RUMOURS *UPDATED*

Canadians have always fascinated me because they have an immense sense of national pride all while taking comfort in being the unofficial “second place” and/or “little brother” to America. Years ago I interviewed Guy Maddin on here and he made a point to associate Canadians with second place:

PINNLAND EMPIRE: Who, in your opinion, is the best active filmmaker working right now?

Guy Maddin: Without a doubt, Sokurov. Then Malick, for those of us, like all Canadians, interested in second place finishers.

Much of the promotion & interviews for Rumours are shrouded in this interesting lighthearted Canadian self-depreciation

if you're making movies in the shadow of America you're pretty self-conscious. You’re the little country next to the big behemoth. Many of my favorite movies are American – Evan Johnson, Reverseshot.com

America has this mythic scale that Canada doesn't quite have – Galen Johnson, Reverseshot.com

As Canadians we are not used to confrontation – Guy Maddin, hammertonail.com

Even when Canadians claim to dislike America or play up the rivalry, their personality is still based on being the underdog as if they have to prove something (it's similar to the almost one-sided sports rivalry between Boston & New York city).

Now...part of me feels like because Canadians are so openly insecure about their relationship to America that it’s an inside “bit” that all Canadians are in on for their own self-amusement and genuinely do feel like they're better than Americans.

Rumours is incredibly Canadian. It’s polite, strangely wholesome and filled with national pride (just underneath all of that are the weird darkly comical perversions that make Guy Maddin films so unique). I love the film as it stands but it would be an interesting “Five Obstructions"-like experiment to see the same film play out under the direction of a director from each of the seven countries represented in the movie just to see how different it would be.

The story pulls from obvious current events, old zombie films & B-movies and the lesser acknowledged work of fellow Canadian filmmaker John Paizs (Rumours would make for the perfect double feature with Paizs’ Top Of The Food Chain in that that they both get a lot of their aesthetic from old B-level zombie movies).

The Brain From Planet Arous / Rumours

There are also a handful of other typical homages regular Guy Maddin influences like Bunuel, Lynch & Benjamin Christensen...

I watch a movie and I pretend Luis Bunuel is sitting beside me - Guy Maddin, TheAVClub.com

Los Olvidados / Rumours

Eraserhead really hit me hard. I was really impressed. It was a big influence - Guy Maddin, Fandor.com

Eraserhead / Rumours

Being evil never looked so sumptuous. I like the alternate version, Witchcraft Through The Ages - Guy Maddin, Criterion.com

Haxan / Rumours

While this film is certainly shrouded in current events & social commentary through a Canadian lens (the character that represents Canada in the film is the most interesting & heroic of the bunch), Rumours is ultimately a comedy about the difficulty of working together & completing a group task. For those that don’t know, this isn't just a Guy Maddin film. He’s the most recognizable name of all the directors, but Rumours was directed by Maddin, Evan Johnson & Galen Johnson (things don’t even feel like a Guy Maddin film until midway in). Directing a movie solo is difficult enough but three directors all working at the same time is a lot. The task of directing Rumours and the basic plot of the film go hand in hand. In front of the camera is the story of seven world leaders trying to come to a consensus on a global crisis in the midst of an apocalyptic attack. Behind the camera are three filmmakers trying to make one cohesive piece of art. The outcome is one of my favorite films of the year and one of the best features Maddin has been associated with with in quite some time. 

Rumours is getting more of a push than the average Guy Maddin/Guy Maddin-related film so it’s bound to get a wider audience than something like My Winnipeg or Brand Upon The Brain (Cate Blanchett might be the biggest movie star Maddin has worked with in his almost 40 years of filmmaking so her presence also helps it's popularity). This might not be the best entry-level Guy Maddin film but for folks like me that are familiar with his body of work, this is something new.

WRONG REEL EPISODE 107: OSCAR NOMINATED SHORTS

I'm honored to be back on the Wrong Reel podcast with James Hancock to discuss this year's Oscar Nominated Animated Shorts. We don't often get in to short films or animation on here so it was a pleasure to step outside of my comfort zone.

enjoy...

THE PREEMPTIVE STRIKE...

Before we get in to the big end of the year wrap-up in a few weeks, let's take a look at some of the films from 2015 that I wasnt able to write about at length but still enjoyed...

Junun

The best thing about Junun, PT Anderson's documentary that chronicles the recording of the Shye Ben Tzur/Johnny Greenwoods/Nigel Godrich collaborative album of the same name, is that it's unlike anything he's ever made. That's not saying it's the best thing he's ever made (because it isn't) but it's still a breath of fresh air within the world of PT Anderson. There's no Altman references or borrowed shots from classic American 70's cinema. There isn't even much of a narrative (or talking) outside of musicians recording & drawing inspiration from their surroundings - the Mehrangarh Fort in Rajasthan, India (prior to Junun this tourist attraction was best known in the world of film as the backdrop for the prison in The Dark Knight Returns). The music within Junun is the real "dialogue" in the film.

PTA takes the cliche dream of the musician going off to an isolated place in a far off country to record, and he makes it an enjoyable experience in under 60 minutes. I feel like had most directors set out to document Junun it would have been an extra feature on a DVD rather than a (short) feature, but Anderson managed to pull a unique standalone project.

Instead of focusing on the key musicians like Greenwood & Godrich, PTA focuses mostly on the singers & musicians from the area in a non-fetishized/fascinated westerner kind of way.
Although the film mostly highlights analog recording and vintage instruments, that signature Radiohead sound (a combination of digital & analog) definitely rears its head at certain points in the film in an organic way (at the 24:20-ish mark there's a great sequences that combines old traditional music with a computer-driven electronic baseline).
I get a slightly bigger bonner for a film like this as I also make music and can be a studio rat from time to time. I love the combination of old/vintage gear & new/computer-driven equipment (artists like Holy Fuck, Animal Collective/Panda Bear, Antipop Consortium & Black Dice are some groups that come to mind when I think of masterful combinations of old/dated equipment mixed new technology).

I'm sure a small handful of PT Anderson fanatics will try to make Junun out to be more than it is but at the end of the day it's certainly worthy of an honorable mention on a 2015 movie list).

White God

I went and saw White God with two good friends of mine who happen to be dog owners, so the emotions were a little heightened in certain parts (that fact alone makes this films success on some level). Any time a dog in the film experienced some type of emotional or physical abuse, I could sense my friends on each side of me cringing and/or looking away in discomfort. The montage where our protagonist dog is transformed in to a fight dog is incredibly hard to watch. And I don’t even own a dog. So imagine what it’s like if you’re a “dog parent” watching a scene of another dog getting strung up by its neck or beaten in an effort to “toughen” it up. So while White God isn’t the master work that some critics said it was, it’s still a worthwhile movie. If not for nothing, the crew behind White God deserves a little extra credit for crafting a film that kind of rested on of the shoulders of shelter dogs. I don’t know if some of you are familiar with the psychology behind some shelter dogs but they aren’t always the most trusting animals (rightfully so). While White God has absolutely nothing on a movie like Roar (a film that saw actors working alongside untrained lions & tigers), it’s still pretty impressive to make a successful movie with a cast of mostly untrusting & abandoned (wild) animals. The lead dog in particular gives one of the greatest animal performances in the history of cinema (his movements & expressions are incredibly humanistic).

