Category: Trailers

By Joe Bendel. If you thought campus speech codes were restrictive, try living by the mysterious rules and regulations governing this liberal arts college. It is never named, but it might as be Matrix U. Campus security is unusually fit and they respond to violations with suspicious swiftness in Cathy Scorsese & Kenneth M. Waddell’s Campus Code, which releases today on VOD from MarVista Entertainment.

Yes, Cathy Scorsese is the daughter of Martin, who pops up in a small role as the campus doctor, along with Ray Liotta who appears as the responsible bartender. This is not Goodfellas 2, though. In fact, Campus Code (or Campus Life, as it was once known) was briefly rather notorious for the bizarre litigation it spawned. Still, Campus is strange enough to be considered on its own weird merits.

Regardless, Scorsese’s doctor does not inspire much confidence. Fortunately, Ari seems to be okay without his services. In the first twenty minutes, he will fall from a thirteen story building and have a large pane of glass impaled in his head, without suffering any adverse effects. Of course, it still rather alarms Becca, the Good Samaritan, who drags Ari down to the infirmary for Scorsese’s close-up. He sort of returns the favor by saving her from the creepy Elliot.

Ari already had a bone to pick with the preppy perv, for bootlegging the original t-shirts designed by his partner Arun. Everyone digs Arun’s art, but nobody more so than the desperately smitten Izzy. Arun is also into Izzy, but he has a secret in his closet preventing him from fully committing. She too has a deep dark secret, which the goth rabble rousing Griefers are holding over her. They are demanding her support for some sort of self-governing petition that never makes much sense, even when the big reveals start coming fast and furious. Into the mix comes Greta, a cool transfer student, who sets out to falsely befriend Izzy, in order to put the moves on Arun.

For some reason, these six students are somehow suddenly exempt from the laws of reality, while the rest of the student body appears blissfully unaware of all the disturbing madness exploding around them. There will be sufficient answers to explain who and what everyone really is. Some of it is even rather clever. The problem is that Waddell and Michael Simon’s screenplay never establishes a baseline for reality, before upending it. Nor do they flesh out any characters before throwing them into the Matrix-esque maelstrom. Granted, they certainly do not waste any time on dry exposition, but it is hard to bring out the respective personas amid all the reality-problematizing noise.

Still, Hannah Hodson and Jesse McCartney are undeniably charismatic as Becca and Ari. They also benefit from their characters’ tougher, hipper attitudes. In contrast, Alice Kremelberg and Ritesh Rajan sort of blend into the background as the more passive Izzy and Arun. However, this is not a problem for Conor Leslie’s Greta, who turns out to be an engagingly forceful pseudo-femme fatale.

Code more-or-less makes sense when it is all said and done, but there are bushels of loose ends lying about. You have to wonder if considerable explanatory matter was cut for budgetary reasons. Yet, the legitimately twentysomething-looking cast is energetic to mostly sell the madness in the moment. It is all sort of grubbily entertaining for those who dig head tripping sf concept films. Recommended accordingly for the indulgent genre fan, Campus Code releases today (9/22) on VOD platforms like VUDU and iTunes, from MarVista Entertainment.

LFM GRADE: C+

Posted on September 23rd, 2015 at 11:34pm.

WORLD OF TOMORROW : Teaser trailer from don hertzfeldt on Vimeo.

By Joe Bendel. One thing animation always does better than live action is showing the world from a radically different perspective. Some of the films selected for Ron Diamond’s annual curated animation showcase take viewers into space and eons into the future. Others give us fresh terrestrial vantage points. Although necessarily uneven, the highs of this year’s program are particularly lofty because it includes one of the few short films that has racked up more reviews and accolades than most features, Don Hertzfeldt’s thought-provoking World of Tomorrow. Space and time travelers lead the way in the 17th Annual Animation Show of Shows, which screens this Thursday in Los Angeles.

