick, makes sure the viewer experiences up close the primordial
world as it once was and still is -- human conceit notwithstanding.
Natural sound plays a huge role in this unnecessarily long
film that requires no diegetic props. Mixed in with the human
breath that is sometimes so close you can smell it are the
menacing rhythms of the jungle, the crackle of fire, the ominous
chorus of the evening feeding frenzy, and the grunt of wild
boar, the ever-present enemy and source of food. They meet
up with outcasts like themselves, there's a clash, someone
is killed, they move on, in search of what -- the missing
tribe, a founding myth? This is a haunting film, in part because
the large faces of the youths are so uncomprehending before
the vastness of the challenges that await. Are these orphans
our doing?
3.0
-- STARLET,
Sean Baker
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
If the billions of dollars generated by the porn industry
are an indication, we would much rather watch actresses X-rate
themselves than go about their daily lives -- unless you can
cut to the quick like director Sean Baker, who from the get-go
gets us to take an interest in Jane. However, this is not
a "porn starlets are just like you and me" film. Jane, who
is all legs and sunshine and seems to come from the right
side of the tracks, has just moved in with her best friend
the volatile Melissa and her boyfriend, all of whom in varying
degrees enjoy video games and smoking crack cocaine. To brighten
up her new room, Jane goes garage sailing and picks up a thermos
which she wants to convert into a vase. While cleaning it,
she finds ten thousand dollars at the bottom and decides to
return it to its owner, Sadie, a sourpussed octogenarian,
who slams the door in her face. However Jane is persistent,
and despite dubious plot devices their lives eventually intertwine,
but we aren't sure why Jane is going out of her way to connect
with Sadie, since the former has friends, is likeable, is
socially well-adjusted and takes her work in stride. With
the viewer supplying the syntax to the mundane activities
of daily life (Bingo, dog-sitting, yard cleaning) we gradually
come to understand that the non-negotiables of family operate
through us in ways we least suspect, but cannot refuse. Dree
Hemingway (Jane) and Besedka Johnson (Sadie) nailed their
parts. Sadie's face, a sagging mess of splotches and wrinkles,
illuminates the screen. Her pauses and silences are portraits,
testaments to the costs exacted by a long life winding down.
To Baker's credit, he doesn't get caught up in the maudlin.
"Starlet" is a not a tear-jerker but a feel-good film because
it shines a light on the hope it offers to the many for whom
the heart is a lonely hunter. And we don't particularly care
that Baker neatly sidesteps the moral issue which could have
taken over the film: Jane in fact does not return the money
but uses most of it to purchase for Sadie and herself two
tickets to Paris. If and when Sadie ever finds out, will the
lady protest? In 1943, Bertolt Brecht gave us "The Good
Woman of Szechwan." Baker makes a strong case that Jane
is her rightful heir.
3.0
-- RENGAINE,
Rachid Djaïdani
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
Sabrina and Dorcy want to get married, but she's Muslim and
he's an African Christian. The film is about the fault lines
their love throws into relief. The action unfolds both in
the streets of Paris and in the mindset of second generation
Muslims who speak perfect French, and, in theory, should be
perfectly assimilated. But traditions linger, and Sabrina's
brothers will not bless the marriage. The tension in the film
is generated by a series of secret, furtive meetings between
Sabrina's brothers. The edgy camera joins them like an accomplice.
As Sabrina and Dorcy discover the depths of their resolve,
we fear for their safety. Though not without missteps, this
small budget film with a huge agenda packs a wallop and a
half. It tackles problems that most immigrants, best intentions
notwithstanding, are unable to handle as it concerns the conflict
between their hopes, humanity and loyalties. Sabrina in blue
jeans is a question every Muslim male has to answer to. Without
taking sides or imposing his view, the director Rachid Djaïdani
offers, like an illuminated manuscript, a group portrait that
is as hopeful as it is disquieting. The ending is riveting,
cathartic, as was the scene of two hands, black and white,
floating over the piano keys. Thus far, my pick for the People's
Choice Prize.
2.6
-- DJECA ENFANTS
DE SARAJEVO, Aida Begic
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
During the Bosnian genocide (1992-95), at least 10,000 people
were killed in Sarajevo. The government was accused of shelling
its own people. Most of the survivors are damaged goods, some
have been permanently traumatized. It is in the bullet ridden
facades of the buildings and dark spaces in the hearts and
minds where Aida Begic finds the material for her films. Rahima
and her much younger brother Nedim are war orphans. She works
in a restaurant and can barely make ends meet, while trying
to keep an eye on Nedim who is in trouble at school, always
getting into fights. Though her days are long and thankless,
she retains her dignity and will not yield to temptation.
She believes her strength and purpose derive from wearing
the Muslim headdress. Despite the persistent gloom in her
day to day existence, and an expression that seems cut off
from any chance for happiness, she perservers and even breaks
out in a smile from time to time. The film's cumulative despair,
the result of one carefully crafted scene after another, is
offset by the joyous music of Beethoven and the understated
strength and character of Rahima who leaves no doubt that
if there isn't a promised land at the end of the rainbow,
there's a better place that has already been found, which
is in her person as other people come to know her and what
she represents. She is the message Aida Begic wants to share
with the world.
