Day: October 21, 2014

LFM Reviews White Bird in a Blizzard

By Joe Bendel. Tired of movies based on YA tearjerkers and dystopian potboilers? Refreshingly, Laura Kasischke writes novels for grown-ups. As for Gregg Araki, he often makes films about teenagers that only adults are old enough to watch. It might seem like an unlikely combination of sensibilities, but it mostly works in Araki’s adaptation of White Bird in a Blizzard, which opens this Friday in New York.

It is the late 1980s, but Eve Connor acts like she just walked out of a Douglas Sirk movie. Rather than dying on the inside, the ostensibly perfect homemaker makes her family miserable, particularly her husband, Brock. Their daughter Kat tries to stay out of the fray, preferring to hang with her hipster outcast friends and hook-up with Phil, her pseudo-boyfriend, who lives across the street. Yet, she still notices her mother’s increasingly erratic behavior in the days leading up to her mysterious disappearance.

Told in retrospect, sort of like a sexually charged, had-I-only-known Mary Roberts Rinehart novel, White Bird examines the ways Kat Connor deals with her mother’s absence—a process that definitely includes resentment and denial. Still, certain opportunities come with mystery, such as her semi-regular trysts with the investigating officer, Det. Scieziesciez. He has his own Nancy Grace-like theories regarding her mother’s fate, but she does not want to hear them. Yet, when she returns from her first semester of college, Connor suddenly starts to crave some closure.

Although White Bird is downright restrained compared to Araki’s wickedly entertaining Kaboom and most of his prior films, he is still working with familiar elements, especially the horny teenagers. He also goes for broke with the third acts twists that should satisfy his cult indie fanbase, but it is really a period domestic mystery and works rather well in that context.

It is hard to think of the late 1980s/early 1990s as a period setting, but Araki and the design team capture the era’s look, texture, music, and zeitgeist quite well. Connor’s frequently self-referential narration might take some viewers out of the film, but fans will understand a Gregg Araki joint is the perfect place for knowing sarcasm.

From "White Bird in a Blizzard."

He also has a perfect mouthpiece in Shailene Woodley. Forget about those love-struck teens with cancer, this should be considered her breakout star-vehicle, because she carries the film through sheer verve and attitude. Of course, Eva Green was born to play a hot mess like Eve Connor and she delivers accordingly. Christopher Meloni sneaks up on viewers quite efficaciously as the compliant but tightly wound Brock Connor, but unfortunately, Shiloh Fernandez’s vacuous presence becomes increasingly problematic for Phil from the block.

Instead of an over-the-top bacchanal, White Bird represents quite a richly realized accomplishment of mise-en-scène. Somehow Araki maintains a vibe that is simultaneously nostalgic and insidious, getting some suitably cagey work from his cast. Recommended for fans of subversive mystery-thrillers, White Bird in a Blizzard opens this Friday (10/24) in New York at the Landmark Sunshine.

LFM GRADE: B+

Posted on October 21st, 2014 at 11:51pm.

The Long Farewell: LFM Reviews Glen Campbell I’ll Be Me

By Joe Bendel. As a one-time member of the first-call studio ensemble, the Wrecking Crew, Glen Campbell could definitely play. His livelihood depended on it. That musical prowess will not abandon Campbell, even when he faces the early and intermediate stages of Alzheimer’s. His “Goodbye Tour” will be a tense high-wire act for his family and sidemen, but there will be moments that justify the stress. James Keach documents the good times and mounting frustrations on-stage and behind-the-scenes in Glen Campbell I’ll Be Me, which opens this Friday in New York.

For those who only know “Rhinestone Cowboy” in a rather condescending way, Keach does a nice job encapsulating Campbell career in the film’s opening minutes. He and his fourth wife Kim (a former Rockette) will soon get the unambiguous confirmation of his Alzheimer’s diagnosis. Even at this early stage, it is clear she understands the implications far better than he. In fact, Kim Campbell is really the protagonist of I’ll Be Me more than her husband, because she is the one who will take the responsibility and do the work, with the help of their grown children Ashley, Cal, and Shannon, who are also regular members of Campbell’s band.

