LAFF 2011: THE SEDUCTION OF INGMAR BERGMAN

The booklet of The Seduction of Ingmar Bergman.

Sparks fly 

By Miranda Inganni

Probably the event of 2011 Los Angeles Film Festival, on Saturday night at the Ford Amphitheatre the musical group Sparks (Kimono My House) and film director Guy Madden (The Saddest Music in the World) presented The Seduction of Ingmar Bergman.

Based on an original story, written and staged by Sparks' Ron and Russell Mael and directed by Madden, the performance was based on the eponymous 2009 album by Sparks, which chronicles the imaginary travels and temptations of Swedish auteur, Ingmar Bergman (Wild Strawberries), on an imaginary trip to Hollywood, California.

It's 1950-something and a Hollywood film mogul (Russell) has the idea to lure Bergman (Peter Franzen) to Tinseltown to direct blockbusters. He sends limos and ladies to help convince the practical quintessential existentialSwede. While black-clad minions move scenery in the shadows, back at his Hollywood headquarters Bergman tosses and turns on his upright, red-sheeted bed, all the while contemplating his next move or movie.

The brothers Mael are pitch-perfect (in every sense of the term) and Franzen turns in a great(ly), conflicted Bergman. Should the writer-director stay to enjoy the warm weather yet endure the torment of tourists, or return home to a chilly climate yet critical acclaim (a lá his Cannes Festival win for Smiles Of a Summer Night)?

With Warhol-colored images projected on the screen behind the action, this brilliant bit of deconstructed musical theater is like a hyper staged reading -- all of it worth a viewing, seeing, listening and experiencing.

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.

DVD REVIEW: BEDWAYS

 Hans (Matthias Faust) and Marie (Lana Cooper) in Bedways.

Here we come

By Don Simpson

In a dilapidated and sparsely furnished Berlin apartment, an aspiring director named Nina (Miriam Mayet) and her two thespians -- Marie (Lana Cooper) and Hans (Matthias Faust) -- screen test for a yet-to-be-scripted film. The video project is is based upon a simple premise: Nina intends to capture authentic feelings, authentic love and authentic sex.

Nina attempts to maintain full directorial control by maniacally manipulating her actors as if they are puppets and she is pulling their strings. The borders between fiction and reality are promptly blurred as Marie and Hans try to decipher what their director really wants from them. According to Nina, Marie and Hans should not play themselves or anyone else -- but what does that mean?

The sexual histories between Nina and both of her subjects further complicates the on- and off-camera scenario. The project quickly evolves into a warped seduction in which Nina pushes everyone’s emotions, including her own, to the limit. Nina, Marie and Hans experience a titillating tilt-a-whirl of emotions and desires, a disorienting ride that thrives off of jealousy, grief and anger.

Can cinematic authenticity be faked? Do Marie and Hans really need to fall in love with each other in order for Nina’s film to succeed? Can two people fall in love in front of the unblinking kino eye and an authoritative voyeur?

Nina is not the only voyeur in the equation as German filmmaker RP Kahl often positions the camera statically at distance in order to form a voyeuristic perspective for the audience. The camera does occasionally venture in for a closer view of the sexual encounters as if to verify for the audience that the penetration is authentic -- like Nina, his onscreen avatar, Kahl is incredibly fascinated by cinematic realism.

By utilizing the film-within-a-film narrative format, Kahl creates a world in which it is practically impossible to decipher when the actors are acting for Nina and when we are witnessing the actors’ reality. In doing so, Kahl discusses how cinema blurs the identities of its actors and contemplates the relationship between their on- and off-screen persona.

Bedways is an experimental chamber piece that concentrates on three actors encased for the most part in one location. This incredibly intimate narrative technique is cleverly juxtaposed with the mental and spacial distancing of intimacy and sex. One of the more telling scenes -- that purposefully bookends Bedways -- is when we witness Hans and Nina masturbating in separate rooms while observing each other via monitors; eventually they reach their limits of torture, the separation becomes too much, and Nina commands for Hans to come to her.

A worthy attempt to merge the worlds of art house and erotic cinema (a la Steven Soderbergh’s The Girlfriend Experience; Michael Winterbottom’s 9 Songs; Atom Egoyan’s Exotica and Chloe; the films of Joe Swanberg; etc.), Bedways aptly blurs the definition of erotic cinema by giving us a well-crafted and incredibly dramatic film with some penetrating sex thrown in.