1.4
-- BOY EATING
THE BIRD'S FOOD, Ectoras Lygizos
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
We observe Yorgos, a sensitive young man with an angelic voice,
faint during a tenor tryout, nibble on his canary's bird seed,
ingest his own ejaculate (warning: graphic
sex), clean a filthy toilet, follow a young girl and
then run away. Throughout the film, an unstable, hand-held
camera clings to him like a sweaty garment, as if the enforced
closeness is all that is required to induce us to sympathize
with him. For most of the scenes, the head and upper torso
occupy ¾ of the screen. We're never told what ails the man
but we don't doubt that he is ailing. He meets the girl again
who makes him a real meal but he is too distraught to consummate.
With his beloved bird and few belongings which he tries to
pawn, he takes to the streets to join the homeless. In the
final scene, he and his bird hole up in an abandoned niche
in a building where broken ancient statues are strewn. Please
-- we get the connection: Greece is in ruins. If the rookie
director wanted us to conclude that the disturbed and sometimes
disgusting person that is Yorgos is the result of the austerity
measures implemented by the Greek government and international
community, the monies would have been better spent on the
needy instead of this needless film. This is an either/or
film. If you don't care about what happens to the protagonist,
it's beside the point that the director has mastered his material.
Nonetheless, "Bird's Food" has credible cult potential and
could become the emblem or rallying point for a nation that
is hurting badly.
2.9
-- NEIGHBOURING
SOUNDS, Kelber Mendonça Filho
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
Brazilians love their tall buildings - by the jungleful. If
the recent new wave of local cinema is a reliable indicator,
Recife now ranks with the big boys on the block (Sao P., Rio,
Belo H., Forteleza, Bahia), meaning there is no circumventing
the security issues that insinuate themselves in the claustrophobic
spaces between the tower and the favela. The film plays out
from the point of view of the haves. João, the grandson of
Don Francisco, who owns most of the properties on the block,
has just hooked up with Sofia, a mysterious, taciturn woman
with no apparent background. João's attractive neighbour Bia
is a bored, pot-smoking housewife who is obsessed with silencing
a barking dog. Dinho, the cousin, has unwittingly vandalized
João's new girlfriend's car during their first tryst. Into
this mix, a security team suspiciously offers its services,
and with it, a sense of dread and foreboding develops; and
it is here where the film excels. Clodoaldo, the team leader,
is ominously polite and soft-spoken. Bia's daughter awakens
to a bad dream; we hear a stampede of kids jumping over a
high security fence; Don Francisco has summoned an impromptu
meeting with the new security team. We're not sure if the
haves are hostage to real fears or their imaginations, which
is why the extraneous revenge plot introduced toward the end
of the film was totally unnecessary, since the film had already
superbly captured the mood and dread that feed and feed upon
the anxieties and concerns of city people. That said, Fihlo,
in his debut film, has masterfully created a sense of an impending
horror out of seemingly incongruous situations that the sum
of all fears cannot account for. I can't wait for his next.
2.2
-- THE MILLENNIAL
RAPTURE, Koji Wakamatsu
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
In Roji, Japan, a small seaside village, The Old One, who
certainly doesn't look her age, on her deathbed, recounts
the effects of a curse on the Nakamoto family, its dashing
and debonair young men who use their good looks and charm
not to better the community but to seduce married women, rob
and steal. As predicted by the curse, they all get killed
or commit suicide or go blind or a combination thereof. For
the unraptured viewer, there is no escaping the excessive
melodrama and theatricality of a movie that suffers from redundancy
(derelict editing) and an endlessly repeating pentatonic (black
keys of the piano) sound track. If you don't believe in curses,
the only plausible explanation of events is genetic, which
the film, keeping to the myth, doesn't explore. But we are
attracted to the exquisitely sculpted faces of the young men
and elegance and beauty of the unhappy women who surrender
to them. At 76-years-old, one wonders if this is director
Koji Wakamatsu's last hurrah, and if "Rapture" is his "Death
in Venice" confession, for the Old One not only likes
all of the Nakamoto boys, she ends up in the arms of one them.
3.4
-- STARLET,
Sean Baker
[reviewed
by Nancy Snipper]
Twenty-one-year-old
Jane, a laid-back blond beauty with an honest, kind disposition
lives with her antithesis -- a narcissistic dark-haired horribly
conceited gal. Both make porno movies. But Jane, known in
the porno world as Tess, is really a plain Jane in real life
with a heart of gold. She stops at a yard sale and purchases
a thermos that she uses as a vase when she brings it home.
The flowers she buys won't stay down in it. What's going on?
She finds ten rolls of hundred-dollar bills at the bottom
of this vase. Bingo! They really belong to the woman who sold
her the thermos. Feeling guilty she drives back to tell the
crotchety old dame her discovery, but when Sadie (the old
lady) answers the door, she immediately shoves it in Jane's
dumbstruck face. Thus begins Jane's mission to befriend Sadie.
And the best way to do this is offer her lifts to the grocery
store and insinuate herself in her life in different ways.