Despite the risks, the Campbells decide to embark on one last tour, as a way to give longtime fans a sense of closure. In the early going, performing also seems to have a therapeutic benefit for Campbell. The shows are generally quite good, but there are always awkward moments that will become more frequent over time.

From "Glen Campbell I’ll Be Me."

In many ways, I’ll Be Me is the equal inverse film of Alan Hicks’ Keep on Keepin’ On, documenting Clark Terry’s continuing dedication to his student while his physical health precipitously declines. Terry’s body might be failing him, but he remains a supportive and insightful music teacher and mentor. On the other hand, Campbell is still strong as a bull, but his brain chemistry is betraying him.

By its very nature, I’ll Be Me asks just what performers owe to their fans and vice versa. Like most real musicians, Campbell during happier days would probably have said he owed them everything and they owed him nothing. Yet, the way the fans pick him up and cover for his rough patches during the later dates is rather touching. So too are bonds shared by Campbell, his wife, and their children. In fact, I’ll Be Me could very well launch Ashley Campbell as a chart-topper in her own right. Yes, she is photogenic, but she can also play like a chip off the block.

In any documentary closely chronicling sickness and tribulation, there is always the risk of confusing exploitation with intimacy. Keach always stays on the right side of the line, showing enough for reality to hit home, but never intruding into the truly ugly moments. Sensitive to all concerned but still honest to the circumstances, he largely redeems himself for helming the misguidedly cloying Waiting for Forever. Recommended for fans of Campbell and fans of his fans (such as Jimmy Webb, Sheryl Crow, and Taylor Swift), Glen Campbell I’ll Be Me opens this Friday (10/24) in New York at the AMC Empire.

LFM GRADE: B

Posted on October 21st, 2014 at 11:50pm.

Frank Capra at Film Forum: LFM Reviews The Donovan Affair

By Joe Bendel. Although everyone recognizes Frank Capra was spoofing old dark house mysteries in Arsenic and Old Lace, few understood he was also spoofing himself. That is because his very first 100% talky was a murder mystery set in an atmospheric manor, but almost nobody has seen it since its 1929 premiere. Perversely, there is a decent print preserved in the Library of Congress, but none of its sixteen inch Vitaphone soundtrack discs survive. On the other hand, we have the sound for its trailer, but not the film.

As part of his efforts to mount comprehensive Capra retrospectives, Film Forum repertory programmer Bruce Goldstein has reconstructed the dialogue to produce special “live read” presentations of Capra’s The Donovan Affair. Twenty-some years in development, Goldstein and company’s stagings were a highlight of last year’s TCM Film Festival and the current Frank Capra film series soon to conclude at Film Forum.

Jack Donovan is a gambler, adventurer, and all around cad. If you didn’t want to kill him, you probably didn’t know him very well. His next dinner date will be his last. He has been invited to the birthday party of Capt. Peter Rankin, who hates his guts, because he knows Donovan has been blackmailing his trophy wife Lydia (but he has not used any of the proceeds to pay off his gambling debts). Donovan also has eyes for her step-daughter, which rankles her tightly wound fiancé. To make matters worse, Donovan happens to be available now that he seduced and subsequently abandoned the Rankin’s maid.

Yes, Donovan only has himself to blame, especially when he has the lights turned out to show off his glowing cat’s eye ring, in a scene that only works in a synch-sound picture. When the lights come on again, we see someone has availed themselves of the opportunity to dispatch the heel. Soon the blustering Inspector Killian and his oafish right-hand man Carney are on the scene, but they do not inspire much confidence, especially when their attempt to recreate the murder works a little too well.

