Foreign Film up for an Oscar and Some Indie Films
"Ida"
starring: Agata Trzebuchowska, Agata Kulesza, Joanne Kulig
written and directed by: Pawel Pawlikowski
This is a beautifully made black and white film about a young soon-to-be nun who has lived in a convent for almost her entire life because of the Nazi occupation and subsequent World War II. The film is set in 1960s Poland. It is a film about discovering who you are, but in a different way, because who you thought you were is exposed as an untruth. It is about what happens when you find out all that you thought you were built from is a deception.
I think the cinematography and choice to shoot the film in black and white was clearly intention, to give that same feeling for the time period, much like Spielberg's "Schindler's List." We certainly get the feeling for being dropped into Anna's story in Communist-era Poland. It is an emotional journey, not just for Anna, but for the viewer and it makes you think about how you would handle hard truths when revealed, especially when they shatter who you thought you were, to the core. I mean, Anna has been living in a convent, devoted her life to God and a religion she believes in, only to find out she was actually born and raised (for a short time) as a Jew.
This film is actually nominated for the Best Foreign Film Oscar this year and I will be surprised if it doesn't win.
..................................................................
"Two-Bit Waltz"
starring: Clara Mamet, William H. Macy, Jared Gilman, Rebecca Pidgeon, Ella Dershowitz
written and directed by: Clara Mamet
What do you do when you are the daughter of David Mamet (who is an incredible writer) and half-sister of Zosia Mament (now famous for her costarring role on HBO's "Girls" where she shines)?
I think the answer is, you make a completely pretentious, hipster-loving, quirky coming-of-age story which you wrote and directed yourself, which also stars you. I wanted to like the film because of its quirkiness (and my love for all things similar), but unfortunately Clara Mamet just comes off rather obnoxious and unnecessarily anachronistic, for the sake of being just that. Her character is just a pain in the ass that you want to slap and tell her to just grow up! As a filmmaker, Mamet is clearly influenced by all things Wes Anderson. Her character's name is Maude (perhaps a nod to "Harold and Maude"). Maude is strange, hostile, brilliant (too much for her own good), disillusioned, and far too privileged as she waxes philosophical with pretty much anyone who will listen or can stand to listen to her as she chain-smokes. Everything that happens and moves the story along in a rather fast pace for such a short film is rather cliche.
Maude gets suspended from school, dumped by the boy she claims to love (but I wonder if she even knows anything about love or just likes the idea of it and thinks she should be in love, albeit just for her own story), and then she watches and stands idly by while she best friend moves away. Her grandmother dies, as well, and her inheritance of $5 million is threatened to disappear if she doesn't decide on a college. Well, I'll be damned, if I didn't have to make the same choices, right?! Life was so difficult back in high school. That's the problem here, Maude's story is just way too completely unrelatable, which makes her unsympathetic and drab.
And then, there were the cuts to Maude's dreamscape in a field telling a story while symbolic characters wandered by. I wish I understood the point of these cut-aways, but then just seemed utterly unnecessary and took away from telling the concise story.
................................................................
"Copenhagen"
starring: Gethin Anthony, Frederikke Dahl Hanssen
written and directed by: Mark Raso
On the surface, the film sounds and plays out like Richard Linklater's "Before Sunrise" (which is hands down one of my Top 5 favorite films) or any number of other meet-cute-in-a-foreign-city stories. But very quickly, other things start to come to the surface, things that don't quite fit. The tension between the expectations that arise due to the familiar genre and what is actually happening onscreen makes "Copenhagen" special, and a bit strange. There's also the undeniable fact that the girl in the film is, in actuality, a girl. She's half the age of William, the lead character. So any possibility of romance is distinctly illegal in nature. "Copenhagen" doesn't shy away from that, and is unafraid to allow that queasy reality to come to the surface.
