Day: February 4, 2015

LFM Reviews Station to Station @ The 2015 Sundance Film Festival

By Joe Bendel. Where can hipsterdom and traditional Americana come together in common purpose? Evidently, along our nation’s railways. Neither wants to be tied down, nor are either in any particularly hurry. Collaborating with musicians who would feel at home either at Lollapalooza or on Austin City Limits, Doug Aitken documents a twenty-four day coast-to-coast train trip in sixty-one one-minute shorts films (plus beginning and end credits), assembling it all into the restless, slightly avant-garde concert doc, Station to Station, which screened at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival.

Granted, Aitken’s preferred term of “happenings” is pretty cringey, but the ten stops his transcontinental train made for multi-disciplinary performances mostly look like a lot of fun. It seems the music never stopped, as performer after performer gets their one minute feature spot, sometimes at the happening, other times on the speeding train.

A pair of flamenco dancers, an old school western auctioneer, and the Kansas City Marching Cobras are particularly fun to watch, because they have tons of talent, but they are hardly recognizable celebrities. However, big name recording stars like Beck and Thurston Moore bring their A-game, perhaps even winning over new fans. Of course, nobody can out power soul legend Mavis Staples. Perhaps the biggest surprise is the appearance of Giorgio “Flashdance” Moroder, but it is pretty cool to see him do his thing on the synthesizer.

From "Station to Station."

Despite its linear direction and the imposed limits of the train, Station is a largely shapeless film. However, it has a lot of energy and it is visually quite stylish. Whether it be the lonely desert vistas, the warm glow of an electronica performance, or the evocative sight of Aitken’s movable light show of a train hurtling through the night, he and co-cinematographer Corey Walter always make the rapidly changing visuals look great. On the other hand, when he invites spoken word commentary from the likes of Gary Indiana, we mostly get annoyingly folksy dialectics.

Frankly, Station to Station probably isn’t experimental enough to sit comfortably in Sundance’s New Frontiers section, but it is hard to see where it would more easily fit. It certainly moves along at a good clip. Like Midwest weather, if you’re not digging it, just wait a minute and it will change. Rather pleasant overall, Station to Station is recommended for listeners of Sonic Youth and Patti Smith, as well as the sort of neo-roots artists profiled in No Depression. Having just notched a number of international sales, Station to Station should find its audience after world-premiering at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

LFM GRADE: B-

Posted on February 4th, 2015 at 8:28pm.

LFM Reviews My Friend Ivan Lapshin

By Joe Bendel. How can you be nostalgic for the bad times? Because they are the old times. For instance, our narrator looks back rather fondly on the early days of Stalinism. He and his father were fortunate to share their flat with the local police constable. That meant there were only five (and later six) people crammed into the apartment. How spacious. Even without depicting the Stalinist terror, there is still plenty of scarcity and absurdity in Aleksei Guerman’s My Friend Ivan Lapshin, which screens as part of a mini-Guerman (sometimes translated as German) retrospective now running at Anthology Film Archives in conjunction with the premiere theatrical release of Guerman’s Hard to be a God.

There is not much sugar in this sleepy village of revolutionary fervor, but there always seems to be some in Lapshin’s flat. The town will also get a treat in the form of a traveling agitprop stage performance. The show is a bad as it sounds, but Lapshin still falls for Natasha Adasova, a demur featured actress. They will have some laughs together, but unfortunately, it will be Lapshin’s suicidal journalist friend Khanin who turns her head.

However, Lapshin has another obsession to fall back on: capturing the dreaded Solovyey gang. It is not clear just what crimes the Solovyey outfit has committed, but their (comparative) liberty rankles Lapshin. Frankly, they seem to be born out of the same cloth of economic desperation that gave rise to Bonnie and Clyde—and their ability to evade justice (probably due to their considerable local support) arguably undercuts the state’s authority.

One thing is certain, everyone spends a good deal of time in queues, struggling with shortages, except Lapshin, who goes out of his way to bust black market firewood peddlers. Yet, somehow he seems like a decent fellow, in a rigid, stentorian sort of way, perhaps because we might guess what sort of trials and travails lie ahead for him.

From "My Friend Ivan Lapshin."

Although Friend is far more accessible and narrative-driven than HTBAG, the vibes of the respective films are not so very different. In both cases, characters exist in a state of constant chaos, yet they live in an environment of near total stasis. Both films are distinguished by their striking black-and-white cinematography, but there is something about the dreamy vibe that keeps us at arm’s length.

Andrei Boltnev is commandingly tragic as the severe Lapshin, while Andrey Mironov makes a strangely charismatic sad sack as Khanin. Nina Ruslanova’s Adasova also brings sufficient heat to let us buy into their love triangle. Indeed, it is quite a fine example of ensemble acting, but it is still a rather odd film to watch, because Guerman is being so deliberately cagey with his allegorical implications, for obvious reasons.

Nevertheless, Friend was duly banned by the authorities for fourteen years, finally seeing the light of day in the late 1980s. Reportedly, it was deemed an insufficiently heroic portrayal of the early days of socialism building. It was also an awkward, sometimes even sarcastic reminder they had been building socialism for five decades, but things were as crummy as ever. Recommended as a fascinating historical document not without its own artistic merits, My Friend Ivan Lapshin screens again this coming Monday (2/9), as part of the Guerman series at Anthology Film Archives.

LFM GRADE: A-

Posted on February 4th, 2015 at 8:27pm.