Pages

Monday, December 26, 2011

We have to talk about Franklin, the hunting teacher

We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011, UK/USA, Lynne Ramsay)

Early in We Need to Talk About Kevin we see a helpless Eva (Tilda Swinton) trying to calm her baby down. The baby, Kevin, keeps crying and despite Eva’s best efforts refuses to settle down.
Eva is exhausted and worn out by the time her husband Franklin (John C. Reilly) returns home in the evening. Franklin does not understand or believe about Eva’s struggles with Kevin because Franklin only sees a quiet and content baby. Franklin goes on to lovingly cradle the baby and play with the child.
Such a scene is not fiction and takes place in virtually every household where there is one stay at home parent and one working parent. The stay at home parent spends an entire day looking after the baby with no time for playing and is exhausted by the time evening rolls around. So when the working parent returns home in the evening, they usually find a calm baby and freely go about playing with the child. As a result, the working parent is often the fun parent while the stay at home parent is the workhorse looking after every need of the baby. In most cases, the stay at home parent is the mother while the father gets to be the cool parent. In a sense, such roles have existed for centuries dating all the way back to prehistoric times. During the stone ages, cavemen were the hunters who spent all their time looking for prey while the women stayed in the cave taking care of the children and cooking the food. We Need to Talk About Kevin examines the continuation of these roles in modern times and highlights the similarity by depicting archery as Franklin’s main bonding activity with his son. Franklin is passing down the ancient art of hunting to his son so it really should not be a surprize when Kevin uses this training to go hunting for live prey.
Raising a child is a difficult task and that task is much more difficult if only one parent is left to do everything. Franklin is an absent parent and he is not shown to contribute in any raising of Kevin. He tries his best to be Kevin’s friend and leaves all the disciplining to Eva which is clearly a mistake as Eva cannot handle the child on her own. When Eva loses her temper and manages to break young Kevin’s arm, she alienates Kevin who grows up to resent her. Kevin’s hatred extends beyond his mother to his young sister who also gets mistreated by Kevin. Franklin never clues in and fails to ponder over any questionable actions. When Kevin orders a box of padlocks, Franklin believes Kevin’s statement that he intends to sell the locks to make a profit. Franklin even pats his son on the back and likens him to a young “Donald Trump”. However, Kevin’s words seem dubious as he has never exhibited any entrepreneurial ambition but Franklin would be the last person to notice that.
Kevin lives in a family where he is free to do whatever he pleases because neither parent comes in his way. Both Eva and Franklin have a hands off approach towards Kevin for different reasons. Eva cannot muster up the courage to say anything to Kevin because she is tired of getting insulted by him. Also any attempt by Eva to be friendly towards Kevin backfires as Kevin is never in any mood to spend “quality time” with his mother. So Eva keeps her distance and comforts herself with a bottle of wine. On the other hand, Franklin thinks he is Kevin’s buddy and tries to play it cool. But even Franklin is not spared as his friendly behavior leads him getting stabbed in the back. Eva and Franklin are not shown to be bad parents but instead they come off as parents who cannot cope with their child and as a result neglect him. Not all neglected children grow up and turn violent like Kevin but when parents neglect their child, they leave the door open for outside forces to influence and shape their child. The film does not show any of these outside influences and as rightly observed by Srikanth Srinivasan, the film is from the perspective of Eva, which means we never get to see the full picture of how Kevin is influenced. The film’s title and layers of symbolism in each frame highlights the guilt that Eva feels with regards to Kevin’s violent act. The repeated images of blood seen throughout the film clearly indicate that Eva feels responsible for the bloodshed. As a result, Eva sees blood on her house, car, face and hair. The strange looks the neighbours give Eva when she is sanding her house indicate that the neighbours don’t see the blood but only she does.
Interestingly, the film starts off with a scene where the color red represents freedom for Eva. A series of scenes from the Spanish festival of tomatina portray that red once symbolized a time when Eva had no worries or responsibilities.
However, that same red color ends up being a burden for Eva because it represents her guilt for Kevin’s act. Naturally, the images of blood are only wiped clean after Eva has found resolution and stopped blaming herself.

We Need to Talk About Kevin saves itself from heading down a slippery slope by not including any outside influences that helped shape Kevin’s motives. When Eva presses him for an answer about his violent act, Kevin replies "I used to think I knew. Now I'm not so sure." Usually, there is no quick answer that can suffice but instead the answer lies in years of neglect, anger and resentment that comes to a boil in a single moment. The film gives snippets of these resentful moments from Kevin’s childhood into his teenage years but only from Eva’s memories. Even if the film tried to incorporate Franklin into the perspective, it is hard to think any worthwhile memories would be generated from his vantage point. Franklin unknowingly supervised Kevin’s killer training yet Franklin is blood free for all but one scene. More importantly, Franklin fails to be there for Eva. Franklin never believes Eva when she tells him about Kevin’s negative actions nor does he observe his son’s rude behavior towards his mother or sister. As a result, Eva can never approach Franklin to get him to discipline Kevin. There is clearly a problem in Franklin and Eva’s marriage but since we never learn anything about Franklin, we can only assume he is not interested in any responsibility whatsoever. In the end, Eva is left to run the household and is forced to pick up the pieces after all the arrows have been fired. One day, perhaps we can talk about Franklin and what was so important that he completely ignored his family.

Note: the casting of Jasper Newell and Ezra Miller as the younger and older Kevin is certainly a great decision as both reflect each other nicely. On top of that, both nail their role perfectly and the older Kevin oozes hatred and evil when needed.

Friday, December 23, 2011

Putty Hill, The Arbor

Innovative Cinema

A character is busy doing something but suddenly the character stops what they are doing and looks towards the camera to answer questions by an unseen interviewer. Once the character has answered the questions, the camera steps back allowing the character to jump back into the fictional story that continues until the next stoppage to address the audience.


Such a unique and innovative approach in Matthew Porterfield’s Putty Hill manages to blur the line between documentary and fiction by incorporating interviews within the framework of scripted cinema.

This same technique of addressing the audience directly can also be found in Clio Barnard’s The Arbor where actors talk directly to the camera before the film continues.

However, there is a difference in the technique between Putty Hill and The Arbor. Porterfield’s film is fiction that uses mostly non-professional actors but The Arbor uses professional actors to lip-sync a true story. This technique is needed in The Arbor because this method is similar to the work of Andrea Dunbar on whose plays the film is based on. Clio Barnard describes this direct address technique in the film's DVD booklet:

Andrea’s fiction was based on what she observed around her. She reminded the audience they were watching a play by her use of direct address when The Girl in The Arbor introduced each scene.

I see the use of actors lip-synching as performing the same function, reminding the audience they are watching the retelling of a true story.

My work is concerned with the relationship between fiction film language and documentary. I often dislocate sound and image by constructing fictional images around verbatim audio. In this sense, my working methods have some similarity to the methods of verbatim theatre.

