Garrett (Justin Long) and Erin (Drew Barrymore)

If Judd Apatow films such as Knocked Up can be credited for introducing romantic-comedy elements into the gross-out comedy genre, then Going the Distance seems to be doing the opposite by delivering strong elements of gross-out humour into a romantic-comedy formula. It may also be the first romantic-comedy to really explore the dynamics of a long-distance relationship in an age where phone and computer technology now allows for such relationships to be better maintained than ever before, but still can’t replace the real thing. And in Going the Distance the real thing is both emotional intimacy and wild sex; satisfying both the fans of romantic and gross-out comedies.

The couple forced to live apart in Going the Distance is Erin (Drew Barrymore) and Garrett (Justin Long). Part of what makes Going the Distance so enjoyable is the chemistry between the pair that makes them a genuinely romantic and sexy on-screen couple. Erin is initially portrayed in a similar way to Mary in There’s Something About Mary in that she’s very much the average guy’s ultimate woman who is not only attractive, fun and into sex but enjoys ‘guy things’ such as arcade games, beer and bongs. Garrett is also initially a little bit too much the ‘conventional guy’ type in that prior to meeting Erin he has commitment issues and can’t read women’s signals. Fortunately, when the sparks do begin to fly between the pair, these broad character traits fade away and they start to resemble a believable couple that you really want the best for.

Dan (Charlie Day), Box (Jason Sudeikis), Garrett (Justin Long) and Erin (Drew Barrymore)

The main problem with Going the Distance is that it peaks early with the courtship between Erin and Garrett, prior to their geographic separation, being the highlight of the film. For the first third of the film it is full of laugh-out-loud humour courtesy of the couple, Garrett’s roommate Dan (Charlie Day) and workmate Box (Jason Sudeikis) providing lots of wickedly funny Aptowesque humour. The scenes with Erin’s family and friends are less successful although Christina Applegate does well as her uptight sister in a role that is very similar to the one Leslie Mann had in Knocked Up. Nevertheless, despite this loss of momentum Going the Distance maintains its charm and smutty humour right through to its pleasingly imperfect resolution.

Going the Distance has attempted a very precarious middle ground in trying to appeal to two difference comedy demographics but overall it works and that’s got a lot to do with how well Long and Barrymore perform. They are both so clearly not prudish in the slightest and that energy is transferred on screen so that you get a sense that the wicked humour shared by the characters reflects that of the performers. It is also refreshing to see a film like this where both the male and female characters have equal status, ambitions and sexual appetites making Going the Distance a truly modern romantic-gross-out-comedy.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

Ellie Linton (Caitlin Stasey)

At first glance the film adaptation of author John Marsden’s hugely popular Australian teen fiction novel Tomorrow, When The War Began resembles a cross between Red Dawn and The Breakfast Club. A group of teenagers – including a princess, a bad boy, a jock and a studious kid – go camping and when they return to their country-town homes they discover Australia has been invaded by an unidentified Asian army. However, this film is more than the sum of its parts and scriptwriter Stuart Beattie (Collateral, Pirates of the Caribbean, Australia) in his directorial début has delivered a thrilling character-driven action/adventure film.

Beattie handles the action magnificently throughout the film with Ben Nott’s (Daybreakers, Accidents Happen) expert cinematography and the incredibly effective sound design facilitating several thrilling moments. The sheer exhilaration of several key scenes considerably compensates for some of the less plausible elements of the film concerning the remarkable speed in which some of the characters adapt to the situation. The Australian teenage characters display an incredible degree of resourcefulness, clarity and perceptiveness; not to mention aptitude for driving heavy vehicles and handling automatic weapons – even for kids who’ve grown up on a farm.

Kevin Holmes (Lincoln Lewis), Homer Yannos (Deniz Akdeniz) and Ellie Linton (Caitlin Stasey)

The emotional journey that the characters go on is completely genuine and engaging, and that level of ‘reality’ is far more interesting. The group dynamics are convincing and the young cast do an excellent job fleshing out their characters.  In particular, the main character Ellie Linton is a fantastic action hero, acted with charismatic conviction by former Neighbours regular Caitlin Stasey. It’s just a pity that these naturally attractive actors have unnecessarily good hair and model-like make-up throughout the entire film so that when they start getting dishevelled and roughed-up, they look more like they’ve adopted Derek Zoolander’s ‘Derelicte’ look.

The major issue with Tomorrow, When the War Began is the representation of the Asian invaders. There is a scene where one character states that it doesn’t matter who the invaders are or what country they have come from – the point is that they have invaded Australia and that’s all the characters and the audience need to know. (There is even an acknowledgement that Australia has been invaded once before.) But if the invaders are merely plot devices without political implications then why represent them as being so specifically one particular race? Why not make them completely nondescript? In the extremely unlikely scenario that Australia is ever invaded then those invaders would probably be from a nearby country (most of which are Asian) but this is not a realistic film so maintaining that ‘authenticity’ is not necessary. Evoking Australian cultural anxieties over the fear of a specifically Asian invasion without addressing the issues that it raises is problematic and a little bit careless.

Nagging concerns about the questionable subtext aside, Tomorrow, When the War Began is an intelligent blockbuster that holds its own with most of Hollywood’s recent output. Hopefully it will be popular enough to generate a franchise based on the rest of the books in Marsden’s series but with the future films showing perhaps a little more grittiness and definitely a little less naivety in how it represents the invaders.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

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Adam Lang (Pierce Brosnan) and The Ghost (Ewan McGregor)

Adam Lang (Pierce Brosnan) is a controversial former British Prime Minister who in order to complete his autobiography requires the assistance of a skilled ghost writer, especially since his last one died mysteriously. Enter the unnamed writer (Ewan McGregor) who is flown to Lang’s remote, wind-swept, compound-like island home. As the writer attempts to learn about Lang, some very disturbing secrets start to surface, forcing the writer to reassess his loyalties as choosing the wrong side may jeopardise his life.

This political thriller is a return to the more straightforward genre filmmaking that director Roman Polanski has previously indulged in with successful films like Frantic and less successful films such as The Ninth Gate. For the most part it is an atmospheric and intriguing film but it does suffer from a slightly naff ending and some very stodgy dialogue. Also, the acting at times comes dangerous close to being wooden. Nevertheless, mystery fans will find plenty to enjoy about The Ghost Writer and Polanski does an excellent job evoking an increasing sense of paranoia and danger. The very final shot is certainly as skilfully composed as anything he has done before.

