* Leaves of Grass is the centerpiece film to the tribute to Edward Norton. Written & directed by Tim Blake Nelson, it’s… let’s see. A pot comedy slash Greek tragedy, maybe? But not a Greek tragedy on the level of Splice (THANK GOD.) Norton plays twins, one of whom is now a classics professor at Brown, while the other is a horticultural genius. No, really. The professor finds himself back in Oklahoma, for reasons that don’t need exploring at this juncture, and hijinks ensue. So to speak. I enjoyed it a lot, and hope it gets distribution soon.

Norton was present for a Q&A after, which was lovely. At the end of it he made a great statement about SIFF: that it was an important festival to support because it’s one of the last that’s actually *for* the audience, for the people living in the town rather than for industry. Which is what I’ve been saying for ages, so it’s nice to have it validated by someone who, you know, actually knows what they’re talking about.

* Utopia in Four Movements was an amazing experience, and I’m thankful to my friend for suggesting it. It’s part slideshow, part film, part lecture, & part concert, a performance piece with two directors (one queuing photos and video clips as well as narrating, and the other queuing music.) The content of it was fascinating; the movements as it were discussed the idea of utopia from the perspectives of the development of Esperanto, 20th century revolutionaries, consumer (but specifically shopping mall) culture, and forensic anthropology. No, really. It totally made sense. I can explain it to you sometime.

It achieved something else, though, which is the impossibility of discussing the film without discussing the form. During the Q&A portion after, a member of the audience suggested that she would have been fine just seeing it as a documentary, without the live bits, and I totally disagree. First off, it’s a piece always in flux (they made adjustments to it as late as 15 minutes before showtime), but also more importantly, live queues can be paced to the rhythm of an audience response, and the audience can connect with a live narrator in a different and more immediate way than with a disembodied voice over.

Furthermore, it brings the experience of the film back to what I’m always going on about: seeing something on the big screen, seeing it without distractions, and seeing it with an audience. You can’t watch a live documentary in one corner of your laptop while you organize your iTunes library in another. You have to be just as present as the filmmakers. It’s awesome. And, in its own way, it’s utopia.

* The Tillman Story is a simple and powerful documentary about how the government and military attempted to manipulate the death of Pat Tillman into a supporting narrative for war in Iraq. It’s a story we’ve all heard in bits and pieces, but to have it all laid out, concise and devastating… it should be required viewing.

* I had intended to see Waiting for Superman after The Tillman Story, but it went on rush before I had a volunteer voucher for it. Instead I jumped on a comp ticket to Blessed, one of the features in the Emerging Masters series. I had been intrigued by it thanks to some of the cast, namely Frances O’Connor and Miranda Otto. The film was developed from a play titled Who’s Afraid of the Working Class, and I am under the impression that it changed quite a bit from the source material, moving from being a strongly political piece to one exploring the relationships between children and their mothers, though still those on the fringe.

Everyone in it was fantastic; Kokkinos is clearly gifted at working with child actors. Reef Ireland in particular struck me as one to watch; he’s like a young Ohad Knoller. Just heartbreaking. And Frances O’Connor is currently my best actress of the festival.

After being destroyed by that, I headed up to the Egyptian to volunteer at the midnight of Fight Club. Because I’m crazy. When I left, Ed Norton was still at the theater, watching the film from the balcony. I had thought seriously about staying for the film — I haven’t seen it since the original release — but in the end I decided that walking home at 3am would probably not be smart. So it goes.

Queer film can be hit or miss (and mostly miss, it seems) but I seem to have the best luck if a) I go foreign and b) I opt for SIFF selections over SLGFF. It’s a formula that certainly worked for Undertow, though circumstances outside the movie did everything they could to ruin it.

I really wish it had been presented on film. I don’t know how it was shot, but I am just about over digital presentations. They seem to add a plethora of new ways to fuck up the projection, and it’s not like certain venues *cough*theEgyptian*cough* needed any help in that regard as it was. We were given comp tickets for another screening, which is as it should be, but it was totally unfair to this beautiful, romantic film that it stopped altogether, that it had color issues (trust me, these characters were not supposed to be green), that the sound went out for what seemed like eternity (thank god it was subtitled), and that the version that finally worked included a goddamned *watermark*.

As for the film itself, it’s that rarest of beasts, a fresh coming-out story. Set in a Peruvian fishing village, it’s also part ghost story. Miguel, married & soon-to-be a father, has also been secretly involved with village outsider Santiago. When Santiago dies accidentally, Miguel learns it is much easier to be in a relationship with a man when no one else can see him.

It’s a concept that could go either way, but the characters all had clear emotional cores, and so it was beautiful and heartwrenching. Also, I particularly appreciated the sympathetic & honest portrayal of his wife. Their relationship had its own validity, which is often not the case in this sort of film.

