drama

False Bottoms

Gary Lucas — Tue, 17 Dec 2024 22:40:24 +0000

False Bottoms Gary Lucas December 17, 2024 - 17:40

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LIE CLUB is one of the most absorbing evenings in the theatre I've spent in ages. I was lucky to catch the final performance of this mind-blowing existential conundrum on Wednesday, Dec. 11th at Studio 3R on St. Mark's Place in the East Village, which was time well spent.

An exhilarating, if not downright dizzying, two person character-driven dark drama all about the games people play and the lies we tell each other day after day after day, the play conveys a sense of crazy forward motion and jump-cut reversals of fortune in the raveling and unraveling of lies told and exposed at Liars Anonymous—a dramatic conceit of an actual therapy center in London. The play at once signifies Progress in stripping back all the layers of the human onion in revealing the Truth that Lies Beneath, and then almost immediately doubles down with yet another Lie—resulting in laughs a'plenty herein—as well as a short sharp gasp of audience surprise at every hair pin turn.

As an audience member, the experience of watching this play was like being strapped into a pleasurable thrill ride but also like being held captive on a careening out of control stagecoach to hell.

It's a disorienting experience which by the play's end, you feel as if you have actually BEEN SOMEWHERE (Heaven's Gate—or the Ninth Circle—you take your pick).

Every time the collective audience seems to be lifted into the blue empyrean with a character's philosophical peroration on this sad human amalgam, and how through the Power of Love we must all rise above the deceitful lies abounding that help self-perpetuate le condition humane tragique, the dramatic rug is rudely jerked out from under us—a reversal of circumstances/fortune which occurs over and over again during the play, as yet another lie is uttered onstage that negates the previous stab at the character in question's "truth-telling."

In that, the play might well have been titled Chinese Boxes—or better yet, False Bottoms (pace the original title of Wyndham Lewis’s masterpiece of a novel The Revenge for Love).

What could have been a mind-numbing exercise in "No Exit"-type existential hokum is totally redeemed by some of the best and freshest stage acting I've ever witnessed by Murmuration Studios' Rachel De Fontes (the co-author of the play, whose character of a lecturer at Liar's Anonymous balances poised elegance on a knife edge with a wicked killer's instinct), and Peter Jeffries (the other co-author, a Scottish actor with preternatural boyish charm and an open, and winning personality, who struggles throughout with Rachel's devilish teasing).

This pair can do it all. They can stop on a dramatic dime, fly through the air with the greatest of ease, deliver howlers and shift gears from farce to tragedy in a millisecond. They had total command of a young East Village audience that cheered them on and loved every minute of this play. Both actors exude a natural honesty and downright sexiness of persona I found extremely engaging. You kind of both fall in love with these two, and alternately, are repulsed by them, as they spider-like spin their glib patter—mainly comedic, but with a through-line that occasionally veers into shock/horror territory. They are that good.

I thoroughly recommend this show, which was a big hit at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and which has been touring internationally with great success.

Here's looking forward to further mind-blowing collaborations from Rachel De Fontes, Peter Jeffries, and Murmuration Studios.

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Her Body, Her Choice

Chet Kozlowski — Tue, 17 Dec 2024 03:31:26 +0000

Her Body, Her Choice Chet Kozlowski December 16, 2024 - 22:31

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You'd be excused for thinking the new Czech film Her Body is something other than it is for the first hour. It's expertly shot and acted and appears to unfold as a tale of female empowerment.

Andrea Absolonová is a professional high diver who is Olympics-bound. She's been training since childhood and is in prime physical shape. Her body is maturing (her younger sister Lucie, also a diver, comments that Andrea's breasts are getting bigger) and she's on the cusp of adulthood. So if the years of training (and borderline bulimia) are going to pay off, the time is now. She is adored by fans, doted on by her parents, and standing tall and confident.

A tragic accident abruptly ends Andrea's career as a high diver. She is incapacitated, in a body brace, and still she pushes herself to return. Finally her coach tells her she's been replaced. She'll never attain her former status.

So Andrea starts to slack. She goes out clubbing. And she sleeps with a photographer who has been circling her since she rejected his advances while training. She knows that he has a "real job": he shoots porn movies and is tied in with the burgeoning underground industry (the film is set in the late 1990s-early 2000s). Andrea knows what he does and she wants in.

She throws herself into porn with abandon and is an instant star (now known as Lea De Mae). She trades a sport for celebrity or, as disapproving Lucie puts it, "fucking for cash." Andrea's parents take differing views: as the money rolls in, Mom delights in her daughter's good fortune. Her father tries to instill shame. Andrea is seduced by the wild life as her porn fame grows. She tracks her parents' estrangement and argues with her sister while partying and doing drugs.