Originally appeared in The Big Issue, No. 361, 2010

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

Lou Ford (Casey Affleck)

Lou Ford (Casey Affleck) is a Texas deputy sheriff in a small country town in the 1950s. On the surface Lou seems like a pillar of virtue. He describes himself as ‘a man and a gentleman’, he doesn’t like carrying a gun and he loves his schoolteacher girlfriend Amy Stanton (Kate Hudson). However, Lou is also having an intense sadomasochistic sexual relationship with prostitute Joyce Lakeland (Jessica Alba) and has Oedipal issues that are more extreme than usual, even for a film noir protagonist. He is also a delusional psychopath who kills people for reasons that he largely has to invent for himself after the event.

Adapted from the novel by Jim Thompson, The Killer Inside Me is the latest film by the highly talented and prolific English director Michael Winterbottom (Genova, A Mighty Heart). It is best described as a ‘country noir,’ resembling films like Lone Star and especially No Country For Old Men for its brutal existentialism. It is also a deeply psychological film that takes the audience further and further into Lou’s mind so that the film ends in a way where we are not too sure what is real anymore and what is part of Lou’s deranged perception of reality. In this way The Killer Inside Me also evokes Orson Welles’s The Lady From Shanghai and a very powerful visual motif from the film’s conclusion is also highly suggestive of Robert Aldrich’s Kiss Me Deadly and David Lynch’s Lost Highway.

Joyce Lakeland (Jessica Alba)

The scenes depicting extreme violence against women have been, and will most likely continue to be, the main focal point for many people. This is a pity as there is a lot more to The Killer Inside Me. However the scenes do contain an undeniable power that is impossible not to address, shot as they are in a sickening, graphic, realistic and intimate way. The combination of make-up, cinematography and gut churning sound effects is designed to make the audience feel complete horror and disgust. Casey Affleck’s performance adds to the impact as he is so chillingly calm, restrained and even slightly playful.

These scenes are not voyeuristic exercises in cruelty as they function instead as confronting representations of the true impact of violence, especially when fuelled by the type of extreme paranoid misogyny that possesses Affleck’s character. Post Silence of the Lambs, cinematic serial killers and mass murderers have tended to become transgressive anti-heroes. By making the violence in The Killer Inside Me so revolting and unpalatable, Winterbottom confronts us with our own tendency to become complicit with onscreen violence, in a way that is not too dissimilar to Gaspar Noé Irréversible and both versions of Michael Haneke’s Funny Games.

Lou Ford (Casey Affleck) and Amy Stanton (Kate Hudson)

The Killer Inside Me is going to attract plenty of detractors not only for its graphic content but also for its pace and bizarre ending. However, it is a slow, atmospheric and simmering film where the tension is maintained effectively through a dread for what may happen next. This is compelling and challenging cinema, punctuated with genuinely shocking moments, by a director and a cast of actors who are right at the top of their game. The content and the unconventional form that this film eventually takes does not make it easy viewing but Winterbottom is a director worth placing your trust in and viewers who are ready to go with him will be immensely rewarded.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

Nobody’s Perfect

Kim Morton

German filmmaker Niko von Glasow was born with malformed arms due to the side effects of thalidomide, a sedative prescribed to pregnant women in the late 1950s. Von Glasow’s film documents the process of putting together a nude photo shoot for himself and eleven other thalidomide affected people, many of who talk about their negative experiences being starred at. By taking part in the professionally produced and exhibited photo shoot, these people not only familiarises the onlooker with their condition but they also empowering themselves by setting the agenda under which they are looked at.

Von Glasow delves into the lives and motivations behind the various participants and uncovers various feelings of frustration, bitterness and anger. However, what makes Nobody’s Perfect such a strong film is the tremendous energy and humour that dominates. Von Glasow encourages everybody to be extremely frank about issues such as insecurity, guilt, depression and self-doubt, and he is certainly extremely frank himself. The results are frequently very wicked observations and self-deprecating humour. Nobody’s Perfect is a film that succeeds on many levels as while it is partially an awareness-raising film it is also tremendously fun and that’s mainly due to the eclectic bunch of people who reveal themselves physically and emotionally.

Read more reviews at MRQE

CJ Jones, Robert DeMayo, TL Forsberg and Bob Hiltermann

Hilari Scarl’s documentary follows four hearing impaired performers. There’s the popular deaf comic CJ Jones who wants mainstream recognition, struggling actor Robert DeMayo and Bob Hiltermann, the drummer in the deaf rock band Beethoven’s Nightmare. The most interesting story is that of TL Forsberg, a goth rock singer/songwriter whose relatively high level of hearing means that she struggles for acceptance within some aspects of the deaf community.

It is always fascinating having an insight into what makes people with an urge to perform tick, especially when you get to see how they juggle their artistic temperaments with the realities of everyday life. You certainly get a strong sense of this dynamic in See What I’m Saying across the four stories but you also get the added element of seeing the particular challenges that is faced by hearing impaired people. Scarl’s film also provides a wonderful insight into deaf culture so that See What I’m Saying is very much an inspirational and celebratory film. Jones, DeMayo, Hiltermann and Forsberg are all tremendously charismatic and talented performers, and you really get a sense of both their disappointments but also their triumphs.

Read more reviews at MRQE

Nobody’s Perfect screens at the Other Film Festival on Saturday 28 August 2010 and See What I’m Saying screens the day before on Friday 27 August 2010.

As for other films screening at the festival, Josh Nelson from Philmology has recommended The Sunshine Boy and Rita to me and Tara Judah’s preview of the festival at Liminal Vision also contains several great recommendations.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone)

The very first kill in The Expendables is a Somali pirate having his entire torso blown to pieces after one of the muscular good guys shoots him with an explosive round. Welcome to The Expendables – an excessively violent and excessively silly throwback to 1980s action films. Co-written, directed and starring Sylvester Stallone, who is clearly now fully embracing his almost parodic action-star persona, The Expendables is ludicrous fun. The characters are an elite team of mercenaries who are tasked with overthrowing a South American dictatorship. In order to avoid any political readings, the dictatorship is being propped up by American investment (boo capitalism) but the investor is an ex-CIA man (boo manipulative government agencies).

