LFM Sundance Review: Kaboom

By Joe Bendel. For college kids, secret societies should only involve getting hammered after performing silly rituals. Unfortunately, ‘Smith’ has stumbled across an apocalyptic death-cult intent on igniting nuclear Armageddon. It’s kind of a bummer, but at least he never lets it cramp his sex life in Gregg Araki’s Kaboom (see the trailer here), which screens at this year’s Sundance Film Festival in advance of its New York opening next week at the IFC Center.

Smith’s orientation vacillates between gay and bi, but his considerable unrequited lust for his surfer roommate Thor remains constant. Though undeniably hetero, the dumb blond exhibits enough meterosexual tendencies to keep hope alive. About the only person on campus Smith wouldn’t sleep with is his lesbian BFF Stella. Acting as Stella’s wingman at a party, Smith eats a bad cookie, if you know what I mean. Much to his mild surprise, he hooks up with London—a chick. Soon thereafter, Smith thinks he witnessed the murder of a mysterious Red-Haired Girl from the party while tripping his lights out on the way home. There is no evidence to be found in the light of day, but strange occurrences seem to suggest “they” know he knows. Then things get weird.

Roxane Mesquida in "Kaboom."

This is a Gregg Araki movie, so there is more sex of various persuasions than an MTV show aimed at young teens. If you can deal with that, it’s all rather amusing watch Smith, his platonic friend Stella, and friend-with-benefits London get pulled into a totally outrageous end of the world scenario. It turns out that Stella’s new lover is a witch—not a Wiccan, but a real witch, and quite a possessive one at that. Meanwhile, Smith learns that his father did not die when he was young after all, but succumbed to the dark side of the Force, taking over a doomsday cult he had been researching.

Despite its goofiness, Kaboom is rather bold in one respect: explicitly comparing Smith’s cultist father to L. Ron Hubbard. Most likely half of Hollywood will never work with Araki now, but he is probably less inclined to care than Ricky Gervais. Yet, the strange thing about Kaboom is that in between all the hooking-up and snappy snark, the secret conspiracy story is actually fairly tense, at least until Araki goes all-in with an outrageously over the top third act.

Even with his creepy unblinking eyes, Thomas Dekker makes a surprisingly compelling hipster protagonist. Clearly comfortable with acid-drenched dialogue, he establishes a nice bantering rhythm with Haley Bennett as Stella. Kelly Lynch also adds a welcome measure of mature tartness as Smith’s unsentimental mom, Nicole. She helps to compensate for the ridiculously broad (even clumsy) supporting turns from Chris Zylka as Thor and James Duval as “The Messiah,” their stoner R.A.

Though Araki is steadfastly indie, cinematography Sandra Valde-Hansen gives it a professional luster that rivals the disposable studio teen comedy of the week. Thanks to production designer Todd Fjelsted, Kaboom has a legit campus atmosphere as well. Make no mistake, though: those who look for things to be offended by will have no trouble finding them in the film. It is over-sexualized and nihilistic, but also more funny than not. Recommended to those who already know they’ll dig it, Kaboom screens at Sundance tonight (1/22), Monday (1/24), and Saturday (1/29) and opens real next Friday (1/28) at the IFC Center in New York.

Posted January 22nd, 2011 at 2:15pm.

LFM Sundance Review: All Flowers in Time

By Joe Bendel. A French cowboy just sounds wrong—disturbing even. It turns out that such trepidation is justified, yet it makes for interesting viewing in Jonathan Caouette’s hard to explain new short film, All Flowers in Time, which screens tonight as part of the New Frontiers shorts programming block at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival.

The French Cowboy in the film is sort of like the old MTM cat, giving the sign-off at the end of a warped Dutch children’s program. His barrage of subliminal images seems to give kids strange ideas and red glowing eyes, sort of like the monkey spirits of Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s Uncle Boonmee (although if you haven’t seen that, you’re not really missing much).

