Film Monitor

PARENT & CHILD

2009-11-10T11:29:00.000-08:00

Inspired by Yasujiro Ozu’s Late Spring and her mother’s relationship with her grandfather, Claire Denis transports the father-daughter story from postwar Tokyo to modern day Paris in 35 Shots of Rum. Denis’s way of illustrating the warmth and yearning of the parental relationship is faithful to her enigmatic style while the resulting film is also true to the essence of the Japanese classic. A homage from an auteur of our time to one from the past, 35 Shots of Rum solidifies Denis’s statute as a master of her generation while reminding its audience of the perennial beauty of Ozu’s picture.

The film opens with the view from a train conductor’s window. Viewers see the train passing through the rails and are treated to the Parisian scenery. Accompanied by the setting sun and the original music by British band Tindersticks, the scene conveys an atmosphere of warmness and melancholy that sets the tone of the film. Under the lens of cinematographer Agnès Godard (a longtime collaborator of Denis), 35 Shots of Rum is illuminated with rich and earthy colors of its trains, apartments, cafes and characters.

Like its Japanese predecessor, 35 Shots of Rum depicts a very close relationship between an aging father and his adult daughter whose life as a two-person family is bound to break when they soon realize the young woman will eventually grow up to have a separate life. Joséphine, the daughter (played by Mati Diop), is a college student who shares a mutual attraction with their rootless neighbor Noé (played by Grégoire Colin). Lionel, the father (played by Alex Descas), is a quiet train conductor who has an elusive relationship with another neighbor, Gabrielle (played by Nicole Dogué). As in other films by Denis, the relationships between the characters and their past are often hinted at bay and rarely spoken aloud, but the closeness between father and daughter is unquestionably the emotional anchor of a picture that thrives within the enclosure of its organic pathos without the burdens of cynicism.

Claire Denis also includes a couple of themes from her previous films in 35 Shots of Rum. Post-colonial France, a recurring topic in a lot of her films, is brought up briefly in Joséphine’s class discussion. But by using a cast of mainly black performers in this gentle family drama, Denis successfully made a quiet statement about the normalcy of France’s diverse population. Mortality, which was the focus of her last film, The Intruder, looms over the pensive Lionel as he watches an ex-colleague struggling with life after retirement. A life in transition summons immense sadness from deep inside him.

Mono no aware— a Japanese concept describing the impermanence of things and the sadness at their passing— is core to Japanese culture and Ozu’s films, yet Denis notices this faintly nostalgic feeling is indeed universal and its presence is central to 35 Shots of Rum. No matter how much happiness the future might bring, Lionel and Joséphine reckon that the uniquely beautiful relationship they have will have to be broken up some day. The final shot is very simple by design, yet the bittersweet sense of loss closes the film in the most profoundly touching way.

PHOTOPLAY MUSIC

2009-11-10T11:27:00.000-08:00

Pianist and composer Donald Sosin has been composing original scores for silent films since the 1970s. With over 300 compositions under his belt, it will be a treat for Houston to see him perform live with singer Joanna Seaton (Sosin’s wife) and Kid Pan Alley students from MacGregor Elementary School at Miller Outdoor Theater for the 1924 silent classic Peter Pan. Film Monitor had the privilege to ask Mr. Sosin a few questions about his work and career before this upcoming show on November 13 (7:00 pm).

With over thirty years of experience, how is it like to be a silent film accompanist in the 21st century?
There are more opportunities now to write and perform silent film music than there were when I first started out in the early seventies, more audience interest, more films to choose from as a result of discoveries and restorations. More places are showing silent films on their schedules, and the proliferation of recorded material has made it necessary to have new scores written for DVD release and for the web.

You have composed scores for the DVD releases of a few silent films by Yasujiro Ozu, including I Was Born But… and Passing Fancy. Like Peter Pan, the two aforementioned films are heavily focused on children. Your music has a youthful spring and captivating childlike wonder in it.
Well, that’s very kind of you, I have always related to children’s stories and have spent a lot of time working with kids, writing songs and musicals for them, and teaching them to write their own. I don’t think of Passing Fancy as a children’s film, particularly, it’s got a boy in it, but it’s really a family drama. I Was Born But... is much more puckish, I love those two brothers, and the gang that seems like a Japanese version of Little Rascals. I wanted to create music that would have some whimsy where appropriate, such as in the wonderful home movie scene where the film gets sped up, but also give a sense of the tensions that accompany the boys’ relationship with their father and their schoolmates.

How is your Peter Pan score similar to (or different from) your score for I Was Born But… ?
Peter Pan is a fantasy, of course, but has some of these same tensions inherent in the story, boys living in a neighborhood filled with bullies (pirates in this case), and fathers (Mr. Darling as well as Peter) who are more absorbed in their work than they are with family responsibilities. But the main thing for me in the music for this film is the wonder of kids learning to fly and traveling to an adventure-filled land where all kinds of exciting things crop up: mermaids, crocodiles, etc. The musical score by John Crook for Barrie’s original stage play has some great tunes in it, and I have appropriated some of those for the score we’ll play. My wife Joanna Seaton will sing an old English lullaby, “Golden Slumbers,” same lyrics as the Beatles song, but with a new tune of mine.
Two years ago in Charlottesville VA the kids in the Kid Pan Alley songwriting workshop wrote three songs that they sang during the film itself, and I incorporated some of those themes into the score. In Houston, the kids will be singing before the actual film, but there is a good chance that those tunes will find their way into the accompaniment. This is one of those cases where I leave a lot to the moment, and it will be great fun to see what the end results are, and how the outdoor venue affects things. We will also invite the audience to make sound effects from time to time; I started doing that a couple of years ago and kids and adults alike really have fun doing animal sounds and cannons and whatnot.

Speaking of Ozu, what is your favorite film by the Japanese master?
I Was Born But... is in fact my favorite film of his, but I also really like Tokyo Story, both versions of Floating Weeds and pretty much everything else I’ve seen of his. The framing of the shots is always so exquisite, and the repeated motifs of telephone poles or laundry flapping in the wind or other cinematic breaks between scenes are remarkable.

What are some music-accompanied silent films that have influenced you as a composer?
I learned a great deal about silent film music from composer/pianist William Perry, who did a lot of scoring for two PBS series, The Silent Years, almost forty years ago. His themes are very memorable and his whole dramatic approach to silent film scoring was a huge influence on me. I have also heard great scores by my friends and colleagues who play at the festivals in Pordenone and Bologna each year; Timothy Brock’s score for Lady Windermere’s Fan, Gabriel Thibaudeau’s Broken Blossoms, Antonio Coppola (no relation) Visage des Enfants, and most recently Maud Nellissen’s adaptation of Lehár’s The Merry Widow are some that come to mind. The late British conductor John Lanchbery also did a tremendous The Birth of a Nation score that used the original Griffith/Breil music as a point of departure but wove it together in a much more organic way than had been done earlier. All of this music, by the way, is written either for orchestra or chamber ensembles. The piano scores we do tend to be improvised, but I have also written instrumental scores for films like Richard III, Foolish Wives, East Side/West Side and Manhatta which have been performed live but not released commercially. I’m very eclectic in my choice of style and try to find the right angle for each different project. There’s a vast difference between films like Ghosts Before Breakfast and The Kid Brother, and I enjoy changing styles as a way of helping the audience interpret the film.

What would you like to say to audiences who are not familiar with silent films accompanied by live music?
Come see Peter Pan , you’ll love it. Seeing silent films with an audience on a big screen and live music is the only way to really get a sense of what this art form is about. People have forgotten how to see films, and these are often much more visually interesting than contemporary films which depend so much on talking heads and sound effects. We have found that once people see one silent film, they want to see more. There’s a wonderful new adventure waiting for them, so think lovely wonderful thoughts and join us on Friday in Neverland.

As part of the Cinema Arts Festival Houston, Peter Pan will be showing at the Miller Outdoor Theater on 11/13 (7:00 pm).

ACROSS THE BORDER

2009-11-10T11:26:00.000-08:00

Thirty-five years after his first film role in 1970, native Texan actor Tommy Lee Jones directed his first film in 2005. The result, The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, is the only feature-length theatrical film he has directed thus far in his career, but is hopefully not his last. Jones also stars in the film, playing the bilingual Pete Perkins, a grizzled ranch foreman in Cibolo County, Texas who has befriended the titular character, played by Julio Cedillo, a ranch hand from Mexico. Melquiades arrives in Texas as an undocumented immigrant looking for work. Pete hires him and the two eventually strike up a friendship. Unfortunately when Melquiades is unexpectedly shot and killed, Pete must identify the body, which prompts him to unravel the circumstances behind his friend’s death.

The Three Burials was scripted by the talented writer Guillermo Arriaga, whose previous writing credits include Amores Perros (2000), 21 Grams (2003) and Babel (2006). Arriaga’s time-fractured method of storytelling continues here and serves the material well. The Three Burials also stars Barry Pepper (Saving Private Ryan) as border patrol agent Mike Norton, January Jones (before her breakout role on television’s Mad Men) as his wife Lou Ann Norton, and Dwight Yoakam (Sling Blade) as Sheriff Frank Belmont.

Once Pete discovers he had no help from the Sheriff and that the insensitive boarder patrol agent, Mike Norton, is resposnible for his friend’s death, Pete forces Mike to exhume Melquiades’ body and return him to his family. The Three Burials is very much concerned with immigration but does so in a humanistic and empathic way. Mike, while he is captive, is forced to traverse the same paths as the immigrants he attempts to apprehend and thus comes face-to-face with their realities and struggles. Although this modern Western focuses on an old cowboy’s quest to fulfill his promise to his murdered friend, it is also about Mike’s redemption.

Cinematographers Chris Menges and Hector Ortega capture some gorgeous and desolate scenery in small towns and the countryside for near the Texas-Mexico border for the film. One scene in particular exemplifies Pete’s loneliness in the aftermath of his only friend’s death. Across the border, in a cantina at dusk, Pete wistfully gazes out at the surrounding countryside from his barstool. After getting up, he stumbles to the telephone to make a phone call with a drunken confession of love to the woman he left behind in Texas. The combination of the normally stoic Pete’s vulnerability, the lighting in the cantina, and the haunting music provided by a piano-playing girl make it the film’s most enduring image.

As part of the Cinema Arts Festival Houston, writer Guillermo Arriaga will present The Three Burials... at the MFAH on 11/13 (6:45pm).

MUSICAL REALISM

2009-11-10T11:20:00.000-08:00

Damien Chazelle’s directorial debut has been described as a “mumblecore” musical but it differs sharply from other mumblecore pictures. Damien Chazelle’s Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench is a new kind of musical. The film is not burdened by Andrew Bujalski’s (Funny Ha Ha, Beeswax) chatterboxes. In fact there is very little in the way of dialogue. The primary communicative device in the film is music. There are choreographed music sections of the film but even the scenes between musical numbers have a certain rhythmic quality. Chazelle’s cinematography captures Boston and a small subculture of jazz enthusiasts with a musical quality that pervades the entire picture.

Chazelle’s characters are intimately connected to their setting. He follows characters walking through the city, up and down staircases and into buildings. We view them up-close. Not only are these characters impossible in a different setting, their setting is impossible without them. The characters walk through a Boston infused with rhythm. It is a city transformed by their presence and they too are transformed by it. One scene opens on a hip party with twenty-somethings sipping cocktails and talking underneath a jovial tune from Guy’s band. Chazelle focuses on a single conversation that imperceptibly slips into a song with choreographed yet spontaneous tap-dancing. The room looks like an apartment but feels like a club. The performers transform the setting as the close-set walls of the apartment lend a kinetic energy to the musical performance. Chazelle keeps the camera close to the performers; changing shots from one side of the room to the other in time with the music.

Scenes without musical numbers also share the rhythmic quality of the choreographed scenes. When Guy meets his new fling Elena, we see the two sharing an intimate moment to the rhythm of the subway. The scene is remarkable. It is bereft of dialogue and the camera cuts from Elena to Guy and only places them in the same frame when they touch. The scene is natural in a way seldom seen in film. This is not the usual beautiful people coalescing like amoebas in a celluloid void. They are in an actual space forced together by the crowded train and its rhythmic roll along the track. This seamless integration of character and setting remains for the entire film.

Chazelle’s characters have a depth that belies any withheld narrative information. He does not encourage us to contemplate what that missing information might be but renders it unimportant. We easily understand the complexities of Guy’s relationships without the simple declarations that characterize lesser films. Guy’s relationship with Madeline brackets the film and illustrates Chazelle’s innovative approach. The film opens with Guy and Madeline sitting in silence. Guy walks away. The scene is simple and understood. We learn through the course of the film why it is that Guy and Madeline split without overt explanation. Through the course of the film Chazelle shows us that Guy only loves his trumpet. When Guy realizes he made a mistake leaving Madeline he attempts to win her back by playing her a song. His trumpet says more than words.
The integration of characters and setting is what sets this film apart from previous “mumblecore” efforts. Chazelle accomplishes this by uniting both characters and setting through music. The musical form is never distracting but an integral part of the story. In other words this film only makes sense as a musical. It is through music that we watch the people and setting transform. Unlike previous mumblecore offerings, Guy and Madeline actually accomplishes one of the tasks of realist cinema without boring us. The film shows us the daily lives of this Boston jazz subculture in a complex and thorough manner. The film does not leave us scratching our heads. It is entirely satisfying because it limits its scope. Instead of contrived complicated sets, Chazelle seems to improvise. He does not force his vision on the setting but uses it to tell his story.

Chazelle is clearly a talented filmmaker. His film breathes new life into the musical. Do not expect any hit songs from the soundtrack. Chazelle does not limit his film to such easy clichés. He attempts to tell a story in the way that a song tells a story. His film is an example of new kind of realist cinema. Chazelle is not afraid to choreograph scenes. He does not risk the banality of chatterboxes in order to make the film seem more real. The film never stops moving so that we can listen to dwindling conversation. One works hard for small rewards and this film is no exception.

As part of the Cinema Arts Festival Houston, Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench will be playing at the Angelika Film Center Houston on 11/13 (6:45 pm) & 11/15 (9:45 pm).

OP-ED: Polanski is indefensible. And the top 10 directors who didn't sign his petition

2009-10-02T17:43:00.000-07:00

by Francisco Lo

Roman Polanski is one of the most acclaimed directors of his generation. Chinatown, Repulsion and Rosemary’s Baby are among the few great films he made. But Roman Polanski was also a fugitive child rapist for the last thirty some years until his arrest in Zurich last week. There is no question that he deserves to be extradited, but over a hundred famous filmmakers, actors and writers have signed a petition demanding his release. As a film critic and a children’s advocate, I am infuriated by the ignorance and arrogance these “celebrities” have displayed. Do they need to re-read the harrowing account of the rape from the grand jury testimony? Have their enormous egos allowed them to think that artistic geniuses should have a free pass to do as they wish and film festivals are holy grounds where no law should apply?

If Polanski has such an unfair trial thirty years ago, maybe it’s time for him to get a fair one this time around. Running away for thirty years does not absolve anyone of his crime. I am in no way denying Polanski’s artistic contribution, but he has committed a terrible crime for which he has avoided a sentence (so far). Polanski might very well be a nice and friendly person (and many perpetrators are). He is possibly a great husband and father, too. But he had raped a child and there is no one can excuse him from facing responsibility in court. Not Martin Scorsese. Not Wong Kar Wai. Not David Lynch.

It is very heartbreaking to see so many of my favorite filmmakers on this list of shame. I can understand why Woody Allen would sign it (kudos to his shameless courage), but I thought Pedro Almodovar, the Dardenne brothers and Costa Gavras are socially conscious artists. For whatever reason you signed the petition, be ashamed of yourself. I am not encouraging anyone to boycott these filmmakers’ works because I have the capability to understand that artistic merit and moral failings do not necessarily overlap (unlike the petition signees). But in no particular order, here is my list of top ten living filmmakers who did not sign the Free Poon-lanski Petition (but I have no idea where they stand on this issue):

1. Agnes Varda
The only female among the legendary group of French New Wave filmmakers, Agnes Varda has always been an innovator in the field. CLEO FROM 5 TO 7 is a masterpiece that challenges the concept of real-time cinema. LE BONHEUR is a feminist look at marriage. Varda is also a renown documentarian and she looks back at her life in the new film THE BEACHES OF AGNES.

2. Jean-Luc Godard
Another French titan that needs no introduction. The 78-year-old director is still an active filmmaker. Known for his leftist politics but occasional patriarchal portrayal on gender issues, I'm surprised he hasn't signed the petition with his peers. Regardless, VIVRE SA VIE (Her Life To Live) is a great movie about the life of a prostitute.

3. Hayao Miyazaki
The master who elevates the art form of animation to legitimate cinema, Miyazaki's movies have often feature strong and well-written female characters loved by adults and children around the globe. It is safe to say he has never made a bad movie in his career, KIKI'S DELIVERY SERVICE and SPIRITED AWAY are among his bests. His new film is PONYO

4. Guy Maddin
Some call him the "Canadian David Lynch", but Guy Maddin's style is one of his kind. Inspired by silent cinema, his films are lo-fi visual spectacles with the freakiest narrative you would see. See it youself in BRAND UPON MY BRAIN! and MY WINNIPEG.

5. Jim Jarmusch
One of the trailblazers of the American independent cinema, Jarmusch's tales of offbeat characters shines in his beautifully shot features. DOWN BY LAW, STRANGER THAN PARADISE and DEAD MEN are some of the best black and white films made in the last twenty-five years.

6. Chantal Akerman
With one foot in experimental cinema and the other in the mainstream, Akerman has always been one of the most challenging filmmakers around. It is hard to imagine anyone else could make a film like JEANNE DIELMAN.

7. Ramin Bahrani
The most promising American director of this generation, Bahrani is still quite under the radar (and Hollywood probably doesn't bother to pass the petition to him). Remember his name and watch his films. CHOP SHOP. GOODBYE SOLO. MAN PUSH CART.

8. Joel and Ethan Coen
The biggest names that have not signed the petition (yet?). Their new film A SERIOUS MAN is coming out this month.

9. Jia Zhangke
He is the best director from China right now and he will continue to be one of the world's best in the next decade (and hopefully longer). 24 CITY is in theaters now. But look for his patiently-paced and gorgeously framed motion picture in STILL LIFE.

10. Lars Von Trier
He once called Roman Polanski a midget because the jury headed by the little man only gave Von Trier a third-place prize at Cannes in 1991. As one of the founders of Dogma 95 movement, Von Trier is the evil genius of cinema. BREAKING THE WAVES, DOGMA, DANCER IN THE DARK are brutal and shocking, but also his most accessible films. His new film, THE ANTICHRIST, is coming. Beware.

(This list is just a small sample. I am also surprised that Harvey Weinstein, the biggest Polanski supporter, has not made his employee Quentin Tarantino sign yet.)

Domestic Dissonance

2009-09-28T20:58:00.000-07:00

The contemplation of Chantal Akerman’s Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles / by Francisco Lo

Cannes, 1975. It was the premiere of her debut feature length film, Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles. As the lights in the theater dimmed, twenty-five year old Chantal Akerman sat down in the back row with the star of her film, Delphine Seyrig, who is an accomplished thespian in her native France. While the 207-minute film was playing, the young director noticed there were audience members walking out of the film theater. Few were prepared for a film like this, but the diminutive girl from Belgium had created an important chapter in celluloid history that would spark debates for decades to come.

