Day: October 8, 2012

Democracy on the March? LFM Reviews A Whisper to a Roar

By Joe Bendel. Freedom and democracy are not the same things, but they tend to go together. Democracy advocates in Venezuela, Malaysia, Egypt, Zimbabwe, and the Ukraine understand only too well how their repressive regimes use rigged elections to legitimize their rule. Largely informed by the writings of Hoover Institute fellow Larry Diamond and the expelled Prince Moulay Hicham of Morocco, Emmy-winning filmmaker Ben Moses follows the struggle for free and fair democracies in all five countries throughout A Whisper to a Roar, which opens this Friday in New York.

Whisper uses an animated fable as a framing device that illustrates how the corrupting influence of power makes today’s hero tomorrow’s despot. Indeed, Hosni Mubarak might have been popular immediately after the Sadat assassination and the freshly “re-elected” Hugo Chavez might have been legitimately elected originally, but that was then. Up until the Arab Spring, elections in Egypt never involved alternative candidates. They were simply an up or down referendum on retaining Mubarak. Likewise, Chavez has rigged the Venezuelan electoral system through the mother of all gerrymandering and forcibly silenced the independent press.

Probably nobody interviewed in Roar has paid a higher price for their advocacy than former Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, who was twice arrested and tried on trumped-up sodomy charges, a transparent attempt to make him socially radioactive in a country where Islam is the official state religion. Yet, Malaysia seems to be one of the two countries that have made the most progress towards democratic reform, along with Zimbabwe.

When longtime dictator Robert Mugabe finally agreed to share power with reformist Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai it represented a dramatic victory for the opposition. However, that victory came at a high cost, after militias loyal to Mugabe systematically beat and killed supporters of Tsvangirai’s party across the country. Mugabe’s cynical land reform proposals, clearly intended to stoke racial resentment, also offer a textbook example of how dictators resort to demagoguery to hold onto power.

Most frustrating is the case of Ukraine, where Viktor Yushchenko survived a poisoning attempt to lead the Orange Revolution, temporarily sweeping the neo-Soviet government out of office. Unfortunately, divisions within the Orange coalition opened the door for the old regime’s return in the next election, fair and square. As journalist turned opposition deputy Andriy Shevchenko trenchantly observes, winning freedoms is an arduous process, but surrendering them is quick and easy.

While Roar obviously has an agenda, it is one that just about all people of good conscience will buy into. It features some valuable on-camera interviews with prominent world figures, including Yushchenko, Tsvangirai, and Ibrahim, as well as boots on the ground activists, such as Roberto Patiño in Venezuela. Even the animated transitions, narrated by Alfred Molina, are rendered with more style than you might expect.

The only problem with Roar is hardly Moses’ fault. Each of these stories is still very much developing. Despite hopeful signs in Zimbabwe and Malaysia, Venezuela has only gotten worse, while the Ukraine has taken one step forward and then one step back, whereas Egypt remains an open question. As a result the five strands do not parallel each other very well and none has a satisfying sense of closure. Of course, Moses and his colleagues would surely like nothing better than to produce happy epilogues for each country, for reasons beyond the cinematic. As things stand, they interwove their stories rather well.

Informative and remarkably even-handed, A Whisper to a Roar is a very watchable status report on the state of undemocratic democracy. Recommended fairly highly for general news junkies and those particularly interested in any of the five subject countries, Roar opens this Friday (10/12) in New York at the Quad Cinema.

LFM GRADE: B+

Posted on October 8th, 2012 at 2:22pm.

French-Montenegrin Noir: LFM Reviews The Big Picture

By Joe Bendel. The French seem to have an affinity for the work of American novelist Douglas Kennedy.  Following the relatively recent art house release for Polish filmmaker’s Pawel Pawlikowski’s stylish French co-production of Woman in the Fifth, American audiences now get a look at Eric Lartigau’s Francophied The Big Picture, which opens this Friday in New York.

Paul Exben seems to have it all.  Married with two young children, he has a thriving private practice and a well equipped dark room to enjoy his photography hobby.  However, cracks are appearing in the façade.  Something is definitely not right with his wife Sarah.  All signs point towards an affair with his neighbor, a professional photographer Exben already resents, as a symbol of his own creative failure.  When Anne, his partner and de-facto mother-figure, reveals her terminal illness, Exben’s stable existence is rocked again. However, it is a confrontation with the cuckolding neighbor that truly throws Exben’s life upside-down.