She even joins her at the weekly bingo games. The average
age there is 72, but Jane in her tight really short pants
and thigh high socks is oblivious to the embarrassment she
is causing Sadie who really wants Jane out of her life. She
even pepper sprays her at one point. The movie ends when their
friendship really takes off. This is a gem of a movie that
confidently paces itself in showing the development of friendship
-- in this case between an old lonely lady and a young lonely
lady. The acting of Dree Hemingway (Muriel Hemingway's daughter
as Jane, and the magnificent performance of Besedka Johnson
(Sadie) -- well -- you couldn't cast a better pair. The Chihuahua
dog Starlet, observes it all; he adds ironic humour to it
all. He goes everywhere with Jane. The ending is touching
and understated as is the entire movie. I loved it.
3.8
-- MIDNIGHT'S
CHILDREN, Deepa Mehta
[reviewed
by Nancy Snipper]
An
epic film of momentous events that includes, magic, mayhem,
munificence and misery. This amazing work follows the life
of one misfortunate boy caught in the constant upheavals of
India's history -- starting with the yanking off of the British
yoke over India in 1947 to the partitioning of India into
Bangladesh and Pakistan -- through to civil war. The story
features two boys switched purposefully at birth (a revolutionary
act by the nurse) so that the poor-born baby grows up in a
wealthy privileged family, and the boy born to the rich couple
ends up groveling for money with his organ-playing dad begging
beside him. Eventually, both boys -- now men meet. They collide
on opposite sides of the political spectrum. One is valiant,
born with a huge nose (this is important) -- the other full
of vengeance. Their upbringing has consequences that are devastating
to both. The movie contains lots of Indian mysticism and absurdist
scenes. The boy with the big nose (our valiant hero) and other
children come together. He has a telepathic gift: he merely
has to focus on his nose and these children of midnight appear
to him in his secret moments. All were born at midnight the
very moment India gained its autonomy. The movie must be seen
in order to witness and empathize with all the various episodes
that close in on the lives of these two boys, and other main
characters in this remarkable film. Salman Rushdie narrates
the film (he wrote the book thirty years ago). An incredibly
ambitious undertaking told with eloquent narration. You can't
get much better than Rushdie's wit, depth and irony that weave
in an out of the movie like a brilliantly coloured Indian
tapestry that is far too big to hang on the wall.
2.2
-- UN MOIS
EN THAILANDE, Paul Negoescu
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
From
an elevation, a fixed, wide-angle lens throws a net over Bucarest's
dreary cityscape. It's December 31st. Wouldn't it be nice
to ship out to Thailand with your one and only, which in Radu's
case is Adine, or so he believes until he catches a glimpse
of his ex, Nadia. What follows is rather self-conscious, uninspiring
meditation on love that from time to time threatens to get
interesting: think Woody Allen at his worst (seven out of
his last 10 films). Radu, a magnet for women, and Adina are
a settled couple: but he is vaguely unsatisfied and she's
a bit possessive so he impulsively decides to end the relationship.
After a lengthy search, he eventually catches up with Nadia
whom he dumped, begs her to forgive him which she does, only
to discover there is no new magical beginning on the horizon.
If prior to the viewing you were wonderings what's happening
in Romania among the upwardly mobile 30s crowd, "Un Mois"provides
enough answers and a nifty soundtrack to make the film worth
the price of admission. That no love or passion is exempt
from the mundane details and duties of daily life is a lesson
everyone must learn. The director seems to think that women
are better adjusted to the hard facts of love than men which
predict the film's colour schematic that ranges from the subdued
to the cheerless.
2.5
-- OUR LITTLE
DIFFERENCES, Sylvie Michel
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
The film takes place in a single day in the life of Sebastian,
a prestigious doctor who works as an embryologist in a fertility
clinic in Berlin, whose plate, we learn, is more than full.
He's under pressure at work to produce embryos for sterile
couples, he's divorced and in a new relationship, and has
returned home to check on Vera, who is housecleaning, and
his irresponsible, impertinent 16-year-old son who likes to
toque and sleep with his girlfriend. Vera is the 20 something
daughter of Jana, a Bulgarian, who looks after the cleaning
at the clinic. When the kids don't return after a night on
the town, Jana panics and takes issue with Sebastian's conceits
on parenting, but both, as it turns out, are equidistant in
their estrangement from their disaffected children. To her
credit, the director Sylvie Michel has gone to great pains
to subtely introduce that notion that while Sebastian and
Jana are worlds apart socially and economically -- the latter
lives in a one room apartment -- they are on the same side
of the generational divide. This is a small, admirably paced
film that is helped by a disciplined script and smart performances.
If we are not any wiser at the end of the day, we are happy
to have made the acquaintance of Sebastian and Jana, two fully
developed characters with whom we can fully empathize as well
as criticize.
2.5
-- IN ANOTHER
COUNTRY, Hong Sang-Soo
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
We're not sure if she's simply bored and imagining the scenarios,
or if a screenwriter is playing them out in her mind. Each
episode, each take features Anne, a famous film director played
by Isabelle Huppert, who has come to a quiet beach town (Mohang)
to tryst with her lover, a Korean film director. Issues of
infidelity with the exuberant lifeguard Yu are played out
with different results in each version, as well as the give
and take with her hosts, and conflicts and jealousies that
arise with her possessive Korean lover, and, in a humourous
vein, the problems posed when different languages and cultures
share the same intimate spaces. "In Another Country" recalls
the much better film, "Run Lola Run," which expertly showed
how a single change in a sequence of events results in a different
ending. But Sang-Soo's film is too light to even suggest the
philosophical implications of choice and consequences. Reality
is turned into a plaything to the effect that the film ends
up as another, but rather original it must be said, serving
of escapist fare, which in fairness was probably the director's
intent. We happily participate in the airy dance like quality
of the film, the thoroughly charming dialogue, and performances
that could have easily overwhelmed, overinterpreted the straight-no-chaser
script.