The cast of new and old action stars (OK, mostly old) include the core team of Stallone with Jet Li and Jason Statham. While Li doesn’t get to shine nearly as much as he should considering his extraordinary pre-Hollywood roles in Hong Kong martial arts classics, Stallone and Statham bring plenty of tough guy charisma to their roles. Eric Roberts also appears and has a wonderful time as a scenery-chewing bad guy, Mickey Rourke is in there to provide some ‘serious acting’ moments and Dolph Lundgren is also in the mix, possibly to make everybody else’s acting look good by comparison.

Tool (Mickey Rourke) and Barney (Sylvester Stallone)

There are also a couple of female characters for the boys to save and fall in love with to remind audiences, in a slightly over-compensatory way, that despite the muscle-rippling, sweaty, intense male-bonding throughout the film, these guys are 100% heterosexual. No really – they are.

While hardly essential viewing, The Expendables does work as a guilty pleasure because it does feel so much like a 1980s boys-own B-grade action film. It operates as a loving homage to a bygone era of filmmaking and while it never out rightly makes fun of itself, it doesn’t take itself too seriously either. It also mostly works better than the similarly plotted The A-Team because its shorter running time and simplicity means that it never feels laboured. Plus, unlike The A-Team, which peaked early, The Expendables saves the best stuff for the end. Both films have similar regressive values but The Expendables, with its cartoonish violence and grotesque hyper masculine bodies, is so clearly a tough guy fantasy film that it really is impossible to take seriously on any level.

Lee Christmas (Jason Statham)

If you believe that being able to leave your brain at the cinema door is something to be proud of then you may regard The Expendables as a masterpiece. However, if you are a little bit more discerning but are nevertheless happy to appreciate a film simply for what it is then chances are you will find something to enjoy about The Expendables in all its ultra-cheesy glory. It’s a pity that a lot of the blood and destruction is clearly CGIed but otherwise watching The Expendables is like watching professional wrestling but with guns, knives and a whole lot of death.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

Splice is not a David Cronenberg film but it comes closer to capturing the sensibility of Cronenberg’s films from the mid-1970s to the late 1990s than anything Cronenberg himself has done in the past decade. From Shivers to The Fly to eXistenZ, the films of the Canadian auteur have explored ideas of science kick-starting evolution, sexual transgressions and bodily horror with a distinctive flair for visceral gore and pitch-black humour. All of these elements flourish in writer/director Vincenzo Natali’s Splice; a glorious blend of science-fiction, horror, melodrama and psycho-sexual thriller.

Elsa Kast (Sarah Polley)

Previously best known for his 1997 low budget science-fiction thriller Cube, in Splice Natali demonstrates how well he can work with big budgets, known actors and challenging material. Splice is at times genuinely frightening with early scenes evoking the unknown terror of Ridley Scott’s original Alien film. The uncanny strangeness of the infant Dren also strongly recalls the nightmarish ‘baby’ in David Lynch’s Eraserhead. The concept of mechanically reproduced life and the film’s perverse representation of ‘child birth’ are confronting and taboo breaking, and in Splice Natali does everything that he can to make the audience squirm, tremble and laugh in a mixture of disgust, dread and wicked delight.

Underpinning the stylish production values and moments of shock are strong characters and engaging writing. What holds your attention throughout Splice is the changing sympathies you constantly have for Elsa, Clive and Dren as they all constantly shift from positions of being the aggressors to being the victims. Splice is science-fiction/horror at its best, underpinning its daring moments of bodily horror and sexual anxieties with flawed characters to care about and moral issues to wrestle with.

Originally appeared in The Big Issue, No. 360, 2010

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

Mother (Kim Hye-ja)

From South Korea, Mother is a stylish and extremely impressive “wrong man” murder mystery. Do-joon (Won Bin) is a sweet natured, mentally handicapped young man who is accused of murder based on circumstantial evidence. Do-joon’s doting mother becomes fixated on finding the real killer to prove her son’s innocence so she starts her own investigation, unveiling all sorts of sordid details about their small town community.

Director Bong Joon-ho’s previous film was the monster movie The Host, which very playfully toyed with its generic conventions without becoming overly self-aware. Mother is more focused than The Host, operating as a strong genre film even though Bong skilfully undermines many of the murder mystery conventions. With its clever play on audience expectations and sympathies there are some completely unexpected twists and turns.

At the heart of Mother is Kim Hye-ja’s lead performance as Do-joon’s mother. Her incredible love and devotion for Do-joon is both touching and sad. Her singular drive to protect him is what drives this film resulting in a heavily ironic and clever examination of guilt and culpability. Beautifully shot and consistently entertaining, Mother is a film that you should not let slip under your radar.

Originally appeared in The Big Issue, No. 360, 2010

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera)

Edgar Wright’s latest film, an adaptation of the acclaimed Scott Pilgrim comic series, is a hyperactive blend of indi cinema storyline, computer game logic and comic book aesthetics. It is slick, fast paced, self-reflexive and so full of cultural references that you’ll probably need several viewings in order to pick everything up.  It could have been a mess of epic proportions but Wright, who previously made Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, has made Scott Pilgrim vs. the World one of the most energetic and fun films of the year.

Scott Pilgrim is a 22-year-old Canadian slacker whose life is transformed when he meets and falls in love with Ramona Flowers, an American girl trying to make a new start. Unfortunately for Scott, Ramona comes with more baggage than anticipated in the form of seven evil exes who are determined to fight him to the death.  Within the world of the film these fight scenes take the form of elaborate and over-the-top combat scenes like the ones from computer games. The various exes are like the end-of-level bosses who have special powers and abilities that Scott must find a way to overcome. Not only is this gaming approach an exciting stylistic device but it is also used as a simple yet effective metaphor for Scott having to find his inner strength in order to win Ramona’s love.

Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) and Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera)

The other distinctive stylistic device present in this film is its comic book aesthetic. While Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is not the first comic book adaptation to replicate the look and form of comics, it is the first one to take it as far as it does. Even the editing cuts dramatically from scene to scene to convey the sudden change in time and space that you get moving from one panel of a comic to another. Far from being a series of alienating jump cuts, this style is remarkably fluid and contributes to making it such a fast paced film that you can completely surrender to.