Verbatim theatre by its very nature (being performed in a theatre by actors) acknowledges that it is constructed. Housing estates and the people who live there are usually represented on film in the tradition of Social Realism, a working method that aims to deny construct, aiming for naturalistic performances, an invisible crew and camera, adopting the aesthetic of Direct Cinema (a documentary movement) as a short hand for authenticity. I wanted to confront expectations about how a particular group of people are represented by subverting the form.

I used the technique in which actors lip-sync to the voices of interviewees to draw attention to the fact that documentary narratives are as constructed as fictional ones. I want the audience to think about the fact that the film has been shaped and edited by the filmmakers.....


This verbatim theatre and direct audience technique results in a rich work that is a fascinating blend of improv theatre, scripted cinema and a documentary. Often, examples of all three methods take place in just one sequence.

For example, an actor describes the context of the scene the audience are about to observe.

The actor then jumps into character in a theatrical set constructed in the middle of the exact same living space the story is based on. So reality feeds into fiction which in turn reflects reality.

This direct address technique also gives the appearance of interactive cinema. In both Putty Hill and The Arbor, the camera pans across the screen before slowly stopping on a character who then addresses the audience. On first glance, this looks to have the same level of control as when a user clicks on an object of interest when scrolling across a user interface. However, this level of control is a bit misleading since it is not a two-way interaction because the audience does not have full control to listen from any character. Instead, the characters that speak up do so as per the film director’s discretion. The directors carefully adjust the audience attention on a particular character via the camera movement (pan combined with a slow focus) thereby arousing curiosity in the mind of viewers. As a result, when a character speaks up, it is not unexpected nor intrusive. In fact, the character’s words are welcome because it allows viewers to learn a bit more about events in the story.

The following example from The Arbor shows how such a one-way interactive moment takes place. This scene shows characters engaged in a heated debate which threatens to get out of hand.
A policeman leads one of the characters away.
The camera tracks the two characters and settles in on a face in the crowd
who then gives the addresses the audience directly.

Both films share a direct address technique although The Arbor has roots in Verbatim theatre while Putty Hill is a fluid blend of documentary with fiction. The two films are innovative works that break free from the conventional cinematic mould and are essential viewing.

Saturday, December 17, 2011

Three Films by Mohamed Al-Daradji

The following three films from Iraqi director Mohamed Al-Daradji all take place in 2003, the pivotal year in which Iraq's history changed drastically.

Ahlaam (2006)
War, Love, God & Madness (2008)
Son of Babylon (2009)

The core of Ahlaam takes place after the American invasion but the film goes as far back as 1998 when Iraq was bogged down by sanctions. Back in 1998, the title character of Ahlaam (Aseel Adel) was on the verge of marriage while Hasan (Kaheel Khalid) was having doubts about staying in the army because he didn’t believe in serving Saddam. Mehdi (Mohamed Hashim) was troubled because his father’s past would stand in the way of him going for higher studies. These characters lives was clearly not great to begin with but their plight gets worse as the film moves along. Ahlaam’s marriage is ruined because her fiancée is taken away by the Iraqi police. She is pushed to the ground which subsequently damages her mind, eventually landing her in a mental hospital. The lack of order after the invasion causes the looters to move into that mental hospital forcing all the patients, including Ahlaam, out on the unsafe streets of Baghdad. As the film shows, most people suffered from poverty while living under the oppressive regime of Saddam. However, things got subsequently worse after the bombs started to fall in 2003 as the locals had to deal with extra problems such as looting, lack of electricity and water. The chaos and looting that spread like wildfire in 2003 causes the lives of the main characters in Ahlaam to spin further out of control. Ahlaam's fate is unresolved at the film’s end, but it is clear that it can’t be hopeful.

The documentary War, Love, God & Madness depicts the struggles and challenges in the making of Ahlaam. In 2003, Mohamed Al-Daradji and his crew entered Iraq posing as journalists (Al-Jazeera being the magic word) otherwise they feared their camera would be taken away. Once in Baghdad, Al-Daradji tried to find the only working film camera while recruiting local actors. He found it quite challenging to select a female lead especially since prospective leads backed out when they learned about the rape scene in Ahlaam. Things are further complicated when one of the crew members walked off suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Additionally, the lack of electricity and safety complicated the daily shoot schedule. Al-Daradji was on the verge of giving up and leaving Iraq but he ignored the advice of others around him and stayed to produce a sharp end product in Ahlaam despite all the stress and complications.

Son of Babylon is set a few weeks after the invasion of 2003 and starts off far away from the Iraqi capital. An older woman Um Ibrahim (Shazada Hussein) goes in search of her missing son when she learns that certain prisoners of war have been freed in Iraq. She take her grandson Ahmed (Yasser Talib) along as her missing son is Ahmed’s father.



Their road journey is not an easy one because the country is in a state of flux especially when horrific truths about the past are unearthed on a daily basis. One of the film’s most emotional sequences is when the traveling duo encounter a funeral procession of recently discovered buried bodies. There are no words spoken but Um Ibrahim’s silent expressions convey her worst fears about her son’s fate.

The film manages to showcase Iraq's vast and picturesque countryside, something hardly ever seen on screen.


Also the film depicts the challenges posed by the cultural and linguistic diversity of Iraq. Um Ibrahim is Kurdish but she cannot speak Arabic so she has to rely on her grandson for translation. People have enough problems to begin with so the language barrier only adds to their frustration and confusion. Yet, no matter what language an Iraqi speaks, they are united in their suffering. The ending of Son of Babylon is even more emotional than the one in Ahlaam but such films cannot have a happy ending, not especially when there are so many unresolved matters. The end credits in Son of Babylon lists that more than a million men, women and children have gone missing in Iraq in the last 40 years. By April 2009, more than 300 mass graves were found containing between 150,000 - 250,000 bodies. The remaining are still missing so there are countless stories waiting to be told about Iraq.


Transfer of suffering

Ahlaam and War, Love, God & Madness are about the suffering of the living. However, Son of Babylon shows that suffering does not end when someone dies. In fact, their suffering gets transferred to their living relatives. And in cases when relatives have no closure about a loved one, the next generation of family members start their lives burdened with a heavy dose of pain.


Smoke and Sounds

Ahlaam is a very well made film that smartly uses a grayish/dark palette to depict the chaos after the 2003 invasion. On the other hand, Son of Babylon is bright and vibrant yet most scenes feature smoke in the background thereby depicting the constant blowing up of things.

War, Love, God & Madness captures the sound of gunfire and bombing that locals have to endure on a daily basis. The documentary also features many conversations with locals in cafes and on the streets. In this regard, the film shares a bond with Sinan Antoon’s About Baghdad. It is quite fascinating to think that both Antoon and Al-Daradji were probably in Baghdad at the same time in 2003 filming their respective documentaries. Their films do feature a bit of hope because the locals believed that being rid of Saddam would eventually lead to a more happier life. It would be interesting if someone revisited the city now and interviewed the same people again because as bleak as things appeared in 2003, we now know that the coming years brought on more uncertainty.