William (Gethin Anthony) and his pal Jeremy (Sebastian Armesto) are traveling through Europe, crashing in youth hostels. The whole point of the trip is to end up in Copenhagen, where William can try to track down the grandfather he's never met. William's dad was abandoned by his father. And William's dad was no great shakes in the father department either. William has a lot of free-floating resentment and rage because of that. He found an unsent letter his father wrote to his grandfather. It's in Danish so he has no idea what it says, but he wants to deliver the letter, decades after it was written. You get the sense that William is not looking for a loving reconciliation but confirmation that father figures suck.
The trip immediately goes off the rails because Jeremy has brought along a girlfriend. William is so hostile and unpleasant from the get-go that it starts to call into question his presence as the lead of the film. He's nasty to Jeremy's girlfriend in a particularly lecherous way; he's vicious to Jeremy when they argue about her; he's a whiny petulant figure. This nastiness is not just an attitude, it's William's default personality. Gethin Anthony is excellent in that he does not soft-pedal these qualities, and does not try to plead his character's case for the audience. He allows William to be as nasty as he is written. It can make "Copenhagen" a trying experience, but there is interesting stuff on the other side of it.
After William and Jeremy part ways, William is left to his own devices in Copenhagen. He needs to find the address on the envelope because he thinks maybe his grandfather still lives there. His initial queries are unsuccessful. Everything changes when he meets Effy (Frederikke Dahl Hansen), a waitress in the hotel cafe where he is staying. She clumsily spills coffee on his table, and he doesn't seem to realize that it is supposed to be a meet-cute moment because he is rude and ungracious in response. In a later encounter, he tells her about his search for his grandfather and her interest is piqued. To Effy, it's kind of like a detective story, and she takes the lead: she knows that address on the envelope, she wants them to go check it out together.
Effy is intelligent, resourceful, and seems to have unlimited amounts of time to wander around Copenhagen with this rude American man, tracking down leads. At first it seems that Effy will be forced to take on the burden of having to be the now-predictable Manic Pixie Dream Girl: "the one" whose only purpose in life is to lighten up the gloomy male lead. She has a pink plastic camera and is impulsive to the point of recklessness. But Effy, like William, does not quite fit into the genre requirements. She starts to emerge as an individual. Much of this is due to the grounded performance from Hansen. She suggests that Effy is not complete yet. She's still in formation, acting a role a little bit, as young girls sometimes do. There's an eroticism in certain moments, when these two interact and kiss a couple of times, problematic and uncomfortable due to the age discrepancy. But you also get that sex and the sexual relationship that Effy clearly wants is not the point.
What one may expect to happen does not exactly go down as planned. "Copenhagen" remains true to its own original and somewhat prickly course. There are moments when it is not clear at all why Effy is even choosing to hang out with William, who is rude and combative. But she wants to know what happened to William's grandfather. Over the course of the film an interesting thing starts happening. William starts to take responsibility for the words he uses. He starts to actually listen to himself and do his best to change course. A lifetime of being a rude rage-boy will not vanish overnight, and a lesser film would have made it Effy's job to show him the better way. But "Copenhagen" isn't really about that. Nobody can save you. You have to save yourself.
This is a beautiful film and worth watching, even if William and Effy's relationship and interactions make you uncomfortable at times. Keep in mind that the actress playing Effy is actually 20 years old, though. Damn, those European women for looking young!
.................................................................
"Supporting Characters"
starring: Alex Karpovsky, Tarik Lowe, Arielle Kebbel, Melonie Diaz, Kevin Corrigan, Sophia Takal, Mike Landry, Lena Dunham
directed by: Daniel Schechter
written by: Tarik Lowe and Daniel Schechter
This is an indie film that could definitely fit in with the mumblecore genre and it stars many up-and-coming indie, specific-genre actors (like Karpovksy, excellent as Ray on Dunham's "Girls" and Sophia Takal, a near-twin of Anna Kendrick, whom I saw recently in a Joe Swanberg film; and then there's the cute/adorable and sexy Arielle Kebbel, an actress who needs more exposure, if only for the vulnerability she can so comfortably exude on film). The film kind of plays out like a twentysomething sitcom or indie mini-series.
