16/08/2011
15/08/2011
Locarno 2011, the report.
Olivier Père, the artistic director of the 64th Festival del Film di Locarno is a firm believer of the Italian doctrine of ‘La Bella Figura’. He wears nice suits, coloured shoes and trendy specs. He’s young, looks good and is the ideal eyecatcher of this festival. Last year his debut was good. This year he surpassed the expectations and positioned the festival as one of the most interesting on the circuit. This edition rested on three pillars. Cinema of the auteur, breakthrough cinema and glamour.
Three elements make up the cinema of the auteur. The main competition, namely the Concorso Internazionale, the retrospective and the honouring of Abel Ferrara awarded with a Pardo d’onore.
The winner of the main prize, the Golden Leopard was ‘Abrir Puertas y Ventanas’, English title ‘Back to Stay’ by Milagros Mumenthaler. A Swiss-Argentine-Dutch coproduction about three sisters living with their grandmother. One sister leaves after the old woman dies and the tensions rise. The selection of the main competition is a bit safe. The word auteur is used a lot in regard to this competition but it concerns mostly gratitiuos coming of age drama’s like the cool but pretentious ‘Un Amour de Jeunesse’ by Mia Hansen-Love and the poetic but visually flawed ‘Tokyo Koen’ by Shinji Aoyama who receveid a special prize recognizing his earlier work. The Dutch film ‘Onder ons’ by Marco van Geffen dissapoints. It’s good at depicting the life of a Polish au pair in a desolate Dutch suburb, but lacks in imagination and sophistication., not to mention the confusing ending. 'Din Dragoste cu cele mai bune intentii’, English title ‘Best Intentions’ by Adrian Sitaru won best direction and best actor. This Romanian film was at least original by using an interesting point of view camera technique throughout the movie involving the audience with the amusing story about a paranoid son mistrusting everyone in the hospital his mother is staying after suffering a stroke. The festival redeemed itself in regards to the meaning of auteur with the annual retrospetive dedicated to auteurs who established themselves as big names of film history. This year Vincente Minelli was picked. An excellent choice. If the days pick was not appealing, one could escape into the worlds of ‘An American in Paris’, ‘Some came running’, ‘Lust for Life’ and many other colourful classics. Minelli and his work were discussed and reviewed at high level by specialists introducing each film. Another example of love for the auteur was the presence of Abel Ferrara at a forum with the public. Everybody could just walk up to Ferrara for a tête a tête. It’s this laid-back atmosphere that makes Locarno special.
The second pillar of the festival consisted of the breakthrough cinema, first and second features which make up the Concorso Cineasti del Presente. Storylines are less idyllic or pathetic but rawer, more avantgarde. Less accesible at times but more daring. ‘Hanaan’ by Ruslan Pak convinces with it’s raw and vivid recount of the Korean minotity in Uzbekistan and the dangers of drug addiction in the former Soviet republic. ‘El Estudiante’ is a very sophisticated debut by Santiago Mitre who made a political thriller about the campagne for the position of dean at a big university in Buenos Aires. A succesful allegory of the hectic political climate of present day Argentina. Oddly enough the organisation was in doubt about the film. Some said it was good enough for the main competition but eventually it was decided the film was too superficial to contend. The winner of the Concorso Cineasti del Presente was the Italian film ‘L’Estate di Giacomo’ , again, a poetic coming of age drama revolving around a deaf teenager knowing he has to let go of his childhood.
The last pillar was all about glamour. Père puts his money on star quality and why not? The festival gets more recognition, and one way or another glamour and cinema will be linked forever.
Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig got on the stage of the beautiful heart of the festival, the Piazza Grande, to introduce the, highly anticipated but cheesy ‘Cowboys and Aliens’. Leslie Caron, star of the classic ‘Gigi’, spoke lovingly about her former mentor Vincente Minelli on the same spot. Abel Ferrara gave an unforgettable concert in the pouring rain and Cluadia Cardinale picked up a golden leopard. Even Kirk Douglas at 95 found time to salute the audience on the opening night from the giant screen.
The highpoint of the festival besides Ferrara’s concert and Q and A, was the screening of ‘Drive’ by Nicolas Winding Refn who already won best director in Cannes for this instant classic reinventing the genre of film noir, supported by an amazing soundtrack and a memorable performance by Ryan Gosling, the Indie circuit favourite who’s going mainstream.
