Category: 4. Joe Bendel

By Joe Bendel. Sex for money can be so liberating – at least, that is what some guys always say. A similar position is staked out in a rather mature new film produced and directed by women and featuring a largely female cast. Even if you adore Juliette Binoche, this is not a film to watch with your parents. However, a lot of people saw it with other people’s parents when it screened at the 2012 Tribeca Film Festival. And mere days later, Malgoska Szumowska’s Elles has opened its conventional theatrical run in New York.

Anne is a wife, a mother, and a freelance writer. Her latest story is a confidential profile of student prostitutes. The assignment came at an awkward period in her marriage, around the same time she busted her husband for a certain kind of net surfing. As she talks to these confident young women, she becomes obsessed with their explicit stories. According to Charlotte and Alicja, their approach to sex is healthier, because there is no hypocrisy. They make a comfortable living exploiting men’s weaknesses of the flesh. Maybe so, but liberation never looked so demeaning.

Films exploring the jujitsu ’empowerment’ of prostitutes are nearly as old as the profession itself. One obvious comparison is Steven Soderbergh’s The Girlfriend Experience, which also screened at Tribeca three years ago. Yet that film, starring an actual pornstar, is far more circumspect in what it depicts. In fact, there is no on-screen sex and only a spot of nudity is to be seen here or there. It is the emotional entanglements surrounding sex that concern GFE. In contrast, Elles jumps right into some of the more explicit scenes you will see in a public theater. And it was not tagged with an NC-17 rating for no reason.

Frankly, Soderbergh had the right idea. Even if Szumowska had a razor sharp analysis of sexual politics to offer, it is hard to get past some of the things she shows the audience. However, the film’s feminist themes are pretty threadbare and the drama is more frustrating than absorbing.

Normally a bedrock of reliability, even Binoche seems a little off here as the journalist. Her reactions to everything often seem wildly disproportionate to the circumstances at hand. Still, Anaïs Demoustier and Joanna Kulig both bring smart, attractive presences to bear on this material. For the record, I briefly met Kulig on the way to a post-screening Q&A and she seems like a lovely and engaging person. I imagine the audience had a lot of questions for her, but whether they had the guts to ask them is another matter entirely. It is also worth noting that the legendary Krystyna Janda (whose credits include Andrzej Wajda’s Man of Marble and Ryszard Bugajski’s The Interrogation) also co-stars in the largely thankless role of Alicja’s mother.

Something about Elles simply does not click. It is not necessarily because of the subject matter, but it makes the lack of depth and cohesion more conspicuous. Due to the accomplished cast, cineastes should have it on their radar, but it is not recommended as a satisfying theater-going experience. After its high profile Tribeca screenings, Elles is now open in New York at the Angelika Film Center.

LFM GRADE: D+

Posted on April 28th, 2012 at 10:38pm.

By Joe Bendel. The Ragunan Zoo is a slightly run down Eden, and the city around it is jungle. One innocent young woman will learn the nature of the world outside in the singularly named Edwin’s Postcards from the Zoo (see clips here), which screened today at the 2012 Tribeca Film Festival.

Abandoned in the zoo as a young girl, Lana simply stayed there, falling in with a group of itinerant workers who do odd jobs around the park and sleep on the premises. Growing up amongst the animals, she seems to have special bond with them, particularly the giraffe. However, her sheltered existence is turned upside down when word comes of the migrant workers’ imminent eviction from the zoo.

Fascinated by a mysterious street magician dressed as a cowboy, Lana is lured out of the park, becoming his assistant and ambiguous companion. While she acclimates to their performance routines, it is not long before she is working at a massage parlor in an even more ambiguous capacity.

Like Lana, Postcards should have never left the zoo. In those early scenes Edwin and cinematographer Sidi Saleh create a breathtakingly delicate, fable-like environment. It is fascinating to watch the quietly subtle ways Lana interacts with the animals. The Ragunan Zoo is also a truly wonderful setting, looking a bit wild and over-run by forest, in a way that further heightens the fantasy atmosphere.

However, once she leaves the idyllic zoo, Postcards becomes a largely by the numbers end-of-innocence tale. While there are arresting visuals to be found throughout the film, usually involving return trips to the zoo, we have been down this road hundreds of times before. Yes, it reflects the reality of Jakarta, which is also why it clashes with everything special in the film. It is also getting emotionally exhausting to see yet another little girl abandoned or abducted in a film from the region. The filmmakers ought to start picking on someone more their size.

Even if Postcards is undermined by its second half, it is impossible to take your eyes off Ladya Cheryl’s Lana. Her earnest engagement and exquisite vulnerability gives the film an emotional center of gravity, preventing it from becoming a mere exercise in archetypal tropes. It is haunting work.

There were obviously some crack animal trainers contributing their talents to Postcards. Cheryl is also an absolutely luminous presence. However, viewers are more likely to fall in love with her or the Ragunan Zoo than Edwin’s movie. Richly crafted but somewhat disappointing, Postcards from the Zoo screened again today (4/28) as this year’s Tribeca Film Festival enters the home stretch.

LFM GRADE: C+

Posted on April 29th, 2012 at 9:31pm.