Cinemism

Asian American International Film Festival Preview

Posted on July 7, 2010 by Wayne Lorenzo Titus

This year the AAIFF runs from July 15th to July 24th. With a smaller selection of films from last year, the choices are consistently good and occasionally remarkable. Opening Night has been handed over to award-winning Filmmaker Raymond Red, who is no stranger to international audiences. He was the first and remains the only Filipino to have won the Palme d’Or in Cannes for his 2000 short film, Anino. In Manila Skies we follow Raul (Raul Arellano), a struggling day laborer who tries to cobble together some money for a trip back to his childhood home in Romblon, where he hopes to help his ailing father. Raul’s attempts to secure a more lucrative job abroad are stymied by Manila’s suffocating bureaucracy.

Manila Skies

After a disastrous turn of events, Raul ends up using a gun and grenade to return to the innocence he longs for. With guerilla-style framing that emotes claustrophobia and anxiety, Red propels us through the grime and heat of the city and never lets up. Unbalanced by a long, meandering middle section, the film nonetheless is a vital commentary on social injustice in the “modern” world.

The Friday night pairing is delectably off-kilter with Slice, a Thai horror thriller screening concurrently with Wo Ai Ni Mommy, a documentary about adoption from China. Slice, taking a cue from recent, excellent Korean thrillers, leaves audiences in brilliant suspension as we meet truly awkward characters in rural settings.

Wo Ai Ni Mommy

The opening screen titles of Woi Ai Ni Mommy let us know that since China began its international adoption program, over 70,000 children have been sent to live in American homes. In this bird’s eye documentary we follow one family, the Sadowskys, as they bring home a second orphan from Guangzhou, China to Long Island, New York. Fang Sui Yong, a precocious and head-strong eight year old is forced to acclimate quickly to her new life as Faith Sadowsky.

Saturday highlights include Bruce Beresford’s latest, Mao’s Last Dancer. A biopic about Cunxin Li, it tells the story of this renowned ballet dancer’s transition from Communist China, hand-picked by Madam Mao, to his success and struggles in the United States. Though rather predictable in its set pieces, Beresford manages to invest a convincing emotional depth throughout.

Au Revoir Taipei

Saturday’s Centerpiece Presentation of Au Revoir Taipei is one of the better films I’ve seen all year, and I promise this is not an overstatement. A love story interrupted by a gangster film, all undone by a screwball comedy is the only apt description for this wonderful romp directed by first time feature director, Arvin Chen. Kai (Jack Yao) is a lovelorn college student, abandoned by his girlfriend, Faye, for the allure of Paris. In his futile attempt to learn French from a book and escape the monotony of waiting until he can see her again, he parks himself on the floor of a local bookstore every day where he meets Susie (Amber Kuo). Interweaving various storylines, Chen takes us through the shops, alleys, and parks of Taipei in crisp, electric night cinematography. We follow a distracted cop, Kai’s best friend, and the gangster’s bumbling henchman as they all try to discern the mystery of love, wrapped up for easy transport.

Sunday ends with At the End of Daybreak. Starting with a disturbing scene of animal cruelty which frames the entire film, Ho Yuhang doesn’t shy away from hard truths. Tuck Chai (Tien Yu Chui), an aimless 23 year old, is involved with Ying (Meng Hui Ng), a reckless high school student. They see each other as temporary distractions from the imposition of expectations and responsibilities placed on their young shoulders. Ho Yuhang captures the complexity of familial entanglements, the consequences of corporal punishment, and the lack of class mobility through a kinetic lens that masterfully flows from heart-wrenching close-ups to sweeping action sequences.

At the End of Daybreak

Closing Night on July 21st features the Mamma Mia-esque romantic comedy The People I’ve Slept With. Angela (Karin Anna Cheung) has a healthy sexual appetite, and when she finds herself pregnant she must embark on a journey to not only find the father, but herself.