The audiences’ polarized reactions come as a stark contrast to the film’s serene and non-dramatic nature. Jeanne Dielman follows its titular widow (played by Seyrig) for three days, putting her daily activities as a housewife on the big screen. Under Akerman’s script and direction, the film is devoid of any conventional drama or story per se, but is fixated on Jeanne’s habitual routine of preparing dinner, running errands, prostituting in the afternoon and dining with her teenage son in the evening.

Her daily afternoon trick is hardly the centerpiece of the film’s attraction, since the first two days only include faceless greetings and stoic monetary transactions, both happen in front of the apartment’s door. Chantal Akerman does not go for the cheap shock. The majority of the screen time is concentrated on the detailed and uninterrupted depiction of the most common household chores. If it takes ten minutes to peel the potatoes, the film will show the whole ten minutes of peeling potatoes. Delphine Seyrig, who often debates with Akerman about the physicality and motives of her character, delivers a phenomenal performance on physical acting. As mundane as it may sound, Akerman’s vision is revelatory because there has never been a film dedicated to the work of a housewife with such realism and conviction. Akerman attributes the scenes to the fond childhood memories of watching her mother and the women in her family.

As much as Akerman appreciated a woman’s labor, she herself was no housewife in training. After watching Jean-Luc Godard’s Pierrot Le Fou (1965) at the age of 15, she discovered there is more to cinema than a linear narrative and was inspired to make movies. The eighteen-year-old aspiring filmmaker doubles as an actor in her first film, Saute ma ville (1968), in which her character causes a playful havoc in the kitchen. Akerman would later revisit the themes of domesticity in Jeanne Dielman. Bored by film school, she left for New York in 1971 where she met her future cinematographer Babette Mangolte, who introduced her to the experimental films of Michael Snow and others. The young Belgian then began to make a series of experimental shorts with Mangolte before their debut feature, Jeanne Dielman.

Feeling that she may have betrayed her experimental roots with a narrative feature in Jeanne Dielman, Akerman was actually developing a style of her own with elements from both traditional and leftfield cinema. Never driven by pretensions, the budding auteur employs the painstaking details of Jeanne’s daily rituals to gradually build up her domestic epic. Mangolte’s static camera, distant and without close-ups, is mostly set at waist-height and the repeating frames reinforce the predictability of Jeanne’s life. Day one is a rundown of her typical day. Day two seems quite as uneventful as the day before, until minor miscues at the evening hint at the potential trouble in paradise. By day three, after two hours of perfect housework, even the slightest drop of a shoe brush would alert the perceptive viewer.

Suspense continues to creep in when things continue to go wrong for Jeanne on the third day. After a series of trivial mishaps, it becomes clear that Jeanne is increasingly affected by her mysterious anxiety. The set up pays off finally at the film’s nonchalant climax— a shocking moment so brief it might very well restore the tranquility in Jeanne’s life. The lack of any explicit explanation for Jeanne’s appalling act leaves it up to the viewer to connect the dots and come up with her/his own interpretation. In an exclusive interview on the DVD, Akerman explains that Jeanne’s appointment with her second client takes more time than she has expected because she experiences her first ever orgasm and that leads to her overcooked potatoes. She then has to go buy more potatoes, hence dinner was late. Her psyche continues to be ruffled the next day and when she had her second orgasm with her third client, she finds an astounding solution to reconstruct her identity as sexless housewife.
Jeanne Dielman’s uncompromising look at a woman’s identity echoes with the tidal wave of Women’s Movement in the 60s and 70s. With her bills paid by the money she earns from turning tricks, Jeanne does not need a husband to fulfill her role as a housewife. The middle-aged widow devotes her life to being the spotless housekeeper and all-round caretaker for her son, Sylvain. When the adolescent Sylvain asks her about sex she is at a lost for words because she has little experience and interest in the subject. Up to that point, she has always defined herself based on the needs of men— her
husband, her son and her clients.

The dynamic between sexuality and female gender training has been analyzed by writers such as Simone de Beauvoir (The Second Sex) and Betty Friedan (Feminine Mystique). Yet in cinema, which was (and still is) much of a man’s playground, few filmmakers had the ability to portray women authentically on film. There were mostly two kinds of female roles— the mother and the whore— and the public was often shocked or confounded by films like Agnès Varda’s marital critique Le Bonheur because they were challenging the confines of the status quo.

Speaking of crushing the status quo, women made up about 80% of Jeanne Dielman’s crew, a rarity at the time (even today, only about 7% of American films are directed by women). Jeanne Dielman is not only a triumphant for feminist cinema, but for cinema as a whole. The film’s audacious experimentation in form is unprecedented and it rightfully belongs to be part of the film canon. Thirty some years since its premiere, Jeanne Dielman’s influence is still evident in the works of today’s filmmakers across the world. Those carefully framed, meticulously observant pictures of Fernando Eimbcke (Lake Tahoe), Jia Zhangke (Still Life) and Carlos Reygadas (Silent Light), can all be traced back to Chantal Akerman’s trailblazing debut.

RUDO Y CURSI

2009-05-15T20:30:00.001-07:00

coming soon.

REVIEW: THE BETRAYAL

2009-03-30T22:02:00.000-07:00

When Ellen Kuras started to shoot her documentary about refugees from Laos, she had no idea the film would be a two-decade long journey for her and her subjects, Thavi and his family. Kuras was still an unknown in the film industry back then. Over the last twenty years, she had made a career as a renowned cinematographer for her works with directors like Martin Scorsese (No Direction Home: Bob Dylan), Spike Lee (Summer of Sam) and Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind), among others. But she never forgets her first project. The resulting documentary—The Betrayal, is a very personal account of the journey of a Laotian family escaping their war-torn homeland, only to end up in the harsh realities of Brooklyn, New York.

The main storyteller of The Betrayal, Thavi, is the eldest son among a family of ten children. Thavi’s father was a military commander for the American-backed Laotian government back in the days of the early Vietnam War. Kuras is interested in the Laotian because she thinks that they are the forgotten ones of the Vietnam War, because Laos was only a neighboring country to Vietnam, but then more bombs have been dropped in Laos than in World War I and World War II combined. The state of Laos was horrific during Thavi’s childhood. When the U.S. retreated from Laos and the Laotian communists claimed victory, Thavi’s father was sent to prison. Thavi’s mother escaped with most of her children and they finally landed in the New York City. But the United States was not as heavenly as they thought it would be. They do not know anyone there. They had no food. Gang violence is rampant. Mother and children were left to fend for themselves in this foreign land. Life away from the war zone, was not rosy at all.

The Betrayal has some of the most poetic imageries one will see in any documentary. Her picture conveys a deep sense of sorrow and loss, but the overbearing soundtrack by Howard Shore (Lord of The Rings) floods the film with sentimentality. The first hour of the movie also seems notably slow because of its heavy use of narration. Thavi and his family have a compelling story to tell, yet most of it is told through interviews, and the film is unable to flesh out the story. The last 30 minutes of The Betrayal is a lot more engaging because the camera captures more of the events happening in the moment. It is interesting to note that Thavi eventually becomes part of the film’s production, and despite its flaws, The Betrayal is an important document about a hidden slice of history.

FESTIVAL REPORT: FIRST WEEK OF 5TH ANNUAL HOUSTON JEWISH FILM FESTIVAL

2009-03-25T21:18:00.000-07:00

Screening on the opening night (3/17) of the 5th annual Houston Jewish film festival, husband and wife directing duo Allen Mondell and Cynthia Salzman Mondell presented their documentary The Monster Among Us, a look at the resurgence of anti-Semitism in present-day Europe. Featuring interviews with various scholars and Jews from six different countries in Europe including Germany, Holland, France, England, Belgium, and Hungary, the film looks at how the interviewees have been directly affected by anti-Semitism, from physical assaults to more subtle but no less painful psychological attacks. Although briefly acknowledging neo-Nazism, the main target of The Monster Among Us is the strain of anti-Semitism being perpetuated by extremist Muslims. The underlying question of the documentary is “If the situation worsens, could another Holocaust be possible?”

A Q&A with the two directors and a moderator followed the screening and audience members raised some important questions, among them why did the directors not do more to differentiate mainstream / moderate Muslims from extremist / fundamentalist Muslims. With only 1 Muslim among the major interview subjects, The Monster Among Us lacks the kind of balance that would characterize a more serious examination of both sides of the issue. However, as the filmmakers themselves mentioned in the panel discussion, their main goal is to raise awareness about a disturbing new trend. Of course, some of the footage taken from Muslim television stations showing blatant propaganda and hate-filled rhetoric is undeniably disturbing and the scenes of young Muslims being taught these lies does not bode well for a peaceful co-existence of Jews and Muslims.

Although the filmmakers succeed in their mission to bring attention to an important issue the effectiveness of their message is undermined by their inability to clearly differentiate peaceful Muslims from extremist Muslims, which may lead some uninformed viewers to judge an entire group of people on the (admittedly terrible) actions of a minority.

On Saturday (3/21), the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston screened Claude Miller’s A Secret to a full house. The French film explores the lives of a Jewish family before, during and after World War II, as a young boy discovers his parents’ past. Decent crowds continued to show up at Sunday’s shows. First, there was Children of the Sun, a documentary about the growing up in a kibbutz (a kind of experimental Zionist community whereas a centralized nursery, not the parents, raised the children). The home videos give a rare glimpse of life in the utopian village. If you miss it, there is another chance to see it this coming Saturday (3/28) at 9:00 pm. The second show of the day was Eran Riklis’s Lemon Tree. A Palestinian widow fights in court to keep her family’s lemon from being cut down by her neighbor, who is the Israeli Defense Minister. Lead by the phenomenal Hiam Abbass (Paradise Now), Lemon Tree is definitely one of the strongest films in this year’s lineup. The MFAH concluded the day with first-time filmmaker Hava Volterra’s documentary The Tree of Life, in which she uncovers the history of Jewish Italians while she learns more about her father’s past. The Tree of Life will be shown again on Sunday (3/29) at 3:00 pm.

IN COLD BLOOD

2009-03-23T14:38:00.000-07:00

In Matteo Garrone’s Gomorrah, no one is safe from the intricate network of organized crime / By Francisco Lo

According to the Old Testament, the city of Gomorrah was such a vile and sinful city, God had to destroy it as well as another equally infamous city, Sodom, by the wrecks of fire and brimstone. Based on the best-selling non-fiction by the same title, Matteo Garrone’s Gomorrah is a wordplay on Camorra, the name of a real-life Italian criminal organization, and a reference to its corruptive influence upon the city of Naples. Source writer Roberto Saviano is currently under witness protection because his book’s revealing content and international success has made him a target of gang retaliation. The cinematic version of Gomorrah is a chilling visualization of the web of cold-blooded dealings within Camorra’s elaborate system.

The five stories in Gomorrah serve as the intermeshing gears in the clockwork of the mafia machine. Under the influence of the Camorra, no one is left untouched— thirteen-year-old Toto (Salvatore Abruzzese) is tempted by the gang life and sees it as a step towards growing up to be a man; Don Ciro (Gianfelice Imparato) delivers money to the families of jailed gang members but realizes his job is becoming increasingly dangerous; Stick-up boys Marco (Marco Macor) and Ciro (Ciro Petrone) do not follow the rules in the gangster world and are testing the patience of the local boss; Pasquale (Salvatore Cantalupo) is a tailor for a designer-knockoff sweatshop but his secret deal with the Chinese is putting his life in danger; College graduate Roberto (Carmine Paternoster) reckons his job in a waste management company has a shady side when he finds out how the chemical waste is disposed. From the young to the old, from the drug deals to the business world, the grip of the Camorra is everywhere.

Twenty some years after its initial release, Brian De Palma’s Scarface is still the epitome of gangster glamour for wannabes, including the imbecilic Marco and Ciro, who spend their days quoting Tony Montana and firing weapons at empty space. In their heads, bullets and guts will lead them to the top of the game, but there is no room for such simpleminded fantasy in the real world. Whoever stands in the way of the system shall be crushed. It is a ruthless way of life that needs no explanation, as such is established in the opening scene— a sudden blast of gunshots pierces the bodies of an unwitting party, leaving an eerily silent scene with bloodied corpses scattered in a tanning salon. For the Camorra, murder is just a usual business practice.

Garrone’s movie takes viewers to the lower depths of the crime network without ever showing any high-level crime boss in the film. Even as high-ranked as Roberto’s boss Franco may seem, he is merely a seasoned businessman who acts as an operative for the organization. The film has no place for any Tony Montana or Michael Corleone. The grim truth is the boss does not need to be seen. The system of recruiting and money laundering is tuned to maximize business efficiently while violence runs amok in the city. Toto’s neighborhood gang bangers do not have a clue about who is against them and they have no problem with shooting anyone with the slightest suspicion. As for Don Ciro, he has little money and no answers for the families of the incarcerated members of the Camorra. His reaction to their inquiries is stoically submissive, but the worrisome man knows all too well that his purpose for the Camorra is like an expendable pawn in a game of chess.

It is only a matter of time before one is engulfed by the dog-eat-dog nature of gang life. Garrone’s imperturbable imagery, punctuated by sudden splashes of violence, institutes the film with a strong sense of mortality. It would be a huge underestimation to think that the Camorra’s influence is own within the hood. Seeing Pasquale’s dress being worn by a starlet on the red carpet and reading the film’s parting message revealing the real-life Camorra’s contract to rebuild part of the Twin Towers, one can only wonder how far the criminal organization can reach.

At times, it feels like there is a lack of time for five individual plotlines to be fully developed in 142 minutes. But like Steven Soderbergh’s Traffic and HBO’s television series The Wire, Gomorrah succeeds in illuminating the complex and elaborate system of the modern criminal world with a great deal of authenticity. Cinematographer Marco Onorato also incorporates some sophisticated long takes into the realistic Gomorrah, giving it the naturalistic look of a documentary without compromising the dramatic touch of the widescreen.

Gomorrah opens at the Angelika Film Houston on March 13.

The 5th Annual Houston Jewish Film Festival

2009-03-23T14:32:00.000-07:00

Film Monitor takes a look at the lineup of the upcoming Houston Jewish Film Festival (3/17 - 3/29) / By Francis Colo

With more than fifteen films in its lineup, the 5th Annual Houston Jewish Film Festival is one of the biggest local film festivals in Houston. The festival opens on March 17th at the Jewish Community Center (JCC) with Allen Mondell and Cynthia Salzman Mondell’s The Monster Among Us, a documentary exploring the recent rise of anti-Semitism in Europe. If you are in the mood for a lighter film, there is Ayelet Menahemi’s Noodle, a dramedy about an Israeli flight attendant’s attempt to return a Chinese boy to his family.

At the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH), viewers will get a chance to see Eran Riklis’s Lemon Tree before it comes to theaters later this year. In this Berlin Film Festival Audience Award winner, Palestinian widow Salma Zidane (Hiam Abbass) is forced to take matters to the courts when her new neighbor, who happens to be the Israeli Defense Minister, threatens to take down her family’s old lemon tree for so-called security reasons. Collaborations between Israelis and Palestinians have produced some of the finest films in the past five years, including the melancholic comedy The Band’s Visit and the suicide-bomber psychological thriller Paradise Now.
Ran Tal’s documentary Children of the Sun looks into life growing up in a kibbutz, a Zionist and Socialist community where children are not raised by their parents but by the nannies of a communal children home. The film is composed of home videos and archival footage, with commentaries by the individuals who spent their childhood in this one of a kind environment. Another notable documentary is first-time filmmaker Hava Volterra’s The Tree of Life, a personal account of the director’s quest to explore her father’s Italian roots, and on her way, she also uncovers the history of the Jewish people in Italy. Volterra’s do-it-yourself effort is commendable, but the film’s poorly made animated sequences highlight the film’s amateurish moments.

Don’t forget to attend a screening of Jan Schuette’s Love Comes Lately at the end of the festival. Based on three short stories by Nobel laureate Isaac Bashevis Singer, the humorous film centers around the septuagenarian writer Max Cohn and his struggle for love and sex.

Film Monitor will be reporting on the 5th Annual Houston Jewish Film Festival from March 17th to March 29th. Please visit our website for extensive coverage. For a complete schedule of screenings, please visit www.jcchouston.org and www.mfah.org/films.

PREACHING TO THE CHOIR

2009-03-23T14:26:00.000-07:00

As It Is In Heaven, filmed in the beautiful countryside of Sweden, was nominated for an Academy Award in 2005, but it hits quite a few wrong notes when it comes to implementing its inspirational message / By RM Crossin

Nominated for an Oscar for best foreign film in 2005, As It Is In Heaven was not released in the United States until this year. The Swedish film is about the healing power of music, but its heavy-handed take on the inspirational message may not be everyone’s cup of tea.

Director Kay Pollak opens the film with a beautifully filmed introduction showing the young protagonist Daniel playing his violin in the midst of a swaying field of wheat in his home village of Norrland. This serene scene is broken up when two bullies intrude on his practice session and beat him up. Eventually, Daniel moves away from Norrland and grows up to be a world famous violinist and conductor. Renowned for his rock star intensity, the grown-up Daniel (Michael Nyqvist) furiously leads his orchestra like a man possessed— not even a bloody nose will stop him from performing. His vigorous style and demanding schedule take a toll on his health, and a heart attack finally puts his career on hold.

Following his doctor’s advice, Daniel decides to retire and returns to his hometown. He moves into a tiny old abandoned school building and tries to keep to himself. While he was running errands, Daniel meets an attractive young lady, Lena (Frida Hallgren), and the brash Arne, who invites him to sit in on the local church choir. Going against medical advice, Daniel decides to take the choir under his wing and make it his project to help the members live up to the potential he sees in them.
There is no shortage of colorful characters in the church choir. Besides Lena and Arne, the singing group includes the pastor’s wife Inger (Ingela Olsson), abused housewife Gabrielle (Helen Sjoholm), the mentally-retarded Tore (Andre Sjoberg) and the timid big man Holmfrid (Mikael Rahm). The rejuvenated Daniel helps the small town folks to express themselves through the choir rehearsals, and in return, he rediscovers his passion for the art. But the film loses its footing after its solid beginning. The unlikely romance between Daniel and the significantly younger Lena takes pleasure in teasing its audience for more than two hours. The sanctimonious pastor Stig (Niklas Falk), whose inflexible personality is obviously the antithesis to Daniel’s child-like artistic ways, takes the film to a point of no return when the insane clergyman finally overshadows any genuine message intended by the filmmakers.

Overt melodrama and predictable clichés prevents the movie from effectively delivering its message. The characters take a brave stance against the dogmatic submission to religious and social norms, yet As It Is In Heaven ends up being preachier than its own hypocritical pastor. That’s when it ceases to inspire.

As It Is In Heaven is currently playing at the Angelika Film Center Houston.

INTERVIEW WITH THE AUTEURS

2009-03-23T14:11:00.000-07:00

FILM MONITOR TALKS WITH DANNY KASMAN FROM THE AUTEURS, THE ONLINE MOVIE THEATER & SOCIAL NETWORKING SITE.

