LFM: Libertas Film Magazine

By Joe Bendel. It was the jazz loft scene before the “Loft Jazz Scene.” In the mid-1970s, downtown lofts like Sam Rivers’ Studio Rivbea were an important venue for the fiery Free Jazz artists that were not getting commercial club bookings. They were sort of following in the tradition of W. Eugene Smith, who hosted round-the-clock jam sessions in his Flower District living space from 1957 to 1965. As a professional photographer and amateur reel-to-reel tape-recorder, Smith documented a great deal of the music and the comings and goings of the musicians drawn to his scene. Treasures from his chaotic archive are revealed in Sara Fishko’s The Jazz Loft According to W. Eugene Smith, the documentary component of WNYC’s multimedia Jazz Loft project, which screens during this year’s DOC NYC.

In the late 1950s, Smith was widely recognized as one of the nation’s leading photo-essayists, but like a good jazz musician, he badly mismanaged his career. Although not a musician himself, he shared a natural affinity for jazz artists, like his neighbor, Hall Overton. If jazz fans are having trouble placing that name, Overton was an accomplished jazz and classical composer who co-led sessions for Prestige with Jimmy Raney and Teddy Charles. He also arranged Thelonius Monk’s compositions for a ten-piece orchestra performance at Town Hall. Naturally, they rehearsed those demanding charts at the Sixth Avenue loft space, where Smith duly recorded them at work.

Fittingly, one of the musicians Fishko interviews is the great Freddie Redd, featured in both the Off-Broadway production of Jack Gelber’s The Connection and Shirley Clarke’s film adaptation. Indeed, its fictional narrative seems not so very far removed from events that transpired there. Unfortunately, that included heroin use, as drummer Ronnie Free explains in detail.

There is a lot of great music in Jazz Loft, but Fishko also gives Smith his due as a photographer. Thanks to his painstaking printing techniques, the contrast between light and shadow in Smith’s black-and-white images is often resembles Renaissance painting. In some ways, the film also functions as a time capsule, incorporating eccentric details of the late 1950s-early 1960s era, such as radio show hosted Long John Nebel, a sort of forerunner to Art Bell and George Noory, to whom Smith often set rather bizarre but expensive telegrams.

In addition to Redd and Free, Fishko includes the reminiscences of Phil Woods (always a lively interview subject), David Amram (who seems like a nice fellow based on a few email exchanges), Carla Bley, Steve Swallow, Dave Frishberg, Bill Crow, and Overton’s colleague, Steve Reich, as well as some contemporary perspective from Jason Moran. That is quite a diverse but talented ensemble.

Arguably, one point Fishko might have emphasized more was the stylistic openness of the sessions. Apparently Zoot Sims ruled the roost whenever he was in town, but Dixieland trumpeter Wingy Manone was equally welcome as his Hardbop, Bebop, and Swing colleagues. That was cool and very jazz. In fact, the entire film is a nostalgic, finger-snapping celebration of music and photography. At times, Jazz Loft is distinguished by a tone of clear-eyed sadness for the human weaknesses that sabotaged so many remarkable artists, but it is mostly just a swinging good time. Highly recommended hip eyes and ears, The Jazz Loft Scene According to W. Eugene Smith screens this Friday (11/13) at the Chelsea Bowtie and next Monday (11/16) at the IFC Center, as part of DOC NYC.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on November 11th, 2015 at 7:34pm.

By Joe Bendel. When Simon Wiesenthal retired, Alois Brunner was the high-ranking National Socialist war criminal on his most-wanted list still at-large. We can thank the Assad regime for sheltering him in Syria. Yet, even on his last day working at the Jewish Historical Documentation Center in Austria, Wiesenthal kept following up leads. He will also host a group of visitors who have come hoping to gain some insight on the horrific events he witnessed and helped prosecute. That would be us, the audience of Tom Dugan’s one-man show Wiesenthal, recorded live in performance at the Acorn Theatre on Theatre Row, which airs as part of the current season of Theater Close-Up on New York’s Thirteen.