Wisely, the really big show starts with one of the best selections, but rather than an exercise in future speculation, Janette Goodey & John Lewis’s The Story of Percival Pits is a wonderfully old fashioned fable. Employing unusually elegant stop-motion animation, it tells the tall tale of a boy who decides to live his life entirely on stilts. As he matures into a man, he recommits himself to the stilt life, building them ever higher to the point he can no longer partake of human society. It is sort of a sad story, but also somewhat Promethean, narrated with appropriate sensitivity by Mark Hadlow.

In comparison, Tant de Forets, Geoffrey Godet & Burcu Sankur’s rendering of Jacques Prévert’s deforestation verse feels like mere filler. Likewise, Conor Whelan’s Snowfall is also decidedly small in scope, introspectively examining a gay man’s emotional response when he is “rejected” by a straight man with whom he thought he was clicking. That would be fine subject, indeed one that is rarely addressed, but the computer animated characters are not very expressive.

However, it is followed by Lynn Tomlinson’s Ballad of Holland Island House, one the most aesthetically adventurous films in the Show of Shows. Using oil-based clay, it follows the rising waters encroaching on an abandoned Chesapeake island house, while accompanied by a haunting sea chanty. Stylistically, Amanda Palmer & Avi Ofer’s Behind the Trees is also somewhat abstract, but it is basically just a short punchline of a film constructed around the slightly nutty things Palmer’s husband says when he is half-asleep that so charm her.

With Konstantin Bronzit’s We Can’t Live Without Cosmos, we finally reach what could be considered the centerpiece of the Show of Shows. It is an increasingly surreal ode to friendship and meditation on loss, focusing on two cosmonauts training for the next big launch. Our POV characters are the class of their class, but it is a one-man rocket. That leaves the second place finisher to watch in horror as the alternate, when tragedy strikes the mission. Cosmos has a retro-Soviet Star City look, yet some of his imagery is still surprisingly haunting. Ultimately, the mysterious trumps all the cold antiseptic hardware. Believe it or not, it would fit well thematically programmed with Kubrick’s 2001: a Space Odyssey.

Although not as high concept, Isabel Favez’s Messages Dans L’Air proves old animation staples like cats looking to scarf down an unsuspecting fishbowl inhabitant still work when executed with wit and style. It is refreshingly old school, even if the pastels are modern. It is also quite funny.

Iranian sibling filmmakers Babak & Behnoud Nekooei seem to invite allegorical interpretation for Stripy, which celebrates the nonconformist impulses of a worker drone tasked with painting straight barcode lines in a box factory. Even though they not so surprisingly avoid any mention of politics in their biographical vignette, any form of dissent in Iranian cinema is a worthy development. It is also visually striking and upbeat, like an unambiguously optimistic Brazil, accompanied by Brahms’ Hungarian Dance No. 5.

Unfortunately, Ascension just doesn’t work, but Melissa Johnson & Robertino Zambrano’s Love in the Time of March Madness, an autobiographical account of life as a very tall, former basketball playing woman has a lot of heart. Shrewdly, Hertzfeldt’s World of Tomorrow concludes the Show of Shows, because it is a tough act to follow, earning mention alongside the likes of H.G. Wells and Olaf Stapledon. Check out a full review here.

There are more than enough substantial and satisfying films to carry this year’s Show of Shows, especially if you have not yet seen World of Tomorrow at Sundance or via vimeo VOD. We Can’t Live Without Cosmos is a worthy companion film in terms of ambition and intelligence. The Story of Percival Pots and Stripy also have some heft to them and they look terrific. Animation fans really need to catch up with all four, so the 17th Annual Animated Show of Shows is convenient opportunity to do so. It screens this Thursday (9/24) at the Arclight in Los Angeles and October 5th at the Spectrum 8 in Albany, with more cities announced here.

Posted on September 23rd, 2015 at 11:34pm.

By Joe Bendel. During the Captive Nations era, Kazakhstan was the whipping post of the Soviet Union. The Republic was a dumping ground for many nationalities forcibly exiled after WWII (de facto ethnic cleansing), suffered widespread famine as a result of agricultural collectivization, and endured Party campaigns against regional cultural diversity. The reclusive Ilyas is a case in point, even though the rugged mountain man is almost completely oblivious of the macro forces conspiring against him. He is simply incapable of conforming to meet the demands of socialism in Yermek Tursunov’s Stranger (Zhat), Kazakhstan’s official foreign language Academy Award submission, which screens at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival.

