Author: Joe Bendel

Courage in the Face of Persecution: LFM Reviews Free China: The Courage to Believe

By Joe Bendel. Odds are excellent you have many products lying about the house that were assembled by Falun Gong practitioners. The Chinese Communist Party forces millions of religious and political prisoners to serve as outright slave laborers. Many victims of the so-called Laogai work camps are in fact Falun Gong practitioners. Two such Laogai survivors tell their harrowing stories in Michael Perlman’s exposé, Free China: the Courage to Believe, which opens this Friday in New York.

Based on traditional Chinese Taoist and Buddhist beliefs, Falun Gong was not always prohibited by the Party. In the movement’s early days, many Party mouthpieces even hailed practitioners’ healthy lifestyle. However, despite the lack of an organized bureaucracy, when the estimated number of practitioners exceeded total CCP membership, the Party freaked. Despite growing adherents within the military, the government responded much in the same fashion as it did at Tiananmen Square—with extreme brutality.

Jennifer Zeng was a Party member. Dr. Charles Lee was an American citizen. Both assumed their statuses would provide some protection, yet both were condemned to the Laogai system. Soon after international activists secured his hard fought release, Dr. Lee found the very Homer Simpson slippers his work camp had manufactured in an American retailer.

While Perlman’s film primarily focuses on the Falun Gong experience, he necessarily touches on human rights abuses that apply to all faiths and prisoners of conscience oppressed by the Party, including: the Tiananmen crackdown, allegations of prison organ harvesting, and the notorious internet firewall. Frankly, one would have liked to see Perlman pull a Michael Moore on Cisco executives, whose Chinese division regarded the intrusive Communist internet policing to be a swell business opportunity.

The testimony of Zeng and Lee is simply harrowing, encompassing tremendous physical and emotional torment. Perlman also incorporates expert commentary from Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ), probably the most principled human rights advocate in the U.S. Congress, and former Canadian MP David Kilgour, who left both the Conservative and Liberal Parties for reasons of principle.

Free China wants to end on an optimistic note, but it sadly feels like a bit of a stretch. Yes, dissident Falun Gong supporters now have the means to report to the world the human rights abuses inside China, having founded NTD TV and the Epoch Times (which I proudly contribute to, in full disclosure). Yet, the Party’s oppression continues unabated. Since the current administration has essentially mortgaged our economic future to China, those like Rep. Smith who strive to alter the Party’s abhorrent behavior will have limited leverage for the foreseeable future.

Regardless, Free China is right on target in diagnosing the problem. Indeed, it does so with commendable economy, clocking-in at just a whisker over an hour. A timely wake-up call, it should be seen by everyone who values the right to think and worship freely. Recommended especially for younger New Yorkers, who must learn to appreciate these values, Free China: the Courage to Believe opens this Friday (6/7) in New York at the Quad Cinema.

LFM GRADE: B+

Posted on June 5th, 2013 at 9:50am.

A French Fugitive: LFM Reviews The Prey

By Joe Bendel. Franck Adrien is not exactly a touchy feely kind of guy, but he’s still a better father than Will Smith in After Earth, even if he is behind bars. However, he must break out of prison to protect his family from the serial killer who recently shared his cell in Eric Valette’s The Prey, which opens this Friday in New York.

Adrien took the fall for his last heist, but not before he squirreled away the loot. He will not say where, not even when his wife Anna asks. His accomplices ask too, but not so nicely. Of course, Adrien can handle a prison beatdown. Unfortunately, he is incapable of walking away from a fight. When the guards allow a gang of toughs to administer some frontier justice to Adrien’s cellmate, he intercedes in spite of himself. This leads to a mistaken bonding moment. Unfortunately, Adrien realizes just how bad Jean-Louis Maurel truly is soon after he is released on a technicality.

Even though his sentence is nearly up, Adrien must escape for his family’s sake. Already a fugitive, Maurel raises the stakes for his Adrien by framing him for some of his past murders. The detective charged with apprehending him, the ambitious Claire Linné, has a sense that something is wrong with the picture, but all her colleagues are idiots. Adrien finds only one ally, Carrega, the obsessive ex-cop who could never make a case stick against Maurel.

As Adrien, Albert Dupontel gives one of the most hard-nosed, unabashedly masculine performances of the decade. His work has a visceral physicality that allows almost no room for verbalizing. Indeed, his character cannot even seem to growl “I didn’t do it, flic” at Linné. It’s actually quite impressive to behold. This film could never be remade with Robert Pattinson or Leonardo DiCaprio, though Heaven help him, Martin Scorsese might try anyway.

Alice Taglioni’s Linné looks pretty credible in her action sequences too, which is a cool bit of fair play. She also invests her character with refreshing intelligence and professionalism. You want her on the case, but not so much Zinedine Soualem as her dumb copper boss. Sergi López adds some nicely rumpled world weariness as Carrega. As a bonus, there is also Zen’s Caterina Murino in the rather thankless role of Anna Adrien.

Valette stages some nifty fight scenes (Adrien’s prison escape is a particular doozy) and capitalizes on some picturesque backdrops. Tightly paced, The Prey delivers gritty action with an art house luster and a distinctly French sensibility. It should well please genre fans and Francophiles alike when it opens this Friday (6/7) in New York at the AMC Empire.

LFM GRADE: B+

Posted on June 5th, 2013 at 9:49am.

Women Blogging for Freedom in China, Cuba & Iran: LFM Reviews Forbidden Voices @ The 2013 Brooklyn Film Festival

By Joe Bendel. For all practical purposes, the act of blogging (something I do every day) is illegal in China, Cuba, and Iran. Despite violent state harassment, three women representing each country have become superstars of citizen journalism. Barbara Miller profiles this brave trio of bloggers in Forbidden Voices, which screens during the 2013 Brooklyn Film Festival.

Probably the best known of the three, Yoani Sánchez blogs at: www.desdecuba.com/generationy. Her reports on Cuban political prisoners and their mothers, wives, and daughters, dubbed the “Ladies in White,” have been picked up around the world. Like many of the peaceful protestors she covers, she has been savagely beaten by Castro’s thugs. Ironically, her international reputation provides her a measure of protection, but there is no mistaking the real and present danger she lives with constantly. For example, during the course of Forbidden, Sánchez reports the suspicious prison death of Orlando Zapata Tamaya and struggles to save the life of hunger-striking Guillermo Fariñas.

As brutal as the Castro regime might be, Zeng Jinyan probably faces an even more perilous situation in China. A human rights activist who blogs at: www.zengjinyan.wordpress.com, Zeng was crudely blocked from leaving her apartment by Party enforcers, well before she was officially sentenced to house arrest. With her fellow activist husband Hu Jia incarcerated, Zeng deals with the challenge of raising her young daughter by herself, in her state of captivity.

Farnaz Seifi now lives in the safety of exile, but her blog has long been terminated by Iran’s special internet secret police. She tries to support activists within the Islamist state by publicizing their plight as best she can, but she fears the reprisals her family might consequently suffer.

Evidently, it is relatively easy to smuggle hidden cameras into Cuba, because Voices includes more coverage of Sánchez than of her blogging colleagues. Yet, the images of Zeng are probably the most dramatic, including a brief interview with the confined woman, shouting down from her window. This is not meant to short change Seifi. She has seen the inside of interrogation chambers and her concerns for her family, friends, and country are genuine and genuinely moving.

Indeed, all three women are truly heroic, pure and simple. By shining a spotlight on Sánchez and Zeng, Miller makes it more difficult for their oppressors to make them conveniently disappear. When watching Voices, viewers will start to understand that conditions are far worse in each country than even the most steadfast critics of Communism and Islamist Fundamentalism most likely realized. This is truly an often shocking but extremely timely and compelling exposé. Frankly, it is hard to conceivably imagine how the upcoming Human Rights Watch Film Festival could proceed without it, but give BFF all due credit for selecting it.

Forbidden Voices is a case of cinematic journalism at its finest. These are stories that need to be told. Miller also pays tribute to the blogging ideal, rather elegantly celebrating the powerful and surprisingly poetic quality of their words. As a result, it is also quite rewarding when judged as a film on strictly formalistic criteria. Very highly recommended, Forbidden Voices screens this Wednesday (6/5) at Windmill Studios and Saturday (6/8) at IndieScreen as part of the “Magnetic” edition of the Brooklyn Film Festival.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on June 3rd, 2013 at 1:06pm.

Resnais Adapts Anouilh: LFM Reviews You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet

By Joe Bendel. Can a play from the 1940’s, based on classical mythology, still speak to contemporary audiences? Alain Resnais will answer in the affirmative. As a consummate cinematic game-player, he naturally stacks the deck, casting a who’s who of French thespians in his meta-adaptation of Jean Anouilh’s Eurydice. Regardless, the star-crossed love still resonates in You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet, which opens this Friday in New York.

Orpheus and Eurydice supply the back bone of YASNY, but the framing device incorporates Anouilh’s Cher Antoine ou l’amour Rate. Playing themselves, the leading lights of French stage and screen are summoned to a memorial for their dear departed friend, playwright Antoine d’Anthac. As part of the ceremony, they are to watch a video of his/Anouilh’s Eurydice, to determine whether the avant-garde revival is worth staging. It is a work they are all familiar with, having each appeared in previous productions. Watching the screen, they get caught up in the story and their own memories and begin to act out Eurydice in concert with the recorded rehearsal.

Cast members overlap and echo each other, but Resnais always maintains the integrity of Eurydice’s storyline. It all sounds very post-modern, but it is really a case of the narrative overpowering its meta-conceits rather than being defined by them.

Of course, it is hard to go wrong with YASNY’s cast. While Resnais has three sets of Orpheus and Eurydice at his disposal, he clearly favors Pierre Arditi and Sabine Azéma (two of his longtime collaborators), with good reason. Watching this couple on the late side of middle age portraying the doomed young lovers is eerily moving. Their experienced faces seem to amplify the tragedy rather than distract from it. Nonetheless, Anne Consigny’s Eurydice is exquisitely brittle and dignified, overshadowing the aloof Lambert Wilson.

Former Bond villain Mathieu Amalric exudes a deliciously Mephistophelean vibe while maintaining the moral ambiguity of Monsieur Henri, death’s avatar, a role he mostly has to himself. Michel Piccoli nicely anchors the film with his warm gravitas, ostensibly revisiting the role of Orpheus’s father, while leading the cheering section within the elite audience. In addition to playing d’Anthac with eccentric flair, Denis Podalydès (from the Comédie Française) was recruited to direct the hipster Eurydice video segments, further complicating notions of what the film is and who is its author. It is Anouilh’s Eurydice, as well as d’Anthac’s, but it is also partially Cher Antoine, mostly reconceived by Resnais, but also shaped by Podalydès.

The key point is: it’s all good. With its cast members handing off their batons like relay runners, YASNY’s affection for the theater’s passion and artifice becomes infectious. Featuring music by X-Files composer Mark Snow and Eric Gautier’s richly noir-ish cinematography, it is an unusually elegant film. Cerebral yet strangely poignant, the highly recommended You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet opens this Friday (6/7) in New York at the Quad Cinema.

LFM GRADE: A-

Posted on June 3rd, 2013 at 1:04pm.

After the Apocalypse: LFM Reviews In the Flesh; Premieres This Week on BBC America

By Joe Bendel. Here’s the good news: the zombie apocalypse is over and humanity won. Gracious in victory, we have developed something of a Marshall Plan for the undead. The proper term is now “Partially Deceased Syndrome.” With proper treatment, those afflicted can regain their consciousness and eventually be reintegrated into society. At least that is the theory. Reality is a lot trickier for one PDS teenager in series writer-creator Dominic Mitchell’s three part In the Flesh (promo here), which premieres this Thursday on BBC America.

The small town of Roarton suffered heavy losses during what is now called “the Rising.” The Human Volunteer Force (HVF) militias were first founded here and Roarton’s unit has yet to disband. It is the worst place a rehabilitated zombie to re-enter society, but it is where Kieren Walker’s family lives. His parents are walking on eggshells, determined to keep his homecoming a secret, but nonetheless overjoyed to have their son back. His younger sister Jem is a different story. Active in the local HVF, she now considers their militant leader Bill Macy a mentor. Kieren Walker already has some complicated history with the Macy family and it will soon get even thornier.

