Korean mystery flick with a touch of magical realism. Really, really good! We loved it and the rest of the audience seemed to as well. Truly creepy and scary in some parts, completely farcical in others. Some really great casting choices/quirky characterizations. Completely original. 100% worth not getting home until after 1 a.m.
I’m sure it’s barely playing anywhere, if at all. But if it comes to your town, I’d call it a Can’t Miss.
Ah, the CIFF. One of my very favorite things about living here. So easily accessible. The previous year I saw 15 flicks there. (I KNOW! NUTS!) The year before, six. This year, I was busy with school and skeered to spend much money so I only saw four. And three out of the four were FANTASTIC. So I was extra happy I made good choices!!!
SPY(IES) [ESPION(S)]
Super! Sexy! Sleek! The main dude looked like a French Patrick Dempsey. Loved this movie. Believed in the frustrations and the attractions. Very nicely done.
Love and Savagery
The one of the four that I didn’t think was great. It was beautifully filmed (in Ireland, where it’s set, I presume) but the storyline and most of the acting were really below par. Particularly compared to the others.
Girls on the Wall
A documentary about girls in an IL juvenile facility who put on a musical/play for their families / guardians / etc. based on their own stories. So good. Really intimate look at their lives. There are so many places one’s life can go wrong. So many times the wrong choice can turn into a terrible mistake. And then there are the ones who fight and fight and eventually rise above that. Really powerful.
Fish Tank
Kinda hard to watch. Super yicky subject. Super fantastic (FANTASTIC) acting. I think this one is now being released wider (saw a review of it in EW) and I highly recommend seeing it. I mean, the subject matter is tough. But the acting is so good. And there’s a lot to like here. It really tied me up emotionally. And the main dude, Michael Fassbender, was also fantastic in “Hunger” that I saw last year (and he also plays the Scottish soldier in “Inglorious Basterds”). Dude has fantastic RANGE.
So back in October, I saw 15 films in 10 days at the Chicago Film Festival. I was quite ambitious in my ticket buying (obviously) and although I was a bit worn out at the end (it’s not like I had any days off work during this adventure), I saw a lot of interesting films, most of which I certainly would not have had the opportunity to see otherwise.
Day 1, Oct 17
The Pleasure of Being Robbed
Misleading description. Not about the pleasure of being robbed at all. Maybe a little bit about the pleasure of robbing, not that it even seemed that pleasurable, and the cinematography wasn’t interesting enough to keep the viewer involved. This wasn’t terrible, but we both felt it smacked of “senior year art project”. And as T pointed out: it ended and you weren’t even sure you knew the main character’s name, much less her motivations. 2.5 out of 5.
Wendy & Lucy
Really nuanced wonderful performance by Michelle Williams. But sad, hard to watch, and one of those movies where it’s more “a portrait of a moment” than a movie/story. Minimal plot. And our second movie of the day featuring a girl who is somewhat lost and alone. 3.5 out of 5. Great performance but not much there otherwise.
Let the Right One In
Beautiful. One of my faves of the festival. Slowly paced, dim and quiet. Sweden. Winter. Loneliness. Vampire. Love. So glad to see this one is getting a more widespread release (if you can consider indie theaters in big cities to be widespread). If you read the review in EW and decided not to see it, I urge you to go anyway. It was really lovely and moving. Icky in places, but quite powerful. This is definitely a 5 out of 5 for me.
Day 2, Oct 18
Sparrow
Very fun. Slapstick drama about four brothers who are all pickpockets and all get involved with the same woman. Her end of the plot was a bit lame but it was so fun, I really didn’t mind that. Sort of Marx Brothers in Hong Kong with a little more seriousness. 3.5 out of 5.
Surveillance
One of only a few US-centric flicks we saw. First 2/3rds = really interesting, tightly plotted, intriguing flick. Last 1/3rd = insane twist that throws away a LOT of the good stuff from earlier on and makes it not nearly as interesting. Bizarre. And then the credits roll and “Oh, directed by Jennifer Lynch. From the content of that movie, I HAVE to think she’s related to David.” 3 out of 5.