Ilyas was in awe of his father, Yedige. The experienced hunter was also his only family in the world, so when Yedige was inexplicably picked up in the dead of night during Stalin’s purges, it understandably devastates young Ilyas. However, instead of relying on other’s charity, Ilyas disappears into the mountains, living on game and the proceeds of his pelts. Sadly, he leaves behind the great love of his life, Kamshut, who will be forced to marry his true-believing contemporary.

In time, Ilyas develops quite the reputation. Naturally, he is invited to join the fight against Stalin’s former allies, the German National Socialists, but the Great Patriotic War means nothing to him. He simply has no reference points for it. Unfortunately, this will cause resentment as Stalin’s bungling prolongs the war and the village’s horrible suffering. When Ilyas finally starts to lose a step, there are those who will take advantage.

In a way, Ilyas is an archetypal holy fool, but in terms of temperament, he is much more closely akin to the classic western mountain man. Tragically, he is also a man very much out of step with the ideological madness of his time. He is like a Dostoyevsky hero transplanted into a John Ford film. Clearly, Tursunov understands both disparate traditions and reconciles them remarkably well.

Ilyas is not exactly chatty, but Erzhan Nurymbet’s powerful presence does not need much dialogue. He expresses his mournful regret and guilelessness with forceful directness. He is a symbol, but he is also a flesh-and-blood character. His desolate fate is not just an allegory to unpack. It has deep emotional resonance.

Tursunov paints on a big canvas, but he still shows a delicate touch with the intimate scenes Ilyas steals with his beloved Kamshut. Frankly, there is a little Doctor Zhivago reflected in their star-crossed love and the tension between tradition and nature on one hand and Communist materialism on the other is very much in keeping with the themes of Wolf Totem. Stranger also has its share of wolves as well.

Cinematographer Murat Aliyev captures the grandeur and unforgiving harshness of the steppe, contrasting the spectacular vistas with the grubby, shabby atmosphere of the village. It is a haunting film that spells out the particulars of Soviet oppression in no uncertain terms, while giving the commissars and apparatchiks precious little face-time. Very highly recommended (particularly for Academy voters), Stranger screens again today (9/19) as part of this year’s TIFF.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on September 20th, 2015 at 2:24pm.

By Joe Bendel. Where would you rather live, a far future apocalyptic dystopia or Brooklyn today? A time traveler chose the latter, but she is having understandably mixed feelings about it. Yet, just as she starts to restart a life in our presence, her future past complicates matters in Alexis Boling’s Movement + Location, which is now playing in New York.

Kim Getty is reluctant to make attachments, because she understands how awkwardly she fits into this era. Once she traveled back in time, there was no going back. Time travel technology only goes one way. Typically, people travel back by themselves, but Getty thought she had a way she and her husband could back the jump together. Somehow they were separated, but on the first day of each month she visits the arrival point, hoping he will finally appear.

Getty’s only real contact is with her coworker Marcel, with whom she does field work for a homeless outreach service. During their rounds, she notices a homeless fifteen year-old girl has the same markings of a future time traveler. Through a lot of fast talking she manages to get Rachel back to her place, but she found herself agreeing to a date with Rob, the earnest beat cop in the process. Amber, her BKLN party girl roommate is rather surprised to learn Getty has a “sister,” but Getty is just as surprised to find she might be falling for Rob. Unfortunately, Rachel’s teenaged naivety threatens to call attention to the deliberately low profile Getty, in precisely the wrong ways.

With its Brooklyn setting, you could almost think of M+L as mumblecore science fiction, but it is much more substantial than that. However, it is definitely a quiet, character-driven piece. There are no scenes of naked Terminators arriving through a portal of lightning bolts. Time travel just somehow happens off camera and we just need to accept it. Instead, screenwriter (and lead) Bodine Boling focuses on the psychological repercussions of such an extreme, irreversible situation.

