FILM REVIEW: REACHING FOR THE MOON

Elizabeth Bishop (Miranda Otto) and Lota de Macedo Soares (Gloria Pires) in Reaching for the Moon.

Lunacy and love

By Ed Rampell

I really liked this movie, mainly because of its unusual characters based on actual historical figures. Directed by Brazilian Bruno Barreto, Reaching for the Moon is a biopic about the Pulitzer Prize winning poet Elizabeth Bishop (Miranda Otto). The film focuses on the long lasting affair between Bishop and Lota de Macedo Soares (Gloria Pires). As breakthroughs in same sex marriage continue to make headlines, this tale of a lesbian romance that began back in 1951 is especially timely.

The script by Matthew Chapman, Julie Sayres and Carolino Kotscho, inspired by Carmen Oliveira’s novel, Rare and Commonplace Flowers, has what this critic considers to be a hallmark of good writing: Lots of twists and turns the viewer doesn’t see coming. Succeeding sequences serve to explain previous scenes. The film opens at Central Park, but soon Bishop is on the road to Rio de Janeiro, where events conspire to keep her there for decades as she encounters Soares.

No frail lotus blossom, Soares is arguably the biopic’s most interesting, original character, and throughout this two-hour feature your mystified reviewer continued to change his evolving opinion of her as Soares' character developed. On the one hand, Soares' is an out of the closet lesbian in the Catholic, Portuguese-influenced, patriarchal Brazil of the 1950s. On the other, she is a charter member of the ruling class, so despite her sexual preference she is used to getting her way. After all, if wealth is our international language, then money talks -- regardless of one’s sexual preference.

It’s interesting that Soares' lesbianism is not made much of in Brazil, nor is her ensuing affair with the far more repressed, secretive Bishop. This seems true both when they are at Soares' modernist refuge in the Amazon jungle or staying at her posh penthouse in Rio. There is lush, sumptuous cinematography by Mauro Pinheiro Jr. of the tropics, Copacabana Beach, Sugarloaf, etc., and the  degree of acceptance of the screen couple’s Sapphic sexuality and same sex relationship from the 1950s through the 1960s is indeed eye opening, especially considering how they most likely would have been treated in the staid U.S.A.

It’s interesting to note that currently another great American writer -- Glenn Greenwald, that fierce champion of civil liberties who brought Edward Snowden’s revelations about NSA über-snooping to the world’s attention -- is an expat who has left America to live in Brazil with his male Brazilian lover. Perhaps Brazil is ahead of the supposedly “advanced” United States?

This critic has no idea how historically accurate this biopic is, but according to the movie Bishop chafes under the rule of the military junta that overthrows the democratically elected Brazilian government in 1964. As a charter member of the land owning elite Soares' position is different, and it’s interesting to see how political events shape the lovers’ lives.

Director Barreto helmed 1997’s fact-based Four Days in September, which starred Alan Arkin as a U.S. diplomat kidnapped by the MR-8 “terrorist” group, which supported armed resistance to Brazil’s brutal military dictatorship (which, BTW, tortured Brazil’s current President, Dilma Rousseff, a former Marxist guerrilla, who is currently fighting against the NSA surveillance of her, which Snowden revealed). Barreto also directed the popular 1976 erotic ghost comedy, Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands, and along with Otto attended the private screening for Reaching for the Moon. His pithy introductory remarks put his finger on Moon’s message, saying: “This is a love story.”

Indeed, straight, gay, trans or whutevah, love is what inspires the poet in all of us -- whether or not we’ve won Pulitzers -- and makes the world and moon go round. Reaching for the Moon is an absorbing, insightful psychological drama with political overtones which won an OutFest Audience Award and is one of the year’s best movies about the love.

 

LALIFF 2011: CHICO & RITA

A scene from Chico Y Rita.

True-ba-loney

By Ed Rampell 

Chico & Rita is another Cuban-music themed film, although it is actually an animated feature, not a doc, co-directed/co-written by Spanish filmmaker Fernando Trueba (director of 1992’s Belle Epoque starring Penelope Cruz).

Chico & Rita's animation is stellar, vividly bringing to life the Havana, Manhattan, Paris and Las Vegas of the 1940s/1950s. The music, too, makes this film worth seeing. However, the script leaves much to be desired. The Havana of bygone days looks glamorous, especially in comparison to today’s Cuban capital, which looks drab and shabby. Well, half a century of embargo may or may not do that to you, but the film's Havana of yesterday is largely devoid of that grinding poverty that inspired, oh you know, that little thing we call “revolution.” It wasn’t all mambo and showgirls under Cuban dictator and U.S. puppet Fulgencio Batista, don’tchaknow?

The love story between a pianist and singer is also remarkably stupid and senseless, full of celluloid stereotypes and completely absent of the sense of the ongoing bond a romantic relationship can generate between two people. The movie’s notion of love is, well, cartoonish; there’s a big difference between true, lasting love and obsession, don’tchaknow? 

But again, having said this, if you can overlook these points Chico & Rita is a fiesta for the eyes and ears, with some of the most compelling cartoon, animated erotic imagery since R. Crumb and Ralph Bakshi’s 1972 Fritz the Cat.  

FILM REVIEW: SUMMER CHILDREN

Diana (Valora Noland) in Summer Children.