The documentary title War, Love, God & Madness comes from an observation by a person that changing one letter in arabic transforms the word "war" into "love" and "God". That is a fascinating observation as wars are something that take place in the absence of love yet wars also take place in the name of God or if one side has too much love of their God. And when wars take place, madness is unleashed, thereby setting one on the path towards more wars.

Voices and Stories


There are plenty of books and films about Iraq yet very few of these works give an Iraqi perspective. One of the big reasons for lack of an Iraqi voice is because most of these works are based on experiences of western journalists who were living inside the Green Zone or embedded with foreign troops so their viewpoint was always a bit restricted. When these journalists went to meet the locals, they were accompanied by a translator or a bodyguard (soldier or private) and as a result, there were always filters and barriers which prevented a true Iraqi perspective from emerging. There are some exceptions such as James Longley’s incredible Iraq in Fragments which covers different parts of Iraq and outlines realistic problems facing the country. However, most films about Iraq hardly feature any Iraqis or are even shot in the country. Therefore, Mohamed Al-Daradji’s films are a pleasant surprize because they are shot entirely on location and manage to give voice to the local Iraqi people.

Mohamed Al- Daradji’s films are not made to collect box-office receipts or to win acclaim. Instead, they are made to depict essential human stories about citizens of a country the world has largely ignored even though the country name itself is regularly featured in headlines. These films won’t change the world but atleast it is good to know that there is still some relevant cinema out there that is not manufactured to win awards.

Friday, December 16, 2011

The Artist

The Artist (2011, France/Belgium, Michel Hazanavicius)


Once upon a time, a megastar was effortlessly able to charm his audience. He smiled and everyone fell over backwards in awe, including producers who obliged to his every whim. A photo with him could turn a nobody into a page one headline. However, he was vain and refused to change with the times so his producer dumped him. The actor was so sure of his success that he became an indie filmmaker and bankrolled his own film. The film flopped at the box-office and when the stock market crashed, the actor went bankrupt. His fortunes were sold off at an auction and he had to pawn off his expensive suits for food and drink money. He turned into an alcoholic and was so washed up that even his shadow left him. When all hope looked lost, a loving hard tried to pull him out of the quicksand. Unfortunately, once again his pride got in the way and his fate appeared sealed.

But in the tradition of a typical Hollywood studio film, he is saved thereby ensuring a feel good happy ending that everyone loves.

Cut. Insert sound. Roll credits.

Applause.

Give film universal acclaim.

Jean Dujardin and Bérénice Bejo charmingly bring their characters to life but ultimately The Artist is a rehashed studio film sold in a different package. The silent film treatment feels like a gimmick as demonstrated by the nightmare sequence in which Dujardin’s character of George Valentin loses his voice. George is told by his producer Al (John Goodman) that talkies are the future and silent actors are on the verge of extinction. This causes George to have a nightmare in which he loses his voice but all the objects and characters around him break free of the film’s silent framework -- the objects make a loud noise while characters laugh in their own voice. This sequence draws attention to itself and makes the film appear more as a spoof of the silent film era, and not as a homage. Also, watching George and Al discussing talkies while reading intertitles appears to be joke geared towards the audience and not as a relevant scenario in the context of a silent film. It would have been more effective if The Artist was a pure silent film with no reference to talkies or if the film was about the making of silent movies where characters talked in their own voice. As it stands, The Artist comes across as a muddled effort trying to use a framework of a silent film without fully embracing the methodology of the era.

Thursday, December 08, 2011

Drive

Drive (2011, USA, Nicolas Winding Refn)
Book by James Sallis


I drive. That’s all I do.

True to his word, Driver (Ryan Gosling) does indeed drive, both for a living and for fun as well. He is a movie stunt driver by day and rent-for-hire driver by night. His conditions to prospective clients are simple and to the point:

Tell me where we start, where we're going and where we're going afterwards, I give you five minutes when you get there. Anything happens in that five minutes and I'm yours, no matter what. Anything a minute either side of that and you're on your own. I don't sit in while you're running it down. I don't carry a gun. I drive.

Given that driving is his passion, it is not a surprize that when he wants to impress Irene (Carey Mulligan) and her son Benicio (Kaden Leos), Driver takes them on a car ride by asking a simple question:

You Wanna See Something?


And when he is not behind the wheel of his car, he works in a garage fine tuning cars so that they can glide in blissful motion.


His entire existence is defined by his car’s movement but even when he is living outside of his car, his internal machine is ticking away, slowly counting down the time before life gives him the green signal to speed off in his car.


This harmony with his internal self means that he is always at peace when he has to wait at a red light as the waiting period until the light turns green is synchronized with his heartbeats. Evidence of this is provided early on in the film when in the initial car getaway sequence, Driver is able to calmly wait at a red light while facing a police car straight on.

Driver is not only calm but a man of few words. Yet his silence emits a strength and portrays a man with no emotional ties. However, as often seen in noir films, an emotionless man often falls for the wrong woman.


In Driver’s case, the woman in question Irene is a perfect girl next door but the problem arises from her husband Standard (Oscar Isaac) who has a lot of unpaid debt to clear up.


One day Driver comes across Standard lying bloodied in the parking lot while his 4 year old son Benicio is in a state of shock. Driver decides to fix things. Since the film does not give Driver’s backstory, one can assume his need to do good is out of his love for Irene. However, James Sallis’ book perfectly outlines two examples of why Driver needs to help Irene and Benicio. The following section explains how Driver lost his father and was placed in a foster home.

Once he’d got his growth, his father had little use for him. His father had had little use for his mother for a lot longer. So Driver wasn’t surprised when one night at the dinner table she went after his old man with butcher and bread knives, one in each fist like a ninja in a red-checked apron. She had one ear off and a wide red mouth drawn in his throat before he could set his coffee cup down. Driver watched, then went on eating his sandwich: Spam and mint jelly on toast. That was about the extent of his mother’s cooking.

He’d always marvelled at the force of this docile, silent woman’s attack -- as though her entire life had gathered toward that single, sudden bolt of action. She wasn’t good for much else afterwards.....
-- Chapter three, pages 10-11.

In one swift move, Driver lost both his parents, one permanently and the other to prison. That meant Driver was forced to fend for himself and his entire life was a struggle. So he does not want Benicio to suffer that same fate. When he sees Standard lying with his face beaten up, Driver has a flashback to his childhood and sees his youth reflected in Benicio. At that moment, Driver decides to put his life on the line to ensure that Benicio will not grow up in a broken home.

Another segment from the book explains how Driver’s need to dish out justice arose in his youth.

Driver’s first and last fight at the new school happened when the local bully came up to him on the schoolyard and told Driver he shouldn’t he hanging around Jews. Driver had vaguely been aware that Herb was Jewish, but he was still more vague about why anyone would want to make something of that. This bully liked to flick people’s ears with his middle finger, shooting it off his thumb. When he tried it this time, Driver met his wrist halfway with one hand, stopping it cold. With the other hand he reached across and very carefully broke the boy’s thumb. -- Chapter Thirty, page 137.