Those prone to obsess over questions like why and how this is happening are likely to be frustrated by Flowers. However, anyone who ever wanted to see Dutch kiddie television produced somewhere deep within the Black Lodge of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks will delight in Caouette’s bizarre visuals (no giants or dwarves, though). The greatest surprise in store for viewers is Chloë Sevigny’s unexpectedly likable and charismatic lead performance, especially given the macabre twist of her central scene, as well as Flowers’ overall surreal vibe and experimental aesthetic. Indeed, the let-me-show-you-a-scary-face game she plays with the young boy in her charge (relationship unknown) is an effective set-up vehicle for creepy chills, not that Caouette is really going for that (or maybe he is, who can say really?).

One thing is certain: Caouette is indulging in quite a bit of gamesmanship throughout Flowers. However, it actually builds towards something somewhat interesting, even if it leaves a ten gallon hat full of question unanswered. Strangely watchable (‘strange’ being the key word), Flowers screens tonight (1/21), Saturday (1/22), Monday (1/24), Tuesday (1/25), Friday (1/28), and Saturday (1/29) at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Posted on January 22nd, 2011 at 1:49pm.

LFM Sundance Review: Troll Hunter

By Joe Bendel. Norway faces a number of tricky public policy challenges, like an aging population, an influx of culturally dissimilar immigrants – and the increasingly belligerent troll colonies. The Norwegian government would like to keep that last one a secret. However, a student film crew stumbles onto the truth in screenwriter-director Andre Øvredal’s The Troll Hunter, a darn well put together monster movie that screens as part of the Park City at Midnight track during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Our title character is the most grizzled civil servant you will ever meet. Hans has no hatred in his heart for the ginormous ogres he hunts. He just has a job to do, working for the double-secret government office of troll affairs. Suspecting he is a bear poacher, aspiring journalist Thomas and his classmates start rather unsubtly tracking the tracker. Fed up with his bureaucratic boss and the piles of departmental red tape, the hunter decides to show them the truth: the trolls are out there.

Though it probably cost less to produce Troll Hunter than to ship the film to Park City, the trolls look shockingly good (more or less resembling big, hulking gnomes), thanks to the canny work of VFX supervisor Oystein Larsen and cinematographer Hallvard Bræin. Presented as the student crew’s salvaged videotape, much in the manner of Blair Witch, the film’s rough look well serves their troll effects. No harsh close-ups here, just flattering wide shots.

While the college kids are all essentially expendable, Otto Jespersen is all kinds of awesome as Hans. The found footage conceit always makes character development problematic, but his cranky Troll Hunter feels like a fully formed, flesh and blood person, albeit a considerably difficult one. In fact, given Jespersen’s rep as the Bill Maher of Norway, his time is probably better spent chasing trolls through the forests of Vestlandet.

Øvredal truly engages in kitchen-sink filmmaking, cherry-picking some clever traditional troll lore while slathering it all in generous helpings of black humor (much of which comes courtesy of the acerbic Troll Hunter himself). Øvredal also sprinkles a thimble full of socio-political “relevance” on top, but wisely never belabors his points. While it is hard to read too much into the trolls’ ferocious response to the smell of the blood of Christian believers, there is an unmistakable anti-developmental message weaved into the subtext. Fortunately, it is not pronounced enough to distract from a good clean troll hunt.

Troll Hunter is one of the most entertaining Norwegian monster movies in years. Øvredal really pulls it off, getting a key assist from Jespersen as his crusty protagonist. Proudly representing the Kingdom of Norway, Troll Hunter screens tonight (1/21), tomorrow (1/22), Tuesday (1/25), next Friday (1/28), and the following Saturday (1/29) at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival.

Posted on January 21st, 2011 at 5:37pm.


ANNOUNCEMENT: Libertas @ Sundance! + LFM’s Steve Greaves Screens New Film Commentary at Sundance Tomorrow

By Jason Apuzzo. Libertas is proud to announce that our own Joe Bendel will be covering the 2011 Sundance Film Festival for us, starting today. We’re very excited to have Joe ‘on the ground’ in Park City providing his insightful and witty analysis, as we are expecting this particular Sundance to be provocative and eventful.