Concerning the lives and loves of two editors as they make the final trims, fixes, and deletions on an indie comedy feature, Supporting Characters is a modest affair, shot on high-definition digital video around a small set of Manhattan apartments, city streets, and postproduction facilities. Darryl (Tarik Lowe, who co-wrote the script with Schechter) and Nick (the ubiquitous Alex Karpovsky) work overlapping shifts while attempting to keep their respective girlfriends (Melonie Diaz and Sophia Takal). On the fringes, the feature's conceited, inferiority-complex-afflicted director (Kevin Corrigan) butts heads with the producer and the cinematographer, leading to some funny confrontations. It is modest in its approach to confrontation. It turns into something good and worthy during a scene in which Nick is required to "direct" (via overtly sexual come-ons and commands, through a glass pane) the film's leading lady during an 11th-hour ADR session, Jamie (played by Arielle Kebbel). This aggressive meet-cute, and the subsequent, weird-uncomfortable Notting Hill variation that follows from it, activated, or at least brought to my attention, the grown-up side of Supporting Characters.
I am a self-described lover of these meet-cute scenarios, and so I fall victim to them every time. But, rest assure, Jamie is not Nick's Manic Pixie Dream Girl.
starring: Agata Trzebuchowska, Agata Kulesza, Joanne Kulig
written and directed by: Pawel Pawlikowski
This is a beautifully made black and white film about a young soon-to-be nun who has lived in a convent for almost her entire life because of the Nazi occupation and subsequent World War II. The film is set in 1960s Poland. It is a film about discovering who you are, but in a different way, because who you thought you were is exposed as an untruth. It is about what happens when you find out all that you thought you were built from is a deception.
Anna (Trzebuchowska) is an orphan and novitiate nun on the verge of taking her vows. Before she does so, however, her mother superior insists that Anna visit with her only living relative, an aunt whose existence was unknown to Anna up until that moment. A naive and cloistered young woman, Anna has grown up in the nunnery, innocent to the world beyond its gates. Her aunt Wanda (Kulesza) is quite the opposite: She’s a heavy drinker and smoker, sexually wanton, and possessed of a cynicism that she wears like armor. This relationship is a beautiful contradiction that works great in the film. She’s a judge by profession, nicknamed Red Wanda for her fealty to the postwar Stalinist regime, during which time she sentenced many perceived subversives to oblivion – actions that she appears to now regret, although she is anything but contrite. Wanda then shares some potentially life-altering news with her niece: Anna’s real name is Ida and she is a Jew born to parents who were murdered during the Nazi occupation of Poland.
Wanda’s revelation leads the two on a journey into the countryside to uncover secrets that were buried long ago. They travel in Wanda’s rickety jalopy to their ancestral home where they ultimately – and quite literally – start digging up the past. Still, there are stops along the way for food and booze and idle flirtations. Anna says little that conveys a clear sense of what she is thinking and feeling. Thus the disorientation is reflected back on the viewer, who along with Anna must make sense of her newfound past and future potential.
I think the cinematography and choice to shoot the film in black and white was clearly intention, to give that same feeling for the time period, much like Spielberg's "Schindler's List." We certainly get the feeling for being dropped into Anna's story in Communist-era Poland. It is an emotional journey, not just for Anna, but for the viewer and it makes you think about how you would handle hard truths when revealed, especially when they shatter who you thought you were, to the core. I mean, Anna has been living in a convent, devoted her life to God and a religion she believes in, only to find out she was actually born and raised (for a short time) as a Jew.
This film is actually nominated for the Best Foreign Film Oscar this year and I will be surprised if it doesn't win.
..................................................................
"Two-Bit Waltz"
starring: Clara Mamet, William H. Macy, Jared Gilman, Rebecca Pidgeon, Ella Dershowitz
written and directed by: Clara Mamet
What do you do when you are the daughter of David Mamet (who is an incredible writer) and half-sister of Zosia Mament (now famous for her costarring role on HBO's "Girls" where she shines)?