Films I missed the first ten minutes of since they were during a volunteer shift (I almost never choose to go into movies on shift for this reason):

* Secrets of the Tribe, which I would like to seek out at some point to see properly. It’s a documentary on the various studies of the Yanomami Indian tribe, though the title really refers to the tribe of academics who studied them, full of their own secrets, customs, and loyalties. It’s flat-out horrifying to be honest; research of indigenous people is an arena fraught with obvious complications as it is, but these teams almost seemed to go out of their way to do everything wrong, from your basic stupid white person trick of influencing a society through well-intentioned gifts, to the far extreme of disease introduction and of course, sexual abuse.

* Mother Joan of the Angels, which somehow managed to make demonic possession of nuns… boring. Amazing, right? It was so tedious, that I seriously considered not seeing the film after it, a noir by the same director that I had an actual ticket for. I just read that it was banned by the Catholic Church, which figures.

This is also probably the best entry in which to note that this day was one of the weirdest in general at the festival so far. First, about 15 minutes into the documentary, the alarm went off and we had to evacuate the theater. Apparently someone burned something in a kitchen somewhere else in McCaw. Second, the last two films of the night, the Polish double feature as it were, had been scheduled as digital restorations, but when the package arrived meant to contain the hard drive, it was found to contain… strawberry jam. So they had to screen DVDs instead. See? Weird.

* Bran Nue Dae is based on the 90s Australian musical about an aboriginal boy in the late 60s. He’s been attending boarding school with the eventual goal of becoming a priest, but he changes his mind for a few excellent reasons, and runs away, landing in a road movie as he tries to get home.

It’s pretty goofy (especially the final 10 minutes) but it has a huge heart, and I quite enjoyed it. (Also, days later I am still singing about how there is nothing I would rather be than to be an Aborigine. So there’s that.)

I couldn’t help but think, though, especially as the credits rolled by with lists of the various stage production casts, that if a similar film had been made in the States, the producers would have had a serious conversation about casting a white guy with a tan in the lead. And then they probably would have done it. Taylor Lautner, I’m looking at you.

* Night Train was the second half of a Jerzy Kawalerowicz double feature, and one I almost skipped out on because I was so bored by the one about possessed nuns. Thanks to the fact that I am painfully cheap I opted to give it a chance, and I am glad I did. It’s a Polish noir set almost entirely on an overbooked overnight train to the seaside. The cast of characters is great, all your noir staples of mysterious men and blonde bombshells eyeing each other with suspicion, flirtation, or both, and among it all trying to guess if one in their number might be an escaped murderer. It was totally entertaining, and would not at all have been out of place as a Noir City selection.

(Yes, the title of this post is a cheap Truffaut reference. I couldn’t help it. I apologize!)

A highly appropriate choice for Memorial Day, The Dry Land is about the challenges encountered by a soldier returning from Iraq, trying to readjust to life in a small Texas town.

It distinguishes itself from the genre of post-war film by virtue of its fantastic cast, of course, but also by its focus on the here-and-now of its characters. There are a few brief, obligatory questions about James’ time in Iraq (largely the inevitable: did you kill anyone?), but there are no arguments for or against the war, no political debate. The war is a fact we can’t change, and the characters have too many wars at home to fight without worrying about that one as well.

The Dry Land is definitely an intense film, wholly engrossing, beautifully shot, and with strong performances. It also portrayed close male friendship with great emotional truth, contrasting the relationships with the childhood friend versus the army buddy. Good stuff. (Also, maybe this is the place to mention that Wilmer Valderrama grew up HOT. Who knew? Well, to be fair, probably everyone but me.)

The writer/director as well as the cast had a surprising amount of support from the military, and they are giving back, touring the film around bases and military towns, raising awareness and discussion of PTSD. At a recent screening in Idaho, mental health professionals were asked more questions than the director and stars, which is fantastic. The cast seems to be supporting the film in a deeper way than usual as well; it sounds as though Ryan O’Nan & America Ferrera are both accompanying the film to more than just festival screenings, so that’s awesome.

During the Q&A, one fellow asked a question that wound up answering a question of my own — I had wondered why Stewart Stern had introduced the film at its premiere two days earlier. He had come up to me when I was volunteering to ask where he needed to be for the intro, and I managed to not fall all over both of us, even though this is what it was like in my head: “OMG it’s Stewart Stern! I am so grateful I have gotten to hear you speak so often this year! I *adored* Rachel Rachel! Eeeee!” Instead, I showed great restraint and pointed him to my manager. (The answer is that he has known the writer/director for some time, and served as a mentor to him throughout the process of developing the film. Also, he is a sweet old guy, and probably would have been quite gracious even if I had embarrassed myself.)

After that let out, I walked downtown to briefly intarweb as y’all saw, then over to Seattle Center to brave the hoards of Folklife for dinner, and then onto SIFF Cinema for my evening feature.