Day 3, Oct 19
Hunger
So good. So sad. HARD to watch. Death of IRA leader Bobby Sands by hunger strike (which had followed a “rub shit on the walls” strike). Loved the first half. Neat stuff showing how the prisoners found ways to communicate both with each other and with the outside world. A really really interesting (long) conversation in the middle of the film between Sands and a priest. But didn’t like how the second half (or last third maybe) of the movie lets all the other characters drop away and basically you just watch someone waste away, hallucinate(?) and die. 4 out of 5. Really good but could have easily been better just by keeping the stories of the other prisoners/activists going.
North Starr
Poor. Definitely the weakest entry I have seen not just this year but last year as well. Poorly written and acted, heavy handed. Maybe a 2 out of 5 and that’s generous. Not sure how this even got selected.
Day 4, Oct 20: No movies for me.
Day 5, Oct 21
Everlasting Moments
WWI Sweden. Woman stuck in bad marriage, constant pregnancy, poverty, etc. Gets the gift of a camera. Changes her life. Somewhat. Beautifully done. The grunge of their lives so well portrayed/styled/etc. 4 out of 5.
Zach & Miri Make a Porno
I am not unbiased about Kevin Smith. I fucking loved this movie. I loved it even more after he took Q&A for an hour afterwards. Sure, it’s crass and gross and whatever else people are saying about it. It’s also super sweet and romantic and really fucking funny. 5 out of 5.
Day 6, Oct 22
Two Lovers
Not very good and you know I love Joaquin Phoenix so that was sad. Same director as We Own The Night which while somewhat formulaic/predictable was a much better movie than this one. Convoluted. And unlike how seeing Kevin Smith’s Q&A made me love his movie more, this Q&A went the other direction.
2.5 out of 5.
Day 7, Oct 23
Girl by the Lake
Italian murder mystery. Starts with your classic misdirection. Some nice subplots about the lead detective’s own life. Liked it. But not sure the conclusion really worked. 3.5 out of 5.
Day 8, Oct 24
Country Wedding
Two busloads of Icelandic family members lost trying to find the right church for a wedding. Some really funny stuff. Some sweet. But dragged a bit. Could have used some zippier editing or maybe a few more contretemps thrown in. 3 out of 5.
Julia
Totally crazy movie about people making insanely bad decisions and then following through on them only to have even worse happen. A lot of it was really uncomfortable and hard to watch. But this is by far the most human I have ever seen Tilda Swinton be. So that was interesting. 3.5 out of 5.
Day 9, Oct 25
Snow
Beautiful. A Bosnian village of women whose men have gone to war and vanished, trying to find ways not just to survive for themselves but to keep their community together. Slowly paced. But really good. 4.5 out of 5.
Day 10, October 26
Terribly Happy
Denmark. This is totally Hot Fuzz, minus the comedy and upping the eerie stuff by half or more. Really creepy and nuts. Very entertaining. Lots of misdirection. Had a little sense of slapstick but in a very serious way. 4 out of 5.
7:30pm – Already in line for Zach and Miri an hour from now (ridiculous).
7:31pm – But turns out pomegranate jelly bellies are addictive. So there’s that.
7:43pm – This is worse than the Battlestar lines at Dragon*Con. And no twins here to keep me company.
8:35pm – Oh shit Kevin Smith is actually going to be here!!
[Viewing Zack and Miri Make a Porno]
10:31pm – Kevin Smith Q and A is making me very happy!
10:37pm – Someone just asked “Kevin, did George Lucas step on your balls about Star Whores?”
10:43pm – Kevin Smith used to be a Front Wiper. I do not jest. [Until Harley Quinn’s birth when a nurse told him he should be doing it the other way!]
10:47pm – His next movie* is so bleak “it makes Dark Knight look like Beverly Hills Chihuahua.”
