Academy Awards

A Separation: brilliant film, tough to watch

by

A contemporary Iranian couple had planned to leave Iran for a better life in the West, but, by the time they have wrangled a visa from the bureaucracy, the husband’s father has developed Alzheimer’s. The husband refuses to leave his father and the wife leaves the home in protest. They are well-educated and secular. The husband hires a poor and religious woman to care for his father (and she does not tell her husband about her job). Then there is an incident which unravels the lives of both families.

This is a brilliant film. Writer-director Asghar Farhadi has constructed a story in which the audience sees and hears everything that happens, but our understanding of the events and characters evolve.  We think we know what has happened, but then other narratives are revealed.  Likewise, the moral high ground is passed from one character to another and to another.  It’s like Rashomon, but with the audience keeping a single point of view.

Much of that point of view is shared by the ever watchful teenage daughter of the educated couple.  She desperately wants her parents back together, views everything through this prism and is powerless to make it happen.  She is played by Farhadi’s real life daughter.

Religion towers above the action – and not in a good way.  It guides the actions of the religious couple into choices against their interest.  The Iranian theocracy restricts the choices of the secular couple and of the judges trying to sort everything out.  Almost every character is a good person who is forced to lie to avoid some horrific result otherwise required by the culture.

One final note:  it will be a lot harder to make an easy joke at the expense of American lawyers after watching the Iranian justice system in A Separation.

The realistic angst of the chapters makes this a difficult film to watch – not a light date movie for sure. But the payoff is worth it, and it’s a must see.

This film is on the top ten list of over 30 critics and is Roger Ebert’s top-rated film of 2011. It is a lead pipe cinch for the Foreign Language Picture Oscar.

Pina 3D: watching dance from amid the dancers

by

There are two reasons to see Pina 3D – to watch modern dance and to marvel at the use of 3D in a dance film.  This documentary shows the work of the late German choreographer Pina Bausch performed by her dance troupe; it’s at least 90% dance performance.

But the singular feature of the film is director Wim Wenders’ use of 3D – the movie audience is transported on to the stage with and among the dancers.  It’s been easy to dismiss 3D with all the crap 3D product out there, but master directors like Martin Scorsese (Hugo) and Werner Herzog (Cave of Forgotten Dreams) can use the technology to make a film even more brilliant.  Wenders (Paris Texas, Wings of Desire) does that with Pina.

Now, if you don’t like modern dance, you’re not going to like this movie.  But, if you do, you should catch this film during the week or two that it will be out in theaters in Real 3D; I’m not going to recommend it in 2D unless you’re a huge dance fan.

[youtube-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGKzXUWAjnI]

Few big surprises in the Oscar nods

by

The Oscar nominations are out, and there are few of the head scratching inclusions and omissions that we frequently see.  Of the Best Picture nominations, The Artist, The Descendants, Hugo and Midnight in Paris all made my Best Movies of 2011.  Although they didn’t make my Best of the Year list, War Horse and Moneyball are very good movies that I recommend.  I haven’t yet seen The Help, which is, by all accounts, a fine film.  Although I hated The Tree of Life, it was the biggest art film of the year and much praised by mainstream critics.  The one jaw dropper is the critically scorned Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, which exploits 9/11 in the pursuit of a three hankie weeper.

My biggest disappointments were the snubbing of Michael Shannon’s performance in Take Shelter and the innovative screenplay by Diablo Cody and Jason Reitman for Young Adult.

The acting categories seem a little light to me this year with the exception of Best Actress, with two performances for the ages by Michele Williams in My Week with Marilyn and Meryl Streep in The Iron Lady.

DVD of the Week: Incendies

by

This searing drama is the year’s best film so far.  Upon their mother’s death, a young man and woman learn for the first time of their father and their brother and journey from Quebec to the Middle East to uncover family secrets.  As they bumble around Lebanon, we see the mother’s experience in flashbacks.  We learn before they do that their lives were created – literally – by the violence of the Lebanese civil war.

Because the film is anything but stagey, you can’t tell that Canadian director Denis Villaneuve adapted the screenplay from a play.  Lubna Azabal, a Belgian actress of Moroccan and Spanish heritage, is brilliant as the mother.

It’s a tough film to watch, with graphic violence against women and  children.  But the violence is neither gratuitous nor exploitative – it is a civil war, after all, and the theme of the film is the cycle of retribution.

Incendies was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Oscar, but lost out to a much inferior film on the same subject of violence, In a Better Life.

Coming up on TV: Midnight Express

by

On July 23, Turner Classic Movies is broadcasting 1978’s  Midnight Express. This film is so gripping that, thirty-plus years after its release, you can’t hear “Turkish prison” without immediately thinking of Midnight Express.  It’s probably done more to keep American kids from bringing drugs into Turkey than any other factor.  Midnight Express is based on a true story, and is amped up considerably by Oliver Stone’s screenplay.  Nominated for six Oscars, it won two.

TCM is also showing Cool Hand Luke on July 23.  Both are on my list of 10 Best Prison Movies

Incendies: best movie of the year so far

by

This searing drama is the year’s best film so far.  Upon their mother’s death, a young man and woman learn for the first time of their father and their brother and journey from Quebec to the Middle East to uncover family secrets.  As they bumble around Lebanon, we see the mother’s experience in flashbacks.  We learn before they do that their lives were created – literally – by the violence of the Lebanese civil war.

Because the film is anything but stagey, you can’t tell that Canadian director Denis Villaneuve adapted the screenplay from a play.  Lubna Azabal, a Belgian actress of Moroccan and Spanish heritage, is brilliant as the mother.

