PFF35 Day Eleven: Another Year

Closing Night plus the best films I saw.

A strange trend I’ve noticed as the fest wound down has been films that mix anachronisms and era signifiers into an almost alternate present day. Part of me wonders if it’s a way to get around having to deal with cell phones but – at least in the case of one – it seems more like trying to recreate the past in a way. I wouldn’t say I’m particularly bothered by it but it is curious.

Goodbye Cruel World (Félix de Givry): B/B+

Rather surprised me out of the gate with its direction, harkening back as the intros said to the French New Wave and the Lost Youth films of the proceeding decades (ie The 400 Blows). That may be a slight crutch given that you could see this being a YA novel if it had slightly worse voiceover provided by someone other than Françoise Lebrun. Givry also ends up writing himself into a corner by having so much time progress after his protagonist’s failed suicide attempt; as much as I do love the final shot itself, he steps into thorny emotional territory that can’t really square with the uplifting message it’s trying to go with. Milo Machado-Graner builds off his Anatomy of A Fall role by suitably brooding while Jane Beever provides a great foil in her first onscreen role. All are definitely talented, they should go on to great things.

Elephants In The Fog (Abinash Bikram Shah): B+

Went into this expecting something more dreamy and freeflowing so the actual narrative centering around a House Mother (as I suppose Pirati is) searching for her lost daughter was a bit of a surprise. The Kinnar were unknown to me and I appreciate the view into a community that on the outside can feel a bit like a cult with its severe restrictions on sex and intoxication but Shah does his best to render it as a true belief system that has a perilous balance with the rest of the community, and he explains as much as necessary so that we understand the difference between this Third Gender and being an actual woman. Towards the back half the misery starts to pile up, and I got disappointed as it verged into yet another Plight Of The Marginialized film focused more making the harsh realities and oppression of the System explicit rather than allowing the characters to really explore their own interpersonal struggles and the deeper conflicts within. Fully won back by the cathartic ending scene that pulls the title into full focus and functions just as well as a metaphor as it does an actual action. Elephants support trans rights!

The Debut (Jessie Eisenberg): B+/A-

Julianne Moore’s big showstopping scene with Paul Giamatti is going to be the talk of the town. It’s one of the things I’d heard beforehand and it’s always nice when one of those really lives up to the hype, down to the theater applauding her after. If you’ll forgive a little Oscar talk: she’s probably going to win and it would fully be justified, reminding us that she’s one of our best “bad” actors and cinematic criers, calling back to both Magnolia and Safe at once. The film around her is pretty sturdy too, granting her so many comedic opportunities and filled with small-town theater details that definitely resonated even for someone who’s only experienced the high school variety (the songs, all written by Eisenberg, sound exactly like what I’d imagine a middling Broadway musical to be). Although the other cast members get their own signature bits – my favorite being the Bowler Hats and the stupid joke after it – this is undeniably a two-hander at most. None of them really ever rise above pleasant support and it does take a bit to settle into the broadness and – dareisay – cringe aspects of the tone, despite it never being bad. Even if it’s never quite deep enough on a more macro level, I enjoyed it way more than I was expecting; as silly as it can get sometimes, Moore provides a solid anchor for emotion and it’s hard not to be charmed by the enterprise.

With that, we conclude coverage of this year’s fest. My count was 1 less than last year at 39 because I’m not including You Can See Everything eating up at least two slots. There were also a lot of longer films in general here: it’s the reason I couldn’t get around to My Undesirable Friends since that would have involved at least 6 hours over 2 days. I didn’t come away with any big surprises or revelations this year; no Blue Film or It Ends, although it’s very possible I missed something I’ll really love in the side sections, especially since the After Hours was quite difficult. Guess it’s a sign of maturing abilities that the surprises ended up being the ones I really hated and in their own ways it’s helpful. Didn’t crash early either unless you count the week before and accidentally missing one because of a party. The heavy hitters did hit like they should, and I’m glad they programmed something like Josephine in Centerpieces rather than a side section, which suggests programming has finally shifted to a newer generation. I will probably write about one or more of these when they get released over here as well as when I have to actually do a top 10 but as it stands, these were my 10 favorites:

La Gradiva
Everytime
All Of A Sudden
Possible Love
Josephine
Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother
Paper Tiger
Tender Loving Care
Minotaur
NAZA

PFF35 Day Ten: Busy Day

Last of the high profiles.

Finally managed to do a 5-movie day and it wasn’t too bad! Could feel the strain by the end so if you’re wondering what the maximum amount someone can watch in a day, it’s probably that. All that’s left is closing night and whatever stragglers I picked up along the way.

Once Upon A Time In Harlem (William Greaves, David Greaves): A-

I do wonder what my reaction would have been like had I not gone into this knowing that it uses ElevenLabs to reconstruct some of William Greaves’ voice when he reads out certain passages. As an archive it’s invaluable seeing a lot of new-to-me writers, artists, and intellectuals all gathered together, keeping each other’s memories alive. Greaves’ trademark splitscreens and overlapping voices help move things along and I would love to see the full 4 hours of footage sometime. Most compelling are the arguments and discussions, people butting in to make sure someone like Zorah Neale Hurston gets her flowers or whether the Harlem Renaissance is still alive. It’s as much a marker for how far they’d come as it is a specific moment in time between several famous periods, and how you never realize you’re living through history until after the fact. Whether that’s ruined by what’s essentially the use of audio colorization is a question I am honestly not sure I can fully answer.