In White God we follow "Lili" and her dog “Hagen”. After Lili’s father refuses to keep a dog in his home, he drives the dog far off to another part of the city and for the rest of the film we watch Lili & hagen try to find they're way back to each other (throughout their journey various forces get in the way of their reunion).

The thing is, for me at least, White God gets its points across long before the movie even reaches the half way mark – animal abuse is terrible, the world can be an ugly place, and the bond between a dog and it’s owner is unlike any other type of bond (personally, I’m a cat person but I do recognize how much more loyal & friendly dogs are over felines). For the rest of the movie things kind of drag on and get a little repetitive. The exploration of friendship, animal abuse and the idea of turning a mirror on society so it can take a look at itself is hardly uncharted territory. With hints of everything ranging from the obvious White Dog & Cujo to Milo & Otis, White God sort of melds together elements of various genres (the title, a play on its spiritual predecessor White Dog, isn’t as controversial as it sounds). On the surface things starts out like a family-oriented drama about the relationship between a young girl and her dog “Hagen”. Then the film focuses primarily on the dog and his journey to get back home (Milo & Otis). After that, the tone completely shifts in to a sort of social commentary on how ugly the world can be and how easy it can corrupt a naive/blank vessel like a loyal canine (White Dog). And by the end of the film we’re waste deep in to a lowkey horror movie where dogs have completely taken over a city and are out for blood (Cujo). 

White God is an enjoyable movie at the end of the day. The only reason I haven’t been raving about it like I have other films is because of what I said earlier – the plot is a mixture of material we’ve all seen in movies before. I think I found certain parts to be funnier than they should have (the scene where the dogs murder the evil dog fighter comes to mind) but it’s still a success. Actually, certain scenes bring about reactions in me that I think the filmmakers wanted to evoke in an effort to challenge the audience. Take the scene I just mentioned where a gang of dogs murder one a guy. I honestly found joy in the fact that a dog abuser got killed by a gang of dogs. But it goes without saying that I shouldn’t find pleasure in seeing someone get killed no matter how bad of a person they are. I’m kind of playing in to that ugly way of thinking that the film is sort of shaking its finger at.

This will definitely come up again in my year-end review.

Room

Not gonna lie – I thought Room was going to fall somewhere between a well made lifetime movie with good actors, and full-on Oscar bait. I’ve said it before on here and I’ll say it again – I can be a judgmental prick when it comes to film and my prejudgment with Room was yet another example of this. I was wrong. I definitely had my internal judgy thoughts thrown back in my face as Room deserves all the praise it’s been getting.
What I appreciated so much about Room is that films with incredibly heavy subject matter tend to focus on the story & performances (which is important) while leaving behind style & ambiance, but that wasn’t the case here. And by style & ambiance I don’t mean that Room is supposed to be some stylized-looking Michael Mann film. But a film like Room needs to convey the grit & ugliness that comes along with being trapped in a shed for 7 years, and it certainly does that. There’s also some cool little metaphoric moments, for folks that like that kind of stuff, which really stuck out to me. When Jack first leaves the shed in an effort to get help, that scene is almost like his second birth as he’s seeing the (outside) world for the first time. Room also has a lot in common with Michael (2012). Both films, which deal with an abducted protagonist held against their will, show the claustrophobia of being trapped in a tight space along with the fear of being a prisoner.

There are a few angles one could take that could pick apart certain aspects of the movie but if you allow that level of nitpickiness to seep in then you won’t be able to enjoy anything. If you’re prone to cry at the movies then this will more than likely bring on the water works as it deals with everything from (the obvious) abduction, rape & crushing isolation to sever depression, hopelessness & PTSD. The film doesn’t take these issues lightly. Room is a realistic portrayal of the aftermath of a traumatic experience) and it doesn’t handle the characters with kid gloves.

Youth

I’ve said it on here a few times this year and I’ll say it again – reality mixed in to fiction seemed to be the general theme in prominent films this year, and Paolo Sorrentino’s Youth is just another example. In the film Michael Caine, Harvey Keitel & Jane Fonda (in a brilliant three scene appearance) all play aging entertainers (a music composer, a movie director and an actress respectively) reflecting on their respective careers while vacationing in Switzerland. Youth has the same vibe of Sorrentino’s previous work in terms of basic plot and overall look (Michael Caine’s look is practically modeled after Sorrentino regular Toni Servillo). Like Great Beauty, Youth is another look at upper-class/well off artists coming to grips with getting old while looking back on life which naturally bring up a few skeletons here & there. Caine’s “Fred” is forced to accept the fact that he wasn’t a good husband or father, while Keitel’s “Mick” has to come to terms that he has fallen off as a filmmaker. If you’re a diehard Harvey Keitel fan like I am, then Youth will definitely hit you right in the gut (mostly towards the end). Like Forest Whitaker in Abel Ferrara's Mary, Keitel’s performance in Youth is fairly tame until the final act of the film when he suddenly lets loose and just hits a homerun (Keitel’s performance in the last third of Youth is some of the best stuff he’s done since his resurgence in the early 90’s).

Youth (along with the release of The Lobster this year) also opened my eyes to how great Rachel Weisz is (I never had anything against her or ever thought she wasn’t a good actress but 2015 was an eye-opening year for me).

Forbidden Room

Forbidden Room is a mixtape of everything ranging from Maya Deren to early Bunuel (Guy Maddin even references his own films in this). There's tons of blended/overlapping imagery, off-kiltered moments and triumphant music. But that doesn't necessarily mean that it can be enjoyed by any & every cinephile. You may love Los Olvidados or Persona but that doesn't guarantee you'll love this. Hell, you may want to approach Forbidden Room with caution even if you're just a casual fan of Maddin. Much like what Inland Empire & Eraserhead is to David Lynch (total & complete self indulgence), Forbidden Room is the equivalent to Guy Maddin. This is Guy Maddin with almost no filter. Now...if you're a diehard fan of his work and/or the type of experimental films played at Anthology Film Archives on a random Tuesday night - then this is right up your alley. I'm a Guy Maddin fan so let me preface that what I'm about to say is meant to be a compliment - the vibe of Forbidden Room feels like the product of an intelligent person staying up all night then having to write a thesis paper in under 24 hours. Sure, there's some misspelled words within the body of the document and possibly some coffee stains on some of the pages, but it still gets its point across to the appropriate audience.

There is a plot (a heroic lumberjack sets out to rescue a kidnapped woman), and some obvious themes are explored (masculinity, sanity and the importance of dreams & nightmares). But Forbidden Room is such an overwhelming film - both visually & sonically - that you may find yourself forgetting about the plot and just zoning out to the moving images on the screen in front of you. Even the ensemble cast is a little overwhelming. While there are a handful of consistent characters that we do follow from beginning to end, there are also familiar faces that appear out of nowhere for a few minutes and then they disappear for the rest of the film (I while say that Maddin does tie all the characters together in the end). 

Side note - it's always a pleasure to see Adele Haenel in anything even if it is a non-speaking role.

This is an experimental feature so don't expect everything to feel polished or "safe". If you appreciate silent film, the ambiguous moments of a film like Clean, Shaven along with obscure Kids In The Hall sketches - then this is a movie for you.

