HOLLYWOOD BRAZILIAN 2011: OPENING NIGHT

A scene from Cold Tropics.

A night to dismember

By John Esther

Riddled with incompetence, the Hollywood Brazilian Film Festival 2011 slowly started its opening night. 

Scheduled to commence at 8 p.m. patrons were held in the cold air outside the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood until 8:25 p.m. No explanation for the delay was offered.

Twenty minutes later after we were admitted, somebody from the film festival addressed the audience. Rather than efficiently go through the typical laborious yet understandable Opening Night procedure of thanking sponsors and volunteers before introducing the filmmakers smoothly and without incident, the audience was subjected to a series of banal flattery, self-congratulatory speeches, lame jokes and repetitive chatter before any films would begin.

Over an hour later after the show was supposed to start, the lights went down and the festival film schedule started with a wonderful short film called Recife Frio (Cold Tropics).  

Directed by Kleber Mendonça Filho, who was in attendance, Recife Frio poses a futuristic scenario where Recife, a northern tropical city of Brazil, mysteriously encounters a drastic climate chance that leaves its citizens coping with some crazy cold weather. In response some discover a new marketplace for further consumption, while others find consolation and answers in religion, others use song, others move out and many others die.

Smart, satirical and shot with impressive precision and scope, the 24-minute mockumentary takes a long bite at global consumerism, self-preservation and idiotic self-reliance. 

After the short was over, and people continued coming to and fro the theater, the opening night film, Craft, started at 9:30 p.m. without the sound. After playing and tinkering with the moving image on the screen for five minutes or so, the theater lights went up to fix the problem.

Having had enough, at that point I departed the Egyptian Theatre for the evening. 

Now running through June 5, for more information on the festival, click HBFF.  

NBFF 2011: BROTHER'S JUSTICE

Dax Shepard (Dax Shepard) in Brother's Justice.

Title game

By John Esther

Dax Shepard (Dax Shepard), the funniest guy in Idiocracy and Baby Mama, has decided to retire his comic chops and become a marital arts star in his next film, which will be written, produced and maybe directed (he has not decided yet) by Shepard. He does not have much of a storyline yet for the his makeover project, much less a script, but he has a title, Brother's Justice. 

After Shepard and his producing buddy, Nate Tuck, are rejected numerous times, and all the poorer for the delays, they decide to reach out to fellow Hollywood actors like Tom Arnold and Ashton Kutcher who are not immediately in on the joke...until Shepard starts pitching.  

Co-directed by Shepard and David Palmer, Brother's Justice comes off in many ways, such as its attack on Hollywood preciousness and America's homophobia, like a stripped down version of Sascha Baron Cohen's latest films. Shepard is not as gusty to go undercover to unmask society's shortcomings as Cohen, nor does he have the budget, but the mockumentary is still a pretty funny send up on moviemaking and, as such, will definitely appeal to Hollywood insiders a tad more than the general public.

Considering how well this would have played to Tinseltown audiences, and that the Newport Beach Film Festival snagged Brother's Justice up before the upcoming Los Angeles Film Festival could screen it, shows somebody behind the Orange Curtain was on his or her toes.