Extra Geography (Molly Manners): B

Cute coming-of-age at a girl’s boarding school distinguished mostly by the Yorkshire accents and the burgeoning lesbianism that neither quite seems to realize is there. Funnily enough it’s also about Shakespeare, and I may have been tickled by the way Flic (played by the extraordinarily named Galaxie Clear) dismisses A Midsummers Nights Dream as much as I was by how in-sync she is with Minna (Marni Duggan). Shares my issue with other ostensible two-handers in that the points-of-view are imbalanced – in this case towards Flic – that feels like it might’ve been a holdover from the short story it’s based on. Ditto the nonspecific time period, in this case looking like at least the 90s or early 2000s though on the other hand it avoids pandering with needledrops and other signifiers; unless you count ending with “The Book of Love” from The Magnetic Fields, and there’s worse ways to end a movie. Overall well-shot and often funny, with a pair of performances that bodes well for the future.

Everytime (Sandra Wollner): A

One of those films that ends up hitting me in ways I find difficult to fully articulate. If broken down by the Hawks line of “3 good scenes and no bad ones” I’d submit the following: rooftop, discovery in the hall, and The Great Departure. Expected something in the line of MMOs or gaming to feature heavily, didn’t realize it’d be Minecraft but somehow that works in a way that’s completely surprising when you discover what the poster is based on. Aftersun comparisons also wouldn’t be wrong but it’s more focused on explicit grief mixed with technology’s impact (there’s a Personal Shopper-eque texting moment that gains real power) and a more dreamy atmosphere that could verge into metaphor or reality or both at the same time. Wollner’s control is simply incredible, there’s nary a single shot that isn’t stunning, almost peaking early with a shockingly casual inciting incident. In the end it’s a strange sort of grace, suggested at by voiceover but written poetically, a hopeful vision of the afterlife and the persistence of our memories. (In the interest of disclosure it appears that Suno was used for a small moment of generating music in a TV ad but I honestly didn’t notice and don’t know if that was made directly for the movie or not. Is it bad? Kind of! I don’t really know what to do with that but it’s there, and the score is otherwise a wonderful mix of bleeps and bloops).

Minotaur (Andrey Zvyagintsev): A-

The personal becomes political and the political will encroach on your life whether you ignore it or not. Hadn’t seen Unfaithful or the Chabrol it’s based on so I don’t know if this follows it completely but Zvyagintsev adds a jolt with corruption and moral degradation. Dmitriy Mazurov displays a sort of desperate grapple to remain in control of his life, trying to appear as if he still has the moral high ground while his soul slips right out of his grasp before he’s even aware it’s in danger. Less a protest against the Russia-Ukraine War – though it most definitely is – than showcasing the rot within the country that leads to a downfall as much as a series of cascading, yearslong decisions leads to the collapse of a marriage. Arresting on nearly every level – especially with the beautiful glass buildings and reflections, a near perfect melding of its core themes together. Maybe could’ve ended somewhat earlier though the image it lands on is discomforting in its own unique way. One of these days I’ll get around to his other work.

Victorian Psycho (Zachary Wigon): C+/B-

Have to give it credit for not trying to make this into some sort of Girlboss Anthem and instead putting Maika Monroe all the way at 11 from the jump. Wigon verges into camp to the point that it’s not really “scary” if it was ever trying to be despite a couple tense moments; the comedy is pretty broad and ably landed by the rest of the cast enough to offset the obviousness of the satire. At times it gets a little too stylized, what with the all the shots centering something in motion as it lands on a head or the look inside Monroe’s throat. It’s fun though, and that’s kind of all that matters in something like this. Wish it had done more with Drusilla rather than focusing on her brother, and the final massacre it builds up to is all chopped up in a way that diminishes the impact somewhat though we still get some very fanciful kills. As far as crazy goes, I’d much rather something that feels deliberately weird and borderline offputting rather than something that goes door to door trying to shock you, if you get my meaning. Nothing else, a nice break from Monroe doing scream queens and getting to be the monster for once.

PFF35 Day Nine: Observational Cinema

The demands of the body clash with the demands of the mind.

I realized yesterday that because of the way scheduling has shaken out, I haven’t gotten to as many after hours showings as I normally would in years past. There haven’t really been a ton of surprises to be honest. Maybe it’s just because I’ve become more aware of what’s out there, maybe it’s because I’ve been actively trying to be somewhat more critical and honest. There’s still two days left for a surprise, and tomorrow at least has two of my most anticipated. Going to try to make this weekend a back-to-back fiver, scheduling permitting of course.

Labrador: Autopsy of Silence (Rodrigue Jean): B+

Direction is always compelling in its stillness even if some of the other elements can sometimes be a bit lacking. Namely the scrambling of the chronology, not in direct reverse chronological but going back and forth. Occasionally it can be a bit confusing; I spent a good portion thinking a “ghost” character was actually someone else real. The lead performers do possess great chemistry – even in the most prurient sense – and Jean manages to draw out some connections between the silence and how racism is structured in Canada. Given that it’s based apparently off a real incident I do wonder how much they’re actually allowed to dig in. I was never bored though, and the central mystery does resolve itself in a rather devastating way. Favorite image: the boat going through a blizzard that nearly whites out the screen.