FILM REVIEW: ONE LUCKY ELEPHANT

Flora in One Lucky Elephant.

Tusk tusk

By Don Simpson

After 16 years as the namesake and centerpiece of David Balding’s Circus Flora, it is time for Flora, an African elephant living in St. Louis, to retire. Lisa Leeman’s documentary, One Lucky Elephant, begins in 2000, as Balding searches for a suitable new home for Flora. At first, Balding is convinced that it would be best for Flora to return to Africa, but when a chance to ship Flora to Botswana falls through, Balding places Flora in the Miami Metro Zoo.

Once settled in her new home, Flora begins to exhibit antisocial and aggressive behavior at the Miami Metro Zoo. David then fights to have Flora accepted into the Elephant Sanctuary, a nonprofit property in Tennessee that attempts to mimic the natural habitat of its Asian elephants. It is not long before psychologists begin to suggest that Flora's erratic personality is due to post traumatic stress disorder stemming back to her youth. As part of Flora’s treatment, Balding must agree not to visit his “daughter” any longer.

Balding purchased Flora when she was two years old. Flora was born in the wild and then brought into captivity after her mother and other members of her herd were slaughtered right in front of her. Upon taking ownership of Flora (if one can ever “own” an elephant), Balding regretfully admits to abiding by cruel -- yet traditional -- practices to “break” Flora into a trainable circus elephant.

Once she was broken, he spoiled her with fatherly love and affection. Balding is riddled with guilt, especially for never socializing Flora with other elephants and for making Flora perform in his circus far past her prime. Balding seems to recognize that his mistakes and misjudgements have harmed Flora and now he finds himself stuck in the middle of a fiery animal rights debate over the ethical treatment of elephants.

Similar in subject to James Marsh’s far superior Project Nim, Leeman's documentary aptly discusses interspecies relationships and the dangers of becoming too friendly with wildlife. One Lucky Elephant alternates between being a love story between a man and his elephant, a wildlife documentary, a character portrait of Balding, and a public service announcement about animal rights. Unfortunately, One Lucky Elephant shies away from truly criticizing the captivity of elephants -- and other wildlife -- in circuses.

LAFF 2011: DETECTIVE DEE

Detective Dee (Andy Lau) in Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame.

A reason to explode

By John Esther

Once upon a peg tale in 7th Century China, a giant Buddha statue was being built for the coronation of China's first female emperor, Empress Wu (Carina Lau). It would be a great day in Chinese herstory, but there were many misogynistic men who did not take kindly to the notion of Miss Lady "wacky eyebrows" Boss.

With just a few days away from the equal-rights event, important men started bursting into flames. Nobody could figure out why. Clearly this was a case for Detective Dee (Andy Lau).

In prison for treason, Detective Dee is released and appointed head of the case by the Empress herself. Of course, the Empress does not trust him so she sends her spy, who might be a double agent, to watch Detective Dee as he finds the bad guys or bad gals.

But this was to be no ordinary adventure. Detective Dee will have to visit places like Spooky Pandemonium in order to find Donkey Wang for information on Fire Turtles and other crazy characters. And just when you think Detective Dee has caught the culprits, a more menacing figure is lurking behind the next clue.

Stuffed to the sensory gills with stunning set designs, elaborate costumes, flamboyant martial art scenes, sneaky sounds, absurdly-sexual innuendos, fantastic photography, masterful special effects and an array of images conducive to multiple viewings under different methods of intoxication (for the record, I had just one beer before the screening), Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame would be a wildly entertaining film on your typical movie screen. However, in a stroke of brilliant programming, the single screening of the film at the 2011 Los Angeles Film Festival was at the Ford Amphitheatre. 

Outside and under the stars, the neighborhood's frogs, birds and other creatures accentuated the atmospheric film-going experience. The real and the reel meshed into a synchronicity, breaking common film-viewing experiences. A bird catches on fire in the film; a second later a real bird makes a sound. Dogs barking in the distance may as well have come from "off screen" in the film. At one particularly precious moment, a live plane flew by the Ford Amphitheatre as the screen showed the gigantic Buddha against the blue sky.

Sometimes art and life just jive right and, as a result, it was the most fun I have had at the movies in years.

And then I attended LAFF's theatrical event, The Seduction of Ingmar Bergman, the next night. Oh my!