The story itself is rather slight with Scott and Ramona playing fairly typical indi film characters with him being the slightly awkward nice guy and her being the mysterious, quirky unobtainable girl. However, the film’s humour and energy overcome any danger of the film feeling overly familiar in any way. Michael Cera as Scott doesn’t exactly play against type but his performance is still enough of a departure from his very distinctive roles in films such as Juno and Superbad. Mary Elizabeth Winstead (Die Hard 4.0 and Death Proof) has a wonderful onscreen presence and while sparks don’t really fly between the pair as much as they probably should, they are still a likeable enough onscreen couple.

Just as Gremlins 2: The New Batch, the Wayne’s World films and The Simpsons introduced a new style of self-aware post-modern comedy, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World feels like the beginning of a new form of super self-reflexive cinema that relies on not just the audience’s knowledge of film and television but also other forms of media. The way it sets up and then sustains its internal logic and distinctive style is a remarkable achievement. It is also a consistently entertaining film from beginning to end.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

Enter the Void

As another Melbourne International Film Festival closes I’m left with mixed feelings. It is admittedly somewhat of a relief to no longer be dashing from session to session every day, not getting enough sleep, not eating properly and drinking way too much caffeine. On the other hand, I do feel sad that it’s all over as it is wonderful to indulge in 2 and a half weeks of doing what I love the most – seeing films, writing about films and talking about films to other passionate cinephiles. It was also a thrill to be one the jury members for the short films awards this year. Being just a very small part of the festival in that way was a real privilege.

I was overall extremely impressed with the way the festival was run and I don’t believe that there were any mishaps (or miffhaps?) that were not understandable considering the immense logistics behind putting on a festival like this. Sure, there will sometimes be delays and projection problems  but this year everything seemed to be rectified and managed quickly and competently. Having proper breaks between sessions was also wonderful. My only wish is that you could exchange tickets online or at least over the phone without paying an addition charge on top of the exchange fee. It would also be great (but perhaps unrealistic I admit) to create a system where you don’t get charged for cancelling a session but instead only get charged for replacing a session. That way tickets would be freed up when people decide to skip a screening completely.

Son of Babylon

My goodness – bless the MIFF volunteers who do such an incredible job with a love of the festival being their main motivation. Having worked professionally on another cultural festival, I am fully aware of how hard volunteers work and that they can sometimes be under-appreciated. Fortunately the general public seemed to be pretty well behaved this year and I only witnessed one temper tantrum, which was so absurd it was actually quite funny (looking at you man who declared that the whole country was apparently incompetent because you had to wait an extra 20 minutes to see a film).

So, onto the films themselves, first with a list of my top 10 favourite films that screening during the festival:

Enter the Void (Gaspar Noé, 2009)
Son of Babylon (Mohamed Al Daradji, 2009)
The Killer Inside Me (Michael Winterbottom, 2010)
I Love You Phillip Morris (Glenn Ficarra and John Reque, 2009)
Splice (Vincenzo Natali, 2009)
Lourdes (Jessica Hausner, 2010)
Boy (Taika Waititi, 2010)
The Messenger (Oren Moverman, 2010)
The Illusionist (L’illusionniste, Sylvain Chomet, 2010)
Poetry (Shi, Lee Chang-dong, 2010)

World on a Wire

I would also like to mention that the final film I saw at the festival, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, was a tremendous amount of fun and I’m glad I finished the festival with such an exhilarating film. I also thoroughly enjoyed the three retrospective screenings I went to, which were Psycho with the live orchestra, Joe Dante’s Homecoming and Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s World on a Wire.

My full list of films seen at the festival is as follows:

Air Doll (Kûki ningyô, Hirokazu Koreeda, 2009) ✭✭✭✩
Alamar (Pedro González-Rubio, 2009) ✭✭✭✩
Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo (Jessica Oreck, 2009) ✭✭✩
Bibliothèque Pascal (Szabolcs Hajdu, 2010) ✭✭✭✭
Boy (Taika Waititi, 2010) ✭✭✭✭
Brotherhood (Broderskab, Nicholo Donato, 2009) ✭✭✭
Caterpillar (Kyatapirâ, Kôji Wakamatsu, 2010) ✭✭
Despicable Me (Pierre Coffin and Chris Renaud, 2010) ✭✭✭
Dreamland (Ivan Sen, 2009) ✭✭✭
Enter the Void (Gaspar Noé, 2009) ✭✭✭✭✩
Exodus – Burnt by the Sun 2 (Utomlyonnye solntsem 2, Nikita Mikhalkov, 2010) ✭✩
Four Lions (Christopher Morris, 2009) ✭✭✭
The Ghost Writer (Roman Polanski, 2010) ✭✭✭✩
Homecoming (Joe Dante, 2005) ✭✭✭✭
The Housemaid (Hanyo, Im Sang-soo, 2010) ✭✭✭
The Hunter (Rafi Pitts, 2010) ✭✭✩
I Killed My Mother (J’ai tué ma mère, Xavier Dolan, 2009) ✭✭✭✩
I Love You Phillip Morris (Glenn Ficarra and John Reque, 2009) ✭✭✭✭✩
The Illusionist (L’illusionniste, Sylvain Chomet, 2010) ✭✭✭✭
The Killer Inside Me (Michael Winterbottom, 2010) ✭✭✭✭✩
Le Donk & Scor-zay-zee (Shane Meadows, 2009) ✭✭
Leap Year (Año bisiesto, Michael Rowe, 2010) ✭✭
Lebanon (Samuel Maoz, 2009) ✭✭✭
Lourdes (Jessica Hausner, 2010) ✭✭✭✭
The Messenger (Oren Moverman, 2010) ✭✭✭✭
The Myth of the American Sleepover (David Robert Mitchell, 2009) ✭✭✩
Poetry (Shi, Lee Chang-dong, 2010) ✭✭✭✭
Psycho (Alfred Hitchock, 1960) ✭✭✭✭✭
Red Hill (Patrick Hughes, 2010) ✭✭✭
The Robber (Der Räuber, Benjamin Heisenberg, 2010) ✭✭✭
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (Edgar Wright) ✭✭✭✭
Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll (Mat Whitecross, 2010) ✭✭✭
Son of Babylon (Mohamed Al Daradji, 2009) ✭✭✭✭✩
The Special Relationship (Richard Loncraine, 2010) ✭✭✭✩
Splice (Vincenzo Natali, 2009) ✭✭✭✭✩
Taqwacore: The Birth of Punk Islam (Omar Majeed, 2009) ✭✭✭✩
Tetro (Francis Ford Coppola, 2009) ✭✭✭
The Tree (Julie Bertucelli, 2010) ✭✭✭✩
The Trotsky (Jacob Tierney, 2009) ✭✭✭✩
The Wedding Party (Amanda Jane, 2010) ✭✭
Welcome to the Rileys (Jake Scott, 2010) ✭✭✭✩
Wild Target (Jonathan Lynn, 2010) ✭✭✭
Winter’s Bone (Debra Granik, 2010) ✭✭✭✩
World on a Wire (Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 1973) ✭✭✭✭
World’s Greatest Dad (Bobcat Goldthwait, 2009) ✭✭✭✭