Yellow Letters (İlker Çatak): C+

Of a piece with Fjord in Festival Prizewinners That Are Actually About “Europe” but in a fairly nonthreatening or self-satisfying way. Çatak goes as far as naming chapters “Berlin as Ankara” and “Hamburg as Istanbul” in case you missed the German language signs strewn about the Turkish buildings. As drama it’s not too shabby: political persecution is a hot topic and for a while it rides on the tension between political beliefs and having to live a life. Ultimately it ends up cheating a bit by making their ultimate crime speaking against the President – surely something people in Turkey have faced but what they find disagreeable isn’t ever clarified, and the numerous shots of walking through protests of basically every leftist cause while the main guy looks indifferent hammers home the vague sense of complicity and comfort (as one character tells them to their faces). Doesn’t help either that it tries to say that art can in fact change the world and comes up with something that seems real corny, even if it does argue in movie that it’s psuedo-feminist claptrap. Digger! Now more than ever! Never really thought the daughter was all that well utilized either, she ends up falling into a surly teen archetype who runs away and craves normality. Serviceable in its own ways, but I had an actual Onion Reaction when I checked the time and realized we had at least 30 minutes left to go. Josephine wuz robbed.

The Dreamed Adventure (Valeska Grisebach): B+/A-

Sometimes all you have to offer is “it was a vibe”. I was never bored on Grisebach’s journey through the Bulgarian/Turkish/Greek border, I really could’ve watched Said and Veska walking around archeological sites and talking with various people for a full 3 hours. There’s political subtext here with talk of the Mafia running Bulgaria, the lingering effects of communism, Veska herself digging underground and uncovering the past to walking around trying to uncover past relationships. I’m sure on a second viewing and reading more I’ll pick up on all of it. I guess the most surprising thing was that I didn’t find it frustrating at all. It’s chill to just hang out and watch people dance to “What Is Love?” as you try to suss out the hints of danger or marvel at how Bulgaria kind of looks like the South or Midwest. Call it the festival catching up to my abilities of analysis if you must. The power of cinema is how much draw there can be in a pretty image.

PFF35 Day Eight: Doldrums

Rescued from mediocrity by India.

Today I finally got around to You Can See Everything since the morning showings felt skippable. I won’t be adding it to the list since it’s not an official part of the lineup, so you’ll have to make do with some dashed-off thoughts on what is indeed one of the best films of the year. Don’t worry, no spoilers.

Rider (Dade & Roan): C

Less a musical and more like a series of music videos for a concept album strung together. That music – Italian lo-fi beats rap combined with the usual pop R&B – isn’t half bad for the most part, though the production gets repetitive and samey, and it’s really mostly rapping and occasionally speak singing. Only once does it really feel like a proper “musical” with people singing on camera; a lot of times the music just plays over regular scenes, and the characters (or rather the main one, Sami) raps directly to the camera about his thoughts and feelings. Too slight in the story department as well: a basic romance, some low-level crime, you know the drill. Non-english musicals are something of a novelty for me just because they don’t seem to get released here at all and honestly, it does work if you don’t understand the words and can appreciate it as melody. There was strong potential here and it’s not too terribly directed, if overreliant on long takes. I wonder what a real music video director could’ve pulled out of it. Barring that, at least a stronger hook and more actual performing.

Elsinore (Simon Stone): D+

Not beating the Oscar-bait allegations, that’s for sure. This might be a controversial take for an English major but I don’t really care about Shakespeare. Yeah I appreciate the legacy and the language, I acknowledge he is Good, there’s just no reverence there for me. Chalk that up to being around theater kids for my adolescence. All of which is to say I had an even bigger uphill battle here than Hamnet (which also made my resistances go up when I could tell it was trying to Make Me Cry) and boy did it not manage to clear that hurdle. Stone is definitely not anywhere close to the visual stylist Chloe Zhao is, and he’s not helped at all by Stephen Beresford’s script, working off “an idea” from Ethan Silverman. The film takes for granted that you 1) care an immense deal about Shakespeare, 2) are familiar with actor Ian Charleson and 3) hold his performance of Hamlet up to the highest caliber. It does not do any work to justify the importance of any of those things, beyond Charleson dying of AIDS and it being his last performance (characters keep bringing up Chariots of Fire, which happened 8 years before the events of this movie, and good luck figuring out what he did in the meantime) . It perhaps is an even bigger own goal that it opens up with the notorious incident of Daniel Day-Lewis walking off-stage mid-performance (for what reason? who cares). My most uncharitable instincts were activated, especially when it suggests that Olivia Colman’s Dr. Johnson is being unreasonable about caring way more about him living than Shakespeare. Andrew Scott could be giving a great performance but it’s hard to tell given how Stone and editor Valerio Bonelli montage the hell out of proceedings, chopping up any hint of process or internal struggle; even an impromptu dance number in the ward is shot back and forth from outside and inside. Having not seen Bohemian Rhapsody, I wouldn’t be able to confirm if this is a more offensive portrayal of the AIDS crisis. Certainly it doesn’t set anything to “Another One Bites The Dust” – instead it just lingers on the Kaposi Sarcoma scars as a symbol of the disease, rattling of AZT and chemotherapy without disclosing what the side effects are or why that treatment option is taken. Most eye-rolling is the deployment of Derek Jarman as the voice of AIDS Activism who wants him to publicize his diagnosis, which Charleson argues against in a way that feels aimed right at the straight audience who wants to separate the person from the art. Rather tedious as a whole, though I won’t say I wasn’t moved by some parts. It’s the kind of movie that sets up long in advance that the doctor is going to attend the performance or the actors are going to bang on the windows at the end. No one involved can make a proper argument for why this should jerk any tears from you other than Stefan Gregory doing his best Max Richter. Scott shouldn’t be in the running at all for this and anyone claiming it’s better than All Of Us Strangers is out of their minds.