For our new readers, Joe Bendel is easily one of the top independent film writers around, and we’re proud to have him on our team. We also want to thank the folks at Sundance for having Libertas there. Joe’s coverage of the festival will begin later this afternoon.

As a special treat, I also wanted to mention to our readers that one of our Libertas writers has a film in the festival this year.

Composer Steve Greaves, who’s previously written music for my own film Kalifornistan also did the music for Commentary, a film that will be screening at Sundance tomorrow (Saturday) at 1pm in the Presidential Suite of the Waldorf Astoria – so if you happen to be in Park City this weekend, make sure to check Commentary out. I’ve put the trailer for Commentary below, and we want to wish Steve and the entire Commentary team the very best with their film.

And stay tuned to Libertas this weekend and all next week as we take a look at Sundance’s most intriguing films.

Posted on January 21st, 2011 at 12:27pm.

Cold War Update: Jack Bauer is Back! + The Kennedys, Red Dawn & Russian Spy Anna Chapman!

By Jason Apuzzo. • The Kennedys miniseries controversy goes on and on, with no end in sight. The Hollywood Reporter recently watched the first hour of the series and – surprise, surprise – found it “brisk, entertaining” and “compelling.” Why anyone would’ve expected less from series producer Joel Surnow (24) is beyond me, but there it is. The series still has no distribution deal, however, although the latest scuttlebutt has The Kennedys potentially landing on DirecTV – which, frankly, would be sad if that winds up being its only distribution venue. Meanwhile, new behind-the-scenes accounts of the controversy are emerging (see The New York Times), with fingers being pointed in many new directions.

Although I probably shouldn’t be surprised by all this, I still am. I’d always thought my colleague Joel had the magic touch, the ability to rise above Hollywood’s ongoing ideological blockade of projects veering even slightly from the Maoist line; alas, not even Joel seems able to pull off such a levitating act at the moment, due to the industry’s apparently fanatical devotion to the Kennedy clan.

And so I’d like to officially welcome Joel to the world of independent filmmaking and distribution – a world he has now joined like the rest of us, albeit unwillingly.

• Speaking of Joel, the big news today is that Kiefer Sutherland told Extra that the 24 movie will be “shooting hopefully by next December or January.” That’s big news, because there had been some concern over the length of time it was taking to complete the script on that one (and it’s apparently still being re-written). So for you 24 fans, Jack Bauer will indeed be back.

• There’s been a lot of casting news for the Clint Eastwood-J. Edgar Hoover pic. It looks like Charlize Theron is out, but Judi Dench, Josh Lucas, Arnie Hammer (late of The Social Network) and some other folks are likely in. ‘Arnie’ is such an old-school name, isn’t it? [CORRECTION: a reader points out that his name is actually ‘Armie,’ which is even more old-school.]

"Red Dawn" cast photo.

• A Red Dawn cast photo has leaked, which you can check out to the right. I want to urge Libertas readers NOT to forward this photo to Hu Jintao, however, because we’re all trying to ‘tone down our rhetoric’ these days. Right?

• Speaking of MGM releases, James Bond 23 finally has a release date – November 9th, 2012 – and Daniel Craig will be returning as Bond, with Sam Mendes directing. Directing a Bond film is no doubt great for Mendes, but is it good for the Bond series? Only time will tell. The current word is that Fox may distribute the film.

• Star Trek‘s Chris Pine talked recently about Moscow, the forthcoming Jack Ryan reboot he’s doing. I like Pine; he seems like a decent, regular guy – and his dad (Robert Pine), incidentally, is a fine character actor. I assume it’s no small challenge for the younger Pine to step into Shatner’s shoes and now Harrison Ford’s, but so far so good.

• It occurs to me that I never posted the Transformers 3: Dark of the Moon trailer. It’s actually quite good, and deserves to be part of a Cold War update. (Aside from the stuff you see in the trailer covering the ’69 moon landing, there’s also apparently a retro-U.S. vs. Russia space race element to the film’s storyline.) Check the trailer out below if you haven’t already – it’s fun.