The public however chose Canadian film ‘Bachir Lazar’ by Phillippe Falardeau which won the prize of the public reserved for out of competition films screened on the Piazza Grande. A well crafted emotional classroom drama about children struggling with the aftermath of the suicide of their teacher. In comes the Algerian refugee replacing her, helping the children to mourn with unconventional methods through the eyes of the rigid Quebequan parents and schoolsystem. However the film never explores the suicide of the teacher, who hanged herself in the classroom for a number of children to see. The hastily clarification at the end feels forced and makes the film less meaningful then it could be.
That the winner of the prize of the public went to a French speaking movie could hardly be a surprise considering the traditional French orientation of the public at Locarno. This was clearly evident in the overcrowded forums of two of France’s biggest stars, Isabelle Huppert and Gérard Depardieu. Huppert’s Q and A was boring. Depardieu however was entertaining during a hilarious , entangled monologue. 'I immediately recognize the difference between a labour of love and an industrial film. Just like I recognize the difference between good, home made wine and industrial wine. But to do so you have to practice, hence my ridiculous nose’. When asked about his relationship with Italian cinema he answers 'I like Italy, because they have a tradition of good food, working the land, growing good products’, nothing is said about his collobaration with Bernardo Bertolucci or Marco Ferreri. ‘I eat a lot in Italy’. When asked if he was having a good time in Switzerland the reply was 'You have good cheese’. During a lucid, non-food related moment, he actually explained the essence of Locarno. ‘What makes this festival so great, are the screenings in the open air at the Piazza Grande. A movie theatre is nice as well, but outside, that’s a celebration of cinema. It brings me back to when we were all kids, somewhere outside watching moving images on a big screen. Pure magic!’. Well said, Gérard.
07/08/2011
Abel Ferrara at Locarno
Abel Ferrara is relaxed when he sits down at the crowded Spazio Cinema, the forum of the festival in Locarno. The man responsible for masterpieces like ‘Bad Lieutenant’, ‘The King of New York’ and ‘Snake Eyes’ is quite popular amogst the festival’s visitors.
The night before het confirmed his reputation as the Master Provocateur when he received the Pardo d’onore on the stage of the Piazza Grande in the pouring rain giving a jamsession, Ferrara on acoustic guitar, to a cranky audience. After the second tune it was quite obvious Abel should stick to his day job, being an auteur of cinema. Sections of the crowd who just want to see a blockbuster in a big square began booing. After the third tune the boo’s got louder. Artistic director Olivier Père and the mayor of Locarno were nervously hovering around Ferrara urging him to maybe stop this concert. Ferrara’s two bandmembers clearly affected by the hostile atmosphere stopped playing. How did Ferrara react? In the best possible way. He played one more long tune, solo, with a big grin on his face. The harder they boo’d,, the more he had a good time.
Today he looks like he’s not having a great time, he looks tired, not interested in questions. But after the first question he turns into the storyteller everybody came for.
His description of the filmdirector’s status in the USA is hilarious. ‘ A conversation like this, with you people all about me the director, lemme tell you, that wouldn’t happen in back in the States. Americans don’t give a fuck about directors. In Hollywood a director is like a necessary evil, someone slowing down the factory. But hey, I’m an American myself. I’m the same. I’m interested in movies, not so much in the guy who made them.’
