MIFF Day 6
Narrative cinema swings back strong today, about time too.
BOY
Taika Waititi's followup to his loveable geekfest Eagle vs Shark, this is a coming of age story set in 1984. ET and Michael Jackson are the cultural touchstones, as Boy's father comes home from prison, looking for the money he hid before being arrested, and trying to spend some quality time with his two children. It's light and airy, with whimsical moments and genuine love on display for the very human and flawed characters. A real charmer. And be sure to stick around for the Thriller inspired haka at the end.
THE UNLOVED
Samantha Morton proves she's a talent behind as well as in front of the camera in this beautifully made film about her childhood as a ward of the state. The film opens with Lucy (Molly Windsor) getting beaten by her father (Robert Carlyle), then going into foster care. What unfolds from there is positively dreamlike, with a strange beauty to it. Much like Bibliotheque Pascal, this is a film where truly awful things happen, but visually they are executed with such beauty that you're torn between fear and awe. Morton has said she's diluted her experiences to prevent the film becoming a horror movie, which to be honest is what I expected. Instead there's no sense of threat, and though you fear it could be just around the corner it never comes. It's a beautiful and thought-provoking film meditating on how society fails its most vulnerable.
THE TROTSKY
Leon Bronstein thinks he's the reincarnation of Leon Trotsky. He tries to unionise his father's factory, and when that fails he decides to make his school's student union into a real union. Naturally with comic results. He has his whole life mapped out, and he's determined to play along with his destiny. This film owes more than a small debt to Rushmore, but it's clever in its examination of the death of radical politics in the modern age. Jay Baruchel's vulnerable yet obsessive performance is just right, and it's a very very funny film.
FOUR LIONS
Chris Morris is responsible for some of the most confronting comedy every to grace the screen. Black barely begins to describe it. He was behind Brasseye, a current affairs spoof that caused a major controversy in the UK when it aired a special named Paedogeddon, a faked expose of paedophiles that featured Simon Pegg as a child molester locked up in stocks saying he wouldn't have sex with Morris's (fake) son because "he's not my type". So going in, you know this film isn't going to pull any punches. We witness the misadventures of five incompetent wannabe suicide bombers as they screw up everything from blowing up a reconnaissance drone attacking their training camp, to blowing themselves up. (There's a reason it's called Four Lions...) The highlight is an evilly funny family moment as one of the men sits with his wife and son as they encourage him to carry through the plan, to follow his heart and blow up the kaffirs. The warm happy family moment turned on its head. They're all complete morons of course, but so are the police and everyone else in this insanely funny film. There's no reprieve, and it really does follow through on what it promises to show, but even then Morris finds a way to make some truly awful and horrible things incredibly funny. He's walked a fine line here, and once again proves he really is a comic genius.
BEETLE QUEEN CONQUERS TOKYO
A look at the Japanese obsession with insects, as people buy, sell, trap and breed them in what turns out to be a major industry. One of the subjects of the film drives a Ferrari bought with the money he's made selling bugs! The film wants to be an exploration of Japanese culture through the prism of one of its more unique pastimes, but it doesn't always click. Meditations on nature, life and change are intriguing but go nowhere, fortunately we also learn about the history of insects in Japanese literature and poetry. The stories of how Dragonflies were viewed as noble and Fireflies as symbols of fleeting love are great. It's a lovely little film despite its flaws, and the inventive ways the insect trappers go about gathering their merchandise are interesting to watch.
BOY
Taika Waititi's followup to his loveable geekfest Eagle vs Shark, this is a coming of age story set in 1984. ET and Michael Jackson are the cultural touchstones, as Boy's father comes home from prison, looking for the money he hid before being arrested, and trying to spend some quality time with his two children. It's light and airy, with whimsical moments and genuine love on display for the very human and flawed characters. A real charmer. And be sure to stick around for the Thriller inspired haka at the end.
THE UNLOVED
Samantha Morton proves she's a talent behind as well as in front of the camera in this beautifully made film about her childhood as a ward of the state. The film opens with Lucy (Molly Windsor) getting beaten by her father (Robert Carlyle), then going into foster care. What unfolds from there is positively dreamlike, with a strange beauty to it. Much like Bibliotheque Pascal, this is a film where truly awful things happen, but visually they are executed with such beauty that you're torn between fear and awe. Morton has said she's diluted her experiences to prevent the film becoming a horror movie, which to be honest is what I expected. Instead there's no sense of threat, and though you fear it could be just around the corner it never comes. It's a beautiful and thought-provoking film meditating on how society fails its most vulnerable.
THE TROTSKY
Leon Bronstein thinks he's the reincarnation of Leon Trotsky. He tries to unionise his father's factory, and when that fails he decides to make his school's student union into a real union. Naturally with comic results. He has his whole life mapped out, and he's determined to play along with his destiny. This film owes more than a small debt to Rushmore, but it's clever in its examination of the death of radical politics in the modern age. Jay Baruchel's vulnerable yet obsessive performance is just right, and it's a very very funny film.
FOUR LIONS
Chris Morris is responsible for some of the most confronting comedy every to grace the screen. Black barely begins to describe it. He was behind Brasseye, a current affairs spoof that caused a major controversy in the UK when it aired a special named Paedogeddon, a faked expose of paedophiles that featured Simon Pegg as a child molester locked up in stocks saying he wouldn't have sex with Morris's (fake) son because "he's not my type". So going in, you know this film isn't going to pull any punches. We witness the misadventures of five incompetent wannabe suicide bombers as they screw up everything from blowing up a reconnaissance drone attacking their training camp, to blowing themselves up. (There's a reason it's called Four Lions...) The highlight is an evilly funny family moment as one of the men sits with his wife and son as they encourage him to carry through the plan, to follow his heart and blow up the kaffirs. The warm happy family moment turned on its head. They're all complete morons of course, but so are the police and everyone else in this insanely funny film. There's no reprieve, and it really does follow through on what it promises to show, but even then Morris finds a way to make some truly awful and horrible things incredibly funny. He's walked a fine line here, and once again proves he really is a comic genius.
BEETLE QUEEN CONQUERS TOKYO
A look at the Japanese obsession with insects, as people buy, sell, trap and breed them in what turns out to be a major industry. One of the subjects of the film drives a Ferrari bought with the money he's made selling bugs! The film wants to be an exploration of Japanese culture through the prism of one of its more unique pastimes, but it doesn't always click. Meditations on nature, life and change are intriguing but go nowhere, fortunately we also learn about the history of insects in Japanese literature and poetry. The stories of how Dragonflies were viewed as noble and Fireflies as symbols of fleeting love are great. It's a lovely little film despite its flaws, and the inventive ways the insect trappers go about gathering their merchandise are interesting to watch.
posted by Andrew Lee at 12:14 AM
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