The Shorts programs are also rather ambitious with themes as varied as family, love, hidden true stories, humor, and a special focus on Taipei. The First Kiss program includes an ode to the serendipity of love in Tall Enough. From the director of Medicine for Melancholy, Barry Jenkins, we witness the unfolding romance between an interracial couple portrayed in snug frames and tender close-ups.

Tall Enough

In another short, Works of Art, a sumptuously filmed New York is explored through Art (Paul Juhn). He is a struggling actor, running to casting calls during lunch breaks from a boring job. Tired of being typecast and ignored, his friend offers him the acting job of a lifetime. While pretending to be someone else, he runs into the one real thing he has been missing all along.

Works of Art

Throughout the festival there are also various panels, including ones on green film-making and overcoming copyright hurdles for those so inclined. All in all, this year offers multivalent options, even within the same film. It will not be uncommon that comedy and family drama enthusiasts will be sitting next to each other or thriller junkies and doc hounds will have something to talk about at the same screening. Take a chance, and you’ll probably walk away with a story to tell!

Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: AAIFF, Raymond Red, Cannes, Slice, At the End of Daybreak, Wo Ai Ni Mommy, People I've Slept With, Au Revor Taipei, Arvin Chen, Manila Skies, Tall Enough, Works of Art | Leave a Comment »

Tribeca Redux San

Posted on May 20, 2010 by Wayne Lorenzo Titus

MicMacs
Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s whimsy (excluding the dismal Alien Resurrection) is near-mythic at this point with a small coterie of films under his belt. MicMacs continues Jeunet’s streak of small, carefully curated jewels. His previous films, The City of Lost Children and Amélie in particular release their brilliance in small doses scattered about the screen in seemingly random trajectories. This technique born of no technique is on full display in MicMacs, as we are introduced to Bazil, our hero, as a child in a disconnected reverie of images, sounds, and emotions made palpable. Primary among those is the death of his father in a mushroom cloud of dust. We are then flung to his adult present where a random bullet to the head propels the inventive plot machinations. Suddenly, we see that Bazil is a man defined by ordnance large and small. When he determines that the manufacturer of the bullet lodged in his brain and that of the mine which killed his father are unrepentant rivals, a singular comeuppance takes form. Of course, all great heroes have compatriots and Bazil’s consist of a group of misifts living underground away from the rest of society. They manifest hijinks by air, sea, and land, which are too artfully crafted to spoil. Jeunet is a master at exposing the soul in dungy crevices, and that’s all it takes to deliver this sumptuous expose on quirkiness with a hint of romance.

Ondine
Neil Jordan re-enters the fray after the Jodie Foster vehicle, The Brave One, with a peculiar Colin Farrell spectacle. The film arrives and leaves painfully slight and undercooked. Farrell (Syracuse) plays a divorced single father, who we are told is a caring dad thanks to a few threadbare scenes with a smart-alecky daughter played by Alison Barry. The story hinges on the improbable tale that Syracuse’s new lover is a selkie, a mythical seal-woman. However, not for one moment was this plausible, nor a fascinating premise. Moreover, the purported selkie, Ondine (Alicja Bachleda) barely registers on the screen. I felt as though a mighty gust would blow her away at any moment. Her coy, enigmatic looks and fragmented statements add up to nothing I could discern. Maybe this film will appeal to children with its peripatetic and facile rhythms that go everywhere and nowhere at once.

A Brand New Life
Somehow reminiscent of Tze Chun’s Children of Invention and So Yong Kim’s Treeless Mountain, this preponderance of abandoned children seems to be a mini-trend. Oddly, I can’t say I’m tired yet of watching these preternatural child actors suffer through harrowing tableaux, especially when they are as good as Sae Ron Kim, who plays Jinhee. Her face is a study in restraint, and I doubt there is any craft involved, as she is so young. We follow her GAZE through riding with her dad on a bike, being left at a Catholic orphanage, deep unresolved mourning, and self-discovery. At all times, our engagement is expertly modulated by the rise of her eyebrow, the downturn of a lip, or an askew glance. I was mesmerized as well by the economy of camera movement director, Ounie Lecomte, and cinematographer, Kim Hyunsook, employ. All the necessary information is relayed in confined frames, akin to Kurosawa’s High and Low but without the stilted formalism. Instead, the film has a quiet, kinetic energy, if possible, that sustains the most mundane scenes of characters walking to and from the orphanage gates. I can’t wait to see absolutely anything else from this first-time director!