The film gives a few examples that Driver is not afraid to take anyone on. When a former robber approaches him for another job in a diner, Driver dismisses the man with the following words:

How about this - shut your mouth or I'll kick your teeth down your throat and I'll shut it for you.

Essentially, Driver’s life is shaped by his childhood experience and just like his mother’s sudden act of violence, Driver is willing to jolt into sudden action to defend what he believes is right. The following words from the book could easily apply to Driver...

...as though her entire life had gathered toward that single, sudden bolt of action...

This sudden bolt of action comes when Driver ruthlessly beats up a thug in an elevator while Irene watches in fear. That burst of violence scares Irene and distances her from him but Driver was only acting out what he saw in his youth. The same bolt of action takes place in the motel when Driver has to defend himself when he is attacked by Nino’s (Ron Perlman) men.

The Latin Touch & the Exotic Life

The film changes the identity of Irene’s character slightly from the book. In the book, she is Latin.

He’d been coming up the stairs when the door next to his opened and a woman asked, in perfect English but with the unmistakable lilt of a native Spanish speaker, if he needed any help.

Seeing her, a Latina roughly his age, hair like a raven’s wing, eyes alight, he wished to hell he did need help. But what he had in his arms was about everything he owned.
-- Chapter ten, pages 43-44

The words in the book give Irene an angelic appearance and this is something which the film manages to depict by having a halo like gentle light lit over her head in a few scenes, especially the elevator kiss. This lighting in the film manages to save needless dialogues and give audience an idea about how Driver perceives Irene.

In the book, Driver has no money so he is always looking for cheap places to eat or to drink. However, his world is not all about inexpensive things because he incorporates some ethnic flavor in his life by eating at Latin restaurants or drinking Pacifico beer.

He caught a double-header of Mexican movies out on Pico, downed a couple of slow beers at a bar nearby making polite conversation with the guy on the next stool, then had dinner at the Salvadoran restaurant up the street from his current crib, rice cooked with shrimp and chicken, fat tortillas with that great bean dip they do, sliced cucumbers, radish and tomatoes. -- Chapter seven, page 28

The film manages to pay a tribute to this Latin influence in a very subtle way. In the supermarket sequence, Driver’s back is framed against a beer cooler packed with Corona. This is not simple product placement but the inclusion of Corona serves a purpose. Corona’s marketing campaign plays up the exotic element of drinking this Mexican beer. However, once the marketing campaign and lime is taken away, Corona is exposed for what it is -- a cheap tasteless commercial beer. It gives the illusion of being something that it is not. In a sense, it is a perfect drink for Driver as it would satisfy his criteria for drinking cheap beer with a Latin twist.

James Hansen gives another example of Driver’s preference for the less flashier side of LA:

...Despite these apparent dangers, the Driver’s world is understated, simple, and perhaps second rate – he waits on the end of a Clippers game, not the Lakers.

The book flushes out this side of Driver’s world completely but it is quite commendable that the film also manages to portray these aspects in a few cuts.

Without too many words

It is essential for the book to provide Driver’s childhood via flashbacks so as to provide context for his current behavior. However, the film does not need to provide flashbacks or a backstory because the expressions of the characters combined with snippets of dialogue should be enough. This is where writer Hossein Amini and director Nicolas Winding Refn deserve a lot of credit because they have managed to precisely extract enough material from the book to depict the various characters with no flashbacks and very little dialogue. The actors then manage to put the finishing touches by providing depth to their characters. Ryan Gosling is perfect in his role but even Ron Perlman, Albert Brooks and Bryan Cranston do great justice to their parts by conveying the right tone. A few lines of dialogue emits Nino’s frustration with his life and why he tries to pull off a nonsensical robbery. A single scene and line of dialogue is all one needs to understand Bernie Rose (Albert Brooks). When Driver first meets Bernie, Driver does not extend his hand to Bernie.


Driver: my hands are a little dirty

To which Bernie replies: so are mine

Those three words sum up Bernie’s shady personality perfectly.

Style Upgrade

Nicolas Winding Refn sprinkles the film with 1980’s music which evokes the cinema of Michael Mann. Also, Refn adds a pinch of David Lynch and that comes out in the sequence when Driver takes takes Irene and Benicio for a fun ride. The background music during the car ride channels David Lynch’s Lost Highway road, albeit the scene in Drive takes place in broad daylight.


Overall, Drive is perfect example of how to properly adapt a book and still give the film a unique identity with just a few modifications. Like Driver's car, the film is easily able to shift gears and speed up when needed and slow down in a few sequences. Easily one of the best films of the year!



[Update]: News emerged today that James Sallis will write a sequel to Drive called Driven....

Wednesday, November 30, 2011

The Girl with Three Names

Martha Marcy May Marlene (2011, USA, Sean Durkin)

Sean Durkin’s remarkable debut feature manages to mix beauty with a disturbing and haunting undertone. The style ensures that a viewer is never completely comfortable with the material even when things look normal. In fact, the film plays with the concept of normality as it invites viewers to drop their guard. The first few minutes of the film appear quite welcoming as the camera shows a peaceful paradise like countryside where men and women are leisurely at work. We then observe the men having their dinner while the women patiently wait outside the room for their turn to eat. This segregation of men and women at dinner does not appear to be sinister but instead seems to be a customary ritual in this paradise. We get a hint that things are not what they seem a few moments later when young Martha (Elizabeth Olsen) secretly tries to leave paradise. Martha walks quietly and clearly appears to be resisting the urge to bolt away from the house. Her body language indicates her nervousness but she tries to maintain a calm exterior. She increases her pace when she enters the forest just as a male voice calls out her name. The male eventually catches up with Martha at a nearby diner where the two appear to act normal. Yet, one can detect a hint of cold terror underneath. This invisible tension then haunts every single frame of the film from thereon and only manages to disappear for a few seconds near the end before reappearing just in time for the final fade to black.

The cold tension evokes the work of Michael Haneke yet Martha Marcy May Marlene manages to stay one step away from morphing into a full fledged Haneke feature. The many scenes of normality attempt to lull the viewer to believe that happiness is around the corner yet the film’s tone tries to psychologically prepare the viewer to anticipate violence. Interestingly, the film also splices the present with plenty of flashbacks to further blur matters as the violence is always shown in the past. So when the film switches to the present, one expects that the pattern of past violent acts will find their way into the present. Yet, no violence takes place in the present causing those past memories to unhinge Martha and making it impossible for her to relax in her sister Lucy (Sarah Paulson) and brother-in-law Ted’s (Hugh Dancy) spacious vacation home. Martha’s inability to cope frustrates Lucy and Ted who cannot understand why Martha is acting the way she is. Martha does not discuss her past at the cult where she spent two years after she ran away from home nor does she speak about the sexual abuse inflicted on her by the cult leader Patrick (John Hawkes) as part of her initiation ritual at the cult.

