COLCOA 2012: MICHEL PETRUCCIANI

Michel Petrucciani in Michel Petrucciani.

Glassworks

By John Esther

For those who have heard Michel Petrucciani play piano, it a pretty impressive experience. The guy's technique is stunning, a marvelous combination of speed, lightness and joy. But to see him play is something altogether more impressive and that is the best attribute of Michael Radford's documentary, Michel Petrucciani.

Born in 1962 with osteogeneis imperfecta (AKA glass bone disease), Petrucciani's body was highly delicate, prone to fracture. He would never grow taller than three feet and could not walk for most of his life. As the outside world was often too dangerous for the boy, Petrucciani would stay home listening to jazz and playing piano (with a custom food petal) on a constant, and soon, phenomenal level.

It was not long before he started playing with the jazz greats. As his career took off, Petrucciani would spend his time traveling the globe, but much of his short time on earth in Paris, New York and Big Sur where he fully engaged in the party lifestyle of a jazz musician. He was also quite the ladie's man, albeit not much of a monogamous one.

For anyone who knew the basic details of late pianist (he died in 199), not much of the information provided in the documentary will be informative. We get the familiar inspiring narrative of a little kid who could along with the sordid details of the rather hedonistic man, but not much else. For example, what were Petrucciani's opinions regarding art, politics or the second class status society places on people with disabilities? What did he think about rock & roll?

But these ommissions can be overlooked to some degree as Radford (Van Morrison in Irelend) unearths some fantastic footage of a man born just right to play the piano.


Michel Petrucciani screens April 17, 5:30 p.m. at Directors Guild of America. For more information: Petrucciani

DVD REVIEW: SASHA

Sasha (Sasa Kekez) in Sasha.

Croatia coming out

By John Esther

Released today on DVD, Sasha tells a very familiar story about a gay teenager, Sasha (Sasa Kekez), who must hide his feelings for members of the same sex from his family while overexposing his feelings toward a mentor with heart of cold, Gebhard (Tim Bergmann).

The son of Croatian parents living in German, at the insistence of his mother (Zeljka Preksavec) Sasha has been taking piano lessons from Gebhard. Dad (Pedja Bjelac) is not too pleased with his son endeavoring in anything has effeminate and effete as artistic endeavors, but lets it slide because Sasha has a “girlfriend,” Jiao (Yvonne Yung-Hee), who is also a musician training for the same upcoming all-important audition.

Already unnerved by living in the closet, Sasha starts to unravel when Gebhard tells him he is leaving for Austria. Sasha, in his adolescence naïvete believed he and Gebhard would always be together, even if Gebhard never showed any type of emotional reciprocation to Sasha.

When Sasha relates his brother heart to Jiao, she has her own emotional panic as she has strong feelings for Sasha. Obviously she, like Dad and dimwit Uncle Boki (Jasin Mjumjunov) has no gaydar. But Sasha's mother and younger brother (Ljubisa Lupo Grujcic) do -- although they do not dare say the words out loud.
Written and directed by Dennis Todorovic, Sasha does not breaking any narrative frontiers. There are plenty of coming out stories these days and the ending here is quite conventional and some of the dialogue rings hollow. However, the fine acting, pace and score make it worthwhile viewing, not enough to buy the DVD (which does not seem to offer any bonus features), but catching it via cable or Netflix should work.