MIFF Day 7

The Higher Force

Those Northern European countries must have something in the water. Either that or the constant daylight or darkness really gets to them. This is a very odd gangster comedy from Iceland, where David is somewhat ashamed of his life as a debt collector, mainly because he isn't very good at it. He dreams of being a martial artist, but never got past buying a bunch of instructional videos. And his brother was killed in a hit and run as a child. When his girlfriend kicks him out, he moves into a new apartment block with a landlord who might be the guy who killed his brother, might be a criminal mastermind, or might just be a racist schoolteacher going off the deep end. David starts talking up his relationship to the maybe kingpin, and suddenly his gangster superiors start to take him seriously. It's all dry wit and ridiculous situations played straight, and it goes nowhere, but the characters are charming and very likeable. Just a fun film really.

Bronson

I've never seen Nicholas Winding Refn's Pusher trilogy, but I did see Fear X, a film that had an amazing mood to it. This is similar, in that it's sensibility is striking. A thoroughly operatic/theatrical telling of the story of Charles Bronson, the most notorious prisoner in Britain. Unlike Chopper, which benefited from a charismatic central character, Bronson is a charmless psychopath. An idiot savant when it comes to violence. There's plenty to like in the film, it's direction is wholly original and the storytelling is engaging, but Bronson isn't a nice guy. He doesn't know what he wants, but he'll hurt anyone for attention. Definitely brilliant, but hard to take, it's proof Winding Refn is one of the brightest directors working today.

The Yes Men Fix The World

Since the last doco I saw on these guys, I've occasionally heard about activist pranks they've pulled. The best was passing themselves off as spokesmen for Dow Chemicals, and promising restitution for the people of Bhopal, site of the Union Carbide chemical plant disaster. Interestingly, in the film they cut their speech slightly (the original can be found online). I'm assuming promising to extradite a Union Carbide official who skipped bail and fled India for Long Island wasn't something they could get past the lawyers for a cinema release. It's a story of pranks carried out to raise awareness of how corporations and governments abuse their people in pursuit of something known as the free market. And they point out that despite a global financial crisis caused by unrestrained greed, government is still keen on an unregulated market. It's kinda depressing. The pranks are funny, the trouble they get themselves into is kinda scary, but the highlight of the film has to be something they had nothing to do with. A free market thinktank, in an effort to scuttle ratification of the Kyoto Protocol, devised an ad campaign that promoted Carbon Dioxide as the source of life. It's an hysterical piece of doublethink, but it just goes to show, you can sell anything if you can find the right angle.

MIFF Day 6

Red Riding: 1983

The trilogy is complete, so now it's possible to look back on the whole and contemplate the question, is it good or not? My answer is: Sort of. This final chapter was, surprisingly, the weakest of the three. Unlike the previous two films, this one didn't have the paranoid streak running through it that kept you on the edge of your seat. That's mainly due to the fact that it's wrapping up the story, giving the background to the nature of the police corruption and explaining all the nasty goings on of the past 9 years. In the end, it's very nasty grubby stuff, but it doesn't carry the weight it should, the weight that was felt but unseen in 1974 and 1980. 1974 was an excellent introduction, 1980 was a nasty false dawn, but sadly, 1983 fails to capture what made the series so engaging. The answers are pat and it ignores the interesting plot elements to tie up some fairly minor ones. I want to read the novels now, to see if it's a failure of the filmmakers or the source material. I was loving this series, and while it's still pretty good, this entry is just not on par with the rest.

A Schoolgirl's Diary

All hail the Dear General! The first North Korean film to get released beyond its borders, this is a fascinating insight into the propaganda cinema that keeps the North Korean people inculcated in the cult of the People's Republic. A story of a young schoolgirl who dreams of leaving their house to move into an apartment (apparently a great sign of status), struggling through school and teased because her scientist father is never home and is rumoured to be useless at his job. Her mother spends all her time translating books for father, neglecting her own health and the care of her children. It's pretty miserable stuff, showing life under Kim as a pretty ordinary experience. But of course, it's a propaganda film, so you know that by the end, the suffering has a purpose. Dad is a massive success, the daughter understands the strange dynamic between her mother and father, and even enrols in college to follow in Daddy's footsteps, proud to be part of a noble tradition that sacrifices oneself to the state. The acting is pretty awful, the sound is weak and the storyline predictable. But as a cultural artefact, it's well worth viewing.

