political

Cinequest: CHUCK NORRIS VS. COMMUNISM

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CHUCK NORRIS VS. COMMUNISM
CHUCK NORRIS VS. COMMUNISM

During the Communist regime of the repugnant Nicolae Ceaușescu, Romanians could only experience two hours of television per day and all of that was boring Ceaușescu propaganda.  They were starving for culture, of any type and any quality, and a ring of smugglers responded to the demand with bootleg VHS tapes of American movies.  The rewarding documentary Chuck Norris Vs. Communism tells this story.

Now this isn’t about high cinema from America and the rest of the world inspiring the current crop of Romanian auteurs – although that did happen. This is about ordinary Romanians feasting on even the crappiest American movies, especially the never-ending cascade of action movies (Chuck Norris movies were among the favorites).

The authorities, usually obsessively repressive, turned a blind eye top the VHS smuggling because they totally missed the subversive impact the movies that were not overtly political.  But the ordinary Romanians saw abundantly stocked American supermarkets and measured that against their own deprivation.

One guy organized this VHS smuggling ring.  Amazingly, one woman narrated a Romanian voiceover for all these movies – hundreds of them.  It was a shady business for him and a moonlighting gig for her – but now they are cultural heroes in Romania.  We meet these two briefly in Chuck Norris Vs. Communism.  And we hear the testimony of Romanians touched by cinema – even trashy cinema.

What is banal in some cultures can have a significant impact on others.  Chuck Norris Vs. Communism makes that point engagingly, in a story you won’t see anywhere else.  Plays Cinequest on March 4, 6 and 12.

Hers to Lose: an inside look at a campaign spiraling into defeat

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Hers to Lose: Inside Christine Quinn’s Bid for Mayor is an extraordinarily evocative political film, it’s only 30 minutes long and you can watch it for free.

It’s the story of Christine C. Quinn’s bid for New York City mayor in 2013.  At the start of the race, Quinn was the heavy favorite.  She was the City Council President and a dominant force in Manhattan’s Democratic establishment. She would have been the first woman and the first openly gay Mayor of New York City.

Then, as happens in politics, two things went wrong.  First, she had positioned herself as the Democratic partner and heir to Republican Mayor Bloomberg, which helped her immensely in the years of Bloomberg’s popularity in New York; but by the time of the 2013 primary, Bloomberg had become very UNPOPULAR among Democratic primary voters.  Then, as voters looked to an anti-Bloomberg alternative, one of Quinn’s opponents, Bill de Blasio unleashed a killer campaign commercial, featuring his teenage son Dante, that crystallized the aspirations of the electorate.  Quinn sank like a rock in the polls, and de Blasio shot upward.  This was one of those moments in a political campaign when there is just nothing a candidate can do to stop a popular tsunami.

As Hers to Lose opens, we see Quinn – just after her defeat – explaining that she granted access to the New York Times documentarians so they could record her victory.  She is composed, but her eyes are filled with pain.  Quinn had dedicated years of her life to running in this race, suffering political and personal attacks, enduring long hours and living in a fish bowl; to see this film is to appreciate how much she put into the contest and how helplessly she watched her lead slip away.  At its most searing, Her to Lose chronicles the never-ending torrent of abuse hurled at Quinn by haters – especially the single issue opponents of horse-drawn carriages who hang around her building so they can revile her as she begins each day; as one might assume, this vitriol takes its toll.

You can view Hers to Lose: Inside Christine Quinn’s Bid for Mayor here at the NYT.

Barbara: Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you

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As Joseph Heller wrote in Catch-22, “Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you”.   Barbara’s suspenseful story is set in Cold War East Germany, so everyone is indeed being watched by the Stasi and informed on by their closest associates.  Barbara is a doctor who has applied for an exit visa and has therefore been exiled to the hinterlands from a top Berlin hospital.   Harassed by the Stasi, she is ever aware of everyone’s motives.  She is played by Nina Hoss in a performance that is extraordinarily controlled, alert and suspicious.

Barbara herself is driven by two imperatives – to escape from East Germany and to provide expert and compassionate medical care.  The story is a series of moments, some seemingly random, which tie together as the story builds to the climax, when the doctor must bet her life on a decision.

Barbara was co-written and directed by Christian Petzold (he won the Berlin Film Festival’s Silver Bear for his work).  Given that’s it difficult to imagine how anyone else could have improved Barbara, I’ll be looking for Petzold’s next movie.