I Love You Phillip Morris

Finally, MIFF this year was extremely sociable and I had a great time drinking and chatting with friends between sessions and making new friends while waiting for the curtains to part. I should really have done this much sooner but below is a shout-out to some of the other places online where MIFF has been discussed and digested. This list is be no means exhaustive and I apologise if I’ve left you off but I wanted to focus on people whom I actually spent time with in person in various queues, cinemas and the festival lounge. So, thanks to the following people for enriching my MIFF experience both online and in person:

Tara Judah at Liminal Vision
Cerise Howard at A Little Lie Down
Richard Watts at A Man About Town
Lee Zachariah (a.k.a. Latauro) at Ain’t It Cool News
Luke Buckmaster at Cinetology
David O’Connell at Screen Fanatic

That’s it for another year! Please feel free to list your blog/website in the comments if you’ve also covered MIFF and escaped my radar. Also, please feel free to share your MIFF highlights and maybe on this occasion it would be good to maintain the MIFF afterglow by just focusing on the films that you can share the love for.

Cheers
Thomas

PS It’s pronounced “FASS-bin-der” not “Fass-BIND-er”!

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Lebanon

The Israeli film Lebanon is about a tank unit during the first few days of Israel’s war with Lebanon in 1982. The main point of interest is that the film is set entirely from within the tank, with the shots of the conflict outside being all via the tank’s gunsight. The incredible sound-design and claustrophobic cinematography  certainly convey the intensity of the experience for the young soldiers. The film also operates as a reasonably effective anti-war film, highlighting the death-by-remote aspect of modern warfare. However, some of the scenes depicting the brutality of war verge on the exploitive and diminish their power. Lebanon also relies a little too heavily on some very conventional war film clichés.

One of the most frustrating films I’ve seen at the festival is the Mexican film (with an Australian director) Leap Year. For at least two thirds of the film, its purpose seems to be to capture the everyday existence of an unremarkable life by making a film that is completely mundane – it’s not exactly riveting cinema. Towards the end of the film it becomes apparent that the subject of the film, a woman who lives alone in an apartment that we never see her leave, is actually very damaged and we get some confronting sadomasochistic daddy-issue sex but it’s still ultimately all a bit tedious.

Alamar

On the other hand, Alamar demonstrates that films depicting everyday life with next to no narrative can be extraordinarily rewarding when those lives are actually of interest and completely removed from the audience’s frame of reference. I was more than happy to watch a Mayan man, living on a coral reef off the coast of Mexico, spend time with his son. The way of life presented in Alamar is a harmonious one based on living off the sea and the relationship between the father and his son  is very touching. This ethnographic docu/drama is a very simple film but completely engaging and life-affirming.

The Iranian film The Hunter is one of those films that I strongly believe would have worked as a 20 to 30 minute short film. It’s about an ex-prisoner who snaps after his wife is killed in a police shoot out and his daughter goes missing. Most of the film is an unnecessarily dull, detached and emotionally distant build up to the final more interesting aspects of the film. Even then, the protagonist becomes so completely unsympathetic that I simply did not care what happened to him.

Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll

The final 2010 MIFF film I’ll give a mini-review to is the closing night film Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll. A high energy biopic of Ian Dury, it was certainly a fun film to close the festival with. However, I was overall a little bit frustrated that the film never really gave me a more substantial picture of who Dury was and his musical significance. The film briefly mentions that his style of music and performance was a sort of unacknowledged precursor to punk but I would have liked a lot more cultural context. The very Brechtian approach of having Dury narrate his life from a stage in an abandoned theatre strongly recalls Bronson (from MIFF last year) but it did not work nearly as effectively. Nevertheless, I really enjoyed Andy Serkis’s performance as Dury especially in the later stages of the film where it calmed down stylistically enough for Dury’s larger-than-life persona to speak for itself.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

I enjoyed Four Lions, a comedy about incompetent Islamic terrorists trying to find something to blow up. However, I really thought it would have a bit more depth and insight considering its provocative subject matter and it being a film by Christopher Morris, a razor sharp satirist whose television work has an audacious and perceptive approach to comedy. Four Lions is certainly quite funny and there are a couple of excellent scenes that explore the absurdity of some of the extremist Islamic beliefs, but I really wanted a lot more than what this film actually delivers.

World on a Wire

A big part of what I love about MIFF are the retrospective screenings and this year seeing Rainer Werner Fassbinder 1973 made-for-television science-fiction saga World on a Wire was an incredible pleasure. Stylistically, World on a Wire owes much to Jean-Luc Godard’s Alphaville in its use of at-the-time modern architecture, interior designs and fashion to represent the future. Eddie Constantine even makes a cameo to really establish Fassbinder’s tip of the hat to Godard’s film. Thematically World on a Wire is a distinct precursor to The Matrix but wondrously it also explores many of the ideas that are found in Inception. Definitely a festival highligh.

Caterpillar is a an anti-nationalistic and anti-militaristic film about a World War II Japanese soldier who returns home deaf, unable to talk, horribly scarred and missing all his limbs. He is declared a War God and the repeated ironic shots of his medals and articles in the newspaper, plus all the rhetoric spouted about the Japanese war effort heard on the radio, reinforcs how grotesque the glorification of war is. Furthermore, he does little but make his wife completely subservient to him by constantly demanding sex and eating more than his share of the food. Maybe I’ve been too caught up in watching short films this year but I am increasingly seeing featuress where I can’t help but think they would have been more effective as 20 minutes shorts. Caterpillar is one such films as it is a single note film that overly labours its point.