Yes, if we could hear them, Jack Holt and Fred Kelsey are probably putting the “ick” in shtick as Killian and Carney, but Capra seems to be having great fun playing with sound. Complicating matters for Goldstein and crew, Capra experiments with conversations conducted between people in different rooms, often outside the camera’s field of vision. Plus there are plenty of those chaos-generating blackouts. It is quite the tricky shoot, featuring a good deal of skulking outside the house and the exchanging of loaded glances.

Eschewing the MST3K aesthetic, the live read cast plays it scrupulously straight within the film’s dramatic context. Of course, they still convey the larger than life nature of their characters, maintaining an appropriately madcap energy level. For many viewers, Boardwalk Empire’s Allen Lewis Rickman and The Practice’s Michael Badalucco will be the most recognizable fuming and bickering away as Killian and Carney, respectively. However, for discerning patrons, James Karen is the man, having appeared in The Return of the Living Dead, Poltergeist, Samuel Beckett’s Film, and the original Broadway production of A Streetcar Named Desire. Yes, wow. Naturally, he brings the voice of authority to Capt. Rankin.

From "The Donovan Affair."

From time to time, lost films are rediscovered, but this is more like a resurrection. Donovan must have been somewhat successful, since Capra’s career continued on an upward trajectory following its release. It is clearly a product of its time, but it is frankly scandalous that Columbia could misplace both the sound and the script (forcing Goldstein and his cast to supplement an incomplete dialogue transcript found in the files of the defunct New York State Board of Film Censors with studious lip-reading sessions). This is Frank Capra we are talking about. Films like It’s a Wonderful Life, It Happened One Night, and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington are not just movies, they are pillars of American culture.

The effort was definitely worth it. Despite the nostalgic creakiness of the film, it leads to a greater appreciation of the breadth and depth of Capra’s career and his early mastery of sound. It is also just a lot of fun to watch the dark and stormy bedlam. This is something you cannot see every day, so if Goldstein and the Donovan players ever mount a live-read near you, jump at the chance to see it. The Donovan Affair definitely added something special to Film Forum’s Capra retro, but they have yet another special to come. Following the Wednesday night (10/22) screening of You Can’t Take It With You, Rickman will moderate a Q&A with Anne Kaufman and Chris Hart, the daughter and son of playwrights George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart.

Posted on October 21st, 2014 at 11:50pm.

LFM Reviews Carnival of Souls @ The Anthology Film Archive

By Joe Bendel. It must be the only film selected for both the Criterion Collection and the Rifftrax treatment. Rightly or wrongly, it was largely ignored when first released and would be the only feature narrative helmed by its producer-director. Yet, Herk Harvey remained a prolific filmmaker, releasing scores of educational shorts through his Kansas-based Centron Corporation. Like Harvey, many future horror auteurs honed their craft and bided their time making educational and industrial films that often strangely foreshadow their macabre work to come. Fittingly, Harvey’s Carnival of Souls with the Centron short None for the Road screen together during Anthology Film Archive’s before-and-after film series, Industrial Terror.

When reluctant street racing passenger Mary Henry manages to walk away from a fatal accident, it ought to be an occasion for some soul searching. However, she seems determined not to process it. Always temperamentally aloof, she simply proceeds with her prior plans, accepting a church organist position in Utah arranged by the owner of the local pipe organ factory. In her new town, Henry tries her best to cut herself off from social contact, even though she dearly needs an emotional support system.

Beginning during her lonely drive into town, Henry has been haunted by visions of a ghoulish man. Perhaps even more troubling, she experiences episodes of time-stoppage, during which the townspeople around appear oblivious to her freaked-out presence. Spurning offers of help from the kindly priest and concerned Dr. Samuels, Henry becomes increasingly obsessed with the darkly picturesque abandoned carnival outside of town.

That carnival setting is definitely creepy, but most of Harvey’s film is a rather Edward Hopper-esque take on the horror movie genre. There is no gore at all, but the lighting and shadows are all kinds of eerie. Refreshingly, this is the sort of film where priests and factory owners are good people. Unfortunately for Henry, there is also very real supernatural business afoot.