The intellectual tone of the interviewer is bugging Ferrara a bit. When asked about why he started out with porn (9 Lives of a Wet Pussy) to then progress to horror (The Driller Killer), he answers ‘Hey dude, I just wanted to make movies back in the day. And that’s what the american public wanted in those days, porn ans slasherfilms like the “Texas Chainsaww Massacre’ a personal favourite of mine, Spielberg likes that one to he once told me. They cost close to nothing, but made huge profits so I could be free in the future to make more personal movies, nothing more man’
After the next question Abel’s really getting into his swing. “Why didn’t you stay in Hollywood after Body Snatchers in 1993?’ The answer is exemplary for the relationship between Ferrara en The Company Town like he calls it. ‘I was never asked to stay’ The interviewer:’But Body Snatchers is wonderful movie.’ Ferrara:’ Yeah well, at the expense of my own mental sanity”
Tinseltown and the excentric New Yorker, they’ll never see eye to eye. When talking about Warner Brothers he referrs to the people there as gangsters. “They take you to L.A after, ’Bad Lieutenant’ and say ‘Ok, you’re a big hit, we don’t know why, but you can make us some money. Out here you just direct and shut up. You got nothing to do with the money. On how it’s spend and why, is that clear?’ A few months later Body Snatchers is 4 million dollars over budget, and I’m being summoned to this acquablue pants and white shoes wearing westcoast gangster’s office. First thing he says to me is ‘You’re going to take that phone over there and call him to tell him he can go to the Jersey coast.’ I have no idea wat this guy is talking about. Again ‘You’re going to call him and tell your New York buddy that he can go shoot at the Jersey coast.’ Now I get it. This mobster wants me to call Spike Lee , because he’s working on Malcolm X, 5 million over budget, to tell him he can’t shoot in Mekka where he was planning to go. And I’m from New York too, so I should call him. Then he says ‘And by the way, where is my 4 million dollars’ I’m telling you, that cat made me feel like I was going to end up in a trunk that night. Spike, Oliver (Stone) and me were the tree New Yorkers at Warner Brothers during that period. The didn’t go after Spike that much because he has even more connections to the press then they do. And Oliver was so succesful, working on JFK at the time, that he didn’t care and could call them bloodsucking motherfucking vampires without too many consequenses. When I left the office he yelled he would never hire someone from New York again”
‘But they’re in trouble now. This is like the third or fourth time time they are trying to shove this 3D shit down our throats again. In the fifties it was their reaction to television. Now they’re panicking again because of the internet. I see kids on the subway in New York watching movies on their phones. 3D, a movie already is 3D! Why should I wear those silly glasses. My brain is creative, I can imagine the things on the screen have depth. What do they want, people running out of the theatre because the train is moving towards them? Come on, man!’
The audience is responding well, Ferrara notices and begins targeting the moderator ‘A journalist once described you as catholic anarchist, what do you think about that?’ No man, I’m a reborn buddhist’ replies Ferrara making the poor man wish he never asked that question. ‘I was raised in a strict catholic way by nuns’ he surprisingly serious continues, ‘and when the religion is in you it’s hard to get it out.’ Ferrara’s films are charged, like another Italian American director’s films, with catholic symbolism. When asked what movie he had like to have made he didn’t, Scorsese’s answer left little to the imagination “Without a doubt, ‘Bad Lieutenant’
Ferrara’s characters are often people with problems like addiction an loneliness living on the outskirts of society. “Why is everbody on drugs in your movies, do you find that interesting?’ asks the moderator. When answering Ferrara’s face shows he thinks this is by far the most stupid question the guy has asked this afternoon, “I just make movies about what I see in real life’
If you read a little about Ferrara, three words keep popping up. Compassion, forgiveness and redemption. Everybody keeps writing down what he just read, I once read that I’m the King of Redemption. I don’t even know what that word means, do you know ?’ he asks the audience. Two people respond. One makes a joke about it, the other gives a deep, farfetched definition, which Ferrara dismisses under loud acclaim of the audience.
One of the questions of the public involves the ‘Bad Lieutenant film’ Werner herzog recently made. But this guy is on the German’s side ‘Is it true you started the media war against Herzog and the movie, not even having seen the movie, just because it had the same title?’ Ferrara is a bit upset and counters “ Hey man, that film is made with the blood, sweat and tears of my crew, Harvey Keitel and me. First those gangsters went to Harvey a few years ago telling him they wanted to turn it into a tv series. Harvey was interested and asked why I wasn’t at the meet. ‘No, Abel is in a hospital somewhere in Switzerland. The funny thing is, this here festival is my first visit to Switzerland ever. It struck Harvey as odd because the night before he just had dinner with me. Harvey is loyal. They offered him a lot of money but he didn’t cave in, The only thing that could made him do it if I was on board as well. I’m just annoyed because it took so much of me to get ‘Bad Lieutenant” made anyhow. ‘What the cop takes the drugs? What kinda movie you’re trying to make? Every studio thought I was crazy. But I did it, and we delivered. Ok, they offer Nicolas Cage 2 million dollars, who’s always in need of money, I don’t know where he all spends it. But I like Nic, he’s an actor, I know where he’s coming from. I don’t even have a grudge against Herzog. That man never sees other people’s movies. I really believe he never even actually saw the original. I don’t believe he was lying about that. Why should he, they offer him a million bucks and he jumps. There’s nothing wrong with that, he’s just an European wanting to make films and money. And now he thinks he’s got beef with me, he don’t want that. No, I got a problem with those gangsters. Ok, you don’t want ma as a director, because I’m difficult and from New York, no problem, fine! But not to hire not one of my boys, my crew, who created the original ‘Bad Lieutenant’, that shit don’t fly. But they got what they wanted now. A stupid Company Town movie.”