Enter the Void

On the other hand, despite the large number of walk-outs and deep sighs of frustration during its final hour, I absolutely loved Gaspar Noé’s new film Enter the Void, an astonishing and hallucinogenic cinematic experience that mesmerised me for its entire running time. It’s shot in a variety of ways to convey a first person perspective to explore the sensations of drugs, death, sex and the neon lit metropolis of Tokyo, making it the type of film that William S. Burroughs may have made. However, it is only fair to warn that most people I’ve spoken to found Enter the Void to ultimately be an endurance test. I would almost declare it a masterpiece if it wasn’t for my recognition that it does become increasing repetitive, challenging and obscure during its long final act. However, I wanted it to keep going and I could honestly watch it all over again right now. It’s certainly looking like my pick of the festival.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Tony Blair (Michael Sheen) and Bill Clinton (Dennis Quaid)

Ever since World War II the close relationship shared between the UK and USA governments has been referred to as ‘The Special Relationship’, sometimes sincerely and sometimes ironically. In this made-for-cable-television film by BBC Films and HBO Films, the term is used to describe the relationship between UK Prime Minister Tony Blair and USA President Bill Clinton, from Blair’s appointment as the leader of the Labour Party in 1994 to the end of Clinton’s presidency in 2001. Examining the shifting lines between the personal and the public, the political and the private, The Special Relationship almost functions as a strange sort of bromance between two men who heralded the arrival of a new approach to progressive centre-left politics. Over the course of the film the two men learn that political friendships are strategic and conditional.

Michael Sheen once more portrays Tony Blair as he has done twice previously in The Queen and The Deal, both of which were written by Peter Morgan who also wrote The Damned United and Frost/Nixon (both of which also starred Sheen). This is clearly a fruitful acting/writing partnership as once again Sheen’s performance is impeccable. In The Special Relationship he appears opposite Dennis Quaid, whose performance as Clinton is very good although sometimes he seems a bit overly focused on impersonating Clinton’s appearance and manner of speaking rather than giving a fully nuanced performance like Sheen does.

Cherie Blair (Helen McCrory) and Hillary Clinton (Hope Davis)

Helen McCrory, who played Cherie Blair in The Queen reprises her role in The Special Relationship and Hope Davis plays Hillary Clinton. Both actors deliver fine performances as women who have to juggle their own ambitions with those of their husbands’. Davis in particular brings a lot of dignity and strength to Hillary Clinton.

The primary point of interest in The Special Relationship is the changing status between Blair and Clinton throughout the film. Prior to his election, Blair is portrayed as a somewhat wide-eyed fan of Clinton, in awe of his success, appreciative of his advice and flattered that Clinton has taken such an interest in his career. Both men do seem to initially share a genuine friendship with each other and have a shared common goal of obliterating the right and far left elements out of contemporary politics. However, as both their terms progress their relationship does become one of small power plays and one-upmanship, further intensifying over Clinton’s sexual misconduct allegations (Blair describes all the sex talk as “blue”) and their differing attitudes over how to handle the worsening crisis in Kosovo.

The Special Relationship is a good dramatisation of the UK/USA relationships during some very formative years. However it does feel made for TV and it will probably be of more political and historical interest than an overall cinematically satisfying experience. Although it is perceptive to a point, in particular its representation of Blair’s attitudes towards military intervention, it actually doesn’t feel as insightful as the fictional representation of UK/USA relations depicted satirically in In The Loop. Nevertheless this is a fine film that if nothing else is as entertaining a way as any to be brought up to speed on some very important contemporary history.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

I Killed My Mother

The highlight of the day was the French-Canadian film I Killed My Mother about a 16-year-old boy’s turbulent relationship with his single mother. Despite being underlit, I enjoyed this comedy/drama for being so funny, perceptive and painfully familiar. The mother is irritating and the boy is frequently obnoxious and yet I felt sympathy for them both, strongly recognising the dynamics creating the conflict between the two of them. I think a lot of people will also identify with the situations that are present in this film either as parents or as children. It’s the sort of film that you probably shouldn’t see with somebody you are related to.

The other film I saw dealing with being a teenager was The Myth of the American Sleepover, an American indi teen film that seemed determined to not be a teen film. Like so many films of the genre – from American Graffiti to Dazed and Confused to even Can’t Hardly Wait - it is an ensemble film with multiple narratives set over one night. So determined to demythologise the world of teenagers and to focus on the mundane and unfulfilled aspects of their lives, the film’s restraint and reliance on non-professional actors ends up creating something that often feels stilted and unintentionally absurd rather than naturalistic.

Taqwacore: The Birth of Punk Islam

Frankly, I’d rather see films about kids who are angry, rebellious and have something to say. That’s all delivered in the documentary Taqwacore: The Birth of Punk Islam. The film is at pains to state that taqwacore is a diverse movement that, like punk and Islam, is frequently misunderstood, vilified and misrepresented. The most general description may be that it is designed to create something good out of pissing off both conservative American and conservative Islam. Despite coming dangerously close at times to glorifying a rather contrived view of punk culture, the doco ultimately achieves its desire to demonstrate the power of music to empower and bring people together. It’s energy is very infectious.

Being a very big fan of director Shane Meadows and actor Paddy Considine, I was very much looking forward to their collaboration on the improvised mockumentary Le Donk & Scor-zay-zee, where Considine plays a roady who is promoting a new rapper. Even at 70 minutes this still felt like a drawn out single joke that should have really just been a one off sketch. Plenty of people in the audience I saw this with seemed to be having a good time but it did nothing for me. I suppose I can’t like them all!

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

The Lost Thing

As I’ve mentioned previously I was on the jury this year for the Melbourne International Film Festival Shorts Awards with fellow jury members Alan Finney and Wendy Haslem. During a fun ceremony on Sunday night, hosted by Colin Lane, the following winning films were announced:

Jury Special Mention: Out Of Love
Melbourne Airport Award for Emerging Australian Filmmaker: The Kiss
MIFF Award for Best Experimental Short Film: Long Live The New Flesh
MIFF Award for Best Documentary Short Film: The Mystery Of Flying Kicks
MIFF Award for Best Animation Short Film: Angry Man
Cinema Nova Award for Best Fiction Short Film: Autumn Man
Film Victoria Erwin Rado Award for Best Australian Short Film: Franswa Sharl
City of Melbourne Grand Prix for Best MIFF Short Film: The Lost Thing

With the exception of Out Of Love all the above films will screen at the Best MIFF Shorts Screening this Sunday and I can’t recommend that session enough.