The film’s title comes from the three identities that Martha has -- Martha is her birth name, Marcy May is her mother’s name which Patrick rechristened her with and Marlene is the name that every single woman uses to answer the phone at the cult home. The names represent the confusing identities that Martha has to live with at each step of her life. On one hand, she is trying to return to her pre-cult life but she can never escape her cult identity nor can she erase her “Marlene” tag which signifies a surrender of her individuality as part of the full fledged cult membership. By getting each woman to answer the phone with a single name, Patrick has erased individuality. He is the authority and everybody is supposed to live by his rules and speak his words. Martha tries to channel Patrick’s words constantly which leads to conflicts with Lucy and Ted. Ted is especially angered when Martha ignores his advice by calling herself a “teacher and a leader”, a title bestowed onto Martha by Patrick. These words further annoy Ted as he is no mood to be lectured by someone he considers to be an irresponsible woman. It is these conflicts that alienate Martha from her family. Martha grapples for help and in a moment of desperation makes the mistake of phoning the cult home. Even though Martha does not identify herself, the damage is done and Martha will never be able to go through life again without constantly looking over her shoulder. The open-ended nature of the film ensures that Martha will continue to struggle with her past and her identity for a lot longer but one hopes that she can return to her true home one day.

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Greek Cinema

Recent Greek Cinema by way of Lanthimos & Tsangari

Three different Greek films by Giorgos Lanthimos & Athina Rachel Tsangari but linked together by control, communication and human behavior:

Dogtooth (2009, Greece, Giorgos Lanthimos)
ATTENBERG (2010, Greece, Athina Rachel Tsangari)
Alps (2011, Greece, Giorgos Lanthimos)

Control & Communication

In Dogtooth the father is the clear head of the family.


He presides over every family decision including his family’s entertainment and even who his son can sleep with -- the father brings a woman to the house so that his son can have scheduled sexual intercourse. The lines of communication are just one way and the parent-child relationship is a closed one where the children are not free to have an open honest conversation. The children are also shut off in the house with no option to go out into the world.

The lines of communication are more open in ATTENBERG where the daughter is free to ask her father about sexual questions, such as if the father imagines his daughter naked.
The daughter also has freedom to roam the streets with her friend and wander about town on her own.

Alps also features a girl having freedom to come home and go out as she pleases. The daughter has a decent relationship with her father but there are some things she cannot ask. In a conversation with her father, the daughter equates herself with her mother and right in the next instance, puts her hand in between her father’s legs, only to be duly slapped in return.
The daughter imagines herself to be like her mother so figures she has the right to reach for her father’s parts. However, she could have simply asked her father a question like the daughter does in ATTENBERG but Alps does not feature complete open and honest communication. There is still a level of control that is exerted over all the characters and a line of authority that is clearly visible. The authority may no longer be present in the house but it exists in the workplace.

Human Behavior

Dogtooth is a twisted human case study of the butterfly effect as the film shows how a single element introduced in a tightly controlled environment can cause ripples of change powerful enough to turn things on their head. Examination of the human behavior also manages to illustrate that rigidly controlled parenting will harm children’s development and prevent children from growing into fully functional adults. The young adults in Dogtooth have only aged in terms of their bodily growth but they have the mental maturity of young kids as shown by their inquisitive questioning and experimentation with sex and violence.


The title of ATTENBERG is inspired by David Attenborough’s BBC nature series about animal behavior and the film naturally features ample dosage of animal sounds. However, the animal instincts parallel the human behavior shown by the characters in the film with regards to how the characters mate, seek partners, entertain themselves and carry out well choreographed dance rituals.

In Alps, characters seek to console those who have lost a loved one by taking on the persona of the character’s lost relative. The film shows that all humans share a certain bond when it comes to loss and eventually healing.

Essentially, all three films can be classified as coming of age tales with a difference. While most coming of age films show characters attaining maturity in their mid teens, the three Greek films contain characters who come of age as young adults. The delayed maturity has more to do with the characters isolation and the way they are raised by their fathers -- there is a mother shown in Dogtooth but she comes across as quiet and subdued while a mother is absent in the other films.

What of Greece?

There are no direct political references in any of the films yet some depictions can be inferred. Dogtooth is clearly a reference about authoritative rule and a closed off society. The characters live in a house surrounded by large walls which shuts off the outside world.
This could represent a Greece prior to its entry into the larger economic and financial European union.

ATTENBERG appears to be during a time when Greece either has joined or is on the verge of financially joining the European union. The film takes place in an isolated small town devoid of jobs. However, there is an optimistic tone in the air which would signal towards a hopeful future.

Alps appears to take place in a time when Greece is comfortable with the rest of the world. Characters constantly sprinkle American pop references in their conversations, especially regards to Hollywood films, while another character talks about Switzerland and the Alps mountains. Nothing in the film suggests isolation and boundaries but presents a nation which is at harmonious union with Europe and the World as a whole.

Grappling for familiarity

Dogtooth is certainly unique but one can recognize touches of Lars von Trier and Ulrich Seidl with regards to the absurd and human behavior. The story goes from dark humour to shock in an instant with its depiction of family abuse and incest. The film is certainly hard to like but it is equally difficult to ignore this work because there is plenty to chew in the film.

ATTENBERG is warm, tender and certainly more accessible than Dogtooth even though ATTENBERG starts off with a kiss between two women and features a lot of talk about sex.

Alps is certainly more accessible than Lanthimos’ previous film but it is still a bit cold when compared to ATTENBERG. Alps minimizes the strangeness that would have put people off Dogtooth and features more deadpan/dark humor. In this regard, Alps is similar in look and feel to The Death of Mister Lazarescu. However, the humor in The Death of Mister Lazarescu is smartly integrated in the film without drawing attention to itself. Whereas Alps is trying too hard to garner laughs. Certain scenarios and dialogues have no purpose in the film and only seem to exist to sell the absurd humor style.

Comments

Lanthimos and Tsangari would want their films to be treated differently but the common themes related to parental control, communication and behavior link the films. Plus, the two directors have tiny imprints in the others work. Lanthimos is a producer and actor in ATTENBERG while Tsangari has a producer tag on both Lanthimos’ features.

Here is a subjective ranking of the films:

ATTENBERG
Dogtooth
Alps

I would have rated Alps higher had I not seen some of the new Romanian films by Cristi Puiu and Corneliu Porumboiu. These Romanian films show how to properly depict a mix of deadpan and dark humor while Alps just seems to be trying to force its material through a template that is not suited for the characters. Also, arriving at Alps after having navigated Dogtooth and ATTENBERG feels like a letdown. Had my Greek journey started with Alps, then I could have found it far more engaging.

Sunday, November 13, 2011

The Ides of March

The Ides of March (2011, USA, George Clooney)

"The punishment which the wise suffer who refuse to take part in the government, is to live under the government of worse men." -- Plato

Once upon a time, a good man wanted to run in politics. He believed he could make a difference because he possessed intelligent ideas, great values and virtues. But once he entered politics, he found out how things truly worked. At first his fingers got dirty but slowly his soul and brain started getting coated with stains of mud. And before a year was over, he was throughly transformed into the very dirty person he had promised to free the country from.