Other Notables:

Vidal Sassoon: The Movie– The man, the myth, the meglomaniac all discussed in brilliant black and white cinematography.

Saturday Night– James Franco’s inside look at the preparation involved in one episode of the iconic comedy franchise…John Malkovich in drag anyone?

Gerrymandering– An in-depth dissertation on the often confusing and ridiculous redistricting that occurs before elections to ensure votes by race, class, or population size. Only for die-hard policy wonks!

Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: A Brand New Life, Gerrymandering, MicMacs, Ondine, Saturday Night, Vidal Sassoon: The Movie | Leave a Comment »

Tribeca Redux Deux

Posted on May 13, 2010 by Wayne Lorenzo Titus

The Arbor
One of the most unique documentary presentations I’ve seen in recent memory, Clio Barnard tells the story of Andrea Dunbar, a famous British playwright who died tragically at the age of 29. In complete disavowal of the usual stock and archival footage and expert analysis, Barnard has professional actors lip sync interviews with Dunbar’s relatives and partners as they interact in the real world. This technique creates an uncanny effect which displaces the narrative and actively mediates the logical-factual truth dichotomy which most documentaries bring up implicitly. Barnard then intersperses these moments with scenes from Dunbar’s plays acted out on the grounds of the actual estate in which they are set, amongst gawking real-life crowds. The Arbor is a challenging piece of performance art wrapped within an evidential premise that rewards multiple viewings.

American Mystic
So a medium, a sundancer, and a witch walk into a bar…My skeptic’s armor was on as I sat through this look at alternative spirituality. In slow, rhythmic scenes which predictably stop-in on each character for ten minutes at some vital juncture and then repeats, Alex Mar manages to raise the import of communication with the dead, Native American animism, and paganism to the level of any Christian religion. They all decidedly have tenets, parishioners, and an apprenticeship structure despite their outsider reputations (minus Native American beliefs perhaps). Listening to the subjects in their own words is a very intimate and convincing tool. Like all of us, they are looking for meaning in the environment around them. Although the signs they are attuned to may be foreign, the purpose remains the same.

Loose Cannons
A nice departure from the melodramatic onslaught of his last film, Un giorno perfetto (A Perfect Day), Ferzan Ozpetek lightens up just a bit. The themes of family, food, and love still abound, but they are at the service of a comedy. The story is framed by the youthful mistakes of the family matriarch, played by a commanding Ilaria Occhini. However, in present day southern Italy her grandson, Tomasso, wishes to avoid becoming part of the family pasta business and instead follow his writing bug. His only way out is to come out and risk his father’s banishment. Unfortunately his brother hijacks that plan, and Tomasso must contend with his familial obligations despite a desire to return to his life in Rome. I can’t say I thoroughly enjoyed this film with its soap opera lineage flagrantly on display, but fans of this filmmaker will still come out in droves. A lot of the cultural semblance is also lost on an American audience and the acting is broad to put it nicely, but Ozpetek always manages to get at some central truth about human interactions despite his lavish detours.