In the 1930s, French film advocate Henri Langlois and his peers founded Cinémathèque Française —an archival cinema celebrated for its huge collection of arthouse and classic cinema. Cinémathèque Française has served Parisians for decades and nurtured filmmakers for generations. Other countries have also developed their own film preservation societies and cinematheques have become an integral part of film culture. Fast forward to November 2008, an online cinematheque is born in the form of The Auteurs (www.theauteurs.com). The Palo Alto-based company takes the concept of cinematheque to a new level. Besides streaming some of the best films from around the world over the internet, their handsomely-designed homepage also acts as a social-networking site, online magazine and forum for film buffs. We talk with Danny Kasman, the editor of The Auteurs’ online magazine Notebook, about The Auteurs and its global vision:

Film Monitor: I read about how Efe Cakarel, the founder and CEO of The Auteurs, came up with the idea of The Auteurs when he realized there was no way he could watch In The Mood For Love through the internet on his laptop. Could you describe the vision behind The Auteurs?
Danny Kasman: The vision behind The Auteurs is to create a global hub for the best of world cinema. This means a place where not only can one discover and watch the best independent, foreign, and classic films, but read intelligent international film criticism, and engage in passionate discussion with film lovers spread around the world. It’s about showing the best movies, connecting them to the people who love them, and then connecting those people to others just like them.

FM: So The Auteurs is like a social networking site for film buffs.
DK: We like to think of ourselves as an online cinematheque. A place not where you don’t just pick a movie, watch it, and be done with it, but a place where the discussion starts before the movie and continues after it. You are right on the money—a movie theater and social network for film lovers. Going to the movies used to be a social activity, something you shared not only with your friends but with an audience. Now with the popularity of DVDs, it is becoming more and more a sheltered experience. We want to utilize the social quality of the online world and invest it back in the movies. You don’t just watch a movie; you read about movies, you talk about movies, you meet other people who like movies, you might even make your own movie. We are providing the space to do that, to share the cinematic experience, and to share your love for cinema.

FM: How many films are currently available for the viewers in the United States?
DK: The Auteurs is a global online movie theater, which means we show a variety of movies in a great number of countries. Some films are available in some places and not others due to the difficulty in obtaining rights to show everything we want everywhere in the world. Currently, we are showing 83 films in the US and we keep adding more films to our line-up! We are showing movies in nearly every country in the world, so there’s something for everyone.

FM: How did the partnership between The Auteurs and Criterion Collection happen? What about any plans to partner any other film companies?
DK: After meeting Peter Becker, president of Criterion, at the 2008 Berlin Film Festival, we met with him and Jonathan Turrell, Criterion’s CEO, in New York in order to try licensing some films in their fantastic catalog. Instead of licensing a handful of movies, we left the office with a tremendous partnership and a new project: to create and power Criterion’s new website. Criterion is now programming a monthly, rotating online film festival at The Auteurs with films in their library. The Auteurs also has strategic partnerships with Costa Films in Argentina, Celluloid Dreams in France, and Fallon in England. We are always looking for interesting ways to expand our vision of an online cinematheque, and each of these partners has contributed invaluably to this vision.

FM: The Auteurs was present at a few big film festivals in the past year. What was your objective before you attended the festivals and what did you achieve from the experience?
DK: We approach major film festivals from several angles. First and foremost is to discover and acquire the most exciting movies, new and old, to show on our platform around the world. We also extensively cover the film festivals in our online magazine, The Auteurs’ Notebook. Additionally, we are always trying to shake things up and do something fun at each festival: last year at Cannes, for example, we staged a short film competition to challenge young filmmakers to make a movie in a limited time frame with limited hardware; and at the 2008 Telluride Film Festival we hosted online their officially selected short films. Film festival attendees—and those people who are unable to attend film festivals but wish they could—are one of our most important audiences, so our goal is always to do something exciting at the festival for people there, as well as to share with the people at home a part of the festival experience.

FM: Netflix is also streaming part of their catalog from their website, too. How do you see The Auteurs competing with other online movie-rental services?
DK: What Netflix is great for what they want to do: become the online videostore for the US. We think that in the very near future—if we aren’t already there—there will be dozens upon dozens of websites offering thousands upon thousands of movies, and it will simply be too much. We are creating a special place where the content is curated, where quality is preferred over quantity. If using Netflix is akin to walking into a massive videostore, using The Auteurs is a boutique where ever film is carefully thought about and selected, where world renowned programmers curate our library into interesting online film festivals, and where every single film is not just one item among thousands but something we known is special unto itself. Part of our mission is to make available online films that have been seen as too risky, financially or artistically, to release through traditional and conservative arms of distribution. In addition, The Auteurs is global: we are showing films around the world, and our audience is not limited to the United States.

FM: What are some of the possible features we can expect from The Auteurs in the near future?
DK: Part of the fun of The Auteurs experience is how we are organically evolving the site based on the needs and interests of our audiences. We certainly have exciting things in development. We can’t say too much at the moment, but we just started offering subscription service as an option for users, and will be re-vamping and re-launching key aspects of the site in the near future. Keep an eye towards Cannes to see what we’ve been up to!

REVIEW: THE SECRETS

2009-03-23T14:03:00.000-07:00

BY Maria Bazhlekova

Avi Nesher’s drama The Secrets (Ha Sodot) is a paradox. It centers on a girl, Naomi (Ania Bukstein), who has the desire to study scripture as intended in the Orthodox Jewish tradition yet yearns to break out of its shackles and become a female Rabbi. She convinces her father to allow her to study at a seminary before marrying her traditional fiancé. There she befriends a fellow student, Michel (Michal Shtamler), and the two set out to help Anouk (Fanny Ardant), a woman with deteriorating mental and physical health, gain forgiveness from God even though she has committed a heinous crime deemed unforgivable by the Orthodox Jewish teachings. The event leads the young girls to experiment with Kabbalah in order to lead Anouk to atonement.

Nesher’s previous work includes mostly B-grade action and horror flicks such as: Doppelganger: The Evil Within, a horror flick about Drew Barrymore’s murderous alter ego, and Raw Nerve, a thriller centering around a rogue cop. The Secrets is far retreat from his previous body of work. Here, the atmosphere he creates in the small Israeli town is spot on, it’s immersive and rich. The subject matter becomes palpable even to anyone who has no experience with or knowledge of Orthodox Judaism. But Naomi’s struggle to define herself by progressive terms in an otherwise archaic belief system is the only interesting characterization in the film. Anouk’s and Michel’s storylines unfortunately fall into clichéd pitfalls from which they never recover. A love story developed between the two leads is handled sweetly and masterfully until it falls into a place where many Sapphic love stories eventually go, when Michel decides that it would easier to take a more traditional path through life. It does, however, serve to show us the evolution of Naomi— once she accepts her sexuality she never looks back or runs scared to traditions.

The film is unevenly paced with a slow start that contrasts negatively with a relatively quick final act. If Nesher was going for a slow, atmospheric start to set the tone, he didn’t quite accomplish it. The beginning just feels slow and tedious. Just as the pace is uneven, so is Nesher’s direction. He has difficulty reining his material in and it eventually spirals into an uncomfortable melodrama. An elimination of about thirty minutes of material, some clichéd dialogue and scenes would have done wonders for The Secrets. In the context of Nesher’s previous efforts, the otherwise forgettable film deserves mild applause.

YEAR IN REVIEW: THE BEST OF 2008

2009-02-19T23:56:00.000-08:00

At Film Monitor, we all have very different taste in movies. Happy-Go-Lucky was one of the few that impressed all of us in 2008. Mike Leigh’s film about an idealistic and cheerful teacher confronted by the contrasting views around her has a very conventional but effective narrative. Free of any creative gimmicks, it draws the audience in with the phenomenal performance of the cast, including the magnificent Sally Hawkins and the brooding Eddie Marsan. Happy-Go-Lucky is back-to-the-basics at its best.

Call it direct cinema or whatever fancy term you like, documentary-style filmmaking continues to be popular in all sectors, including one of our favorites from 2007, 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days. Filmmakers creatively push the boundaries of the form by blurring the line between fact and fiction. Guy Maddin convolutes his hometown documentary My Winnipeg with his wacky stories and surrealist aesthetics. Ari Foleman traces the lost memories of his traumatic military experience through his animated documentary Waltz With Bashir. Even established director Jonathan Demme joins in the action by shooting Rachel Getting Married like a home video. Realism never gets out of style.

For Houstonians, since the closing of Landmark Greenway Theatre at the end of 2007, the choices of independent and foreign films are mostly down to the Angelika Film Center and Landmark River Oaks Theatre. Fortunately, alternative venues like Rice Cinema, the Museum of Fine Arts Houston (MFAH), Aurora Picture Show and others continues to provide us with a healthy dose of cinematic diversity. Among them, the Jean Eustache retrospective at the MFAH was my personal favorite. It was a rare chance to discover the entire catalogue of the filmmaker who made his mark as the watershed of the French New Wave. The retrospective, including the four-plus-hour long The Mother and the Whore and the whimsical Santa Claus Has Blue Eyes, is only one of many exciting events for film lovers in Houston.

Top 10 of 2008/ Francisco Lo (editor):

1. Happy-Go-Lucky

2. My Winnipeg

3. Waltz With Bashir

4. Chop Shop

5. Still Life

6. The Band's Visit

7. Che

8. Slumdog Millionaire

9. Silent Light

10. August Evening

Top 10 of 2008/ R.M. Crossin (editor)

1. Slumdog Millionaire
2. Man on Wire
3. Dark Knight
4. Milk
5. Let the Right One In
6. Che Part I (The Argentine)
7. WALL-E
8. Happy-Go-Lucky
9. Revolutionary Road
10. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days

Top 10 of 2008/ Joseph Ross (editor)

1. Waltz With Bashir

2. The Band's Visit
3. Happy-Go-Lucky
4. Milk
5. Rachel Getting Married
6. The Wrestler
7. Standard Operating Procedure
8. Persepolis
9. Mister Lonely
10. The Year My Parents Went On Vacation

IN THE CLASSROOM

2009-02-19T23:55:00.000-08:00

Classroom dramas usually have two key ingredients—an inspiring teacher and underperforming students. People are creatures of habit, and filmmakers are no different. From Stand and Deliver to Freedom Writers, the genre includes some good films and plenty of mediocre ones, but most have suffered from a ready-made feel-good message. Laurent Cantet’s The Class is nothing like the above formula. The film chronicles French teacher Francois Marin’s year-long journey with his class of junior high students in Paris’ 20th arrondissement, a ethnically diverse working-class neighborhood. Filmed in the course of a school year with real-life teachers and students, the film faithfully reveals the happenings in the classroom.

Having real students playing students in a film is convenient, but having a teacher playing himself is simple yet ingenious. François Bégaudeau, who plays Mr. Marin, also wrote the book Entre les murs (Between the Walls), in which the film is based on. Bégaudeau has been a teacher for more than ten years and an occasional film critic for several French publications. His book, like the film, describes his daily experience with his students during the school year. Director Laurent Cantet and his crew held weekly improvisation workshops in the school, and the students who ended up in the film are the ones who stayed in the course throughout the year. During the workshop, the filmmakers had the teenagers improvise different situations and the teenagers developed their own lines, which set the film’s naturalistic tone. Hence, the film’s situations are predetermined but each scene’s development is guided by the cast’s rehearsed improvisation. Shot with a documentary-like style, The Class is as realistic as any fictional film can be.

Shooting a film like a documentary can make it look real, but for the viewers to feel that it is a work of authenticity, the filmmaker has to operate with the understanding of the dynamics in the real world. Most classroom dramas fail because they are based on the false premise that one teacher’s unflinching ideals will change the lives of students who are seemingly waiting to be rescued. While such romantic legend is faintly possible, it is fair to say that is not the case in the real world 99.99% of the time. Laurent Cantet’s film focuses on the students as much as it does on the teacher, showing that a teacher’s work is simply one of many factors contributing to a student’s success or failure. Mr. Marin tries to open dialogue with his students, but they test his patience from time to time. The film captures some very heated exchanges between him and his class. Sometimes, Mr. Marin handles it smoothly. Other times, the students frustrate him and he gets sarcastic with his class. And there are also times that he cracks under pressure and reacts unprofessionally. Is he a good or bad teacher? The film defers the judgment to the viewers.

France is an increasingly heterogeneous society with most immigrants coming from its former colonies. Race and class issues are unavoidable in a film about the youth of this multicultural nation. In The Class, the young people’s attitude towards cultural and national identity is explored in their conversations with Mr. Marin and between each other. The students express their disinterest in Mr. Marin’s lesson on formal grammar, which they find outdated and irrelevant to their lives. The boys’ discussion about the African Cup of Nations seems rather innocent, but their viewpoints not only reflect their attitudes concerning the soccer tournament, but also their feelings toward assimilation and the importance of their cultural roots.

As its original French title implies, everything in the film happens between the classroom walls. The Class offers no subplots on the private lives of the teacher and students, leaving viewers to wonder how the characters’ personal experiences affect their choices and behaviors in the classroom. It is apparent that Cantet wants his film to avoid as much personal judgment as possible and strictly focus on the classroom dynamics, which does little to satisfy the voyeuristic desire of a cinema audience. At the end of the school year, when a student disquietingly tells Mr. Marin that she has not learned a single thing, the two of them are confronted with the very same fear and uncertainty. Mr. Marin steadfastly attempts to instill hope in his students, but he too understands that the obstacles in front of them are enormous.

The Class opens at Landmark River Oaks Theatre on February 20.

THE GIRL WHO LOST HER DOG

2009-02-19T23:54:00.000-08:00

Wendy Carroll is on her way to Alaska when she passes by a small town in Oregon. Coming all the way from Indiana, Wendy is hoping to find a feasible job in the Last Frontier. To save money, Wendy keeps track of all of her spending and she sleeps in her 1988 Accord every night with her dog Lucy. One early morning, a Walgreens security guard wakes her and tells her to move her car out of the parking lot. Wendy then tries to start her car but the beat-up automobile does nothing other than make a loud noise. The old man was kind enough to help push her vehicle to the side of the street. He even gives her directions to the nearby mechanic and grocery store. With an empty bag of dog food in her trunk, Wendy decides to take a risk. After tying Lucy on the bike rack outside the store, she nervously puts a couple cans of dog food inside her bag and walks without paying. A self-righteous employee catches her instantly, and insists on calling the police on Wendy. By the time she pays her fine and return to the store, Lucy, her only companion, is gone.

That is the opening of director Kelly Reichardt’s new film Wendy and Lucy. For the rest of the movie, Wendy is shown to be looking for Lucy around the small gloomy town while she also tries to get her car fixed. To be honest, there is not much drama in this 80-minute feature. But then drama is not what Kelly Reichardt has in mind for Wendy and Lucy. Inspired by the public’s insensitive attitude towards Katrina survivors, Reichardt’s intention is to make a film to show how a person lives when he/she has no money, no support and no safety net to fall back on. Wendy and Lucy takes a backseat from manipulating the audience’s emotions to show the difficulties encountered by Wendy from a bystander’s point of view. Like the smugly moralistic store clerk who thinks Wendy should not own a dog if she cannot afford dog food, the tendency to judge someone based on fragmented details is grossly prevalent in our society.

While Kelly Reichardt has acknowledged the influence of Italian Neo-realism and New German Cinema has on Wendy and Lucy’s subtle social commentary, the film’s minimalist approach is comparable to the style of French director Robert Bresson, whose films dissects the nature of human suffering in the most non-dramatic manner. Actress Michelle Williams’s introspective take on the character Wendy exposes the kind of vulnerability and loneliness that is also seen in Bresson’s tragic protagonist in Mouchette. Wendy and Lucy is nowhere near as bleak as most of Bresson’s films, but the sadness and longing it unravels is no less profound.

Wendy and Lucy opens at the Angelika Film Center on February 20.

JOURNEY TO THE NORTH

2009-02-19T23:52:00.000-08:00

Watching El Norte is a humbling experience. The film shows not only the harrowing journey of the brother and sister traveling from Guatemala to Los Angeles, but also the remarkable spirit of resilience. When the Oscar-nominated movie came out in 1984, it received tremendous praise from both critics and viewers. As the immigration debate heats up, Criterion Collection’s re-release of El Norte cannot arrive at a better time.

Co-written by producer Anna Thomas, director Gregory Nava’s El Norte was groundbreaking in many ways a quarter-century ago. Funded by PBS, it was one of the first films to illustrate the lives of undocumented immigrants, and was very well-received by the Latin community in the United States. Spanish and Quiche are the primary languages spoken in the first half of the film, an anomaly at the time. In addition, the filmmakers’ attention to the details of the Indian’s rituals and customs also gives El Norte a great deal of authenticity.

El Norte is about immigrants as much as it is about the indigenous people of the American continent. It is ironic to call the Mayan siblings “immigrants” because they really are the native people of this land. The military kills Arturo, the father of protagonists Rosa and Enrique, when he tries to organize other coffee pickers against the oppressive regime. Stories like this happen to the native people over and over again in the last few hundred years. In El Norte, Rosa and Enrique face prejudice from mestizos and gringos alike. The slums of Tijuana is dirt poor, but the two of them understand they will always have to pretend to be Mexicans because getting sent back to Guatemala would be a death sentence.

At first glance, life in a run-down Los Angeles motel seems like a huge upgrade for the naïve duo. The sight of a running tap and the chance to be picked up as a day laborer are brand new experiences for them. This part of the film offers some very frank and satirical observation of the American culture through the eyes of immigrants. Enrique’s friend Jorge jokes about their U.S.-born Mexican colleague’s inability to understand Spanish, showing a clear divide within the Latino community in the States. Rosa, who teams up with her friend Nacha as maids for the gringos in the mansions, is absolutely confounded by her employer’s attempt to explain the dozens of functions of her washing machine. With the film’s funniest line, Nacha tells Rosa, “The important thing is, whatever they (employers) say, just smile and say yes.”

Just when Enrique starts to believe that life will be great as long as he works hard, the film squashes the illusion of the self-made man simultaneously. Deportation is a constant fear, and they reckon no matter how hard they try, they still don’t belong. The siblings’ father Arturo once said, “To the rich, a peasant is only a pair of arms.” The truthfulness of his words haunts this powerful film from the start to the end. And sadly, the message retains its relevance and power today.

El Norte is currently available on DVD.

REDISCOVERING THE MASTER

2009-02-19T23:51:00.000-08:00

ooking at any given poll of greatest directors, David Lean’s name is bound to be on the list. His most celebrated epics The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)and Doctor Zhivago (1965) are household names that will be forever remembered for their lavish cinematography and sophisticated set pieces. But years before Lean achieved his glory in Hollywood, he was known for intimate dramas in his native England. In the months of January and March, Houstonians will have a chance to experience eight of these ten recently restored classics at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH), one of the only two places in town (Rice Cinema is the other) with reel-to-reel projection equipments suitable to screen these valuable prints.

Given the chance to restore some of the best works by Britain’s most acclaimed director, the British Film Institute (BFI) chose to work on Lean’s first ten films with the help of Granada International and Studio Canal. In my conversation with the BFI’s senior curator Nigel Algar, he mentioned the costly and labor-intensive restoration process would not have been possible without the generous support from the David Lean Foundation. The British director, who is famously known to have waited for days in the desert to get one great shot of a sunrise while filming Lawrence of Arabia (1962), leaves behind a foundation that is true to his spirit. During the restoration process, Mr. Algar told a trustee of the David Lean Foundation that certain parts could be slightly improved, but not without a hefty price. Mr. Algar suggested that maybe they should take a more pragmatic attitude towards the process. The trustee, who was Lean’s lawyer, replied, “ ‘Pragmatic’ is not a word in David Lean’s vocabulary!”

