FILM REVIEW: THE STRANGE COLOR OF YOUR BODY'S TEARS

A scene from in The Strange Color of Your Body's Tears.

The man and the menses 

By John Esther

Dan Kristensen (Klaus Tange) has just returned to Brussels from a business trip abroad. After leaving several messages for his wife, Edwige (Ursula Bedena), without receiving response, Dan comes home to find the door is chained from the inside. When Edwige still does not answer Dan through the ajar door, Dan breaks the chain and enters his home. 

Edwige is missing. Rather than immediately call the cops, Dan goes on a drinking binge and then rings up his neighbors to see if they have seen his wife. One of his neighbors lets him into her home. A strange woman whose face remains shadowed in darkness, Dora (Birgin Yew), relays a ghastly story about the day her husband went missing in the ceiling after he tied her up and sedated her. (She wakes up later to help him, somehow eschewing or forgetting or forgiving her husband's horrific behavior.)

After this bizarre encounter with the elderly lady in black, Dan's journey becomes increasingly strange -- while one's patience diminshes. People appear and disappear. There are displaced bodies in the forms of simulacra, split screens, broken glass and sliced flesh. Side stories are started and stopped. Snuff recordings are played over the phone. Nightmares repeat themselves. Carnage becomes fetish. Razors are the choice of weapon, but any piercing object will do. Law enforcement is ephemeral.

Oh, as The Strange Color of Your Body's Tears never lets us forget, the male gaze is at work. Eye see you. Does it want to see female flesh or blood or both? Well, it is certainly obvious what is more thrilling to the filmmakers; and they are not going to break down the patriarchal visual paradigm a la Marguerite Duras, Toril Moi, Toni Morrison, Jane Campion or Robert Altman. 

Written and directed by the husband and wife team behind Amer, Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani, The Strange Color of Your Body's Eyes is intended (Italian artists audibly participate throughout) and advertised as a "homage to the Masters of Italian Giallo horror" -- an aspiration about as admirable as a novelist writing a homage to the novels of Danielle Steel or a cinephile's homage to pulp fiction -- and almost as reactionary and illogical in execution.

Stuck in a beautiful-turned-nightmarish Art Nouveau building where people hide and emerge from the walls and ceilings (are they ghosts?), the directors, plus the director of photographer, Manu Dacosse, are obsessed with the image at the risk of plot or sign, which in many cases displays a pornographic fear of female sexuality. As if reworking the work of George Bataille inside out or Jacques Lacan upside down, the Belgium filmmaking duo (whether they are familiar with those French authors or not) see sexuality not as an extension of one's self, but the murder of one's self -- metaphorically and literally. Continuity is obliterated in the name of discontinuity. Here, sex is horror without any redeeming pleasures. Man has vagina on the mind -- a bloody nightmare triggering subconscious memories of lost innocence. All because a little boy saw a trickle of blood. Menophobia. It also turns out that, indeed, some women do fantasize about being stalked, raped and murdered. Or is that Dan's dream? Golly gee, even Ingmar Bergman had a better sense of humor when it came to sex than this couple.

The film rarely maintains an image for more than a few seconds. Everything must be rapid, colorful and artsy, but it is an intellectual sham. At least Marquis de Sade and Jean Genet knew how to play both filthy and sensitive while simultaneously addressing violent sexual practices within and between the realms of power and the powerless. In The Strange Colors of Your Body's Tears, nothing enlightening goes beyond one of those "horror" films where a bunch of teenagers are stuck in the woods, getting killed off one by one because of the big, bad, old monster known as sex is after them.



 

 
















 

FILM REVIEW: LUCY

Lucy (Scarlett Johansson) in Lucy. 

Knowledge equals power, guns and car chase scenes

By Ed Rampell

Writer-director Luc Besson’s Lucy may be the most visually visionary science fiction movie since Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 2001: A Space Odyssey. Scarlett Johansson portrays the title character, a foreign student studying at Taipei who is ensnared in a bad drug deal with Taiwanese mobsters. This leads to her ingesting a high dose of a chemical substance called CPH4 that causes Lucy to become hyper-intelligent.