2.4
-- THE ANGEL'S
SHARE, Ken Loach
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
Ken Loach has made a career of telling the stories and giving
a voice to the less fortunate. Without ever being didactic,
he makes us less judgmental about behaviour that would otherwise
be frowned upon -- by revealing the cause and effects that
produce it. "The Angel's Share," shot in Glasgow, Scotland,
continues Loach's life long work. A judge has ordered a group
of delinquents/criminals to perform community service. One
of the lads, Robbie, whose girl-friend is bursting pregnant,
is especially violent. With his first child on its way, he
wants to change his life but circumstance won't let him: a
family feud that began with his father dogs him and he's afraid
he won't be able to restrain himself from retaliating, which
would result in an automatic jail sentence. Despite hilarious
dialogue among the offenders, up to this point in the film,
we're expecting a gritty social tale to unfold as it concerns
the uncertain fate of Robbie, his new-born child, and the
past that won't let him go. But the plot changes dramatically.
After a visit to a whisky distillery, Robbie discovers that
he has an exceptional nose for evaluating rare whisky, and
shortly thereafter he concocts a plan to steal a precious
keg, the huge monies to be divided among his gang of thieves.
The remainder of the film is a feel-good, suspense-heist with
an all-too predictable ending. As to the message, that crime
pays, or among the have-nots is justifiable, is surely not
what Loach intended, which begs the question and point of
the film, besides its entertainment value. Note: without subtitles
(which were in French), I would not have understood this film.
2.2
-- ROOM 514,
Sharon Bar-Ziv
[reviewed
by Nancy Snipper]
Anna,
a military investigator with the Israeli Defense Forces, is
fearless about finding out about what happened when an elite
army group attacked innocent Palestinian civilians in occupied
territory. The entire action takes place in this room, including
scenes she has with one of the soldiers. One wonders if she
does this in the attempt to glean more information about this
attack. None one want to snitch. I found this movie to be
claustrophobic; it all took place in a single room and the
shouting and excessive dialogue left no room for subtle entrapment
to get to the truth. Intimidation and sex were the only tools
used to uncover the truth. This low budget film -- the director's
first feature -- did not merit a special jury award at the
Tribeca Film Festival. Tackling the code of silence which
is insidious in the Israeli army is indeed courageous, and
a daunting task in art and reality; only a veteran director
or a spy will have a slim chance at success.
3.8
-- SEEKING
ASIAN FEMALE, Debbie Lum
[reviewed by Nancy Snipper] This terrific documentary is hilarious. At the age of 60, Steven
is totally obsessed with Asian women, and for the past two
years -- he's already gone through two divorces from two Caucasian
wives -- he has become intent on marrying a Chinese woman.
Evidently, there are oodles of sites that draw the attention
of American men in search of marrying an Asian girl. Steven
is a hoarder which adds to the humour of his funny personality
and child-like manner and merry take on life. He oversimplifies
and stereotypes Asian women. He does meet one named Molly,
but nothing really comes of it after he visits her (we never
meet her). Molly can't commit to marriage. Finally, he hits
it off with 30-year-old Sandy who is poor, tough and very
smart. They actually love one another. Steven and her finally
marry, but he is in debt, is caught in an emotional crisis
when Sandy finds Molly's pictures still sitting pretty in
Steven's email. She discovers he may still have a thing for
her. Off goes her marriage ring. She says she wants to go
home but can't, as she will lose face. She also plans to divorce
him after she gets a Green card and can work. Clearly, the
marriage is in crisis. Debbie Lum -- a Chinese American herself
-- soon becomes the translator and marriage counselor to both.
She wonders if she is in fact sabotaging the affair and that
she must step back. Sandy moves out, but in the end, she misses
Steven who by now has shaped up -- having deleted all remnants
of Molly, and dumping away apartment clutter and bad habits.
He is now committing to being a more mature husband and man.
He always loved Sandy, and Lum's ability to get both to reveal
adds plot intensity. Lum actually stops filming after the
crisis, but she returns three months later to find out they
are separated and then, to our relief, return to one another.
We leave feeling they are going to stay together. Sandy begins
to take control of the reigns and Steven adjusts accordingly.
He realizes, there is a real woman behind the slanted eyes;
he acknowledges how infantile his ideas are. What is so cute
about this engaging comedic documentary is the filmmaker becomes
an integral part to the story as it advances. Her role is
unique and double-sided. A great film that all-Asian-obsessed
men ought to see before taking the plunge.