It is an age old story applicable to every politician in every country around the world. The names and details change but the idea remains the same -- that power corrupts, directly or indirectly. Sometimes a politician feels they are still on the side of good even though they are cutting deals with those who break the law. Eventually, all those one time compromises, handshakes and promises erode away any remaining morality/credibility the politician may once have had.

The Ides of March depicts this well known story of how ideals and promises are crushed under the political reality machine. In this regard, the film is not showing anything new but what is refreshing is the focal point of the story. The film does not focus on governor Mike Morris (George Clooney) who is vying for a Democratic presidential ticket but instead fixes its attention on his young press secretary Stephen Meyers (Ryan Gosling) and shows that ditching of ideals can start at a very early age. Meyers is flying high after his intelligence and hard work have put him on the road towards an apparent better future. However, all of that changes when he receives a phone call from the rival campaign manager, Tom Duffy (Paul Giamatti), for a quick meeting. Meyers accepts the meeting request because he fails to think a few steps ahead like Duffy. When Meyers finally realizes that he was just a pawn in a political chess match, he starts scrambling to save his career. First, he opts for revenge but when that leads to nothing, he resorts to blackmail. In both cases, he uses a potential scandal that he accidentally uncovers to turn things around for himself.

The film shows the transformation of Meyers from an idealistic person into a cold calculative person, perfectly conveyed by the film’s final moments when the camera stays fixed on Meyers’ emotionless face. One can also see the genesis of Morris via Meyers. Morris is shown to be an intelligent person who talks a lot about honesty and integrity. However, as the film shows, his integrity can still be negotiated with. One can easily imagine that a long time ago Morris started out as idealistic as Meyers but Morris probably ditched a few of his ideals for a slice of power. Morris still retained a sense of good values but he is willing to rinse those values occasionally with some grayish shades in order to move ahead.

The fact that The Ides of March focuses on people around a potential presidential candidate is a smart choice. As history has often shown, a president or a party head is just the front man (or woman) with little decision making power. It is often the people working in the shadows that shape the policies and decisions the president/party head speaks about in public. In the film, Morris finds himself in a situation where he loses his ability to exert any power thereby allowing himself to be tugged by another. The film’s title, which refers to the date of Julius Caesar’s assassination, is also highly appropriate. There is no assassination in The Ides of March but there is a death which is caused by betrayal, something which also played a part in Caesar’s slaying. In fact, almost every character in the film, including Morris, Meyers, Zara, Molly (Evan Rachel Wood) and even the journalist Ida (Marisa Tomei), are betrayed to some extent by those around them. Loyalty and trust are stabbed occasionally with no hint of remorse.

The sound and lighting are used to great effect in The Ides of March as are the close-ups. The camera focuses directly on a character and lingers there for a few extra seconds to give an idea of their thoughts while there is silence in the frame when needed. The film also leaves a little bit of doubt regarding not only the scandal but also the death in the movie. This doubt may seem like a loophole in the plot but it also leaves room to show that there is someone else, outside of the frame, that is pulling the shots thereby making every character in the film, from Meyers to Morris, just a pawn in the bigger picture. There are some excellent performances in the film, most notably by Ryan Gosling who is easily one of the best American actors working in the industry today. His great performance in Blue Valentine was ignored but he truly deserves a nod for 2011 after giving two top-notch performances in Drive along with The Ides of March.

Sunday, November 06, 2011

Invisible Cinema

The following words stand out from Anthony Lane's article for the New Yorker:

There’s only one problem with home cinema: it doesn’t exist. The very phrase is an oxymoron. As you pause your film to answer the door or fetch a Coke, the experience ceases to be cinema. Even the act of choosing when to watch means you are no longer at the movies. Choice—preferably an exhaustive menu of it—pretty much defines our status as consumers, and has long been an unquestioned tenet of the capitalist feast, but in fact carte blanche is no way to run a cultural life (or any kind of life, for that matter), and one thing that has nourished the theatrical experience, from the Athens of Aeschylus to the multiplex, is the element of compulsion.
................

As Justine’s mother says of marriage, and as the movie tries to say of mortal life, so we should say of cinema: “Enjoy it while it lasts.”


His words may be applicable to those who live in New York City but they hold very little relevance outside New York. The truth is that for people living in North American cities aside from New York and to some extent LA or Toronto, home is the only logical option to watch foreign films. There are no choices for people in majority of North American cities to catch Melancholia or even The Turin Horse in their local cinema. I can confidently vouch for the latter because no Bela Tarr film has ever played in my city. As for Melancholia, it might eventually get here but it won't be until the summer of 2012, more than a year after its Cannes premier. Is that considered a valid choice? Not really especially if the film is going to be available officially in Europe via DVD or by digital pay options much earlier than that.

Talking about the pure experience of cinema is not relevant for people whose weekly cinematic choices are Spider Man 1: the 10th remake, Shrek 7, Transformers 5 or Harry Potter, the diaper years. If these are the only theatrical options that I have each week, then I rather not visit a cinema hall.

Thankfully, there are great films being made around the world every year even though access to such films is getting more and more restricted via traditional theatrical means. Even rental DVD is getting hard as local independent DVD stores across Canada are vanishing at a fast rate. Before anyone else blames Netflix, they need to have a look at the dismal selection of films available on Netflix Canada. As for digital/pay-for-view options, they mostly carry the same Hollywood titles that play in every Canadian multiplex. However, the foreign films are out there. The onus is now on each cinephile to look hard to find those precious films lurking in some region free DVD zone or via other digital means.

Here are just a few worthy films from the last few years that I was lucky enough to see via the film festival circuit. For the most part, these films are still invisible to the rest of the world. That is a shame because they demand to be seen:

Manuel di Ribera (2010, Chile, Pablo Carrera/Christopher Murray)

This visually stunning film is a fascinating mix of Lisandro Alonso and Bela Tarr yet is completely original. The lonely journeys of Manuel, conducted with the aid of boats, has touches of Alonso (from both Los Muertos & Liverpool) while the mostly grayish/dark environment and the drunken locals' distrust of Manuel feels similar to Tarr's The Outsider and Satantango. Also, the film brilliantly plays with the concept of reality by having two almost similar scenes of an event incorporated into the film -- one real and one imagined. The audience is left to figure out what the reality is.

The Intern (2010, Argentina, Clara Picasso)

Clara Picasso's sublime film cleverly uses a Buenos Aires hotel setting as a springboard to examine wider issues, such as male-female power games and the thin boundary that exists between private and public life. Not a single minute is wasted in the film's brisk 64 minutes. Almost at each 20 minute segment, the viewer has to track back to the previous segment to get a clue as to mystery or relationship tussle taking place on screen. The end result is an engaging film.

R (2010, Denmark, Tobias Lindholm/Michael Noer)

The tag 'dark film' is easily thrown around but in the case of R, the tag is entirely justified. The film makes the wonderful Un prophète look like a feel good happy film. Besides being completely savage, R is intelligent and that is demonstrated by a clever perspective shift two-thirds into the film which shows the similar hierarchies of two rival gangs.