Arias with a Twist: The Docufantasy
This documentary is an utterly charming look at the New York underground wunderkind, Joey Arias, and his sometimes puppeteer collaborator, Basil Twist as they prepare for their groundbreaking new show. The wonderfully inventive Twist sadly seems like a sideshow to the Arias main attraction. It is Arias’ restless re-invention, legendary collaborations, and perseverance through loss that drives the narrative and holds interest. When people are on screen describing how great Joey is, you just want to see Joey being great. When Arias channels Billie Holiday in various guises and countries, I truly did get goosebumps and the theater suddenly got a little steamy. He managed to capture all of her soulful frailty–it was not an impersonation in any traditional sense but some sort of celestial convergence. We follow Arias from his days as a clerk in Fiorucci’s clothing store to his performances with Klaus Nomi and on to his master of ceremonies duties with Cirque du Soleil’s Zumanity. I was wholly entranced by his journey and my only regret is that the film ended so quickly.

Legacy
This psychological drama stars Idris Elba as a returning mercenary for hire, who deals with the demons of his most recent mission in the claustrophobic confines of a Brooklyn apartment. Playing crazy is notoriously difficult because all the tics we associate with madness read as comic when transported to the big screen. Elba is certainly a multi-talented actor as his turns on The Wire, The Office, and countless British gangster films attest. However, jettisoning his natural charisma for a paranoid, blistering portrayal isn’t wholly successful. At times Elba does resort to calibrated histrionics which read as false when we have the luxury of seeing so many PTSD sufferers in real life. Moreover, the director, Thomas Ikimi cloaks the proceedings in a political plot that never really goes anywhere. Ultimately we are left with a competently executed thriller with no real thrills. Moments which question the character’s perception of reality are intriguing, but they also don’t seem to play into a larger thematic cohesion and come off as cheap tricks. In interviews, the director speaks of an affinity for Hitchcock, but he has yet to master his use of misdirection and understatement. Nonetheless, I look forward to how Ikimi’s style might develop with future projects.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: American Mystic, Arias with a Twist: The Docufantasy, Legacy, Loose Cannons, The Arbor | Leave a Comment »

Tribeca Redux Uno

Posted on May 11, 2010 by Wayne Lorenzo Titus

Snap
Honestly I can’t tell you what this movie is about at all and that perhaps is a failing in me, but halfway through the screening I began to wonder if the director, Carmel Winters, was simply testing the limits of comprehension in some wry clinical manner. We follow a foul-mouthed mother as she is being interviewed about some undisclosed tragedy, the same mother sometime in the past, and a seemingly unrelated story of a young man as he alternately taunts and nurtures an accommodating baby. I suppose the film is about some trauma that is represented by the fractured mis-en-scene, but I may not be the right audience for such an achingly pedantic journey. The lead performance of Aisling O’Sullivan is certainly stirring, but to what ends?

Elvis & Madona
Could this possibly be the first film about a drag queen and lesbian relationship? It might as well be, for Brazil’s Marcelo Laffitte has unquestionably made a landmark romantic comedy. Despite contending with an obviously low budget and limited actors, this was a buried gem in the festival. The infectious love for passionate failure, dreaming in color, and struggling artists on screen was a welcome antidote to the spate of more dour films this year. Even the more brutal scenes with Madona’s ex-lover seemed somehow tender and revelatory. Let’s make way for a new cult classic!

Sons of Perdition
Three young men escape from the suffocating strictures of Warren S. Jeffs polygamist sect in order to determine their own fate. This documentary, directed by Tyler Measom and Jennilyn Merten, trails Sam, Bruce, and Joe as they deal with the traumatic loss of their families and the often confusing roadblocks which limit their educational and job prospects. The lack of structure unsurprisingly encourages the normal teenage psyche to claim dominance and alcohol, drugs, and sex become coping mechanisms as they acclimate. Jeffs’ eerie voice, intoning tenets from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, serves as the connective tissue between fragmented vignettes– attempted rescues of a sister and mother from the compound, giddy salon visits where new freedom is expressed in blond highlights, and talking heads with intimate knowledge of the polygamists. Ultimately the audience is drawn into the plight of these exiles not necessarily because of where they came from, but out of worry for their future.

brilliantlove
An all-consuming, explicit romance à la 9 Songs, Ashley Horner drops us into the middle of a lit fuse soaked in gasoline. The sweaty, prelapsarian garage in which Manchester and Noon copulate ferociously is a dream-like space undisturbed by the rest of humanity. When they leave their dilapidated Eden to pilfer food or drink the devil’s nectar, only danger skulks about the countryside– a real threat to their prolonged incubation. We are repeatedly asked to ponder whether their brilliant love can survive the temptations of money and fame. In an almost childlike, rudimentary way the images build up to some pleasing whole, and I found myself caring for these slight, naive characters despite themselves. You want them to win, even as you marvel at their mere existence.