• Eugene Jarecki’s Reagan documentary will soon be unspooling at Sundance, which is depressing. This other, totally separate new Reagan documentary called Ronald Reagan: An American Journey is looking more promising to me if for no other reason than that Jarecki’s name isn’t on it. Ronald Reagan: An American Journey premiered Thursday night in Orange County – and was directed by Robert Kline, a former executive vice president at Fox Studios and producer of “Firing Line” with William F. Buckley Jr. Best wishes to him on that project.

• Peter Weir’s anti-Soviet epic The Way Back opens today, and you can read the LFM review of it here. Also, the film’s post-theatrical distribution rights just got bought up (a good sign) and both Weir and star Ed Harris have been doing a lot of media lately. (See Weir here, here, here and here and Ed Harris here).

January Jones in "X-Men: First Class."

• The forthcoming X-Men: First Class is set in the swinging, Cold War 60s, and a bunch of new cast photos just got leaked of that film – including of Mad Men‘s January Jones as Emma Frost. Yowza! Ms. Jones has been out doing interviews about her insanely sexed-up costumes for that film (see here and here) … but at least she had costumes in the film, as opposed to Jennifer Lawrence. Ms. Lawrence, formerly of the indie hit Winter’s Bone, recently described to Hollywood Reporter the process of having her nude body painted blue each day by seven female make-up artists, all in preparation for playing Mystique. Welcome to Hollywood, Jennifer! We’re all looking forward to seeing how that worked out. (Memo to James Cameron: have you looked into trademarking blue women?) Also: check out some new First Class interviews here and here.

Russian spy Anna Chapman.

• In other Cold War News & Notes: buzz is building for John Milius’ Homefront video game; new photos are out of Atlas Shrugged; Timur Bekmambetov’s Apollo 18 will now be released on April 22nd; and one of my favorite classic movie sites, Greenbriar Pictures Shows, did this great post recently on John Wayne’s Cold War anti-communist classic, Big Jim McLain (one of the inspirations for Hawaii Five-O, incidentally). The Duke wears some strikingly snazzy suits in that film while he’s fighting the Reds on The Big Island.

• AND IN TODAY’S MOST IMPORTANT NEWS … our old friend Anna Chapman is back! Fox News is reporting today that the comely ex-Russian spy has landed a new Russian TV gig for herself, a series in which she unlocks the ‘hidden mysteries of the world’ – such as stigmata, and other bizarre skin phenomena! Maybe The History Channel can slip this show into the slot previously reserved for The Kennedys, as I’m sure Ms. Chapman’s series must certainly meet History’s ‘rigorous’ broadcast standards!

And that’s what’s happening today in The Cold War!

Posted on January 21st, 2011 at 12:05pm.

Kevin Smith Apparently Has No Plans to ‘Tone Down the Rhetoric’ with Red State

By Jason Apuzzo. Apparently Kevin Smith hasn’t gotten the message about how we’re all supposed to ‘tone down our political rhetoric’ in the wake of the Tucson shooting. Take a deep breath and check out the new teaser trailer for Red State above.

Since Smith is going forward with his forthcoming Red State debut at Sundance, I can only assume he didn’t catch President Obama’s recent speech in Tucson during which the President made the following remarks:

[A]t a time when our discourse has become so sharply polarized – at a time when we are far too eager to lay the blame for all that ails the world at the feet of those who think differently than we do – it’s important for us to pause for a moment and make sure that we are talking with each other in a way that heals, not a way that wounds …

We may not be able to stop all evil in the world, but I know that how we treat one another is entirely up to us. I believe that for all our imperfections, we are full of decency and goodness, and that the forces that divide us are not as strong as those that unite us.

The Red State trailer wallows in exceptionally ugly, inflammatory and hateful stereotypes at the worst possible moment. I hope Smith understands what he’s unleashing here. The sad thing is that he probably does, and doesn’t care.

[UPDATE: Red State is currently expected to have its distribution rights sold by Sunday night – the evening of its debut – for around $4 million. Meanwhile, Joel Surnow’s The Kennedys currently has no distributor whatsoever.]

Posted on January 20th, 2011 at 1:48pm.