NEWPORT BEACH 2012: THE WAR AROUND US

Sherine Tadros in The War Around Us.

There will be no shelter here

By Ed Rampell

One of the hardest hitting documentaries I’ve seen in years, Abdallah Omeish’s The War Around Us deserves not only distribution so audiences can see it, but also an Oscar nomination.

The War Around Us is the true story of the only two international journalists reporting from the war zone, as Israel bombarded and invaded Gaza in late 2008. Al Jazeera’s Cairo-born, Arab-American Ayman Mohyeldin and Arab-British Sherine Tadros were on the ground in Gaza City during the Israeli military operation that resulted, according to this gripping documentary, in the highest number of Palestinians killed in a single day since 1948.

The dynamic duo of Mohyeldin and Tadros does yeoman work reporting on the war’s consequences on a largely civilian population for the Arab network, and provide a window on the conflict to the outside world. The doc alleges that the Israeli Defense Forces committed war crimes against noncombatants, including unarmed women, children and elders, including the use of white phosphorus, which an Israeli spokesman denies, although eyewitnesses, including human rights activists, confirm it. During the conflagration, as hospitals are filled beyond the bursting point and basics such as electricity, water and even cheeseburgers, are cut off, a U.N. compound is bombarded by the IDF.

The War Around Us is a gripping reminder that war is hell, and of a specific conflict most of us have forgotten about. Of course, the poor Palestinians remember it, but this doc would have benefitted from providing more context as to why the Israelis did what they did, and the roles that the change in U.S. administrations (from the Bush to the Obama regime) and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s alleged corruption played in this devastation -- so heroically chronicled by Mohyeldin and Tadros.   

  

  

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.

NEWPORT BEACH 2012: UNDER AFRICAN SKIES



Paul Simon in Under African Skies.

Sounds of defiance

By Ed Rampell

Joe Berlinger’s complicated two-hour documentary Under African Skies has, on the one hand, a sonorous soundtrack featuring Paul Simon and his African Graceland band. On the other hand, the doc deals with a complex issue: The role of art and politics. When the better half of Simon and Garfunkel flew to Johannesburg to record tracks for an album mixing American pop and the South African sound, he ran afoul of a cultural boycott supported by the U.N. and African National Congress against the tyrannical apartheid regime, enforced in those gloomy days before Nelson Mandela was released from prison.

Twenty five years later Simon reunites with his onetime African bandmates and the doc examines the controversial role Simon played then and its resonance today. In crucial scenes the aging Simon meets one of the ANC revolutionaries who condemned the musician in the 1980s for breaking a boycott intended to strangle the segregationist state. Simon continues to decry the way politicians use artists and insists on the right of talents to express themselves. Who’s right? Having triumphed over apartheid, the ANC activist can afford to be magnanimous.

In any case, the music, featuring Miriam Makeba, Hugh Masekela, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Simon, etc., is extraordinary, and creates a musical mélange that’s the dialectical opposite of apartheid.         

  



NEWPORT BEACH 2012: CAROL CHANNING

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Carol Channing in Carol Channing: Larger than Life.

Gentlemen prefer talent

By Ed Rampell

Watching Dori Berinstein’s delightful documentary Carol Channing: Larger Than Life is a sheer joy. The now 91-year-old performer who embodied Broadway with her original onstage incarnations of Lorelei Lee in Gentleman Prefer Blondes and the eponymous matchmaker in Hello Dolly! is a force of nature.

This nonfiction biopic traces Channing from her 1921 birth into a Christian Science family in Seattle and upbringing in San Francisco to her debut onstage, TV appearances from Steve Allen to Laugh In, and movie career. In addition to the ever hilarious Channing herself, the doc’s talking heads include Betty Garrett, Jerry Herman, Lily Tomlin, Bruce Vilanch, Tommy Tune, etc. Channing’s second husband, Harry Kullijian-- a childhood sweetheart who reappeared late in life -- co-stars. (However, the film sweeps under the carpet Channing’s disastrous long first marriage and how her career conflicted with motherhood.)

You don’t have to be a fan of Channing or of musical theater to be swept away by this feel good ode to the Great White Way’s eternal nightingale. Cinema wasn’t the medium that most favored the entertainer with those flying saucer eyes, lips as red as Dorothy’s ruby slippers and blonde tresses -- Marilyn Monroe and Barbra Streisand portrayed Lorelei and Dolly onscreen. But this doc finally makes Channing -- Oscar-nominated for 1967’s Thoroughly Modern Millie-- the movie star she deserves to be, too.      