Dog Pound
From the first image to the last, this film never allows one moment of passive engagement. Kim Chapiron shows us the inner madness of a juvenile detention facility located near some region of hell. We follow three young criminals as they are shuffled through the system and left to fend for themselves amongst embittered correction officers, adult felons waiting to blossom, and a racial stratification right out of your typical 70′s prison movie. The strangely charismatic star of the film is Butch (Adam Butcher), a sociopath with a heart of gold. His frighteningly contained anger is a palpable threat which gives the film most of its jolt. We watch him slowly rise the ranks by cajoling, threatening, and mauling all those in his way. By mixing real juvie delinquents and actors the film manages to contain a really oppressive sense of dread in an after-school special setting.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: brilliantlove, Dog Pound, Elvis & Madona, Snap, Sons of Perdition | Leave a Comment »

Rainy Tuesday Musings

Posted on March 30, 2010 by Wayne Lorenzo Titus

I caught Night Catches Us last night at the New Directors/New Films Festival. I went in with way too high expectations given the dynamic combination of Kerry Washington and Anthony Mackie. It is still rare to see African-Americans play the leads in complex dramas, much less two actors in their prime, and I was eager to sit-in.

The story focuses on two former Black Panthers whom reunite during a 1976 Philadelphia summer. As is likely with a movement that encouraged armed resistance in protection of community and family, there is a lot of psychological trauma to wade through. Having spoken to former Black Panthers personally, I appreciated the portrayal of justified paranoia that encircles the characters, whether through bugged phones, insipid surveillance, or opportunistic cops. COINTELPRO was also a constant source of intimidation and fear perpetrated by the government to disrupt a myriad of free-thinking movements in the 60′s–the Panthers being a favorite target.

However, the personal relationships seemed to be under duress, competing with repetitive stock footage and an overpowering soundtrack. Mackie does what he can to bring an internal life to Marcus. Turmoil seethes beneath his eyes and under the burden of his black duffel bag, which belies a history of moving often and quickly. And it pains me to admit this, but Washington may have been miscast. Her clipped phrasing and too easy smile mark her immediately as not of this time. She is built up as the emotional linchpin of the story, but her climactic scenes fizzle quickly without delving into her motivations in a convincing way.

Veteran actors from The Wire–Jamie Hector and Wendell Pierce almost destabilize the piece, given their instant recognition. I’m not one to typecast, but they do it well enough without me, as it feels they are playing watered down versions of their Baltimore doppelgangers.

Ultimately, despite my apprehensions, more films like this need to be made, as access to these stories require a large stage to provoke discussion. The struggles of that time are still portrayed in cliche and costume. Night Catches Us has not completely escaped that quicksand, but it is a step forward. I look forward to seeing if first-time director Tanya Hamilton continues to unearth this rich, untapped well in her future work.

Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: 1970's, Anthony Mackie, Black Panther Party, COINTELPRO, Jamie Hector, Kerry Washington, Night Catches Us, Philadelphia, Tanya Hamilton, Wendell Pierce | Leave a Comment »

AAIFF On the Road

Posted on March 30, 2010 by Wayne Lorenzo Titus

Some of the best films from last year’s Asian American International Film Festival that I reviewed are on tour nearby. Check out the details below…

NATIONAL FESTIVAL TOUR FEATURES IN BERGENFIELD
Presented by Clearview Cinema and ACV

Come experience another big screen presentation of AAIFF09′s best features at the Bergenfield Clearview Cinema starting Friday, April 2 through Thursday, April 8. Our selection will guarantee to satisfy your divergent tastes! Be it about a raunchy story of two performers in the Philippines, a laugh-out-loud dysfunctional family in Jersey or a sweet tale about a little girl who loses her bus pass, these films will sure to entertain. So bring a date or take your family and grab some popcorn, sit back, relax and enjoy the show!