After his unsuccessful attempt to follow in his father’s footsteps as an accountant, Lean entered the movie business at an early age and worked his way up from the bottom. Eventually, he made a name for himself as a skilled editor. His first big break came when he was given a chance to co-direct In Which We Serve (1942) with notable British playwright Noel Coward. Coming from a theatrical background, Coward had little knowledge about filmmaking and hence David Lean became the de facto director in charge of camera placement and the actors when Coward was in front of the camera. The World War II film about life on a warship established Lean’s position as a director and Noel Coward was so impressed with Lean that he offered the film rights of his popular plays to the young director and his production company Cineguild.

David Lean’s next three films are all adaptations of Cowards’ plays, which guaranteed him a certain degree of public interest, but also put the fledging filmmaker in the big-name playwright’s shadow. 1944’s This Happy Breed was praised for its portrayal of life in Britain between the two World Wars. The following year, Lean adapted Coward’s comedy Blithe Spirit for the big screen. The film was one of only two comedies in his career (the other was Hobson’s Choice) and Lean’s brand of comedy was not very well-received. His command of shooting in Technicolor with simple special effects was laudable, but Noel Coward was far from being impressed. Mr. Algar told me that upon seeing the film, Coward told Lean, “You just fucked up the best thing I’ve ever written.”

Brief Encounter (1945), a film expanded from Coward’s one-act play Still Life, would be the last collaboration between David Lean and Noel Coward. In fact, the film is a turning point for Lean’s career, not only because he finally emerged from Coward’s shadow, but also because this is the film in which he exhibits virtuosic command over the film medium. The clever combination of noir-style lighting, Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No.2 and the flashback storytelling signifies the emergence of a great director. Brief Encounter, like a cinematic ancestor of the popular foreign film In The Mood For Love (2000), is a film about an unfulfilled affair made more than sixty years ago, yet little of its magic is lost over the passing of time, especially for a film that was initially ridiculed by preview audiences for its lack of physical intimacy. The love affair between the middle-class housewife Laura (Celia Johnson) and the idealistic lonely physician Alec (Trevor Howard) has little to do with the act of adultery, but is instead marked by Laura’s agonizing guilt of falling in love. MFAH film curator Marian Luntz noted that David Lean evokes the kind of British sensibility that one will not find in his Hollywood genre pictures.

The narration from the first-person perspective of a female protagonist in Brief Encounter was almost unheard of at its time of production. How Laura feels about her annoying friend, her guilt over her passion, and her sadness over the lost affair are all exposed to the audience, which makes Laura such a realistic and wholesome character. Thank goodness Celia Johnson’s Laura is not a desperate housewife and every bit of her performance shows more restraint than drama. Her ethereal presence is in the same vein as Setsuko Hara’s depiction of a dutiful yet conflicted modern woman in the films of Yasujiro Ozu (Tokyo Story, Late Spring). As for the choice of Trevor Howard as the married doctor, it was most certainly a bold and wise move on Lean’s part, for Howard was more known for his supporting roles than his leading-man qualities. His everyday-man demeanor is a perfect match for the role and his chemistry with Celia Johnson is essential to the film’s success.

As Ms. Luntz suggested, some of these largely forgotten gems reveal different sides of Lean, such as Hobson’s Choice (a comedy featuring Charles Laughton), The Sound Barrier (an adventure drama), and Madeleine (a melodrama). Regardless of genres, David Lean’s early films remind viewers of the passionate side of a filmmaker whose legacy is ironically dominated by his technical achievements.

NO PLACE LIKE HOME

2009-02-19T23:50:00.000-08:00

Thomas Wolfe once wrote, “You can’t go home again,” but Mikey, the protagonist of Momma’s Man, attempts to prove this wrong. Played by Matt Boren, Mikey is a pudgy, balding thirty-something new father who, while visiting his mother and father in New York City on a winter business trip, can’t seem to leave his childhood home. At the beginning of the film, Mikey bids a fond farewell to his parents and get on a train to JFK airport. However, when the train reaches its destination, he inexplicably decides against getting off. Next thing we know he is back at his parents’ loft apartment giving them a vague explanation about his flight being canceled and telling them he’ll have to stay for another day. His parents, excited about the prospect of spending more time with their son, welcome him back. Written and directed by Azazel Jacobs, Momma’s Man is an exploration of a man-child on the precipice of serious adult responsibilities. Will he keep climbing up or will his fear paralyze him and cause him to slide back down?

So begins the curious case of Mikey. It starts out innocently enough – Mikey says he’ll catch a flight back to Los Angeles the next day. In the meantime he begins methodically examining boxes containing his childhood mementos. He reads old comic books. He plays hilariously awful songs he wrote as a teenager on his acoustic guitar. “Fuck, fuck, fuck you—hope you die, too,” he sings. When his father, who is trying to sleep through this song in another part of the loft, yells out for him to be quiet, a flicker of pleasure flashes across Mikey’s face – perhaps a remembrance that THIS was what rebellion used to be like. It becomes quickly apparent, though, that Mikey doesn’t have any immediate plans to go back to Los Angeles and he begins lying about what is keeping him in New York and when he intends to leave. While ignoring phone messages from his distressed wife (Dana Varon) pleading with him to come back to her and their infant child, he doesn’t appear to have any understanding of his motivations (or lack thereof) for staying. However, it is obvious that something is bothering him and holding him back. Gradually, Mikey’s reminiscing morphs into regression. He lets his beard grow and becomes less concerned with his appearance. At his lowest point, he is alone and drunk in the loft, and starts crawling on all fours in his underwear – mirroring an earlier scene in which a small wind-up toy baby crawls on a table. Boren does a good job in his understated role and lets his eyes and subtle facial expressions speak for his character in stretches without dialogue. That he manages to elicit sympathy playing a character that really doesn’t deserve much is a testament to his acting abilities.

The struggle to let go also extends to Mikey’s parents who, at least initially, are all too comfortable to let him stay as long as he wants. However, as Mikey lingers on and as his excuses become less and less plausible, his parents’ compassion is put to the test. Mikey’s parents are played by the director’s own parents – legendary experimental filmmaker Ken Jacobs and his wife Flo, who is a painter. This casting gives Momma’s Man an added degree of emotional authenticity. Azazel Jacobs pays homage to his father’s films by showing Ken Jacobs screening them for Mikey and the viewers onscreen. Towards the end of the film, we also see some home-movie footage of the director as young boy asleep at the kitchen table in the loft. Obviously, it is a somewhat autobiographical and deeply personal film for the director.

Just what exactly is behind Mikey’s distress is suggested but never explicitly revealed. Jacobs leaves this up to the viewer to decipher. The director succeeds in achieving a balance between sweet, tender moments and some comic scenes in addition to hinting at a deeper undercurrent of darkness. Similar to the way in which Mikey’s parents confront him with compassion, the director never resorts to ridiculing or belittling his protagonist. The pacing is probably a bit slow for some viewers but it parallels Mikey’s own sluggishness. Momma’s Man is shot in grainy 35mm by cinematographer Tobias Datum and captures a New York City neighborhood that, as Mikey’s childhood friend Dante (Piero Arciles) laments, is quickly disappearing to gentrification.

Mikey’s parents’ cluttered lower Manhattan loft is a character unto itself and also happens to be the home of the director’s parents as well as his own childhood residence. The loft is part studio and part warehouse and filled to the ceiling with rows upon rows of art, toys, books, antiques, creative clutter, and beautiful junk. Contrast it with Mikey’s threadbare apartment in Los Angeles and you can understand part of the reason he is so reluctant to leave – it is infinitely more interesting. There are a few slow 360-degree pans to show its labyrinthine qualities. Its personality changes as the film progresses: at first it takes on the quality of being comforting but eventually it becomes suffocating and claustrophobic as Mikey finds it difficult to escape. A number of times we see Mikey attempt to leave the loft and make it as far as the stairs leading down from the front door. As the camera lingers on his foot hesitating to take that first step out of the door, it is a perfect visual representation of his ambivalence to leave adolescence behind and walk into adulthood.

The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston will be showing Momma’s Man on Jan. 23 (7:00 pm), Jan. 24 (7:00 pm) and Jan 25 (7:00 pm).

RELENTLESS AMBITION

2009-02-19T23:49:00.000-08:00

One man’s revolutionary is another man’s terrorist. Ernesto “Che” Guevara, one of the most polarizing figures of the 20th century, has supporters who regard him as an anti-imperialist hero but also critics who consider him a ruthless murderer. Worst of all, his legacy has been trivialized by the clueless youngsters who adorn his face on countless posters and t-shirts. For good or bad, there has always been an endless fascination with this larger than life character. In Che, filmmaker Steven Soderbergh strives to tell the story of Guevara through two of his revolutionary campaigns – his victory in Cuba constitutes the first half of the film (known as The Argentine) and his defeat in Bolivia is the basis of the second half (known as Guerilla).
“…I am fascinated by the technical challenges that go along with implementing any large-scale political idea. I wanted to detail the mental and physical demands these two campaigns required…” said Steven Soderbergh in Che’s press notes. The film, especially the second half, focuses on Guevara’s struggles in the harsh conditions of jungles. Rather than adding to Guevara’s folklore, the mirroring pieces act as an examination of his success and failure. The key phrase in the earlier quote is “technical challenges”— revealing not only Soderbergh’s motive behind the making of Che, but also a connection between the director and the guerilla fighter.

Steven Soderbergh was only twenty-six years old when he marked his arrival at the center stage of cinema by winning the Palm D’or at Cannes for sex, lies and videotape in 1989, the youngest-ever director to receive the prestigious prize. He spearheaded the 1990s American independent film movement alongside the likes of fellow directors such as the Coen Brothers, Jim Jarmusch and Quentin Tarantino. Often serving as his own cinematographer and editor, Soderbergh is also known for his vast knowledge of filmmaking and film history, as evident in his informative and often entertaining DVD commentaries. Listening to him arguing with screenwriter Lem Dobbs on the DVD of The Limey will diffuse any assumption that commentaries are boring. The prodigious director’s approach to filmmaking is as bold as Guevara’s approach to guerilla warfare. Gray’s Anatomy and Schizopolis are playful exercises that prove that early success did not tame him into conforming to the Hollywood system. Traffic proved to be Soderbergh’s very own Cuban Revolution, which garnered Best Director and Best Film awards at the Oscars. Much like Guevara, Soderbergh’s commitment to his cause continues to march on. Solaris, a psychological science fiction film, and The Good German, a noir film with 1940s aesthetics free from the stifling production code censorship of that era, both failed commercially, but one has to be impressed by his creative determination. In more than one interview (including Film Comment and Filmmaker Magazine), Soderbergh has asserted how he is amazed by Guevara’s guts to start his Bolivian campaign after what he had gone through in Congo. The director does not need to look further to understand Guevara. He has his own fair share of spectacularly failed experiments, and his will to go through with this ambitious project is just as amazing as his technical mastery.

The total running time of Che is a little over four hours long— epic in length— yet calling the film an epic would be misleading because this one big movie is also two separate films that happen to be indispensable companion pieces. The two films, shot back to back with a relatively modest budget, are far from the highly dramatic visual spectacles like Saving Private Ryan and Lawrence of Arabia. Che Guevara and his compañeros were guerilla fighters, not full-fledged armies, in the jungles of Cuba and Bolivia, not in the open space of a beach landing. The Battle of Santa Clara in the first part is the only battle outside the jungle, and for lack of a better term, this half has a more traditional Hollywood look because of its more structural camera placement than the second half, which contains a lot more handheld camera shots. The first half is also framed by Lisa Howard’s (Julia Ormond) interview with Guevara in 1964, shot in black-and-white. Their conversation acts almost like a commentary to Guevara’s reminiscences of the Cuban Revolution.

Close-ups on Benicio del Toro’s Che Guevara are rare, and the camera, operated by Soderbergh himself under the pseudonym Peter Andrews, is often at an observatory distance. Soderbergh undeniably makes a conscious effort to avoid the usual biopic clichés and refuses to go the easy route of simply glorifying Guevara. Benicio del Toro’s solemn portrayal of Guevara subdues the temptation of personifying an equivocal legend very much distorted by public opinion. His introspective Guevara is at his most expressive during his confrontation with different delegates while speaking at the UN in New York City. While the second part of the film is mostly focused on his failed ambitions, the first part is filled with a slew of colorful supporting characters including Raul Castro (Rodrigo Santoro), Guevara’s wife Aleida March (Catalina Sandino Moreno) and Camilo Cienfuegos (Santiago Cabrera). Demian Bichir’s convincing depiction of Fidel Castro is worthy of a spin-off.

When the project first started, Che was only conceived as one film about Guevara’s fight in Bolivia. Soon enough, Soderbergh realized Che’s motives in Bolivia could not be fully understood without his experiences in Cuba. Guevara could easily have had a comfortable life after Cuba doing anything but what he did— putting himself into the punishing conditions of one jungle after another, one armed struggle after another.Guevara’s obsession ultimately cost him his life, yet this dogged determination also made him who he was. Unlike Guevara, Soderbergh has an escape plan—his highly bankable films like Ocean’s 11 give him a unique status in Hollywood. The fiercely creative filmmaker, who is never complacent with his Hollywood success, applies a similar kind of obsessive ethic in his work. Though Steven Soderbergh will never have to put his life on the line for his obsession, he is compelled to explore the life of a man who would.

Che opens at the Angelika Film Center on January 16.

THREE PICKS FOR A DIFFERENT KIND OF HOLIDAY MOVIES

2008-12-21T15:56:00.000-08:00

Let's face it, the holidays inspire a lot of awful movies. If one Christmas is not bad enough for you, Hollywood can shove four down your throat (wink, wink, that new Vince Vaughn/Reese Witherspoon movie). Lousy holiday flicks also like to recycle those same old cliches to program you to tell yourself Christmas is all about your warm and fuzzy family. For Christ's sake (really!), here are my three unusual picks for holiday films:

WHAT WOULD JESUS BUY (2007)

The documentary follows a performance artist who called himself Reverend Billy and his choir of "Church of Stop Shopping" as they cruise across the country to "preach" about the ridiculous American tradition of holiday consumerism. Though the documentary is not as tight and focused as I hope, Rev. Billy is just the kind of character you can't miss- just the exorcism in a Starbucks coffee shop is worth your time. The satire is brilliantly absurd, but nothing is more absurd than trampling over a human being at a Wal-Mart.

THE APARTMENT (1960)

I know, I know, THE APARTMENT is not really a holiday movie, but part of the film is set in New Year's Eve (kinda like how IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE is set on Christmas Eve). But Billy Wilder is no Frank Capra. Wilder, who also directed SOME LIKE IT HOT and SUNSET BOULEVARD, is known for his sardonic humor and sharp wit. THE APARTMENT is about the hardworking office slave CC Baxter (Jack Lemmon) who will truly do all he can for the bosses in order to climb up the corporate ladder, including lending out his apartment for his bosses to meet their mistresses. Baxter, who has no life outside his job, happens to fall in love with the elevator girl (Shirley MacLaine). Unbeknownst to him is that the girl is actually a mistress to one of his bosses. It is one of the best black-and-white film on widescreen, and you wouldn't cynicism feels so heart-warming anywhere else.

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. MATTHEW (1964)

Hello? The last time I check, Christmas is "supposed" to be about Jesus, right? Guess what, the best Jesus move is made by an atheist-- a marxist homosexual atheist to be precise. Yes, yours truly, Pier Paolo Pasolini. The birth, life and death of Jesus with the most naturalistic and poetic look on film. The Jesus in this film speaks Italian, but Pasolini captures the essence of the man's conviction faithfully. The film was endorsed by the Vatican at the time, though Pasolini would eventually scared the bejesus out of the Church (and everyone else) with his highly controversial 1975 film SALO, which is based on the book by Marquis de Sade. There may not be any proof, but it is not difficult to believe Pasolini was killed for the film(s) he made.

What's your alternate holiday movie pick?

CHANCE OF A LIFETIME

2008-12-06T22:59:00.000-08:00

Director Danny Boyle gives his protagonist a chance of a lifetime in Slumdog Millionaire/ by Francisco Lo

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Everyone loves a good underdog story. Growing up in the harrowing slums of Mumbai as a panhandling orphan, Jamal Malik is perhaps one of the most improbable success stories. Now he is on India’s most popular television show Who Wants To Be a Millionaire? and is one question away from winning the top prize of 20 million rupees. So begins Danny Boyle’s enticing Slumdog Millionaire.

Hold on a second. That is not exactly how the story begins. In the first frame of the film, you’ll see Jamal tied up and tortured by interrogating police officers because he is suspected of cheating. The cops have a point. Lawyers and doctors can barely get beyond half the questions on the show, so how could an uneducated slumdog like Jamal possibly possesses that much knowledge? It all sounds like a pretty simple and wishful story, but Slumdog Millionaire cleverly unfolds the history and mystery of Jamal Malik with each question from his run on the game show. Adapted from Vikas Swarup’s book Q & A by screenwriter Simon Beaufoy, Jamal’s story is told in a series of flashbacks and flashforwards. In between the scenes of police interrogation and Jamal’s childhood, the audience is also treated to nail-biting scenes between Jamal and the tongue-in-cheek game show host Prem (played by Bollywood star Anil Kapoor). The flow of the film is unconventional, yet with the game show as the center of the spin, the story is surprisingly easy to follow.

The high-energy sequences shot in the slums of Mumbai will remind viewers of Fernando Meirelles’s City of God, but Boyle’s film has a much softer rhetoric in comparison. To be fair, Slumdog Millionaire never sets out to be a social realist drama with its fairytale-like storyline of a peasant on the verge of being a millionaire. The film is confidently idealistic, but Danny Boyle’s subtle social commentary is no less powerful. From the fake bottled water filled by Jamal’s brother Salim for a touristy restaurant to the boys’ phony tours at Taj Mahal, the film takes a witty jab at cultural colonialism, not to mention that the popular television game show is also a Western creation. Well-intentioned Westerners pay young Jamal a hundred dollars for a tour in the slums, despite the fact that their Mercedes rental is completely ransacked by Jamal’s fellow street urchins. As an outsider from another country, Boyle sensibly avoids any heavy-handed moral lessons, the kind of white privilege so prevalent in a world where Angelina Jolie saves the Third World one child at a time.

The rags-to-riches story of an underdog trying to save the love of his life from a horrid gangster looks bland and conventional on paper, but Slumdog Millionaire is far from your ordinary picture. With the captivating cinematography, by Dogma 95 veteran Anthony Dod Mantle, and a chest-pounding soundtrack, Danny Boyle keeps his viewers wanting to know more about Jamal’s compelling story in spite of the unbelievable coincidences. Jamal’s single-minded pursuit of saving his beautiful childhood friend Latika (Freida Pinto) is simple but effective because newcomer Dev Patel effortlessly displays the kind of innocent radiance that makes his character so engaging. Besides his run-ins with the jaded cop (Irfran Khan) and the unpredictable host, Jamal’s naïve approach to life is juxtaposed with his brother Salim’s callous way of street survival. Jamal’s Cinderella-run on the show excites the people of India, and for the film’s audience, it is irresistible to root for this foolhardy romantic.