KILLER'S KISS

Not to repeat some of what I already wrote for the pink smoke, but there's nothing worse than a blind/slightly uninformed Stanley Kubrick fan. Don't get me wrong, he's quietly one of my all-time favorite filmmakers but I at least know why that is and I can talk about/praise his work beyond 2001 & A Clockwork Orange (I say "quietly" because at this point, who doesn't consider Stanley Kubrick one of their all-time favorites?? And the minute I say he is one of my favorite filmmakers my insecure side kicks in and I fear I'll get grouped in with a million other mindless cinephiles who praise his movies because they feel they have to).
There's folks out there who feel he's never made a bad film which is a clear indication to me that they've never actually seen Killer's Kiss or sat through Barry Lyndon in its entirety.
I guess Barry Lyndon isn't completely bad. It's just painfully boring. But Killer's Kiss is kind of bad (and if it's not bad it's one or two tiers away from bad). But because it's an early film that Kubrick didn't distance himself from (like Fear & Desire), certain folks treat it like it’s the holy grail of early masterworks.
Killer's Kiss was initially met with mixed reviews but almost 60 years later it sits on rotten tomatoes with an 84% fresh rating. Sorry but this is hardly a B-grade film (I have additional issues with this rating when modern noirs like Demonlover & Fear X sit with a 49% & 58%, respectively).
Killer's Kiss is just another noir/love triangle story from the mid-1950's centered around a beautiful woman, a gangster and a boxer (with an incredibly awkward climatic fight scene between our protagonist boxer and antagonistic gangster where they frantically swing axes & mannequin limbs at each other while trying not to fall over).

The fact that people try to defend this film makes me want to dislike it more than I should (I once saw The Killing at IFC with one of the most pretentious repertory crowds who treated it like some kind of gem. I mean seriously, am I missing something?) Stanley Kubrick's “second debut”/sophomore feature always gets a pass with movie fans. He hadn't completely found his footing as a director yet (that's putting it lightly) or The movie really shouldn't count in his filmography when you really think about it (yes it should). It's like when people try to defend Interstellar's lukewarm reception by comparing it to 2001 (no, dude, people didn't even like 2001 at first but they finally came around. The same thing is gonna happen with Interstellar. Just watch.)

And hey, you could very well take a lot of what I'm saying and turn it around on me. Some of my personal favorite films are early works like Eraserhead & Shadows. I know plenty people who consider those films to be sloppy amateurish casualties of a limited budget. But what films like Eraserhead & Shadows lack in craft or budget, they make up for in subject matter (Shadows) or the fact that there was an honest attempt at tackling a serious subject, like man’s fear of fatherhood in Eraserhead, in a somewhat abstract way. Killer's Kiss is no different from the hundred other old timey noirs that play on AMC on a random Sunday afternoon.

Killer's Kiss / Maniac

This mild bashing of Kubrick's sophomore feature might seem a little random but in the last few years I've heard & read too many variations of the same complaints about how Eyes Wide Shut ruined Stanley's previously perfect filmography. That's hardly the case. Eyes Wide Shut certainly has its problems but at the same time I'd watch Eyes Wide Shut on a 24-hour loop over another screening of The Killing (I've also been sitting on a review of Renoir's Rules Of The Game for over four years with the hopes that John & Chris will do another installment of Old Movies Suck at the pink smoke. So until that happens I have to fire shots at another "old" film that gets a lot of undeserved praise).
My gripe with people's acceptance of Killer's Kiss isn't that much different from Monte Hellman's Road To Nowhere - another subpar movie that gets a pass because it's directed by a legendary veteran filmmaker (read my rant concerning Hellman's Road To Nowhere and the momentary back-and-forth it brought on between myself and the film's producer).

To be fair, Killer's Kiss did plant the seeds for what eventually became The Killing (another crime noir centered around dames, gangsters & sports) and it did inspire some imagery in recent films that I do kind of enjoy, so I can't completely dismiss it. Only in the last decade or so has The Killing been put on the same pedestal as some of Kubrick's other 2nd tier classics like Paths Of Glory.

Imagine if Stanley Kubrick revisited the noir genre after finding his signature style of bold colors, polarizing hallway shots and cryptic stares. All that time & energy spent on Barry Lyndon & the second half of Full Metal Jacket could have been used on a super cool stylized crime flick (admit it, a lot of you zone out, lose interest and start surfing the internet after Vincent D'Onofrio's "Private Pile" makes his exit in Full Metal Jacket).
I guess we have to take Nicolas Winding Refn's movies as conciliation...

CLOUDS OF SILS MARIA: IRMA VEP PART DEUX

Writing about Olivier Assayas' latest film is going to be a little difficult because on some level I've already written about it in the form of Portrait Of The Artist (I even mention Assayas' filmography quite a bit throughout the review). I don't like repeating myself in write-ups but it's hard not too as both Portrait & Clouds Of Sils Maria mesh fiction & non-fiction in an almost identical way (some of the actors in both films play slightly fictionalized versions of themselves).
In Clouds Of Sils Maria Juliette Binoche plays an accomplished veteran actress ("Maria Enders") with a resume that stretches from big budget mainstream movies to foreign arthouse films. Sounds a bit like Juliette Binoche's actual career, doesn't it? Not only is Binoche a mainstay in the films of arthouse heavyweights like Michael Haneke & Leos Carax, but she's also appeared in more commercial films like Dan In Real Life & Godzilla. 
Chloe Moretz also plays a character in Clouds ("Jo-Ann Ellis") that's somewhat similar to her real self - a young up & coming actress that's mostly known for popular studio films & tween movies (as we all know, Moretz is known for her roles in films like 500 Days Of Summer, Kickass and the recent Carrie remake).
The only (main) actress in Clouds Of Sils Maria that doesn't play a fictionalized version of her real self is Kristen Stewart. Instead, she plays Maria's dedicated personal assistant "Valentine". Valentine does more than just fetch coffee and set-up interviews for Maria. They have a bond with each other. They travel together, know each other in & out and are friends on some level. A large majority of Clouds focuses on the unique relationship between Maria & Valentine. They're spiritually connected in the same way "Betty" (Naomi Watts) & "Diane" (Laura Herring) were in Mulholland Drive or "Alma" (Bibi Anderson) & "Elisabet" (Liv Ullman) in Persona. In the opening scene of Clouds Of Sils Maria we're actually introduced to Maria through Valentine...

The film starts with Maria on her way to Switzerland to accept an award on behalf of her mentor and frequent collaborator; "Wilhelm Melchior" - a legendary author, playwright & filmmaker (Maria & Wilhelm are not only frequent collaborators in both film & theater, but they've been close personal friends for more than two decades). Naturally Maria is making this journey with her assistant Valentine who spends her time juggling calls and fanning fires so Maria can rest and get away from Hollywood for a few days. However Wilhelm unexpectedly passes away right before the award ceremony.
In addition to dealing with the loss of her friend/mentor, Maria is going through an ugly divorce, she's prepping for her latest role and is also having a difficult time aging (she becomes fascinated by her younger co-star Jo-Ann who will be reviving a role that Maria played when she was 18). All of this obviously makes her insecure & vulnerable and for the rest of the film we watch Maria try to hold it together (imagine a more toned down version of Black Swan with elements of Cassavetes' Opening Night).

