About That Awards Show...

The Oscars are Sunday, as you may have heard, and everyone wants to know what will win. Although this year has more of my favorites than ever nominated, and the Academy has awarded some of my favorite films of past years recently (The Hurt Locker, No Country for Old Men, There Will Be Blood), my care level for this year’s Oscars are at an all time low.

This is not to say I won’t watch them, because I certainly do. But now that it is almost March, I am anticipating the releases of Uncle Boonmee, Certified Copy, and Meek’s Cutoff than focusing on last year’s films. Sure there are people that will only watch “Oscar” movies, and I’m glad The Hurt Locker found an audience because of its unbelievable win that I still find perplexing. However, the self-congratulatory atmosphere is almost unbearable, and the awards themselves are almost pointless.

I’ve always enjoyed the awards given at the Cannes film festival, mainly because they are willing to give ties, extra awards, and make a statement for the hell of it. The Romanian film 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days beat No Country for Old Men in 2007. Both are excellent films, but the Cannes jury made an important statement by stating that Romanian cinema had truly made an impact on the world.

I don’t think the Oscars have ever made a statement as much simply accept a consensus. Sure, it made for one really great book once, but otherwise, the Oscars are an afterthought on the year. They play like nostalgia, a revisiting of some of our favorites, as well as some films we despise. Below you can find my choices for who will win, who I would like to win, and who should have been nominated. I’ll provide links to my reviews of each of the films when I have them. I’m skipping the short categories—I didn’t see them, and I'm sure they are worth checking out, but I haven't had time.

If you want real awards coverage, I suggest checking out Kris Tapley and Guy Lodge on InContention.Com—They do a great job, and at least pretend to care a hell of a lot more than I do.

Click on through for predictions...

We Are What We Are: Hungry for Power, and Literally Too

We Are What We Are

Written and Directed by: Jorge Michel Grau

Starring: Francisco Barreiro, Alan Chavez, Paulina Gaitan, and Carmen Beato

Director of Photography: Santiago Sanchez, Editor: Rodrigo Rios, Production Designer: Alejandro Garcia, Original music: Enrico Chapela

Rated: Unrated, but plenty of cannibal-related gore

    Horror films often come with allegories. The creatures that inhabit the screen space that we could never imagine our often representations of our own cultural fears. We see Frankenstein and think about the danger of man. Zombies represent capitalist drive to desire more and more and simply consume everything. But what do cannibals mean?

    I’m not sure that Jorge Michel Grau’s We Are What We Are, a refreshing if not entirely pleasant diversion of a film, has an answer for that. In fact, the cannibalism element that sits at the center of this film itself is a hook into the story of a family power struggle. And yet, the reason the film is fun to watch is also its Achilles heel—Mr. Grau is so irreverent and comical in his direction thatWe Are What We Are feels like a midnight movie in the making. 

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NYFF Review: Film Socialisme

Film Socialisme

Directed by Jean-Luc Godard

Switzerland and France

            During last Wednesday’s public screening of Film Socialisme, Jean-Luc Godard’s latest, and perhaps final statement, on cinema, I counted about fifty walk outs.These people weren’t walking out because the violence was too graphic, or the characters too misogynistic, or its political statements. They walked because of the form. Since 1968, Mr. Godard, director of Breathless, perhaps the most important film in the second half of the medium’s history, has become increasingly more abstract, fighting against normative traditions of not only Hollywood but also all of cinema. A staunch Marxist, who rarely gives interviews (and skipped the film’s Cannes premiere in 2010, providing an ambiguous statement about the political situation in Greece), Mr. Godard has gone from riding the top of the new wave and landed somewhere in land so far that no one is sure where he is.

            Certainly, one can’t even begin to describe Film Socialisme, which has no narrative to even begin to speak of, and instead is a collection of scenes, footage, sounds, ideas, and themes that are simply clashed onto each other. To add to that difficulty, the film’s characters speak mostly in French (though there is some German, Russian, Yiddish, and Arabic), and the subtitles are not translations, but a few chosen words used to represent the possible meaning, or as Mr. Godard has stated, “Navajo English,” a reference to the poor English spoken by Native Americans in Hollywood Westerns (film critic Glen Kenny pointed out they resemble Twitter hashtags).