The weight of this drama falls on Natalia Germani's able shoulders. She plays Andrea as focused and ambitious. Ms. Germani, a regular presence on Czech TV, is fit and attractive. Her demeanor suggests that what Andrea wants, Andrea will get. The actor's physical beauty and grace are capped by intelligent blue eyes that, while alluring, are steely. She simmers, giving Andrea Absolonová's quest deeper meaning.

Her Body is a solid film. Director Natálie Císarovská has a firm command of the material, giving Ms. Germani a strong showcase. Denisa Baresová as Lucie is a fine foil: young and waiflike, she gets stronger as her sister wanes. Zuzana Mauréry and Martin Finger as Andrea's parents adeptly portray the up-and-downsides of parental faith and ambition. Klara Belicova's cinematography is appropriately lush and tawdry as circumstances change. The sound design of Petr Cechák and Frantisek Sec accentuates Andrea's breathing, baring the effect of events on her metabolism; that sound is often the only thing we hear.

Warning: spoilers ahead.

The problem with Her Body is: it's a true story. The film must adhere to Andrea's biographical details. So it's disappointing that that story becomes so typical.

Porn is a stronger social force than we care to admit. It's as old as human communication. In these times it's toxic and corrupt—what isn't?—but porn's not just about human trafficking, as proven by the draw of non-pros to OnlyFans. In its purest form, porn epitomizes why we watch movies in the first place: to be aroused and to see something we haven't seen before. For the performer, it can be gratifying for its exhibition and endurance: See what my body can do? See how much it can take? For Andrea Absolonová, the experiences of diving and sexual display might have been similar: a pride in possessing a perfect physique and putting it through its paces.

In any case, it must have been more gratifying than a conventional tale of diminishing returns. And sadly, because we have Andrea's life story to work with, and she died young, we'll never know how she felt about it. The climax of her quest, and her life, amounts to an eleventh hour deus ex machina which does not grow organically out of her actions.

Ms. Císarovská's film has the potential to be a unique take on autonomy and the physicality that both sports and porn require. Andrea wants to exceed expectations and remain the center of attention. She goes from Princess to Harlot and manages to retain her dignity. While gorging on food and drink and sex, she secretly smiles. "I'm happy," she maintains. "Finally free."

So it’s too bad that ultimately Her Body’s message is trite and predictable. Andrea Absolonová’s story is interesting but not extraordinary. Director Natálie Císarovská and actor Natalia Germani make compelling drama of it until the facts demand banal morality. It's sometimes better to trust the fiction. It, like Ms. Germani's performance, reveals more when untethered from immutable "truths."

___________________________

Her Body. Directed by Natálie Císarovská. 2023. From Film Movement. On digital platforms. 105 minutes.

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Does Schindler’s List Meet Pink Flamingos in Solvent? Not Exactly.

Brandon Judell — Thu, 05 Dec 2024 02:04:41 +0000

Does Schindler’s List Meet Pink Flamingos in Solvent? Not Exactly. Brandon Judell December 4, 2024 - 21:04

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As the end credits roll by for Solvent, an awe-inspiring pseudo-documentary, you'll be relieved to learn that "no mice, dicks, or feelings were hurt in the making of this film." I was indeed worried about the rodent.

The credits also note that "some pipe shots were taken in the plumbing system of Castle Leopoldskron in Salzburg, the film location of The Sound of Music." One can hear the Trapp Family slightly tossing in their caskets. (We'll get to those pipes in a second.)

Director/co-writer Johannes Grenzfurthner has noted that his latest filmic oddity is a spiritual successor to his two previous works, Making Threshold (2021) and Razzennest (2022). On experiencing Threshold at Festival Maudit, I was inspired to write: "With one of the best screenplays of recent years, . . . this deliriously witty, yet highly discomforting film is a wry, dissective look at modern society's derangement." The hero of that effort, a polymath, was searching for a cure for his extreme tinnitus utilizing worms, fungi, and a polyester shirt. He was shackled with a boyfriend who was an alcoholic acupuncturist and was also a bit of a pessimist: "If life gives you lemonade, inspect it closely. It might be piss."

Well, after enveloping myself in Solvent's similarly addictive frenziedness, I find myself once again writing: “This deliriously witty yet highly discomforting film is a wry, dissective look at modern society's derangement."

Solvent, however, has a slightly more optimistic hero: Gunner S. Holbrook (John Gries), an American former mercenary and recovering Catholic whose face we never view except for a quick snapshot. You see, he’s the head of a sort of documentary/research team, and he’s almost always behind the camera. His hands, his legs, and his private parts, though, do make appearances now and then.