Wipe out whiteout

By Don Simpson

Vilmos Zsigmond, the master cinematographer behind such films as McCabe & Mrs. Miller, Deliverance, The Long Goodbye and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, was still a little moist behind the ears from his training at the Budapest Film Academy -- where he studied alongside Laszlo Kovacs -- when first-time director James Bruner recruited him to lens Summer Children. Bruner wanted to create an homage to the masters of Italian Neo-Realism and the French New Wave -- and Raoul Coutard was probably too busy working with the highly-prolific Jean-Luc Godard -- so he chose Zsigmond, a 35-year old devout student of European cinema. 

Together, they created a visually magnificent film that, upon completion of production, lacked the appropriate financing for post-production publicity and distribution. As a result Summer Children was placed in storage for over 40 years in several different Deluxe Laboratory Archival vaults in several states and countries. The fact that Summer Children's original producer, Jack Robinette, and restoration producer Edie Robinette-Petrachi found all of the footage still in pristine quality (even the splices were in perfect condition) showcases the archival quality of the Kodak film Plus-X Film Stock. Once the footage was in Robinette and Robinette-Petrachi's hands, they remastered the film with the assistance of Zsigmond. 

Maybe the acting, dialogue, and narrative have not withstood the testaments of time, but Zsigmond's luscious photography is still as startlingly beautiful as ever. The striking contrasts of the black and white film stock teamed with the noir-ish shadowing, shot primarily on location (including in the tight quarters of the “Mayflower," which was a 130-foot sailing schooner, and Catalina Island), Summer Children plays like an academic lecture in visual composition. Zsigmond plays with the environments of the shooting locations -- the constant motion of the water, the blowing of the wind, and the powerful rays from the sun -- to give the scenes more life and depth. One scene that truly stands out for its painterly quality is a night scene on the beach at Catalina that was actually photographed during the daytime. 

West (Stuart Anderson) is a bit of an old fashioned romantic; he is a product of the sexually conservative past and is having a difficult time adjusting to the burgeoning sexual revolution in America. West's friend, Frankie (John Kulhanek), though older, has no qualms about enjoying the promiscuity of the youth generation. 

West is taking his father's 130-foot sailing schooner out for a spin around the Pacific Ocean and he invites Frankie and a few other friends along for the ride. The friend that West wants most in this whole wide, wicked, wonderful world is the elusive but magnetically beguiling, Diana (Valora Noland). West perceives Diana to be his date for the cruise, but Diana's free spirit has other plans. We do not know why Diana is playing hard to get when West makes his first couple passes -- he is rich, handsome and obviously interested -- but eventually she gives in to his wooing and courting. Unfortunately, West is not the only guy Diana gives in to, and West's jealousy runs wild. 

Summer Children is about the naiveté of youth and the harsh real world realities that all maturing adults must eventually face. Essentially, its message is the same as that old guy sitting next to you at the local dive bar, you know the one who is always reminiscing about how wonderful life was in the 1950s. The women were simple and accommodating; they were happy to settle down with a handsome, well-to-do man like West. It was not until the absurd notion of free love -- like that ever-so-tempting apple in Eden -- that ruined romance forever. Suddenly, women were not marrying the first man to offer to put a ring on their finger; they began to think silly thoughts about not wanting to settle down or waiting for someone better. Well, I typically zone out before that creepy curmudgeon gets anywhere near this point in his diatribe and, to be honest, I also stopped paying attention to Summer Children's narrative after a while. The scene in which Diana finally gives in to Frankie is especially painful to watch. 

But I never lost interest in Zsigmond's photography. 

Summer Children will screen at the American Cinematheque in Los Angeles, May 10. Vilmos Zsigmond is scheduled to be present for a Q&A.

SFIFF 2011: ASLEEP IN THE SUN

Lucio (Luis Machín) in Asleep in the Sun.

Burning dreams

By Miranda Inganni

Director Alejandro Chomski's feature film, Asleep in the Sun (Dormir Al Sol), begins with a doggie-eye-view sequence of what turns out to be a Jack Russell Terrier delivering an envelope. While we have no idea what possesses this postal pup, he is clearly a dog on a mission. The recipient opens the letter and starts reading. And the story begins.

Set in 1950s Argentina, Lucio (Luis Machín), a watchmaker, and his not-so-happy homemaker wife, Diana (Esther Goris), enjoy a birthday dinner for Lucio. In addition to the family, there is an extra guest participating in the festivities: local pet shop owner "Professor" Standle (Enrique Piñeyro), a mysterious if not nefarious figure.

While Lucio and Diana are very much in love with each other, she suffers from a mild nervous disorder, pushing her away from her husband and toward the dogs at the Standle's shop. She is a woman possessed by the pooches. Standle points out to Lucio that his wife is clearly abnormal -- she spends time away from the house, she is incapable of bearing children, she visits with the dogs all day – and suggests she seek treatment at a phrenopathic clinic where "they get right to the point" on curing such disorders. Much against his better wishes, but at his wife's (and Stendle's) urging, Diana agrees to enter the facility. What follows is an absurd and charming story of misunderstanding, mistaken identities, missing brain matter and mystery.

Based on a story by Adolfo Bioy Casares, Asleep in the Sun is bizarre and silly, and very much like an episode from The Twilight Zone -- multi-layered, a love story and a thriller as well as a cautionary tale of blindly following the pack.