HUBAD (Philippines) Director: Mark Gary and Denisa Reyes
KARMA CALLING (United States) Director: Sarba Das
LI TONG (China) Director: Nian Liu
PASTRY (Hong Kong) Director: Risky Liu

For more info, tickets and schedules please visit http://www.clearviewcinemas.com/exciting_events/aiff.shtml

Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

Top 10 and then some of 2009

Posted on December 27, 2009 by Wayne Lorenzo Titus

1. Inglorious Basterds
I am far from a Tarantino fanatic so this placement is quite surprising to me if no one else. Nonetheless, when I closely examined the competition, I had seen no other film more than once willingly, nor did I enjoy a lead performance more this year than Christoph Waltz as the deranged Nazi sophisticate, Col. Hans Landa. Where has this guy been? Plus Michael Fassbender continues to blow my mind with each role he inhabits. His small bit part as a British soldier and published film theorist warmed my heart and was a dramatic reversal from his stunning portrayal last year as a skeletal IRA prisoner in Hunger. Tarantino also fortified his own obsessive love of film with countless nods to the history of the medium which somehow gelled to create a visually stunning, pseudo-intellectual, and simply fun experience.

2. Hurt Locker
Can Kathyrn Bigelow direct the next James Bond film? I really think that franchise needs to sip whatever she’s drinking. Her heroes fully isolate themselves to the point where the outside world starts to ripple with paranoia, premeditation, and evil, but unlike Quantum of Solace there is a deep understanding of politics, family, and responsibility—the real marrow of the mundane. And have no doubts, this stuff is inherently cinematic. I will take a tense, deliberate bomb defusion over a visually muddled car chase any day.

3. Humpday
Two straight, male buddies decide to sleep together over a dare–sounds like a bad joke really, but Lynn Shelton pulls off a deeply funny and effective study of the male psyche, cultural norms, and thirty-somethingness. Actors Mark Duplass, Joshua Leonard and Alycia Delmore should also be given their due for making these characters believable and fully schizoid like we all really are. Our image of ourselves is rarely tested in daily interactions, so one mimics the liberal, open-minded intellectual in theory until life calls your bluff. Uncomfortable laughter was never so liberating!

4. Big Fan
Obsession is one of the most perplexing emotions to convey on screen, as it is so all-consuming—saturating every pore of the afflicted—that two dimensions seem inadequate to capture all of its wicked energy. The particular micro-world of sports fanaticism is done even less justice. However actor Patton Oswalt and writer/director Robert Siegel captured all the slovenliness, delusion, and anxiety that are characteristic of the fan drop kicked over the edge. True derangement turns out to quite funny in retrospect.

5. Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans
Nicholas Cage has finally returned from the wilderness of depressing action films and family friendly dreck to shock us into attention. It probably won’t last, so even more reason to soak it up now! Cage shuffles about like a rabid dog motivated by a lust for drugs, guns, women, and drugs in that order. Somehow under all this vice, he creates a sympathetic sociopath who is ironically led hellward due to a good deed. When I first heard this was a Werner Herzog film I thought it must all be some joke. Why would he troll in such pedestrian fare as a cop drama? Alas now I know only one with Herzog’s sardonic view of humanity could create such an off-kilter love note to New Orleans.