I think the answer is, you make a completely pretentious, hipster-loving, quirky coming-of-age story which you wrote and directed yourself, which also stars you. I wanted to like the film because of its quirkiness (and my love for all things similar), but unfortunately Clara Mamet just comes off rather obnoxious and unnecessarily anachronistic, for the sake of being just that. Her character is just a pain in the ass that you want to slap and tell her to just grow up! As a filmmaker, Mamet is clearly influenced by all things Wes Anderson. Her character's name is Maude (perhaps a nod to "Harold and Maude"). Maude is strange, hostile, brilliant (too much for her own good), disillusioned, and far too privileged as she waxes philosophical with pretty much anyone who will listen or can stand to listen to her as she chain-smokes. Everything that happens and moves the story along in a rather fast pace for such a short film is rather cliche.
Maude gets suspended from school, dumped by the boy she claims to love (but I wonder if she even knows anything about love or just likes the idea of it and thinks she should be in love, albeit just for her own story), and then she watches and stands idly by while she best friend moves away. Her grandmother dies, as well, and her inheritance of $5 million is threatened to disappear if she doesn't decide on a college. Well, I'll be damned, if I didn't have to make the same choices, right?! Life was so difficult back in high school. That's the problem here, Maude's story is just way too completely unrelatable, which makes her unsympathetic and drab.
And then, there were the cuts to Maude's dreamscape in a field telling a story while symbolic characters wandered by. I wish I understood the point of these cut-aways, but then just seemed utterly unnecessary and took away from telling the concise story.
................................................................
"Copenhagen"
starring: Gethin Anthony, Frederikke Dahl Hanssen
written and directed by: Mark Raso
On the surface, the film sounds and plays out like Richard Linklater's "Before Sunrise" (which is hands down one of my Top 5 favorite films) or any number of other meet-cute-in-a-foreign-city stories. But very quickly, other things start to come to the surface, things that don't quite fit. The tension between the expectations that arise due to the familiar genre and what is actually happening onscreen makes "Copenhagen" special, and a bit strange. There's also the undeniable fact that the girl in the film is, in actuality, a girl. She's half the age of William, the lead character. So any possibility of romance is distinctly illegal in nature. "Copenhagen" doesn't shy away from that, and is unafraid to allow that queasy reality to come to the surface.
William (Gethin Anthony) and his pal Jeremy (Sebastian Armesto) are traveling through Europe, crashing in youth hostels. The whole point of the trip is to end up in Copenhagen, where William can try to track down the grandfather he's never met. William's dad was abandoned by his father. And William's dad was no great shakes in the father department either. William has a lot of free-floating resentment and rage because of that. He found an unsent letter his father wrote to his grandfather. It's in Danish so he has no idea what it says, but he wants to deliver the letter, decades after it was written. You get the sense that William is not looking for a loving reconciliation but confirmation that father figures suck.
The trip immediately goes off the rails because Jeremy has brought along a girlfriend. William is so hostile and unpleasant from the get-go that it starts to call into question his presence as the lead of the film. He's nasty to Jeremy's girlfriend in a particularly lecherous way; he's vicious to Jeremy when they argue about her; he's a whiny petulant figure. This nastiness is not just an attitude, it's William's default personality. Gethin Anthony is excellent in that he does not soft-pedal these qualities, and does not try to plead his character's case for the audience. He allows William to be as nasty as he is written. It can make "Copenhagen" a trying experience, but there is interesting stuff on the other side of it.