11:12pm – Rosario Dawson was supposed to play Miri. [They moved the timing of filming and that made it conflict with “Eagle Eye” so they had to find someone else relatively last minute. But Elizabeth Banks is actually perfect in it (my opinion AND his) so it worked out great. Per Kevin: “She really grounds the movie.”]
11:24pm – Kevin Smith’s all-time fav porn title: “Jerk my cum crayon and color me white.”
*Next movie = Red State. Described as him finally finding a way to talk politics. A political horror film. Not funny at all. Having trouble finding financing.
Explanatory:
At Chicago Film Festival to see Zach & Miri. Often there are directors and/or actors who take Q&A afterward but it’s generally noted in the program. This one didn’t say so but surprise surprise. So sad my dad couldn’t be here to see this!!! If you don’t know: Kevin Smith LOVES doing Q&As. If you’ve ever listened to a SModcast or watched one of his An Evening with Kevin Smith DVDs, you can pretty much imagine how a) awesome and b) funny this was. And also how insanely comfortable he is talking about any and/or every personal detail of his life.
Other random quotes that I didn’t actually twitter:
Ben Affleck on viewing Jason Mewes’ nude scene: “You realize Mewes is just one pump away from full liftoff, right?”
Personal note to Ben from me: Are you just maybe kinda jealous because Jason Mewes is so smokin hot in this movie? [I’m so not joking. Skinny and his hair all clean cut? And damn those shoulder tattoos are AWESOME.]
After talking about Red State and saying “Sorry for bringing the whole room down”, someone started their question with “Not to bring the whole room down again” and KS yelled “So Don’t!” and tried to move on. Turned out the dude wanted to ask him about the whole “how’re you doing on your diet thing?” [What a dick.] KS wasn’t necessarily “happy to” but he, in his usual brutally honest way, did respond and chat about it. But the best part was when he pointed out “You know, some skinny motherfucker always has to point out how fat I am!!!” And the whole audience looked at the questioner disapprovingly! Ha!
And the movie?
Lots of fun. Totally crude and nasty and gross. And soooooo funny and very sweet and romantic. Honestly, the last five minutes, even with the Dutch Rudder jokes, were so touching. YAY!!! [And I don’t even like Seth Rogen.] Also Darryl from The Office? is HYSTERICAL in this. Brandon Routh was a total Tom Cruise doppelganger. So much so it gave me a little doubletake each time. A great night at the movies. The flick alone made me grin like an idiot. And then Kevin Smith’s appearance just sent the evening over the top.
*Bliss*.
Dir: Anton Corbijn
Actrs: Mostly fairly unknowns (Sam Riley = awesome!!), with Samantha Morton as Deborah Curtis.
A biopic of Ian Curtis, lead singer of Joy Division, the remaining members of which became New Order after Curtis’ suicide. Based on the biography written by his wife, Deborah. Reading up on details in various places, sounds pretty true to events, with some scenes/dialogue obviously imagined due to lack of other people in the room.
Corbijn is protesting in interviews being known only as a “rock photographer” although I’d say the skills of a rock photographer add greatly to the filming of this story. Regardless, it’s beautifully filmed in black and white, does a good job of showing the extreme bleakness of the surrounds, where they grew up, Curtis’ mental and emotional bleakness. Pondering whether either a) the side effects of his epilepsy medication made him not take the medication thus leading to more (and more?) epileptic fits on stage or whether b) he was indeed regularly taking it leading to more and more depression, paranoia, etc. The scene where the drugs are prescribed and the extreme lack of medical knowledge at the time around epilepsy was pretty scary. (Is it better now? One has to hope so.)
If not for Curtis’ suicide, you feel like you could be watching a movie about the early Stones or the Beatles. The music business was such a different animal, even in the late 70s when JD was getting their start. You see the evolution not only of the band, but of their manager and record company.