  

NEWPORT BEACH 2012: WORTH THE WEIGHT



LaShawna (Constance Reese) and Miles (Tommy Snider) in Worth the Weight.

Fat chance

By Ed Rampell

Worth the Weight is in the tradition of Paddy Chayefsky’s 1955  film, Marty, a realistic look at love among ordinary people. Like Ernest Borgnine as the Bronx butcher in that Best Picture Oscar winner, Robbie Kaller plays a meaty plebian character yearning for romance. Sam is a washed up university athlete whose football injury put the kibosh on his NFL and college aspirations, leading to enormous weight gain and an unglamorous bowling alley career.

Weighing an estimated 411 Sam enters into a weight loss contest with his roommate and friends where he also meets Cassie (Jillian Leigh), an attractive trainer (not “a coach!”) at “Fat Cutters.” Leigh renders an intriguing character study, as a young woman ensnared in an unsatisfying romance with pretentious poet Stephan (Bryan Bellamo), who contrasts sharply with the earthy, good natured Sam. What’s a woman to do?

This romantic comedy’s supporting cast includes Constance Reese as LaShawna, who lights up every scene she’s in as the girlfriend of quirky Miles (Tommy Snider). Coincidentally, Reese portrayed Michelle Obama in a musical about the First Family -- this film’s theme is a perfect fit for the First Lady’s anti-obesity campaign.

Director Ryan Sage’s feature debut, which won the Beverly Hills Film Festival’s Audience Award, is also an excellent example of low budget indies shot with DV cameras.



TRIBECA 2012: JACK AND DIANE

Jack (Riley Keough) and Diane (Juno Temple) in Jack and Diane.

Eaten by the monster of love


By Don Simpson


Here is a little ditty about Jack (Riley Keough) and Diane (Juno Temple)… When Jack and Diane’s eyes first meet, it is love at first sight. Their chemistry is electric until… After staying out all night with Jack, Diane is grounded by her aunt (Cara Seymour). Knowing that she must attend a summer fashion program in Paris in a few weeks, Diane does not let her punishment stop her from spending time with Jack. The problem is Diane never told Jack that this is just a temporary visit.


Bradley Rust Gray’s Jack and Diane is an overtly metaphoric study of young love. Just as the Zoe Kazan character from Gray’s The Exploding Girl expresses her emotions by way of convulsive seizures, the love between Jack and Diane is so explosive that it causes blood to gush from various orifices and prompts a recurring dream about a horrific, organ-devouring beast. The strength of Jack and Diane is in its normal representation of the love between two, polar opposite teenage girls. Temple’s uber-girlie Diane is far from Hollywood’s stereotypical lesbian while Keough’s boyish representation of Jack is much more in line with what Hollywood has taught us about lesbians.

TRIBECA 2012: ANY DAY NOW

A scene from Any Day Now.

Cumming Undone

By Don Simpson

Set in Los Angeles, 1979 and inspired by a true story, Any Day Now follows the trials and tribulations of a gay couple who fight for custody of a teenager with Down syndrome.

Paul (Garret Dillahunt) is a straight-laced, closeted deputy district attorney who falls in love with Rudy (Alan Cumming), a flamboyant, lip syncing drag queen. When Rudy's drug-addled neighbor abandons her son, Marco (Isaac Leyva), Rudy takes in the Down syndrome teen; then, while petitioning for custody of Marco, Paul takes in Rudy and Marco to provide them with more stability. (In an effort to remain in the closest, Paul tells everyone that Rudy
is his cousin.)

It is not long before Paul, Rudy and Marco are a happy nuclear family. For the first time in his life, Marco has loving and nurturing parents. He even begins to flourish in school. But it is also not long before Paul and Rudy find themselves in court, fighting for their parental rights once again.

At the root of Any Day Now is an unwavering message of treating everyone equally, despite their sexuality, gender, ethnicity, economic status or medical condition; and writer-director Travis Fine even practices what he preaches in the production of Any Day Now. Being that Hollywood prefers to cast
straight actors in gay roles, it is refreshing to see an openly gay actor (Cumming) get the lead in Any Day Now -- an inspiring performance that is one of the best of his career. It is equally impressive that Fine casts an actor with Down syndrome (Isaac Leyva) to portray Marco.