Look for longer reviews of some stuff soon (including The Guard and Another Earth), but in the meantime, here’s a few capsules for some more LAFF screenings, before I get too far behind. After three 4.5 star reviews in a row, it’s going to look like I just like everything and have no critical acumen anymore, but I’ve just been saving up all the lesser ones. But even these I rate Above or Well Above Average. I really have enjoyed every film this festival, to one degree or another. Either LAFF programs really well, or I’m really good at picking good films out of the program. Or I’ve lost all critical acumen. Whatever.
Tomboy
(3.5/5)
2011 France. Writer/Director: Céline Sciamma. Starring: Zoé Héran, Malonn Levana, Jeanne Disson, Sophie Cattani. 82 min.
Moving into a new neighborhood means new kids to play with, and a chance for ten-year-old tomboy Laure (already androgynous with cropped hair, tank top, and shorts) to pretend to be a boy with her new friends. Introducing herself as Mikael, she passes quite well, playing sports with the boys and hanging out with new friend Lisa in a perhaps more than friendly way. But summer won’t last forever, and keeping her increasingly elaborate attempts at being a boy a secret from her friends and her parents is getting harder. The film is slow and contemplative, giving a lot of time just to the children playing (and to Laure playing with her little sister Jeanne at home, providing a counterpoint to the more rough-and-tumble play with the neighborhood boys) and to Laure’s internal but weighty struggle with her own identity. I wanted the film to go a little bit deeper into the gender politics involved, but it stays fairly aloof, content to observe Laure without making any real statements of its own, which is also fine, but didn’t feel as profound as it seemed to want to be. Zoé Héran is really good as Laure, but it’s the precocious Jeanne who steals the show. Gorgeous cinematography and a good use of shallow depth of field make the film more watchable, but also lend a sense of profundity that the film doesn’t entirely earn. Releasing in the US in Fall 2011 from Rocket Releasing.
Haunters
(4/5)
2011 South Korea. Writer/Director: Kim Min-suk. Starring: Gang Dong-won, Ko Soo, Enes Kaya, Abu Dodd. 114 min.
One of the festival’s all-too-few Beyond screenings (basically like Midnight Madness, except the screenings aren’t at midnight, heh), Haunters introduces us to the extraordinary young man Cho-in, who can exert control over anyone he can see. His gift, his prosthetic leg, and his abuse upbringing mark him as an outsider, and that’s how he lives, using his gift to protect himself and get by. But when he robs a financier’s office, he meets his match in Kyu-nam – the one man who can resist his control. Kyu-nam takes it on himself to stop Cho-in, who constantly sends armies of bystanders to fight Kyu-nam, but Kyu-nam always manages to break free. It’s an intriguing set-up, because without his gift (and thus without other people around to control), Cho-in is basically helpless, only able to limp at a slow pace due to his leg. It’s actually a super-hero/super-villain story, but on a very intimate scale – sort of an Unbreakable but with more cool fight scenes. The director was a co-writer on The Good, the Bad, the Weird and has also worked with Bong Joon-ho – this film is much smaller than those, but still shows a lot of promise, and I enjoyed it very much. A lot of fun to watch, and a good bit of subtext to chew on. No US distribution.
Elite Squad 2: The Enemy Within
(4/5)
2010 Brazil. Director: José Padilha. Screenplay: José Padilha, Bráolio Mantovani. Starring: Wagner Moura, Irandhir Santos, André Ramiro. 115 min.
I didn’t see the first Elite Squad film, but I heard great things about it and its action sequences cleaning out the drug-lord-ridden favelas of Rio de Janeiro, and was hoping for a no-holds-barred good time with the sequel. Well, the sequel is a different beast. Though it’s got a couple of virtuouso action sequences (notably one set in the high-security prison where the leaders of the three main drug cartels continue their turf war inside the prison and the elite squad, or BOPE, intervene), most of the film is much more focused on the power plays between corrupt cops and politicians exploiting the favelas and Lt. Col. Nascimento, the head of BOPE who’s trying to bring them down. Also involved is human rights activist-turned-politician (one of the few non-corrupt individuals in the government), who butts up against Nascimento in the opening prison sequence and also happens to be married to Nascimento’s ex-wife and raising Nascimento’s son. There are a lot of really interesting dynamics here (most of which are based on real situations, according to the director, just tweaked a bit to fit a narrative structure better), and if I hadn’t been quite so sleepy, I think I would have enjoyed it a lot more. I was disappointed that the action sequences were cut almost as incoherently as any big American action film; I was hoping to be free of that little annoyance, but it meant I wasn’t able to enjoy the action as much as I wanted to, either. Also, there’s an almost constant voicover of Nascimento telling us everything that’s going on, which is annoying overkill. Just show us already. Overall, I’m looking forward to checking out the first film, as its on-the-street-with-the-cops approach sounds a bit more like what I was in the mood for here, but this one’s going on the rewatch list for when I’m more in the mood. US release TBD, from New Video.
Karate-Robo Zaborgar
(3.5/5)
2011 Japan. Writer/Director: Noboru Iguchi. Starring: Itsuji Itao, Yasuhisa Furuhara, Mami Yamasaki. 101 min.
I’m giving this a lower rating than Elite Squad 2 because it’s not really as good a movie, but I sure enjoyed it a heck of a lot more. It’s based on a ’70s Japanese TV show (which I really want to watch now) about an evil meglomaniac using sexy androids and cyborg halfbreeds to collect DNA from various high-level politicians to build a world-dominating giant cyborg with which he intends to destroy Tokyo. But Daimon and Zaborgar are there to stop him. Oh, wait, I forgot to mention, Zaborgar is a motorcyle which turns into a karate-wielding robot at Daimon’s command. Their main foe on the ground is Miss Borg, a lovely cyborg who eventually wonders if maybe Daimon is right. But lest that lead you to believe there’s any psychological complexity to this piece, there’s not. It’s a ridiculously over-the-top good time with crazy plot developments, insane line readings, and cyborg henchwomen in football helmets who can change their legs out for jetpacks and shoot missles from their breasts. Yes. It’s that kind of movie. Add in clean, bright sets and peppy ’70s pop music and a willingness on the part of everyone involved to go for broke with this ridiculous concept, and it’s a super-fun time. No US distribution.
Sidewalls (Medianeras)
(3.5/5)
2011 Argentina. Writer/Director: Gustavo Taretto. Starring: Pilar López de Ayala, Javier Drolas, Inés Efron, Rafael Ferro. 92 min.
No one at the festival could decide whether they wanted to use the original Spanish title or the translated English title for this film. I think the Spanish Medianeras sounds way prettier, so I’m going with that. A romantic drama/comedy concerned with the difficulties of connecting in an increasingly digital world isn’t an wholly original concept, but Medianeras is quite charming and easy to like. Martin and Mariana live in apartments across the alley from each other, their side walls (or medianeras) facing each other blankly. Both are somewhat neurotic and solitary, avoiding people and personal interaction as much as possible. Both have voiceovers talking about their personal quirks (Martin is recovering from something of a psychic break that left him unable to leave his apartment for a while, Mariana has a phobia of elevators), and how they relate them to the city of Buenos Aires at large. The gimmick is that even though they share so much in common, even to the kinds of TV shows and games they like, they never seem to quite meet. It’s kind of like one long meet cute, except without the meet. So yeah, it has a dollop of indie quirky cuteness to it (which isn’t something I mind anyway, generally), but the way the city is brought in to the equation and the way the voiceovers play off each other and the general charmingness of the two leads make this quite pleasurable. Releasing in the US in Fall 2011, from Sundance Selects.