Treeless Mountain

Over the border, the lives of South Korean children aren't that flash either. This is a lovely film about two young girls, first abandoned by their father, then their mother, then their aunt, finally ending up with their grandparents. It stays with the two girls, Jin and Bin, without ever deviating to give an adult perspective. Their story is sad, and the broken promises of their mother are heartbreaking. Their aunt seems awful, but possibly may be doing the best she can. The disappointments and hardships build and build, before finally they find themselves living on their grandparents farm. But throughout, the children are never defeated. They cope in a multitude of ways, whether it's simple hope or the kindness of the parents of kids they befriend. Notable is the lack of fear both in the kids, and in the film. So much wrong could happen to them, but there's never a sense that they're in any danger, it's just life and they bounce back every time. It's a surprisingly hopeful story of the resilience of children.

MIFF Day 5

Action Boys

It never really finds its rhythm, but this documentary about the 8th graduating class of a Stunt School in Korea is an interesting insight into the lives of stuntmen. There's some really funny moments, especially a staged re-enactment of how two of the guys realised that stunt work could be their calling. The producers weren't in on the joke, so when you discover that they met by one running the other over with his car, it's both shocking and really funny. Several years on, only one of the graduating class remains in stunt work, and the sobering reality of the job is driven home with the death of a stunt director they all looked up to on the set of The Good, The Bad and The Weird. It's far from the best documentary I've seen, but the men it profiles made it a great watch.

Red Riding: 1980

More grim death and corruption in West Riding, Yorkshire. This time Paddy Considine is a Manchester detective sent to review the Yorkshire police's failure to apprehend the Ripper. The murders are only the backdrop to a tale of police corruption that dovetails into the events of 1974. The mood of the piece is excellent, with a creeping paranoia that something rotten but unseen has fingers and eyes everywhere. There are revelations, answers and a lot more questions. I can't wait for the final installment tomorrow.

MIFF Day 4

Red Riding: 1974

Originally made for television, it plays well on the big screen. The subtitles were a bit odd, the assumption probably that the Yorkshire accents were too difficult to understand. They weren't. As a film, it's a grim piece of story telling. Set against the backdrop of a series of child murders, a young journalist finds himself enmeshed in police and government corruption, violence and a coverup. The paranoia ratchets up, and while the end is strangely satisfying, it raises a great many questions. There are two more films in the series, so hopefully the next two days will see some answers. As it stands, it's a solid piece of storytelling. Hardly surprising since it's based on a well-regarded novel by the ironically named David Peace, and adapted by the incomparable Tony Grisoni.

Outrage

Here's an ethical conundrum for you. Is it ok to out a gay man who wants to remain closeted? Is it ok to out him if he's a closeted gay politician actively campaigning against gay rights? Director Kirby Dick decided the answer is yes, and this film is a sobering look at the lives of a number of US politicians who marry, have children, present a safe public face and then go and solicit gay men for sex in bars and public toilets. It's a sad film in many ways, a condemnation of society and a disturbing insight into the functioning of politics at its highest level. That gay men are actively using gay issues as a lightning rod to get themselves re-elected is self-hatred of a bitter and nasty kind. But the film itself is still difficult, though it does make a very good point. When politicians are caught having affairs it's news. But when they're caught with other men, suddenly nobody knows quite how to report it, or whether they should just leave them alone. The inequality in treatment is stark, which I guess is why this film cannot really be faulted for it's content. Far less weighty gossip manages to become the subject of national news.

Humpday

First off, I really hate mumblecore cinema. I think it's lazy, poorly shot, filled with improvisational dialogue that is far too in love with itself. I've yet to see an example that could constitute good filmmaking. The garage band aesthetic might work for a band, but cinema with crap visuals might as well just be a radio play. That said, this is about 50/50 crap and funny. The camerawork is poor, the editing fairly random, the story fairly slight and filled with pointless diversions that make a good chunk of the film boring. But the central premise, two guys daring each other to have sex with each other for an "art" porn film (because nobody has ever done a film with two straight guys shagging each other) is a source of much comedy gold. When I wasn't distracted by the crap framing and no-effort DV lighting I was laughing a lot. There's whole sequences of dialogue that are hysterical. The performances from the two leads as each realises the other isn't backing down are priceless. And when they find themselves in their hotel room with their camera, there's a lot of finely observed character work mixed in with a lot of laughs. It starts off awful, climbs it's way up to promise a lot, loses its way, finds it again and finally delivers a bit less than promised. It could have been so much more, but in the end it was okay.

Drag Me To Hell

Sam Raimi is back, baby. It's not another Evil Dead film, but it kinda feels like one. Definitely worth a look, it's a lot of fun. Read the review here.