“So you don’t live in L.A anymore, you still live in New York?’ ‘No, I moved to Rome a few years ago. I live in the neighbourhood next to the Vatican. The neighbourhood with the highest concentration of atheists in the world. None of my neighbours believes in God. Come to think of it, Rome is like a Company Town too. Religion is business, so no one really believes.
05/08/2011
05/02/2011
The Russian Soul of Gromozeka - International Premiere
Image: Courtesy of International Film Festival Rotterdam
Russian director Vladimir Kott attempted the seemingly impossible. Depicting ‘Russian soul’. A Dutch documentary maker went on an extensive trip to Russia to find an answer to the question what Russian soul actually means. In a journey that took him from Moscow to Vladivostok, he wasn’t able to find a conclusive answer. Russians even tend to say that you can’t understand Russian soul by reason.
‘You can only approach and sense our soul’ Kott tells me when I bring this up in the lobby of the Pathé theatre in Rotterdam. This particular soul comes in many different forms and shapes. Dostoyevski describes one, but Kott was inspired by another great Russian version, Checkov’s.
The film is loosely based on ‘Three Sisters’ by the famous playwright. A play about unhappy sisters desperate for a different life. Gromozeka revolves around three childhood friends who once formed a band as young boys but lost track of each other leading melancholy lives as adults. ‘My characters, like Checkov’s sisters, want to lead another life but are overcome by a form of fatalism and do nothing to obtain that other existence, just like in the play’, said Kott.
The paths of a clumsy policeman, a cabdriver torn apart by family circumstances and a terminally ill surgeon are crossed in a mosaic-like structure. The tragedies befalling them are wrapped in intelligent comedy and the touching fashion in which they try to survive in the harsh concrete jungle of Moscow makes them endearing characters. As if the audience is the fourth friend who left the stage a long time ago looking on.
In relation to the other Tiger nominees the film is rather conventional in its storyline, camera, art direction and acting. It‘s safe to say that the movie is the odd man out considering this year’s selection. Most Tiger projects tend to lean on an experimental approach to cinema whereas this film contains a highly accessibility. Therefore Kott is very pleased that his picture was selected by the International Film Festival Rotterdam to make its world premiere. On questioning him about how he feels the festival audience has responded to his work he reacts positive. ‘The screenings were all early in the morning and each time I was surprised to see very few empty seats. When people left the theatre I saw they were touched and that’s the greatest compliment for me as a director’
The story is touching, aimed to mind and soul. ‘Indeed, my film is different from the others in competition, mind you, there is nothing wrong with cinema appealing more to intellect, but I wanted my film to honor the traditional Russian cinema in which emotions are targeted as well. I think one doesn’t necessarily exclude the other. I like to think my movie reaches a balance. I want my audience to think and feel simultaneously.’
Gromozeka is a famous clumsy Russian cartoon character shown in a short clip, who always arrives late to save the day thus explaining the title. The three men are a mixture of Checkov’s sisters and this cartoon character. Clumsy, tormented and desperate. Gromozeka is to be considered as one of the years best Tigers, even though the jury begs to differ.
During a question and answer session someone from the audience asked the inevitable question ‘What defines Russian soul exactly?’ An extremely serious Kott replied ‘Russian soul is gloomy and moody, while the world’s soul is bright and cheerful.’ But then again Kott’s outlook on the Russian soul is contradictory to what he shows the audience. Gromozeka is not gloomy or moody. It is heartwarming.
31/01/2011
Review: The Mill and the Cross (2011, Poland / Sweden) - European Premiere
Image: Courtesy of International Film Festival Rotterdam
Don’t expect a conventional biopic about Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Don’t expect a conventional film anyhow. Lech Majewski, Polish artist, poet, writer and director pays a visual tribute to one of his favourite works of art by Bruegel. The procession to Calvary, painted in 1564.
Majewski first saw the works of the Flemish Master in a museum in Vienna where he was confronted with the artist’s Weltanschauung. A view of the world that sucked him right in and transported him to the landscapes of long by gone eras filled with people and their daily routines.
And that is exactly the ambitious layout of The Mill and the Cross. To give the viewer that same sensation, sucking them into the painting. During the big talk before the European premiere of the picture at the International Film Festival Rotterdam Majewski stated he always had the feeling he could live in Bruegel’s landscapes.
