SFIFF 2014: MARY IS HAPPY MARY IS HAPPY

Suri (Chonnikan Netjui) and Mary (Patcha Poonpiriya) in Mary is Happy, Mary is Happy.

Tongue Thai-ed 

By Miranda Inganni

 
Finding inspiration in 410 consecutive tweets by a teenager, Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit's Mary is Happy, Mary is Happy fuses social media and filmmaking in this wonderfully whimsical movie.

Deftly intertwining the tweets (originally posted by Mary Malony) with the drama, we follow moody Mary (Patcha Poonpiriya) and her more evenly keeled best friend Suri (Chonnikan Netjui) as they navigate their way through their final year of high school. Mary is impulsive  -- ordering a jellyfish in the mail, booking a quick trip to Paris which she subsequently sleeps through because of jet lag -- and a frustrated creative  -- forever chasing the “magic hour” in which to take her pictures. But mostly she is a mercurial, seemingly hopelessly romantic, teenager.

Mary and Suri are in charge of creating the school’s yearbook, which provides for many distractions and obstacles that they must overcome to complete the book.
 
Accident prone Mary traipses through her days, despite her cell phone blowing up repeatedly, getting poisoned by mushrooms while on a quick camping trip and even a terrible tragedy. All the while, she pines for M(Vasuphon Kriangprapakit, a young man she meets near a pancake cark next to the train tracks.
 
While Mary goes through what is for so many the awkward transition into adulthood, Thamrongrattanarit capitalizes on the limitations -- and lack thereof -- of the original tweets allowing Mary to mature in the face of adversity during the course of the film.
 
As director Thamrongrattanarit creates the story line around the tweets, plot points can seem eclectic. But the feature has a groove that flows smoothly once you suspend all reality and give in to the film's playfulness. It's got to be hard for a grown man to create a story out of a bunch of tweets written by a teenaged girl. But Thamrongrattanarit pulls it off with aplomb.

FILM REVIEW: LOUDER THAN BOMBS

Nova Venerable in Louder than Bombs.

Words and images

By Don Simpson

Call me naïve, but I knew nothing of the existence of poetry slams until 2004, thanks in no small part to a co-worker at the time -- the now 2011 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship for Poetry award winner, Cristin O'Keefe Aptowicz, who appears in Louder Than a Bomb as an emcee. As it turns out, the first poetry slam dates back to November 1984, when Marc Smith organized a poetry slam event at the Get Me High Lounge in Chicago. Poetry slams have since spread like wildfire around the world, resurrecting the art of poetry from its ashes and fostering a new generation of poets.

Greg Jacobs and Jon Siskel’s (the late film reviewer Gene Siskel's nephew) documentary Louder Than a Bomb is about the 2008 Chicago-area poetry slam competition of the same name. Louder Than a Bomb is the nation's largest poetry slam competition with teams and soloists from approximately 60 high schools competing. Jacobs and Sickel opt to hone in on four teams: Steinmetz, Oak Park/River Forest High School, Whitney Young Magnet High School and Northside College Prep. Steinmetz is a troubled inner city school that won first place in their first ever foray into the world of slam poetry at the 2007 Bomb, so the self-proclaimed “Steinmenauts” (Lamar Jordan, Kevin Harris, Jésus Lark, Charles Smith and She'Kira McKnight) are an obvious choice for Jacobs and Sickel to follow in 2008. The other three teams are presumably chosen because of their gifted solo talents: Nova Venerable (Oak Park/River Forest High School), Nate Marshall (Whitney Young Magnet High School) and Adam Gottlieb (Northside College Prep).

Almost half of this 100-minute documentary takes place during the 2008 Louder Than a Bomb competition. The crowded environment seems to handcuff Jacobs and Siskel’s ability to capture the content in any kind of aesthetically pleasing manner, but the amazing performances that they capture on tape is sure to distract most audiences from the shoddy cinematography. Before we arrive at the Louder Than a Bomb competition, however, we are told the riveting back stories of the Steinmenauts, Venerable, Marshall and Gottlieb -- a clever, yet often used, directorial tactic to get the audience to be more emotionally invested into the outcome of the competition.

The Louder Than a Bomb competition stresses that “the point is not the points, it’s the poetry”while Louder Than a Bomb, the documentary, serves as a means of questioning the legitimacy of judging creativity and talent. Will the most deserving team and soloist win? Better yet, how do you define “most deserving”?