The film opens in lower Austria on March 8, 2023, at 7:00 AM with Holbrook, his blonde academic Polish girlfriend Krystyna Szczepanska (Aleksandra Cwen), and several production aides setting up across from the farm of a former Nazi, Wolfgang Zinggl. Zinggl was involved with Chelmno, the first stationary facility where poison gas was used for the mass murder of Jews. (Please note there is frequent usage of Holocaust footage, mostly in photos and seconds-long clips, integrated throughout Solvent.)

Unpunished for his crimes against humanity, Zinggl apparently disappeared in 2014, and no one knows what happened to the gent who outwardly led a "normal" life after the war. Not even his grandson Ernst Bartholi (played by the director), who runs a woke PR boutique, has any answer. He does note of his relative, "[Gramps] never hit me. He was a nice guy," although admittedly, during the last years of Gramp's life, the man "became kookier and kookier." Rumors abound that a nearby swamp swallowed him up, and he is now haunted by his ghost.

What other ending would you propose for a man who often hung pigs from a door and then castrated them? His cats apparently enjoyed the tidbits Zinggl scattered on the ground. (Two butchers are also listed in the credits.)

Anyway, what Holbrook's group is after is the Nazi's "Judenkiste" (Jew Box), a container said to contain documents and personal accounts of those who died at Chelmno.

Well, where can such a container be hidden? In the Nazi's house? Entering the abandoned home, Holbrook and crew, attired in hazmat suits, discover a porn collection, banana-flavored antidiarrheals, and much untidiness. No box. So, was this venture going to be a complete loss?

A curious, buffoonish neighbor pops by and asks whether anyone has checked out Zinggl's wine cellar across the road? What wine cellar?

At full gallop, the squad rushes over into the dark, musky oenophile's liquor dungeon, but is anything there of importance? Not at first glance. Just an ordinary-looking pipe sticking up in the middle of the floor. Cold air seems to be escaping from this eerie metal cylinder. Is this proof of another room below? If so, what will happen if you twiddle with this inanimate metal curiosity? Or worse, if you lower a camera through the pipe into the cellar's lower depths? Oh, no!!!

What follows defies easy categorization. There is horror, comedy, surrealism, underground absurdity, and even a dash of romance, but these genres are called upon to do more than entertain. Along with his co-writer Ben Roberts, Grenzfurthner unites every aspect of filmmaking with his encyclopedic knowledge of science, history, and philosophy to expose how historical violence and hatred have refused to remain historical. Croatia, the Middle East, and Bolivia are among the areas that get a current nod here.

As the director notes in Solvent's press notes: "The film's grotesque imagery underscores its themes, depicting the twisted and deformed nature of the past that shapes our present. While Solvent features an artistically exaggerated core, it diverges from typical horror films that use Nazis as central motifs. My goal is to use this stylized approach to explore the enduring effects of Nazi ideology and its infiltration into modern society."

Grenzfurthner succeeds grandly.

(Solvent won "The Film from Hell (Best of the Fest)" award at the Nightmares Film Festival 2024.)

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Armand Assante: An Appreciation

Chet Kozlowski — Wed, 06 Nov 2024 02:45:39 +0000

Armand Assante: An Appreciation Chet Kozlowski November 5, 2024 - 21:45

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Allow me a brief appreciation of Armand Assante. The occasion calls for it: the release of Don Q, a new film in which he stars.

Few actors command the screen, like Armand Assante. I’d seen him first in 1978’s Paradise Alley as Sylvester Stallone’s brother. I’m a fan and have been since I saw him in I, The Jury, the 1982 version of the Mickey Spillane novel directed by Larry Cohen. His chiseled features (in his advanced age, he looks to be carved out of granite) and his naturalistic delivery brought Mike Hammer explosively to life.

Mr. Assante would go on to make a mark in TV, winning a Best Actor Emmy for his lead in 1996’s Gotti, and starring as Odysseus in an ambitious 1997 miniseries of The Odyssey. Other notable parts and awards followed, but to my mind he hasn’t attained the household-name and leading man status he deserves.

Which is odd, because he rose in the era of The Tough Guy. He was tough and he had soul. He played Gotti and Napolean and Nietzsche and was a mob boss in Hoffa. He was in American Gangster and The Mambo Kings and Private Benjamin. He’s the son of an artist and a poet. Despite his Italian (and Irish) heritage, he’s hasn’t appeared in a Martin Scorsese picture.

I don’t know the man. I only have my perceptions to go on, and he’s always struck me as an actor apart for his dynamism, which radiates off him. I saw him in a restaurant in the Village once, and even while relaxing, his presence was palpable.

Which brings me to Don Q. I’ve been thinking a lot about why certain movies are made. I know, I know: the profit motive. But there are easier ways to make money. Making movies is hard work: it takes a skill for organization, it’s subject to the whims of many, and it always ends up revealing something about the filmmaker, even if it’s only to ask why they took on the project in the first place.