With his wife Cyla waiting for him at home, Wiesenthal promises to revisit his “greatest hits” and then ask us, presumably a group of fresh faced students or the like, the question he nearly forgot to ask. It is 2003, but the Linz office looks unchanged since the 1970s, with its rotary phone and battered filing cabinets. By this point, Wiesenthal has outlived most of his prey, but he is still trying to get someone in the Damascus Meridian Hotel to confirm Brunner’s presence in writing.

Wiesenthal’s career highlights are indeed significant. Aside from contributing behind-the-scenes to the Mossad’s celebrated capture of Adolph Eichmann, Wiesenthal also revisits his pursuit of Franz Stangel, the commandant of Treblinka and Karl Silberbauer, the SS officer who arrested Anne Frank and her family. He also looks back ruefully on the unsuccessful prosecution of Franz Murer, “the Butcher from Vilnius.” Frankly, those exploits ought to be much more widely known. Yet, what many average media consumers know about Wiesenthal, if anything, probably starts with Eichmann and ends with his frustrated search for Mengele.

Fittingly, there is a sunflower amongst the clutter of Wiesenthal’s impressively designed office. Although his controversial short story is never directly addressed, there is a bit of poetry to Dugan’s text. Indeed, that final question is genuinely moving, in a suitably quiet and reflective way, thanks to the early groundwork he lays down. It is also ties back in with the evil Alois Brunner rather adroitly. As Wiesenthal, Dugan makes an engaging raconteur, as well as a haunted witness to some of the worst atrocities imaginable. It is a down-to-earth portrayal that doggedly humanizes the Nazi-hunter rather than elevating him on a pedestal.

There was a time when filmed theatrical productions were a staple of pay cable programming, around the time Gallagher was smashing melons with the Sledge-O-Matic. It is nice to see Thirteen bring the stage back to television. Despite a bit of fourth wall-breaking here and there, Wiesenthal transfers quite easily to the small screen. Smart and poignant without ever getting heavy-handed or lectury, Dugan’s Wiesenthal is definitely recommended when it premieres this Thursday (11/12) on WNET Thirteen.

LFM GRADE: B+

Posted on November 11th, 2015 at 7:34pm.

By Joe Bendel. During the Cold War, the Soviets not only quartered an occupying military force within Poland, they also groomed a serial killer in their midst. At least the young psychopath was eventually packed off to Russia, where he would keep busy as the nation’s most prolific and elusive murderer. The story of Kola Sokolow is fictional, but the Soviet and Russian attitudes it depicts are profoundly true in Waldemar Krzystek’s The Photographer, which screens during the 2015 Three Rivers Film Festival (that’s in Pittsburgh).

Natasza Sinkina actually had the nerve to arrest a regime-friendly oligarch who deliberately mowed down a young woman with his SUV. As a result, she is sent in for a psych evaluation, but it goes surprisingly well. It turns out she was not talking to the shrink she had been referred to, but the notorious serial killer known as “The Photographer” (so dubbed because of the forensic photography markers he always mockingly leaves around his corpses), who had just butchered the real psychiatrist in the next room. Unfortunately, due to strange circumstances, Sinkina never really got a good look at the chameleon-like murderer, but FSB Major Lebiadkin has her assigned to his task force anyway. He wants to know why the Photographer spared her.

Sinkina quickly deduces the psychiatrist was not a random spree killing. The Photographer deliberately stalked him, because of the archival films he had just shown in class. Secretly shot by the KGB for potential blackmail purposes, they record a rather disturbed young boy’s visits to a less than enlightened doctor. Young Kola was a gifted mimic, who refused to use his own voice. It is also safe to say the son of an ambitious Soviet officer also had parental issues. Like many people deemed inconvenient by the Socialist state, the seven year Kola was soon shipped off to a dubious mental hospital. His current whereabouts are unknown, but he appears to be headed back to Poland for old times’ sake.