Louder Than A Bomb also showcases the importance of broadening the social circles of adolescents, while also nurturing their creative impulses and intellectual exploration. Poetry may not provide these kids with the financial support that they will need to survive in the big bad world, but it does appear to provide them with everything else they need – especially companionship, love and happiness.

Louder Than A Bomb bears an uncanny resemblance to Spellbound, Wordplay, and even Hoop Dreams – but I suspect Jacobs and Siskel will be just fine being lumped in with that family. The “competition” -- whether it be athletic, intellectual or creative -- as a sub-genre of documentary cinema seems to be a favorite of audiences nowadays, and I suspect this is because of the tension and emotional drama that is inherent within the subject matter. Of course the key to this form of documentary filmmaking is the initial choice of who the director decides to follow during the course of the competition. I do not know how they came upon their subjects, but Jacobs and Siskel made a remarkably sound decision when they chose to follow the Steinmenauts, Venerable, Marshall and Gottlieb.

FILM REVIEW: DAYDREAM NATION

Thurston (Reece Thompson) and Caroline (Kat Dennings) in Daydream Nation.

Teen Age Riot

By Don Simpson 

The year this story takes place is the year that nearly everything happened to 17-year-old Caroline Wexler (Kat Dennings) -- or at least that is how Caroline's narration introduces Daydream Nation. Caroline's widowed father (Ted Whittall) has relocated them from a big city to bumble fuck suburbia, a town purportedly with more incest than an Atom Egoyan film...and a white-suited psycho killer (Qu'est-ce que c'est?) is on the loose.

Caroline, immediately realizing she is mentally superior to the drugged-out lowlifes in her new high school, opts to pursue the one male who she considers to be her intellectual equal, her 30-something English teacher, Barry (Josh Lucas). As a disguise for their tawdry affair, Caroline simultaneously develops a relationship with a sweet and awkward -- but also troubled -- classmate, Thurston (Reece Thompson). Cue the bizarre love triangle. ("Every time I think of you, I feel shot right through with a bolt of blue...")

A hyper-intelligent high school girl with an Algonquin-table wit, Caroline is really not all that different from Easy A’s Olive, except that I found Caroline to be a more well-rounded character -- and I am not talking about her ample bosom or voluptuous lips -- until she becomes just another conniving young vixen bouncing between the beds of two suitors. Love is a battlefield and Caroline leaves a casual victim pile in the wake of her so-called sexual revolution.  

Where Daydream Nation succeeds is in portraying two male -- Barry and Thurston's -- fantasies of who they want Caroline to be: Barry wants Caroline to be his young sex toy and literary muse while Thurston dreams that Caroline is the sweet yet friendless new girl next door. (Taken out of context, that last sentence reads like I am reviewing a lost episode of Joss Whedon's short-lived television series, Dollhouse.) But this is Caroline’s story -- she is our narrator; this is clearly from her perspective -- so who knows what we should believe. 

Caroline is our daydream believer in Daydream Nation; surrounded by a sonically youthful indie rock soundtrack (Beach House, Sebadoh, Stars, Sonic Youth, Devendra Banhart and Emily Haines) she struts through the dazed and confused narrative like a sexy kool thing. In this hyper-exaggerated fantasy world, Caroline's one wish is to be rescued from the fools of this podunk town -- where the guys are all sexist and the stupid girls just eat it up -- that insufferably pervade her existence. Until then, she will dream, dream, dream... 

The Sonic Youth record from which this film derives its name was ground-breaking in its anarchistic deconstruction of known musical paradigms. Sonic Youth ignored all preexisting musical genres and created a sound collage that was unique. Without Daydream Nation Nirvana may have never existed. Who knows what music would sound like now? Very few records in the late 1980s can claim to be as influential as Daydream Nation. 

What does Canadian writer-director Michael Goldbach do with his film Daydream Nation? Well, for one, he over-relies on the crutch of Caroline's narration -- which all but ruins the film for me. Goldbach also falls way short of developing Caroline into the strong feminist role model she purports to be. The worst foul of them all: Daydream Nation ties up all of its plot lines with one simple and concise action. Sure it is an expected conclusion, but it is too damn preposterous to matter.

Okay, so Goldbach does deserve some credit for developing such a weirdly demented coming-of-age rom-com, but the strangeness seems all too purposeful and rarely works in the context of the plot.  