Half (Samjad): B+

Pure belt-to-ass cinema that absolutely whips. Is it simply a series of set ups for violent action scenes? Yes. Does it really do all that much with the vampire lore? Not as much as you’d think. Was I still hootin’, hollerin’, and cacklin’ for extended periods of time? Absolutely! Sometimes all you need is a pair of half-vampire siblings on a road trip, a crew of nasty highway robbers who have no qualms with killing and disposing of an entire family, and a collision course. Samjad orchestrates some brutal, nasty fights full of stabbings, scaldings, and stranglings soundtracked to Midhun Mukundan’s Bollywood techno. The action may not be as clean as The Furious or even as inventive, but it isn’t poorly dubbed in English, and free of getting bogged down in any story or real-world implications (save the ending). Both the lead actors do great snarling work even if it doesn’t really do much with one of them being mute. Flawed as it may be, I had a great time with the melange of styles from Indian Western to road movie and beyond. It’s a great display of the scrappiness of Indian (Mayalam in this case) genre flicks, a willingness to bow down to the alter of Cool and Badass. A great year for seeing dudes get the absolute hell beaten out of them and more.

PFF35 Day Seven: Lighter Fare

I feel the comedown and yet I persist.

Festival work is starting to catch up to me a little bit but I think I’ve managed to actually get decent sleep all throughout and haven’t had to binge caffeine too much. Should be able to maintain last year’s number but the amount of long films this year may have set the schedule slightly out of whack. Today and tomorrow will likely be filler, as it were.

I See Buildings Fall Like Lightning (Clio Barnard): B-

Clicked into place when the credits rolled and I learned it was adapted from a book. For the runtime it has, five characters is a bit unwieldy though Barnard and the actors make their best efforts to make them distinctive as personalities. Their exact problems tend to slip through the cracks, all of them tending around money except for Con’s, which follows a more typical alcoholism plotline. Biggest disappointment is that Lola Petticrew – who gave one of the year’s best TV performances on Furious – doesn’t get much other than a plot about sleeping with her husband’s best friend years ago but she lights up the screen whenever she’s on. Occasional poetic touches such as security cam footage of the apartment going up to highlight the passage of time or intercuts of buildings going down lend a bit more art to the affair, less so when characters stop to give an extended lecture about inequalities to us. The whole lot of them are quite good all that aside and dareisay by the end it even manages to get itself some tragedy even if it comes off a bit hoary. The Arbor appears more and more like true lightning-in-a-bottle the further time goes on; haven’t seen Barnard’s other films but given they don’t appear to generate much interest outside (or even in) the UK I suppose she’s settled into a lane a bit. Not without interest but nothing you haven’t seen before.

First They Came For My College (Patrick Bresnan): C-

Bad sign when the director gave an introduction encouraging audience participation Rocky Horror style, particularly whenever a fascist or the former administrator appeared onscreen. I agree with everything the film is saying of course; more than most people I’d be open to a documentary on neofascist skullduggery. Bresnan’s film is too sloppily constructed to be anything more effective than a vehicle for shaking one’s head and lamenting the state of the country as you leave the theater (Digger! Now more than ever!) It breezes past the history of the New College of Florida, establishing its new board and president as Bad People without diving into their ideology or who exactly they’re working for. How and why is Chris Fucking Rufo of all people on the board? Sure would’ve loved to know! Obviously it’s affecting seeing people fight hard for the school they love but I could’ve done with a lot less focus on a vacuous transfer student spouting the usual dumb young conservative anti-woke talking points and more with the student journalists and activists fighting to keep their haven and the professors they love. Strangely you don’t get a whole lot of info about them, not even what their majors are or their personalities. The fly-on-the-wall aspects can be a decent tactic but this really needed more context even if it wasn’t a systemic overview of the GOP’s decades long project to attack higher education. I still don’t know what makes New College itself so special as a takeover for this experiment and I’d very much like to read the article about that. At least that way I wouldn’t have to listen to Ron DeSantis speak for extended periods of time.

Vertiginous (Quentin Dupieux): B

As good of a time as I had with this I really can’t justify giving it a higher grade. Dupieux is cinema’s preeminent shitposter and to a degree, you kinda don’t need much more than the trailer to get the central joke of the film. For me personally, that joke – of a guy telling his friend that they live in a simulation, as both of them live in a world that looks somewhere between the PS1 and PS2 – took me pretty far with all the clipping and low-res backgrounds, not to mention the cast’s vocal performances. Even at 67 minutes it comes close to wearing out its welcome; there’s only so many times you can harp on reality being fake and headspinning philosophy. Thankfully it comes around with an incredibly stupid gag that got me back on board and ends with some cute bloopers that are also a stupid gag in their own way. Honestly, the animation does a lot to make this even work, what with the concept of bugs like a pigeon flying in one place for infinity or a baby coming right out of the womb, no umbilical cord. I appreciate Dupieux going off on his own little flights of fancy like this even if I’m not always going to watch them.