Hunting & Zn (2010, Holland, Sander Burger)

This powerful Dutch film shows how a complicated relationship can be strained when lies and a pregnancy enters the equation. Like Maren Ade's brilliant Everyone Else, this film is bold enough to look at the nasty side that exists in all relationships and thereby causes the audience to get deeply involved with the film. As a warning, pregnant women or couples expecting a child might want to brace themselves for an emotionally challenging film.

Breathless (2009, South Korea, Yang Ik-June)

This debut feature by Yang Ik-June packs quite a punch and as per the title leaves one breathless. There are many movies which claim to be anti-violence but instead end up glorifying violence because the consequences of violence is never fully explored. On the other hand, Breathless clearly depicts the danger of a violent life, whether that life is in a household or in a gang. There is a consequence to every violent action and Yang Ik-June’s film has a purpose for every scene of violence and abuse.

The Happiest Girl in the World (2009, Romania co-production, Radu Jude)

Winning a free car is supposed to usher in new freedom for Delia Fratila. All she has to do is act in a 35 second car commercial and drive away with her new car. But things don’t turn out to be that simple. Her parents want to exchange the car for money to finance a better future and the commercial shoot turns out to be an artistic and physical challenge. Funny and engaging. Another vintage film from Romania.

Katalin Varga (2009, Romania co-production, Peter Strickland)

Devastating cinema! After Katalin is kicked out of her home along with her son, she undertakes a journey. The music points to a dark past and even a darker future. Indeed, there is some darkness for Katalin Varga is a revenge tale. But it is unlike any other revenge movie. In fact, it carves out its own rules for vengeance. That means no dramatic dialogues but instead we are treated to beautiful images and haunting music which conveys the hovering tension in the air.

Call If You Need Me (2009, Malaysia, James Lee)

A visually sharp film that combines the sensibilities of diverse film-makers such as Hou Hsiao-Hsien, Pen-Ek Ratanaruang and Quentin Tarantino while still retaining a unique Malaysian flavour. Hou Hsiao-Hsien elevated a gangster film to an art form with Goodbye South Goodbye and James Lee does a very job in carrying on that tradition. Call if you Need me is about gangsters and kidnappings but there isn’t a single gun or drop of blood to be found on screen. All the violence is kept out of the frame and we are instead shown events that precede or succeed a violent act. The lack of violence allows audience to focus on the characters and their day to day lives, including their love interests and their choice of food and drugs.

Rough Cut (2008, Korea, Hun Jang)

Rough Cut has taken some aspects of the extraordinary Korean film Dirty Carnival and gone in a different direction with good effect. Dirty Carnival showed how gangsters complained about movies not having authentic fight scenes and in order to correct things, a local gangster (Byeong-du) helped his old college friend (Min-ho) to make an authentic gangster film by giving pointers to the actors and fight instructors. In Rough Cut, a once popular action star asks a local gangster to play a villain in his movies so that the actor can save his career. The gangster, who always dreamed of being an actor himself, agrees provided that all the fight scenes in the film are real and not staged. The end result is a no holds barred on screen contest where even the film’s director has no idea if the end result would hold true to his original script.

Wonderful Town (2007, Thailand, Aditya Assarat)

Wonderful Town is a tender love story between a Bangkok architect Ton, who comes to the southern Thai town Pakua Pak to work on a new beach resort, and Na, the owner of the hotel that Ton stays in. Everything in the film exists in harmony, be it the haunted house, the construction of the new resort, the empty hotel, the isolated beach or even a road-side garage. The town is empty, almost a ghost town, where everyone knows each other. Yet this loneliness never feels oppressive but just a natural cycle of life.

Kill the Referee (2009, Belgium, Y.Hinant/E.Cardot/L.Delphine)

This Belgium soccer documentary does not have any narration or title cards to guide the audience but instead dives right into the action. Like the Zidane film, this documentary gives a completely different perspective to what one experiences when watching a soccer game. One gets to see the game from an on-field angle, but instead of a player's point of view, we see the game from a referee's angle.

This film is essential viewing for anyone who has ever seen a soccer game. And since the film is artistically shot and edited, it offers non-soccer fans plenty to chew on as well. The games shown in the film are from Euro 2008 and if a person is familiar with some of the players, then that enhances the experience. This film does an excellent job in showing us the human side of the refs and also some of the egos that operate in the game.

Steam of Life (2010, Finland, Joonas Berghäll/Mika Hotakainen)

A beautifully shot contemplative film that places the viewer in an awkward position of a voyeur observing Finnish men pour their heart out while sitting in a variety of saunas. The film remarkably shows that any enclosed space can be transformed into a sauna, even a phone booth, and the calming effect of the steam is essential to allow men to tackle life's daily burdens.

Woman without a Piano (2009, Spain, Javier Rebollo)

A sublime film that uses a low key treatment in depicting a single night's events. The camera quietly follows Carmen around and the events that unfold around her are hilarious and sad at the same time. The film is set in Madrid and in some alleys we see situations which Pedro Almovodar uses in his films but Woman without a Piano is an art film through and through, with a pinch of comedy.

Note: I have mentioned these films previously but I still get puzzled looks when I talk about these films to people. Since I have no power over these film's distribution, all I can do is repeat my words.

Saturday, November 05, 2011

Contagion

End of the World with a cough and a handshake

Contagion (2011, USA/UAE, Steven Soderbergh)


Day 2: A woman coughs on one side of the world and the planet starts moving towards a quick end.

In reality, the end of the world started on the night of Day 1 after the woman passed on her contracted virus to others in an invisible indirect manner when others touched any objects the woman held in her hands. Her cough on Day 2 is the first visible sign that something is wrong. However, there is not much time for anyone to be saved once they get the disease because the virus moves rapidly through the body causing instant death. Naturally, global panic results as more people start dying around the world.

As with most mass epidemic diseases, a few work hard to find a cure, some try to help as many people as possible, others spend their time spinning conspiracy theories or causing more panic while a few look to make money for themselves. In this regard, the movie gives an adequate time slice to an entire array of characters so as to paint a complete picture of what unfolds when a mass epidemic results. So there are characters who are shown to collect samples and analyze the virus, others try to grow the virus so a cure/anti-body can be found, government/health officials debate how to handle public safety, pharmaceutical companies try to sell vaccines, journalists cover the story while common folk are concerned for their loved ones and do whatever they can to save their families/friends.

Contagion shows that most humans are driven by fear or greed, regardless of their job title, so in a sense the film is short on selfless heroes. A single rebel doctor who grows the virus is probably the only hero in the film but the planet could have been truly saved if every human citizen had a hand sanitizer. Of course, if a hand sanitizer was readily available, then there would have been no spread of the virus on Day 1. The absence of a hand sanitizer to save the day means door knobs and hand railings in Contagion are made to look as dangerous as dark hallways do in horror/slasher films.