Boling duly impresses as the brittle and reserved Getty. She also develops some refreshingly sweet romantic chemistry with Brendan Griffin’s Officer Goodguy. In fact, it is Griffin who really grounds the film and gives it heart. Likewise, the commanding screen presence of theoretical physicist Haile Owusu brings to the table as Marcel contributes further depth and integrity to the unusual character study.

There are times when you might forget M+L is a speculative fiction story. Still jazz musician Dan Tepfer’s evocative minimalist score gives it a vaguely disconcerting, science fiction vibe, while subtly underscoring the intimate dramatic action. Like so many genre films, the Bolings sort of lose control of the conclusion, but at least ninety-five percent of the film is remarkably assured, which is more than good enough for a high passing grade. Recommended for those receptive to a mature, emotionally realistic science fiction chamber drama, Movement + Location is currently playing in New York at the Cinema Village.

LFM GRADE: B+

Posted on September 20th, 2015 at 2:23pm.

By Joe Bendel. If you want to generate an avalanche of email, some of which speculating on the nature of your parentage, then merely point out somewhere online that the Muslim Ottoman Empire essentially invented genocide in 1915. No serious historian disputes the Armenian Genocide, but the denial reaches levels well past the absurd, approaching outright lunacy. Therefore it is somewhat encouraging to see hardcore leftist Turkish-German filmmaker Fatih Akin seriously address the subject. His reference point is more The Searchers than Schindler’s List, but there is no denying the enormity of the events of 1915 in Akin’s The Cut, which opens this Friday in New York.

In his Armenian enclave bordering Syria, Nazaret Manoogian can tell an ill wind is blowing from Constantinople, but he hopes the worst of it will be the impressment and slave labor endured by the village’s able-bodied men. Alas, true horrors await when they finally finish the highway for the military. The entire work party is then massacred by a group of convicts specifically liberated for such duties. However, Mehmet the thief has no stomach for mass murder. At risk of death he slices Manoogian’s throat, but only cuts deep enough to sever his vocal chords, rather than a major artery.

The resuscitated Armenian and Mehmet soon fall in with an apolitical group of Turkish deserters, but Manoogian subsequently lights out on his own after hearing survivors have congregated in Ras-al-Ayn, essentially to wait for death. From there, Manoogian will follow an epic trail that leads through Syria, Lebanon, Cuba, Florida, Minnesota, and North Dakota, in search of his surviving twin daughters, Lucinee and Arsinee.

Akin deserves credit for fully facing up to the Armenian Genocide in the Ras-al-Ayn sequences, as well as the brutal mass murder of his fellow villagers, but it clearly makes him uncomfortable. Arguably, the film’s emotional power peaks in the Ras-al-Ayn dying fields. For the next two acts, Akins seems to be desperately searching for “righteous” Muslims to protect Manoogian and thuggish Americans to torment him as he pursues his quest.

Nevertheless, Akin absorbed plenty of the right lessons from John Ford. The vistas do indeed sweep. Alexander Hacke’s muted electronic soundtrack is also quite effective, creating an appropriately otherworldly vibe. Truly, there are times when Manoogian might as well be on Mars. However, the narrative’s Homeric episodic nature is inevitably uneven. Some scenes just work better than others.

Still, Tahar Rahim nicely anchors the film with necessarily quiet power. He is acutely expressive without ever indulging in exaggeration or Streep-like excess. Once again, the Cecil B. DeMille-worthy supporting cast is a decided mixed bag, with Bartu Kucukcaglayan and Kevork Malikyan earning notice as Mehmet and the Cuban barber who befriends Manoogian, respectively.

When Raphael Lemkin coined the term “genocide,” he did so specifically in response to the systematic Ottoman massacre of Armenians. Frankly, the denial is becoming toxic for the deniers, so if someone with Akin’s ideological standing acknowledges the historical record, it might just help dilute some of the vitriol. The Cut is not perfect but it towers above his unsoulful Soul Kitchen. Recommended on balance for those interested in the Armenian Genocide (a tragedy scarcer than albino elephants in cinema), The Cut opens this Friday (9/18) in New York, at the Landmark Sunshine and Lincoln Plaza Cinemas.

LFM GRADE: B

Posted on September 18th, 2015 at 2:33pm.