Written On The Wind (Douglas Sirk): B+

I usually don’t go to retro screenings in the interest of focusing on the new, but I had to make a stop since Karina Longworth of You Must Remember This was introducing it as part of her tour for The Bisexuals. My first Sirk and a pretty good intro to his deal: lush colors, big emotions. Admittedly there’s not a whole lot of substance here other than a tawdry tale of love triangles, hard drinking, and murder. Sirk does some really cool choices like using the wind to blow the calendar pages back for a flashback and of course it looks fantastic. The big draw is gonna be Dorothy Malone’s Oscar-winning performance, and justly deserved. She manages to stay just under the top but uses every trick in the book to entice a man. I’m always surprised to rediscover how much sex and alcohol 50s films could feature; this was a year after The Man With The Golden Arm and already you can feel the production code straining. Inarguably “problematic” to depict a woman essentially killing her dad with the power of her libido as with one crazily intercut scene but that is pretty wild. The other performers are great as well, retaining enough nuance that they can really go big when the time requires. Never quite fell in love but I want to see more even if they don’t have the bitchiness of “let me get you a towel, your ears still look a bit wet”. Malone playing with an oil derrick is such a galaxy-brained way to end a film, I’ll tell you hwat.

PFF35 Day Six: Approaching The Hump

Couple Berlin features and one of the year’s best

Might’ve mentioned before but we’re getting to the spots where I left my schedule open, mainly because I’d gotten everything down I “needed” to see. It’s good for me to watch things I don’t necessarily think I’ll be interested in I suppose (at least that’s what I tell myself) but hopefully I didn’t make it so that the gaps come about because I’ve already seen the films.

Salvation (Emin Alper): C+/B-

I think I got lost somewhere along the way, maybe in expecting it to be something like a horror or a possession film. There are some creepy moments but frustratingly they come across as dream sequences that are so seamless that by the third time or so it starts to feel like a rugpull. Opening text said it’s based on a true event and I got that it’s about ethnic tensions between two Turkish groups but Alper doesn’t always make it clear who is on what side or even what those sides necessarily want in the moment. Builds and builds to an appropriately horrific conclusion that I’m sure is also allegorical and the direction is engaging enough with the scenes set in the dark. Just not quite sure that I got who all the characters were and what the truth of the situation was, nor was I ever particularly frightened or spooked by the forays into horror. Fairly well-acted from what I can tell and ends strongly enough.

Wolfram (Warwick Thornton): C

Fairly standard Western of the Australian variety, ie All About Colonialism (not that our Westerns aren’t). Never saw Sweet Country which is apparently related to this rather inert story about a trio of Aboriginal kids on the run from their white masters and searching for their mom. Unique in that I don’t know another film that features so many flies both on screen and on the soundtrack, it’s truly impressive after a while. The rest won’t be new unless you’re completely unfamiliar with Australia’s dark history and need to be really shown that the obviously bad guys are bad by having them shoot some women by a river. Thornton is also fond of inserting split-second flashbacks/flashforwards that come across as random rather than tied to any particular memory or moment and other than Joe Bird from Leviticus getting the shit kicked out of him by an old Chinese guy I was faintly bored throughout most of it. If you’re gonna give us a kid survival story, give us the kids the whole time! No one cares about the adults, especially not these stock characters.

La Gradiva (Marine Atlan): A

As someone who went on a (partial) trip to Italy in the summer between junior and senior years, let me add to the chorus singing this low-key stunner’s praise. Atlan’s gorgeous 16mm camera never judges, simply observes her group of students as they fumble about adulthood, cracking jokes, getting up to no good and generally being a bunch of teens; it’s nice to see that no matter the time or place, some things never change. Sometimes achingly sad and lonely, sometimes bursting with life and joy, it feels like something I’ve been waiting since I was a teen, down to the occasional focus on the teacher and her struggles professional and personal. And as much as some may quibble with how the story of Toni ends, I found it refreshing that not only is he out but he has some level of self-respect and seems lost for other reasons. In the end you can’t ever really know someone or how they felt, whether they stand next to you or exist only as a plaster cast from Pompeii. Truly major cinema, Do Not Miss.

Test (Sam McConnell): B+

Much more complex than it would seem out the outset, specifically when Tammy Blanchard comes on as a collection of Indiewood quirk and neuroses. Brock Yurich gives an actual, full-bodied performance and his screenplay too has some more interesting ideas than simplicities like “closeted bodybuilder with daddy issues”. I was rather delighted when his relationship with his mom began to crack and reveal something much darker; also liked that his ex-girlfriend is incredibly sympathetic and understanding about his unknown-to-him queerness, getting paid dust in return that suggests a deep history both are only starting to become aware of. Can’t say I wasn’t disappointed by where it ultimately ends up, both in his relationship with Coach Mike (rather sweet, I will not say more about Mike Edward lest I get bullied) and with his mom, or really with the church despite Matthew Morrison’s (perfectly casted, no shade) genuine concern. I do like a good process movie so for all its regular sports clichés you do feel an actual director’s hand behind it, visual and otherwise, and I’m intrigued by what Yurich does next offscreen or on.

PFF35 Day Five: Slow Burn

Films both necessary and sublime

Possible Love. (L to R) Sul Kyung-gu as Ho-seok, Jeon Do-yeon as Mi-ok, Cho Yeo-jeong as Ye-ji, Zo In-sung as Sang-woo of Possible Love. Courtesy of Netflix.

Didn’t quite intend to see these in order of increasing favorability but that’s kind of how it ended up anyways. No clear sign yet that I will be Seeing Everything but I might have to bite the bullet lest I see the entire movie spelled out online.