The film moves at a healthy pace, crisscrossing across various international cities, and keeps the viewer engaged by following a different character in each segment. Contagion shows that a good film can still be made within a predictable template that depicts expected behavior from most characters. However, the true power of Contagion is reserved for the film’s final segment which depicts how the disease came to be spread on Day 1. There are some clues given for the disease’s origin before the final segment that would allow people to piece things together. Still, the final segment is chillingly effective and manages to tie the whole film together nicely.

Friday, October 14, 2011

CIFF 2011 -- All about the Mavericks

Calgary International Film Festival 2011

Every year I joyfully look forward to the 10 day cinematic adventure that is the Calgary International Film Festival (CIFF). Normally, I have my festival specific routines and relish tweaking my schedule as the festival goes on, adding in extra films or altering my plan to get some rest. However, this year my schedule for the opening weekend was decided well in advance because I was invited to be on the three person jury to judge the Mavericks competition award. The Mavericks competition featured eight films from first time directors. The goal was to watch all eight films in the cinema along with the audience during the opening weekend and then deliberate to come up with the award. As per the film schedule, I had two options to see all eight films:

1) 2-3-3: Start off with two films on Friday and then take in three each on Saturday or Sunday.

2) 3-3-2: Three on the opening day and end the weekend with two.

I opted for the second option and added two more films for personal viewing, making the format a much more soccer friendly 4-4-2. This format also allowed me to give my full attention to the Mavericks films.

The eight Mavericks films seen in order of viewing:

Maria, my Love (2011, USA, Jasmine McGlade Chazelle)
Heat Wave (2011, France, Jean-Jacques Jauffret)
The Sacrament of Life (2008, USA, Joseph Sorrentino)
Flowers of Evil (2010, France, David Dusa)
Radio Free Albemuth (2010, USA, John Alan Simon)
Old Goats (2010, USA, Taylor Guterson)
The Whisperer in the Darkness (2011, USA, Sean Branney)
Sunflower Hour (2011, Canada, Aaron Houston)

All the eight films are quite wonderful and different from each other which made it fascinating to judge the competition. The eight films are also clearly a labor of love by the filmmakers and it was a great experience to hear the stories about how some of these films saw the light of day. I had the pleasure to listen to Jasmine McGlade Chazelle, Joseph Sorrentino, Sean Branney and John Alan Simon talk about their films and had a very nice chat with Joseph Sorrentino. These films highlight the importance of film festivals in helping to showcase talented filmmakers whose works would otherwise be lost in the overpowering Hollywood dominated North American cinemas. I relished viewing all these films and hope they get the larger audience they deserve.

In the end, we chose Flowers of Evil as the winner of the Mavericks award.

Here is our jury statement:

Flowers of Evil is a bold, innovative film brimming with fresh new ideas. David Dusa has crafted a unique film that smartly integrates social media such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube within the film’s visual language while maintaining the story’s flow. Dusa’s film contains living breathing three dimensional characters who draw the audience into their lives thereby creating an emotional connection with the characters lives in Paris and a revolution taking place in a far off land.


In addition, Flowers of Evil also features a grooving soundtrack and makes great use of Shantel’s Disko Boy song.

The other two films that I saw on the opening weekend were Kill List and Alps.

Kill List (2011, UK, Ben Wheatley)

Ben Wheatley’s film packs quite a powerful punch and increases the tension and violence as it races along at a riveting pace. One remarkable aspect of the film is that it keeps certain elements off the screen thereby allowing the audience to fill in their own version of certain events related to the characters background story and even to the cult group. The violent scenes cause plenty of discomfort although the film’s most shocking scene won’t seem as a surprize to those who saw a certain 2010 film.

Alps (2011, Greece, Giorgos Lanthimos)

Lanthimos’ follow up to Dogtooth features far more deadpan humor and less of the strangeness that might have put some people off Dogtooth. That is not to say that ALPS is without its quirky dark humor but it is presented in a much more accessible manner than Dogtooth. The material that is presented in ALPS only seems much more darker and sinister when one walks away after seeing the film and thinks about the characters and their lives.


Some quick comments on other films that showed at the festival:

Guilt (2011, Canada, Marc Bisaillon)

This excellent Canadian film is based on a true story and raises some worthy moral questions about guilt/punishment. There is some humor as well regarding how the champ jock is given preferential treatment but the humor is subtle and does not draw attention to itself.

In Heaven, Underground (2011, Germany, Britta Wauer)

The story about how the Weissensee Jewish cemetery survived the Nazi era and continued to operate for more than a century is certainly extraordinary. Surprisingly, this is a very light tender film about the heavy topic of death and features many poetic and contemplative moments.

Target (2011, Russia, Alexander Zeldovich)

Like all good sci-fi films Target uses a single topic, elixir of youth in the film’s case, to explore larger issues about human behavior and morality in society. Plus, the film uses current trends of China’s growth to extrapolate a future where the political power balance is altered. One forgets the sci-fi element 30 minutes into the film after which the story unfolds like an epic Russian novel, carefully highlighting the disintegration of the principal characters. The ending shot certainly evokes Tarkovskiy’s Solaris as do certain other aspects in the film.

Journey of a Dream (2011, Canada co-production, Shenpenn Khymsar)

This worthy documentary is a fascinating mix of a memoir, a road journey, a political film about Tibet's struggle of independence and a look at the underground music scene in Darjeeling. Each part contains many engaging aspects which are nicely tied together in the end when the filmmaker draws a line between his Buddhist beliefs and love of metal music.

Le Quattro Volte: I wrote about this film previously and it is still a front-runner for one of my favourite films of the year.

George the Hedgehog (2011, Poland, Wojtek Wawszczyk, Jakub Tarkowski, Tomasz Leśniak)

And now for something completely different...George the Hedgehog is a Polish animated film that is a blend of political and social satire packed with plenty of sexual innuendo and some nudity to boot. The film is surprizingly liberal with its sexual depiction and is not afraid to offend with its crudeness and racial jokes. George the Hedgehog also smartly includes the impact that online videos can have in swaying public opinion and starting a revolution of sorts.


The ones that got away

The opening weekend certainly exhausted me and that meant I had to give away some of my film tickets over the next few days just to recover. So I missed seeing Take Shelter, Monsieur Lazhar, The Skin I Live In and The Bengali Detective. On top of that, family commitments meant that I missed the closing gala film Take That Waltz along with three of my must-see picks for the festival -- Le Havre, El Bulli and The Salt of Life. Still, CIFF 2011 was another great festival experience highlighted by the outstanding Mavericks competition.

Oh Canadian weather

CIFF has always taken place place in the final week of September and usually spilled over into the first few days of October. As a result, my memories of the fall season have always been associated with CIFF because my waiting in line for films has gone hand in hand with a chill tinged air. However, remarkably last year the weather during the first week of the festival was summer like thereby making the walks in between the cinemas pleasant and fun. Incredibly, this time around the first weekend of the festival (Sept 23 - 25) featured temperatures in the range of 29-30 deg C thereby meaning some of the warmest summer weather of the year took place in the fall. If this summer like weather occurs during the festival next year, then it will certainly be further proof of the changing weather pattern.