Some of it is just maddening, particularly the events that appear to lead directly to his suicide. Basically couldn’t handle being married and a father at his young age (they got married at 17 or 18, had a kid around 22, suicide at 23), was involved in at least one extramarital affair, (although I think the movie may have trimmed out other affairs for time), but prospect of wife divorcing him over him a) being unfaithful and b) stating to her that he doesn’t love her anymore! makes him completely despondent. Yet, he’s having an affair, so… Classic case of digging one’s own hole, yet his mental state left him completely unable to handle it or face up to his own actions. Interesting to see events in his life tied to songs writtenly shortly thereafter (“She Lost Control” and “Love Will Tear Us Apart” particularly).
Great acting here. Actors playing the band play the music themselves. If you liked Ray for Jamie Foxx’s incredibly Ray-like interpretation, or Walk the Line for a similarly incredible performance by Joaquin Phoenix, you should see this. Although Sam Riley’s voice is much higher than Curtis’, the band does a more than credible job of interpreting the songs and it all feels very, very real. Thought Riley did an incredible acting job, as well as Samantha Morton playing his wife and Alexandria Maria Lara playing his other love Annick (she’s breathtakingly gorgeous).
In my own “rock history”, given that he committed suicide in 1980 when I was whatever, fucking young as shit, I knew the music of New Order much better, became a huge fan thanks to my friend Pete freshman year of college who was the first person to play New Order for me, as well as The Replacements, and so many more bands that certainly owe some musical debts to Joy Division. Even today, bands like The National, would their lead have considered a rock career without having heard similarly low-voiced Ian Curtis, one has to wonder. Curtis was a big Bowie fan early on, there are lots of other bands up and coming alongside them (the Buzzcocks, hilarious bit in the film about the name; The Sex Pistols), and watching the movie just made me need to go home and sit down in front of the stereo…
New Order site lists showings around the country. Go! Highly recommended. Might want to bring kleenex.
Dir: Helen Hood Scheer.
A documentary about the sport of Jumprope, a rising phenomenon in what appeared to be mostly inner cities. Despite not being an official sport for any schools, universities, etc., it’s highly organized with regionals, nationals and world championships. Film follows primarily kids from four (or five? i’m starting to forget) groups as they practice their routines, appear at the meets, etc. I was really into the Razzmatazz kids.
If the highlight of the Olympics for you is gymnastics, I think you’d probably enjoy this. These kids are pretty amazing athletes and their jumprope routines incorporate all kinds of tumbling/gymnastic skills as well as just plain muscle and endurance. There are speed competitions of several kinds, and jumprope routines done in singles, doubles, triples and quads. (When they get to worlds, seems like there are routines done there with many more kids at once.)
Unlike the competitive backstabbing world of gymnastics (no I’m not joking about that), and probably partially because this is a more intramural/extracurricular activity, these kids are very friendly with their opponents. Practicing together before meets, sharing new “tricks”, teaching younger kids… The sharing and “hey try this!” bit at the worlds is really cool, and very interesting to see the different styles evolving in different parts of the world: all the Asian kids seem to incorporate breakdancing into their jumprope routines!
And just like Olympic gymnasts, these are young kids, pouring their hearts into this sport, practicing for hours on end, devoting themselves physically AND mentally. Their collective goal is to get the sport into the Olympics. They need 5 continents (they have the 5), 74 or 75 countries (they only have about 35 right now) and all under the same rules (that part was unclear). Seems less structured rule & scoring wise than gymnastics, which is something that probably comes with regulation / the more structured a sport it becomes, the more spontaneity it will lose.
Made me cry several times. Really engaging.
Dir: Paul Oremland
Actrs: Mostly unknowns with a great performance by Simon Callow (who you might know as the overweight gay guy who dies in Four Weddings and a Funeral)
A young teacher with a secret gay nightlife. A rich (sometimes gay) playboy with a connection to the royal family is kidnapped and murdered. London’s incredible network of surveillance cameras are the only leads.