Big Picture could be thought of as a big twist film, but it takes two sudden game-changing turns, rather than just springing one surprise gotcha down the stretch.  For reasons that are well developed within the film, Exben finds himself reinventing himself in Montenegro, under an assumed identity.  Indeed, Big Picture is all about questions of identity, both self-perceived and as assumed by others.  It is also a wickedly clever thriller.

As nifty as twists and turns might be, Big Picture is entirely dependent on Romain Duris to make it tick, but fortunately, he knocks it out of the park as Exben.  Duris creates a memorable portrait of a truly complex noir protagonist.  Somehow, we can always understand his often rash decision making and never pass judgment.  It is his movie, but he has some wickedly wry support from French character actor Niels Arestrup as the boozy expatriate newspaperman, Batholomé.  Viewers will appreciate the gleam in his eye as tucks into the tasty Montenegrin scenery.  Francophiles will also appreciate Catherine Deneuve, who is also characteristically engaging in the less showy role of Exben’s soon to be late partner.

From "The Big Picture."

Someone ought to make Lee Daniels sit in the corner a watch Big Picture over and over.  Although Kennedy’s story, co-adapted by the director, takes viewers on a far wilder ride, Lartigau’s skillful execution sells it to all but the most annoyingly pedantic viewer.  In contrast, the recent train-wreck of The Paperboy is considerably more credible on paper, but not one second is remotely believable.

The rocky coastal landscape of Montenegro adds immeasurably to the moody atmosphere, giving the film a truly distinctive character.  One of the more successful films following in the tradition of Hitchcock and Chabrol, it is tricky to discuss without dropping spoilers, but very satisfying to watch unfold.  Highly recommended for fans of moody, literate thrillers, The Big Picture opens this Friday (10/12) in New York at the IFC Center downtown and the Lincoln Plaza Cinema uptown.

LFM GRADE: A-

Posted on October 8th, 2012 at 2:20pm.

LFM Reviews Lines of Wellington @ The New York Film Festival

By Joe Bendel. Torres Vedras was not exactly Waterloo, but don’t tell the Portuguese that. It was there Gen. Wellington and the combined British and Portuguese troops he commanded defeated Napoleon’s invading army behind secretly commissioned fortifications. An epic campaign that still resonates on the Iberian Peninsula, Wellington’s military sojourn in Portugal was perfect fodder for a grandly sweeping Raúl Ruiz film, but it was not to be. Passing away during a stage of either late development or early pre-production, Ruiz’s widow Valeria Sarmiento stepped into the master’s shoes, helming Lines of Wellington, which screens during the 50th New York Film Festival.

Wellington has just shocked the French with tide turning victory at Buçaco, yet he is retreating anyway. Despite the demoralized state of the Bonaparte forces, they simply have an overwhelming numerical advantage. The British and their Portuguese allies will dig in behind the Torres Vedras ramparts, letting time fight the battle for them.

This is classic Nineteenth Century warfare, attracting spectators and hanger-ons. For British evacuee Clarissa Warren, it is the perfect opportunity to find an officer-grade husband. The distinguished Major Jonathan Foster looks like a good candidate, but he is not necessarily in the market for a trophy wife. Wounded soldiers will recuperate, romances will blossom, combatants will ravage the local populace, and spies will be dealt with. Yet the real story for LOW’s domestic audience is scorched earth – damaged wrought by the French and British on their native land.

Condensed from a longer Portuguese miniseries for the international festival circuit, a la Ruiz’s brilliant Mysteries of Lisbon, LOW is a rangy narrative, featuring scores of prestigious cast members, entering and exiting in maddeningly quick succession. Unlike Mysteries, viewers will definitely feel like there are holes in LOW, at least in its current festival edit. There are numerous promising subplots here, including Foster’s relationship with the rather forward Warren. Yet, after being introduced early on, they disappear from the film until the closing scenes. Likewise, when Chiara Mastroianni appears as Hussar, sort of a Bonapartist Emma Peel, it looks like a promising development – but her mere seconds of screen time do not appreciably advance the story.

From "Lines of Wellington."

The only characters getting a puncher’s chance at development are the General himself and Francisco Xavier, a dispossessed farmer now serving as a Sergeant in Wellington’s Portuguese auxiliary and as the film’s primary POV character. Fortunately, Nuno Lopes has the right rugged, world-weary presence as the disillusion soldier, while John Malkovich chews the scenery like an old pro as the British commander.