Essentially, Goldbach's Daydream Nation is as genre-redefining as a brick over the head. That said -- the transcendently cinematic visuals (lensed by Jon Joffin) are quite stunning and I love the soundtrack, especially the use of the Stars' track "Your Ex-Lover Is Dead."

TRIBECA 2011: TURN ME ON, GODDAMMIT

Alma (Helene Bergsholm) in Turn Me On, Goddammit.

Talk to the hand

By Don Simpson

Alma (Helene Bergsholm) is a 15-year-old virgin...well, except by her own hand; but what else is a teenage girl supposed to do when she is trapped in a secluded Norwegian town that has nothing to offer except empty roads, sheep, tractors and hay? Alma wants to get all hey, hey in the hayloft with Artur (Matias Myren), but until that time comes, Alma must rely on a friendly phone sex operator at "Wet and Wild Dreams" to get her rocks off. 

A relatively normal teenager with an overactive imagination that has been hijacked by hyperactive hormones, Alma daydreams incessantly about a variety of sexual encounters. Her fantasies begin to get so confused with reality that neither Alma nor the audience know which is which. It is important to note that despite the unquenchable itch in her crotch, Alma never reduces herself to trying to do the deed with just anyone; she is the master of her own domain and is perfectly content racking up her mother's telephone bill with calls to "Wet and Wild Dreams." That is, until her mother (Henriette Steenstrup) sees the bill.

One fantastical (?) encounter with Artur seems so real that it leaves Alma totally convinced that he actually "poked" her, but after she recounts the absurd-yet-innocent event to her friends, Alma becomes an instant freak, earning herself the nickname of "Dick-Alma" (a moniker that most 15-year-old girls would not aspire to possess). Even Alma's friends, Ingrid (Beate Støfring) and Saralou (Malin Bjørhovde), stay clear of her. Trudging onward in an even more isolated haze of high school, Alma rides her misfit status like a roll of coins into a not-so-wild world of booze, hash and nicked porn mags.

Adapted from Olaug Nilssen's novel of the same name, writer-director Jannicke Systad Jacobsen shows us how the repressive tendencies of small rural towns can really screw with the adolescent minds of its inhabitants. The kids of Turn Me On, Goddammit feel locked up and oppressed and hormonal tension is boiling inside them.

The cast is played primarily by teenage actors, lending Turn Me On, Goddammit the aura of an authentically awkward adolescent world that is saturated with overwhelming sexuality. In Hollywood, these kids would have been total horn-dogs, talking raunchily about wanting to get into each other's pants; but Jacobsen's film is incredibly subtle, approaching teenage sexuality naturally rather than exaggeratedly. The high schoolers in Turn Me On, Goddammit are way too shy and timid to discuss sex with each other, thus causing their brains to become overloaded with closeted thoughts and desires.

Another interesting aspect of Turn Me On, Goddammit is the character of Saralou. She gives Jacobsen the opportunity to attack the use of capital punishment in the United States, specifically Texas. Saralou's sole desire is to travel to Texas in order to protest the death penalty. In the meantime, she has become pen pals with several death row inmates in Texas, using the prisoners as sounding boards for all of her pent up adolescent frustrations.

SFIFF 2011: CHILDREN OF THE PRINCESS OF CLEVES

A scene from Children of the Princess of Cleves.

Text-ing times

By Miranda Inganni

In director Régis Sauder’s documentary, The Children of the Princess of Clèves (Nous, Princesses De Clèves), teenagers from a Marseilles high school learn about life and love from the classic French novel, The Princess of Clèves. Using the students to read excerpts from the book, reenact selections and discuss the subject matter with their friends and families, Sauder brings the 17^th century book to life in the 21^st century.

Proving some things are timeless, this documentary is an age-old story of children growing up – testing their boundaries and their parents patience and exploring their own emotions. Instead of the 16^th century royal court of Henri II, the backdrop is a contemporary working class community, but the themes are the same: love, passion, duty, disappointment, jealousy, betrayal, angst, et cetera.

And when the parents get involved in the discussion, it is clear that the kids, being teenagers, are not used to having these issues talked about at home. It’s quite laudable that Sauder gets the conversation going between parent and child during a time when the child is less like to talk and more likely to walk away. There are raw and revealing scenes where it’s clear that some of these young adults still want their parents’ affection and attention, all the while reaching out on their own and rebuking their elders.