In Don Q, Mr. Assante plays Al Quinto, a man full of bonhomie and goodwill. He considers himself the unofficial Don of New York’s Little Italy. Everybody knows him and hails him. He does good. He advises the owners of local businesses. He saves a Chinatown waitress from a sinister pimp. He cracks down on marauding skateboarders. He mentors a Mafia wannabee.

It comes around to the fact that Al Quinto is delusional. He’s not a Don at all, but a Walter Mitty type. Don Q. is Don Quixote. Which in the right hands could be an interesting premise. Think Brando in The Freshman. He pulled that off without tarnishing his image.

Don Q is a disjointed and amateurish film. It’s a parody of Mafia pictures and TV shows (The Soprano’s own Big Pussy, Vincent Pastore, appears in a thankless part) without understanding what makes them work. Don Q. pores over books of Mafia lore and has a voluminous library of DVDs and records which he plays on a vintage Victrola (?). He lives in a fantasy world and is advised by the ghosts of cartoonish gangsters dressed in Zoot suits (!) He instigates confrontations and says things like “Oh, you got balls?” and then walks away. Through much of it he seems harmless, so it’s incongruous when characters come to violent and bloody ends.

Don Q has the feel of a cut-and-paste just-pals production. Much of the film is improvised but lacks the skill and trust that convincing improvisation requires. It’s billed as a comedy but isn’t funny. The only comic element I see is the occasional Road Runner swoosh on quick pans.

So one wonders why, at this stage of his career, Mr. Assante goes along with all this, and even takes a producer credit. The early scenes of Don Q carousing Little Italy and Chinatown have a certain charm that is undone by what comes after.

I almost didn’t write this review. I have a rule: don’t review anything I can’t say something nice about. But I wanted to pay tribute to an actor I respect. And anticipate that more, better film roles await him in the future. Put Don Q behind us. Let’s toast a unique and strong actor who doesn’t seem to know his own strength.

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Don Q, Directed by Claudio Bellante. 2024. From Archstone Entertainment. Available on VOD. 84 minutes.

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Vulgar Ironies

Chet Kozlowski — Mon, 21 Oct 2024 01:17:16 +0000

Vulgar Ironies Chet Kozlowski October 20, 2024 - 21:17

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The man known as the Mayor of Aurora is a skinny, rumpled guy who looks like a vagrant but lives in a spacious mobile home. In the first scene of the documentary Sweetheart Deal, he sits on a park bench, lures in a pigeon, and captures it by hand. His name is Laughn Doescher, but he goes by his middle name, Elliott. He comes on as a sort of saint, affording comfort to a vulnerable population. Aurora is a section of Seattle, Washington, and is a center of drugs and prostitution, a sort of skid row of strip malls and neon signs.

The movie about Elliot starts out laudatory. He’s a character and smooth talker with his scraggly hair and pocked complexion. On good days, he’s a silver-tongued merry prankster. Then he turns evangelical—he calls addiction “the Monster” as he watches his charge writhe and whine in agony. Elliott is oddly endearing. We look past his filthy habitat, the grimy pans and scummy dishes, the butt-filled ashtrays, because he’s doing good. He’s not an addict himself, yet he takes in these poor souls, giving them a place to be, feeding them, and helping them kick.

Word about him spreads. A female newspaper reporter comes to interview him. He takes a shine to her. “No wonder you have a stalker,” he says. “Now you’ve got another one.”

The women he watches over include Kristine, who is a welder who found herself out of work and options. She has a scathing sense of humor, even at her worst. Then there’s Tammy, who pays her disabled parents’ expenses by turning tricks. Her invalid mother complains she’s out of cigarettes; Tammy nonchalantly drops that she’ll solve that by “sucking an extra dick.” Sara is “dopesick” and can’t shake even after her grown kids disown her. Amy is in the brutal throes of crack withdrawal; her animal wails from the back bedroom, barely sounding human. She’ll return to her parents and try to live up to the photos that hang in their home of her in high school, before her fall, when she was known as “Krista.”

These women are rough and resilient and, while self-sufficient, have come to rely on the guy in the RV on the corner and the haven he provides. Sara says she knows he’s a “slimy old man,” but she goes back to him anyway. She’s got nowhere else to go, and she needs a place to even out.

And through it all is Saint Elliott, unflappable and unassuming. He lives in a shithole, but for all intents and purposes, as they say, his heart appears to be pure. He just wants to help.