2.2
-- IT LOOKS
PRETTY FROM A DISTANCE, Anka
Sasnal & Wilhelm Sasnal
[reviewed
by Nancy Snipper]
Nothing
looks pretty from a distance in this post-war depressing film
layered in a never-ending series of degrading scenes, including
the poisoning of dogs, the burning of a neigbour's house,
the scavenging of possessions that have seen better days,
the carting off of a mother with dementia who gets holed up
in some dilapidated dwelling to meet her fate of further neglect.
But she did piss alongside of the bed where her son was sleeping,
and became a nuisance when she wandered off in the field.
Everyone is expendable in this particular setting where village
life is rotting from within; denigration and disgust for most
living things is the ethos here. Hypocrites to the hilt, they
all gather at the church on Sundays. Pawel, a scrap metal
dealer, has a girlfriend who wears a cross around her neck,
but she's the one who poisoned the dogs. Pavel disappears,
and maybe that's a good thing in the end. I couldn't tell
which family was wreaking vengeance to whom, and I have a
sneaky suspicion it doesn't matter. It is an understatement
to say this is not a feel-good film, but it is realistic and
somehow weirdly captivating. I believe the filmmakers felt
passionate about this shameful vague- post-war period in Poland,
and wanted to expose it all. The frightening thing is, it
was so believable.
1.3
-- IT LOOKS
PRETTY FROM A DISTANCE, Anka
& Wilhem Sasnal
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
Set in rural Poland, "It Looks Pretty from a Distance" is
a relentlessly bleak house of an affair that takes place after
the war, but we're not sure when. In fact we're not sure of
anything in this film, whose protagonists are thoroughly dislikable,
self-destructive, and downright mean to themselves and each
other. A broke down family runs a scrap metal business, there's
an affair that really doesn't happen, nobody cares for anybody,
but we don't know why, we don't know what happened to their
humanity. Despite the attractive landscape, the film plays
out like a paean to decrepitude and decay: one brutish, ugly
scene follows another. An addled mother approaches her sleeping
adult son, drops her drawers and urinates on the spot. Had
she been endowed with an appendage, the son would have awoken
to a sun shower. The family gets rid of her, reminding itself
that if she returns it will be in a coffin: tough love ad
extremis. A young woman frustrated in a relationship decides
to poison a couple of dogs. Based on an obscure custom, a
family takes to destroying and torching a house. Pork bellied
male adults sit around all day long chain smoking, slurping
back beer and chomping on sausage. The film ends as it begins,
suffocating in its own elliptical web of nihilism. Slant
and other reviewing media have sung the praises of this film.
By my reckoning, the danger in leaving too much unsaid is
that nothing gets said, which in this case is unfortunate
because the film stayed the course according to its internal
logic; it was cohesive, and I don't doubt for an instant that
the writer and director had something, perhaps even profound,
to say. But I didn't hear it.
2.0
-- MOLD,
Ali Aydin
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
Set in Turkey, Basri is a morose, vaguely depressed, slow
moving train track inspector. He is called in for another
interrogation, which unfolds at a snail's pace. We eventually
learn that in the 1990s his son, an activist university student
in Istanbul, disappeared, and that Basri's grief-stricken
wife died shortly thereafter. For the past 18 years, Basri
has been writing letters to the government, asking what happened
to his son, but to no avail and to the displeasure of the
authorities. Since we know the cause of Basri's stoic unhappiness,
"Mold" ends up being an unsatisfying character study of a
dignified, honourable man who has lost the will to live, who
goes about his day on automatic pilot. He has convinced himself
that he wants closure, that his life will change when he finally
finds out what happened to his son, but when he does, nothing
changes. The film suffers from affected silences, a plot thinner
than rice paper, and a sub plot that is only peripherally
related to the main inaction. When the remains of Basri's
son are handed over, we expect to learn more about the mass
grave that was uncovered, but we don't. In short, this film
was short on substance and long in minutes.
1.1
-- MOLD,
Ali Aydin
[reviewed by Nancy Snipper] This movie moves like a slow funerary dirge, bereft of any emotional
colour. Painfully bleak is the tempo and tenor of the story
that surely should have been dramatically conveyed with many
emotional ups and downs. Basri, a 55-year-old railroad track
inspector lives in a mold- infested hovel of an apartment.
He is prone to seizures which he claims has nothing to do
with epilepsy. Maybe it is the mold that causes his seizures.
He is obsessed with locating his son who disappeared18 years
ago. Evidently, he was taken in for anti-government activities.
What happened to him, only chief inspector Murot knows --
perhaps. Cemil, a drunk who works with Basri is hit by a train
in the yard, and Basri sees the accident as it is about to
happen, but he does not warn Cemil to get out of the way.
Cemi had what was coming to him; he insulted the memory of
Bosri's son in the most vile manner and he raped a woman,
and during the act, Basri beat him off her. You would think
a film that has a rape scene, a man hit by a train, a father
despairing over his missing son with frequent visits to the
authorities who most probably knew the fate of his son, would
prompt the lead actor -- Tansu Bicer to show more emotion
than that of a mute timid man. No anger here, no climatic
breakdown. When news reaches Basri that his son is dead, all
that remains for Basri to cling onto is a box with his son's
belongings inside. Violence, secrets and lies infuse this
film, yet we are not affected by any of it. Somehow the film
got derailed from the get-go. I fell asleep in some parts.
