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.
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.
posted by Andrew Lee at 1:47 AM
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