The Blow (Julien Gaspar-Oliveri): B

A rather fantastic performance and some claustrophic direction surrounding a film that’s rather ordinary when you take a step back from its chokehold. I had gathered it was about some sort of abusive relationship from something I read around Cannes as well as from the synopsis and programmer Trey’s opening, and to be fair the film doesn’t dance around it exactly (in fact, it does eventually come out and say it, which is part of the whole theme of repression etc). Diego Murgia is a truly great physical performance, all tight body language suggesting that of a child and the sort of neediness that hides something much darker. It’s a slow-motion break-down and the inevitable blow-up is itself devastating. Walking out though, I’m not quite sure it really has much new or interesting to say, and I think the dramatic score puts too fine a note on things. It may not be anything groundbreaking but in its own way it does capture the toll abuse takes on a person and how it can be difficult to separate that abuse from love.

A Long Winter (Andrew Haigh): B+

Sure, it may not be the open wound that All Of Us Strangers was. Dareisay, even a bit cold. Haigh’s restraint in this case subverts your expectations in a number of interesting ways – even the repressed queer longing, gently sketched out, declines to take any obvious plot routes and instead becomes another sort of secret released as the winter begins to thaw out. All the performances are quite good; Hechinger and Moss-Bacharach are both enormously compelling to watch and like the rest of the film, they tend to underplay the drama that results in a lot of careful subtext. Admittedly it does get somewhat slow and meandering once the winter itself really settles in since there’s not a whole lot anyone can do, but Haigh remains one of our more underrated visual stylists and that’s really helped by the beautiful Colorado mountains. Not sure if this is a fuller theme but I really dug the clash between the much older house and town and the encroaching 50s technologies; no overt signing but lots of texture.

NAZA (Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor): A-

Not quite what I expected in terms of form. Abraham and Szor utilize archival B-roll and frequent pillow shots (not sure what else to call them) observing Tel Aviv in the night that draws out a lot from the mere sight of, say, a Target logo on a building or the fact that so much of the city resembles a European one. They’ve been open about the content of the film having been published in several places long ago but it does feel different to hear these people actually say it out loud and try to justify so many clear war crimes that your only response is to scoff when they dance around comparing themselves to Nazis. As a film itself it is rather beautiful though the specific form of observing people in their apartments and blurry TVs with the news on it isn’t exactly a new tactic. In a way it’s a strange companion piece to Digger: yes it’s necessary and vital but I can’t help wonder if it will actually move the needle, and whether it serves a purpose after that. It definitely makes me think of my own complicity in the horrors of the world and how I should be doing better, but how is one supposed to do better against what appears to be an entire country parched for blood and a systemic infrastructure dedicated to turning murder into a game and desensitizing everyone? Similarly to No Other Land, I also have qualms with the inclusion of real life bombing footage that shows dead bodies uncensored. Obviously those are on our timeline everyday and it’s real things that people have to see. Do we need to see it though? Is it not enough to see a man wailing in pain, yelling that he told his daughter to watch out for her siblings? Anyone with a single moral fiber will already be outraged by the concept of NAZA (collateral damage) itself. I don’t know that you should be able to pay money to see such pain in a distant location.

Possible Love (Lee Chang-dong): A

Talk about ethics in documentary filmmaking. Lee’s clearly thought a lot about exploitation even in a fictional story and he combines that with a rumination on class and love that – like Burning before – builds up slowly until it all comes bursting out of the surface in an inevitable shock. The film largely belongs to Jeon Do-yeon and Cho Yeo-jeong – the latter doing what feels like a less comic and more self-aware take on her character from Parasite – but the big showstopping scene belongs to Lee veteran Sul Kyung-gu, who spends so much of the film harboring a deep well of sadness that reveals itself to be simmering rage and shame. Through flashbacks and different camera styles, Lee interrogates what it means to make a documentary in total, when everything could be an opportunity to film and you can’t help seeing them as subjects as much as you want to see them as friends. It’s dense in its contrast of class, of hierarchy in speech and and age. It not officially be a Dekalog remake anymore but the opening quote of “Thou shalt not covet” attains power nonetheless. It’s thoroughly enjoyable to listen to the characters speak as it is to observe the careful details and fine-tuned comic moments. I really must watch his other films, let’s hope it doesn’t take almost 10 years for the next one.

PFF35 Day Four: Heavy Hitters

(Mostly) Bangers, (Most of) The Time

So far among the best days I’ve had at the fest, with only one I’m more mixed on. I think by now all my Centerpieces are just about finished except for Closing Night, which feels a tad strange but perhaps appropriate. Schedule will remain fluid based on what I hear from people.

Tender Loving Care (Mike Leigh): A-

Allow me to join the chorus singing the praises of Leigh’s potential last feature. Had expected Kate O’Flynn to be great of course (haven’t been fully aware of her dramatic work, I didn’t recognize her in Widow’s Bay after seeing Happy-Go-Lucky) but hadn’t expected to fall so in love with Alice Bailey Johnson (also a Leigh veteran, from Mr. Turner and Hard Truths). Sometimes a bit blunt but it expands in some really lovely and heartbreaking ways, retaining his core sense of humor; one of the funniest scenes of the year consists of Paul Jesson sitting in a chair reading an Atlas thanks to the editing. Don’t think it’s necessary to have seen Career Girls to pick up on some of the quoting of his past work but it adds just a little spice to proceedings. More than anything it’s just such a joy to hang out with these girls and the parents, they feel so lived in like the best of his work with a hint of darkness hanging around the margins, and ultimately kind of a hopeful, if mournful, final message. A worthy film to end on. Someone please put Kate and Alice in a million more parts together.