This extraordinarily optically opulent film combines two of Besson’s obsessions: powerful female protagonists and science fiction. Per the latter Besson co-wrote and directed 1997’s The Fifth Element co-starring Bruce Willis and Milla Jovovich. Besson’s then-wife went on to star in 1999’s The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc (talk about woman warriors!). Previously Anne Parillaud played another action heroine in Besson’s 1990 La Femme Nikita, while Michelle Yeoh depicted the title character in Bresson’s 2011 The Lady, the biopic about what may arguably be Bresson’s most courageous female character ever: Burmese pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.  

Besson’s graphic depiction of Lucy’s state of ultra-cosmic consciousness to the extreme is highly cinematic in this film full of stunning cinematography and Sergei Eisenstein-like montage sequences (not so much in terms of their timing but in regards to associational editing). It’s interesting that the more intelligent Lucy becomes the more violent she is -- one of the movie’s many Kubrickian references. In 1971’s A Clockwork Orange the thuggish droogie Alex (Malcolm McDowell) may behave like a soccer hooligan but he’s highly intelligent and a fan of Ludwig van Beethoven. 2001: A Space Odyssey's HAL is a murderous computer (“I’m sorry Dave, but I can’t do that”).  And of course, the proto-human character in the beginning of 2001: A Space Odyssey wins a fight by cunningly figuring out how to kill his opponent with a weapon (the bone which, in the cinema’s greatest jump cut, becomes a spacecraft when tossed into the air).

Lucy is -- as Johansson’s character is reminded -- also the name of our oldest human-like ancestor, who is glimpsed onscreen at various points in the movie. Her name may also be a reference to the Beatles’ “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds," especially given the film’s psychedelic cinematography. Lucy becomes a character similar to the savior-like “star child” Dr. Dave Bowman (Keir Dullea) is transformed into at the end of 2001: A Space Odyssey; during Lucy’s end credits (which, remarkably, include the names of every musician who contributed to the movie’s soundtrack) the lyrics of a song are about a “messiah.” As previously indicated, Besson’s special effects are reminiscent of Kubrick’s as Dullea’s astronaut soars throughout the solar system (although Lucy I is sans monoliths and Richard Strauss’ Thus Spake Zarathustra).

Besson has previously helmed action packed flicks such as Nikita (about a female assassin) and unfortunately, Lucy is full of screeching car chases and blazing gunplay. Although Besson has demonstrated a penchant for violent films, this may be intended as box office insurance to lure the multiplex and male adolescent crowds to buy tickets and popcorn. Given its sidewalk cafes, bookstalls and the like, Paris is the world’s worst city for driving at high speed on the streets (especially since this is the first time Lucy has ever driven a car, as she tells detective Pierre Del Rio, played by Cairo-born Amr Waked). Alas, poor Yorick, Besson should leave the mindless explosions to lesser helmers like Michael Bay. They intrude on and mar what could have been a more philosophical sci-fi cinematic treatise on the nature of knowledge (which, as Lucy shows, is flawed if it’s not accompanied by compassion -- therein lies true wisdom). 

The movie’s negative depictions of Asians also leaves much to be desired.  

Johansson is fine as the CPH4-amped up action star and genius who uses 100 percent of her brain power. Morgan Freeman co-stars as a scientist and it’s fun to see Danish actor Pilou Asbæk -- who plays the troubled spin doctor in the superb Borgen TV series about Denmark’s first woman prime minister and co-starred in the 2012 movie, A Hijacking -- in a smarmy cameo role as Lucy opens. Lucy is for fans of Johansson, female action parts, sci fi and, above all, visionary cinema that imaginatively uses the attributes of the motion picture medium to the max.   

THEATER REVIEW: THE MAGIC FLUTE

A scene from The Magic Flute.

Sigh-lenses and breath

By Ed Rampell

The current version of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s The Magic Flute presented by LA Opera raises two essential artistic questions (plus, perhaps, eyebrows). Pouring vintage works into new bottles can be problematic, and in this reviewer’s opinion, more often than not they are not successful. This year I saw three modern dress Greek tragedies and, sans togas, only the Getty Villa’s Prometheus Bound worked. Resetting the other two myths in modern times served solely to detract from the original intents of the creators, and did absolutely nothing to enhance the banal productions.

On the other hand, every once in a while, a Leonard Bernstein, Arthur Laurents, Jerome Robbins, Stephen Sondheim and company come along, updating Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, whipping up a whole new, relevant concoction like West Side Story. It was a stroke of genius to replace Juliet’s balcony with a Manhattan fire escape. So I’m happy to say that the British “1927” theatre company and Komische Oper Berlin rendition of Mozart’s 1791 Flute -- the planet’s most produced German-language opera -- falls into this latter category of reconfigured and re-jiggered classics.

