Yazdi

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THURSDAY TILL SUNDAY (De Jueves A Domingo) | Review

Moviewallas

THURSDAY TILL SUNDAY (DE JUEVES A DOMINGO), by first time director Domingo Sotomayor Castillo is a Chilean film that is constructed almost entirely from the unsaid, the perceived, the things lurking just outside the reach of what is literally seen. It is an immersive experience. Nominally, the film covers a road trip taken by a couple, their daughter, and young son over four days.

The movie is seen for the most part through the eyes of the teenaged daughter. Approaching neorealism, this is a work of stark austerity which may tempt a viewer to assign it hastily to the ignoble genre of films where ‘nothing happens’. The studiedly documentary feel, the naked abandon of traditional plotting, and the patient, unrushed lingering of the camera over these four characters, may unsettle at first. But stop trying to deduce the film on a minute by minute basis, settle into its rhythms, and see how it will breathe alongside you. This is a film that trusts the intelligence of the viewer enough to not provide easy, obvious answers. And demands that the viewer bring their own experiences to glean what they will from this story.

Slowly the cracks in the relationships come into focus, sometimes ever so briefly. And one begins to comprehend that the entire film might be a hazy recollection, an evocation of a child’s earliest memory of the first sign of the dissolution of their parents’ marriage. The movie deftly evokes a sense of nostalgia – for a time when being a child meant not having the tools to decipher what the behavior of adults signified.

The young daughter is never precocious, or all knowing, and the actor who plays her (Santi Ahumada) brings an effortless naturalism that belies any knowledge of a camera being around her, and captures all the complexities of being a teenager: distracted, self-involved, impatient – but, always well-meaning. In the Q and A after the film at the Los Angeles Film Festival where the film screened in 2012, the director revealed that the four-year old who played the younger brother was obviously not up to acting in the traditional sense, and the other actors learned to ad-lib and work around his natural behavior on camera. No wonder the film evokes a feeling of purity about it.

The wonderful, deeply meditative THURSDAY TILL SUNDAY is screening at the Digital Gym Cinema in San Diego. Any lover of cinema owes themselves a viewing of this film. February 14-20. http://digitalgym.org/thursday-till-sunday/

OUT OF THE FURNACE | Review

Podcast Review

OUT OF THE FURNACE is a well-made film. I respect its discipline and its hard-working craft. But I cannot abide by what it represents.

And what it represents is another one of those Americana tales that is going for the mythic by way of violence. It is achingly blue-collar – with the collar so scuffed with the dirt and grime of hard-working, economically hurting Americans that it might as well be brown-collar.

Christian Bale plays older brother Russell in the economically frayed industrial Northeast. He is trying to curtail Rodney his more impetuous sibling (played by Casey Affleck), who has just returned from a war deployment and is getting involved with backwoods criminals in an effort to earn some money. Soon upon return from jail after serving time for an accidental killing, Russell finds his brother missing. And has to deliberate on options for trying to find Rodney.

There is much to appreciate about the film’s commentary on many things. About how there is dignity in the lives of those working hard, to get by. By working in mills, by taking care of aging parents, by going off to fight the country’s wars, by taking ownership of honest but no less irreversibly harmful mistakes. The movie does a fine job of conveying the nobility of its characters. It is hard to do this without patronizing, and the film and its amazing actors manage to reflect these lives with remarkable authenticity.

But then why soil this hard-won authenticity with savage violence. The film begins and ends with violence as horror. And then in the middle tries to find poetry in revenge. And it is this poetry in revenge that I couldn’t bring myself to buy. What is this film saying? That there are monstrous people in the world and the only way to deal with them is by retaliatory blood-letting?

I know the film is not trying to deliberately do so, but in this grim, acutely considered American tale about the degradation resulting from violence, the film instead reveals its own unhealthy fascination for violence. People are killed off ruthlessly – and quickly – leaving one wondering as to what this director was aiming for? To make the point that this happens in real life? Maybe so, but why should this make for good cinema?

I have tremendous appreciation for Christian Bale who completely possesses this role. Here again is reason, if you ever needed one, that Bale is best in class amongst his generation of actors. And for Casey Affleck, who is turning in consistently believable, complex turns in film after film these days. And Woody Harrelson who makes you look away in fear every time he is on screen, which is saying something considering his more recent filmography of scary bad men. There is a scene halfway through the film where Christian Bale reaches out to Zoe Saldana in a park, hoping to win back her love. It is spare, and beautifully written and sublimely acted, especially by Bale. He breaks your heart. I wish the film had towed more closely to these characters and their lives as its reason for being.