LOW definitely has its moments, including a genuinely moving conclusion. Not intended as an action movie, it powerfully recreates the aftermath of battle, rather than the actual warfighting. Yet, one wishes it had delved more deeply into the strategic chess game in play, particularly Wellington’s penchant for strategic retreats, which suggest he might have learned something from a certain General Washington.

Even at one hundred fifty-one minutes, there still seems to be something missing from LOW. It has plenty of the elements to satisfy fans of historical costume drama, but the Around the World in Eighty Days style cameos from the likes of Michel Piccoli, Isabelle Huppert, Catherine Deneuve, and Mathieu Almaric are more frustrating than satisfying. Laudably ambitious, Lines of Wellington is ultimately more notable for what it represents than as a self-contained film. Nonetheless, interested viewers ought to satisfy their curiosity, because they may not have many opportunities to see LOW in any form. It screens this Monday (10/8) and Tuesday (10/9) as a main slate selection of the 2012 New York Film Festival.

LFM GRADE: B-/C+

Posted on October 8th, 2012 at 2:20pm.

Yakuza Badassery: LFM Reviews Outrage Beyond @ The New York Film Festival

By Joe Bendel. The Sanno Yakuza clan has practically become Japan, Inc. through the shrewd investment strategies of turncoat underboss Ishihara. His rise to power was ruthless, as the scars of a handful of surviving foes attest. Lead actor-director Takeshi Kitano (a.k.a. Beat Takeshi) gives a grateful world another dose of Yakuza badassery with Outrage Beyond (trailer here), the more restrained sequel to last year’s Outrage, which screens as a midnight selection of the 50th New York Film Festival.

If they know what’s good for them, viewers will be fully aware the last time we saw Kitano’s ultra-hardboiled Otomo, he was on the business end of a rather fatal looking prison attack. However, it will take more than a shiv in the yard to dispatch a hardnose like Otomo. Things are looking up as OB opens. Otomo is about to get an early parole thanks to the scheming of the contemptible Det. Kataoka. By kicking Otomo loose, the crooked cop hopes the gangster will do what he does best. If nothing else, it is sure to alarm Ishihara.

Not proud of the things he was ordered to do in Outrage 1, Otomo is reluctant to get back in the game. Yet, he is convinced by an unlikely new ally, Kimura, the man on the other end of the shiv. Frankly, Otomo does not blame him. He was the one who permanently scarred his former rival’s face. Rather put out by the way their former bosses manipulated them, Otomo and Kimura agree to Kataoka’s dodgy plan to wage war against the Sanno – with the suspect backing of the Hanabishi clan. But of course, it gets way more complicated than that.

Kitano is still the Miles Davis of Yakuza movies. Nobody else is so rivetingly stone cold cool, while saying so little. Once again, his shark-like relentlessness and knowing resignation are wholly sufficient to carry the film on his shoulders. OB is far less action-driven than its predecessor, but it nicely matches the world-weariness of its protagonists. Still, the opening act is a bit talky and heavy on the exposition. Nonetheless, the intriguing relationship between Kitano’s Otomo and Hideo Nakano’s Kimura, putting the honor back into the underworld, elevates the second Outrage above the Yakuza field.

From "Outrage Beyond."

While Kitano is the definitive star of the film and possibly the entire genre, he has some colorful support from the overwhelmingly male dominated cast. As Kataoka, Fumiyo Kohinata is still a hissably audience-pleasing sleazebag. Coming more to the fore in OB, Ryo Kase also takes a heck of a villainous turn as the oily, borderline psychotic Ishihara.

Like the previous film, Kitano presents the Yakuza world as a chilly, severe environment, dominated by ritual and rich – yet Spartan – decors. Fans will be happy to hear that it is also rather violent. Though it might not be as slam-bang as they would prefer, it payoffs in a big way. Although not quite as inspired as its predecessor, Outrage Beyond is a cerebral excursion into gangsterism from a master of the genre, making it a fitting choice for NYFF’s inaugural Midnight section. It screens this Friday (10/12) and Saturday (10/13) at the Walter Reade and Francesca Beale Theaters, respectively.

LFM GRADE: B

Posted on October 8th, 2012 at 2:19pm.