Yesterday I got back into seeing feature films, starting with two OK films and ending on a very strong one.

Based on a true story, The Robber is about an Austrian man obsessed with two things – running and robbing banks. There is something slightly cold and detached about this film and the rather subdued acting keeps you at an arms length for the entire film. There are some exhilarating bursts of action and in particular some of the on foot chase sequences echo the effective use of first person cinematography that Kathryn Bigelow is so skilled at delivering. However, overall The Robber never fully connects in the way that you feel it should.

While watching the hitman farce Wild Target I was surprised at how much I remembered from the original 1993 French film Cible émouvante. In this new English remake Bill Nighy plays the lead role of the professional hitman that  Jean Rochefort played originally and he is an excellent choice with his wonderful comedic timing. The rest of the cast aren’t as well suited but they are likeable enough to make this remake work reasonable well. Weirdly, the fact that the very black humour – where somebody getting murdered is often the punchline – seems so suited to the English sensibility, makes it actually less funny than it was when done by the French where it felt so outrageous by comparison.

Poetry

I went to see the South Korean film Poetry at the last minute mainly because I’d heard it compared to last year’s Mother. Stylistically far more naturalistic that Mother it does contain some thematic similarities. Discovering that she is displaying the earlier signs of Alzheimer’s and finding out that her grandson, whom she cares for, was involved in a horrible crime, a woman in her 60s turns to poetry to find some kind of beauty in life. Apparently inspired by a real event, Poetry reminded me of River’s Edge and the Australian play Blackrock with its social critique. The gently paced film is a blend of poetic observations about the natural world and very sad observations about social culpability. The central performance by Yoon Jeong-hee, a star of 1960s and 1970s Korean cinema, is what grounds this film and gives it such a moving emotional core.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

I Love You Phillip Morris

Back to the festival. On Friday night I saw I Love You Phillip Morris, which is essentially a con-man film, with some similarities to Catch Me If You Can, but with a warm love story at its heart and a very wicked sense of humour. Jim Carrey gives a terrific performance as the extroverted con-man who does what he does to fund the lifestyle he shares with his sweet and shy partner Phillip Morris, played beautifully by Ewan McGregor. Carrey and McGregor have incredibly chemistry and are completely convincing as a couple. You will gasp at some of the subject matter that this film draws laughs from but that’s part of its brilliance. The distributors in Australia and other countries who are nervously sitting on this film for whatever reason (surely in 2010 they’re not worried about the gay content?) need to give this film the wide release that it deserves or pass on the distribution rights to a company that can handle a film like this.

The new film by Francis Ford Coppola, Tetro, is about estranged brothers reuniting in Buenos Aires. Tetro is gorgeously shot in crisp black-and-white, full depth-of-field cinematography. For the most part it is a steadily paced drama with faint echoes of John Cassavetes in the way it gives a sense of vibrancy to the everyday lives of the people who occupy the various locations the film is set in. However, the final section of the film moves it from drama to melodrama so that ultimately a very good film is let down by a flabby ending. Vincent Gallo is great in the lead role, demonstrating just how photogenic he is and just how suited he is to playing such disagreeable characters.

The Illusionist

Many people will check out the animated feature The Illusionist because it is directed by Sylvain Chomet of The Triplets of Belleville fame. That is a good enough reason in itself but my own interest was more it do with the fact that it is based on an unproduced Jacques Tati script. It is only in the past five years that Tati has become one of my favourite filmmakers and I was delighted by how well The Illusionist captures both the look of Tati’s films and his favourite theme of how modernity is sweeping away a way of life that was simpler and purer. The animated character of the magician looks and moves exactly like Tati, provoking plenty of laughs. The defining aspect of Tati’s onscreen persona is the idea that he can’t fit into the world around him. This facilitates lots of great physical comedy but also the incredibly sad nostalgic sentiment that the time of old-school entertainers is over. The Illusionist is a wonderful and a fitting tribute to the great Jacques Tati.

I went to see Welcome to the Rileys mainly because of James Gandolfini and he certainly gives a fine performance as a man who is still coming to terms with the death of his teenage daughter. He befriends and takes is upon himself to look after an underage stripper played by Kristen Stewart, in a role even grittier than the one she played in The Runaways. When Melissa Leo’s character enters the narrative more substantially, the film gets even more interesting as it explores the situation of a middle-class America couple wanting to ‘save’ an underprivileged teenager. Welcome to the Rileys has some similarities to The Blind Side, as both films explore a similar scenario, but Welcome to the Rileys is more complex, less conservative, less offensive and an overall far superior film.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Lourdes

Lourdes depicts the various rivalries, resentments and jealousies that are bubbling under the surface of an organised pilgrimage group who have gone to Lourdes in the French Pyrenees  Mountains. At the centre of the film is Christine, a woman whose Multiple Sclerosis makes her one of the most disadvantaged members of the group. She is played by Sylvie Testud who gives a lovely, understated performance. Lourdes is a slow burning film that rewards patience as it builds up to its very powerful conclusion. I was certainly completely taken aback by how emotional I was feeling during the film’s final five minutes making Lourdes one of my favourites within the festival so far.

The first of yesterday’s two meditative films was Dreamland, the latest by Australian filmmaker Ivan Sen. The screening was introduced by producer David Jowsey who made it clear that the film was not a conventional narrative but more a “no budget”, experimental soundscape to be experienced on a sensory level. This was a very good description as little happens in this film about a man searching, presumably for alien life, in the Nevada desert surrounding the infamous Area 51. Dreamland would have benefited from a shorter running time but within the film are some wonderful sequences using timelapse photography and eerie stock footage. The sound design is magnificent and the one dialogue scene is surprisingly moving. Think the final section of 2001: A Space Odyssey with a touch of Paris, Texas.

While by no means essential viewing at least Dreamland maintained my interest, which is more than I can say for Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo, a documentary about the fascination that the Japanese apparently have with insects. The broader cultural, social and historical contexts of this fascination are presented but as Beetle Queen becomes increasingly philosophical it becomes far too laboured and repetitive. There is only so long you can endure listening to haiku and watching Japanese people mucking around with bugs.