More than a decade after the release of Trainspotting, the film that cemented Danny Boyle’s place in British cinema, it is still delightful to see another character of his diving into the shitter in a hilariously desperate situation. In serious terms, Slumdog Millionaire embodies all of Boyle’s strengths as a filmmaker. It has the adrenaline-rush of his zombie thriller 28 Days Later, the heartfelt poignancy of his children’s drama Millions and the mischievous humor present in all of his films. From Jean Renoir’s The River to Wes Anderson’s The Darjeeling Limited, India has always captured the imagination of Western filmmakers. Amidst pressure from the studio to make the film in English, Danny Boyle manages to capture the beauty and chaos of the “maximum city” with a primarily local cast and crew, including brilliant performances by the child actors (who keep part of the film in Hindi). The slight reference to Indian superstar Amitabh Bachchan and the vivacious dance number during the end credits is a playful tribute to Bollywood cinema.

A film as lovable as Slumdog Millionaire still has a handful of detractors. New York Times critic Manohla Dargis says the film’s “joyfulness feels more like a filmmaker’s calculation than an honest cry from the heart about the human spirit.” While Danny Boyle’s film is meticulously engineered to dramatic perfection, it is unfair to criticize a filmmaker just because he is simply good at making his film thoroughly entertaining. The film is well-balanced with mainstream appeal and artistic merit, a rarity in modern day cinema. Whereas last year was filled with award-winning pictures about the dark side of human nature, Slumdog Millionaire proves that you don’t need a ruthless serial killer with a bad haircut to make a statement about the human experience.

Slumdog Millionaire opens at the Angelika Film Center, Houston on December 19.

VOICE OF A GENERATION

2008-12-06T22:57:00.000-08:00

Milk evokes the spirit of the country’s first openly gay elected official, Harvey Milk/ by R.M. Crossin

In 1977, Harvey Milk became the first openly gay man to be elected to public office when he joined the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Just as Barack Obama’s election was seen by many as an important step in moving beyond this country’s legacy of discrimination and racism, Milk’s election was seen as an important step in the recognition not just of gay rights but also of human rights. The parallels between the two are unmistakable: an unlikely candidate challenging the status quo and breaking down the doors of discrimination to win an election. The story is remarkably timely, too, given the recent controversy in California over Proposition 8 that eliminated the right of same-sex couples to marry. Thirty years after Harvey Milk’s assassination Gus Van Sant delves into the last eight years of Milk’s life in a biopic starring Sean Penn in the title role. Who better to direct than openly gay filmmaker Gus Van Sant? Certainly the subject of gay rights is one that is very personal for him and like many of his previous films, Milk deals with characters outside of mainstream society. However, in contrast to his past films, the characters that inhabit Milk are interested in changing that dynamic.

Milk is framed by Sean Penn (as Harvey Milk) speaking into a tape recorder to preserve his recollections of life in San Francisco and the events that led to his election to the Board of Supervisors. We later find out that he is taking this action in response to receiving death threats, although he has courageously chosen to ignore them. The film begins with Milk and his new partner Scott Smith, portrayed by James Franco (Pineapple Express, Spiderman), moving from New York City to the Castro neighborhood in San Francisco and starting a camera store. As the Castro district transforms into a gay mecca, Milk becomes a vocal leader in the community and is dubbed the “Mayor of Castro Street”. Van Sant uses plenty of archival footage to help show the metamorphosis of the neighborhood. In addition, Van Sant went for an authentic look by filming on location. He employs cinematographer Harris Savides, who also worked with David Fincher to convincingly recreate 1970s-era San Francisco in the 2007 film Zodiac.

As his profile increases, Milk meets and recruits the young street hustler Cleve Jones, impressively acted by Emile Hirsch (Into the Wild). Hirsch is almost unrecognizable behind big glasses and big hair as Jones, who Milk mentors and encourages him to focus his energy into political activism. Alison Pill (Pieces of April) stands out in the mostly male cast as Anne Kronenberg, Milk’s new campaign advisor, who wins the respect of her initially skeptical male peers and is instrumental in Milk’s eventual success. Among many other factors, Harvey Milk’s success was due to making a conscious effort to appeal to a wide variety of voters and emphasizing the theme of “hope” in his campaign – very familiar concepts in 2008. After he takes office he begins working with fellow Supervisor Dan White. Josh Brolin (No Country for Old Men) turns in a stunning performance as the deeply conflicted, paranoid, and (as suggested by Dustin Lance Black’s thoroughly researched screenplay) latently homosexual White. The moments when Penn and Brolin are together onscreen are some of the most tense and exciting scenes in the film. Diego Luna (Y Tu Mama Tambien) is the only weak link in an impressive cast as Jack Lira, Milk’s last partner of note. Unfortunately for Luna, he doesn’t have much to work with in a one-dimensional role that attempts to elicit sympathy yet annoys viewers with his drama queen antics.

In Milk, Van Sant eschews his more experimental tendencies (particularly on display throughout his “Death Trilogy” comprising Gerry, Elephant, and Last Days) that have often alienated viewers looking for an emotional connection and directs one of his most accessible films since 1997’s Good Will Hunting. Ultimately, the success of the film hinges on Penn’s ability to inhabit the man and he is up to the task here. With equal parts warmness and empathy to go alongside a dogged determination and sense of justice for all people, Penn’s performance nails the qualities that were surely essential in Milk’s own political success. Harvey Milk’s drive to succeed, despite the tremendous obstacles and numerous setbacks he faced, and the courage he displayed by speaking out provide the foundation for a powerfully inspirational film. These factors help Milk rise above the standard-issue biopics that major studios routinely release around Oscar season. The final images of the film, showing archival footage of the huge amount of people who came to Milk’s vigil with lit candles continued to resonate with me long after leaving the theater and gave me hope that in the not-too-distant future Harvey Milk’s hopes and dreams for equal rights for all can be realized.

Milk is currently playing at Landmark River Oaks Theatre.

The Fearless Feat

2008-12-06T22:53:00.000-08:00

James Marsh’s documentary Man On Wire recounts the tale of a man who once walked between the World Trade Center towers on a tightrope/ by Vikash Singh

New York City’s once-looming twin World Trade Center towers are destined to be remembered not for the lives they lived, but for the way in which they died. Few will recall the wonder they evoked as they were being erected, but many will never forget the horror of watching them crumble. Fewer still will remember the day in 1974 when a man walked a tightrope 1,350 feet above the ground suspended between the tops of the two towers, at the time the world’s tallest buildings. Director James Marsh tells the enthralling tale of that day, and a time when these buildings were alive and well in his latest film, the documentary Man On Wire.

The pinnacle of French high-wire artist Philippe Petit’s wirewalking career, and arguably his life, came on August 7, 1974 when, at the age of twenty-four, he made the World Trade Center walk in what became known as “the artistic crime of the century”. His obsession with the towers originated in 1968 when he read a magazine article about the as-yet non-existent structures overseas and felt an immediate calling to conquer them.

Man On Wire is a documentary constructed in the manners of a heist movie with all the suspense and tension found in all the great Hollywood bank robbery films. Told through interviews of Petit and others involved, archival footage, photos, and a smattering of dramatic reenactments, the preparation and law-breaking attempt at the feat unfold in a way that builds tension and keeps the audience on the edge of their seats. Despite knowing the outcome, there’s still a nerve-racking feeling that he may get caught on the way up to the roof or, worse, that he may fall to his ultimate death from his precarious position atop the wire.

It’s hard to imagine that Marsh could make such an engaging documentary without any moving image of the climatic event. Though it’s a bit audacious and, while there are conceivably many ways in which the film could have failed for this reason, the success of the documentary relies heavily on Petit’s ability to recount the story. Petit has the kind of magnetic personality that draws people in - someone who is doing big things and everyone wants to be associated with - and as such he is an engrossing storyteller. Surely he’s done so many times over the last thirty-four years. Whatever the case may be, he pulls the audience in and holds them until the credits roll. And though it is explained in the most thorough way possible, such a feat remains, to any rational person trying to make sense of it, utterly inconceivable.

While Man On Wire is more about Petit than it is about the Twin Towers, it does serve, in part, as a tribute to their perplexing wonder. Notably absent from the film is any mention of the demise of these towering structures, and while some viewers may be slightly perturbed by this, the director’s choice to distance the story from the obvious will be quite refreshing to others. It would, in a way, be interesting to know how someone like Petit, who spent so much of his life closely linked to the towers and who seems to love them like he would a family member, would feel about seeing them fall. But, after watching the film, how he likely felt is quite evident.

Marsh was clearly heavily influenced by Errol Morris’ style of documentary filmmaking, from the dramatic reenactments to the Philip Glass-esque score, and while some viewers might wonder, “Well, who better to emulate?” other viewers might cringe at the possibility of this becoming the convention of documentary filmmaking. That’s not to say it doesn’t work here.

The film is at its most affecting when Petit’s former girlfriend tearfully recalls the sheer beauty of watching his acrobatic movements on the wire for nearly an hour from the sidewalk below. In a way, it seems like that’s why he did it. Not simply for the fame and the notoriety, but to give those watching something beautiful. Sadly, the film ends with the events following Petit’s rise to fame, the cliched tale of a man who, having achieved celebrity, destroys the relationships that helped get him there.

Man On Wire is an engrossing ode to the towers, to New York, to a childish sense of adventure, and to a time when people looked up in wonder and amazement.

Man On Wire will be released on DVD on December 9.

GIRL CUT IN TWO & FEAR(S) OF THE DARK

2008-11-17T20:25:00.000-08:00

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Legendary French director Claude Chabrol’s new film, A Girl Cut In Two, is loosely based on the 1906 murder of New York architect Stanford White. The title character, a young and beautiful TV weather girl Gabrielle played by Ludivine Sagnier, is torn between her affair with an accomplished married writer (Francois Berleand) and her relationship with a mentally unstable wealthy heir (Benoit Magimel).

Many critics have hailed the new film as a solid and suspenseful criticism on class relations by the director known as the “French Hitchcock.” It is clear, just as the film’s title indicates, that Gabrielle is pull by the two rich men whose love is clearly rooted in their own self-absorbed egos. The literature-quoting Charles is unabashedly self-righteous about his womanizing ways while the childishly unstable Paul has never failed to get what he wants (nor has he worked a day in his life). The key to the story is how Gabrielle handles the power dynamic between her and the two infatuated suitors with her sex appeal, which eventually becomes a two-way sword for this innocent young woman in an increasingly dangerous situation, yet the film ends up too bland and average with its unsurprising developments.

The most interesting thing in A Girl Cut In Two is the deliberate absence of sex and nudity in the seemingly steamy story. Chabrol wants to leave it up to the imagination of the viewers. It sounds clever and daring, but it is hard to say if this tactic actually galvanizes a film with an age-old scandalous love triangle that sounds all too familiar for the viewers of 2008.

I can respect a critic who offers a different opinion, but I can’t respect a critic who offers nothing but a synopsis. As a humble writer for the little Film Monitor, I am in no position to step on another writer’s turf, but I can’t resist telling you that New York Post’s V.A. Musetto wrote some of the most pointless reviews in recent memory. Aside from summarizing the film, Musetto throws in his two cents (and not a penny more!) on A Girl Cut In Two by calling it “a stylish and intelligent melodrama” without any dedicating a single word on why he thinks the film is good. That’s just flat out lazy. Why does anyone need to waste his/her reading the review when the writer's not even trying?

Another pathetic Musetto review brings me to the next film, Fear(s) of The Dark. It is a collection of animated shorts done by graphic artists and animators from the U.S. and Europe. V.A. Musetto claims that “there isn’t a dud in the 10 shorts,” but after counting over and over again by rewinding my screener, I still couldn’t find ten shorts. Unlike Musetto, I’ve only seen five short stories plus the computer graphics intervals in between. These shorts all share the subject of fear but they all vary in style. American cartoonist Charles Burns’ story of an insect-collecting nerd who is smitten by the prospect of a girlfriend is the best in the bunch. Burns, who is the author of Black Hole, translates his distinctive black-and-white graphic novel style perfectly with the help of computer animation. Marie Caillou’s segment of a Japanese girl with a nightmare about a dead samurai looks too much like something made with Adobe Flash, which I wouldn’t mind watching on Adult Swim but not in a theater. The rest of the bunch is aesthetically innovative, but they don’t provoke much fear and thrill.

Is it possible that Musetto made a typo when he claimed there were ten shorts in his review? Possibly. Why would I imply that he wrote a review without watching the film?

FEAR(S) OF THE DARK opens November 21 at the Angelika Film Center.

STRANGER THAN FACT

2008-11-06T23:39:00.001-08:00

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Located in Manitoba, Canada, Winnipeg is right in the middle of the North American continent. When Guy Maddin, who is often compared to his contemporary David Lynch for his surrealist films, was given a chance to produce a documentary about his hometown Winnipeg, he did not make a straitlaced textbook example. Instead, his resulting film is a “docu-fantasia” (a term coined by Maddin) that exposes his own complicated love-hate relationship with his longtime home through the city’s historical events and urban legends. Mixing travel documentary, childhood anecdotes and silhouette animation (and more) together in his cinematic laboratory, Guy Maddin (or should I say Dr. Frankenstein?) stitches together a wildly imaginative and absurdly engrossing film in My Winnipeg.

After introducing 1950s femme fatale Ann Savage in the role of Maddin’s mother in the opening shots, My Winnipeg takes the viewers to a midnight train filled with sleeping passengers. Guy Maddin, who also serves as the film’s narrator, introduces Winnipeg and confesses his motive behind this film is to explore the reasons why he never succeeded in leaving Winnipeg for good. His first step is to sublet his childhood home, a big white house he grew up in with his parents and siblings. For one month, Maddin invites his mother to live in the house, hires actors to play his sister and brothers, pretends to exhume his father’s body and reburies it in the living room (under the rug), has his girlfriend’s Pug, Spanky, play his childhood Chihuahua, and reluctantly includes the weird old lady who sublets the house but refuses to leave. He suggests that by reenacting his family episodes on film, he will be able to understand how both his relationships with his family and his hometown keep him from leaving the sleepwalking Winnipeg once and for all.

A few minutes after calling his mother’s beauty salon “embarrassing,” Guy Maddin the narrator recalls all the details and vivid memories of the little shop in front of his house and nostalgically proclaims his love for the place. Ledge Man, a TV drama which Maddin claims to be the only original production in Winnipeg for the last fifty years, features a young man threatening to kill himself by jumping off his apartment’s ledge in every episode, only to be talked down by his mother (“coincidently” played by Maddin’s mother) every time at the end of the program. While Maddin has previously explored his relationship with his overbearing mother in his last film, Brand Upon The Brain, it becomes explicitly personal this time around with his melodramatic reenactments of specific family incidents. Moreover, his complicated feelings towards Winnipeg bear uncanny emotional resemblance to his relationship with his mother. At times, he can’t seem to bear the city’s (and his mother’s) dealings at all. Yet deep in his heart, he always has a soft spot for his maternal roots.

There is really no way to tell what’s fact and what’s fiction in My Winnipeg. Maddin boasted that Winnipeg has ten times the sleepwalking rate than any city in the world. According to Maddin, Winnipeg is also the coldest city and the city with the most paranormal occurrence. Once during a fire at a racetrack stable, a band of horses stomped out into the wild in panic and ended up having their bodies frozen underneath a river with their heads stuck above the ice – the spot becomes a popular picnic spot for lovers for the rest of winter. Many of these folksy stories may not be factually accurate, but like any good campfire story, who cares how true they are if they’re wild and entertaining?

Despite the factual liberties Maddin took in his storytelling, My Winnipeg is an emotionally truthful film at its heart. Guy Maddin’s narration is passionate and intimate as if he was reading straight from the diary he kept under his pillow. He forcefully condemns the civic government for demolishing the historical architecture in Winnipeg, turning its landmark department store into a sterile and corporate-owned minor league hockey arena, which he describes as “a zombie in a cheap new suit.” Soon afterwards, the government tears down the old Winnipeg Arena, “the real Winnipeg Arena,” says Maddin. He claims to be born inside the arena’s dressing room and grew up in the locker room while his father managed the team. For Maddin, hockey is the paternal side of his upbringing and his beloved arena is a memorial of his childhood. With one last chance to say goodbye to his holy place, he literally marks his own territory by relieving himself in the bathroom one last time. With much wit and heartbreak, he vehemently expresses his anger towards the senseless city planning and his grief over the loss of his sentimental mementos in his powerful voiceover.

A big reason why My Winnipeg is so successful in convoluting the facts with the myths is Guy Maddin’s seamless blend of archival footage and newly-shot materials. Maddin, who is an avid fan of silent films and early talkies, has the remarkable ability to produce contemporary works with the vintage look of a 1920s film. For My Winnipeg, he shot most of it on an HD camera, projected his digital recordings on his refrigerator and re-shot the images with a film camera to create his vintage effects. His actors’ melodramatic acting style heightens those long-
buried feelings with an occasionally humorous edge which fits right in with his visual design.

“What if…?” is a question that Guy Maddin keeps asking himself throughout the film. What if Winnipeg Arena had never been torn down? Maddin imagines having hockey legends playing their hearts out in their old age as the wrecking ball crashes onto the pillars of the arena. He also envisions Winnipeg being salvaged by a proletariat superhero, Citizen Girl, who would right all the wrongs done to his dear city. There is not a doubt that Guy Maddin has a romantic heart full of nostalgia. But My Winnipeg does not come across as mawkish because Maddin’s feelings for his Winnipeg are endearing to anyone who has a hometown where they once belonged.

The Museum of Fine Arts Houston is showing
My Winnipeg at the following times:
Saturday, Nov. 22 (1:00 PM)/ Sunday, Nov. 23 (7:00 PM)/ Friday, Nov. 28 (7:00 PM)/ Saturday, Nov. 29 (7:00 PM)/ Sunday, Nov. 30 (5:00 PM)/ Sunday, Nov. 30 (7:00 PM)

The Theatre of Life

2008-11-06T23:38:00.001-08:00

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An apartment perpetually on fire. A young girl with a full-body tattoo. A stalker cast to play the man he has been following for 20 years. Welcome to the weird world of Charlie Kaufman’s Synedoche, New York. In his directorial debut, Kaufman (the creative mind behind the screenplays for Being John Malkovich and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) swings for the fences and, although he doesn’t knock it out of the park, he still provides the viewer with a lot to think about after the credits roll. This mind-bender of a film warrants a second viewing to properly digest and appreciate.

Phillip Seymour Hoffman, the best of a top-notch cast, portrays the protagonist, Caden Cotard (a clear stand-in for Kaufman). I am hard-pressed to think of another actor who could do a better job bringing Caden to life. From longing, to sadness, to anger, and resignation, Hoffman is able to completely embody the variety of emotions that Caden exhibits throughout the course of the film. Things start out relatively normal: Caden, a theater director, and his wife, who paints miniature portraits, played by the consistently impressive Catherine Keener, live in Schenectady, New York with their 4-year old daughter Olive (Sadie Goldstein). While attending couples therapy with a bookselling therapist (Hope Davis), Adele confesses that she fantasizes about the death of her husband. In Caden’s latest directorial effort, Death of a Salesman, his use of young actors and actresses for the middle-aged roles has attracted critical acclaim. Due to his obsession with salvaging his relationship with Adele, Caden ignores the advances of Hazel (Samantha Morton), who runs the box office at his theater, and Claire (Michelle Williams), an actress who stars in his play. Odd physical ailments assault Caden at every turn but it may all be in his head (“Cotard’s syndrome” is the delusion that one’s body is decaying). He is referred from doctor to doctor and never seems to be given a definitive diagnosis. Adele, who is less than impressed with Caden’s play and with Caden in general, decides to go to Berlin with Olive to exhibit her paintings. Shortly after Adele and Olive leave, Caden is notified that he has won a MacArthur genius grant that will fund his magnum opus. So begins the film’s and Caden’s journey away from anything that might be considered normal. One week later Caden is told that an entire year has gone by.