There are already multiple layers to Clouds Of Sils Maria within the first 10-15 minutes but that doesn't stop Assayas from adding on as the film progresses. Some of you that aren't too familiar with (modern) French cinema may not catch this, but the (fictitious) relationship between Maria and Wilhelm is very similar to the (real) relationship between actress Sandrine Bonnaire & director Maurice Pialat. Both relationships revolve around the mentorship/frequent collaborations between an older director/father figure and a younger actress. In interviews, Sandrine, who acted in three of Pialat's best films, said she always looked at him like a father figure. In Clouds, Maria never mentions her actual father, but she always speaks of Wilhelm as if he's her actual father.

Sandrine Bonnaire & Maurice Pialat in A Nos Amours

Not that it takes away from the film, but being a cinephile/movie nerd makes this even more enjoyable (just read back the wide range of movies I was able to name-drop through the course of this review). If you have a wide appreciation for all aspects of cinema you'll more than likely fall in love with Clouds Of Sils Maria as there's references to the X-Men films & Harrison Ford to experimental arthouse cinema.

The theme of "the aging actress" in Clouds Of Sils Maria also serves as a nice companion to Patricia Arquette's journey that many of us followed last year with Boyhood. Little bits of reality seeping in to fictional stories seems to be the theme in 2015 so far. This is obviously something a few filmmakers touched on last year with Birdman, Top 5 & Chef, but it's even more prominent this year. Besides Clouds Of Sils Maria & Portrait Of The Artist, I felt that Gerard Depardieu put real pieces of himself in to the character he played in Welcome To New York. And personally, I thought Viggo Mortensen's role in Jauja was an existential look at aging as well as a callback to all the physically demanding roles that brought him to prominence in the last 14 years or so (A History Of Violence, The Road, Hidalgo, Eastern Promises, LOTR). As an actor in his mid/late 50's, I'm not sure how many naturally physically demanding roles he has left in him without the help of CGI, lots of editing (like in the case of The Expendables) or extensive stunt double work (not to say those things haven't already been incorporated in some of Viggo's performances, but everything he does physically in front of the camera feels like it's all him).

I also found it peculiar that even though Clouds is partially about aging women in film, the (aging) character Binoche plays is actually 11 years younger than she is in real life (Maria is 40 while Binoche is really 51). I don't think Assayas is sexist or has something against older actresses like so many other filmmakers & producers in the movie biz (in fact, I think he's trying to call a lot of those sexist issues out) but it's still interesting that even though his latest film is about aging gracefully, the lead actress still had to portray a younger age.

Style-wise, Clouds Of Sils Maria feels like an extension of the obvious Irma Vep, but it also feels like Assayas combined the ambiance from his chaotic films (Demonlover, Boarding Gate & Carlos) with his more subtle/toned-down work (Summer Hours, Late August Early September & Something In The Air). He also incorporates some interesting editing techniques that I've never seen him use before. Some of the transitions between scenes slowly blend in to one another like in Kubrick's The Shining or Todd Haynes' Safe. Then other moments end abruptly out of nowhere almost in mid-conversation. And like the second half of Demonlover & Irma Vep, there are elements within Clouds Of Sils Maria that make absolutely no sense but for some reason we kind of accept it (like the sudden disappearance of one of the main billed characters 3/4 in to the movie).
It shouldn't go unmentioned how surprisingly good Kristen Stewart is in this. Yes, I can be a judgemental snob at times. When I heard that Kristen Stewart (and Chloe Moretz) were going to costar in Assayas' latest film I turned my nose up in suspicion. But I'm willing to admit when I'm wrong. She, along with Moretz, did a fine job.


I'm writing this review after having seen this movie less 48 hours ago so my thoughts could be a little tainted. Maybe I'm just excited having watched one of the few films from this year so far that wasn't lackluster, underwhelming or just "ok", but Olivier Assayas, along with Mike Leigh, might be my two personal favorite filmmakers working right now. For a while it used to be Denis & Haneke, but between Bastard (which I still like, but is a bit of a head-scratcher, and not for entirely good reasons) and Amour (which I've been losing excitement for over the last three years), I'm a little conflicted with their work. I like that Michael Haneke made Amour because I wasn't sure if he actually had a heart, and Bastards was kind of a return to Claire Denis' more aggressive side that I hadn't seen since Trouble Every Day. But I haven't felt the urge to revisit either of those films. Assayas (and Leigh) never leave me completely disappointed or feeling empty. Even Assayas' recent films that I'm conflicted about (Carlos) or not totally in love with (Something In The Air) still leave me with plenty to talk about.
Clouds Of Sils Maria is a multi-layered journey about aging, cinema & identity that's both unique & slightly original as well as a callback to some of the films I've already mentioned (Mulholland Drive, Persona, Irma Vep, Demonlover, etc).

Now that Assayas has worked with even more known/"mainstream" actresses in a successful film, perhaps this will open the door for Assayas to make even more mainstream/studio films in the U.S. (he received a golden globe nomination with Carlos and between Demonlover & Boarding Gate, he's worked with more universally known actors like Michael Madsen, Chloe Sevigny and even Gina Gershon for whatever that's worth). Not that it matters as Olivier Assayas is already an accomplished director, but mainstream American cinema could use a director like Assayas to add some variety to the mostly stale pot that we have today.

WILD CANARIES (CutPrintFilm.COM)

check out my review of Lawrence Levine's Wild Canaries over at Cutprintfilm.com

IT FELT LIKE LOVE

Eliza Hitman's debut feature is a success in my eyes because even though I was exposed to a world I obviously know nothing about (the world of a 14 year old girl) I still left the theater having fully enjoyed what I saw (coincidentally, I bumped in to one of the film's editors, filmmaker Scott Cummings, after leaving the theater the night I watched It Felt Like Love). There's so many moments in this movie that I'm sure came from a very real place that I could never personally relate too, yet I found myself fully engaged in everything. I couldn't help but wonder if the women close to me in my own personal life had some of the same experiences as Lila (the film's protagonist) when they were younger. I don't necessarily want to think about younger versions of my female friends, fiancée or little sisters of close friends I watched grow up over the years in certain particular situations as Lila, but I couldn't really help it - this movie just kinda naturally brought up all these thoughts inside me. I'm sure if I had a sister I would've felt even stronger about this movie.
As I mentioned in my review of Boyhood (another coming of age story from this year) - It Felt Like Love is definitely a film with some gender specific issues having to do with females, but it can obviously be enjoyed by any gender. Actually I think this is something that fathers, especially those with daughters, might want to watch.

In the film we follow "Lila" - a 14 year old girl who feels inexperienced in the ways of the opposite sex, especially when compared to her best friend "Chiara". Chirara isn't portrayed as "easy" in any way, but she definitely has a little more experience than Lila does (she goes through a couple of boyfriends through the course of the film). Eventually Lila becomes fixated on an older boy ("Sammy") who doesn't exactly share the same feelings towards her. The more she pursues Sammy the more agitated & aggressive he becomes to the point where Lila finds herself in a very vulnerable spot. 