Using state of the art technology he succeeds to give the audience the feeling to live for a mere 90 minutes in the landscape of the painting. The images are of a dream like quality, with intense bright colors like the ruby red tunics of the mercenaries to the deep ochres disappearing into the sfumato on the horizon. This picture would no doubt amaze Bruegel on seeing the seamless overlapping moving image and his original painting. Layer after layer achieved this effect, one shot in particular consists of a staggering 143 layers! Real locations to match the landscape in the painting were scouted all over the globe, from the land of the Czech Republic to the clouds of New Zealand. The composition is explained by voice-over of Bruegel himself, portrayed by Rutger Hauer, moving through his own painted arena. Short story lines are used to introduce some essential figures in the painting, like the mother, played by Charlotte Rampling, of the condemned son, while Michael York portrays a wealthy banker and art collector.
The culmination of the film lies in the freeze moment in which all figures are halted by a gesture of Bruegel’s hand followed by another hand gesture performed by the miller high above in his mill on the jagged rock overlooking the spectacle, stopping the vanes in a Bruegelian metaphor of God stopping time. He just makes bread and looks on. Subsequently the camera glides the audience through the painting during a dazzling scene covering multiple points of view of the canvas. The audience was clearly holding its breath in the old Luxor theatre during this piece of bravado.
Majewski makes the painting come to life and what guts to make a feature about it! He goes to great lengths explaining the philosophy of Bruegel in which everyday life is more important than the bigger than life events in the Bible. Jesus is even obscured by Spanish soldiers and Flemish peasants. After the crucifixion life goes on and children playing replace the cruel acts filling the landscape in the painting.
The Mill and the Cross is of invaluable educational importance, even tough too theoretical to get carried away by. A fascinating experiment drenched in love for painting that will inform you better about Pieter Bruegel the Elder than any documentary you’ll ever see.
Rating: ****
30/01/2011
Review: Bleak Night (2010, South Korea - International Premiere)
Image: Courtesy of International Film Festival Rotterdam
High school can be very traumatic for boys. This is the case in every nation in the world, but maybe even more so in South Korea. Bleak Night by debuting Korean director Yoon Sung-hyun starts out as a classic whodunit. The saddened father of a boy whose death is shrouded in mystery goes looking for the deceased boy’s best friends searching for some answers. One of them had suddenly moved prior to the death and the other had not attended the funeral. Shady circumstances causing the father to suspect foul play.
The ingenious flashforward-structure used in the film confuses the audience. The film doesn’t start out with the death of Gi-Tae, a marvelous performance of Lee-Je-hoon, but we see him as the school bully whose only ambition in life is to terrorize his classmates and his best friends in particular. A classic interpretation of ‘we hurt the ones we love the most’. Especially kind-hearted Becky portrayed by Park Jeong-min-I is a favorite and easy prey for Gi-Tae.
The only one who has the guts to stand up to this near borderline case is the third member of the trio, Dong-yoon, played by Seo Joon-yeong. The three of them also have their good times. To illustrate their fragile friendship the director shows us beautiful dreamy shots of late afternoon sun filled baseball games on the railroad tracks alongside the grey suburbs of the big city. The unbearable lightness of being a teenager in suburbia is interrupted by sudden violence. Bleak Night deals with the world of boys only. Girls are just extras. In that regard there is even a hint of gay feelings in Gi-Tae’s persistence of harassing Becky. Every time he pleads for forgiveness like a lover does when he’s been unfaithful. The three actors are astonishingly realistic in their approach and are completely credible as a tight knitted tough emotional explosive group of friends. The many hand-held close-ups of the boys give a good impression of the internal conflicts tearing them apart. When I asked the talented young director during the Q&A how he achieved this interplay amongst inexperienced young actors (Park Jeong-min-I debuts as an actor), he answered that he gave them the difficult task of really listening to the other actor during dialogues instead of focusing, like young actors often do, on their own lines and to react instead of recite.
As the structure of the narrative gets closer and closer to the resolution of the question of who and how, the fabric of the film changes from a whodunit in to a social drama in which there are only victims and perpetrators. Everybody is innocent and everybody is guilty.
The emotional warfare in Bleak Night is, according Yoon Sung-hyun, a metaphor for the current state of South Korea, where people hurt each other because like Gi-Tae, they are weak on the inside. Weak, because people don’t live for themselves and are defined by their work. They suffer from peer pressure, just like everybody has experienced at one time or another at school.