The company’s artistic conceit is to draw upon the conventions and aesthetics of silent films in order to express the fairy tale by Mozart and librettist Schikaneder. As such, we have some Hollywood studio slapstick and German expressionist elements, with references from Clara Bow’s “It Girl” to The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari to Fritz Lang’s Dr. Mabuse.

To be specific, the character Monostatos (tenor Rodell Rosel), who is identified (perhaps in a racist way?) as a “Moor” and chief of the slaves of the temple, is straight out of Nosferatu, F.W. Murnau’s 1922 creepy forerunner to Dracula. Pamina (soprano Janai Brugger) is suggestive of those Jazz Age sexually liberated flappers, such as Louise Brooks, the American-born actress who starred in G.W. Pabst’s 1920s German films, such as the daring Pandora’s Box -- one half expects her to burst out dancing the Charleston. Papageno (baritone Rodion Pogossov) is dressed like none other than that king of silent comedians, Buster Keaton (BTW, French Stewart is reviving the stellar bioplay Stoneface in June 2014 at the Pasadena Playhouse).

In addition to the innate artistry pertaining to and peculiar to silent movies, the 1927/Komische Oper Berlin production uses lots of 1927’s Paul Barritt-designed animation, which is the format the non-live action imagery is actually projected in, onto the wall Esther Bialas (who is also the costume designer) had constructed, in lieu of LA Opera’s usually lavish sets. This backdrop has elevated portals with sort of revolving doors out of which the various characters appear (strapped in harnesses, as they are on high). The visuals are often witty, and reminiscent of the type of animated images seen in the Beatles’ Yellow Submarine, Monty Python, Betty Boop Max Fleischer cartoons, and Dumbo -- although they never attain the polished perfection of works by Disney or Pixar.

This production is gloriously and very precisely, painstakingly co-directed by Suzanne Andrade, an Englishwoman, and Australian Barrie Kosky, who is the Intendant (chief administrator) of the Komische Oper Berlin. Viewer/listener beware: One misses it at his or her own peril, and an extra performance has been added. In our violent world, Mozart’s opera persuasively argues in favor of less Glocks -- and more glockenspiels. This rapturously imaginative Magic Flute is nothing less than -- well -- magical.

 

The Magic Flute runs through Dec. 13 at LA Opera at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 135 N. Grand Ave. For more info: 213-972-8001; www.laopera.com.

LAFF 2013: PURGATORIO

A scene from Purgatorio.

Over theirs

By John Esther

Two men stand outside a large fence waiting for the right time to climb over, leaving a family behind. Another man leaves water for those who have made it over the fence while another man goes around picking up what he thinks are clues for people who have crossed the border unannounced. Others are imprisoned by drugs, violence and vengeful fantasies. Borders as large prisons.  

Bullets litter automobiles, kill three policemen, and a local drug dealer. Deadly currency. Automobiles, planes and buildings rust in the dessert sun. Scrapyards of paradise lost. (Forever?)

Drug gangs rule the land, abandoned dogs roam the land while others just run to wreck it. To be sure, a few good men and women remain, but the ugly weight of a divine comedy has turned into a human tragedy. It is hard to strive when one can barely survive.

These are ideas, attitudes and illustrations of Rodrigo Reyes' Purgatorio: A Journey Into the Heart of the Border. An intellectually impressive and refreshingly angry documentary -- which also happens to be the best thing I have seen at LAFF 2013 hitherto -- Reyes moves around an undisclosed part of the Mexican-U.S. border casting his eyes toward unnamed men and women beaten by the system while lending his ears to people who have not been beaten by the system, yet.

Between the interviews, Justin Chin's cinematography captures the haunting landscape where our "hero" shakes his tongue, trying to find salvation in a cold and indifferent universe. If this is purgatory, how can the inferno be worse?

Highly recommended.


Purgatorio screens at the Los Angeles Festival June 20, 7 p.m., Regal Cinemas. For more information: Purgatorio at LAFF 2013.

FILM REVIEW: SAVAGES

O (Blake Lively) and Lobo (Benicio Del Toro) in Savages.