After William and Jeremy part ways, William is left to his own devices in Copenhagen. He needs to find the address on the envelope because he thinks maybe his grandfather still lives there. His initial queries are unsuccessful. Everything changes when he meets Effy (Frederikke Dahl Hansen), a waitress in the hotel cafe where he is staying. She clumsily spills coffee on his table, and he doesn't seem to realize that it is supposed to be a meet-cute moment because he is rude and ungracious in response. In a later encounter, he tells her about his search for his grandfather and her interest is piqued. To Effy, it's kind of like a detective story, and she takes the lead: she knows that address on the envelope, she wants them to go check it out together.
Effy is intelligent, resourceful, and seems to have unlimited amounts of time to wander around Copenhagen with this rude American man, tracking down leads. At first it seems that Effy will be forced to take on the burden of having to be the now-predictable Manic Pixie Dream Girl: "the one" whose only purpose in life is to lighten up the gloomy male lead. She has a pink plastic camera and is impulsive to the point of recklessness. But Effy, like William, does not quite fit into the genre requirements. She starts to emerge as an individual. Much of this is due to the grounded performance from Hansen. She suggests that Effy is not complete yet. She's still in formation, acting a role a little bit, as young girls sometimes do. There's an eroticism in certain moments, when these two interact and kiss a couple of times, problematic and uncomfortable due to the age discrepancy. But you also get that sex and the sexual relationship that Effy clearly wants is not the point.
What one may expect to happen does not exactly go down as planned. "Copenhagen" remains true to its own original and somewhat prickly course. There are moments when it is not clear at all why Effy is even choosing to hang out with William, who is rude and combative. But she wants to know what happened to William's grandfather. Over the course of the film an interesting thing starts happening. William starts to take responsibility for the words he uses. He starts to actually listen to himself and do his best to change course. A lifetime of being a rude rage-boy will not vanish overnight, and a lesser film would have made it Effy's job to show him the better way. But "Copenhagen" isn't really about that. Nobody can save you. You have to save yourself.
This is a beautiful film and worth watching, even if William and Effy's relationship and interactions make you uncomfortable at times. Keep in mind that the actress playing Effy is actually 20 years old, though. Damn, those European women for looking young!
.................................................................
"Supporting Characters"
starring: Alex Karpovsky, Tarik Lowe, Arielle Kebbel, Melonie Diaz, Kevin Corrigan, Sophia Takal, Mike Landry, Lena Dunham
directed by: Daniel Schechter
written by: Tarik Lowe and Daniel Schechter
This is an indie film that could definitely fit in with the mumblecore genre and it stars many up-and-coming indie, specific-genre actors (like Karpovksy, excellent as Ray on Dunham's "Girls" and Sophia Takal, a near-twin of Anna Kendrick, whom I saw recently in a Joe Swanberg film; and then there's the cute/adorable and sexy Arielle Kebbel, an actress who needs more exposure, if only for the vulnerability she can so comfortably exude on film). The film kind of plays out like a twentysomething sitcom or indie mini-series.
Concerning the lives and loves of two editors as they make the final trims, fixes, and deletions on an indie comedy feature, Supporting Characters is a modest affair, shot on high-definition digital video around a small set of Manhattan apartments, city streets, and postproduction facilities. Darryl (Tarik Lowe, who co-wrote the script with Schechter) and Nick (the ubiquitous Alex Karpovsky) work overlapping shifts while attempting to keep their respective girlfriends (Melonie Diaz and Sophia Takal). On the fringes, the feature's conceited, inferiority-complex-afflicted director (Kevin Corrigan) butts heads with the producer and the cinematographer, leading to some funny confrontations. It is modest in its approach to confrontation. It turns into something good and worthy during a scene in which Nick is required to "direct" (via overtly sexual come-ons and commands, through a glass pane) the film's leading lady during an 11th-hour ADR session, Jamie (played by Arielle Kebbel). This aggressive meet-cute, and the subsequent, weird-uncomfortable Notting Hill variation that follows from it, activated, or at least brought to my attention, the grown-up side of Supporting Characters.
I am a self-described lover of these meet-cute scenarios, and so I fall victim to them every time. But, rest assure, Jamie is not Nick's Manic Pixie Dream Girl.
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