Fjord (Cristian Mungiu): C+/B-

It’s Fjine. Not an inherently despicable track to take with this story, apparently based on a real life event from 2016 (which explains the extremely jarring presence of a brand-new PlayStation Vita in one scene). I agree with others that the deck is pretty stacked in favor of the family, even though I still came out feeling like they shouldn’t be doing that to their kids. One thing to dispute on the nature of a “slap” and the language barriers that could make discerning seriousness difficult; another to have a child stand up in class and say homosexuality is a sin (plus having Sebastian Stan leering in the background of his maybe-closeted daughter, as well as a gender identity poster in a school). Maybe it’s unrealistic for that to happen but in my mind it doesn’t really reckon with what type of things we should be tolerating under “religious views”. The fact that both Stan and Renate Reinsve seem to be pretty decent parents all things considered feels like a missed opportunity, given how annoying at best Evangelicals can be, not to mention the ideas swirling around of the far-right using this for their own ends even if they are kind of right. Stuff about the real problems being at home also kind of landed flat for me, just seemed disconnected no matter how many Norwegian flags are in the background. Beautiful landscapes but you’d have to try real hard to make those look ugly. Wouldn’t have given this any award at Cannes, much less the Palme, but I guess court room scenes are the big draw now.

Behemoth! (Tony Gilroy): B+

Didn’t know much about this going in beyond Pedro Pascal as a cellist directed by Tony Gilroy, which is probably the best way to experience it. He talked in the Q+A about the title coming about as a code name for another project and really liking it as well as it being inspired by his life in the biz, and I wouldn’t disagree with those who say it’s a bit messy and all over the place. That element is kind of what made it work for me though: as slippery as the timeline can get, it does feel unique to dive into memories inspired by specific tracks that function as diagetic music, and Gilroy seems to have had as much fun flipping through tones and genres as the numerous composers did riffing on scores. Pascal is good in the main role for the most part but doesn’t particularly stand out to me as owning the screen, but he does have a way with a one liner and he’s very pretty to look at. Olivia Wilde isn’t in it as much as you’d think from her second billing but she plays such a chaotically funny demon that I totally get why she’s there; I actually said “Oh god” when I realized she was coming up in one scene and I honestly could’ve used more of her or at least more backstory. A fascinating oddity and as diplomatic as Gilroy is, it feels like the kind of thing you deserve from Disney after making the only Star Wars piece widely considered “good” by the vast majority in ages. Hope he gets more.

Josephine (Beth de Araújo): A-/A

Brutal and unsparing but remarkable in its sensitivity. Channing Tatum and Gemma Chan have gotten and will receive much praise for their performances (easily the former’s best work) and justly so but don’t let Mason Reeves get lost in the weeds either. It’s the kind of movie that lives and dies on the strength of a child performance and she handles it with such aplomb. Never saw de Araújo’s debut Soft and Quiet though I have been intrigued; her work here is completely assured, making great use of dissolves and transitions as well as the San Francisco fog on a visual level, but she excels at trapping the viewer in Josephine’s state even when she isn’t using a POV camera (it does break once or twice from that, and I’m not sure that was totally needed), often cutting back to her face for key moments. I’ve seen a lot of reviews quibble with the parents for not taking her to therapy in the aftermath and being horrible parents generally but putting aside the fact that there’d likely be no movie (or at least not an interesting one): both genuinely believe they’re doing what’s in the best interest for her, unable to get outside their own feelings on the horrible event. Pynchon has a line in Vineland comparing something difficult to explain as “explaining rape to a child” and this is basically that extended to an entire film, reckoning with how much she should know about both the incident and themselves, while the girl herself struggles with the sudden crushing reality that the world is unsafe and a gender may not be able to be trusted. My praise is tempered a little mainly from some moments that feel a little like “owns” – specifically in the very well-done court scene, which I’m sure has happened before even if it’s a little overboard – and I did wish it ended slightly earlier even though it finds the perfect grace note to land on. A small distributor named Sumerian Pictures has it, and I highly urge anyone interested to check it out. It’s a real reckoning with childhood trauma and the ways parents accidentally hurt their kids, and a major work.

PFF35 Day Three: You Cannes See Everything

Turns out the critics were right.

Just to get this out of the way: I have no idea if I will See Everything in one of these dispatches. It’s rough enough trying to fit in 3 hours, more so when it’s not part of a festival. Hopefully I can avoid spoilers before then. All my social obligations should be taken care of now (with apologies to Half if I don’t get around to it) so I’m also hoping to get in at least one 5 film day before this ends. Sorry for slacking, and thank you to my lovely friends Steven, Jared and Max for their respective parties. La Bola Negra thoughts will be on Letterboxd as soon as Netflix puts it in Philly.

Iron Boy (Louis Clichy): B/B+

Exceedingly lovely. Gorgeous watercolor animation will be the star of the show; I really loved the way character’s facial expressions are drawn and especially the quick-motion gags and tilts (heh) into fantasy. Was surprised to learn that Clichy has mainly been an animator on 3D CGI films before – most notably WALL-E – not so much so to learn he did actually wear a back brace when he was 10 like main character Christophe; it really feels autobiographical but strangely not very specific. It’s not really about disability so much (though it does make you appreciate the ADA a whole lot) and follows a relatively typical coming-of-age path to the story, though I do appreciate only a few period markers that probably stand out more to the French. The voice cast is uniformly excellent though, and the animation really is so beautiful that it’s worth a watch. Easy to see why this won Jury Prize at Un Certain Regard.