Granted, some of the line readings are a little stilted, but Harvey’s visual style is remarkably accomplished, particularly his smooth jump-cut transitions. He patiently builds an atmosphere of foreboding, rather than resorting to sudden shock scares, perfectly supported and emphasized by Gene Moore’s unnerving organ score.

The performance of method-trained Candace Hilligoss (who bears some resemblance to Judith O’Dea in Romero’s original Night of the Living, another Industrial Terror selection) is almost too inwardly focused for the demands of the genre, but she is certainly convincingly brittle and standoffish. While the supporting ensemble is admittedly all over the place, Stan Levitt provides a solid anchor as Dr. Samuels and Harvey himself is effectively ghastly as the ashen apparition man.

Carnival will have its critical champions and detractors, but you can see its influence in scores of films, such as Adrian Lyne’s Jacob’s Ladder. It is a strong example of the greater efficacy of suggestiveness rather than splatter in horror movies. Thematically, it is also a good fit with None for the Road, in which a research scientist gets lab mice hammered and tries to balance them on metal dowels, while telling kids that if they are going to drink and drive, get so blitzed that the Highway Patrol is guaranteed to pull them over. Science is hardcore. Carnival of Souls is also weirdly potent stuff. Highly recommended, it screens this Friday (10/24) and next Tuesday (10/28) as part of Industrial Terror at Anthology Film Archives.

LFM GRADE: B+

Posted on October 21st, 2014 at 11:49pm.

LFM Reviews When You Can’t See the Film @ The 2014 UN Association Film Festival

From "When You Can’t See the Film."

By Joe Bendel. For Hollywood, Chinese multiplexes are paved with gold. Unfortunately, you will be more likely to see a leprechaun inside one than a locally produced independent film or documentary. Any film accurately reflecting the struggles of China’s underclass and the corruption of the Communist government will never be approved for domestic distribution. Of course, that will not be an issue for our left coast moguls, but it is a persistent frustration for discerning cineastes and just plain curious viewers. The sad state of official Chinese film distribution is analyzed in Yijun He’s short but revealing documentary, When You Can’t See the Film, which screens as part of the 2014 UN Association Film Festival in the Stanford area.

Sadly, Yijun’s film is especially timely in the wake of the thuggish forced closure of this year’s Beijing Independent Film Festival. This is a familiar story to a small but hearty band of the underground film clubs that have sprung up to fill the demand for unsanctioned independent film, particularly documentaries. Often meeting in bars or universities, organizers risk arrest and persecution for the sake of cinema, but they are not bandits. Clubs always screen films with the consent and participation of filmmakers grateful to have a forum for their works, typically offering a small honorarium for their appearance.

Since their previous venues were shut down under suspicious circumstances, the primary club featured in WYCSTF ironically rents space from a local multiplex, sort of following the hide-in-plain-sight strategy. It is nice to see American documentarian J.P. Sniadecki (whose The Iron Ministry was one of the unlikely hits of this year’s NYFF) present his previous film Yumen and graciously engage with patrons. On the state authorities’ Richter scale, Yumen is probably about a three, given it applies Sniadecki’s uncompromising ethnographic observational aesthetic to an abandoned Northwest industrial ghost town.

From "When You Can’t See the Film."

However, Xu Xin’s Karamay qualifies as a radioactive ten-plus. The nearly six hour epic documentary exposes the infamous (despite a total media blackout) fire in which nearly three hundred school children perished while government officials were ushered to safety. It is clearly the film to program if you want your screening swarming with cops.

The club organizers Yijun profiles and the filmmakers they support truly represent independent film in its bravest and most honest manifestation. It puts to shame our smug little so-called indies that cling to the label and the marketing platforms that come with it. At a svelte thirty minutes, When You Can’t See the Film is quite illuminating and sadly frustrating for film lovers. Highly recommended, it screens this Saturday (10/25) in Palo Alto, as part of session 27 of this year’s UNAFF.

LFM GRADE: A-

Posted on October 21st, 2014 at 11:49pm.