We also get a glimpse in to Lila's home life. Her mother recently passed away and she's raised by her single father (it should be noted that there are very few adult characters in this movie). 

I haven't seen too many (realistic) young vulnerable female characters in recent years like Lila. American cinema definitely needed this. I always felt the "coming of age" genre was a bit shaky/inconsistent with American filmmakers. Call me cliche, pretentious, whatever... but I've always looked at French cinema as setting the standard for good/great modern coming of age stories on the big screen (A Nos Amours, US Go Home, Fat Girl, Goodbye My First Love, Blue Is The Warmest Color, etc). Obviously there's exceptions like Todd Solondz, (early) David Gordon Green and a few others, but there's just a little too much quirkiness & cuteness with American youth on the big screen (and when things aren't cute & quirky, we get forced realism). I think young American girls are sometimes treated too much like precious caricatures to the point where it becomes unrealistic and a lil' disrespectful.

On a side note - It was refreshing to see a prominent Brooklyn-based movie set outside of areas like williamsburg, park slope, bed-stuy or flatbush that doesn't strictly focus on things like 20-something year old hipsters having unimportant relationship problems and/or gentrification. When's the last time we got a popular film set in Brooklyn neighborhoods like Gravesend or Sheepshead Bay?

A few months back, Indiewire ran an interesting article that drew a comparison between It Felt Like Love & Nymphomaniac (two coming of age tales with young female protagonists). But in all honesty I didn't really find young Joe (Nymphomaniac) as interesting as Lila. I thought there was a little bit more depth to Lila and she wasn't surrounded by as many frustrating supporting characters as Joe was in Nymphomaniac. I understood Indiewire's comparison on the surface, but when you dig a little deeper you'll see that both films are quite different.

I'm sure IFLL is also bound to draw some comparison to other stuff like The Virgin Suicides or Goodbye My First Love but I was mostly reminded of Welcome To The Dollhouse more than anything else. That's not to say It Felt Like Love was trying to be like or copy Dollhouse. Both films stand alone on their own and are pretty different. It's just that both stories focus on young girls dealing with some of the same issues shown in a more realistic light: post-puberty, having a serious crush on an older boy, close friends becoming distant, making the transition from jr. high to high school, etc. Dawn (Dollhouse) is far more unpopular and catches way more shit than Lila (IFLL) and their family dynamics are different, but they're both ignored, looked over and/or treated like shit by older boys they're attracted too. 

Some other blaring differences between the two films are 1). It Felt like Love has a far more serious tone. Sure there's some awkward moments that might make you laugh or snicker, but at the end of the day it's a drama whereas Dollhouse is a quirky dark comedy.

2). Each film speaks to a different generation in my opinion. Dollhouse represents Generation Y/millennials while It Felt Like Love is, in my opinion, a film for Generation Z - a generation of kids who grew up with smart phones, tablets, social media & just easier access to all kinds of information from an early age. The teenage characters in IFLL aren't exactly zombies attached to their phones 24/7, but their faces are still in their phones from time to time, and social media does play a minor part in the story (I know people of all ages are slaves to their smart phones, but generation Z is the first demographic to be introduced to those kinds of devices at such a young age).

It Felt Like Love is definitely in my top 5 of 2014 so far along with Boyhood, Stranger By The Lake The Unknown Known & Guardians Of The Galaxy. It's currently streaming on Netflix so I highly recommend checking it out.

A TOUCH OF SIN

If you were to watch a montage of only the violent parts from A Touch Of Sin you might think it was something along the lines of Death Wish or Taxi Driver. In the opening moments of the film, one of the four main characters rapidly shoots a gang of hatchet-wielding thugs without blinking an eye as if he were Bernard Goetz. Later on in the film, another one of the main characters is pushed over the edge, like Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver, and goes on a shooting spree where almost no one in his path is spared. But A Touch Of Sin is hardly just a shoot 'em up style movie. It's an anthology film about corruption, greed, exploitation, and the misuse of power within modern day China. Director Jia Zhangke just uses the type of violence found in a Takeshi Kitano film as a way to get our attention. Like The Battle Of Algiers, Z & Carlos before it, A Touch Of Sin is another layered socio-political story with plenty of bloodshed (I also wouldn't be surprised if Haneke's 71 Fragments Of Chronology Of Chance was a major influence on this given the similar subject matter, tone & structure of both films). 

I admit that I slept on A Touch Of Sin last year. On paper it didn't look that appealing - A "message movie" where various characters are all in some way connected to one another? I hate to come off like a snob but that really sounded like something I'd already seen a million times in the 90's alone. I also read a few reviews that compared A Touch Of Sin to the work of Tarantino (an instant turnoff for me these days). But I should have known that any modern Asian movie with a touch of violence is automatically going to draw some comparison to Tarantino in the same way that anything "weird" or "strange" is going to get compared to David Lynch. Step your game up movie critics!

This turned out to be one of the best movies of last year that I didn't end up seeing until this year (along with Thomas Vinterberg's The Hunt).

A Touch Of Sin is broken up in to four separate stories...

In the first story we follow "Dahai" - A miner who’s grown beyond frustrated with his employers exploiting him & his fellow co-workers. After taking a beating that leaves him in the hospital, courtesy of the people he works for, Dahai decides to take vengeance with a shotgun...
The second story focuses on "Zhou" - a mysterious migrant worker/vigilante who has a fascination with guns & violence.
Story #3 follows "Xiao Yu" - a receptionist at a massage parlor/bathhouse who’s beaten and almost raped until she finally defends herself.
The final story is about a teenager, "Xioa Hui", who quits his job at a sweatshop in order to work in a hotel (which is really a front for an upscale brothel) but he ultimately succumbs to the pressure of having to support his mother & siblings.

Clockwise from top left: Stories Dahai, Zhou, Xiao Yu & Xiao Hui

The four stories that make up A Touch Of Sin are somewhat connected, but it’s not what you think. The characters don’t step out of one story and cross paths with a character from another story like in Pulp Fiction, Happiness or Magnolia. Instead, Jia Zhangke makes spiritual connections between his characters. In the first story, there's a seemingly random scene of a man whipping a horse repeatedly on the side of a road which is mirrored later on in the third story where another man repeatedly beats a woman with a wad of cash over & over in the same manner. Both scenes eventually end in explosive violence. In the fourth story, we see the young protagonist take the train from one town to another in order to find a new job, while in the previous story; one of the supporting characters boards another train on the same railway that eventually has a derailment. And as I said earlier, the main characters in the first & second stories (who are the only two main characters to share minor screen time together) go on shooting sprees for various reasons. Social media & the sex industry are also recurring elements throughout the film and all four main characters are a part of the Chinese working class.

Some of the murders in A Touch Of Sin may seem random & senseless at first but it all serves a purpose at the end of the day. For a moment I found myself questioning why Jia Zhangke makes violence the final outcome for all of his characters. I understand there are cases where people feel that their backs are against the wall and have no more options, but resorting to randomly shooting (and stabbing) people seemed a bit over the top. Did he just not know how to write a good script and in order to make up for it he just threw in random moments of violence?