Although it is quickly apparent Sokolow is the killer, The Photographer is still a tense cat-and-mouse thriller, constantly complicated by the grimly absurdist realities of the old Soviet and not so new Russian systems. You could say the Photographer is truly a product of his Communist environment, but his parents’ refusal to provide any sort of nurturing did not help either. Consequently, the stakes in Photographer are greater than “merely” catching a ruthless serial killer.

Aleksandr Baluev is absolutely terrific as the world weary but still Machiavellian Lebiadkin. He makes even the most routine procedural scenes unpredictable. Tatiana Arntgolts is also an impressively intelligent, coolly collected presence as Sinkina. Indeed, Krzystek and co-screenwriter Krzsztof Kopka treat her character with rare respect. Just about the only time it seems she needs her male colleagues’ help, it is largely because they put her in jeopardy. Although we hardly see the grown-up Photographer, Ukrainian Andriej Kostash is all kinds of creepy as the young Kola seen in flashbacks, while Elena Babenko will make your blood run cold as his Mommie Dearest.

Throughout Photographer, Krzystek clearly equates the bloody micro horrors of the Photographer with the macro horrors of the Soviet era, without bashing us over the head with his points. As a result, it is quite distinct from any other serial killer film you have seen before. Unusually cerebral, but also gritty and gripping, The Photographer is recommended for mystery-thriller fans when it screens today (11/9) and Wednesday (11/11), as part of the Three Rivers Film Festival.

LFM GRADE: A-

Posted on November 11th, 2015 at 7:33pm.

By Joe Bendel. For some reason, serial killers develop fannish followings, especially among goth rockers and radicals like Bernardine Dohrn. This Halloween, karma will come around good and hard when some of the worst serial killers will escape their Arkham-esque psychiatric prison and take over the new haunted house, conveniently featuring attractions based on their murders. It all goes according to their mastermind’s evil plan in Andy Palmer’s Funhouse Massacre, which opens this Friday in New Jersey.

To dissuade a muckraking reporter from writing an expose, the Warden gives her a good look at the five psychopaths in his custody. Unfortunately, she is no journalist. She is the daughter of the prisoner Mental Manny, a mesmerizing Jim Jones-ish cult leader responsible for a notorious local mass suicide. Known in her own right as the serial killer Doll Face, her M.O. is stitching her victims’ eyes and mouths closed, because she is crazy. They are off to the new Funhouse, along with her father’s fellow inmates: Chef Jeffrey Ramsees (a.k.a. Animal the Cannibal, Walter Harris, a.k.a. the Taxidermist), Bradford Young DDS (a.k.a. Dr. Suave), and Rocco the Clown (backstory unknown, but at least he also has a trade), specially prepared for them by the arrogant horndog owner. Doll Face saw to that.

Against their better judgement, Laurie and Morgan are joining their oversexed co-workers Christina and Jason and a couple of other dudes on a trip to the horror show. As you might expect, it all looks unusually realistic. The cops will not be coming anytime soon thanks to some strategic crank calls received by the spectacularly unintuitive Deputy Doyle. However, his boss, Sheriff Kate will start putting the pieces together. Since she has some history with the psychos, she understands what they are dealing with.

I’m sure you’re rolling your eyes right now, but Funhouse is way more fun than you think. Screenwriter Ben Begley nails the late 1990s Kevin Williamson attitude and dexterously mines the macabre situations for dark (occasionally gory) humor. Renee Dorian and Matt Angel are also surprisingly engaging as the innocent Laurie and earnest Morgan. Chasty Ballesteros continues to show major scream queen potential as Christine. Maybe next time she will even get to be the final girl. Of course, Robert Englund does his thing as the Warden, while former sitcom star Jere Burns’ Mental Manny is surprisingly sinister.

Palmer and Begley give the conventions of 1980s slasher films enough twists to draw blood. While not as inventive as Todd Strauss-Schulson’s The Final Girls, it maintains a suitably manic energy level. Recommended with unexpected enthusiasm for horror fans, Funhouse Massacre opens this Friday (11/13) in the Tri-State Area at the AMC Jersey Gardens.

LFM GRADE: B+

Posted on November 12th, 2015 at 9:25pm.