The result is a complex, well-crafted, emotional gem of a film. It’s been only the third Tiger feature I’ve seen this year, but I already dare to state that Bleak Night, the winner of the Pusan New Current Award, is a serious contender for winning the Tiger Award at the International Film Festival Rotterdam.
Rating: ***+
30/11/2010
Review: Balada triste de trompeta (Spain, 2010) - Alex de la Iglesia
Image: Courtesy of Stockholm International Film Festival
Alex de la Iglesia’s intentions are very clear at the start of Balada triste de trompeta. He wants to take the audience for a wild ride. The year is 1937, the place: Madrid in the middle of civil war. A clown gets recruited by a communist rebel leader to fight the Francistas. The following scene is one of the most hilarious scenes ever. A clown with blonde corkscrew curls and a beard, armed with a machete butchering Franco’s fascists like John Rambo in his heyday. When the audience is just catching it’s breath after this openings sequence de la Iglesia rattles them with one of the most powerful opening credits ever. Fascist Franco symbolism is intercut with popular icons from 1937 to 1973, the present time of the movie from this point on, cleverly jumping from one point of the narrative to the next spanning more than three decades. The film sustains this visual bravado till the very end on this rollercoaster ride through the violent recent Spanish history.
Balada triste de trompeta is shot in a way reminding the old master Fellini. Multiple absurd characters and chaotic events happen in rapid succession taking place in a mise en scene set up like a choreography. The art direction is flawless and reflects the period, yet pumped up to surrealistic proportions. Think ‘La Strada’ on acid.
The characters are bigger than life. Carlos Areces convinces as the lovesick Sad Clown (son of the ‘warrior clown’ mentioned before), craving for Natalia, the beautiful acrobat of the circus he just joined, trying to save her from a violent relationship with the Happy Clown, Sergio. Antonio de la Torre as the Happy Clown delivers the best acting performance of this film and one of the best I’ve seen all year round. He plays an irresistibly charming bad guy. He’s a misogynist, he’s cruel and mean, but you can’t stop loving him. Natalia is touched by the kindheartedness of Javier, thus arousing intense jealousy in Sergio. Neither man backs down commencing a bloody battle for Natalia in which both clowns turn into grotesque figures of themselves. It all results in fear of Natalia (read: Spain) for both men (read: Francistas and the communist rebels) and leading up to an exhilarating culmination, in which the admiration of the director for Alfred Hitchcock and Fritz Lang is clearly visible.
Beneath all absurdity there is a malicious undercurrent, represented by the fascist colonel belonging to the inner circle of the Generalissimo. A colonel who seeks vengeance against Javier for something he did to him in the past when he was vindicating his father. An undercurrent reflecting the central theme of this black comedy is the, at times literally, explosive atmosphere of the country de la Iglesia grew up in. Balada triste de trompeta is a highly creative, exciting and well crafted cinematic experience of the very complex history of a torn nation threatening to destroy what they love most.
Rating: ****
29/11/2010
Review: Animal Kingdom (Australia, 2010) - Competition Stockholm International Film Festival
Image: Courtesy of Stockholm International Film Festival
It’s a first timer’s dream to make such an intelligent and mature film that works on different levels. Animal Kingdom has depth, is entertaining and consists of images that linger in the mind long after viewing. What really impresses is the fact that David Michôd consistently underplays all aspects of the crime genre. By doing so he sets Animal Kingdom somehow apart from this genre.
This style of underplaying kicks off with file footage of bank robbers in Melbourne banks during the eighties, accompanied by heavy synthesizer music. These are by the way the only images of any bank robbery throughout the film you’ll see. Crime is never romanticized. Instead the criminals are portrayed as lazy, badly dressed inhabitants of suburbia killing time with boozing and fiddling with the barbecue under the Australian sun. The score is minimalistic without crescendos, contrary to the more usual style of bombastic orchestrated music to enhance menace and anxiety. Even production design has a minimalistic approach creating no specific sense of period thus making the movie somewhat timeless.
The story revolves around Josh, a 17-year old boy who after his mother dies from a heroine overdose, get’s taken in by his grandmother nicknamed Smurf. Smurf rules over her three sons who form a bank robbing crew like a real Don. When the armed robbery squad of Melbourne declares war on the bank robbers nobody seems safe, and a struggle for Josh’s loyalty gets underway. Smurf and her oldest son Pope try to maintain Josh on their side while good cop Guy Pearce is the only one who wants to protect him and tries to persuade him to take the stand and testify against his own family.