Rare is the film that touches upon so many contemporary American issues. Including how we do not seem to have a place of stability, or even dignity, for soldiers returning from war. The situation created with Bale’s character getting involved in a car accident that results in fatalities is handled with uncommon deft; how often have you see a film delve into the resultant hopeless and crippling guilt. There is so much to be said with these players in this setting. It is disappointing then that the film chooses instead in its final act to settle for being a grotesque revenge tale.

Scott Cooper, the director made his debut helming CRAZY HEART a few years ago, and that film too was about a weathered, beaten character who is trying to claw out of the hell of his addictions and failings. But that film was ultimately about redemption and so found grace in its final notes. There will be those who fill find grace in the final notes of OUT OF THE FURNACE too. I am just not one who can get behind a validation, no matter how genuine, no matter how to the bone and unadorned as it may be, but a validation no less for an-eye-for-an-eye.

2013 San Diego Film Critics Society winners announced

Moviewallas

Members of the San Diego Film Critics Society gathered this morning to take the nominations from yesterday to the next step. Votes were cast in each of the categories below. And several categories needed subsequent run-off voting. And here are the winners! The wealth was spread wide. And I would say the group got it right for the most part.

Best Film: HER

Best Director: Alfonso Cuarón, GRAVITY

Best Actress: Cate Blanchett, BLUE JASMINE

Best Actor: Oscar Isaac, INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS

Best Supporting Actress: Shailene Woodley, THE SPECTACULAR NOW

Best Supporting Actor: Jared Leto, DALLAS BUYERS CLUB

Best Original Screenplay: Spike Jonze, HER

Best Adapted Screenplay: Richard Linklater, Julie Delpy, Ethan Hawke, BEFORE MIDNIGHT

Best Foreign Language Film: DRUG WAR

Best Documentary: THE ACT OF KILLING

Best Cinematography: Emmanuel Lubezki, TO THE WONDER

Best Animated Film: THE WIND RISES

Best Editing: Christopher Rouse, CAPTAIN PHILLIPS

Best Production Design: Catherine Martin and Karen Murphy, THE GREAT GATSBY

Best Score: Arcade Fire, HER

Best Ensemble Performance: AMERICAN HUSTLE

Kyle Counts Award: Destin Daniel Cretton (Director, SHORT TERM 12)

San Diego Film Critics Society announces its 2013 nominations for best of the year

Moviewallas

It is the time of the year when film review groups around the country start announcing their year-end picks in the major categories. The New York Film Critics Circle bestowed their best picture prize on AMERICAN HUSTLE, a soon-to-be-released Scorcese-esque caper film set in the 70’s, the latest from director David O. Russell (SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK, THE FIGHTER). The National Board of Review picked HER, the wistful new Spike Jonze film set in a not so distant future, and about a man who falls in love with the his computer operating system. With those two groups out of the gate first, many other reviewer groups have followed in the past few days. And so far, the winners have been blissfully inconsistent, which promises to make for an exciting awards-season.

The San Diego Film Critics Society (of which Moviewallas is a member) announced this afternoon their nominations in all of the top categories. The voting occurs tomorrow morning and the winners in each category will be declared later in the day. We will be sure to post the final winners here, but below are the top five picks in each category (nominations), which may help guide your movie watching plans over the holiday break.

BEST FILM
12 YEARS A SLAVE
GRAVITY
HER
INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS
SHORT TERM 12

BEST DIRECTOR
Alfonso Cuarón, GRAVITY
Destin Cretton, SHORT TERM 12
Joel and Ethan Coen, INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS
Spike Jonze, HER
Steve McQueen, 12 YEARS A SLAVE

BEST ACTRESS
Adèle Exarchopoulos, BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOR
Brie Larson, SHORT TERM 12
Cate Blanchett, BLUE JASMINE
Emma Thompson, SAVING MR. BANKS
Sandra Bullock, GRAVITY

BEST ACTOR
Chiwetel Ejiofor, 12 YEARS A SLAVE
Joaquin Phoenix, HER
Matthew McConaughey, DALLAS BUYERS CLUB
Oscar Isaac, INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS
Tom Hanks, CAPTAIN PHILLIPS

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Elizabeth Banks, THE HUNGER GAMES: CATCHING FIRE
Jennifer Lawrence, AMERICAN HUSTLE
Lupita Nyong’o, 12 YEARS A SLAVE
Sally Hawkins, BLUE JASMINE
Shailene Woodley, THE SPECTACULAR NOW