I know less than nothing about classical music in general, let alone anything specific related to classical pianists, and to be honest, I largely added Genius Within: The Inner Life of Glenn Gould because I am a fan of 32 Short Films About Glenn Gould. These things happen.

Genius Within is a solid documentary, drawing on a surprising quantity of archival footage of Gould, as well as interview subjects who have only recently begun to open up about their relationships with him. It was an interesting contrast seeing elements it naturally had in common with 32 Short Films being treated in a far more straightforward manner, and it certainly brought home the ideas from that film which had stuck with me, namely his interest in the themes of solitude and loneliness, and the perception that even with those who thought they were close to him, he was really still performing. I identify with that more than is healthy. Unfortunately, I am not a genius, so there’s no compensation.

On the way out of Leaving I heard the gentleman in front of me say that it wasn’t the sort of movie that you liked or didn’t like, which is very true. I can’t say that I enjoyed it, since it was quite upsetting, but I did respect it. It’s a French film, starring Kristin Scott Thomas as a woman who has spent 20 years maintaining a home & raising a family, and existing in a marriage that has devolved into more-or-less roommates.

There’s a fantastic dialogue-free scene of her & her husband in bed; she’s reading a text on reflexology, he’s playing with his phone, and they might as well be in different rooms altogether. It’s the polar opposite of the scene in No Country for Old Men, where Josh Brolin & Kelly Macdonald have a conversation on the couch, both looking straight forward, but with such a clear & deep intimacy. It’s all in the performance. Fantastic.

Scott Thomas’ character isn’t always easy to like, which I appreciated. She falls in love with a Spanish fellow who is doing manual labor under the table for her husband, and when she tells her husband about it, he moves from benign neglect to straight-up abuse, believing he can make her stay through sheer force. (After the screening I heard a guy say “well, it’s not like he was torturing her *every* day”, as if emotional blackmail, wife beating, and intimate partner rape is a-ok as long as you limit yourself to a few times a week. I believe I showed great restraint in not punching him in the nose.) Her character makes decisions which were painful to watch, but were emotionally true, and her performance is brilliant. But it’s definitely not the sort of movie that you like or don’t like.

I did think it noteworthy that the film was written and directed by women. I felt that it made quite a difference in the storytelling. Not that a man couldn’t possibly have told that story in that way, but it’s rare.

(I’m pressed for internet time, so I’m going to do this a bit in reverse. Because obviously I have been so chronologically correct in this blog to date.)

Secret #2 was another foreign language drama. It was compared to another film, which I have seen before & loved, and went out and bought after the feature. (This is not a clue as there’s no one on earth who would know if I added something to my DVD collection.)

Next up was my first documentary of the festival, Marwencol. It was recommended all over the place, and rightly so. Marwencol is the name of a fictional Belgian town Mark Hogancamp created out of scraps of wood, toy dolls, and action figures, as a sort of self-imposed art therapy after a brutal attack left him with a brain injury & robbed of his memories. He populated the town with alter egos of people in his life, created an ongoing narrative, and takes flat-out amazing photographs of the stories.

It’s getting distribution in the fall, and I highly recommend it. I think it would actually be pretty interesting playing with Prodigal Sons. That’s for when I run my own theater, I suppose! The director was in attendance at my screening, which was particularly cool because he was able to call Mark to get an update on the doings in Marwencol, and we were able to give Mark himself a well-deserved round of applause. They were also selling books of Mark’s photographs at the screening. I didn’t get one since I didn’t have enough cash on me, but I plan to order one.

Finally, I had my only midnight screening of the festival: Splice. I added it for the cast (Adrien Brody & Sarah Polley) and the writer/director (who also did Cube.) I felt a little goofy about the whole thing since about five minutes after I ordered my ticket I started seeing ads for it on TV. But, I figured, there was no way any standard screening was going to beat a midnight at the festival for crowd energy, and I was right. It was a packed house, and I ran into a few more friends in line, which always improves things.

The film itself, though, man. Where to begin. Early on in the picture, I was expecting I’d be writing about how annoyed I was by the relentless gendering of the chimera. Little did I know that by the end gender issues would be the least of my concerns. Gore I am okay with, jumpy outy things are not a problem, & general mutant action is fine by me. What I did not expect was the ongoing squicky sexual content. If Splice had been a piece of fan fiction*, it would have had a list of warnings the length of my arm. That said, the movie was highly effective; I was definitely engaged the whole time. Engaged and horrified. I just think that there are some of you who will need to know going in that it has, for example, a sex scene of great horror and neverending-ness. EW. Ew ew ew.

Speaking of squick, before Splice we got a trailer for RoboGeisha. It certainly appears that anything worth seeing in that movie is in the trailer, and a few things I wish I hadn’t seen as well.