3.4
-- ANTIVIRAL,
Brandon Cronenberg
[reviewed
by Daniel Charchuk]
The son of the famed Canadian filmmaker finally comes into
his own with this, his debut feature, and, unsurprisingly,
it is chock full of many of the same thematic elements that
Cronenberg Sr. made his name on: perverse sexuality, the infusion
of technology into biology, and the horrors of the human body.
But Cronenberg Jr.’s aesthetic style seems to be much more
showy and obvious than his father’s, utilizing a clinical,
antiseptic approach that is both in line with recent ‘art
film’ trends and bizarrely befitting of this film’s concern
with disease and sickness. It is also much less subtle when
it comes to the issue of social commentary, as the film makes
all-too-clear its position on celebrity worship and fan culture.
Still, it’s an impressive debut for a second-generation director,
even if the filmmaker is somewhat too reliant on his father’s
name and reputation.
3.6
-- SINISTER,
Scott Derrickson
[reviewed
by Daniel Charchuk]
At once both a criticism of the recent wave of found-footage horror films and a commentary on the very nature of filmmaking itself, this latest Halloween spook-fest imbues its jump-scares and modest thrills with a grander sense of purpose and meaning. Though lacking a third act (perhaps intentionally, to increase terror and unease), and relying too heavily on sharp musical cues and sudden visuals to effect the aforementioned jump-scares, director Derrickson nonetheless shows a skilled hand in building tension and crafting a prevailing sense of dread throughout. And via its narrative involving a true-crime novelist (Ethan Hawke) investigating Super 8 footage of grisly serial murders, the film shows it has something to say on the nature of horror movies and, indeed, cinema itself. “Why would somebody film this?” Hawke’s character asks himself, and perhaps we, the audience, are asking ourselves the same question.
2.8
-- TABOU,
Miguel Gomes
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
On
the surface, "Tabou" is a languid, nostalgic, sometimes despondent
film that contrasts life in modern, post-colonial Lisbon with
(presumably) Mozambique 50 years earlier. It is entirely and
expertly shot in black and white: 35mm for Lisbon, and the
more grainy (pointillist) 16mm for Africa: the former to convey
state of mind, the latter, which allows for more air and light,
to capture the glory and privilege enjoyed by Portuguese colonizers.
But beneath the film's lethargic pace simmers memories of
events and relationships that will disturb the surface. In
the opening sequences we meet three elderly women who are
without men. They are vaguely disappointed in life but have
their small projects and occupations to keep them going. Aurora
is the least stable of the three: she gambles too much, complains
that her daughter never calls, has visions, and during her
deathbed ramblings, she tells of the mysterious Gian Luca
Ventura, a man with whom she had a torrid affair 50 years
earlier - while she was carrying her husband's child. With
Ventura narrating, the film flashes back to the earlier period.
The effects of the affair on her subsequent life and its parallels
with the growing independence movement are what give the film
its heft and depth. Gomes uses black and white to great advantage.
Scenes of the magnificent tea-fields bathed in mist, being
worked by black slaves are so beautiful as to be accepted
as part of the natural order. The illicit affair, its joys,
the cost that it exacts, are wonderfully and often wordlessly
conveyed. When silent film is handled correctly, the face
and eyes can speak more eloquently and transparently than
even the best script. However tempting, it would be facile
to conclude that "Tabou" is simply another 'infidelity
doesn't pay' film. Gomes has stitched together at times a
mesmerizing conjunction of events, both large and small, showing
how ineffectual we are in managing the events that shape our
lives. One way to correct this universal shortcoming is to
revisit remembrances of times past in order to creatively
reconstruct the most fugitive aspects of the meaning of our
lives.
2.0
-- GOOD LUCK
SWEETHEART, Daniel Aragao
[reviewed
by Nancy Snipper]
Obviously,
the director was in love with the face of lead actress Christiana
Ubach. This black and white film noir seems to mimic a Clint
Eastwood western with "Casablanca" close-ups and
sultry dialogue. Maria, a marginalized music student who comes
from the Brazilian countryside somewhere near Recife meets
her lover who falls madly in love with her. He also comes
from the countryside, but he's a step ahead of her into the
game of love, city partying and fun. The film is disjointed
and it's full of affectation. Maria disappears, so her lover
boy goes looking for her. He ends up eating dinner with her
impoverished inhospitable family. In a subsequent scene, the
father more or less tells him to get lost while revealing
that Maria has gone abroad. I have no idea what this film
is really about other than the usual alienation, destruction
of country family life and cities that have nothing to offer
except a strong desire to escape into the arms of a lover
or at the keys of a piano.
2.7--
GOOD LUCK SWEETHEART, Daniel
Aragão
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
As South America becomes a major player in the global economy,
it is discovering that it is not exempt from the dislocations
and disaffections spawned by modernity. This raw material
easily lends itself to a new wave of cinema that is taking
hold south of the Panama Canal. "Sidewall (Medianeras 2011)"
which takes place in Argentina, meticulously examined the
ravages of urbanization and connectivity on personal, depersonalized
relationships. And now, from Brazil, we have Daniel Aragão's
"Good Luck Sweetheart" who uses his native city Recife as
the backdrop to a film that is ostensibly about disambiguating
the relationship between Dirceu and Maria and their contrasting
attitudes to their back country origins. Maria, thoroughly
citified, doesn't believe in love, and like most young Recifians,
she is non-committal in her many relationships, until she
meets Dirceu, who, despite his care-free ways, finds himself
deeply in love with a woman he cannot possess. But the plot
is secondary to Aragão's daring and inventive film making.