            Now it would be easy—quite easy—to have joined those walk outs. The film isn’t fun per say, it’s an academic experience, where one must be constantly interpreting image and sound placement in order to create ideas. So when I sat down (pen and paper ready), I took on Mr. Godard’s challenge, to understand what he was trying to say—about politics, cinema, history, philosophy, you name it. To create my enjoyment, I wrote down a number of observations on what was going on, and then looked over those notes to try and create meaning. Film Socialisme is full of academic references that will go over even the most astute viewers’ heads, and thus a full explanation could only be made by Mr. Godard. So in my own “fuck you” to Film Socialisme (as Mr. Godard has no plans on making anyone actually enjoy watching his films), I present THE interpretation of the film. It’s not the right one, but it’s the only one that matters to me, because Mr. Godard has created this film and wants me to respond. So if I am wrong, he can make another film telling me how I am wrong.

NYFF Review: Meek's Cutoff

Meek’s Cutoff

Directed By Kelly Reichardt

United States

            The first thing one easily notices when watching the latest film from Wendy & Lucy director Kelly Reichardt, Meek’s Cutoff, is that she has shot the film in the classic Academy Ratio of 1.34:1, meaning it’s shaped like a box. Some modern films—including Andrea Arnold’s Fish Tank—have done this approach, but Ms. Reichardt is also making a Western on the dry, barren landscapes of 1845 Oregon, which are perfect for visual representation. And yet, Meek’s Cutoff is not a Western about the miles of open land—it’s instead claustrophobic, with the options of the characters falling apart, and squeezing in on them. There is a certain fear that pervades the entire film, and it comes from this often devastating visual technique.

            Yet why make a claustrophobic allegorical Western? That’s the problem that Meek’s Cutoff will have on its initial viewings. The astute work of Ms. Reichardt is on display, but the film is difficult to swallow in a way even different from Wendy & Lucy, which was a much more emotional journey, thanks to the performance of Michelle Williams. Ms. Williams is back here, but she’s only part of a group of pioneers, lost along the Oregon trail, none of whom standout, except for a bearded Bruce Greenwood as the titular Meek.

            A series of long, distant shots sets the stage for Meek’s Cutoff, as we see the three families and Meek traveling along barren landscapes with little joy. We see one of the characters carving into a branch a single word that gives you all you need in terms of exposition: “Lost.” With that, we are invested in what these families are about to go through, and whether the titular Meek is attempting to rouse the group to their death. And then things get weird with the appearance of a Native American, which sparks a number of more debates.

            In Meek’s Cutoff, the tension is not the settlers against the terrain, though it certainly have its effects. It’s an essentially psychological drama where small gestures or phrases drastically change power dynamics. The film’s cast is reserved in their emotions, and do so in a truly austere manner. This not only includes Ms. Williams and Mr. Greenwood, by Shirley Henderson, Zoe Kazan, Paul Dano, the always-underrated Will Patton, and Rod Rondeaux in the strange, strange performance as the sole Native American.

            Not much happens when compared to the large landscapes, all of which are brutally harsh. The technical aspects of the film are amazing, from the locations (Roger Fairies has received a singular credit for his amazing work), the drab and flavorless clothes of the men and women, and the harsh unflattering cinematography by Christopher Blauvelt. All work together toward Ms. Reichardt’s vision of the West, which feels more like a psychological-heavy realism than a mythic tale.

            However, there is an allegorical approach to Ms. Reichardt’s narrative, and the film is full of symbols, cryptic dialogue, and an ending that will leave many unsatisfied. It left me a little unsatisfied as well, only because one viewing will not be enough to sufficiently understand the world Ms. Reichardt has brought to the screen. The film is difficult, and only those willing to work through the ideas on screen will be rewarded. And yet, it’s a film that really merits the word “original” next to it, because the genre has never been starker, and in a strange way, more beautiful in a haunting way, than presented here. 

NYFF Interview: Mike Leigh and Cast (Another Year)

Festival Director Richard Pena, Leslie Manville, Jim Broadbent, Ruth Sheen, Georgina Lowe, and Mike Leigh

Since 1988’s High Hopes came to American audiences, the British filmmaker Mike Leigh has been considered one of the most dynamic curiosities in contemporary cinema. Starting with a cast and no script, developing characters’ entries lives before beginning to write one word, and, as this interview shows, condescending to members of the general press, Mr. Leigh makes films that truly touch on the entirety of human emotion, whether in its darkness or exuberance. Another Year, his latest film, finds a bit of both, which stars Jim Broadbent and Ruth Sheen as a happy married couple that play a surrogate mother and father to the people that enter their homes, most notably the talkative boundless Mary, in a career-turning performance from Leslie Manville. At the NYFF press conference, Mr. Leigh sat down with both his cast and his producer Georgina Lowe to discuss the creation of his film, if also to deride some critics about writing about him.

