Queen and Country

Movies to See Right Now

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WILD TALES
WILD TALES

There are two Must Sees in theaters now, and both were nominated for this year’s Best Foreign Language Picture Oscar:

  • The hilariously dark Argentine comedy Wild Tales, a series of individual stories about revenge fantasies becoming actualized.
  • The Job-like Russian drama Leviathan, a searing expose of post-Soviet Russian society.

Magician: The Astonishing Life and Work of Orson Welles is a satisfying bio-doc that features lots of clips of the great Orson himself.  Queen and Country is director John Boorman’s (Deliverance) well-crafted and moderately entertaining look back at his year as a British Army conscript in the 50s.

My DVD/Stream of the Week is Whiplash, the drama about the line between motivation and abuse and the line between ambition and obsession. J.K. Simmons just won an acting Oscar for his dominating performance. Whiplash is available on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and streaming from Amazon Instant Video, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play, Xbox Video and Flixster.

If you haven’t seen the hilarious gender bender comedy Victor Victoria in a while, catch it again on March 20 on Turner Classic Movies. I think that’s it’s director Blake Edwards’ best comedy – and that’s saying something after all the Pink Panther movies. Along with the alcoholism drama Days of Wine and Roses, this is Edwards’ masterpiece. Julie Andrews (Mrs. Blake Edwards) and James Garner give perfect performances, and there’s a memorable supporting turn by Alex Karras. Victor Victoria is over thirty years old, but stands up just as well today as in 1981.

Movies to See Right Now

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LEVIATHAN
LEVIATHAN

There are two Must Sees in theaters now, and both were nominated for this year’s Best Foreign Language Picture Oscar:

  • The hilariously dark Argentine comedy Wild Tales, a series of individual stories about revenge fantasies becoming actualized.
  • The Job-like Russian drama Leviathan, a searing expose of post-Soviet Russian society.

Queen and Country is director John Boorman’s (Deliverance) well-crafted and moderately entertaining look back at his year as a British Army conscript in the 50s.

We’ve just concluded the 2015 Cinequest film festival. Here’s all my Cinequest coverage – with several features and comments on over twenty five movies – conveniently linked on one page.

My DVD/Stream of the Week is Dear White People, a brilliant comedy about identity that’s on my list of Best Movies of 2014. It’s available on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and streaming on Amazon Instant, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play, Xbox Video and Flixster.

On March 16, Turner Classic Movies is playing the French thriller Wages of Fear. It’s directed by that master of suspense Henri-Georges Clouzot (Diabolique), nicknamed the French Hitchcock. The Wages of Fear features one achingly scary scene where two truck drivers try to get a long truck around a cliff side hairpin curve – and the truck is filled with nitroglycerin.

WAGES OF FEAR
WAGES OF FEAR

QUEEN AND COUNTRY – a fine director reminisces

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QUEEN AND COUNTRY
QUEEN AND COUNTRY

Queen and Country is director John Boorman’s autobiographical look back at his own young manhood. In 1987, Boorman’s Hope and Glory revisited his London childhood during WW II, and now we see Boorman’s experience as a very young man drafted into the Korean War-era British army. The protagonist goes through basic training and is posted in the home nation as a military typing teacher.  Along the way, he learns what happens when 1) a petty tyrant subjects you to ridiculously stupid requirements and 2) when you become infatuated with someone crazier than you are.

Boorman (Deliverance, Excalibur, The General) is an excellent filmmaker, and Queen and Country is well-crafted.  The story isn’t compelling enough to make this a Must See, but it’s wry and warm-hearted, and moderately entertaining.

I saw Queen and Country at Cinequest 2015 at a screening with John Boorman present. Boorman was more memorable than was Queen and Country, especially when he reflected on his eccentric cult sci-fi film Zardoz: “It went from failure to classic without passing through success”.

Cinequest 2015 – festival preview

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CinequestIt’s time to dive into the 2015 version of the San Jose film festival Cinequest running from tomorrow through March 8.  This year’s program looks GREAT.  You can find my festival coverage, including both features and movie recommendations, on my Cinequest page (which you may wish to bookmark).  Follow me on Twitter for the very latest.

Here are my 18 best bets at Cinequest 2015:

  • WILD TALES: the darkly comic Argentine collection of revenge stories. Wild Tales has been a festival hit (Cannes, Telluride, Toronto and Sundance) around the world and was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Oscar.  One of its vignettes features one of my favorite screen actors, Ricardo Darin (the Argentine Joe Mantegna).  See it at Cinequest before it gets to Bay Area art houses on March 6.  Ann Thompson (Thompson on Film) will be receiving a Media Legacy Award at the screening.
  • CLOUDS OF SILS MARIA:   The ever-radiant Juliette Binoche plays an actress now relegated to the older role in her breakthrough play, with her younger role going to Kristen Stewart (All About Eve, anyone?).  And Stewart just became the first American actress to win a César (the French Oscar) for  this performance.
  • ’71:  Everybody says that this thriller about a British soldier trapped overnight in a hostile Northern Ireland neighborhood during the Troubles is pedal-to-the-metal intensity.
  • SLOW WEST:  This offbeat Western with Michael Fassbender won a prize at Sundance.
  • QUEEN AND COUNTRY:  Director John Boorman’s Korean War-Era quasi-sequel to his Hope and Glory.  Boorman (Deliverance) will appear at the screening.  Silicon Valley release on March 6.
  • L’ATALANTE: The 1934 masterpiece of French writer-director Jean Vigo, who died at age 29 soon after its completion.  Richard von Busack, the highly respected film critic for Metro, will receive a Media Legacy Award at the screening.

Here are my pre-festival picks from among the films that I’ve seen:

DRAMA:

  • ANTOINE ET MARIE: A brilliantly constructed French-Canadian drama with two unforgettable characters.
  • THE CENTER: An absorbing and topical American indie drama about the seductiveness of a cult.

COMEDY:

  • LOS HAMSTERS: A biting darkly hilarious Mexican social satire.
  • DIRTY BEAUTIFUL: An American indie comedy that is decidedly NOT a by-the-numbers battle of the sexes.

DOCUMENTARY:

  • ASPIE SEEKS LOVE: A surprisingly sympathetic portrait of a guy looking for love like anyone else, but whose social skills are handicapped by Asberger’s.
  • MEET THE HITLERS: Tracking down real people burdened with the Fuhrer’s name, this successful doc weaves together both light-hearted and very dark story threads.
  • SWEDEN’S COOLEST NATIONAL TEAM: A character-driven take on the sports movie takes us into a Nerd Olympics.

I’ve also gotten tips from insiders about some other very promising films (that I haven’t seen yet):

  • CORN ISLAND: Reportedly transcendent Georgian drama.
  • FOR SOME INEXPLICABLE REASON: Hungarian comedy.
  • GUARD DOG: dark and violent Peruvian thriller. US premiere.
  • MILWAUKEE: US indie sex and relationship comedy. World premiere.
  • THREE WINDOWS AND A HANGING:  Searing Kosovan drama.

Take a look at the program and the passes and tickets. (If you want to support Silicon Valley’s most important cinema event while skipping the lines, the $100 donation for Express Line Access is an awesome deal.) You can download the Festival Guide from this page.