He is not afraid to take chances and there are missteps we
gladly suffer because the whole is engaging from the very
first frame. Symbolism plays a major role in the film: the
congested Recife skyline takes on the aspect of a virus that
has run roughshod over the city while the very in-your-ear
but apropos soundtrack reinforces the harsh realities and
contrasts that are the inevitable side-effects of rampant,
unplanned urbanization. The film is shot in black and white
and it works for the most part, but when the action shifts
to the verdant countryside, we want to see it in colour. If
the storyline is sometimes overwhelmed by style and effect
considerations, it is offset by the director's vision and
exceptionally original take on a theme that renders our essential
city-pampered aloneness more bearable.
2.6
-- AFTER LUCIA,
Michel Franco
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
An agitated, unstable camera follows a middle-aged man, Roberto,
who has just settled into a completely refurbished car. On
his way home, he suddenly stops and abandons the car. We soon
learn that it was the same car his wife was driving when she
was killed in an automobile accident. The film examines how
both Roberto and his 15-year-old daughter, Alejandra (Ale),
attempt to deal with life after Lucia, the title of Michel
Franco's gritty film. We are initially introduced to Roberto,
a chef, who has troubles at work, is depressed and can't sleep,
but gradually the plight of his daughter takes over the film.
Having left Puerto V. for Mexico City, she's anxious to fit
into her new school. One night she gets drunk and has sex
with José, who has turned on his camphone for the occasion.
The video goes viral, Alejandra gets branded as a slut, which
is the excuse for her new friends to turn on her, harass her
and finally bully her. During a school excursion to Vera Cruz,
her 'friends' lock her in the bathroom where, in the middle
of a wild party, she gets raped. Post bacchanalia, the hung
over students decide to enter rough waters for a cleanup,
but Ale disappears, and is presumed dead. Roberto, who has
already lost his wife, unhappy with the pace of local justice,
decides to take matters in his own hands with tragic consequences.
The ending will leave many unsatisfied, since the bullying
theme, deftly handled by Franco, is left dangling, unresolved.
That said, the film's stark realism, its spot on dialogue,
its depiction of teens trying to find their elusive selves
is wholly convincing.
1.0
-- YOU AIN'T
SEEN NOTHING YET, Alain Resnais
Uribe
[reviewed
by Nancy Snipper]
Nothing but senility can explain the machinations behind this
ridiculous film where an aging director fakes his death, and
has his butler calls up all old actor friends to watch a film
of a reenactment of a modern troupe put on Eurydice -- they
all once acted in. They have been told that their once beloved
director is now dead, and he wishes them to assemble to watch
the film. As the film begins, the actors watching it begin
to replay their parts while sitting down, standing up and
moving into different sterile, dark rooms. It is utter nonsense.
Then the director magically appear to greet his old time friends
to tell them he just wanted to see if they would show up upon
his death. So he never really died after all. But at the end
of the film, he jumps into a lake and dies. Is Alain Resnais
insecure about whether he was loved or not, or is he simply
the worst filmmaker to hit 90 years of age?
1.0--
POST TENEBRAS LUX, Carlos
Reygadas
[reviewed
by Nancy Snipper]
To think this travesty of a film actually received Best Director
Award at this year's Cannes Festival! Do not ask me what this
film was about. I only registered a never-ending totally unrelated
sequence of uninteresting events. I did see farm animals in
the dark, a cartoon of a devil wandering at night through
the home of a family with two children who were on camera
far too much (that's because they are the director's), a makeshift
12-step program meeting held in some forest of some country
that is never mentioned, the wife of the husband has sex with
two men in some bath orgy place in France, and then the husband
gets sick and seems to die. Really, "Post Tenebras Lux"
should stay in the darkroom forever. I could hardly wait until
the light came on at the end of the film as we could all leave.
A total bomb imploding with boredom and banality.
2.5
-- LA DEMORA
(THE DELAY), Rodrigo
Pla
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
A more subdued affair than his ambitious 2007 film, "La
Zona," which deservedly won the People's Choice
Prize at the 2007 FNC festival, "La Demore,' (The Delay)
sides with Uruguay's have-nots, but from the more static and
sedate point of view of a single mother -- a non-unionized
seamstress -- who is trying to raise three children while
looking after her aging father whose memory is more porous
than a sieve. Shot mostly in grey in one of Montevideo's non-descript
suburbs, the late November colour sets the tone for a film
that is relentlessly bleak and despairing. Maria, the mother,
goes about her dreary day trying to instill calm by speaking
in a calm voice while all around her is pending chaos. She
pleads with her sister to take her father in for a while but
the latter selfishly declines. A few days later, after the
father doesn't qualify to live in a nursing home, Maria snaps,
and she abandons her progenitor, but later that night, in
the wee hours of the morning, her conscience bids her to hit
the streets and save him from either freezing to death or
the humiliation of being sent to a homeless shelter. During
his abandonment, Agustin, the addled father, is comforted
by the kindness of strangers when it is least expected. The
film benefits from steady helmanship but some of the plot
devices were a bit thin and we wish we knew more about Maria
and how she got into her predicament.