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Daniel Bruhl, RUSH
James Gandolfini, ENOUGH SAID
Jared Leto, DALLAS BUYERS CLUB
Michael Fassbender, 12 YEARS A SLAVE
Sam Rockwell, THE WAY, WAY BACK

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Aaron Guzikowski, PRISONERS
Joel and Ethan Coen, INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS
Nicole Holofcener, ENOUGH SAID
Spike Jonze, HER
Woody Allen, BLUE JASMINE

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
Billy Ray, CAPTAIN PHILLIPS
Destin Cretton, SHORT TERM 12
John Ridley, 12 YEARS A SLAVE
Richard Linklater, Julie Delpy, Ethan Hawke, BEFORE MIDNIGHT
Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber, THE SPECTACULAR NOW

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOR
DRUG WAR
NO
THE BROKEN CIRCLE BREAKDOWN
THE HUNT

BEST DOCUMENTARY
20 FEET FROM STARDOM
BLACKFISH
LET THE FIRE BURN
STORIES WE TELL
THE ACT OF KILLING

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Bruno Delbonnel, INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS
Emmanuel Lubezki, GRAVITY
Emmanuel Lubezki, TO THE WONDER
Roger Deakins, PRISONERS
Simon Duggan, THE GREAT GATSBY

BEST ANIMATED FILM
DESPICABLE ME 2
FROZEN
GET A HORSE
THE CROODS
THE WIND RISES

BEST EDITING
Alan Edward Ball, THE HUNGER GAMES: CATCHING FIRE
Alfonso Cuarón and Mark Sanger, GRAVITY
Christopher Rouse, CAPTAIN PHILLIPS
Eric Zumbrunnen, Jeff Buchanan, HER
Joe Walker, 12 YEARS A SLAVE

BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN
Adam Stockhausen, 12 YEARS A SLAVE
Andy Nicholson, GRAVITY
Catherine Martin and Karen Murphy, THE GREAT GATSBY
K.K. Barrett, HER
Michael Corenblith, SAVING MR. BANKS

BEST SCORE
Arcade Fire, HER
Bjorn Eriksson, BROKEN CIRCLE BREAKDOWN
Hans Zimmer, 12 YEARS A SLAVE
Hans Zimmer, RUSH
Steven Price, GRAVITY

BEST ENSEMBLE PERFORMANCE
12 YEARS A SLAVE
AMERICAN HUSTLE
PRISONERS
SHORT TERM 12
THE WAY, WAY BACK

The Good Road | Review

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Just what does it take to become India’s entry for the best foreign film category at the Academy Awards 2013? Well, you have to beat out 21 other contenders as newcomer filmmaker Gyan Correa’s film The Good Road has done and in doing so is perhaps the first Gujarati film to have made it. Produced by the National Film Development Corporation (NFDC) The Good Road albeit a little controversially has left behind strong films including “The Lunchbox”, “Bhaag Milkha Bhaag”, “English Vinglish”, “Vishwaroopam”, Malayalam film “Celluloid” and Bengali film “Shabdo”.

Correa’s debut movie is an interesting intertwining of three separate stories all set on a highway in Gujarat that come together in a thought provoking climax. A truck driver called Pappu (Shamji Dhana Kerasia) and his side kick (Priyank Upadhyay) are given a task which is not so legal, a middle class family from Mumbai (Ajay Gehi and Sonali Kulkarni) are holidaying in Gujarat with their young son (Keval Katrodia) and a young girl (Poonam Rajput) who is on her way to meet her grandmother unfortunately loses her way and finds herself lured into a roadside brothel.

What the film lacks in depth, is totally compensated for by the Colorful and often breathtaking cinematography care of Amitabha Singh; gaily dressed village women contrasted against a white salt plain, gaudily painted trucks along the highways & vibrant life-filled rest stops and stunning sparse vistas of the Gujarat which are all set to hauntingly beautiful acoustic Gujarati folk music

What I admired most about the movie though was the social narrative that Correa manages to evoke; child prostitution, the class system and the struggles of an often-stressed working class. In addition, the tension created throughout the movie is often intolerable as we watch the decisions of each of the characters play out hoping that nothing too bad will happen to them. Correa who wrote and directed the film also chose to cast locals in the movie, a great decision in my opinion since they add to the authenticity of the movie

The Good Road may not win the Oscars, however it is a journey that will stay with you for some time

The Good Road will be the closing film at The South Asian International Film Festival, presented by HBO running from December 3rd through the 8th

ENOUGH SAID | Review

Directors Moviewallas Review

ENOUGH SAID, directed by Nicole Holofcener

Several years ago, Nicole Holofcener directed a film called LOVELY AND AMAZING, criminally unknown to many, but beloved by those who saw it. It’s too bad that Holofcener already used that title, since it would have been apt for her latest film, ENOUGH SAID. The new film is both lovely and amazing.