Throwing Stone

By Don Simpson

In what is being heralded by some as a “return to form,” writer-director Oliver Stone relies all-too-heavily upon the voiceover narration of O (Blake Lively) -- who teases us with hints that she might just be communicating with us from the afterlife -- to set up her three-way relationship with entrepreneurial marijuana cultivators, Ben (Aaron Johnson) and Chon (Taylor Kitsch). You see, Ben and Chon share O, sometimes at the same time (adding fuel to the right-wing's perception of marijuana as an immoral drug), and as long as the two guys are capable of providing O with orgasms-a-plenty and a credit card (for binge shopping at the mall, of course) she will stick around.

As if attempting to take a page from John Woo's playbook, Ben and Chon have an intense brotherly bond, but they have very little in common. Chon is an ex-Navy SEAL who has been forever traumatized by harrowing tours of Afghanistan and Iraq (while having sex with O, he has "wargasms"). In other words, he is the irrational brawn of the duo. Ben is a peaceful Buddhist who donates much of his time and money to help save the world. In other words, he is the rational brains of the duo.

Ben and Chon have cultivated a strand of Afghan marijuana that clocks in at an unfathomable 33% THC and their primo product puts their exclusively high-class indie start-up on the radar of a gargantuan Mexican drug cartel (the Walmart of the drug world). The cartel's leader, Elena (Salma Hayek), wants to bring Ben and Chon's highly profitable business into her fold, but Ben and Chon naively snub their noses at Elena's offer (Chon tersely exclaims, "You want us to eat your shit and call it caviar?!"). The problem is, no one ever says no to Elena and gets away with it! Thus, Elena's dastardly-yet-cartoonish henchman Lobo (Benicio Del Toro) kidnaps O, and all the while he twirls his mustache. Luckily for Ben and Chon, they have an elite squad of ex-Navy SEALs and topnotch IT team at their disposal, which they assemble to plan a scheme to get O back. Somewhere in the middle of the whole mess is a corrupt DEA agent, Dennis (John Travolta).

As much as I wanted Savages to be a return to form for Stone, the film is way too riddled with amateurish mistakes and uneven direction to be compared to the films of his heyday -- which, in my humble opinion, came to a grinding halt in 1997 with U-Turn. Yes, I get that Savagesis intended to be a trashy, fun, pulp-y, genre flick -- the problem is that we all know what Stone is (or was) capable of. I might have been willing to cut Stone a little slack if not for the clunky voiceover narration in the film's opening minutes and the horrendous closing act. Really, the only reason to watch Savages is for John Travolta and Benicio Del Toro's masterfully comedic supporting performances (especially during the one scene in which they face-off) -- though I am still quite unclear as to whether they are intentionally being funny.

Speaking of muddled intent, what is Stone really trying to say about marijuana and the war on drugs? Other than a couple heavy-handed attempts to drag medical marijuana into the equation, the perception of marijuana in Savages seems to be incredibly negative. Our perpetually stoned antiheroes -- Ben, Chon and O (who visualize themselves as a modern Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid) -- have reaped millions from the marijuana business, but have lost sight on reality because of their over-reliance upon their own highly potent product. Stone seems to be telling us that marijuana turns people into stupid capitalists who are addicted to materialism.

As for the war on drugs? Well, Stone simply relishes in its ridiculousness. The running joke is that each party views the other parties as savages; but if they all just worked together, there would probably be no need for violence. I guess I expected a little more from Stone, especially given the rare opportunity of featuring a female cartel leader. But, Stone turns Elena into a woman who is just as irrational and brutal as any male cartel leaders we have seen on celluloid. The only difference is that she has a weakness -- her motherly instinct to want to see her daughter (Sandra Echeverría).

TRIBECA 2012: DEADFALL

Addison (Eric Bana) in Deadfall.

Fury on wayward sons

By John Esther

From the writer-director excellent 2007 film, The Counterfeiters, director Stefan Ruzowitzky's American feature wastes little time informing viewers that there is much masculine violence in the cold mountains near the USA-Canada border.

First there is the violent car crash leading to a man's head going through the window. (The only non-white character in the film is killed off first. We have a word for that narrative trope in cultural studies).

Addison (Eric Bana) and his sister, Liza (Olivia Wilde) survive the crash, drenched in a pool of blood, snow and cash. As an officer pulls up to see what is going on, with a southern elocution Addison says to the lawman, "I hope one day you can forgive me" before shooting him multiple times.

Request denied.