6. Avatar
Despite hokey dialogue and predictable plot machinations, James Cameron managed to transport me out of my stationary seat, stale air, and awkward eyewear for what seemed like a comfortable eternity. Pandora is the most fully convincing virtual environment I’ve seen on film since Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. Therefore, it is not surprising that the successful depiction of Gollum convinced Cameron that his long-gestating dream was possible. Taking cultural and natural cues from Earth didn’t manifest the fully alien, but rather the fully convincing. I await the inevitable sequel…

7. An Education
A lovely meditation on the arrogance of youth, this gem slowly reveals itself. What I like most besides Carey Mulligan’s puckish wit, is the patience and care with which the camera sweeps onto a moment in time. It feels like a memory even though all the action takes place in a present past. We are seduced along with Jenny, and we root for her even as we curse her naïveté.

8. Moon
Though a slight film by any definition of a space epic, the actor Sam Rockwell pulled off the impossible. He created two characters from the same DNA that live life in convincingly divergent health, relative age, and sanity so that I genuinely forgot he was alone on the set. Director Duncan Jones seems to have materialized from the ether with this succinct reverie on what it means to be human at a very inhumane time. My secret dream is that truly forward-thinking space operas like Space Odyssey 2001, Alien, and Solaris will make a resurgence. Hopefully Moon is a sign of the times.

9. Goodbye Solo
Lead actor Souleymane Sy Savane is refreshing as a good-hearted, immigrant taxi-driver. So rarely do we encounter hard-working transplants in American film even though reality would be a perfect source of stories. Ramin Bahrani has made a career of exploring the lives of people depicted on the edges, but who are actually at the heart of our cultural experiment. Souleymane’s personality is so infectious and endearing that his encounter with a self-loathing and bitter William, played with acerbic zeal by Red West, seems unfair for us as well as Souleymane. They both end up leeching a little bit of the other’s spirit and ultimately both learn that life is full of duplicity.

10. Up in the Air
For once Clooney’s deadpan delivery, wry smirks, and facial pratfalls equaled the sum of its parts in a film that is actually kind of serious. Everyone I know is unhappily, under, or unemployed so following around an individual who fires company lifers for a living is a hard sell. However Jason Reitman takes the opportunity to tackle the simple question: What is the meaning of life? Is it having an office to trudge to everyday or is it pursuing your dreams or is it finding a “co-pilot” to enjoy life with? The answer is obvious, but we are too stubborn to see it, so we might as well be kind to everyone we meet lest they become our bosses, lovers, or friends some day far off in the future…

The Rest of the Best

11. Gomorra
12. Up
13. Broken Embraces
14. Zombieland
15. The Road
16. Children of Invention
17. Watchmen
18. Star Trek
19. Rudo y Cursi
20. The Maid
21. Summer Hours
22. Black Dynamite
23. Antichrist
24. Fantastic Mr. Fox
25. The Messenger
26. Coco Before Chanel

Biggest Disappointments

Tyson, District 9, Funny People

What I Missed and Want to See

The Headless Woman, The Informant!, 500 Days of Summer, Where the Wild Things Are, Me and Orson Welles, Julia, Treeless Mountain, The White Ribbon, Brothers, In the Loop, A Serious Man, Two Lovers, Sugar, Crazy Heart, Collapse, A Single Man, The Exploding Girl, Medicine for Melancholy, Anvil: The Story of Anvil, Of Time and the City and The Baader Meinhof Complex

Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: Inglorious Basterds, Hurt Locker, Humpday, Big Fan, Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans, Avatar, An Education, Moon, Goodbye Solo, Up in the Air, Gomorra, Up, Zombieland, The Road, Children of Invention, Watchmen, Star Trek, Rudo y Cursi, The Maid, Summer Hours, Black Dynamite, Antichrist, Fantastic Mr. Fox, The Messenger, Coco Before Chanel, Broken Embraces, The Headless Woman, The Informant, 500 Days of Summer, Where the Wild Things Are, Me and Orson Welles, Julia, Treeless Mountain, The White Ribbon, Brothers, In the Loop, A Serious Man, Two Lovers, Sugar, Crazy Heart, Nine, Collapse, A Single Man, The Exploding Girl, Tyson, District 9, Funny People, Of Time and the City, The Baader Meinhof Complex, Medicine for Melancholy, Anvil: The Story of Anvil | Leave a Comment »