After the recent news of the retired Florida cop shooting a man in a movie theater over an argument about texting, I immediately thought about my love for the scene in Bobcat Goldthwait's God Bless America where the two main vigilantes shoot up a movie theater because the audience was acting unruly, and I felt a little guilty for enjoying that. Violence in film has become a mirror to what’s going on in real life now more than ever and it's honestly turning me off. But then I quickly realized that's just it - A Touch Of Sin is in fact a mirror of what’s going in the world and it needed to be made. I eventually came to discover that all four stories are based on true events ripped from the headlines of various Chinese news reports. With the exception of our mysterious central figure from the second story, all of our main characters have truly reached their boiling point and see no other choice but to resort to violence (or suicide in the case of one of them). If two men are forcing you to have sex when you don't want too, like in the case of the third story, and no one is around to help, you really have no choice but to take matters in to your own hands. If you're just a teenager (which is essentially still just a kid) faced with the pressure of supporting not only yourself, but your demanding mother back home, and you make very little money to begin with, you're eventually going to lose hope like the teenage protagonist in the fourth story.

the have-nots in A Touch Of Sin

Jia Zhangke steers clear of the Dardenne Brothers approach in exploring the poor and/or working class by not making all the characters out to be perfect, angelic do-gooders who just get shit on (we'll actually be getting in to the Dardenne brothers next month). These are real people who make poor choices, are dislikeable and sometimes do dishonest things. Dahai, although 100% on point with his frustration of being exploited, is very stubborn & somewhat unpleasant, while Xiao Yu is having an affair with a man knowing that he's married. But at the end of the day we still sympathize with these people. This is something I wish Ryan Coogler did more with Oscar Grant in Fruitvale Station. True, we saw an imperfect side to him, but overall, Grant's portrayal still felt a little a too perfect to the point where it taints the atrocity that actually happened to him.

Parts of this film are a tad bit film schoolish and some people might find certain scenes to be random for the sake of being random, but it’s the overall picture Jia Zhangke paints that makes A Touch Of Sin so great. It’s a violent, heartbreaking & complex story. There's multiple scenes that'll have you either choked up, enraged or both (the scene of Xiao Hui getting chewed out by his mother over the phone for not earning enough money is enough to make you wanna cry).
One might think A Touch Of Sin is just a reflection of Chinese society (and it is for the most part) but given the world's relationship with China (the products we all use in our daily lives that come from over there), to the ridiculous amount of gun violence plaguing America these days, this is a film anyone from any culture could appreciate.
Money, power, greed, materialism & corruption were all huge themes in cinema last year (spilling over in to this year) with films like The Wolf Of Wall Street, Pain & Gain, Spring Breakers & American Hustle. A Touch Of Sin fits right in with those films but what also sets it apart is that Zhangke actually shines a light on and gives a voice to the exploited & less fortunate. While the aforementioned films only focused on the exploiters & hustlers, A Touch Of Sin actually focuses on the have-nots. If anything, this is the ant-Wolf Of Wall Street. There's a quick scene towards the end of Scorsese's latest film were agent Denham (the FBI agent who busts Jordan Belfort) rides the subway and we get a glimpse of all the every day, working class and/or poor people who are either director or indirectly affected by those abusive people in power that Belfort essentially represents. I found this to be mildly insulting because in a 3+ hour film, we only got about 20-30 seconds of light shed on the struggling people of America while the rest of the film was dedicated to the crazy antics of these glutenous rich people who abuse their power. Jia Zhangke does the opposite and gives the powerless people a voice.

MANDERLAY: LARS UNCHAINED...

I'm a little embarrassed to say this, but I was pretty intrigued by Manderlay when I was younger. I never thought it was a great film but I remember thinking there was something interesting about it in all of it's heavy-handedness, but not so much anymore...

I used to take Lars Von Trier way more seriously than I think I was supposed to. But now that I've read enough books on the man, kept up with his antics over the years and have re-watched everything he's done over & over, I honestly get that he's trying to be a button-pushing provocateur over everything else (Dancer In The Dark, Breaking The Waves, parts of Melancholia and the final moments of The Idiots being the exceptions) and for whatever reason; I dig that about him. It's in my newfound understanding of Von Trier that I've come to respect him and enjoy his work even more. I just wish more people shared my way of thinking about him. Anyone who STILL gets frustrated over a Lars Von Trier movie in 2014 deserves the aneurysm that they're giving themselves when they get all worked up at the sound of his name. It's like people who saw Terrence Malick's To The Wonder and took the time to write super long scathing reviews of the film or go on verbal rants about how stupid, weird & artsy it is. I personally love Malick's latest work but I can understand if someone were to not like it or brush it aside. But some people's reaction to that film were as if it was his debut and they had no idea that Tree Of Life, The New World & The Thin Red Line existed (sorry, I refuse to believe anyone stumbled upon To The Wonder without knowing about Tree Of Life. You knew what you were getting in to). It's the same thing with Von Trier's recent work. Sure, it's understandable that something like Antichrist would cause the stir that it did given certain scenes and how women are presented in it. But at the same time, were those frustrated critics & cinephiles that were familiar with his work unaware of the abuse that Nicole Kidman & Emily Watson took in the last half of Breaking The Waves & Dogville, respectively? What about Bjork's body just dangling from the noose at the end of Dancer In The Dark? Was it really that shocking to see how Von Trier handled his female character in Antichrist based on his previous two decades of work? To be honest, LvT haters make me like him even more. I liken him to that of a heel wrestler. He's essentially a troll. But what's so strange is that he's a talented troll. When it comes to the technical aspects of filmmaking (which is important no matter how you look at it), having an understanding of the language of cinema and getting excellent performances out of his actors (Emily Watson in Breaking The Waves, Bjork in Dancer In The Dark, Charlotte Gainsbourg in Antichrist, etc); I'll put Lars up against your favorite filmmaker any day of the week from Alfonso Cuaron to Christopher Nolan (yeah, I said it).

As you can see I have no problem defending LvT as a filmmaker but unfortunately Manderlay is something I can't get behind no matter how many nuggets of truth or social commentary it contains.

Top row: Confederate States Of America / Cache
Bottom: Django Unchained / 12 Years A Slave

Because of recent films like Django Unchained, 12 Years A Slave & elements of The Butler, slavery & racism has suddenly become a hot topic in cinema again. But this is an echo of 2005 when the subject of racial guilt became a minor deal within indie/art house cinema all of a sudden. You had Cache (one of the greatest modern films ever made), Confederate States Of America (one of the most eye-rolling, almost unnecessary films ever made) and Manderlay, which is somewhere in the middle of those two films although it treads closer to Confederate States Of America. Cache is a film about everything from racism being swept under the rug in Europe to chickens coming home to roost while Confederate States Of America (produced by Spike Lee) is a sort of hybrid mockumentary/fiction story about a modern day America had the confederacy won the civil war. Two out of those three films dealt with slavery (Manderlay & Confederate States) and all three were about racism, guilt and atrocities committed against people of color (I can’t exactly group the Algerian characters from Cache in with the African American characters from Manderlay & Confederate States Of America, but they’re all descendants from Africa in some shape or form so, close enough…). Strangely enough, both Manderlay & Confederate States Of America played at the IFC Center around the same time if I'm not mistaken...