Sweetheart Deal was originally released in 2022, and its title was the more innocuous sounding Aurora Stories. This gives us a hint about how the project started as an omnibus of life on the streets. Directors Elisa Levine and Gabriel Miller focus in on four sex workers, I’d guess not suspecting that Elliott was the real story. This is Ms. Levine’s first feature. Mr. Miller, who was the cinematographer, died in 2019 before the film’s release.

Sweetheart Deal is shot handheld verité style. The filmmakers are true flies on the wall. Their access to personal conversations is remarkable. Ms. Levine and Mr. Miller’s subjects trust them and are forthright. That they had a bank of footage for what looks to have been a conventional documentary, that they were there at all, was a career-making coincidence. They were ready and had scrupulously documented events when those events took a turn. That’s what makes Sweetheart Deal unforgettable.

The less you know about Sweetheart Deal going into it, the better. A trailer will necessarily steer the viewer. The film sometimes feels voyeuristic, encouraging an unhealthy interest in peoples’ pain (one of those “vulgar ironies” astutely referred to by a character). The narratives that come out of their surveillance are heartbreakingly observed. The proceedings that make up the last half hour seem only too inevitable and yet are riveting.

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Sweetheart Deal. Directed by Elisa Levine and Gabriel Miller. 2022. From Abramorama. In theaters in limited release. 99 minutes.

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Woman Overboard

Chet Kozlowski — Wed, 16 Oct 2024 01:57:46 +0000

Woman Overboard Chet Kozlowski October 15, 2024 - 21:57

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In the new Turkish film Afloat, a family gathers for a cruise. Sister Zaynep flies in from America with her American husband, Stephen. Younger sister Yasemin is mopey and obstinate. Father Yusuf is a charismatic journalist who attracts fans wherever he goes. The cruise is his idea: while waiting to hear whether he will be jailed for his reporting, he wants the family together to take a relaxing trip "one last time."

It's anything but relaxing. Though they bask in sunshine and eat luscious food, tension roils under the surface. Yasemin envies her sister's lifestyle and that she moved away at all. Mom Alev remains cooly aloof. Zeynep gets little support for her nascent career as a documentary filmmaker. Stephen complains that she "likes the idea of being married more than the reality of it." Stephen's also concerned that his passport has been stolen and that his wife is off her meds.

While this crew island-hops among blue skies, open water, and ruins, they trade barbs and pointed silences. Secrets are revealed. Feelings are hurt and betrayed. Father is the fulcrum, but Afloat belongs to its women and their struggle loving a "political freedom warrior." They pose and kvetch and rebuff their father's advice to just enjoy the time. "Is it only you whose mistakes have to be tolerated?" one asks.

Afloat's scenery is lovely, and its cast is attractive. Nihan Aker as Zaynep is model-elegant, while Elit Iscan's Yasemin is pretty and pouty. Serhat Ünaldi (the director's father), as Yusuf, is the picture of stability, even as everything falls apart around him. Oscar Pearce's Stephen is clearly incongruent with his pale complexion, red hair, and inexperience with the language. (The characters alternate between Turkish and English with acuity). Lila Gürmen plays reticent Alev with poise.

Writer/director Aslihan Unaldi was born in Turkey and is now based in Brooklyn. She teaches at Columbia University and NYU. She is also known for her previous feature, the environmental documentary Overdrive (2011). Not many films in Turkey are made from a woman's perspective. Ms. Unaldi seeks to rectify that.

Aslihan Unaldi lets the exotic locales and pretty people do the work. Granted, the deck of a boat doesn't offer many possibilities for camera angles unless the limited floor plan becomes claustrophobic. She manages to cull some stirring sequences: an interlude through island ruins, the sisters dancing to silent music in their earbuds, Yasemin biting ravenously into pomegranates.

As sumptuous and watchable as Afloat is, these characters don't learn much. If a narrative quest is structured to take characters through conflict and bring them self-knowledge, these folks remain predictably themselves. For all the potential built into these fictional (maybe autobiographical?) characters, they are pretty much the same at the end as when they cast off.

_________________________________

Afloat. Directed by Aslihan Unaldi. 2024. 115 minutes

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Where The Heart Is

Chet Kozlowski — Mon, 26 Aug 2024 14:00:00 +0000

Where The Heart Is Chet Kozlowski August 26, 2024 - 10:00

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The new film Know Your Place is set in a part of Seattle that's undergoing rapid gentrification. Money talks, those that don’t have walk. But where do you go if you are an immigrant to the U.S. and part of a vital community?

The community in question hails from Eritrea, one of Africa's poorest nations. Eritreans preserve their religion and their native language, difficult to do when you're being forced to scatter. Know Your Place centers on one family, the Hailes, and Robel, a 15-year-old Eritrean-American boy, in particular. Robel is known for keeping his feelings hidden. "You never say nothin', Bro," says his friend Fahmi on the basketball court. "What's on your mind?"