MIFF Day 3

Yakuza Eiga

There are documentaries that are great films, that have insight and a narrative drive. And then there are films like this, which is a collection of interviews charting the development of Yakuza cinema of post-war Japan. There's a lot of interesting facts, but they're not strung together very well. If you know your Japanese gangster cinema though, you'll find new dimensions to the films you've seen. It also sketches the demise of the traditional yakuza as well, something that probably deserves a much longer film. There's a much bigger film to be found in the material, but this is satisfactory.

Pierrot Le Fou

And speaking of yakuza cinema, Takeshi Kitano's first masterpiece, Sonatine, was made in homage to Godard's absurdist parody of noir cinema. A totally nonsensical film, shot in a mixture of elaborate single takes and rapid and bizarre sequences, it's a fun and silly ride. The newly remastered print is gorgeous on the big screen, though the subtitles retain their period charm. (The swearing is politely ignored.)

Troubled Water

This was something unexpected. A film to fill in a gap in the schedule, it's one of my favourites so far this year. Boy A was a great film exploring a fictionalised account of the James Bulger murder from the perspective of one of the killers, recently released from prison. This film takes a very similar premise, but absolutely blows Boy A out of the water. Jan gets a job as a church organist, falls in love with the priest, takes care of her young son and begins to enjoy a normal life. But Agnes, the mother of the child he killed, discovers him and fears that the child is in great danger. It's a pulse pounding thriller, filled with amazing character moments, riveting performances and questions about the nature of forgiveness and what it requires. The moment that Anna (the priest) discovers her son is being cared for by a child killer is potent, and as all her homilies about forgiveness and evil are thrown in her face, the extreme cost of grace is highlighted. Structurally the film is smart, drawing us into Jan's life before hitting the reverse button and taking us through Agnes's grief, building up to an explosive ending. Easily the pick of the festival so far.

Balibo

Robert Connelly's film about the Balibo Five and Roger East, murdered by the Indonesian military in 1975, is surprisingly quiet about the political conspiracy surrounding their deaths. Instead, we get a very direct story about the men, what happened (based on eyewitness accounts and the novel Cover Up by Jill Jolliffe) and what came next. A visceral film that tells in focused miniature the events surrounding the Indonesian invasion of East Timor, it's raises more questions than it answers. A deeply affecting and uncomfortable film, it's a very strong piece on a shameful episode in Australian foreign policy.

All Around Us

Does anyone do intimate family epics better than the Japanese? I can only think of one or two Korean films that come close. A sprawling story of a husband and wife, struggling through marriage, mistrust, miscarriages, and mental breakdown. It's a very light film for all it's heavy subject matter, with a good heart and a sunny optimism that is perhaps the secret that keeps the couple together. A great film about good and decent people struggling to stay good and decent. And best of all, succeeding.

MIFF Day 2

The Milk of Sorrow

A visually striking film about a woman living her mother's trauma. Fausta has grown up being told that her mother's rape while pregnant resulted in her passing her fear on through the milk fed to her as a baby. When he mother dies, the fears she lives under are thrown into sharp relief as she struggles to find ways to live and cope with a fear that has no basis in reality. It's a powerful film about the way parents can traumatise their children, and the pain of growing up. It won the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival, and I reckon it deserved it. A really great film.

Tyson

Mike Tyson narrates a documentary about his life. He reflects on his childhood, his rise to fame and his fall from grace. He's incredibly honest about some things, other parts you wonder if he's telling the truth or not. But while he's not the most articulate man in the world, his life is a great story and the film, while annoyingly using splitscreens and video inserts for no reason whatsoever, is quite engaging.

Animation Shorts

The usual mixed bag, with a ripper claymation of a french maid saving a family from zombies by picking up a chainsaw and carving up. Stupid and hilarious. The best however was Birth, a wonderful short about a pregnant girl learning about childbirth from her mother and her mother's friends. Sad, comic and magical.

The 10 Conditions of Love

Well, China screwed this one up pretty badly. By trying to get MIFF to pull the film, they've only managed to get extra screenings put on, gain the film international notoriety, and have film festivals worldwide asking to screen it. But about about the film itself? It's a really good portrait of Rebiya Kadeer, the spokeswoman for the Uighur people of East Turkestan (now known as Xinjiang Provice in Northwest China). It gives a good introduction to the background of the issues surrounding the plight of the Uighur, and the personal cost to Rebiya Kadeer and her family as she refuses to be silenced. Interestingly, unlike other exiled leaders, she's not asking for independence from China, only that they honour the constitution put in place after the occupation of East Turkestan. That the Chinese won't even do that is a pretty poor statement on their approach to governance. The film is guaranteed to raise the profile of the Uighur people, which is great. I travelled through Xinjiang last year and their culture is amazing and their food is incredible.