 

LAFF 2011: NATURAL SELECTION

Raymond (Matt O'Leary) and Linda (Rachael Harris) in Natural Selection.

Problems of the flesh

By John Esther

Bewitched and bewildered, Linda White (Rachael Harris), is a good, doting Christian wife who blames herself for wanting to get down with her husband (John Diehl) in a biblical way to such a degree that when he has a stroke while stroking at a sperm bank – albeit a very desperate and deregulated one – the seemingly-barren woman feels it is her godly duty to find her husband's missing bastard son.

After trekking from Texas to Florida (a "bush" correlation?), Linda finds a young man, Raymond (Matt O' Leary), who happens to be on the run from the law. (Raymond's introduction in the opening scene of the film is a mise-en-scène tour-de-force.) Raymond, the super-seed monster, agrees to be her son, thus setting off a road trip back to Texas.

Along the way, the couple endures several mishaps, misfires and even, uh oh, a marital mistake .

Marked by Harris' stellar and adorable performance, writer-director Robbie Pickering's SXSW award-winning Natural Selection offers enough credibility, satire and laughs that, despite some visually incredulous images regarding sex, make this delightful indie film worthy of watching. 

LAFF 2011: THE DYNAMITER

Robbie (Patrick Ruffin) and Fess (John Alex Nunnery) in The Dynamiter.

Stealing time

By Don Simpson

The ramshackle old cottage in the back woods of Mississippi where Fess (John Alex Nunnery) and Robbie (William Patrick Ruffin) live with their aged grandmother is almost identical to the homes in Winter’s Bone and Two Gates of Sleep.

Twenty-plus miles from town, we meet 14-year-old Robbie as he frolics in a field near his home teaching his younger half-brother, Fess, how to battle hay bales with hand-carved spears and knives. Left to their own devices, things do not seem all that bad for the two footloose and fancy-free young lads. The boys lack any adult supervision, their absentee mother is reportedly in California nursing some sort of mental breakdown while their seemingly senile grandmother (Joyce Baldwin) utters nary a syllable as her glassy-eyes stare blankly; and who knows or cares where their fathers are. Robbie is not adverse to thievery when he and Fess need something to eat and the brothers have mastered the manipulation of small change in order to coax Cokes from a gas station vending machine.

Robbie stands out at school as a sweaty and smelly white trash kid and he has a difficult time staying out of trouble. It is the end of his eighth grade term and he is hauled into office of the Principal (Layne Rodgers) for stealing. Plagued by failing grades, the principal offers Robbie a ticket to high school: Robbie must write an essay over the summer; if the essay is deemed well-written, he will graduate eighth grade and proceed to high school. In turn, Robbie pens a series of letters which he reads aloud via voiceovers throughout the remainder of the film.

Out of the blue, Lucas (Patrick Rutherford), a sibling ten years Robbie’s senior, appears back at home. In his prime, Lucas was a star high school quarterback; he has since de-evolved into low-life parasite who dates women who are naive enough to support him. Whenever Lucas is unable to find a willing female host to suck dry, he goes home to clear his mind. Robbie worships his older brother, so when Lucas instructs Robbie to find a job in order to support their family, Robbie jumps to task. Robbie thus begins waking up at the (ass)crack of dawn in order to work a shit-job at a local gas station for a measly wage.

Robbie eventually discovers that Lucas is not worth idolizing. It also becomes increasingly obvious that the boys’ mother is never coming home. Worst of all, there is an ever-looming threat that social services will become cognizant of the lack of adequate adult supervision in the household. Forced to grow up much earlier than most boys, Robbie must take these burdens and responsibilities by the horns in a last-ditch attempt to retain his and Fess’ freedom.

Writer-director Matthew Gordon’s The Dynamiter personifies the struggles of the poor as they attempt to claw their way up from their non-existent income bracket. Robbie is destined to remain poor because of his failure in the education system, his family history and lack of a support structure at home. His only chance to escape this poverty is to leave town and start over somewhere else. The inherent class conflict becomes most apparent during Kissy’s (Sarah Fortner) graduation party. Just like at school, Robbie stands out like a sore thumb. Kissy has a crush on Robbie but he seems to recognize that the caste system would never allow them to come together. Instead, Robbie befriends a poor black girl, Mamie (Ciara McMillan) -- it is worth noting that her race never factors into the equation. Both kids have been beaten down and have the bruises to prove it; together they are looking for a way out of their current predicament.