Robel wonders, simply, where he belongs. His father is dead; his mother struggles to keep the family afloat. His grandfather suffers from dementia and sleeps on the living room couch.

And then comes a plea from the parent's homeland: relatives are ailing, medical expenses are high, and they need financial help. Despite her family's own dire circumstances, Mother assembles clothes, money, and medicine to send over. Robel is tasked with delivering a large suitcase full of provisions across town to his aunts.

Writer/director Zia Mohajerjasbi turns this into a lyrical, profound quest, played out on city streets and light rail and buses. Of course, Robel and Fahmi encounter obstacles, but their comradery and street smarts make for a fascinating journey. Know Your Place is thick with Eritrean culture and interludes of quiet grace.

Seattle in autumn has rarely looked so bleak and beautiful. Mr. Mohajerjasbi counterpoints the drama of displacement by sending his camera to wander languidly amongst canopies of tree branches and street signs, segments of visual poetry. Buildings are being torn down. Residential streets are being decimated. Cranes loom over every horizon. Yet the gloom is often cut by pools of light, actual and symbolic. There's hope. The city becomes a living thing, aided by the fluid camera of Director of Photography Nicholas Wiesnet.

Match this with the naturalistic performances of Know Your Place's young protagonists. Joseph Smith's internal reserve as Robel is tweaked by Natnael Mebrahtu's brash Fahmi. Robel frets and Fahmi joshes. The pair make an engrossing odd couple, trekking across town with their literal McGuffin. Days after having watched the movie, I still feel the presence of these characters.

But the notion of "home" is the point. Where do you go when poverty undercuts your mobility yet forces you to keep moving? As Robel says in a moment of pique, "I wish everything would slow down so I can know where I'm supposed to be."

Their path takes unexpected detours and is dotted with compelling characters, most notably Selamawit Gebresus as Robel's mother (who delivers a stunning monologue with the camera tight on her face), Esther Kibreab as Robel's striving sister, Haileselassie Kidane as gansta cousin Aboy, and Tirhas Haile as the cantankerous Auntie Hana. Aaron Sahle plays Uncle Yonas, a rowdy yellow cab philosopher who contends that America is "drowning in a sea of names," but deep down everyone is where they should be. Every member of this ensemble is a believable and welcome swatch in this heartfelt tapestry.

Zia Mohajerjasbi is a filmmaker to watch. He has a particular vision and, for a first-time writer/director, the discretion to make it come alive. He takes risks: despite the rigors of the inner-city milieu, Mr. Mohajerjasbi isn't afraid to stop the action to make a point. One breathtaking montage is of people, just people, in all their normal glory, caught still and facing the camera.

Know Your Place is a warm, rich, and affectionate portrait of an ancient culture unmoored in the modern world.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Know Your Place. 2022. Directed by Zia Mohajerjasbi. Available on VOD and in select theaters. 118 minutes.

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Who’s the Little Man?

Chet Kozlowski — Sun, 18 Aug 2024 21:31:09 +0000

Who’s the Little Man? Chet Kozlowski August 18, 2024 - 17:31

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Domestic abuse is a provocative topic for drama. The control of one person over their significant other goes to our essential notion of individual freedom. So, it’s useful to think about how a French movie might treat the subject differently from one produced in the US.

The occasion for this is Valérie Donzelli’s entirely watchable new film Just the Two of Us. That’s not meant as faint praise: I was stuck to the screen for the whole runtime. But in the end, I felt a little…undernourished by what I’d been shown. This may be the difference between Gallic and American film expectations, but it also implies an acceptance of spousal dominance in polite society.

In Just the Two of Us, Blanche is an intelligent, accomplished woman and a teacher who happens to be unattached romantically when her twin Rose fixes her up with Grégoire. He remembers Blanche from school; she does not remember him. He comes on as a charming and ingratiating (if ordinary) fellow who dotes on her and wins her heart. They marry and start a family, but cracks show almost immediately. He wants Blanche to himself and convinces her to move away from her sister and mother. He puts her on a rigid schedule, calls repeatedly while she’s in class, and stalks her at work. He turns her life into “a complete wasteland,” devoid of personal agency. This toxicity continues until Blanche seeks some kind of recourse.

If this were a US film instead of a French one, one can imagine it lurid and violent. Americans expect violence to beget violence as a catharsis. In 1977’s The Burning Bed, Farrah Fawcett Majors literally sets Paul Le Mat (remember them?) on fire. In Enough (2002), Jennifer Lopez solves her trauma by kicking the shit out of her husband, Billy Campbell.