It’s a tough film to watch, with graphic violence against women and  children.  But the violence is neither gratuitous nor exploitative – it is a civil war, after all, and the theme of the film is the cycle of retribution.

Incendies was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Oscar, but lost out to a much inferior film on the same subject of violence, In a Better Life.

 

Movies: Best Bets for May

by

You can see trailers and descriptions of upcoming films at Movies I’m Looking Forward To.

Nominated for the Best Foreign Language Oscar, Incendies, releases widely May 6.  Upon their mother’s death, a young man and woman learn for the first time of their father and their brother and journey from Quebec to the Middle East to uncover family secrets.

Meek’s Cutoff is especially promising because it is directed by the excellent Kelly Reichardt (Old Joy, Wendy and Lucy).  The route of the Oregon Trail was not yet well established in 1845, so a covered wagon train hires a mountain man who claims that he has found a shortcut through the Cascades.  However, it becomes clear that the mountain man (Bruce Greenwood) is unreliable, and there is a new option of following an Indian of unknown motives.  The men (Will Patton, Paul Dano) must figure out what to do while their wives (Michelle Williams, Shirley Henderson) eavesdrop and guess their fate. Releasing widely on May 6.

And now for a lowbrow guilty pleasure on May 27:  The Hangover Part II.  The buddies return – this time losing a little brother on a wild night in Bangkok.

Here’s the trailer for Incendies:

In a Better World: an ambitious contemplation on violence

by

How do we respond to violence without perpetuating a cycle of violence?  What and how do we tell our kids?  Danish filmmaker Susanne Bier (Brothers/Brodre, After the Wedding, Things We Lost in the Fire) takes on these questions through the stories of two 12-year-old boys and their well-meaning but troubled parents.

A schoolboy bully is handled through shock and awe, but the responses to other incidents of violence are far messier.  A parent’s teachable moment about pacifism doesn’t seem effective, and the boys fashion their own disproportionate solution.  One of the fathers, a do-gooder doctor who puts in time at a hell hole of an African refugee camp, must face pure evil in the form of a local warlord.  It’s an often tense drama.

In a Better World benefits from outstanding performances, especially by the boy actors, William Jøhnk Juels Nielsen and Markus Rygaard.

In a Better World won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Picture.  I didn’t like In a Better World as much as Brothers and After the Wedding, but it’s still an ambitious and successful film.

Movies: Best Bets for April

by

You can see trailers and descriptions of upcoming films at Movies I’m Looking Forward To.

I’ve seen Potiche,  which opens April 1.  It’s a delightful French farce of feminist self-discovery, the funniest movie in over a year, and another showcase for Catherine DeNeuve (as if she needs one).   DeNeuve plays a 1977 potiche, French for “trophy housewife”, married to a guy who is a male chauvinist pig and the meanest industrialist in France.   He becomes incapacitated, and she must run the factory.  It’s smart and quick like the classic screwball comedy that American filmmakers don’t make anymore.

Jane Eyre also releases April 1.  I’m not on the edge of my seat waiting for a Bronte bodice ripper, but many of my readers are.  Stars the excellent Mia Wasilova from Alice in Wonderland and The Kids Are All Right.

Carancho:  Well, they have ambulance chasers in Argentina, too, and that seamy world is the setting for this sexy and violent noir thriller.  Stars Ricardo Darin of The Secrets of Their Eyes and Nine Queens.  Won Un Certain Regard at Cannes.  Will release widely on April 8.

Hanna is a paranoid thriller starring Saoirse Ronan as a 16-year-old raised in the Arctic Circle to be a master assassin by her rogue secret agent father (Eric Bana), and then released upon the CIA.  She is matched up against special ops wiz Cate Blanchett.  Hanna is directed by Joe Wright (Atonement, The Soloist).   Releases April 8.

Poetry: This is the story of a Korean grandmother who goes to a poetry workshop and begins to understand the real characters of the people she lives amongst.  Highly praised at Cannes.  Releases widely April 8.

Restless:  Gus Van Sant (Good Will Hunting, Milk, Paranoid Park, Last Days, Elephant) directs (from IMDb) “the story of a terminally ill teenage girl who falls for a boy who likes to attend funerals and their encounters with the ghost of a Japanese kamikaze pilot from WWII.”  The girl is played by the very promising Mia Wasilova, who had a tremendous 2010 with The Kids Are All Right and Alice in Wonderland.  Releases April 8.

In a Better World/Haevnen releases April 15. This won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Picture.  It was directed by the great Danish filmmaker Susanne Bier (Brothers/Brodre, After the Wedding, Things We Lost in the Fire).  A Danish do-gooder returns from Africa to face family problems with his estranged wife and their vulnerable, bullied son.

The Princess of Montpensier: This film, admired at Cannes,  is an adaptation of a well-known short story about a young woman who is forced by her father to marry – but not the man she loves.  It is set in late 16th century France amid the French religious wars.  Look for it on April 22.

Here’s the trailer for In a Better World.

Elizabeth Taylor – Farewell to a Movie Star

by
A Place in the Sun

Elizabeth Taylor was a fine actress and a compelling screen presence.  The movies are full of extraordinary beauties, but few could better dominate a camera’s attention.

She won her Oscar for Butterfield 8, which was entirely her vehicle.  But my favorite Elizabeth Taylor performances were in the ensemble casts of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and Giant.  Although A Place in the Sun is Montgomery Clift’s movie, Elizabeth Taylor is essential – if an 18-year-old Elizabeth Taylor fell in love with him, what man wouldn’t at least think about killing for her?

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof