Category: Trailers

Dramaville Goes Noir: LFM Reviews Inside Men

By Joe Bendel. Incentives matter. A cash-processing depot manager is put through the wringer by his superiors for the occasional irregularity in his accounts, but if an armed robber sticks a gun in his face, they will grant him time-off and provide counseling. If he is ever going to steal from the apparently impenetrable Larson House, he ought to do it in a big way. That is pretty much his plan in the four-part Inside Men, which premieres this Wednesday on BBC America’s Dramaville showcase.

The unassuming John Coniston is like a Bob Cratchit, promoted to management. He is keenly aware that neither his boss nor his subordinates respect him. When viewers first meet Coniston, he is having a bad day. Masked gunmen are forcing him to open the vault, while an accomplice holds his wife and newly adopted daughter hostage. However, there is more to this story, as the series title ought to indicate.

Yes, Coniston is in on it, but there are complications he never anticipated. Having caught his chief security guard Chris Lebden and loading dock worker Marcus Riley skimming mere tens of thousands off the top, he recruits them for a far more ambitious take: the lot of it.

Constantly flashing forward and backwards between the September heist and the planning stages six months earlier, Inside Men requires fairly close viewer attention. While there is plenty of skullduggery afoot, it is really more of a dark character study. Writer Tony Basgallop and director James Kent show us step by step how it all goes down, twisting viewer assumptions here and there along the way.

Warren Brown as Marcus Riley in "Inside Men."

The deceptively bland Coniston is clearly the key piece to the conspiracy. Steven Mackintosh convincingly sells his burgeoning empowerment as a criminal mastermind. Indeed, some of his best scenes involve the grudgingly respectful relationship he forges with Kalpesh, the purveyor of criminal support services reluctantly brought into the scheme. Though his character arc is quite intriguing, it is still hard to believe Coniston would put his family through such trauma, despite the safeguards he puts in place.

As Riley, fellow Luther alumnus Warren Brown makes a credible enough good-time knucklehead, while emerging UK TV star Ashley Walters is appropriately intense as the conflicted Lebden. However, the most invigorating supporting turn might come from Irfan Hussein, playing Kalpesh with icy flair.

Inside Men could well be too cold-blooded and intricately pieced together for fans of cozier British mystery television. Unabashedly naturalistic in its depiction of human nature, it definitely follows in the tradition of more fatalistic film noir. Even though it ends on a bit of a flat note, it is smart television, keeping a fair amount of surprises in store for engaged audiences. Recommended for those who enjoy a dark criminal yarn, Inside Men begins this Wednesday (6/20) and concludes July 18th (skipping Independence Day), on BBC America.

Posted on June 18th, 2012 at 4:49pm.

Women’s Basketball, Women’s Freedom in Iraq: LFM Reviews Salaam Dunk @ The 2012 Human Rights Watch Film Festival

By Joe Bendel. There was no Title IX in Iraq under Saddam. In fact, the general idea of gender equity that motivated the landmark legislation remains scarce throughout the region. Yet, two years after its founding, the American University of Iraq, Sulaimani (AUIS) fielded a pioneering women’s basketball team. They never won a game during their first season. David Fine documents their second in the truly inspiring Salaam Dunk, which screens as part of the 2012 Human Rights Watch Film Festival in New York.

Their students are the future leaders of Iraq. Offering a rigorous academic program in the relatively sheltered environment of Sulaimani, AUIS makes a point of recruiting a cross section of Iraq’s population. As a result, the nascent women’s basketball team boasts a roster of Arabs, Kurds, Shiites, Sunnis, and Christians. They are led by Coach Ryan, a visiting American English lecturer. Tough but supportive, he is a refreshing antidote to all the wrong sorts of coaches who have made the news recently. However, everyone is keenly aware that his fellowship ends with the current academic year.

For students from Baghdad, Sulaimani is an island of stability, yet many still worry about their families. Nearly all team members have lost friends or family to violence. As Coach Ryan observes, his team has faced more in their still young lives than most of those watching their documentary will ever have to contend with. Not merely an extracurricular activity, basketball becomes something uniquely “theirs.” It bonds the young women together and gives them a sense of identity. They also want to win.

Probably no genre traffics in shopworn clichés like the sports documentary, but Salaam is something else entirely. When the coach consoles his team after a hard loss that their gutty performance is more important than a “W” or an “L,” it is not hollow. It is a profoundly heavy moment. Notions of sportsmanship and the “healing power of sport” take on very real meaning here.

Director-editor-co-cinematographer Fine gives viewers a full sense of players’ personalities, as well as that of their coach and student-manager. They are all bright and immensely likable. Indeed, the experience of AUIS in general and the women’s basketball team in particular appears to be a successful social catalyst, bringing the diverse team together, despite their religious and ethnic differences. This does not mean Salaam is uneventful. The AUIS team just saves their drama for the court (or the classroom or the debating society).

This is a great documentary. The term “crowd-pleaser” just does not cover it. While the circumstances of the Iraq War unavoidably hang over the young Iraqis, Salaam scrupulously avoids politics, as such. It is one of the best sports docs in years, but it is not really about games and stats. It is about a group of young scholars becoming athletes and leaders, who will inspire audience confidence in Iraq’s future. While the HRW festival is always a radically mixed bag, Salaam Dunk and the opening night selection, Alison Klayman’s Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, the Sundance alumnus profiling the Chinese dissident artist, are two films that should absolutely not be missed. Highly recommended, Salaam Dunk screens this Saturday (6/16), Sunday (6/17), and Monday (6/18) at the Walter Reade Theater.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on June 14th, 2012 at 11:29am.

LFM Reviews The Woman in the Fifth

By Joe Bendel. Tom Ricks is a writer, so he must be a little off. With only one obscure novel to his name, the American cuts an underwhelming literary figure, but he has enough issues to earn a restraining order from his French wife. Following her and their daughter to Paris does little for his overwrought state of mind in Pawel Pawlikowski’s The Woman in the Fifth, which opens this Friday in New York.

Less than thrilled to see him, Nathalie Ricks promptly calls in the gendarmerie. Beating a hasty retreat, Ricks finds himself penniless at the flop-house motel run by gangster Sezer. To pay for his room and board, the novelist accepts a job working as a sketchy subterranean watchman for one of Sezer’s criminal endeavors. He figures it will give him time to work, but his writing is definitely not of the healthy variety. The only bright spot are his semi-regular assignations with Margit Kadar, an elegant and alluring widow of a Hungarian novelist perhaps even more obscure than Ricks, living in Paris’s 5th arrondissement.

While his ex shuns his reconciliation attempts, Ricks attracts the romantic attention of Ania, the Polish immigrant waitress at Sezer’s tavern, who also happens to be the mobster’s lover. This profoundly destabilizes the novelist’s situation. It also starts a chain of events leading Ricks to suspect a hitherto unknown force is meddling in his affairs.

Kristin Scott Thomas and Ethan Hawke in "The Woman in the Fifth."

Based on the novel by Douglas Kennedy, Fifth blends elements of genre cinema in ways that would be spoilery to discuss in detail. However, Pawlikowski is more interested in presenting an extreme psychological study with a distinctly Continental art film sensibility than aiming for mere thrills or chills. Never rushing the revelations, Pawlikowski still deftly creates sense that all is not right with his protagonist and his world.

Leading a multinational ensemble, Ethan Hawke and his terrible French accent are effectively moody and withdrawn as the socially problematic Ricks. Polish actress Joanna Kulig, recently seen (and very much exposed) in Malgoska Szumowska’s Elles, is also quite credible as the glammed-down Ania. Yet, Kristin Scott Thomas is the crucial piece of the film’s puzzle. Always an intelligent presence, she is absolutely perfectly cast as the sophisticated Kadar. The audience instantly shares Ricks’ interest in her—and of course her accent is always flawless, in both French and English.

Fifth’s slow build and emotionally detached approach to Ricks’ existential drama might be difficult for some viewers to whole-heartedly embrace. However, it is a smart, stylish film. Indeed, cinematographer Ryszard Lenczewski’s chilly gray color palette nicely suits the on-screen mystery and alienation. It is the sort of film viewers will kick around in their heads for days after screening it, which is an increasing rarity. Highly recommended for fans of European cinema with a dark twist, Woman in the Fifth opens this Friday (6/15) in New York at the Village East.

LFM GRADE: B+

Posted on June 13th, 2012 at 10:39am.

LFM’s Govindini Murty at The Huffington Post and AOL-Moviefone: “We’ve All Been Brainwashed”: China’s Dissident Bloggers Speak Out in High Tech, Low Life

[Editor’s Note: the post below appears today on the front page of The Huffington Post and AOL-Moviefone.]

By Govindini Murty. Even as Chinese dissidents like Nobel laureate Liu Xiaobo and artist Ai Weiwei suffer physical imprisonment, hundreds of millions of their fellow Chinese citizens are suffering a form of mental imprisonment thanks to their nation’s system of internet censorship. For example, the Chinese government recently blocked on-line searches for words relating to the 23rd anniversary of the June 4th, 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, censoring the terms “Tiananmen square,” “June 4th,” the number twenty-three, the words “never forget,” and even images of candles. The award-winning documentary High Tech, Low Life, currently screening at film festivals in the U.S., UK, and Australia, profiles two dissident Chinese bloggers who are working to challenge this Orwellian system.

Directed by Stephen Maing, High Tech, Low Life was in part funded by a Kickstarter campaign publicized on The Huffington Post and was an official selection of the 2012 Tribeca Film Festival. High Tech, Low Life documents the work of 57-year old blogger Zhang Shihe (known as “Tiger Temple”) and 27-year old Zhou Shuguang (known as “Zola”), two of China’s best-known “citizen reporters.” Even as the Chinese government uses internet technology to stifle dissent, these brave bloggers find creative ways to circumvent “The Great Firewall of China” and publish the truth about human rights abuses to the world. Along the way, Tiger and Zola suffer official harassment, familial disapproval, eviction, and arrest.

Blogger Zola describes in the film the vast apparatus of internet censorship that exists in China:

“There are 440 million netizens in China, 40,000 internal police monitor them, and 500,000 websites are blocked in China.” [Despite this,] “if an incident happens anywhere, netizens and citizen journalists will flock to the scene from all over the country. The censors might stop some of us, but they can’t stop all of us.”

Tiger Temple expands on the morally corrosive effect of the government’s censorship: “We’ve all been brainwashed. We’ve been listening to lies for too many years.” Although material prosperity may have improved in China, Tiger argues that life today is as bad as it was under Mao’s dictatorship. As Tiger puts it, the Chinese people are “complacent because they feel powerless.”

Tiger Temple and Zola could not be more different in style. The older, more experienced Tiger is a writer and former publisher living in Beijing who becomes closely involved in his subjects’ lives, bringing them food, money, and legal help. Tiger’s father was a high official in the Communist Party, but the family was persecuted by Mao during the Cultural Revolution in the ’60s. Tiger recalls how he and his family were beaten, evicted from their home, and exiled to the countryside. It was then, as a 13-year old, that Tiger says he started “roaming the country.”

Tiger’s entry into blogging was almost accidental. Returning home one day from viewing an exhibition of Monet paintings in Beijing, he saw a woman being stabbed to death on the street by a man as bystanders watched. Horrified but unable to prevent the murder, Tiger grabbed his camera and documented its aftermath instead. He notes that when the police showed up, they were angrier at him for taking the photos than at the murderer himself, because such scenes would normally be censored from the press. Tiger went on to publish the photos online and caused a sensation, becoming known as China’s first “citizen journalist.” Tiger adds that he calls himself a “citizen” and not a “citizen journalist” because that way the government can’t ban him.

Years later, Tiger makes lengthy journeys on bike through the countryside to report on the lives of the rural poor who have suffered in the rush to urbanization. He is even on occasion tailed by agents of the government. In one trip documented in the film, Tiger bicycles 4000 miles to Er Loa, a village devastated by the illegal flooding of toxic waste by the local government. The floods of waste have caused the farmers’ homes to collapse and have made farming impossible. Villagers tell Tiger that local officials have warned them that if they complain too much they will be arrested. Not only does Tiger take photos and video of the environmental devastation, he also brings the villagers flour and noodles to feed them and tells them he has forwarded their information to a university in Beijing where law students are working to file a legal complaint with the authorities. Tiger interests an NGO in their case, and the farmers are ultimately brought to Beijing to speak at the Civil Society Watch’s Environmental Protection Conference.

The blogger Zola at the Great Wall of China.

Continue reading LFM’s Govindini Murty at The Huffington Post and AOL-Moviefone: “We’ve All Been Brainwashed”: China’s Dissident Bloggers Speak Out in High Tech, Low Life

China’s Exploitation of Tibet: LFM Reviews Old Dog

By Joe Bendel. In news of yet more outrageous but hardly surprising interference in Tibetan affairs, China has just announced an open-ended ban on foreign tourism to the occupied country. However, friends and admirers of the Himalayan nation can still get a glimpse into the on-the-ground realities there through Pema Tseden’s narrative feature Old Dog, which screens tonight at the Brooklyn Heights Cinema, as part of the 2012 Brooklyn Film Festival.

Not content with Tibet’s sovereignty, China also covets its dogs. For the Chinese nouveau riche, nomad mastiffs are the newest status symbol. It is a seller’s market, assuming unscrupulous dog merchants do not steal the traditional family canines first. Dog-nappings are so pervasive, Gonpo figures he might as well sell his father-in-law Akku’s beloved pet and at least get some money for him. Akku does not see it that way, enlisting the help of his a local copper kinsman to retrieve the shaggy pooch. Unfortunately, the dog brokers are not about to forget about so prized a pooch.

If Jia Zhangke remade Old Yeller, it might look something like Old Dog. Helmed by Tibetan auteur Pema Tseden (a.k.a. Wanma Caidan when he is in China), it is a slight departure for distributor dGenerate Films, the independent Chinese cinema specialists. However, Tseden’s naturalistic documentary-like approach is quite in line with the Digital Generation style for which they are named. He and cinematographer Sonthar Gyal capture the sweeping grandeur of the landscape, as well as the hardscrabble nature of life for Tibetans, both in cities and in the countryside. It is also clear the last fifty-three years have been devastating for contemporary Tibetan architecture.

Amongst a cast clearly at home on the Tibetan Steppe, Lochey gives a remarkably assured performance as Akku. Deeply human and humane, his character bears witness to the steady corrosion of traditional Tibetan values, but he does not necessarily do so silently. Drolma Kyab’s performance as the hash-up son-in-law Gonpo is also quite honest and engaging. Indeed, the small ensemble is so completely unaffected and natural on-screen, Old Dog could easily pass for a documentary. Yet it has a very real dramatic arc.

Already the focus of a career retrospective at the Asia Society (amounting to two films at the time), Tseden is a filmmaker of international stature. Taking some subtly implied but recognizable jabs at Chinese hegemony over Tibet, Old Dog is his boldest film yet. Cineastes will earnestly hope there will be more to follow. Quietly powerful, Old Dog is highly recommended during this year’s BFF. It screens tonight (6/8) at the Brooklyn Heights Cinema, with Tseden appearing for Q&A afterward, as well as this Saturday (6/9) at IndieScreen in Williamsburg.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on June 8th, 2012 at 8:09am.

Terrorism in Turkey: LFM Reviews Labyrinth @ The 2012 Brooklyn Film Festival

By Joe Bendel. Turkey is still the modern, secular republic founded by Ataturk, but there are those who would like to turn back the clock. Nobody understands that better than the agents of Turkey’s counter-terrorist agency. They will risk their lives to thwart a violent group of Islamist fanatics in Tolga Örnek’s Labyrinth, which screens during the 2012 Brooklyn Film Festival.

A horrific homicidal suicide bombing has murdered 95 innocent souls, including thirty Americans and five Brits. Unfortunately, the shadowy mastermind (who never delivers the bombs himself, mind you) is working on a more ambitious attack. For Fikret, the moody Turkish Jack Bauer, it is not just an assignment, it is personal. He is out to avenge the partner kidnapped and presumably murdered by the newly resurfaced terrorist ringleader.

Fikret has one ace card in his hand. He has been running a confidential informative more-or-less off the books, whose brother has fallen in with the elusive terror cell. He only trusts Rasim’s identity with his loyal colleague (and prospective romantic interest), Reyhan. A valuable source, Rasim is coveted by British intelligence, who offer information on Fikret’s missing partner in return for the mystery source. The proposition is not appreciated.

Frankly, the tension between the Turkish and British security services never escalates beyond trash talking. In point of fact, Labyrinth is a refreshing corrective to the notoriously anti-American and anti-Semitic Valley of the Wolves: Iraq, the Turkish Islamist agit-prop film co-starring Gary Busey and Billy Zane. Here, it is the Islamists who are explicitly identified as the terrorists, freely murdering their own more moderate co-religionists for the sake of their extreme agenda. Of course, their preferred target is Turkey’s Jewish community. They even use inconvenient terms such as “the caliphate” in the pre-bombing videotapes. The American military only appears in passing, productively collaborating with their Turkish counterparts on a mission in Northern Iraq.

While there are some moments of inspired movie violence, Labyrinth is more cerebral than action-oriented. As Fikret, Timuçin Esen power broods like nobody’s business, while also developing some nice chemistry with Meltem Cumbul’s smart and mature Reyhan. They make it clear they care about each other in ambiguous ways, without ripping their clothes off. As for their quarry, the effective supporting ensemble is flat-out chilling when portraying the face of Islamist terror.

We could be proud of Hollywood if it finally tackled terrorism with a film like Labyrinth. That it was produced in Turkey is downright shocking, in a good way. Engrossing and tragically realistic, Labyrinth is a standout selection of this year’s BFF. Highly recommended, it screens again this Sunday (6/10) at IndieScreen in Williamsburg.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on June 7th, 2012 at 6:19pm.