Holofcener is a wonderful aberration in the world of cinema. Her movies are talky, inwardly drawn, and almost always centered on a thirty- to forty-something female character. Or many such female characters. Stand-ins for what Holofcener wants to say about the world – about how we live, and how we interact with each other – one can sense that the lead characters have matured with the director through successive films. This should tell you then that her films do not exactly set the box-office ablaze. Which might change with her latest offering; it will surely be her most commercially profitable venture. Holofcener has always had a knack for good writing, and with ENOUGH SAID she (intentionally?) moves about as mainstream with her storytelling as she ever has. Couple that with some particularly on the nose casting, and you get a warm pudding of a film. You would have to be a Grinch to resist its charms.

This time, the lead female character is a masseuse, Eva (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) who is trying to navigate post-divorce life with the hallmark embarrassments and despairs that are characteristic of this filmmaker’s work. Struggling with both professional and personal impediments, she forges a friendship with an impossibly self-assured woman who appears to have it all (played by Holofcener mainstay Catherine Keener who is as usual very fine here, although I can’t help thinking that with a bigger budget, Cate Blanchett might have been hired for this role). Eva also tentatively starts what might be a romantic connection with the laid-back, affable Albert (James Gandolfini, in one of his final film roles). Each has grown daughters from prior marriages. And individual careers. And each is of that age when a person knows who they are, and have settled into the shape of their adult personality, not willing to alter it for another person. Willfully allowing their two separate worlds to collide will have its implications.

It is curious that many longtime Holofcener champions as well as those unfamiliar with her work have complained that this movie is reminiscent of a sitcom. Were it that every television sitcom were this perceptively written, finely acted, and tethered to the very grounded realities of day-to-day living.

The genius of this film (and I don’t use the word ‘genius’ lightly) is in the casting. Whoever thought to bring Julia Louis-Dreyfus and James Gandolfini together – not exactly an obvious pairing – must have had the hand of cinematic gods on their shoulder. These two are magic. And one cannot help be wistful knowing that we will never see the two act again. Plus the movie adds further evidence to the theory that every film is bettered by the presence of Toni Collette.

I have long been part of the minority singing the praises of Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who I consider in the same league as Tina Fey, Amy Poehler and Kristen Wiig. Is there another actor working in film or television right now that does better reaction shots than Louis-Dreyfus? Her facial reactions are Film School class good. There is something right with the world when a stellar television actor gets to headline a film. There has been some surprisingly nasty reaction, thankfully from a minority, to Luis-Dreyfus’ performance in this film; those not recognizing the wit in her acting will be awfully late to the party. With her lauded turns on HBO’S VEEP and the underrated, now cancelled show NEW ADVENTURES OF OLD CHRISTINE (with which this film shares much of its sensibility), Louis-Dreyfus’ star is on the rise. And one oddly almost resents sharing a personally-known secret treasure with the rest of the world.

And what is one to say of James Gandolfini. That someone thought to consider him as a male romantic lead is cause for celebration. That he utterly pulls it off – using every facet of his dog-eared, scrappy, warmly intelligent persona to full effect – comes as a surprise; it shouldn’t have, but it does. That film cameras will never be able to focus upon Gandolfini again is cause for considerable sadness.

There’s a scene early in the movie where Albert drops Eva outside her home at the end of their first date. In lesser hands their lines would have come off as silly or worse cheesy. But to watch Gandolfini and Louis-Dreyfus make that dialog sing is to know the value of good actors.

This film reminded me, in its modern, urban, everyday sensibility of the movie THE KIDS ARE ALRIGHT. ENOUGH SAID pulls off one sleight of hand after another in fleshing out, with remarkable skill – and efficiency – so many relationships: mothers and daughters, ex-wives and ex-husbands, employers and maids, confidantes and confessors. All of it works.

One may get the impression that the film is overly serious; this is hardly the case. Even as it has an understated gentleness to its rhythm, and an underlying wiseness lurking underneath, the film is mostly on a minute-by-minute basis genuinely funny. The movie’s singular strength though may be in the ease with which it demonstrates the need for, and the great difficulty in, practicing acceptance in any relationship. About how what might seem an unbearably annoying trait to one individual may be endearingly charming to another.

A.O. Scott in the New York Times called this film a minor miracle and I can see why. It is the sort of unshowy, unfussy, and uncommonly well-written film that rarely gets made these days.