Link Round-Up: NYFFing It Up

These people are having way more fun than most of my first dates do.

The New York Film Film Festival ends this weekend, but my coverage is only about halfway complete, starting with this piece (my first) for Reverse Shot on the latest Romanian comedy, Corneliu Porumboiu's When Evening Falls on Bucharest or Metabolism. It's a strange little work that tries to articulate a number of concerns related to art and theory, and I hope the piece (made palatable by Reverse Shot's tremendous editor, Michael Koresky) is worth your time, especially if you've seen it.

On podcast duties, there are two for you - first up, how about some experimental cinema? Views From the Avant-Garde featured over 200 films this year, and somehow fellow Columbia alum and now OSU PhD candidate James Hansen joined me to work through films by Luther Price, Nathaniel Dorsky, Jodie Mack, Stephanie Barber, and a few more. Back in something a little more mainstream (though not by much), Boston's darling Monica Castillo talks about the latest from the Coens, Tsai Ming-Liang, Phillipe Garrell, and Joanna Hogg from the festival.

To Be (Cont'd) continues this month with a discussion on Francis Ford Coppola's Twixt between Bill Ryan and Keith Uhlich. Ryan gets the ball rolling here.

On Letterboxd: Russian Ark, Il Grido, The Rapture, Written on the Wind, Trent's Last Case, and Paid To Love.

Screening Log: Time Travel Edition

            Oh dear, how far behind are we here? I don’t want to defend my lack of screening logs (we’re now three weeks behind), but as you may have noticed, it’s been a big couple weeks for LabuzaMovies, and now with a whole new project getting launched, I may have fallen off the boat for a bit. But we’re back, baby!

-Limelight, 1952. Directed by Charlie Chaplin. 35mm projection at Museum of Modern Art.

-The Steel Helmet, 1951. Directed by Sam Fuller. 35mm projection at Museum of Modern Art.

-The Life of Oharu, 1952. Directed by Kenji Mizoguchi. 35mm projection at Museum of Modern Art.

-The Earrings of Madame De…, 1953. Directed by Max Ophüls. 35mm projection at Museum of Modern Art.

-Born on the Fourth of July, 1989. Directed by Oliver Stone. DVD.

-Margaret (Extended Edition), 2011. Directed by Kenneth Lonergan. DVD Projection at Landmark Sunshine.

-Daises, 1966. Directed by Věra Chytilová .35mm projection at Brooklyn Academy of Music.

-The Battle of Algiers, 1966. Directed by Gillo Pontecorvo. 35mm projection at Film Forum.

-One from the Heart, 1982. Directed by Francis Ford Coppola. 35mm projection at Museum of the Moving Image.

-Rear Window, 1954. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock. 35mm projection at Brooklyn Academy of Music.

-Play Misty for Me, 1971. Directed by Clint Eastwood. 35mm projection at Film Forum

-The Sugarland Express, 1974. Directed by Steven Spielberg. 35mm projection at Film Forum.

-The Clock, 2011. Directed by Christian Marclay. Digital Projection at Lincoln Center.

Uncle Boonmee: At the End of It All, Ghosts, Laughs, and the Absurd

Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
Written and Directed By: Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Starring: Thanapat Saisaymar, Jenjira Pongpas, Sakda Kaewbuadee, and Natthakarn Aphaiwonk.
Directors of Photography: Sayombhu Mukdeeprom, Yukontorn Mingmongkon and Charin Pengpanich. Editor: Lee Chatametikool. Production designer: Akekarat Homlaor
Rated: Not Rated, and pretty tame, save for a scene involving aquatic life.

By the time a princess does some unspeakable things with a catfish half way through the latest film by the acclaimed auteur Apichatpong Weerasethakul (he’ll tell you just to call him “Joe”), the film truly finds its absurdist, but slightly calming ground. The Thai filmmaker, known for his striking films Tropical Malady and Syndromes and a Century, has created a strange world of our own existence and filled it with animals, monsters, ghosts, doubles, and other strange sights. Yet Mr. Weerasethakul is not just putting the bizarre in our face to confound and play with us; there’s a philosophical and political stance behind every moment of his film. In Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, Mr. Weerasethakul has found a narrative structure that reflects his own philosophy of life and death.

The title gives a good explanation of what to expect: Uncle Boonmee, who has a bad kidney and is soon on his way out, starts having visions while out in his countryside home in the Northern part of Thailand. His sister-in-law and son can see them too, and instead of freaking out, they kind of welcome them into their home. This is typical of Mr. Weerasethakul, who acknowledges the absurdity of his film’s narratives. When Boonmee’s deceased son returns as a “Ghost Monkey,” a walking, talking ape with red glowing eyes, Boonmee’s sister-in-law tells him “you’ve let your hair grow out.”