There is an ominous feel to the film, a major contribution to this feel are the exquisite performances by Ben Mendelsohn and Jacki Weaver. Mendelsohn plays Pope, the leader of the three brothers who as the film progresses slowly shows a side that gets darker and darker. Weaver is equally terrific as the sinister ‘Smurf’ the mother of the family who resembles most of all a snake in her motions and actions. James Frecheville is well cast as the seemingly emotionally numb Josh at the center of the narrative. Star quality is added to the project by the mere presence of Guy Pearce as the detective.
The use of violence is rare, but raw and shocking because it takes place when you least expect it. Michôd never builds the tension towards such a moment in a conventional way. He manages to surprise the audience with his realistic touch. This dazzling debut is hard to label (which is always a good thing) but if I would be forced to do so I would qualify Animal Kingdom as a study of how evil can manifest itself in Australian suburbia disguised as a gangster flick. David Michôd obviously has the maturity to mould the conventions of a genre to his own will to expose a complex and profound theme.
Rating: ****
25/11/2010
Review: Winter's Bone (USA, 2010) - Competition at Stockholm International Film Festival
Image: Courtesy of Stockholm International Film Festival
Behind the faces of the crystal meth scarred mugshots of white trash America, lies more than meets the eye. Once these faces belonged to a people establishing new frontiers conquering the vast landscape of mainland America, a people of character and perseverance. Winter’s Bone, Debra Granik’s second feature is a fascinating tale about seventeen-year old Ree’s search for her father. Ree Dolly, a magnificent performance by Jennifer Lawrence, has to find her father, a crystal meth cook, who fails to show up at court, to prevent bounty hunters from seizing the house her remaining family, a confused mother, two younger siblings and herself live in. Ree seems to be the personification of the strength and courage the people in this God forsaken region still posses.
The film takes a while to get underway because Granik really wants to convince the audience that Winter’s Bone takes place in a region immersed in addiction and desperation. The result is lots of shots of run down farms, car wrecks and hillbillies fiddling with their banjos. The film takes a turn for the better when slowly it becomes clear that Dad isn’t somewhere living it up, but has vanished from the face of the earth. Ree’s search for her father gets hazardous when she is confronted with the fact that the very people, most often family since everybody in the film seems related, who she turns for help try to shut her up in menacing tone. Everybody is afraid ‘The Law’ might get wind of the whole thing. A whole community of users/producers unravels along the process. Entire families are hooked on their own supply. Despite the many wide shots of the open spaces a feeling of claustrophobia creeps up by this entanglement of users, cookers and families.
Even though everybody is suspicious, Ree is liked and gets clues about who to turn to concerning her father’s whereabouts. They lead to ominous, dark characters with names like Teardrop and Thump. The tension builds when she’s instructed not to ask the mysterious and powerful Thump anything directly to his face. As if he’s like the Medusa from the Greek myth, which made you turn into stone if you gazed in its eyes too long. This mythical quality of the movie gets enhanced by the many hardships Ree has to endure on her quest (like Odyssey and Hercules for that matter). She deals with them like a true heroin, never losing faith in herself.
This is one of the reasons the film was ultimately well received by the population in the concerning area in the state of Missouri. Many were weary of yet another portrait of a lost people, mainly maid up by criminals, addicts and stupid rednecks who got what they deserved. But Granik won their trust by casting minor roles from the area, Ree’s little sister actually lives in the house the whole story begins with, and using actors who work on the coasts but grew up near the Ozark Mountains to enhance authenticity (Jennifer Lawrence is from the neighboring state of Kentucky). She also gives their music an important role in the movie. But what’s most important is the fact that Ree represents the same values as they do, namely courage, perseverance and willingness to sacrifice. The Ozark people identify with Ree and not with the depressing image the American media paints of them.
Rating: ****
22/11/2010
COMING SOON TO STOCKHOLM FILM FESTIVAL
Strongman Sandow will be visiting the 21st edition of the Stockholm International Film Festival. Starting from November 23 get ready once again for movie reviews and festival impressions.