Fatherland (Paweł Pawlikowski): B-/B

Dunno if I’ve underrated this one. Handsomely crafted for sure, with a great Sandra Hüller performance as Erika Mann (daughter of famous writer Thomas Mann), and like Cold War, Pawlikowski manages to get in and get out without overstaying his welcome. I found it faintly boring at times, especially in the back half once the Manns go to Eastern Germany, perhaps because I was expecting more tension between father and daughter on the outset (potential title meaning?) There’s some interesting political themes towards the beginning when you realize just how recently the Holocaust has ended; when Erika slaps her ex-husband Gustaf Gründgens, he was literally close friends with Hermann Göring and probably actively contributed to the Nazis. Other talk about the split between communism and capitalism as Germany looks towards a future as well as Thomas Mann’s own centrist position is fertile ground, which somewhat gets disturbed by the suicide of his son Klaus, a thing I somehow forgot was a plot point. I don’t necessarily think it’s a problem of unfamiliarity either with the characters or real life, but the drama and angst never materializes quite enough for me to generate much heat or ardor. Can’t say yet if this is the best Hüller of the year until I see Rose.

All Of A Sudden (Ryusuke Hamaguchi): A

Talk about a relevant title: it even shows up immediately this time! Honestly I was a bit surprised by how much I loved the dynamic between Virginie Efira and Tao Okamoto; credit to Hamaguchi as well who somehow managed to make a scene consisting of what amounts to a 15-minute lecture on a whiteboard feel riveting, not to mention the walk-and-talks that don’t call attention to themselves, or the scenes that start out in near total darkness before slowly becoming brighter as the sun rises (which never failed to wow me). I think what makes it work for me is that it feels like genuine conversations about Marxism and inequality, working through what it means to try and work towards a utopian ideal when there’s so much systemic and material pressure pushing down against you from almost all angles. And of course, it winds up incredibly moving when the inevitable terminal cancer finally emerges. Part of you wishes for the impossible to happen and it’s a credit to all that that doesn’t feel like a stupid want so much as a lament. Easily among the best films I’ve seen at fest so far, and sure to be among the year’s finest.

PFF35 Day Two: Highest 2 Lowest

Some of the year’s best and one of the worst.

I had penciled down today as a tentative 5 Film Day, depending on whether I could get to the final screening in time after this one let out. One thing I always forget when scheduling is accounting for bumpers and introductions, not to mention delaying things so people can get seated. That’s always meant a certain degree of fluidity and with the rain today and incoming I wouldn’t be surprised if I call it early again. Luckily it stopped after the last one today because hoo boy.

The Assassin(s) (Hur Jin-ho): B+

JFK if the thesis were not only plausible but maybe what actually happened (along with being way less homophobic). I’ll admit there’s a lot of moving parts going along, and it would’ve helped if I had a better grasp on Korean history, especially in the dictatorship period. Taken as a mixture of Journalism Procedural and Police Procedural, it works like gangbusters. Occasionally blunt and speechifying but it works like gangbusters as entertainment, and you know I love seeing Big Chunky Technology.

Rehersals For A Revolution (Pegah Ahangarani): A-

Kind of film that can really sneak up on you in ways that I don’t think I really want to spoil. Suffice to say I was unprepared for it to get pulled into the present and it’s bracing the way it functions as both a memoir, history of revolutions, and an ongoing portrait of resistence. Ahangarani uses the wear and tear of the archival material to fantastic effect, and the jump in quality serves as the perfect marker for time passing, while her narration is poetic without trying too hard. Perhaps the most surprising companion piece to Digger, in terms of a filmmaker asking themselves why they’re making a film, and the audience why they’re watching it, what is this all for. Answers that question in a really lovely way.

Paper Tiger (James Gray): A-

I suspect Adam Driver is going to get most of the attention and justifiably so (Miles Teller ain’t too bad either). But no one should be sleeping on Scarlett Johansen, who pulls off a piece of physical acting that’s quite astonishing to witness. At times it feels a little like Gray is straining to bridge her story with the main one involving an engineer getting too involved in the particulars of his shady business partners, but in the end it coalesces into a story about family, sacrifice, of knowing when your time is near and what you’re gonna do about it. New York itself features once again, period detail standing out just subtly enough and lending an atmosphere of coming change. Devastating, but maybe one I’ll need to dig in more since I’ve only seen Ad Astra.

Club Kid (Jordan Firstman): D

Went into this one practically cutting open my sternum and pulling out my ribs in order to keep my heart open; the premise had always sounded a bit corny and like many of the extremely online, I found Firstman fairly annoying from time to time. So please trust me when I say that I tried so hard to meet it on its terms and might’ve actually fled the theater had it not 1) been completely sold out and 2) lack the Mike D’Angelo Walk Out ability. I concur with Adam Nayman on finding it reactionary: specifically, I find it reactionary in a way that feels like Firstman throwing his community and possibly his extended friend circle under the bus in a cheap bid for respectability points and Serious Artist credentials. Yes, I might’ve taken issue with some of the plot even if I’d liked it more. It’s not the most sturdy, nor are the characters particularly well drawn or defined. But there’s something rancid in the idea of having a guy who – as far as we know – is a complete Gold Star Gay somehow having sex with a woman that results in a child (if it wasn’t rape). There’s also numerous cheap shots taken throughout, whether it be jokes for the gays or the way the camera frames the club as inherently scary or dangerous due to all the drugs and the sex and whatnot. Somewhere in there I could see a movie in there I’d maybe even love, but I find it rich that someone who talked as much public shit about Heated Rivalry went on to make a movie about 10x more geared towards a straight audience down to barely even showing any explicit sex or nudity except in the most leering terms. Reggie Absolom innocent, Diego Calva innocent, Colleen Camp innocent.