Rivette’s Circus Full of Sad Clowns

Posted on October 3, 2009 by Wayne Lorenzo Titus

In Around a Small Mountain, a chance meeting on the road leads to romance. If only it were that simple, Rivette wouldn’t still be making character dramas at 81. Best known for his playful, subversive Nouvelle Vague works, here the undervalued master tells a story of glorious, missed opportunities. A kind stalker, Vittorio (Sergio Castellitto), follows Kate, a subdued Jane Birkin, into town after he helps her with a stalled car. She invites him to attend a circus, in which she is a performer. He proceeds to invite himself into her life, one scarcely lived for fifteen years.

The story at hand is a culmination of tragic events from the past. Kate has never forgiven herself for her lover’s mishap. The circumstances are too delicious to spoil, but they caused her to leave the circus and her family. Her prodigal return is initiated to memorialize her father’s death. He was the founder of the circus and an authoritarian figure who disapproved of her relationship. The present offers a chance to exorcise demons, get to know the sister and niece she left behind, and start a new relationship. Vittorio, a stranger, serves as the ideal catalyst for all these overdue mileposts.

READ THE REST OF MY REVIEW AT filmlinc blog!

Filed under: 36 vues du Pic Saint-Lou, Jane Birkin, Paris, around a small mountain, circus, clowns, jacques rivette | Leave a Comment »

Claire Denis and The African Problem

Posted on October 2, 2009 by Wayne Lorenzo Titus

A flashlight clicks on. Wild dogs run across a desolate road. Wooden masks hang haphazardly on a wall. The dead, wounded body of someone called “The Boxer” is splayed on a couch. We have no idea where we are, but the idle commentary and the worn, green military uniforms of the soldiers lurking about suggest Africa. That’s the extent of what is revealed about the locale for the duration of White Material, but the characters we meet tell us more than we could ever imagine about the psychological toll of war on all sides and in between.

Claire Denis crafts a hypnotic parable about the African condition, which punctuates the news cycle every few months when there is a new conflict, but which otherwise remains hidden and ignored. We could be in Guinea, Cameroon, or even Rwanda with its charismatic rebel leaders, terrified and cynical bystanders, corrupt officials, drug-fueled child soldiers, garrisoned white landowners, and opportunistic bandits. Denis places all these groups in stark conflict. There is little to no camaraderie amongst all the competing goals. A white female protagonist, an unrecognizable Isabelle Huppert, appears to be a progressive bridge between these groups, but even her motives are soon clouded.

READ THE REST OF MY REVIEW AT filmlinc blog!

Filed under: Africa, Francophone, Isabelle Huppert, civil war, claire denis, coffee, plantation, white material | Leave a Comment »

Resnais Dispenses with Form for Fun

Posted on September 23, 2009 by Wayne Lorenzo Titus

Based on the novel L’Incident by Christian Gailly, Alain Resnais’ Wild Grass is this year’s Opening Night film. The venerable filmmaker earns this coveted spot by passing along his sheer intoxication with the medium, parachuting any stuffy formalism or burdened dialogue for the pleasure of light and shadow.

We enter the film through a magical doorway and a smirking voice-over warmly takes us in. The visage of our heroine is coyly denied and we are left with the indeterminacy of feet and a torso as Marguerite is described in whimsical detail. The central incident referenced by the novel occurs when her purse is stolen by an anonymous hand. At this very instant the narrative enters rarefied territory. The yellow purse is suspended in air and flails in glorious slow motion, while lit by the softest light. Purse becomes legend in the blink of a cinematic eye.

READ THE REST OF MY REVIEW AT filmlinc blog!

Filed under: Andre Dussolier, Christian Gailly, L'incident, New York Film Festival, Sabine Azema, alain resnais, wild grass | Leave a Comment »

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