2.8
-- DEADMAN'S
BURDEN, Jared Moshe
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
We commonly think of the whiteman's burden as the shame he
experienced regarding his unconscionable enslavement/treatment
of blacks. Deadman's burden, an out-of-time western of the
same title, refers to a father who, during the Civl War, has
been shamed by his turncoat son and later shot by his patricidal
daughter.
Combing elements of Shakespeare and Greek melodrama at their
unsubtlest, the film, shot in the gorgeous badlands of New
Mexico, roughly deals with family dysfunctionality (ad extremis)
and good and evil. Redemption was quietly and appropriately
left out of the equation. At the end of the Civil War, Wade
McCury, presumed dead, returns home only to discover that
his father Joe, who disowned him, is dead. His smart-looking
sister Martha, a shotgun wielding Lady Macbeth, is desperate
to sell the homestead and has invited Lane, a slick investor,
to visit and finalize the sale. But Wade isn't convinced that
his father's death was an accident and he doesn't like Martha's
husband: rouge-necked Heck. The more deeply he probes, the
more he discovers that everyone is well acquainted with evil,
which guarantees a satisfying body count well before the film's
final bullet. The last family member standing is Martha. With
a patricide and fratricide under her garter belt and a saddle
bag full of someone else's money, she's about to ride like
a cowgirl into the dawn when Three Penny Hank, who is so lonely
he talks to himself, decides to intervene. If the director
didn't intend it, I'll say it: we are irrevocably the sons
and daughters of Martha and Wade. Despite a woody script and
depthless acting, every frame of the film is glazed in style.
Like the hypnotic, sun-drenched, sienna-burnt landscape, the
faces glow and we can't take our eyes off them. There are
moments when the film suggests a secret debt to a off beat
play that was never staged, which perhaps explains its peculiar
charm and irksome staying power.
3.0 --
LA MISE À L’AVEUGLE (SMALL BLIND),
Simon Gallero
[reviewed
by Daniel Charchuk]
The opening film of this year’s Festival du Nouveau Cinéma
is an intimate Québécois drama detailing the life of recent
retiree Denise (Micheline Bernard), living a life of quiet
isolation and organized boredom. Detached from those around
her, she finds solace in her neighbours’ nightly game of poker
-- a game she quickly takes to. Denise’s life soon enters
another stage, as new relationships are fostered and past
ones left by the wayside. Though the story is small in scope
and short on drama, director Gallero’s assured hand, combined
with Bernard’s fearless performance, craft a mature portrait
of a middle-aged woman forced to start her life over again
-- and the people she encounters as she does so.
3.1
-- KLIP (CLIP),
Maja Miloš
[reviewed
by Daniel Charchuk]
In many ways a companion piece to the controversial and infamous
"A Serbian Film," echoing that film’s explicit
sexuality and apparent political edge. But whilst
the earlier work is brutal, disturbing, and without a shred
of redeemable content, this one at least maintains its sense
of humanity, even amongst the degrading sex scenes and graphic
blowjobs. Following the life of teenager Jasna as she deals
with her father’s terminal illness, her family’s resigned
poverty, and her boyfriend’s carefree misogyny, it is both
a criticism of post-communist Serbia and an optimistic look
forwards. Though some might find this film far too troubling
and misogynistic to be of any value, the fact that it is,
in fact, directed by a woman goes a long way in allaying such
concerns. Serbia may be screwed right now, but at least there’s
hope for the future.
2.0
-- MARS &
APRIL, Martin Villeneuve
[reviewed
by Robert Lewis]
Seven years in the making, Martin Villeneuve's debut film"Mars
& April," boldly translated as March & April,
played out like a dreary day in November: the gargantuan effort
failed to generate excitement over the large questions the
film, it must be said, bravely tackles. A work of science
fiction, aging musician/composer Jacob Obus (Jacques Languirand)
believes he can forestall death through art and music. He
is helped along by an infatuation with the young and lovely
Avril (Caroline Dhavernas), his confessor, who, after their
first sexual consummation, gets transported to the planet
Mars. Jacob, whose lungs, unlike those of asthmatic Avril,
are still very much up to the task for the brass instruments
he plays, is desperate to find her. Eugene Spaak, played by
Robert Lepage (“Impossible Worlds”), whose haloed
head is a hologram, is a wise cosmologist who convinces Jacob
that his desires can be attained through mind projection.
If the film is arguing that art and only art is immortal,
I’m not sure if the science fiction props helped or
obscured the message. Scenes of a spacecraft soaring through
space were as superfluous as the reference to Kepler and the
harmony of the spheres. Except for the eerily haunting opening
number, the sound track by Benoit Charest (“Les Triplettes
de Belleville”) was as lackluster as the film. In overspending
his limited capital on special effects, Villeneuve forgot
about making an affecting film.
![Canadian Tire Repair Scam [2211 boul Roland-Therrien, Longueuil] = documents-proofs](../2010_v9_n5/images/mapleleaf.jpg)