Accordingly, Addison and Liza must split up, but not before one gets the feeling he and Liza have a little down south affair going on. But that their daddy's fault, really.

Meanwhile, Jay (Charlie Hunnam), who was once an Olympic-winning boxer, has just been released from prison. Once out he gives a call to his parents. His mom, June (Sissy Spacek), is pretty cool. She wants her boy to come home for Thanksgiving. His dad, Chet (Kris Kristofferson), is not so eager to see his disappointing son.

Jake agrees to his mother's pleas, but he first needs to settle a score. This score is anything but settling and now Jay is making a run for the border. Along the way, Jay meets Liza. They hit it off while Addison is on his little murder spree.

Along with some other characters dealing with similar issues regarding paternal guilt, eventually, predictably and not too convincingly, all meet up in one location for the final showdown. Time for a little redemption through revenge.

Interesting characters snowbound by Zach Dean's debut screenplay, Deadfall has its moments of deep, fleeting poignancy during moments of violence -- like when a little girl tells Addison "you're no angel" as he shoots down another officer; when Chet assures his son "this is your table" after Jay makes his Thanksgiving amends; and watching Hanna's (Kate Mara) terrible luck as she tries to please her misogynistic father (Treat Williams) -- but those moments get buried in yet another bloody tale of American violence and redemption.

TRIBECA 2012: SLEEPLESS NIGHT

Vincent (Tomer Sisley) and Vignali (Lizzie Brocheré) in Sleepless Night.

Dust to windbag

By Don Simpson

In the time span of a brutally intense 24 hours — including a sleepless night for everyone involved in the film — director Frédéric Jardin’s taut thriller, Sleepless Night begins with a drug heist gone horribly awry and snowballs into a relentless powerhouse of non-stop action from that point onward. In a tale in which there are very few good guys and countless shades of baddies, it is difficult to surmise where the protagonist, Vincent (Tomer Sisley), falls.

Vincent possesses a bag of cocaine that was stolen from two cronies employed by a local drug lord named Marciano (Serge Riaboukine). Marciano kidnaps Vincent’s son and offers Vincent a trade — the boy for the cocaine. Left with no other choice, Vincent makes his way to Marciano’s labyrinthine discothèque called Le Tarmac with no plan, only the overwhelming parental desire to save his son.

Vincent spends a majority of the film in a hopeless cat-and-mouse game with two drug lords, their minions, and at least two police officers. An assortment of nightclub staff and patrons are also engulfed into the tornado of fisticuffs — early on, Queen’s “Another One Bites the Dust” throbs from the sound system to serve as a precursor of what is to come. Dust will be bitten, you can be certain of that. Party people saturate every orifice of Le Tarmac as the block rockin’ beats blend seamlessly with the non-stop pummeling of flesh and shattering of bones. The intensity — and length — of some of the fight scenes is almost laughable, especially when we see the same characters moving around as if unscathed one scene later.

FILM REVIEW: LEAP YEAR

Laura (Monica del Carmen) and Arturo (Gustavo Sánchez Parra) in Leap Year.

Belle die blur

By Don Simpson

Not to be confused with the Anand Tucker’s overtly saccharine Leap Year (2010), starring Amy Adams and Matthew Goode, Michael Rowe’s Mexican import focuses on the bleak life of Laura (Monica del Carmen). 

Except for the opening scene, in which Laura goes grocery shopping, the camera does not leave her Mexico City apartment. Laura, a freelance journalist, only leaves her apartment to stock up on food and find new men to lure back to her lair. We gaze upon Laura as she puts away groceries, cooks dinner, talks on the phone, masturbates, has sex with a random guy, talks on the phone some more, types on her laptop, watches television, has more sex with other random guys...rinse and repeat. The monotony of Laura’s life is strangely lulling yet utterly depressing.

One fateful night Laura brings Arturo (Gustavo Sánchez Parra) back to her apartment. Arturo takes her from behind, slaps her ass, and Laura takes it all in stride. Arturo comes back another night for more, this time he slaps her across the face then nearly strangles her. Arturo comes again and again, each time the sex becomes more and more violent; and Laura continues to accept Arturo’s increasingly sadomasochistic behavior as if a form of penance for sins she has committed in the past. For both Laura and Arturo, sex is a recreational activity, not an emotional connection. Despite Arturo’s perceived dominance during their sexual trysts, Laura always maintains full control (golden showers and all). Arturo may not realize it, but he is merely a puppet submitting to Laura’s will.