Leslie, Jim, and Ruth—You’ve all worked with Mike over the years, in leading roles. On Vera Drake and Happy-Go-Lucky, you had people who hadn’t been in lead roles before with Imeldas Staunton and Sally Hawkins. What has changed over the years with the working method?

Leslie Manville: I don’t think it really has changed over the years. I suppose it’s more about the time you had to make a film as opposed to the early days when Mike was making films for the BBC and Channel 4. So there’s more time now. But really the way we work together and collaborate and create the film hasn’t really changed.

Jim Broadbent: Absolutely the basic structure remains very much the same. I’d say the real only change, having done it quite a few times before. The process isn’t as much as a voyage of discovery, as it kind of was in the early days. The actual working has been very consistent.

Ruth Sheen: I think the main thing is that we’re all older.

Broadbent: I’m not older!

Sheen: The process is the same.

Broadbent: I thought you were going to say older and wiser and more depth and life and spirit…As we’re older, the filling in the back story for the characters takes a lot longer. When we were first working with Mike, I was in my 20s, and the characters were in their 20s, so it didn’t take long to fill in the years. But when you get to 60, it can take quite a long time.

What was the germ of the film? Did you start with the relationship between Leslie’s character and Jim and Ruth’s, or was it broader than that?

Mike Leigh

Mike Leigh: The actual germ of the film is impossible, because I can never talk about “a germ” because these films, and this film is no exception, come out of ongoing occupations at times. Apart from anything else, as far as I’m concerned, having made Happy-Go-Lucky which is pretty much about young-ish people, I wanted to start from where we are. It’s about a lot of things, this film, and it’s hard to talk about it in a simple way from that. But it comes from a joy and pain of life I wanted to show. As to the actual mechanical second part of the question, as you know from the film, Mary’s relationship is something that’s happened much later in their history. In fact, the chronology is always logical. We actually started with Tom’s relationship with his brother Ronnie, and the first actor I started working with at all, is Ronnie [David Bradley] because he’s some years older than that. So it was the logic of their lives. Thus Gerry entered their lives quite a bit down the line. While that was all being developed, I was inventing this horrendous life with Mary.

In the film, Tom and Gerry’s home seems like a place of nurturing, very similar to their garden. Was this a theme you wanted to design?

Leigh: It’s not really a question. You’re pretty much defining one of the central things the film is about. It’s about nurturing, it’s about caring, it’s about those who need and those who are able, in various ways, give them what they want. And then there’s a moral dilemma of where you draw the line, where do you protect yourself from all of those. That’s what it’s all about. And of course the relationship between nurturing and people and their relationship with the Earth, with the environment and the planet is implicitly there, in a way their organic people. I had a notion that I wanted to deal with environmentalists but you can’t make a dramatic film about environmentalists. It’d be turgid.

Leslie Manville, Jim Broadbent, and Ruth Sheen

There seems to be a similarity between Mary and Beverly from Abigail’s Party. Could you talk about that relationship?

Leigh: Well I think they are very different kinds of films actually. I don’t think there’s much worth discussing that relationship.

Manville: It’s not certainly something we would think of doing.

Leigh: We’ve never done that before.

Manville: No we haven’t…maybe we should. But it’s certainly something we hadn’t thought of replicating. It’s not the agenda. The agenda is to create a fresh new character obviously and she where she goes. But you saw similarities than that’s your prerogative.

Leigh: I apologize, but I feel a bit of a cul-de-sac question really. I can’t really see the connection, and it’s never occurred to us, and I should give it no more thought.

When did you develop the idea of the seasons to have these four very specific vignettes at these four very specific times?

Leigh: Well it’s integral in the conception of the film really. It’s hard to think of “when” it was. It seems like a logical thing to do really.

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NYFF Review: We Are What We Are

We Are What We Are

Directed by Jorge Michel Grau

Mexico

            The New York Film Festival often offers films of…a certain type of prestige. Slow films, quiet films, films with subtle characters, or of a certain political ideology, and what not. Thus, with that being said, Jorge Michel Grau’s We Are What We Are is a refreshing diversion, a comically irrelevant horror film that may have some higher allegorical purpose, but in all honesty, is just damn good fun time (The film won Best Picture at the genre-oriented Fantastic Fest in Austin).