* On a related note, thank you SGA fandom for making David Hewlett’s mere existence in the movie hilarious to me. I have this weird affection for Rodney created entirely by LiveJournal icons.

Nevermind the backlog, here’s the SIFF capsules. That is, if I don’t skip everything else and post about SIFF now, I might as well just give up. Obligatory background: this is my 14th year attending, I’m only planning on about 30 films*, and I currently have tickets to about 20, including the Secret. Let’s get this party started!

One of the things I look forward to most about the festival is the opportunity to see Asian film. First up, the Hong Kong/Taiwan film Prince of Tears is understandably indulgent, being a composite of memories from the director’s childhood, but is all-around gorgeous: cinematography, costumes, and the cast are all beautiful. The perspective is that of a fairy tale, the traditional kind containing true horror, as beloved adults surrounding two sisters are arrested & accused of being communist spies. I’m looking forward to seeing star Joseph Chang later in the festival in Au Revoir Taipei.

I believe From Time to Time is my only Films 4 Families selection this year. Adapted from a novel & directed by Julian Fellowes, it’s a charming fantasy/ghost story. It’s very mildly cheesy in spots, an effect of being a children’s film, but even though you know more or less how it’s going to end, it’s a lovely ride getting there. Maggie Smith is delightful as ever as the grandmother, and Dominic West is a classic, sneering villain as the evil butler from the past. Also, I have to say, it was solid Jaci-bait, what with the present of the film being the end of WWII, and the past being Age of Sail/early Regency. I would very much like to read the original series.

Holy Rollers was my first totally crazy over-sold screening of the festival, and even starting a half hour late (on an already late screening) it was a great time. I have yet to meet a Jesse Eisenberg film that I do not enjoy. Here his character is a Hasidic Jew who gets caught up in an ecstasy smuggling ring. Based on a true story, and definitely my recommended feature of the weekend. I don’t know why the current IMDb rating is so low. Save it to your queues!

All I will say about Secret #1 is that it was full of failures of communication. Also that I enjoyed it. Shhhh. This is my second year doing the Secret Festival, and I only wish I had started sooner. It is absolutely the only time that I can have the experience of viewing a film with zero preconceptions. Such a unique thing, and very much worth getting up for an 11am Sunday screening.

We’ve been excited about On the Town for weeks, and deservedly so. Musicals on the big screen are such a fabulous treat. I am looking forward to the Grease sing-along (and still think SIFF missed a chance — a sing-along Everyone Says I Love You would have been a great addition to the Ed Norton tribute series. I know at least two people who would have gone. Um. Including me.)

The weekend finished off with a Northwest Connections feature, The Penitent Man. It’s a low-budget time travel piece in the tradition of Primer (which is far and away the better film, so if you haven’t seen that, please do.) I found it to be a great example of the importance of casting; the film is largely conversation, so much that the concept would have been better served by the novella format rather than a feature film. However, Lance Henriksen was great, elevating the material he had to work with. Bonus: street scenes shot in my neighborhood. See my supermarket & my walk home immortalized on film! Or, I suppose, on digital.

* Not very many, I know, in a festival of 250 features. But I am poor. So it goes.

Now that no one cares, let’s react a bit to the Oscar Nominated Short Films.

Animated:

French Roast (France): The coolest thing about this short is that about half of the action takes place in the mirror behind a customer in a café. The second coolest thing is what it has to tell us about nuns, namely, that they cannot be trusted.

Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty (Ireland): Great use of two different animation styles, one for the grandmother telling the story and the other for the story being told. I liked it a lot.

The Lady and the Reaper (Spain): Probably my favorite, if only because I enjoy rooting for death.

Logorama (Argentina): Which took home the Oscar, and which I rather hated. It’s a fantastic concept, and I get that it was supposed to be satirical, but that is no excuse for a totally crap script. I am not amused,

A Matter of Loaf and Death (UK): Latest Wallace & Gromit installment, which I was totally on board with until you discover that the murderer’s motive? Is that they have gained weight.

They also showed three bonus shorts: Partly Cloudy (which everyone had seen before Up), The Kinematograph (I wasn’t that into the story, but the texture of the animation was very cool) and Runaway (a fun Canadian short about a train and a cow and ensuing hijinks).

Live Action:

The Door (Ireland): Which would have made a lot more sense if we’d had the Chernobyl context at the beginning rather than the end.

Instead of Abracadabra (Sweden): Screwy, very Swedish short about a wannabe magician.

Kavi (India/USA): Frustratingly, only half of a good short on modern-day slavery. It ends a bit abruptly, and I would have really liked it to go on a bit longer.

Miracle Fish (Australia): Fantastic. Probably the best of the bunch, with true narrative tension and a great performance by the child star.

The New Tenants (Denmark/USA): The winner, dark, which reminded me a lot of Six Shooter.