29/09/2010
02/09/2010
Cold Weather: Sherlock Holmes in Portland
Image courtesy of Festival del Film Locarno
The story revolves around Doug, (Cris Lankenau) a twenty-something American guy returning home to Portland, Oregon after dropping out of college not really knowing what to do with his life and not really caring about it either. He lives with his sister Gail (Trieste Kelly Dunn), and starts working at an ice factory. The opening scenes have a soothing, calming effect on the eyes. Aaron Katz, the director, has a real sense of place and knows how to photograph the elements that define a place like Portland. Every shot of landscape reflect the cold and grey this city in the American Northwest has to offer. Doug meets Carlos at the ice factory and invites him over to his sister’s house where his ex-girlfriend Rachel, who popped back in to town, is also there. Carlos and Rachel hit it off and go on a date to a Star Trek convention. Now the story really starts. Rachel suddenly disappears.
It’s a funny film. When Doug reaches a dead end in the investigation, he goes out and buys a pipe in an amusing scene at a local tobacco store. The spirit of Holmes is ever present. Katz manages to build a sense of suspense, which totally disappears after the mystery is solved. The movie goes on for about 45 minutes to an hour after, which is a considerable flaw because the movie loses its edge. But on the other hand that’s not the mojo of this film. It’s more about a brother and his sister, who become little kids again trying to solve a mystery, reminding them what they like about each other. Shutting of the outside world while playing their game like siblings do.
Rating: **
17/08/2010
Review: Periferic (Romania, 2010) - Concorso Internazionale
Image courtesy of Festivale del Film Locarno
It took me 6 days to find an astonishing movie here at the Festival del Film Locarno.
Periferic (Outbound), by Romanian director Bogdan George Apetri, shows us the 24 hours of leave Matilda gets from the women prison to attend her mother’s funeral. The film starts at dawn and ends at dawn. These 24 hours are dramatically condensed in a terrific story supported by magnificent performances of literally every actor. One performance stands out though. The one of Ana Ularu, portraying Matilda.
From the opening scenes we see a troubled young woman hardened by prison life who’s planning to escape the country (Romania) while being on leave. The first person she meets is no family. No friend either, but a truckdriver. The husband of one of the other inmates who has agreed (for a considerable fee) to smuggle Matilda out of the country. Matilda rarely speaks; nonetheless her body language and facial expression are so poignant that words are useless. The film is cleverly constructed on visits during this day to three of the most important men in her life.
The first is Andrei, her older brother, another brilliant performance by Andi Vasluianu. Matilda’s past is so compromised that when she visits him straight out of prison he doesn’t know how to react. His wife is very clear and flat out rejects the whole idea of her criminal sister-in-law attending the funeral, and has no problems in sharing this with Matilda in harsh words. The following scenes, including the burial of their mother, show a complicated relationship between brother and sister. Andrei loves his sister but is not man enough to stand up against his dominant wife and let’s her down in a heartbreaking scene. Just one of many to follow.
The film is gritty and well shot. The camera is always following Matilda getting up-close , registering every nuance in her face. The film is action packed and an emotional rollercoaster which compel the audience to root for the anti-hero Matilda. An anti-hero because Apetri clearly shows that Matilda isn’t only a victim, but also someone who made bad decisions in her past.
Bogdan George Apetri is New-York based, he graduated in film directing and cinematography at Columbia University. No stranger to American Cinema, as this movie proves. Apetri, just like Aronofsky, manages to make his protagonist so human, so real, you must care as an audience. You have no choice than to get involved with the protagonist who is his or her own worst enemy, just like Randy the Ram in The Wrestler Apetri and Aronofsky seem to be the new exponents of New Hollywood Cinema . The torch, lit by Scorsese, Coppola, Friedkin and Schrader is being passed on to young directors like Apetri., who rely on strong performances, a no-nonse approach and passion for story. Periferic (which means peripheral) is a film about it’s very title. Not only in it’s surroundings but even more about all the characters, living and operating on the edges of society, each struggling for a better life going against all the odds. Lot’s of movies are made concerning this theme in Europe nowadays. It’s very much in vogue. Most tend to be melodramatic, or the other extreme, too cerebral and politic in it’s approach. They are more or less studies on modern day Europe in decay. Forgetting about character and story. Cinematic essays, not cinematic experiences. Apetri focuses on character and story exposing through the pain of his lead and the clarity and thrusting force of the narrative more than any film or documentary I’ve seen on the Festival de film Locarno.
A work of art has the power to attack the nervous system of a human being, provoking an immediate emotional response, not an intellectual one. Seeing this film amidst all other films at this festival was like walking through a museum you’ve never visited before packed with Social Realism paintings to ultimately discover a Francis Bacon, sending shivers to your spinal chord. And that’s what it ‘s all about.
Keep an eye on Bogdan George Apetri. I know I will!
Rating: ****
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