Caden begins work on a theatrical piece so epic that he uses what seems to be the biggest airplane hangar in the world (which is somehow located in Manhattan) as his stage and begins to construct a microcosm of life on the outside – a sort of mirror world. The unnamed play is a synecdoche— a figure of speech to indicate when a part of something represents the whole. The hugely ambitious play becomes an obsession for Caden and it begins to consume his life as well as the lives of all those involved. Rehearsals appear to go on around the clock and Caden is constantly adding to and changing the script and the set in an attempt to exorcise his own demons and explore the human condition. As he states, “There are nearly thirteen million people in the world. None of those people is an extra. They’re all the leads of their own stories. They have to be given their due.” What was designed to be a reflection of life becomes an alternate reality unto itself. Caden is using the play to try to find meaning in his own life but eventually the play becomes his life and the two are so intermingled that it becomes almost impossible for Caden and the audience to differentiate between them.

Loss is a central theme of Synecdoche, New York. Hoffman’s character is always mourning some loss, whether it is the loss of his daughter, his failed relationships, or his health. However, he is unable to properly reflect on these losses except through rehearsals for his play. His obsession with things that he cannot control and the past leads him to neglect the present— his new wife and daughter. Amidst all the sadness, loneliness, and death that permeate the film, there are unexpected moments of laugh-out-loud humor, although usually of the dark variety. Patient viewers will feel rewarded with the challenge of interpreting the cryptic plot. However, this is a double-edged sword for Kaufman – while all the intellectualizing can bring up some fascinating ideas and theories, it works in opposition to the emotional side of the film and does little to illuminate the relationships between the main characters. The film loses momentum after the first half and begins to drag but recovers towards the end.

Synecdoche, New York alternately mocks artistic pretension and celebrates the creative process of following your muse. The most fitting comparison might be Federico Fellini’s 8 1/2, as both films feature overlapping subplots and artists struggling with personal and professional crises. Like Caden with his mammoth theatre, director Charlie Kaufman’s attempt to embody the vast drama of life in 124 minutes is admirably ambitious, but perhaps a little too epic for this commendable film with such delicate feelings.

Synecdoche, New York opens November 7 at the Angelika Film Center, Houston.

ODD MAN OUT

2008-11-06T23:37:00.000-08:00

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Between the West and the East, Capitalism and Socialism, ideology and methodology, there remains the obliterated center, illuminated in the sixties by the Cold War, and discussed bluntly in Martin Ritt’s 1965 screen adaptation of John le Carre’s novel The Spy Who Came In From The Cold. A story of the existential crisis of the post-war West; a dark-hearted anti-epic spy thriller wrought with a direct skepticism and distrust of the bloated political systems and ideologies of the World’s burgeoning super-powers.

“Brace yourself for greatness” reads the tagline for this film. Perhaps an executive’s feeble attempt to generate ticket sales to the downer movie of the year, or perhaps a well placed bit of irony for a film based on a convoluted bit of espionage that cannot end in anything but defeatism and the absence of a hero. To brutally summarize the plot of The Spy Who Came In From The Cold: there is a washed up and drunk British spy, an intelligence agency in need of a pawn, an intelligence agency in need of intelligence, love, agents and double agents, and finally, in the end, a woman in trouble. Our aforementioned spy is Alec Leamas, acted by Richard Burton, head operator of British intelligence agents in East Germany. A self described “technician” and alcoholic, he holds no real ties to any friends or family, and only the faintest glimmer of that to his country.
After Leamas loses his last man in East Germany, he is brought in by his agency and told he should “come in from the cold,” or stay out in it if he is willing to take on a mission in which he will be used as a pawn. What is interesting in this film, as in many spy dramas, are the levels of acting present within them. Leamas must, to fulfill his new mission, act as a washed up, alcoholic spy with a disenfranchised resentment for his mother country in order to defect to East Germany posing as a flipped agent. Of course what we, the audience, know (but perhaps unbeknownst to his handlers) is that this is not much of an act for him. Leamas is the detritus of high capitalism. He is the epic hero boiled down into the technician with a task; the spy with enough inside information to acknowledge, “Communism, Capitalism, it’s the innocents that get slaughtered,” and that the great democratic hope of the West is being held in place by the same tactics they are fighting against in the East. The core political ideologies and morals no longer exist even though the power structures meant to uphold them still do (which, of course, in 1965 would have been a bit of a radical voice in comparison to the 007-duck-and-cover-under-your-school-desk-from-the-slanted-eyed-fur-cap-wearing sickle-and-hammer-carrying-bread-line-waiting-wire-tapping-red-commie-pig cultural climate).

The film’s social statement resonates deeply within our current political climate, for which the Criterion Collection should be commended for once again re-releasing such a necessary and timeless film with a load of insightful special features. The Spy Who Came In From The Cold speaks of a human society at its limit—that is, society as a system that has become so large it is beginning to enter into supernova stage. Like a dying star it has expanded so far out in its reaching that its core/center has disintegrated, creating the vacuum of a black hole, whose great gravitational pull, which although may currently be holding its pieces together, will be the end of the whole mess, colliding itself into itself until nothing is left. The film’s world is one in which there are few true ideological or methodological convictions left behind the actions of those in power. It is probably more the case that these kinds of core convictions have never existed within the realms of the powerful, only more successfully masked in ages before the age of mass communication. In the film there is the perpetuation of nations and creeds through complex systems of war, espionage, and propaganda, but what those wars are about, any epic sense of right and wrong, or nationalism based on deep connections to a motherland, are being reduced to nothing within the complexities of human society’s exponential growth.

In a world where the wars perpetuate wars, and the spy missions more spy missions, all without any real knowable cause—save for the powerful to stay powerful, which Ritt holds off screen and out of reach of his characters. The men behind the curtain in this film are as abstract and removed as the god who told Noah to build an ark. Leamas has little ideological or nationalistic beliefs, and yet he carries on with his work. It is interesting to note that it is during his mission, in his double-agent-traitorous monologues given to his East German captors, that he perhaps comes closest to the truth of his (and that of the film’s) perception of reality.

The Spy Who Came In From The Cold will be released on DVD on November 25.

Reliving The Past

2008-10-08T21:57:00.000-07:00

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Wong Kar-Wai’s contemplates the vulnerability of a yearning heart with the return of his martial arts epic Ashes of Time Redux/ By Pancho Torres

Filmed in the remote Gobi Desert in China, Hong Kong director Wong Kar-Wai’s 1994 martial arts film Ashes of Time was a troubled production from the beginning until the end. Crippled by the unpredictable and punishing conditions in the desert, the filming schedule was severely prolonged and the frustrated director took months to edit the film. The final product is not an action-oriented epic but an intricate narrative about the pitfalls of regrets. After it bombed in the box office, Ashes of Time slowly faded into obscurity and has become a lost classic that is finally revived in a “redux” version in 2008.

After garnering critical success with his second film Days of Being Wild, Wong got enough traction to gather funding for his ambitious martial arts project. Ashes of Time is the first and only wuxia film ever made by the filmmaker who is known for his melancholy romantic films. Wuxia is a fantasy subgenre of martial arts films which mainly deals with stories of swordsmen making a name for themselves in ancient China. For western audience, these are the action flicks that inspire pop icons like the Wu Tang Clan and Quentin Tarantino. While Ashes of Time is loosely based on the characters of the popular wuxia novels by Hong Kong writer Louis Cha, Wong’s illustration of the human side of these fantasized heroes is a refreshing take on a genre that is overdone by the constant recycle of the same old formula.

The story centers on a skilled swordsman by the name of Ouyang Feng (the late Leslie Cheung) who does contract killing for a living in a desert town. Every year, his friend and fellow swordsman Huang Yaoshi (Tony Leung Ka-Fai) visits him for a brief reunion. One day, the mysterious Murong Yang (Brigitte Lin) comes through his door and hires him to kill Huang Yaoshi, who has broken his promise to marry Murong Yang’s sister Yin(also played by Brigitte Lin). Huang’s complicated relationship with the Murong siblings reminds Ouyang Feng of the reason for his self-imposed exile— his lover (Maggie Cheung) has become his brother’s wife during his adventures in the martial arts world. Later, Ouyang Feng meets a nameless swordsman (Tony Leung Chiu-Wai, Wong’s frequent collaborator) who needs a job for the money before he can go back to see the peach blossoms in his village once more before he goes blind. The blind swordsman has left his village after his wife falls in love with his best friend Hunag Yaoshi. In the film’s most action-oriented sequence, Ouyang Feng takes a homeless swordsman named Hong Qi (Jacky Cheung) under his wing. But the idealistic Hong Qi risks his life to avenge the brother of a penniless girl (Charlie Yeung) for the price of an egg. Such an all-star cast with Hong Kong’s most acclaimed actors shall never happen again, especially after the tragic suicide of the magnificent Leslie Cheung in 2003.

Wong’s intimate and personal take on such a culturally ingrained genre is reminiscent of Billy Wilder’s 1970 film The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock Holmes, like the martial arts heroes in Ashes of Time, has been portrayed in hundreds of films and television programs with the same old clichés over and over again. Billy Wilder, who is famous for his ability to produce films that transcend their genres (Sunset Boulevard, The Apartment), depicts a melancholy Sherlock Holmes whose strictly rational persona is rattled by his feelings for a woman. Like Wilder, Wong put life into a genre film with his very own themes and ideals. In Wong’s martial arts world, the super-human swordsmen are ordinary people tormented by loneliness and alienation. They often make irrational and regrettable decisions in their relationships— Ouyang Feng is haunted by his memories of his lover who is now his sister-in-law, Huang Yaoshi wishes a magical wine will erase the memories of his past affairs, Murong Yin is driven into insanity after being spurned by Huang and the blind swordsman wants to see his wife again even though she is in love with his best friend. A second-rate director can easily make these subjects look pedestrian and puerile, but Wong Kar-Wai always manages to capture the complexity of the heart’s desire with finesse and humanity.

Ashes of Time also transforms the martial arts genre aesthetically with Christopher Doyle’s iconic cinematography and William Chang’s colorful production design. With the desert landscape as a backdrop, Wong and his crew infuse a strong sense of desolation into the film like a Sergio Leone western. The dejected environment matches perfectly with the characters’ lonesome inner monologues. While the film is primarily a character study, there are a few notable displays of martial arts. The fighting sequences are composed of disorienting shots with various slow-motion and strobe effect that creates a one-of-a-kind viewing experience. However, a new version of the film is much needed because any existing version of the film on DVD has mercilessly butchered this gorgeously filmed epic with distorted colors and shadows, in addition to the poor sound quality and horrible subtitles. While the trailer for the Redux version gives a glimpse of the vast improvement made, the digitally altered colors look a little too glossy and saturated for this somber desert drama. The Redux version is also five minutes shorter the original release, and cello solos by Yo-Yo Ma have been added to the score. It is a little disheartening to witness such revisionist antics from the director, but any new version of Ashes of Time has to be better than any existing one.

The infamous production troubles and commercial failure could have been a career killer for Wong Kar-Wai. Yet during this difficult time in his career, Wong took a two-month break away from editing Ashes of Time and made a low-budget quirky comedy known as Chungking Express, a film that propelled Wong to international stardom. Ashes of Time can now serves as a remembrance of an unconventional chapter in an illustrious career.

Ashes of Time Redux opens October 24 at the Angelika Film Center Houston.

** UPDATE 10/22 ** On the Redux version:

In my original review (above), I was a little concerned about director Wong’s possible revisionist motives on his Redux version of 1994’s Ashes of Time. Watching the screening of Ashes of Time Redux proves that I was totally wrong. It is true that the colors of the sand and sky in the new film are more saturated than any earlier version, but the overall film is a top-notch improvement that is true to the original’s form.

There is some minor editing work that enhances the details in the quick-and-furious fight scenes of the film, but it is still the uniquely frantic visual spasm that is different from any martial arts film. My only complain is the digitally-enhanced blood in the new version, which only amounts to a few seconds of the whole movie.

For the viewers who are not interested in any bloodbath, there is no worry because the bulk of the film remains a meditation on lost love and rejection. Yo-Yo Ma’s cello solo of the original score proves to be a perfect fit for the film’s pensive mood. With newly added title cards, the Redux version illuminates the five chapters set to the five seasons in the Chinese almanac calendar, an important element in the film. From the one-minute friendship in Days of Being Wild to the expiring cans of pineapples in Chungking Express, Wong’s time-obsessed characters are often haunted by the memories of their past affairs and. The fortune-telling nature of the Chinese almanac adds a strong sense of fatalism into the heavy-hearted loners of the film.

FLAWLESS EXECUTION

2008-10-08T21:46:00.000-07:00

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The Visually Stunning Revenge of a Kabuki Actor is a tale of vengeance with a gender-bending twist/ BY FRANCISCO LO

"When a man masters a style, and develops a reputation in the world, he tends to forget his initial enthusiasm for the task.” — Master Isshosai on the significance of his blank scroll.

An artist always leaves a personal touch on his/her work like the fingerprints left at a crime scene. Looking at any film director’s career, it is usually not difficult to connect the dots between his/her works. From science fiction to British period drama, Stanley Kubrick is as versatile as one can be. Yet even the most causal Kubrick fan can pick up on his distinctive style within his works. With Japanese director Kon Ichikawa, there is not much similarity between the works in his five-decade long career. Even the two war films he made in the 1950s, The Burmese Harp and Fires On the Plain, are vastly different— the former is a pacifist meditation about a soldier-turned-monk whereas the latter tells the bleak story of a band of desperate soldiers who resort to cannibalism. It is difficult to believe a director who made these realistic black-and-white war films is the same guy who made Revenge of a Kabuki Actor, a period drama filled with vibrant colors and elaborate theatre-inspired design

Kabuki is a form of traditional Japanese theatre that is notable for the actor’s heavy make-up, splendid costumes and its unique sing-and-dance setup. Yukinojo, played by Kasuo Hasegawa in his 300th film appearance, is a cross-dressing actor playing female roles and remains in feminine clothing off the stage, a common practice at his time. During one of his performances, he recognizes two men in the audience are the sleazy merchants who bankrupted his family’s business and drove his parents to suicide decades ago. Vowed to avenge his parents, Yukinojo, who is also a trained swordsman, opts not to reveal his identity and kill them on the spot because one of the sleazebags is not present. One of the three merchants, Sansai Dobe (Ganjiro Nakamura), is now a powerful man in the area thanks to his beautiful daughter Namiji’s status as the warlord’s favorite concubine. Namiji (Ayako Wakao) falls in love with Yukinojo’s androgynous beauty after watching him on stage and invites the actor to meet her in her father’s mansion. Capitalizing on the innocent woman’s infatuation, Yukinojo inches his way to a masterplan that will destroy his enemies with their own greed and guilt.

In contrast to the mournful tone of Yukinojo’s deadly quest, a group of colorful minor characters reveal a lighter side of the film. Yamitaro, also played by Kasuo Hasegawa, is a Robin-Hood-like thief who secretly observes and assists Yukinojo from afar. Hirutaro (Raizo Ichikawa) is a hopeless imitator who always tries to outdo Yamitaro, only to fall short comically. Ohatsu (Fujiko Yamamoto) is a headstrong female pickpocket who can’t seem to decide how she feels about the pale-faced protagonist. Then there’s Kadokura the runaway samurai (Eiji Funakoshi) who attempts to kill Yukinojo in order to prove that he is the better swordsman, an assessment not shared by their teacher Isshosai (Jun Hamamura).

With a tight and straightforward screenplay adapted by Ichikawa's wife Natto Wada, Revenge of a Kabuki Actor is an entertaining drama as well as a stunning work of art. Ichikawa, an aspiring painter before he became a director, pours his creative talents into this colorful cinematic exercise. His use of light and shadows is uniquely inspired by theatre, as demonstrated in the deliberate changes of lighting within a shot and the striking presence of darkness throughout the film. Revenge of a Kabuki Actor is anything but a point-and-shoot recording of a staged drama. Every frame is a gorgeous picture because Ichikawa uses the widescreen as his canvas with careful execution. The quiet little sword fights, though only lightly choreographed, are composed with neat little shots of a reflecting blade and short blasts of action. While many of the film’s actors have backgrounds in traditional Kabuki training, the ensemble’s performance is spot on and free from any overtly theatrical display. It is clear that Ichikawa’s film is an attempt to challenge the traditional form of filmmaking with theatrical devices, instead of exploiting the readiness of filming a play.

Irony is probably one of the very few elements known to be in common among Ichikawa’s films. The biggest irony in Revenge of a Kabuki Actor is the fact that the two female characters are crazy about the androgynous cross-dresser with heavy make-up, an absolute antithesis to the masculine world of samurai cinema. But in true samurai man-love fashion, Yukinojo is also adored by the leader of his acting troupe and Yamitaro, the manliest of men in the film. The brotherly love between Yukinojo and the two men suggestively implies the unspoken affection that is left to the viewers’ imagination.

After shooting Revenge of a Kabuki Actor under the total control of a studio set, Ichikawa ventured to the outdoors with 1965’s Tokyo Olympiad, a sports documentary that is still considered one of the best. Kon Ichikawa never settled down with a style or niche. He is the blank scroll that always adapts with enthusiasm. In comparison to his fellow Japanese masters, Ichikawa’s name remains relatively unknown today, and that is the biggest irony of his legacy.

Revenge of a Kabuki Actor will be released on DVD on October 14.

UNSUNG HEROES

2008-10-08T21:38:00.000-07:00

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Spike Lee’s Miracle at St. Anna depicts the exploits of four Buffalo Soldiers in Italy during World War II/ By R.M. Crossin

At the 2008 Cannes Film Festival, Spike Lee criticized fellow director Clint Eastwood for not featuring any black soldiers in his recent World War II film – Flags of Our Fathers. However, instead of being content to sit on the sidelines, Lee was already in the process of backing up his criticism with action by delivering his own political and artistic statement of intent to theaters. Miracle at St. Anna is Lee’s attempt to rectify the overlooked contributions of African-American soldiers during World War II. Lee co-produced and directed the film, based on the 2003 novel by James McBride, who also wrote the screenplay. The novel is inspired by the exploits of the 92nd infantry division of Buffalo Soldiers in Tuscany, Italy as they advance on the Germans and, in particular, on four soldiers who find themselves behind enemy lines after a bloody battle. In particular, Lee examines what motivates these soldiers to put their lives on the line for a country in which they are treated as second-class citizens at best.