I’ve eluded to my extremely uncomfortable experience watching Manderlay at IFC in previous entries, but allow me to explain in full now that we're actually talking about it...

As I sat watching this in a theater made up of mostly white people, I found myself becoming more & more uncomfortable as everyone around me chuckled & laughed out loud at scenes I honestly didn’t find to be funny as a black person. Not only was I uncomfortable, but I found myself almost embarrassed for a lot of the white audience members because a lot of their laughter was clearly their way of dealing with the discomfort they felt while watching Manderlay. Don’t get me wrong, there are some legitimate humorous moments in the film, but overall there was WAY too much laughter about something having to do with slavery. 

Manderlay is ultimately a failure but at the same time, there is still a reason I bought the DVD at full price and end up talking about it from time to time at length with equal minded friends. I even devoted some time to write about it on here when I could be writing about something else...

Shot in the same stage play style as its predecessor; Dogville, Manderlay is the kind of film where if you were to stumble upon it in the middle, you’d find yourself asking; “whoa, what am I watching here?”

Black face in Manderlay

Lars touches on the (tired) taboo's of interracial relationships in Manderlay

Strange Fruit.

Going back to my troll comment from earlier; the whole motivation behind Lars Von Trier making his Grace/America Trilogy, made up of Dogville, Manderlay and a not yet made third part, was to be just that - a troll. He just wanted to challenge/annoy Americans after the criticism he faced for Dancer In The Dark. In Dogville he criticized the immigration system in America (no matter how much he denies this) while Manderlay is about race issues concerning black people in America.

In Manderlay, we pick up with the Grace character following the events of Dogville. This time around Bryce Dallas Howard takes up the role of Grace instead of Nicole Kidman (John Hurt does return as the film's narrator). Set in the early 1930's, Grace travels with her mobster father (played by Willem Dafoe this time instead of James Caan) and his henchmen through the deep south. In their travels they eventually come across a plantation ("Manderlay") that still practices slavery decades after it's been abolished in America. Apparently this was a deep backwoods southern region where they somehow kept the news of slavery being abolished a secret. Sounds a little far-fetched, I know. But I can let that go. It makes for an interesting story. Grace, along with her father’s henchmen, takes it upon herself to free the slaves but given their institutionalized mindset, they can’t function as free people. Against her father’s wishes, Grace stays back in an effort to help the freed slaves and of course by the end of the film she incidentally becomes the new defacto "master" which is the exact opposite of what she was trying to do in the first place. It's also revealed at the end of the film that one of the elder slaves (played by Danny Glover) is a bit more sinister than what we thought. It's kind of a shame Glover wasted such a good performance on this overall mess of a film. 

Manderlay is a paradox because Grace is self-righteous & obnoxious, yet so is the overall message of this film. Von Trier tries to criticize the Grace character in all of her self-righteousness & know-it-allism in her mission to help the slaves not realizing that Grace is actually a mirror of Von Trier himself in making Manderlay. Lars points his finger at America and criticizes the racism that exists in this country (which it certainly does exist) but he has yet to even step foot on American soil. I'm not saying that he can't have an opinion on racism in America (or even make a movie about it) but for him to go as far as he did with Manderlay without ever witnessing it firsthand is a little strange to me. How could this be truly authentic? Plus, Von Trier is pretty much trying to go out of his way to blame all white people for the plight of black people in America and its SOOO much more complicated than how he presents it. He simplifies such a complex issue (racism) to the point where it becomes insulting. In the final moments of Manderlay, one of the slaves, played by Claire Denis regular; Isaach De Bankole, practically looks in to the camera and says to Grace; "YOU made us this way." I have two major problems with that. One, it's as if Debankole is speaking for all black people (myself included) as if we're one like-minded group of people who all think the same and blame the same. My other issue with that statement is, like I said earlier, it's the biggest oversimplification of what's probably the most complex issue in the world, yet Von Trier manages to whittle it down into a single phrase.

Recently a good friend of mine (Mtume Gant of the site; Alter Eye) offered an interesting perspective on Haneke's Cache which I actually feel applies more to Manderlay. On the subject of Cache, a film we don't exactly see eye-to-eye on, he felt that at the end of the day Cache was about racism & people of color, but it was made by white people and for white people only. I understand that take on it, but in my opinion, Cache is the only kind of film Michael Haneke could make. Had he made that kind of film from the perspective of the Algerian characters in Cache, I feel it would have been out of line & out of place. Cache is told from the perspective of a white European male because Haneke himself is a white European male. If you're going to make an authentic film about racism, it's potentially dangerous to take on the perspective of a black person when you've never walked in their shoes (not saying it can't be done, but it is risky). Even the few parts of Manderlay where Von Trier is on point with his social commentary, I can’t help but feel like it isn’t his place to say anything given he’s spent ZERO time around African Americans outside of a movie shoot and has yet to step foot in a highly populated black area in America. And to add an extra layer to things, Manderlay is the kind of film where mostly white intellectuals will talk about this among themselves without knowing or wanting to know a black person’s opinion on it.

And lets be clear – had a black person made this very exact same film, I still would have had problems with it…

I’m a little disappointed that Lars’ one & only film to date that tackles race head-on turned out to be this. He’s handled minor racial issues in the past (on & off camera) in a way that I’ve respected. The character that Catherine Deneuve plays in Dancer In The Dark was originally supposed to be a black woman but Lars decided to not add to another long list of black supporting, sidekick female characters so he made her white instead (as strange as that sounds, that’s how I personally prefer more filmmakers handle things instead of trying to please black audiences by throwing in an under-developed black character in an effort to make things “diverse”).
I always found it odd that the biggest controversy from the production of Manderlay was John C. Reilly walking off set in protest due to a donkey being killed for a particular scene. 

How were there no reports of racial tension or inner turmoil among the director and his mostly black cast given the subject matter & tone of Manderlay?
This almost feels like what a movie about slavery would be had it been produced by Vice Magazine. Manderlay also suffers from some of the same issues as Django Unchained - another film centered around slavery with a heavy tone of white guilt (conveyed mostly through the Dr. Schultz character) where the white characters are more interesting & complex than the black (MAIN) characters (Danny Glover's performance being the exception). I still place Manderlay above a film like Django but that’s almost like picking the lesser of the two evils. Although this movie is ultimately a failure/mess, I still think it should be seen by anyone with an interest in race issues or the films of Lars Von Trier.
I love Lars to death but I don't know if it’s possible to have something backfire in your face as bad as Manderlay did.

THE FATHER OF MY CHILDREN: A LOVE LETTER TO AN UNSUNG HERO OF ART HOUSE CINEMA...