Just the Two of Us—original title L'amour et les forêts (Love and Forests)—plays down exploitation almost to blandness. Its attitude seems to be that this is just how some marriages evolve. Just the Two of Us is not a thriller, exactly. Comeuppance is in short supply. The film is compelling due to the performances of Virginie Efira, who plays both Blanche and Rose and Melvil Poupaud as Grégoire. His spousal control is portrayed as the obsession of a needy man caught between adolescence and adulthood; his psychosis plays down. Both actors are excellent and, as I’ve said, watchable.

Anyone who has had experience with domestic abuse will recognize the signs sooner than Blanche does (or chooses to), but they’re all there, including Grégoire’s refrains of “If you loved me a little, you’d have never let me treat you like that,” and “How can you love me and turn me into a monster?”

An intriguing scene has Grégoire acting out in front of a stranger and then attempting to stare that woman down. They recognize each other’s type. The woman is a stranger to him but no stranger to domestic abuse. When he’s gone, she wryly asks Blanche, “Who’s the little man?”

The device of Blanche and Rose being twins comes to little effect. The point is made that both siblings come from a strong mother and are not easily manipulated, but the narrative opportunities of twin-dom are not explored. Rose’s role in the plot could be accomplished by a sister of any status, a sympathetic friend, or, for that matter, no one at all. Ms. Efira does a valiant job of portraying both women, but the difference ultimately comes down to bangs or no bangs.

It’s directed by Valérie Donzelli, a prolific French actor, so much so that she plays herself in the Netflix series Call My Agent. She’s directed several shorts, TV episodes, and feature films, including Notre Dame (2019) and Nona et ses filles (2021).

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Just the Two of Us. Directed by Valérie Donzelli. 2023. From Music Box Films. 105 minutes. Streaming, on VOD, and DVD.

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Traffic-Jamming with Sean Penn and Dakota Johnso

Brandon Judell — Wed, 14 Aug 2024 19:50:38 +0000

Traffic-Jamming with Sean Penn and Dakota Johnso Brandon Judell August 14, 2024 - 15:50

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Film Review

Tags

drama

There are few cinema offerings nowadays I can personally hold forth on the veracity of. No chasing of tornados (Twisters), no imaginary friends (If), and no mortgaging of my home to finance a flop (Horizon) really ring a bell in my life. Daddio, an ode to grizzled cabbies and their perplexed passengers, is the exception.

Having recently cabbed from the Upper West Side to JFK and two weeks later from Convent Garden to Heathrow, I know what it is to be rubbernecked in traffic and chewing the fat for close two hours with drivers who admired my earliness in waving them down. No need to rush.

Yes, my Lisbon Air flight was in five hours. My American Airlines back home in four.

The two gents—one from Senegal, the other a young Brit, wed with a second child on the way—knew I would not tense up and start hollering obscenities as their motors slumbered due to the onslaught of stymied hybrids. Yes, our progress could often be measured in inches or centimeters

Now Christy Hall, who here directs Daddio from her stage play-cum-screenplay, has captured the . . . uh-hum . . . magic of two strangers, one sitting behind the other, connecting and possibly reconstructing each other’s outlooks on life even with the awareness they will never see each other ever again. And maybe just because of that.

Dakota Johnson is “Girlie,” a highly intelligent, sexually active, wounded romantic whose much older lover is married with children. When not putting his kids to sleep, her chap has a propensity for sending dick pics to her and asking her to photograph her private parts for him, even while she’s in a cab. This is the man she’s told, “I love you.” Oh, no!

Well, some background: Girlie, which is not her real moniker, has just arrived from visiting her sister in Oklahoma, and the taxi to midtown Manhattan she’s climbed into is driven by Clark (Sean Penn). She’s his last fare of the day.

Clark, as inhabited by Mr. Penn, is reminiscent of Humphrey Bogart at his gruffiest: macho with an initially unsavory but eventually addictive charm. There is a lamb hidden within this foul-mouthed, lone wolf.

Cabbing for twenty years, his wife whom Clark loved deeply in the not most respectful of ways is now deceased. As for his main talent, other than surviving mentally unscathed from Big-Apple traffic jams, is being a front-seat Freud for those unravelling, jet-lagged travelers who’ve hunkered down for what they thought was going to be a quiet ride home.

Let the banter begin: “Have you ever been a pig in the bedroom?” Clark asks.

Now if I were a young woman, even in my 30s or 40s, after a few verbal back-and-forths with this gent, I would have yelled, “Stop!” thrust open the door and ran for my life. To hell with my luggage! If not then, when Clark takes out a bottle and is ready to piss in front of me, that might have been the moment.

But Girlie’s no pushover: “I honestly hate you right now. You are everything that’s wrong with the world.”