Enriched by the ensemble of students featured in the film, The Children of the Princess of Clèves, culminates in the results of their baccalaureate exams. Some pass, some fail, some skip the exam entirely (without his or her parent’s consent or knowledge). In the end, the mobile texting kids seem to have learned a little more about themselves through the exploration of this text -- disproving what French President Nicholas Sarkozy said about it.

SFIFF 2011: SHE MONKEYS

Emma (Mathilda Paradeiser) in She Monkeys.

Persona non-grata

By Miranda Inganni

Set in a rural Swedish town, Lisa Aschan’s first feature film, She Monkeys, centers on Emma (Mathilda Paradeiser) and her bid to land a spot on the local horse vaulting team. It’s at the tryouts that she meets the beautiful, pouty Cassandra (Linda Molin), who pulls Emma out of her shell, only to push her around.

Emma’s life seems to be all about control – from perfecting her vaulting moves, to “click” training the family dog, to tightly plaiting her hair – so much so that her coach comments, “it’s not all about strength and control…it’s about presence.” Cassandra, on the other hand, has an abundance of presence. As the two girls flirt, with local boys (Adam Lungren and Sigmund Hovind) and each other, their friendship turns from one of frivolity to jealously to love then hatred.

Initially, Emma enjoys being told what to do by Cassandra, but the increasingly perverse trust games the girls engage in forces Emma to realize her own seductive power (and the power of seduction). The control volleys between the two, with the quiet but tough Emma eventually showing a slightly sadistic side.

While Emma toys with the idea of being in love with Cassandra (or just wanting to be Cassandra), her younger sister, Sara (Isabella Lindquist), a preternaturally sexual yet pudgy child, tries to seduce her much older babysitter, Sebastian (Kevin Caicedo Vega) who happens to be her cousin.

Nothing scares Emma or Sara, but both are filled with anger -- and though it is never mentioned in the film, perhaps it is because there is no mother? -- some of which is finally released when each expresses their rage and frustration through violence.

Conveying the idea that one must hide one’s feelings or risk getting hurt – something often found in Swedish films – She Monkeys (by the way, a lousy title) is a concisely lensed film with some strong performances by young actors.

FILM REVIEW: PUTTY HILL

Zoe (Zoe Vance) in Putty Hill.

The shape of things

By Don Simpson

The setting is a poor, working-class suburb of Baltimore that descriptive adjectives such as decrepit, depressing and boring seem to fit best. There is nothing of merit or worth here. It seems like no one works -- with the exception of drug dealers. This location is not the Baltimore of John Waters, nor is it the Baltimore that we have seen in The Wire. This is a place that the U.S. economy left behind a long time ago.

This, dare I say, “white trash” community -- of tattoos, dreadlocks, torn clothing, skateboarders and BMXers, graffiti, paintball and video games, and drugs -- seems like something Harmony Korine would have concocted for the silver screen but, in the sympathetic hands of writer-director Matthew Porterfield, Putty Hill brims with subtle neorealism. It feels like Porterfield is one of these characters, as if he knows them and understands their lives. Honesty and delicacy prevail throughout this film.

Cory -- the underlying link to the ensemble of characters in Putty Hill -- has died of a drug overdose. It was an untimely death but, if anything, his funeral propels his fractured and disjointed family to come together. Few of his family conversed with Cory on a regular basis; none of them really knew him. Friends didn’t even know Cory. So a majority of them do not seem all that upset that Cory died. But something about Cory brought everyone back together. Maybe they recognize that they should be closer, that they should know each other better. In some ways it might be harder to lose a relative (especially a sibling or child) if you were not close to them. Things like death seem to make you think about your relationships more.

Putty Hill is a story with a multitude of interconnected characters who do not communicate very well. Most of the characters only speak when asked a question (and sometimes those questions need to come from off camera -- presumably from Porterfield -- in true mockumentary fashion); but the heart of Putty Hill is what the actors do while they are not talking, when they are doing nothing. In a strange kind of way, Putty Hill is like Mumblecore for the working class. As with Mumblecore the focus of importance is on the space between the lines of dialog; the quiet between the action. Not much happens in Putty Hill, to be perfectly blunt. This is a character-driven story to the nth degree yet with little individual character development. I think that’s the key to Porterfield’s film and what makes it special. Who would dare make a character-driven film without proper character development? Strangely enough, it works quite well.