Had I known this was loosely based on the life of Humbert Balsan, the French film producer & occasional actor who committed suicide back in 2005, I would have rushed to see this a few years back when it played at IFC. Anyone can appreciate, understand or enjoy The Father Of My Children as its about depression & workaholism which are two things that affect just about everyone in some way or another, but you kinda have to know who Balsan was and what he did in order to really feel the full impact of this film. He indirectly affected the lives of so many cinephiles, like myself, who appreciate seeing indie, foreign, art house & abstract cinema on the big screen. Hes been described as a warrior & pioneer in the world of art house cinema when it came to getting financing for films that most people would consider pointless because they were "artsy" or couldn't generate money. I first learned about Balsan while reading up on Lars Von Trier's Manderlay back in 2006 (one of the last films he produced). After clicking a few external links and doing a little bit of research I came to find out that he not only produced films for Claire Denis (The Intruder) & James Ivory (Jefferson In Paris) but he also maintained a relationship with filmmakers like Robert Bresson & Sam Fuller. I recently discovered he also produced films for Jacques Rivette & Jean-Louis Trintignant (co-star of Haneke's Amour). Then come to find out I'd been looking at him on my TV screen for years as an actor, most notably in Bresson's Lancelot Du Lac, without even knowing it...

Balsan (right) in Bresson's Lancelot Du Lac (1974)

His life is a testament to how amazing cinema can be and how connected & intertwined it often is which makes me sad because I have this feeling he didn't realize all the things he accomplished. His life was not that much different than that of a guy like Tony Wilson (co-founder of Factory records who signed groups like Joy Division and played a major role in the Manchester music scene). The Father Of My Children's existence is more important than some may realize. Had this film not been made many people wouldn't know how important of a figure Balsan was. His legacy would have been downplayed and only those close to him would know the kind of person he was. Not that there's anything wrong with that but he seemed like a great human being, from what I've read, whose story deserves to be told.

The more you read about cinema the more you learn about the great & selfless things that sometimes go on behind the scenes. The movie industry is obviously known for being cut throat & shady but there are some great little behind the scenes stories that many people don't know about like; Wim Wenders giving Jim Jarmusch film so he could make Stranger Than Paradise in to a feature length film, Monty Montgomery (the cowboy in Mulholland Drive) downplaying his role in the creation of Twin Peaks, John Cassavetes setting up a meeting with Gordon Parks and some movie executives so Parks could make The Learning Tree (Cassavetes never took credit for helping Parks get his foot in the door) or Shirley Clarke lending John Cassavetes her camera equipment so he could make his first film. The event's in Humbert Balsan's life were not that much different than the examples I just gave you. Movie producers sometimes get a bad wrap as being money hungry control freaks without any understanding about the art of cinema. You hear horror stories of producers re-editing films behind a directors back or screwing people over for money but you don't always hear about the Ted Hopes, Bingham Rays & Humbert Balsans.

There is a scene in The Father Of My Children where the main character; Gregoire, based on Balsan, is urged to sell his entire back catalog of films in order to get money he desperately needs to stay afloat yet he replies: its a non-question. I wont sell my catalog. losing it would mean I did all this for nothing. Moments later hes asked why he works with a particular artsy filmmaker who has a reputation for being difficult (I'm pretty sure is supposed to be loosely based on Lars Von Trier) Gregoire casually replies: I like his films. Everyone turned him down.
That's the beauty about the main character in this film - Hes a movie producer with integrity who actually loves cinema and isn't just in it for the money.

Balsan apparently suffered from depression and I'm sure his production company going under didn't help things. His life makes you think of so many struggling independent artists (not just in film) who give so much of themselves to their craft and get nothing or very little in return. That could drain someone after a while and make them wanna give up. You start to question what you do and wonder if you're putting all this energy in to something for nothing. Imagine if you were in Humbert Balsan's shoes - you've been a movie producer for 25 years and all you have to show for is bankruptcy and a failing production company. That's enough to make anyone depressed. It goes without saying that quite a few art house, foreign & indie filmmakers come from wealthy families so weather or not their films make money is irrelevant. But there are those struggling filmmakers out there who do need to make a living off of a craft they love that may not be "profitable" or interesting to mainstream audiences (like many of the films Balsan produced). I don't know about you all but its pretty damn heartbreaking when a talented artist cant make a living off of what their good at.

I don't know what kind of relationship director Mia Hansen-Love had with Balsan or the impact he had on her life but it must have been pretty special because her sophomore film essentially plays out like a sweet love letter to the late producer. Maybe they didn't know each other at all and Hansen is just giving praise to a producer who made it possible for her to make the kind of films she makes. In The Father Of My Children Louis-Do de Lencqueasing plays Gregoire - a workaholic movie producer and family man. He's smooth, calm and soft spoken. Unlike other workaholic characters we often see in movies Gregoire is actually a good father and tries his best to be there for his wife and children (one of which is played by Lencqueasing's real life daughter Alice). Due to his smooth & laid back demeanor you'd have no idea that he's suffering from depression mostly due to the fact that his films are no longer successful and he has major financial problems closing in on him (his habit for producing abstract & artsy films that don't make any money has put him in the hole). The Father Of My Children has a pretty calm atmosphere but as the film progresses we start to feel the pressure that's falling on Gregoire and we see him slowly come apart. Gregoire's wife (played by Chiara Caselli) is the unsung hero of this story in my opinion. When he starts to show his depression and becomes vulnerable its Gregoire's wife who tries to hold him up and keep everything together (especially in the 2nd half of the film). Everyone gives a great performance and I honestly believe Alice Lencqueasing (who plays Gregoire's oldest daughter) is going to be a hell of an actress when she gets older.

The Father Of My Children is also about the relationship between fathers & daughters to some extent (the main character in the film has three daughters). This seemed to be a trend in art house cinema a couple of years ago. Between 2009 & 2010 art house/indie cinema gave us quite a few great portrayals of good fathers (or fathers who at least try) on the big screen. All three stories are pretty different but at the same time 35 Shots Of Rum, Somewhere & The Father Of My Children all have a similar minimalist ambiance and show a realistic relationship between a dad and their young daughter. This trend hasn't completely taken over cinema yet but recent stuff like Pariah (as we discussed in my recent write-up on black characters in modern film) is an indication that fathers aren't being painted as these one-dimensional, uncaring hard asses as much these days. Even though Gregoire suffers from depression, he tries his best to instill real happiness in his moody eldest daughter.

Real life father & daughter (Louis & Alice Lencqueasing) in The Father Of My Children

The Father Of My Children has quite a few elements of Olivier Assayas' more personal style of filmmaking (this makes sense given that Assayas is somewhat of a mentor to Mia Hansen-Love). The chaotic behind the scenes atmosphere of Irma Vep, the ensemble cast of actors from Late August, Early September and the story of an upper-class family dealing with the aftermath of a death in the family (and all the legal stuff that follows) that's in Summer Hours (which coincidentally co-stars Alice Lencueasing) runs all throughout the film. Even the ending has an eerie similarity to the ending of Summer Hours. This is one of those rare recent works were I'd use the word touching to best describe it and not feel corny or insecure. For a film about depression & heartache there's plenty of sweet & happy moments all throughout.

Much like Scarlet Diva, The Father Of My Children is yet another film that shares a spiritual connection with Bernard Rose's brilliant Ivan's XTC (both films are personal, semi-autobiographical stories about key background figures in the movie industry that pushed themselves too hard who die sad deaths long before their time). I don't care how many times I've mentioned this film - I'm gonna find an audience for it and get it rediscovered if its the last thing I do!

The Father Of My Children isn't just strictly a love letter/dedication to Humbert Balsan. Its about the importance of family, coming of age, the beauty of film as well as the bumps and other legal issues that go into the filmmaking process that people don't often think about.