“I like to push buttons,” Clark admits, adding he’s one of those awful men who can’t be trusted when it comes to women. In fact, no guy is actually trustworthy, he professes.

“There are good men out there,” Girlie retorts, but she also notes when she refuses to reveal her age, that “the moment [women] hit thirty our value is cut in half.”

The battle of the sexes here, which is actually less a battle and more like a raunchy therapy group, continues with more than several moving revelations along the way.

But with a 100-minute running time, the idea of being stuck on a highway with just two folks in a taxi combatting over sexual inequities and out-of-reach desires might not seem that inviting to some. Think again. With two superb performances by the leads, Hall’s sharp dialogue, plus award-worthy cinematography by Phedon Papamichael and editing by Lisa Zeno Churgin, Daddio is one cab ride you won’t mind leaving a 20 percent tip for.

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(Daddio is now available to buy or rent at such sites as AppleTV, Spectrum, Amazon, and Microsoft.)

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Squatters Rites

Chet Kozlowski — Thu, 25 Jul 2024 16:51:19 +0000

Squatters Rites Chet Kozlowski July 25, 2024 - 12:51

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Film Review

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drama

The two bears of the title are a woman and a man, 30-something backpackers, first seen walking out of a shopping mall. The man barters with a little girl peering out of a car, trades a copy of Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil for French fries. The pair then goes to an apartment building, where they work the lock of one unit, and enter to find the place barren, no furniture except for a big bed with a pristine, unmade mattress. They strip down in individual bathrooms and shower, the woman languishing, the man screaming as if burned. They fall asleep on the mattress, the man getting up to lay out cardboard to sleep on.

“Goldilocks” is the owner of the apartment. She arrives to find the two bears there, asleep. Hence, Goldilocks and the Two Bears.

The women hit it off. The squatter, Ingrid, is tall and brunette. The owner, Ivy, is shorter and blonde. They retreat to a park so as not to wake the man, Ian, and exchange anecdotes. Ingrid, Ivy, Ian. Later we’ll meet Irena. Sense a pattern? Who is the I, the I, the I?

What could easily turn into an indie gabfest takes on nuance. The tales Ivy and Ingrid tell are by turns trite, provocative, and fantastical. Their chat is fueled by Ivy’s growing fascination with the more bohemian Ingrid. The women talk and bond, Ian wakes up and speaks in riddles. The squatters claim that as soon as Grandma arrives (it’s really her apartment), they’ll depart and squat somewhere else.

Tones and locations will change. Blackouts end scenes at the most beguiling juncture, always a surprise. Characters suddenly break the fourth wall and address the viewer. But it’s not showy. It’s part of a subtle and intricate tapestry that leads us back around to the stories Ingrid and Ivy tell each other.

This film shouldn’t work but it does. Goldilocks and the Two Bears (more about that title in a second) is the work of independent writer/director Jeff Lipsky. Mr. Lipsky cites as his inspiration Covid (isolation and separation), and his move from NYC to Las Vegas (culture mindfuck). G&TTB is set in Vegas, 2016.

I’m tempted to tell more of the plot, but its strength is the guilelessness with which it unspools. The actors’ skills make it work. They are relatively new faces, and they sell their characters without a hint of indie self-consciousness. Serra Naiman (Ingrid) exudes a vagabond’s free spirit yet seethes underneath. We presume Claire Milligan (Ivy) to be naive, but her shrewd cat’s eyes betray her growing infatuation with these two “broke junkies.” Bryan Mittelstadt is stoic as Ian, boyish, a self-styled sage who becomes cold and sinister. He uses Nietzsche’s phrase “Truth is a Woman” like a password of trust. None of the actors have appeared in major films but here show disarming confidence.

Mr. Lipsky has a keen sensibility and an eye for detail. Painting the bare walls of the apartment invites a shift in mood. Ian’s homemade bookshelf is stocked with worn copies of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Joseph Heller’s Something Happened, Dorothy Parker’s collected works, and Men and Menstruation. Phobias abound. Ivy welcomes the intruders because she fears being alone. Ingrid fears dogs, specifically getting scratched by them. On a trip to the Strat Tower the trio encounters and woman who asks them to take her daughter up because she herself is scared of heights.

Jeff Lipsky has other films to his credit—including The Last Nazi (2019) and Mad Women (2015)—and if they are half as well-realized as this one, I have a new auteur’s works to anticipate.

But that title. Goldilocks and the Two Bears is a serious film and one to be admired. That title implies a facile satire of a popular fairytale. This movie is more than that, and the title might just misdirect people and keep them away. Mr. Lipsky, consider renaming it before it goes into wide release. Maybe something like “Squatters Rites”?

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Goldilocks and the Two Bears. Directed by Jeff Lipsky. 2024. In theaters. 136 minutes.