Second Staff Sergeant Aubrey Stamps (Derek Luke), Sergeant Bishop Cummings (Michael Ealy), Corporal Hector Negron (Laz Alonso), and Private First Class Sam Train (Omar Benson Miller) survive a horrific battle that makes it clear that they are considered little more than cannon fodder by their racist commanding officer who directs artillery fire on their position. Before they can regroup in the small Italian village of Colognora, they rescue an abandoned and injured Italian boy named Angelo (Matteo Sciabordi). Luke stands out the most among the five principal actors – his Stamps exudes honor and quietly leads his men by example. Ealy’s Cummings is a polar opposite of Stamps – cynical, streetwise, and quick-tempered. One of the central conflicts of the film is between these two men as they attempt, sometimes with words and sometimes with fists, to assert their dominance over the other. Stamps, while acknowledging the inequalities he faces at home, believes that fighting in the war will help bring about a better future for his children. Cummings, however, is constantly questioning why he is fighting in a “white man’s war”. A beautiful and resourceful Italian villager, Renata (Valentina Cervi) is also a point of contention between the two men. Another major focus of this film is the relationship between Angelo and his rescuer Train (named “the chocolate giant” by the boy for his enormous size and skin color). Train is a gentle, slow-witted, and brave Southerner who carries around a large marble statue head he believes makes him invulnerable. He senses something special about Angelo and is fiercely protective of him despite his difficulty communicating with the Italian-speaking child.

Some intriguing ideas are explored in Miracle at St. Anna. For starters, Lee examines the irony that these soldiers feel more at home and accepted in the foreign village than in their own country. Although some of the characters border on stereotypes, Lee shows that each army has its honorable and morally corrupt soldiers and that all the characters are praying to the same god. Unfortunately, a number of factors bring Lee’s epic aspirations crashing down to earth. The relationship between Train and Angelo, which should be the heart of the film, fails to connect emotionally. The magical realism surrounding their relationship (does Angelo have special powers?) stretches the limits of believability and feels out of place in the middle of a war movie. The momentum slows to a crawl when the soldiers arrive in the village because they have nothing to do but hide out – this might work if the dialogue was not so weak and the actors had better material to work with. Lee tries to include too many subplots, including battles between Italian partisans and German soldiers, and a murder-mystery from 1983 that acts a framing device for the World War II portion of the film, which is actually told in flashback. Eventually, Miracle at St. Anna collapses under the weight of it all – including the attempt to make a historically significant film. At 160 minutes, the film may have benefited from a shorter running time and the scenes taking place in 1983 could have been edited out entirely. The film’s ending, which attempts to wrap up all the loose ends, is contrived, unconvincing, and feels like it belongs in an entirely different film.

Ultimately, Miracle at St. Anna is a flawed but passionate tribute to the sacrifices made by men of color who served their country with honor. Kudos to Lee for at least having the guts and ambition to take a risk and try something so epic with a social conscience. We know he can make engrossing epic films - he scored with 1992’s Malcolm X. Perhaps he would have been more effective tackling this subject matter if the source material was better.

Miracle at St. Anna is currently playing in theaters.

Life During Wartime

2008-10-08T21:24:00.000-07:00

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Joseph Cedar’s Oscar-nominated film from Israel explores the defense of a remote outpost from a soldier’s point-of-view/By R.M. Crossin

Imagine defending a military outpost for 18 years from enemy troops who want to destroy it and then, one day, receiving orders to blow it up. The absurdity of this situation and of war in general is explored in Israel’s Oscar-nominated Best Foreign Language Film from 2007. Beaufort is adapted from a novel by Ron Leshem (who also co-wrote the screenplay with the director), which was based on true events. The film takes place in the year 2000, in the last days of Israel’s 18-year-long first war with Lebanon. Joseph Cedar, the director, himself was a veteran in the first Lebanon war. His personal experience in the conflict helps lend the film an extra layer of authenticity. Beaufort takes its title from the ancient 12th-century Crusader mountaintop fortress inside the Lebanese border and next to the outpost where the Israeli troops are hunkered down.

Although Beaufort is a war film, it also eschews some of the standard elements of the genre, most obviously it never shows the viewer the faces of the enemy soldiers. Not once do we see any of the Hezbollah fighters who are bombarding the Israeli outpost with sporadic mortar attacks. This allows the camera to focus on the IDF (Israeli Defense Force) soldiers and their reactions to the situation they find themselves in. In essence it becomes a much more personal film with war serving as the backdrop. The soldiers’ superiors are only seen on-screen once, although we often hear their voices relaying commands and giving orders over the radio, further emphasizing the soldiers’ sense of isolation. The narrow tunnels inside the maze-like outpost help contribute to the sense of claustrophobia. The film’s pace perfectly captures the long stretches of inactivity that the soldiers face as they guard the outpost and wait for supply trucks between random bursts of chaos and violence. The minimalist / ambient score by Ishai Adar complements the often haunting mood and tone of the film.

At the heart of the film is 22-year-old Israeli commanding officer Liraz Liberti (portrayed by Oshri Cohen), who is aware that he and his troops will soon be abandoning the outpost but is determined to hold it until that time. Cohen does an admirable job of conveying the heavy burden of responsibility that Liraz bears. As the casualties mount, Liraz becomes more and more affected and cracks begin to show in his and his troops’ resolve. His beliefs are tested and he is torn between following orders that at times do not make practical sense and protecting his men from needless harm. Liraz is constantly trying to stay one step ahead of the Hezbollah attacks by rebuilding the defensive concrete walls that are repeatedly blown up and has to resort to tricks like using mannequins as guards so he can keep his troops well-rested and alert. Cedar is particularly successful in slowly building the tension as Ziv (Ohad Knoller), a bomb disposal expert, is sent to the outpost from headquarters to diffuse a nearby bomb preventing supply trucks from delivering much-needed supplies. The act culminates in a scene in which the initially hesitant Ziv dons the heavy armor meant to protect him before slowly and cautiously making his way towards the bomb. In the aftermath, some of the soldiers begin to question their mission and openly defy Liraz’s command. Despite the dark tone, some genuine moments of humor occasionally lighten the mood and provide a release valve for the soldiers and the viewer. At one point, Ziv asks another IDF soldier what he does all day. The soldier responds, “Guard the mountain. So it doesn’t escape.”

As news of the withdrawal reaches the Hezbollah, they begin to increase the frequency and intensity of their attacks to make it look as though they have forced the IDF to retreat. The last act of the film has Liraz carrying out orders to blow up the bunker before abandoning it – something Hezbollah has been trying to do all along. Cedar lets viewers make up their own minds about whether defending the outpost was worth the lives of all the soldiers who died trying to defend it. Beaufort castle is a powerful symbol – it has remained intact for centuries and has stood witness to soldiers dying in countless wars and conflicts over little more than a piece of land.

Beaufort will be released on DVD on September 30.

HERE'S LOOKING AT YOU, KID.

2008-10-08T20:55:00.000-07:00

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Son of Rambow is a heartfelt comedy about the friendship of two little Rambo fans.
by J. Palmer Cass

Long before Rambo became the subject of countless parodies and ridicule, he was the idol of many young boys in the 80s. The trigger-happy maniac was the epitome of masculinity— a one-man army who defies the constraint of society and set his own score with the evildoers. In the British comedy Son of Rambow, two neglected schoolboys are inspired by Rambo: First Blood to make their own action movie.

The story is driven by the relationship between the two main characters—Will and Lee. Will (Bill Milner) has an imaginative mind, but he can only secretly express his creativity with his drawings in a book because his family is part of a strict religious sect that forbids any kind of pop culture, be it music or television. Lee (Will Poulter) is the devil child of the school. Without any parents at home and barely getting any attention from his older brother, Lee indulges in his daily mischief and hopes to win a young filmmakers contest with his homemade action videos. The two boys meet each other through detention and Lee recruits the clueless Will as his stuntman while Will gets a first taste of the secular world after watching Lee’s bootleg copy of Rambo: First Blood. Will’s repressed creativity is awakened by Rambo’s bloodthirsty heroics and hence decides to join Lee in the production of their own homemade action flick.

The stark contrast between two personalities is a classic comedy setup. Lee’s reckless behaviors and Will’s simple-minded innocence leads to many of the film’s funniest moments. Son of Rambow is smart enough not to rely merely on the boys’ goofy homemade videos. The filmmakers understand that making a film focused on cheesy DIY videos will only lead it to Youtube, but not the big screen. The strength of the film is the chemistry between the two very young actors as two young boys becoming good friends in the process of working together.

But what good drama can sustain for ninety minutes without a conflict between the two heroes? After Lee is suspended from school for a week, Will befriends the coolest lad in school, Didier the French exchange student. Bored by making out with every girl in school, Didier is fascinated by Will’s vision and volunteers to star in his film with his little gang. Lee and Will’s friendship takes a hit as Lee is dismayed by Will’s willingness to let the new kids hijack his project. This is supposed to push the film into its dramatic peak but Didier is such a poorly written character, his presence ruins the film’s early buildup. For the most part, Son of Rambow successfully avoids being overtly quirky like most independent comedies. But it goes to great lengths to imply Didier’s coolness with much unnecessary quirk and little charm. It is safe to say, even by the standard of the 80s, it is painful to see a French kid breakdancing in his skinny jeans.

The film never explains why the boys are so attracted to Sylvester Stallone’s Rambo. It is clear that Son of Rambow is not attempting to be any kind of statement about the social education of masculinity. Yet it is interesting to note that both Will and Lee long for a father figure in their life. Will secretly hangs onto his late father’s watch and rejects the guidance of a church member who is interested in his mother. Lee devotes his time to filmmaking after he routinely fails to impress his brother. Though Rambo may not be the most sensible role model, Will and Lee can easily relate to a rebellious and lonesome hero.

Director Garth Jennings, known as Hammer & Tongs with his producer Nick Goldsmith, is a veteran music video director. He is arguably one of the best in the medium and his creative vision is evident in his videos for bands like Blur, Radiohead and Vampire Weekend. Jennings’s use of Will’s doodling in Son of Rambow lovingly illustrates the imagination of a child’s mind. Although music video directors usually have no problems translating their hip aesthetics into a feature film, very few are successful in crafting a satisfying full-length film without heavily relying on an overtly stylized look. Son of Rambow has its moments but it is a tad too predictable at times. Nevertheless, it is a heartwarming film about the friendship of two young boys, and it is pleasant to see that Son of Rambow is nothing like his “father.”

Son of Rambow is currently available on DVD.

With Bliss and Agony

2008-09-10T19:24:00.000-07:00

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Max Ophüls’s films give you the idea that the director seems to be very fond of both the joy and pain of falling in love. The couples in his films are often intensely tangled in their love affairs and happily showered by the bliss of yearning for each other. Yet in most of his films, the couple are also tortured by the pain of being set apart. The Earrings of Madame de… is arguably Ophüls’s best romantic tragedy and it showcases the German-French virtuoso’s skills and style at the pinnacle of his career.

At the beginning of this carousel of passion, Louise sells her least favorite pair of diamond earrings to a jeweler behind her husband’s back in order to settle a personal debt. While she is at the opera house, she lies to her husband André, who is a wealthy general, about losing the same earrings. The general then uses his connections to look for the “lost” earrings and the scared jeweler shows up at his office the next day. After re-purchasing the earrings from the merchant, the general gives them to his mistress as a farewell gift. The mistress, who happens to gamble all her cash away in Constantinople, ends up selling the exquisite earrings to a local. The earrings’ next buyer is Baron Farbrizio Donati, an Italian diplomat who travels from Constantinople to France. In a cleverly staged scene at a train station, Donati falls in love at first sight with Louise but ultimately misses the chance to talk her as they only manage to share a stare at each other.

The chain-of-events in the ownership of the diamond earrings turns out to be an elaborate setup for the film’s romantic centerpiece. When Donati finally gets to meet Louise again, their courtship begins in the ballrooms of the aristocrats. André, who is confident and usually tolerates his wife’s suitors, warns Donati that his wife is an incorrigible flirt who has dashed the hopes of plenty of men. On the dance floor, Louise and Donati engage in a series of flirtatious conversations and it does not take very long for Louise to fall for the charming diplomat, who is a mirror opposite of her military husband. André soon finds out his wife’s little affair is beyond playful this time and orders her to stay away from Donati by sending her on a faraway vacation. Not knowing when will he see Louise again, Donati gives her the diamond earrings from Constantinople—the exact same ones which Louise sold away.

The story does not end here but it would be a crime for this review to give away such a well-written story. The brilliant use of the earrings as a plot device embellishes the complexity of Louise’s desire. With loads of accessories to spare, Louise cannot wait to sell her earrings at the beginning of the film. After a few changes of hand and a change of heart, the very same pair of jewelry has transformed into a gift of love that Louise cannot live without. The plot device elevates an ordinary and melodramatic love triangle to an intriguing study on passion and desire.

Ophüls’s carefully staged shots make The Earrings of Madame de… a feast for the eyes. Cinematographer Christian Matras’ camera glides through the ballroom smoothly as Louise and Donati dance gracefully and sensually across the dance floor. The tracking shot should not take all the credit though, as the film’s lavish set, built with detail and precision, provides a wholesome look into the characters’ surroundings while the panning camera gives the viewer a panoramic view of the entire scene. Very few filmmakers in history can match Ophüls’s ability to capture his subjects with such innovative camera movements and exhilarating tracking shots.

The Earrings of Madame de… cannot be completed without the excellent peformance by its cast. Charles Boyer portrayed Louise’s husband André as an emotionally distant military man who never articulates his pain for his wife’s affair explicitly. On the other end of the spectrum, Donati, played by famed Italian filmmaker Vittorio De Sica (Bicycle Thieves), seems like the tender and charming lover that André can never be. At first glance, Louise has the appearance of a superficial upper class woman that few could relate to. But Danielle Darrieux’s Louise is not only trapped by her status as a general’s wife, but also by her status as a woman during that time period. Her otherwise innocent flirtatious front hints at the fact that sexuality is her only trump card within the male-dominant aristocracy. Ophüls’s depiction of and interest in female subjects is way ahead of his time.

As expected, Criterion Collection does a wonderful job of restoring the 1953 film to pristine condition. The best part of the DVD package is the 70-page booklet featuring an essay by a film critic, an excerpt from a book by the costume designer and the source novel by Louise de Vilmorin. The introduction by filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson (There Will Be Blood) on the DVD will hopefully spark the interest of a new generation of American audience. The audio commentary provides a feminist perspective but the interview featuring source writer de Vilmorin’s bashing of the film is perhaps the most interesting supplement.

The Earrings of Madame de… will be released on DVD on September 16.

(Article from Issue No.7, September 2008)

Ô Canada

2008-07-07T00:18:00.000-07:00

Hailed as the best Canadian film ever made, Mon Oncle Antoine solidified the legacy of the enigmatic Claude Jutra.
By Francis Colo

Spring finally arrived in Cape-Santé, Quebec after months of freezing weather. The ice over the surface of St. Lawrence River was melting and something unexpected washed up on the banks. It was a man’s body, one which you could not identify from his face because god knows how long it had been soaking underneath the ice. The mystery was solved when a piece of paper was found inside the man’s belt. It said, “I am Claude Jutra.”

Fifteen years prior to his death, filmmaker Claude Jutra made Mon Oncle Antoine, a coming-of-age tale set in a small mining town that opened with little commercial fanfare but was praised as the best Canadian film of 1971. Over the last three decades, critics at the Toronto International Film Festival have consistently voted Mon Oncle Antoine as the best Canadian film ever made. Despite the praises from up north, Jutra and his film is still relatively unknown outside Canada.

The history of Quebec plays an important role in the setting of Mon Oncle Antoine. The 1940s and 50s is known as The Great Darkness in Quebec’s history because of conservative premier Maurice Duplessis’ corruption and church-oriented policies. Many economic institutions, such as asbestos mines, were controlled by English capitalists in French-majority Quebec. In a subplot of the film, miner Jos leaves the asbestos mine out of frustration, only to find his chances are just as grim elsewhere. Later in the film, the English boss of the mine rides his sleigh around town and throws candies at houses with a disdainful look on his face, only to be greeted by indifference from the poor villagers. In an act of defiance, Benoit and his friend scare his horse to pull him away abruptly by throwing snowballs at him. The scene echoes the bitter sentiments of Francophone Quebec towards the Anglophone ruling class.

So what qualifies Mon Oncle Antoine as the best Canadian film ever made? U.S. critic Leonard dismissed it as “not bad, but nothing special.” It is true that the film is not an epic like Gone With The Wind, but its merit is built upon Jutra’s keen eye for the details of daily life. For the first half of the film, fifteen-year old Benoit quietly observes the adults while he helps out his uncle Antoine at his general store on Christmas Eve. He sees his aunt and uncle lovingly interact with each other, the patrons singing together and Uncle Antoine drinking shot after shot for any sort of occasion. Meanwhile, Benoit is confounded by his newfound interest in sex and love, as he deals with his attraction towards Carmen, the hired girl at the store. With plenty of experience working as documentary filmmakers, Jutra and his cinematographer Michel Brault give the film a very organic look that immerses the audience attention into the characters’ lives. Brault is also unique in his use of the zoom, a breakaway from conventional filmmaking.

The film reaches its climax as the story takes a dark turn after the first hour. The naive Benoit thinks it would be fun to ride the sleigh across town and help his jolly uncle with collecting a dead body. After a grueling ride in the snow, Benoit is quietly petrified by the sight of the corpse of the fifteen-year old boy. The proximity between him and the boy awakens the idea of mortality for Benoit, who has never thought of death in a personal way. The cold pale feet, the lifeless body and the unfit casket are all too close for comfort. He could have been in that boy’s place, too. And to make things scarier for him, people are not really what he thinks they are. (Spoiler alert) Uncle Antoine is not really a jolly confident fellow who likes to drink, but a bitter old man who drinks to numb himself. He also finds out Fernand, the store clerk who he trusts, sleeps with his aunt while they are away. Life is not so simple and innocent after all. Benoit’s painful lessons on life are all packed in one night.

Besides the love for his culture, Claude Jutra’s yearning for childhood is what ultimately makes Mon Oncle Antoine a heartfelt movie. The playful Jutra once bluffed his way to director Federico Fellini’s hotel room by pretending to be a television news crew. After finishing medical school at the age of 22 to please his mother, he continued his pursuit as a filmmaker with his short films and documentaries. In 1963, he won the Best Canadian Film award for his first non-documentary feature À tout prendre. After years of struggling to find financial support, Claude Jutra displayed many of his talents again by writing, directing, editing and playing the role of Fernand in Mon Oncle Antoine. The film also shows his uncanny ability to convey the joy and pain of growing up. Even without any knowledge of Quebec’s history, any audience could enjoy the poignant beauty of Mon Oncle Antoine.

Praises and awards for his films never catapulted Jutra’s career as a filmmaker. He continued to struggle with getting his films made and seen, and he often had to settle with television work and acting jobs. Sadly, Jutra’s memory started to decline in the early 1980s and he realized that he was in the early stages of Alzheimer’s, a painful secret that he never shared with anyone. He could not remember the lines for his acting roles, nor could he remember the scenes he shot mere hours earlier. In November 1986, he wrote a couple of notes to his friends about his “departure” and directions to feed his cats before he left his house, never to be seen alive again. Mon Oncle Antoine serves as the pinnacle of an artist’s career and remembrance of a perpetual child.