MIFF Day 1

Another year, another load of movies. It's started well, so fingers crossed the quality stays high.

Who's Afraid of the Wolf?

A story of family breakdown told from the perspective of a little girl in kinder. Lots of Little Red Riding Hood references, a story that becomes quite involving and a few performances that are really very good. And the constant low angles of the shots work really well to make it a child's experience of a very adult story. It's let down by a pat ending that's a bit too neat given what's come before, but overall it was still a good film.

The Cove

Cinema as activism, this is an excellently made film about dolphin slaughter in Japan. Edited to take on the feel of a thriller, it draws you into the fairly paranoid world of dolphin and whale harvesting. The lengths to which the filmmakers had to go to get footage of what happens is incredible, and it's hard to dismiss what you see. Perhaps best of all, while it takes on an animal rights agenda, it also puts a human perspective on why killing whales and dolphins is pointless. The mercury levels in dolphin and whale meat are waaaaaaay above the safe levels for human consumption. The people selling it don't want to talk about that, but when it was mooted that dolphin meat was to be served in school lunches, suddenly some councillors opposed it. Hopefully this is a film that has an impact beyond the usual "preaching to the choir" audience such documentaries attract. It's definitely one to see.

Accellerator Shorts

A collection of short films, some good, some bad, some awful or simply pretentious. One film, about a cleaner who was once a translator, was particularly good.

In The Loop

A political satire about the lead up to the invasion of Iraq, it's a foul mouthed and hysterically cynical take on politics, double dealing and the apparatchiks who feed off the system. A great laugh.

Thirst

Park Chan Wook's latest film takes on the vampire mythos with a baroque and pitch black comic touch. The narrative is meandering and oftentimes irrelevant, but the central performances are great and the sheer perversity of the film is incredible. Weird in the extreme, with a great comic/tragic end.

Black Dynamite

Michael Jai White must've been peeved his scene got cut from Kill Bill, but at least he's now got a whole film to show off his kung fu. A deleriously silly parody of blaxploitation films, it leaves things like Undercover Brother looking pale by comparison. Gotta love a film with a nunchuck wielding Richard Nixon.

SpecTapular

The Local Taphouse’s SpecTapular Beer Festival was a great way to spend the 4^th of July. I didn’t sample everything, but I got a good run at most of ‘em. Here’s my thoughts…

Voodoo – 2 Brothers Brewery

A smooth and lightly malty beer, perfect for Melbourne since it’s overwhelming taste is espresso. A coffee beer. Awesome.

Ice Cap Larger – Arctic Fox Brewery

Not brilliant.

Epic Ale – Bootleg Brewery

A nice pineapple beer, nothing special, but nice.

Brown Bomber – Brewboys

A really nice thick and rich taste to it.

Saison De Coing – Bridge Road Brewers

I think I love saisons. This was a nice fruity beer with hints of cinnamon. Very tasty.

Colonial IPA – Colonial Brewing

Nice, nothing special though.

Nut Brown Ale – Holgate Brewhouse

Very nice.

Steam Ale – Mountain Goat

A Corona-ish beer, refreshing. To quote my friend Abi, a good breakfast beer.

Yippy IPA – Mt Brewery

Rubbish.

Murrays Icon 2IPA – Murrays Brewing

A bitter beer, but the aftertaste is very pleasant.

Two Metre Tall Cleansing Ale – The Two Metre Tall Company

Fruity, pleasant to drink, but the aftertaste is awful.

Dead Guy Ale – Rogue

Smooth rich and malty.

Chocolate Stout – Rogue

Dark chocolate yumminess.

Dry Hopped St. Rogue Red – Rogue

Nice, not as good as the other Rogues on offer though.

Hazelnut Brown Nectar – Rogue

Amazing. A really tasty and enjoyable beer.

XS Imperial IPA – Rogue

Another bitter beer, but this time the bitterness is just right. The best analogy would be having a Grapefruit. Bitter, but pleasant as well. The best of the IPA beers on tap.

XS Imperial Stout – Rogue

This isn’t a beer, it’s a meal. Dark and rich with a wallop to it. The sampler glass was more than enough. A great beer, but only in moderation.

Pick of the bunch:

I had another Voodoo, but the Hazelnut Brown Nectar was a close second. I’m definitely a malt man, the hoppy beers do nothing for me.

Transformers 2

The kindest word is disappointing. Crap is closer to the mark though. Read my sorrow over the derail(gun)ment of a promising franchise here.