Rowe -- an Australian-born writer who has been living in Mexico for 16 years -- has formulated a heartbreaking account of hopelessness, self-isolation, and sexual aggression. The winner of the Camera d’Or prize at Cannes 2010, Leap Year is a subtle and subdued character study about an intelligent and doughy young woman whose calendar suggests that something wicked this way comes. The hashed-out days on Laura’s calendar are quickly approaching February 29th, a day that is menacingly designated in blood red.

LAFF 2011: BAD INTENTIONS

Cayetana de la Heros (Fatima Buntinx) in Bad Intentions.

Death to the bourgeoisie

By Don Simpson

Writer-director Rosario Garcia-Montero’s The Bad Intentions is a coming-of-age story which centers around a quirky-yet-morose nine-year-old girl, Cayetana de la Heros (Fatima Buntinx). Cayetana’s parents (Katerina D'Onofrio and Jean Paul Strauss) are divorced -- which, as she learns at her Catholic school, means they are going to hell. Cayetana is raised primarily by the servants (Liliana Alegría, Tania Ruiz, Melchor Gorrochátegui) at her Valium-popping mother’s bourgeois home in Lima, Peru. Whenever Cayetana does spend time with her mother, she devises new and interesting ways to play torturous mind games with her. And though Cayetana’s father seems too preoccupied with life -- especially attractive young women -- to pay her much mind, Cayetana idolizes him nonetheless.

As her surname suggests, Cayetana is obsessed with heroes. It seems most of Peru’s heroes are losers and Cayetana is specifically interested in their heroic deaths. Cayetana’s fascination with death, especially violent deaths during battle, lends her the morbid air of a Peruvian Wednesday Addams. Death’s allure becomes even more personal when Cayetana suddenly -- and quite irrationally -- concludes that she will die on the day that her pregnant mother gives birth. Cayetana is not very worried about dying, but she seems utterly frightened of being rendered invisible.

Of her entire family, Cayetana’s most sane and rewarding relationship is with her cousin, Jimena (Kani Hart). When Cayetana becomes too much for her mother to handle, she is sent to spend the summer at the beach with her cousin. When Jimena becomes mysteriously ill, Cayetana is snapped back into reality. Death is more than just a magic realism-tinged dream; death becomes real for Cayetana.

The Bad Intentions takes place in 1982 and the brutal guerrilla attacks of the Maoist group, the Shining Path (Sendero Luminoso), hover around the periphery of the narrative. The terrorists always seem to be lurking around the corner; as the violence creeps closer to Cayetana, her mind is catapulted into more frequent and fervent daydreams about Peru’s past war heroes.

Garcia-Montero’s film functions as an absurd allegory for bourgeois feelings of ambivalence towards an uncertain future. The invisible yet always-present threat of death has warped repercussions in the mind of a nine-year-old child; Cayetana is riddled with Catholic guilt, consciously for her parents’ unholy divorce and subconsciously for being a part of a bourgeois household that is quite similar to the colonialists that her favorite revolutionary heroes fought against.

LAFF 2011: SEX CRIMES UNIT

Natasha Alexenko in Sex Crimes Unit.

Victimized and victorious 

By John Esther

Two days and one day before the HBO premiere on June 20, the Los Angeles Film Film Festival screens Sex Crimes Unit, an insightful yet flawed look at a group of dedicated city employees working to bring rapists and other sexually violent perpetrators to justice. 

Before the Sex Crimes Protection Unit was formed in 1974 by Manhattan District Attorney and father of five daughters, Robert M. Morgenthau, victims of rape had very little legal recourse. Marital rape was not considered a crime (and good luck with prosecuting acquaintance rape or date rape cases). It was subject to statues of limitations. And more importantly, it was, and still is to a considerable degree, a victim-precipitated crime. In other words, a woman had it coming to her -- even if she was married, at home, sober, in bed asleep and the assailant broke into the house and sexually violated her. (Some of the reasoning behind this latter part, especially when it came to women holding this point of view, are some of the more interesting moments in the documentary.)

Today, sexually-violent crimes still persist but now there are 53 people handling sex crimes in Manhattan. Not only do they go after fresh cases, thanks to the removal of the statue of limitations on rape, they go after cold cases such as Natasha Alexenko. 