Life In a Glass House: The Model Couple

2008-05-30T04:15:00.000-07:00

by R. M. Crossin

The Model Couple (Le couple temoin), a 1977 French film by director William Klein is an interesting but ultimately flawed look at a social experiment gone awry and the loss of privacy and freedom. Claudine and Jean-Michel are selected by the Ministry of the Future to represent the “average couple” and live in an “experimental urban center” for 6 months so the government can analyze their behavior and use the results to improve housing and other government programs in the future. Ordinary citizens can see the couple’s every move throughout the experiment on broadcast television. The Ministry of the Future constantly bombards them with a series of bizarre tests. One amusing sequence has them lying naked next to each other with multiple wires attached to their bodies and encouraged to use only sounds and/or numbers to express how they feel. Unable to control themselves, the couple laughs at the absurdity of the situation.

Gradually the psychological tests begin to become more intrusive as Claudine and Jean-Michel are told what to do and when to do it. It soon becomes clear that they are little more than product testers and promoters for the consumer goods and products that fill their apartment. The couple’s privacy begins to further erode as fans of the television broadcast come into their apartment to gawk and ask for autographs, walking through the set as if it was a museum exhibit. The objectivity of the experiment is called into question when the staff is shown encouraging the couple to fight and then trying to portray the argument to television audiences as something that spontaneously occurred, reminiscent of how reality television is anything but real considering all of the editing and interference by producers.

Eventually, Claudine and Jean-Michel begin to tire of constantly living under a microscope and begin to rebel by sabotaging their apartment and the experiment. Unfortunately, the end of the film feels rushed and the lack of a conclusion left this viewer confused and unsatisfied.

We'll Always Beat Them With Star-Spangled Freedom: Mr. Freedom

2008-05-30T04:12:00.000-07:00

by Francis Colo

Decades before the invention of Stephen Colbert and Freedom Fries, there was Mr. Freedom fighting to spread the good word of “freedom” for the U.S. of A. Sent by Dr. Freedom to stop the infiltrating communists in France, Mr. Freedom’s patriotic pursuit is a razor-sharp political satire that magnifies the absurdity in our reality.

Made in 1969, Mr. Freedom has the wildly imaginative DIY look to match its outrageous story. Mr. Freedom (John Abbey) is a superhero dressed in obnoxious red, white and blue football gear. Marie Madeleine (Delphine Seyrig), his sexy sidesick, is a tongue-in-cheek bimbo with puffy red hair. And with names like Corporal Dick Discount and Johnny Cadillac (and a cameo by Serge Gainsbourg as Mr. Drugstore), Mr. Freedom’s crew is a group of freedom fighters who fund their underground movement with a prostitution ring. His supposed ally, Super Frenchman, is a huge balloon who refuses to have Mr. Freedom interfering with France’s affairs. His Soviet nemesis, Moujik Man, is a sleazy communist in a fat suit. His other enemy is Red China Man, another enormous talking balloon. In one of the film’s funniest scenes, Mr. Freedom visits the U.S. Embassy in France - a Wal-Mart-like supermarket with a group of skinny female dancers following Mr. Freedom and the U.S. ambassador. On the surface, Mr. Freedom looks like a nightmarish fairytale, but its underlying message cannot be any closer to the truth about America’s consumer culture.

Mr. Freedom is filled with hilarious one-liners. “Wrong is red, and right is… red, white and blue!” and “Right is might, and might is Freedom - Our Freedom,” are mottos that would make George Orwell chuckle. In a speech to his crew, Mr. Freedom reminds them that the Reds and the Blacks are endangering the “White Wall of Freedom.” The hypocrisy of America, rattled by the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement, is brutally ripped apart throughout the film. While these events are seemingly dated now, Mr. Freedom is as relevant as ever. Like Mr. Freedom, the United States is protecting its so-called freedom by liberating another country with its bombs. It is scary to see how Mr. Freedom still rings true today. Sadly, it is even scarier to realize how little American Imperialism has changed over the decades.

An American Model In Paris: Who Are You, Polly Maggoo?

2008-05-30T04:05:00.000-07:00

by Henri Leopold

William Klein’s debut feature Who Are You, Polly Maggoo? floats across the screen in such a self-assured, breezy manner, it’s nearly impossible to imagine that this is the American auteur’s first foray into feature filmmaking. But it seems as though such a film could only come from someone like Klein, who spent years as Vogue magazine’s most renowned photographer before helming this classic absurdist satire in 1966.

This light, entertaining romp tells the story of titular Brooklyn-born model Polly Maggoo in Paris, played by Dorothy MacGowan, who serves as both the primary subject of self-doubting television director Gregoire, played by Jean Rochefort, and the delusional obsession of lovesick Prince Igor, played by Sami Frey. As Gregoire attempts to find out what makes Maggoo special - to find, as he puts it, “the truth behind the makeup” - for his television show ‘Who is Polly Maggoo?’, he can’t help but fall in love with Maggoo’s flippant persona. He feels she’s hollow and sets out to prove himself right (or wrong) through a series of nonsensical psychological tests. To him, her life is nothing more than a masquerade in which she’s always acting, always posing. But he finds her irresistible nonetheless.

The oft-indecipherable plot points are lost and found along the way, but that’s of little importance. Who Are You, Polly Maggoo? is a deft and experimental critique of modern fashion, and a humorous and poignant satire of the way Europe views Americans and their way of life. Though self-indulgent at times, it’s self-aware and cheeky, and, most of all, fun. It plays, in part, like an outrageous cinema verite documentary that evokes Godard at his most pop and Fellini at his most absurd.

Much like other films of the Nouvelle Vague, Who Are You, Polly Maggoo? is primarily concerned with the preoccupations of the bourgeoisie - fashion, celebrity, and vanity. But in this uber-serious world of high fashion, in which models must wear monstrous sheet-aluminum dresses and bear the constant wrath of media hounds, it’s a relief that Klein’s film never takes itself too seriously.

Fighting in the War Room, Ep. 1 - May 2008

2008-05-19T14:57:00.000-07:00

This is the first of what will be a monthly web-exclusive series from FilmMonitor.org. Each month the editors of Film Monitor will sit down and discuss various cinematic topics in hopes that something worthwhile and/or entertaining will be said. In this installment, Francis Colo, R. M. Crossin, and Joseph Ross meet at Film Monitor headquarters in Montrose to thresh out their thoughts on the films of 2008 thus far. Before proceedings can begin Crossin turns his chair around so he can straddle the back of the seat.

Joseph Ross: Should we sit like that?
R. M. Crossin: Not unless your name is Rory.
JR: Or Dwayne Wayne.
RC: (Laughs) So we’re here to talk about our most anticipated films of the summer?
Francis Colo: Of the next four months.
RC: And our favorite films of the year so far?
FC: Have you watched many films this year?
JR: Other than Iron Man.
RC: Yes. I actually haven’t seen Iron Man.
JR: Really?
RC: Believe it.
JR: I don’t believe it.
FC: I guess most of the movies I’ve liked so far are actually left over from last year. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days was definitely my favorite movie of last year.
RC: That’s something we can all agree on. What we don’t agree on is what year it’s from.
JR: Pretty much any foreign film is going to be from the previous year by the time we get it here.
FC: Another film I really liked is The Counterfeiters.
RC: Tell us about that because our readers might not know, and I know I don’t know about it.
FC: The Counterfeiters is an Austrian film about these Jewish prisoners in a concentration camp who were forced to make counterfeit American bank notes and British Pounds during World War II as a Nazi scheme to destabilize their economies. I thought it would be good, but it was even better than I expected. It was very gritty and the camera work was really good.
RC: Was it a documentary?
FC: It’s a fictionalized account of something that actually happened.
JR: I thought it was also very good - definitely one of my top films of the year, but the musical choice was really bad. It varied between totally out of place to completely inappropriate at some points. Not offensive really, but very poorly chosen.
FC: It’s definitely worth watching anyway. It’s one of the most entertaining Holocaust movies, I would say. Most Holocaust movies are downers. This one is a downer too, but it makes you want to see more.
JR: But did you think the music was bad?
FC: I didn’t pay too much attention to the music but I feel some of it was a little over-dramatic. I guess it was trying to fit the period.
RC: Was it as bad as the music in Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead? Because that was so out-of-place.
FC: (Laughs) No.
JR: Basically they used Jewish music from the period, a lot of which was really upbeat, and it really doesn’t fit with the themes of the movie. It was either that music or really overly dramatic strings that are a very weird contrast. It just doesn’t fit. The music is either too happy or it’s trying to force the drama, and in both instances it’s unnecessary. But the cinematography and the acting were very good.
FC: Very good.
RC: Should we be on the lookout for this director? What else has he directed?
FC: He directed another WWII movie with Matt LeBlanc, Joey from Friends, in it. It was a bomb, so this was a resurrection for him.
RC: It’s nice to see a director can bounce back from working with a member of the Friends cast.
FC: Let’s not blame it on Joey.
JR: His budget was clearly lower than the last movie he made but it worked.
RC: It seems like sometimes when directors are limited by their budget it brings out the best in them.
JR: That’s what the point of Dogme95 was in a way - if you limit yourself it forces you to be more creative. And I think because of the lower budget on The Counterfeiters the camera work is really great - all handheld - and it really worked well.
FC: So what’s your favorite movie so far this year?
JR: My Brother is an Only Child, which neither of you has seen. It’s about two brothers growing up in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s in Italy who both feel like they need to change the way things are going in their country, but set out to do that in different ways. One becomes a Communist and the other a Fascist but they find out that family is really important even though they differ in their political views. It’s told from the viewpoint of the Fascist brother, but the Communists are generally portrayed as the more sympathetic group. It’s a really powerful movie.
FC: Did you like it because you’re a Commie?
JR: I could definitely relate to the Communist brother.
RC: I’ll have to say at the top of my list is 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, which really disturbed me. It’s definitely not a “date movie.” In fact it’s about as far on the opposite end of the spectrum as you could imagine.
JR: Which is why I’m wondering why you took me on a date to see it. I guess you didn’t know beforehand.
RC: (Laughs) It’s very stark and the takes are really long, and as a result of that the actors really have to step up their game, and I feel like they really rise to the challenge. It shows these two young women’s determination to follow though with this abortion, basically at any cost. I think it’s interesting that the term ‘abortion’ isn’t even used for a good portion of the film. You don’t necessarily know what’s going on at first. It’s really ambiguous. I’m not really doing it justice.
JR: That was definitely the best movie of last year. I think it’s one of the best films in a long time, so it’s hard to do it justice.
FC: The last frame of the film when Otilia looks right into the camera - it was a very powerful moment for me.
RC: Also at the top of my list is Paranoid Park, directed by Gus van Sant, which I was pretty impressed with. I didn’t necessarily know what to think going in because I hated his film that was loosely based on Kurt Cobain’s “last days.” It was awful, but I like and respect van Sant and I like Nirvana a lot so I thought it had all the ingredients of a good movie.
FC: Let’s not talk about that.
RC: Anyway, Paranoid Park impressed me.
FC: (To readers) Read the article in issue number two.
RC: Right, I’ll cop out on that one, but Young@Heart I really thought would be a novelty - old people singing rock songs, but it was really touching. I’m not the kind of guy that will cry at the drop of a hat but I’ll admit that that movie brought a tear to my eye. I like how it challenged a lot of the stereotypes about old people, and it was nice to see that. Society is always emphasizing youth and saying things are over when you reach a certain age, and the subjects of the movie really prove a lot of those stereotypes wrong. It was very ‘punk rock.’
FC: Are you done?
RC: I’ll just say that Shine a Light is one film I regret not seeing in theaters. One of the reasons I didn’t see it contradicts what I just said about Young@Heart, about getting older. It’s a documentary about the Rolling Stones but they’re old. I thought, ‘well, these guys are past their prime,’ and I didn’t want to pay ten bucks if I wasn’t going to like it, but I definitely want to see that on DVD.
JR: Since we’re talking about movies we missed in theaters but look forward to seeing on DVD, I really wish I had seen The Band’s Visit. Did either of you see it?
FC: No, but it’s about a Muslim Egyptian police band that gets lost in an Israeli town.
JR: They get off at the wrong bus stop or something?
FC: It’s supposed to be a comedy.
JR: The opposite of Paradise Now.
RC: What made you want to see that?
JR: I don’t know. I think the poster looked interesting. Back in the day, before the internet, movie posters were the primary way of marketing a movie. It still works sometimes, for me anyway.
RC: I think it’s an overlooked art form now. You can do so much with them, but some look really tossed off. The ones that really catch my eye are the ones that are mysterious or enigmatic, that don’t reveal everything and make you wonder, ‘what’s that about?’
JR: It’s a neglected art form, but I feel like there are still some really good ones out there. One thing that really bothers me is that the people making the DVD covers never use the poster artwork. Bad Education, for example, had a really great poster, but the DVD cover is horrible. That happens a lot.
RC: Is that a contractual thing?
JR: I don’t know. Maybe they feel that the way to sell a DVD is different than selling a ticket to a movie in a theater. They feel like it must have the actors’ faces on the cover, whereas a poster doesn’t necessarily have to. There Will Be Blood just had a cross on it, but of course the DVD cover had to have Daniel Day-Lewis.
RC: It was very minimal.
JR: But it leaves you wondering which is great. The font was perfect.
FC: It looked like a gangster movie.
RC: It could have been a gangster movie, a Tupac documentary or something.
FC: The font on the poster for The Year My Parents Went on Vacation looked like an old-school soccer jersey and the movie is about a boy in the summer of 1970 when Brazil is in the World Cup - it’s a Brazilian movie - and the boy wants to see the World Cup with his parents, but they told him they were on vacation. They were actually left-wing students and professors who were running away from the government, so they dropped him off at his grandfather’s home in a Jewish neighborhood in Sao Paulo. I think the font really captured the time period.

RC: I feel kind of like a mainstream whore saying this, but I genuinely am interested in this new Batman movie, The Dark Knight, by Christopher Nolan. I like when a franchise can retain the same director and the same major players, and I was impressed with the first one, and with the exception of Katie Holmes, I think the whole cast did a good job. I’m glad Maggie Gyllenhaal is replacing her and I think it’s going to be really weird seeing Heath Ledger on screen, knowing that it’s the last completed film he was in.
FC: You don’t have to be ashamed of wanting to see a mainstream movie. I want to see it just because Heath Ledger is in it.
RC: Just because of that?
FC: He’s phenomenal in the trailer. His performance looks very promising. He has a terrifying presence in the trailer that I think is very different than Jack Nicholson.
JR: Heath Ledger looks genuinely crazy in this, like a psychopath.
RC: For me Jack Nicholson’s performance in the 1989 Batman movie was enjoyable, but I think what they’re trying to do with this one, even though it’s based on a comic book, is make it a little bit more realistic and believable.
FC: He reminds me of Brandon Lee in The Crow a little bit.
RC: Well, not just visually, but they’re both based on comic books, they’re both pretty dark-toned, and they’re both going to be released after the actors died. They were both young guys with a lot of potential - you could argue about Brandon Lee on that. I’ve really been impressed with Christopher Nolan’s films so far. There’s a lot of moral ambiguity in them, and I’m hoping he continues in that tradition.

JR: My most anticipated film of the year is Standard Operating Procedure because, really, anytime Errol Morris makes a movie it’s something to look forward to. In my opinion he’s the greatest American director making movies right now.
RC: Wow, that’s a bold statement. I thought you were going to say the greatest documentary filmmaker.
FC: I think a lot of people would agree with you on that.
JR: He’s the only documentarian that I know of that you can watch one of his films, and just by the look of it you can tell it’s an Errol Morris movie.
RC: Right, in two minutes or less.
JR: You can tell just by the cinematography, the framing of the shots. I think he’s got his own visual style and that’s something not many documentary filmmakers have.
RC: It’s hard to infuse your own individual style in that type of filmmaking.
FC: I agree with that but at the same time I think that to be a great filmmaker doesn’t mean that you have to have a distinctive visual style. Quentin Tarantino has a distinctive style.
JR: You’re saying that just because someone has a distinctive style doesn’t make them a great director?
FC: Yeah. It depends on how you view filmmaking. I’m sure people who align with the ‘auteur theory’ would be more into a visual style, but some people feel like it’s a distraction. Billy Wilder was against that. Louis Malle doesn’t really have a distinctive style either, but I agree that what Errol Morris has achieved with documentaries is very rare and unmatched by most people.
RC: And yet he remains to mainstream filmgoers relatively unknown.
JR: Even to people who watch documentaries. The movie is about the Abu-Ghraib prison photo scandal. It’s interesting because he generally picks subjects that are not well known, or not known at all - just random people. Like Vernon, FL, which focuses on people he found in a small town in Florida, or Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control. The Fog of War was different because it was about Robert McNamara, a person that many people are already familiar with, but he managed to tell a story that not many people knew. Nobody’s heard from him in years.
RC: It showed him from a different angle, where he’d previously been demonized.
JR: Right, and when I heard his next film would be about Abu-Ghraib it seemed like a departure that he would make a movie about such a well-known topic - everyone knows of it, but when you really start to think about it, not many people know the actual story of what happened there. They know of the scandal and they know about the photos, but they don’t know the story behind them. They know about the lies and the cover-up, but the story of the people who took the pictures hasn’t been told yet. So, Francis, what’s your most anticipated film of the year?
FC: There’s a Wong Kar-Wai film that was released a few years ago, Ashes of Time. I know Sony bought the rights to it and is re-mastering it.
JR: For DVD?
FC: I think there’s a chance that they may want to release it in theaters. Right now any copy you can find in North America on DVD is super crappy. It’s one of the worst DVDs you can find. Before Chungking Express he was making a martial arts epic. He normally doesn’t make genre movies, but Ashes of Time is in a martial-arts setting but there is not a lot of fighting in it. The focus is on a relationship. The imagery is great - the usual Christopher Doyle cinematography.
RC: He also did Paranoid Park.
FC: Yeah, and his usual actors, Tony Leung and Leslie Cheung from Happy Together. It was one of the biggest flops of his career because the movie took a long time to make and it made very little money in return. It took him more than a year just to edit the movie and he filmed it in the desert, which was a pain in the ass. The movie was so frustrating that he decided to make Chungking Express to get away from Ashes of Time. So I’d like to see that one the big screen.
RC: Did he finish the film and then make Chungking or did he take a break and film Chungking in the interim?
FC: I think he finished shooting the movie but he wasn’t done editing it. What he did with Chungking Express was he wrote it during the day and shot it at night.
RC: So it was much more free and spontaneous. Sounds like kind of a 180.
FC: Right, and Chungking Express put him on the map while Ashes of Time was sort of forgotten by people. My Blueberry Nights was disappointing, but I’m looking forward to Ashes of Time. That reminds me, Criterion Collection is actually going to release Chungking Express later this year.
JR: They’re also releasing Bottle Rocket, which has been on the rumor list for years and has finally been confirmed.
RC: We all love Wes Anderson and Bottle Rocket has so much quotable dialogue (Mimics Dignan’s famous bird-call).
JR: So, what do you guys think about Mister Lonely? It’s about a Michael Jackson impersonator, played by Diego Luna, who befriends Marilyn Monroe, played by Samantha Morton.
FC: I thought Michael Jackson would be interested in Shirley Temple.
JR: Exactly, Marilyn Monroe’s daughter is a Shirley Temple impersonator, and I think we’ll find out in the movie that his love interest is actually Shirley Temple.
FC: Or maybe there will be an Emmanuel Lewis impersonator there.
RC: Or a Macaulay Culkin.

This is followed by Francis Colo imitating Macaulay Culkin’s scream from Home Alone, putting both hands to his cheeks. At this point the meeting is officially adjourned.