The entire film is done on CCTV and surveillance cameras, cameraphones, handhelds, etc. While this had a very direct tie-in to the plot and the point of the movie (thus a plus), it also lends itself to a very amateur look (a minus). Similar to when you’re watching a well-produced, well-photographed TV show and then a super cheap commercial comes on and the filming is just flat / no depth / feels two-dimensional. While part of the point of this is the “it could happen to anyone” and “you never know what’s being caught on film” and “we’re being watched/ photographed/ surveilled at all times”…on the other hand, you’re in a theater watching it on the big screen, and it just doesn’t have the visual zing of a more traditionally produced, high quality camera & film movie.
Raises some very intriguing questions. Good performances. (The lead is a little hottie.) A very 20/20 investigative feel. Really enjoyed the Q&A with the director afterward. Some of his conversations with MI-5 and MI-6 were quite…astonishing. And followed by “I never knew whether to believe anything they were telling me. Those guys get so caught up in their own mystique.” My only quibble would be: is there a way to do this, but have it look better, yet still have the “feel” of the surveillance cameras?
Very hard to describe. Definitely an “art house” or “film festival” flick. Starts with a sunrise. That seemed to take approximately 20 minutes. Twenty minutes!! With nothing but the sun slowly lightening up the sky. No sounds but the wind and the birds and…maybe you can hear trees growing?
A lot of the movie is that silent. And that slow. And that ponderous. Not in a bad way. But definitely in a disconcerting way. I found my mind racing, racing, racing. Any scene with even a hint that disaster could happen had me imagining the wildest things…things that would never actually happen in this movie.
Technically the “action” of the movie is about a Mennonite farmer, with a wife and six kids, who has fallen in love with another woman. And struggles with how to go on from that moment. Although he stays with his wife, she ultimately dies (of a broken heart?)…but then there’s this one moment of magical realism at the end… Which was lovely, but a bit odd considering the very very NOT fantastical rest of the movie.
It was the opposite of, say, a three hour movie that feels like it only took 45 minutes. It was only a little over two hours, but oh sweet monkey sundae, I felt like I was in the theater for 25 years. Sitting in such utter silence, broken only by, say, the sound of someone’s feet walking through grass. Or walking on snow. Or occasionally having a very slow, very drawn out, very few sentences conversation.
Some of it was really beautiful. And the tension in it was very powerful, despite being such non-tense kind of tension. (Maybe you had to see it to even make any sense out of that sentence.)
But it was not an easy movie, on the mind. It totally wore me out. Consider yourself warned.
Dir: Jerry LaMothe
Actrs: Mostly unknowns (to me) but a few familiar faces such as Jeffrey Wright, Zoe Saldana, and Saul Rubinek.
This movie was EXCELLENT. Completely compelling. I turned in my ballot with a 5 and I hope it gets a major distributor. Excellent even though the print we watched had a HUGE time code along the bottom of the screen (blocking about the bottom fourth of the screen) and no credits at the end.
Focuses on the New York City blackout of August 2003*, details the events in one Brooklyn neighborhood, particularly focused on the tenants of one apartment building and the workers at one hair salon. (Based on true events from the blackout, but believe the specific particulars are fictional.)
Really really great. Great acting, great pacing, great suspense, great passion and concern… Loved it. Both thumbs way up.
*hello, I was there! that was my last night in New York and I wound up sleeping on a couch in Manhattan unable to even get to my apartment in Queens!, and walking up and down many sets of stairs in complete darkness, and going for a very scary walk on the dark streets trying to find Amy…
Dir: Paul Schrader.
Actrs: Woody Harrelson (main lead), Kristen Scott Thomas, Lauren Bacall, Lily Tomlin, Willlem Dafoe, Ned Beatty.
This was a bit of a mess. We were down with it for the first half and then things started to unravel. Had a very 80s/90s feel to it, hard to believe it was filmed recently. Full of Washington DC “high society” (oh sweet monkey sundae, are those people pretentious or what) and supposed intrigue. The attempt to make Harrelson’s character BOTH a gay dandyish society fop AND a gay in a serious relationship with a trendy political artist didn’t really work for us. The two sides of his personality never melded and the contrast of the scenes was choppy.
Some good acting, not terrible, but would be very surprised if this film ever really sees the light of day.