On the eve of her first anniversary in her New York apartment, Alexenko was raped at gunpoint in her apartment hallway by Victor Rondon (a particularly cowardly young man who has no idea what it takes to be a man in any legitimate or dignified sense.)

As Sex Crimes Unit follows new cases, as well as Alexenko's, we get a sense of not only the challenges incurred getting justice but also the victimization and victories between the time of the assault and actual sentencing. 

However, on a couple of occasions, the documentary takes a bit of an ironic tone, as it feeds right into those who are prone to be dismissive of women crying rape. The Zambrano case discussed early in the film is one example. Based on the information provided in documentary, it seems any decent defendant attorney should have been able to fight that one. In another scene a DA has a talk with a group of medical examiners that borderlines on coaching a witness -- albeit before the fact(s). 

And what about those times when the DA fails to prosecute a guilty defendant? The documentary leaves the impression that the accused, at least those who are arraigned (40 percent of rapes go unreported), will be sent to prison for a very long time. 

Yet despite these editorial/directorial flaws, Sex Crime Unit is an inspirational piece of filmmaking about a group of individuals addressing a prevalent problem in American society.

FILM REVIEW: VIVA RIVA!

Riva (Patsha Bay Mukuna) in Viva Riva.

Shaft-Ed. lives 

By Ed Rampell 

The Black exploitation films that burst upon the screen in the 1970s with flicks such as Shaft and Super Fly have largely faded to black here in America, with the exception of genre spoofs such as Eddie Griffin’s 2002 Undercover Brother, where Afros are sources of ridicule. But judging by writer-director Djo Tunda Wa Munga’s award-winning Viva Riva!, Blaxploitation is alive and well in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where this high voltage gangsta flick full of sex and violence was shot and set. 

But don’t expect to watch Tarzan and Cheetah swinging from tree to tree in the jungle; there isn’t a rain forest in sight in this African movie. The only thing worse than the West’s modern cities are Third World underdeveloped, overpopulated, impoverished metropolises where basic utilities such as water and electricity often don’t work -- think traffic jams with no power for the stoplights -- as in the DRC’s capital of Kinshasa that is, apparently accurately, called a “shithole” in the film..

The plot of the stylishly shot and edited Viva Riva! is simple enough. Returning from Angola to Kinshasa, a popular, handsome, charming, young man named Riva (the likable Patsha Bay Mukune, a musician making his acting debut) is determined to get rich quick by ripping off his Angolan boss, Cesar (Angolan actor Hoji Fortuna), in order to make what a Shaft movie called his “big score.” A criminal overlord, the sadistic Cesar doesn’t take kindly to his former underling’s theft and is hot on his trail, wreaking mayhem and murder in his wake as he relentlessly tracks Riva down in Kinshasa. 

Along the rollicking way, big spending Riva is smitten by the redheaded Nora, portrayed by the exquisitely beautiful Manie Malone in her feature debut. Unfortunately for Riva, Nora appears to be the kept woman of another thug, Azor (the menacing Diplome Amekindra), although she repeatedly insists she’s “no whore” (apparently because her father was an English teacher). Fortunately, Azor prefers to watch porn featuring unattractive women to sexually satisfying Nora, whom he presumably keeps as an ornament to burnish his gangsta image. 

There’s genuine chemistry between Riva and Nora, and in a pic full of sex, they have extremely erotic scenes. The sequence where Nora tells Riva to give her a “real kiss” is truly arousing, as is their bathtub lovemaking interlude. The latter is clearly a homage to the famously hot aquatic sex scene between Ron O’Neal and Sheila Frazier in Super Fly, and if anything, Viva Riva!’s watery rapture is even steamier. In fact, Viva Riva!’s cinematic references are part of the flick’s good fun appeal for cinephiles. In addition to Blaxploitation pix, Munga, who studied cinema at Belgium’s INSAS (Institut National Superieur des Arts de Spectacle), gives sly nods and winks to 1931’s Little Caesar, starring Edward G. Robinson; Jean-Luc Godard’s 1959 Breathless, starring Jean-Paul Belmondo; and the 1972 Jamaica cult classic, The Harder They Come. 

With its relentless gunplay, torture, etc., and candid sex, Viva Riva! is more of a “dick flick” (to coin a phrase) than a “chick flick.” The frank sexuality includes lesbian trysts between the corrupt female military officer called Commandante (Marlene Longage) and the bar girl, Malou (Angelique Mbumba). Some may consider the film's brutality, nudity and promiscuity to play into stereotypes of blacks in general, and of Africans in particular.