            So what is the frightening element of Mr. Grau’s hypnotic film? It’s hard to tell at first. We see an old man, walking around a shopping mall, almost like a zombie. He coughs up black vomit, and collapses dead, and a team quickly and efficiently removes him and the mess with a quick pace as not to disturb anyone else in the mall. We then transfer back to the man’s family, a poor one made up of a mother, a daughter, and two competitive sons. They are in trouble they tell us. They need to perform the ritual before time runs out, which we can tell by the 100 ticking clocks scattered around their dilapidated home. And when a pair of detectives see the father’s dead body at the morgue, they learn a finger was in his stomach.

            We Are What We Are follows cannibals, but not savage cannibals, but it is really a family tragedy story about the turmoil a family goes through without a patriarch. More than horror, this is a cruel family drama in which each member competes for the power void left in the wake of the father’s death. And Mr. Grau, with a wink to the camera, might shoot it in realist in harsh manner, but at least his score is right out of Hitchcock. The film’s gore is certainly cheesy and got a laugh out of me.

            The film is certainly nowhere near perfect—a side plot following those corrupt detectives is worth more than a few groans—but the sheer trashiness and absurdity of We Are What We Are is easy to have fun with, in a film that is certainly indebted to films like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Family comes first for the subjects of We Are What We Are, though more than a little blood gets spilled along the way. 

NYFF Review: Another Year

Another Year

Directed By Mike Leigh

United Kingdom

            Mike Leigh has a way of capturing human emotions and gestures that few other directors ever have the nuance to reach. A certain pause, or a glance, or a pan of the camera, speak volumes in the British directors work. In the shocking opening scene of Naked, we aren’t sure if the woman in the beginning is enjoying her sexual encounter to begin with or it simply turns at some point; Mr. Leigh enjoys those ambiguous lines, and his characters are often not characters as much as they are living, breathing human beings.

            So chuck his latest, Another Year, up to the same category of his other greats, which include Vera Drake, Secrets & Lies, and his most recent work, Happy-Go-Lucky. The beautiful thing about Mr. Leigh is that while no film tackles the same ideas on class, gender, or existentialism, they are all presented through a clear and subtle way that no director can match. Part of that is Mr. Leigh’s highly-regarded process, in which he creates the characters entire lives with the actors before ever beginning to write down a script.

            You can definitely see that process all over Another Year, which is basically set over four day or two day long vignettes in four different seasons. All four revolve mainly around the home of the perfectly named Tom and Gerri, played by Leigh regulars Jim Broadbent and Ruth Sheen. Tom and Gerri are the perfect couple in their happiness—they garden together, eat together, and seem to have got everything they need in life. Yet while Tom and Gerri provide the atmosphere for the film, a somewhat light-hearted and nurturing environment for whoever stops by their door in the suburbs of London, the real spark of the film is Gerri’s co-worker Mary, played with an electric ferocity by Leslie Manville.

            When Mary first talks about her life to Gerri while sitting at a bar after work, she cannot stop talking about how happy her life is—everything seems to be going for her, if not quite perfectly, to a satisfactory point. The problem is that Mary talks a lot, and uses talk to hide from her truths, even from herself. Thus over the four seasons, we watch Mary go from bad to worse, and Ms. Manville transform herself ever so slowly, bringing almost a completely new woman to each world. Mr. Leigh’s camera shifts onto the human faces for the important reactions—none of it is showy, but all of it is necessary.

            Yet to say Mary, and Ms. Manville’s performance, is the highlight of the film is to obscure the wonders that make up Another Year. Mr. Leigh rarely provides context, or does it very slowly, for each of the four vignettes, and each is filled with new characters that could easily have there own stories. There’s Tom’s old friend Ken, who’s overweight sight is only the first of many issues he hides under. There’s the son Joe, who is quite happy where he is, although without a girlfriend, something Mary at one point feels set on changing. And there’s Ronnie, Tom’s older brother, who simply seems to silently mock the world around him. Mr. Leigh brings these people on not as plot devices, but as ranges of human empathy and emotion.

            If Happy-Go-Lucky was all about how we create our own happiness, Another Year is about how we foster happiness in others. The film could have easily put its perspective from Mary, but the majority of the film is about how Tom and Gerri respond to the accomplishments and suffering of others, and how to best foster those, just like their vegetable plants. Mr. Leigh, is interested in how people judge and be judged, even in a loving environment. And like the seasons, our views of both others and ourselves is always changing, always recurring, and always in need of the nurture of love.