Son of Babylon

The other film I saw yesterday was one I almost skipped so that I could go to a media screening of The Loved Ones (which screened at MIFF last year and is reportedly fantastic). I’m so glad I stayed in the city to instead see Son of Babylon as it is one of the best films I’ve seen this year. Set in Iraq in 2003 just after the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime, a boy and his grandmother search for the boy’s father. The war torn countryside and burning cities they travel through have the same look and feel to them as you’d expect from a post-Apocalypse film. While Son of Babylon contains some very confronting content it doesn’t have the same social-realist, miserablism feel that often characterise so many of the films made in the Middle East. The more devastating aspects of the story are slowly revealed so that their impact is one of deep sadness rather than horror or depression. The characters are also wonderful people and the kindness and shared sorrow that the boy and his grandmother experience from the various people they meet is beautiful. Son of Babylon resonates with a deep and powerful sense of humanity and is a must-see film.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Richard Samuels (Zac Efron) and Sonja Jones (Claire Danes)

It is New York in 1937 and a naive yet cocksure 17-year-old aspiring actor named Richard Samuels has just talked himself into a small role in a Broadway play. However, it is not just any play but a gritty modern version of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar directed by the great enfant terrible Orson Welles. A year later Welles would do his notorious radio broadcast of The War of the Worlds and four years later Welles would make Citizen Kane, a film still considered to be one of the greatest films ever made.

Me and Orson Welles is essentially a coming-of-age story with Samuels learning about life, love and friendship while enduring the trial-by-fire of working on a Broadway play. High School musical star Zac Efron plays Samuels perfectly, suggesting that Efron may indeed have a solid acting career ahead of him beyond his current tween idol status. He gives Samuels a very likeable blend of confidence, charm and vulnerability. The excellent supporting cast includes Claire Danes as Sonja Jones, the theatre company’s production assistant who is driven primarily by personal ambition despite developing feelings for Samuels. James Tupper is also a lot of fun as Joseph Cotten, an unashamed ladies man and favourite actor of Welles (Cotten would later appear opposite Welles in Citizen Kane, The Magnificent Ambersons and Carol Reed’s The Third Man).

Orson Welles (Christian McKay)

However, the performance of most note belongs to the relatively unknown actor Christian McKay who portrays Welles. Vincent D’Onofrio did a more than decent job portraying Welles in Ed Wood but McKay is astonishingly good.  His performance is more than simply mimicry as he completely inhabits Welles, expressing both Welles’s seductive charm and his cruel vindictiveness. McKay presents Welles as a charlatan, a conman and a genius. Welles was such a force to be reckoned with and in the film he is so charming that people often forget the ruthless way he could strategically dismiss, undermine, belittle or ignore people close to him. Welles’s almost duel personality is something that he himself is aware of, explaining that the reason he acts is because it is a “miraculous reprieve from being myself”.

Director Richard Linklater (A Scanner Darkly, The School of Rock, Before Sunrise, Dazed and Confused) has arguably achieved a career best with Me and Orson Welles. It certainly contains none of the slightly contrived philosophising that sometimes creeps into his other films and is instead a celebration of the optimism of youth with a slightly bitter aftertaste. It also functions as a glorious tribute to the power of theatre, capturing the chaos, fear, adrenalin and passion that goes into putting on a show. There is a great sense of that classic “the show must go on” mentality that makes theatre so magical but it is also an indictment of how ruthless and compromised the entertainment industry can be. With its wonderful period details, strong performances and fascinating characters, Me and Orson Welles is an incredibly enjoyable film.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

Read more reviews at MRQE

Homecoming

Last night I went to a screening of three of Dante’s short works including It’s a Good Life, his excellent contribution to Twilight Zone: The Movie. The rather unremarkable western Lightning was also screened but the highlight was Dante’s 2005 zombie soldier film Homecoming. Made for the cable television series Masters of Horror, Homecoming is about dead American soldiers who come back to walk among the living in order to vote in the next election to get rid of the Republican party for sending them to their deaths. The satire is as blunt as it comes but Dante is clearly not trying to be subtle. Extremely funny and subversive, Homecoming addresses media manipulation, spin doctoring, the religious right, election rigging and concealing information from the public. Is anybody in any doubt that zombie films can provide incredible social commentary? I just wish Homecoming was made into a feature.

Bibliothèque Pascal

I also went to see Bibliothèque Pascal, by Hungarian director Szabolcs Hajdu. It’s about a woman who is sold into the sex trade and forced to work in a very exclusive club that caters to various literary fantasies (she starts off playing the part of Joan of Arc from Bernard Shaw’s Saint Joan). Bibliothèque Pascal has a similar heightened reality/Magical Realist  feel to it as many of the films by Emir Kusturica and leading up to the club scenes this lush combination of music, colour and absurdity is very seductive. However, when the action does move to the club where the women (and young men and children) are kept against their will, drugged, beaten and raped, the high level of artistic stylisation left me feeling a little uncomfortable. I wasn’t so sure about the fact that such scenarios were being used to create extravagant tableaux. However, the more I consider Bibliothèque Pascal the more I appreciate it for challenging me the way that is has. After all, being challenged and provoked is a big part of what festivals like MIFF are all about.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010

The Messenger

Before the judging I saw The Messenger, a film I had moderate expectations for and basically only saw because it was one of the few films I hadn’t seen that was nominated for a couple of Academy Awards this year. I’m so glad I went as it is one of the best film I have ever seen about soldiers who have returned home. It alternates between being a fun buddy film to a painful exposé  of how families react when confronted with the news that their loved ones have died while fighting. Most significantly is how plausibly The Messenger humanises these tough-guy soldier types by showing that deep inside they are broken people experiencing immense repressed pain.

The Housemaid

I also saw The Housemaid last night and wasn’t as impressed by it as I was hoping I would be. Director Im Sang-soo was at the screening to introduce his film, and also took questions afterwards, and he frequently talked about how it is a critique of South Korean society, in particular the gap between a new class of super rich and the working classes. This is certainly reflected in The Housemaid where a young maid becomes seemingly gladly subservient to a wealthy family, including making herself sexually available to the husband. All of this was fine and the film was very engaging but I found it increasingly heavy handed, obvious and melodramatic. That may have been the point I suppose and possibly exactly what other people have liked about it but it left me feeling a little unsatisfied.

© Thomas Caldwell, 2010