Following the lead of George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead, Flesh employs zombies as a vehicle for social commentary. However, this approach is always limited by the nature of the genre. We see through Walker’s flashbacks the terrors he wreaked in his feral state. It was not his fault according to his doctors, but it still isn’t pretty. With rumors swirling of rehabbed PDS cases deliberately going off their meds, it is hard to blame the good citizens of Roarton for being slightly on edge. Nonetheless, Mitchell stacks the deck against them, casting the fire-and-brimstone Vicar and the unhinged Macy as paranoid demagogues.

From "In the Flesh."

Flesh works considerably better on the micro level when it focuses on Walker’s guilt for both his zombie atrocities and the circumstances that led to his initial death. There is also an interesting relationship that develops between him and Amy Dyer, a more free-spirited PDS teen.

Luke Newberry is adequately morose as Walker, but he is frequently upstaged by other Walker family members. Harriet Cains shows potential star power as the forceful Jem, but Steve Cooper really gets to lower the emotional boom as Kieren’s still reeling father. Unfortunately, Steve Evets (so engaging in Ken Loach’s Looking for Eric) and Kenneth Cranham largely portray Macy and the Vicar as crude caricatures. In contrast, lefty comic Ricky Tomlinson nicely humanizes anti-PDS activist Ken Burton, while Emily Bevan adds some energy to the dour milieu as Dyer.

Already renewed for a second season in the UK, In the Flesh ends its first outing with some intriguing avenues open for further exploration. Yet it faces an obvious dilemma. To satisfy genre fans, eventually the show must produce the shuffling hordes, but to do so would undercut their peace and tolerance soap-boxing. Notable as an original premise, imperfectly executed but showing promise for future development, the first season of In the Flesh airs this Thursday, Friday, and Saturday (6/6-6/8) on BBC America.

LFM GRADE: B-

Posted on June 3rd, 2013 at 1:03pm.

Our Voyeuristic Future: LFM Reviews Channeling @ The 2013 Dances With Films

By Joe Bendel. In the very near future, about five minutes from now, people will become even more exhibitionistic. Personal internet reality shows are the thing, made possible by special contact lens cameras. ‘Channelers’ broadcast themselves snowboarding, booty calling, and navel gazing. Some also broadcast criminal activity, such as an Army sergeant’s estranged brother. When the punk winds up dead, his avenging sibling assumes control of his channel in Drew Thomas’s Channeling (see viral teaser above), which screens tomorrow during the 2013 edition of Dances With Films.

The Maddox family was always pretty dysfunctional. The death of Wyatt, the Fast & Furious wannabe, does not help much. Returning on a bereavement leave, Jonah soon starts nosing around with the help of Tara, his brother’s on-camera co-host, sidekick, or whatever. Essentially, this leaves all the responsible stuff to his younger sister, Ashleigh. She broadcasts her life too, in hopes of finding validation from voyeuristic netizens. That is really the wrong place to be looking.

It is always pretty obvious who the bad guys are in this film, but it is never clear why they had it in for the Brothers Maddox. Wyatt’s ratings were always pretty good by channeling standards, unlike the late Howard Beale in Network. Regardless, it offers Jonah an excuse to boost some fast cars.

From "Channeling."

Channeling is a serviceable enough b-movie, but it pales in comparison to Bertrand Tavernier’s thematically similar Death Watch, which remains an eerily prescient critique of our media-driven society even over thirty years after its initial release. It is also hard to compete with Harvey Keitel, Harry Dean Stanton, and Romy Schneider.

Regardless, as a leading man, Dominic De Vore seems to have graduated from the Caspar Van Dien school of acting. He is adequately square-jawed in the action scenes, but that’s about all you get. However, Kate French (probably best known from The L Word and One Tree Hill) lends the film some style and presence riding shotgun as Tara, while Taylor Handley does a presentable James Dean impression as the ill-fated Wyatt.

Thomas and cinematographer Andrew Huebscher keep things looking slick and cool throughout. Cars will be wrecked and thugs will get their beatdowns. It’s all a cut above SyFy Channel original movies, but those primarily intrigued by the premise should checkout Tavernier’s underappreciated gem instead. For Kate French’s fans, it screens tomorrow night (6/2) as part of this year’s Dances With Films in Hollywood, CA.

LFM GRADE: C+

Posted on June 1st, 2013 at 1:02pm.