Nevertheless, Viva Riva! swept the African equivalent of the Academy Awards and won the 2011 Pan African Film Festival’s Best Feature Film prize. Beneath the film's shoot-’em-up, hands up, get it up sensibility, a critical eye might just be at work, scouring and skewering the former Belgian Congo, which fell from grace after the assassination of nationalist leader Patrice Lumumba, who was either saintly or just didn’t live long enough to overstay his welcome in power and turn into just another African tin pot strongman, like his despicable despotic successor, Mobutu. 

The film's second most interesting character may well be Anto, a street hustling streetwise kid well-played by Jordan N’Tunga, who befriends the appealing Riva. The final shot of him is rather haunting, and refers to some characters’ back stories, which are not spelled out but indicate that something went wrong with their childhoods, as their innocence was lost and corrupted. Perhaps this is a metaphor for post-colonial Africa? 

This subtitled movie is for fans of gangsta and Blaxploitation pix, as well as for serious cineastes interested in where African cinema is currently at. The realistic Kinshasa setting is a contemporary reflection of 21^st century Africa, just as the musical I wrote the book for, Still Standing, is, with its urban Nairobi background and real life depiction of rapper Gleam Joel living the thug life in Kenya. Instead of Tarzan, Jane (Goodall and the Ape Man’s mate), Dian Fossey, Karen Blixen and other white characters starring in movies made about and in sub-Saharan Africa, it is now the indigenous people starring in movies about their lives. And they are getting behind, as well as in front of the camera more and more now. By some accounts Nigeria’s Nollywood has the world’s third largest movie industry, and Viva Riva! is at the cutting edge of Africa’s cinematic new wave. Call this refreshing if jolting indigenous trend: Get Out of Africa.
 

 

 

 

 

 

FILM REVIEW: HOBO WITH A SHOTGUN

Hobo (Rutger Hauer) in Hobo with a Shotgun.

Not taking the ride

By Don Simpson

I typically do not read reviews of films before I write my own, but in this instance I read everything about Hobo with a Shotgun that has been published to date on IMDB.com and Rotten Tomatoes and, I have to admit, I really do not understand why so many people are raving about it. And that, my friends, is why I hopped on this god forsaken “I hate Hobo with a Shotgun” bandwagon in the first place.

Hopping off a train — because that is where all hobos seem to come from -- the nameless Hobo (Rutger Hauer) finds himself in the ironically named Hope Town (the adopted moniker of ”Scum Town” seems more appropriate). Within minutes, the Hobo witnesses the über-violent antics of the cartoonish mob boss, The Drake (Brian Downey), who yanks off people’s heads, leaving their decapitated body dangling inside a manhole of a public street, all at the frightful bemusement of a public audience. Or maybe they are merely waiting for some scantily clad women to bathe in the blood? (They do not have to wait very long for that to happen.)

The Hobo also befriends a street smart, young prostitute, Abby (Molly Dunsworth), who he likes to believe is a chaste schoolteacher. The Hobo mutters some nonsensical diatribes about bears and eventually announces his intentions of doling out justice for the sake of the local townspeople. Hurray! The Hobo arms himself with his titular weapon — a shotgun purchased at a local pawn shop — and sets his sights on The Drake and The Drake’s two evil sons, Ivan (Nick Bateman) and Slick (Gregory Smith), plus The Plague. By this point, what little plot there was in the first act has dissolved into some sort of nonsensical violent lunacy.

In the film’s one moment of metaphoric thoughtfulness, a lawnmower is revealed as a symbol of suburban domestic tranquility for the Hobo, but once push comes to shove that fairytale is promptly exchanged for the shotgun. Otherwise, Hobo with a Shotgun gratuitously avoids any mental stimulation.

I do not have many favorable things to say about Hobo with a Shotgun, yet I still give writer-director Jason Eisener’s for one thing: Hauer. The casting of Hauer in this role was truly an inspired yet fleeting moment of genius. As for the supporting characters, Eisner should have just set up a bunch of cardboard cutouts of overused cinematic stereotypes and the effect would have been exactly the same. To be honest, I do not discredit the actors — my problem with the supporting characters rests in the shoddily contrived dialogue and utter lack of character development.