Night Call, Co-Starring Romain Duris as a Bad Guy

The right to protest must always be preserved, but its always best to take a break and start fresh in the morning. All-night demonstrations are dangerous because both protesters and cops get tired, making it harder for cool heads to prevail. Indeed, an all-night BLM protest in Brussels further complicates a locksmith’s night-from-heck in director-screenwriter Michiel Blanchart’s Night Call, which opens today in theaters.

Mady Bala is not an idiot. He requires proper ID and cash payment for his late-night house-calls, but for some reason, he trusts “Claire.” After all, she perfectly describes the apartment’s interior. However, she scoots out with a package of something just before the real tenant, a white supremacist drug dealer, returns home.

Somehow, Bala kills the raging thug in self-defense, but the long-running protests convince the misguided locksmith to clean-up the crime scene instead of calling the cops. So, there he is, looking extremely guilty when druglord Yannick’s men arrive for their money, finding him instead. After some enhanced interrogation, Yannick starts to suspect Bala might be telling the truth, so he sends the poor patsy off to the dead man’s favorite sex-worker club in search of the mystery woman. Inconveniently, one of the henchmen minding him is aggressively ill-tempered and the other was in on the theft.

It seems pretty clear Blanchart sympathizes with the movement, judging from Bala’s anxieties regarding the police. Yet, ironically, the demonstrators constantly make his situation worse. In fact, the protest—which is really more of a contained riot—precipitate several of the darned things in Blanchart’s one-darned-thing-after-another storyline. There are also a handful of violent eruptions that are not exceptionally graphic, but are still shocking within the dramatic context.

The Advent Calendar, on Shudder

In 2021, Germany perversely specialized in inflicting misery on Europe. Much to the free world’s chagrin, they forced through Nord Stream 2, Russia’s energy extorting pipeline, for purely mercenary reasons. There is also a rather sinister German Christmas relic that brings fear and woe to those who receive it. The obvious religious significance of Advent is completely ignored in this Belgian film. Instead, December 24^th is just a fateful day to count down towards. For Eva, a wheelchair-bound former dancer, each successive day requires more sacrifices in screenwriter-director Patrick Ridremont’s The Advent Calendar, which premieres this Thursday on Shudder.

Only Eva’s hot mess pal Sophie remembered her birthday. To celebrate, she swiped her a hand-crafted wooden Advent calendar from a holiday market in Munich. Fortunately, she can also translate the instructions, which are surprisingly stern, even if they are in German. Each door contains a candy, but if you eat one, you must eat them all. Also, no skipping ahead. The device is safeguarded against that, until the stroke of midnight releases the next door.

When Eva chomps down on the favorite candy of her Alzheimer’s-afflicted father, he is suddenly calling her on the disconnected land-line. Subsequently, some of the folks that do her wrong find themselves in a mess of trouble. Eva herself also starts losing time and coming-to in alarming positions. Yet, the calendar holds out the promise that she may yet walk again.

Ridremont takes the traditional careful-what-you-wish-for Twilight Zone-ish premise and adds a whole lot of Final Destination­-style carnage. In this case, there is definitely a supernatural entity connected to the calendar, but frankly Ridremont shows way too much of it. Also, Ridremont plays it somewhat fast-and-loose with the Calendar’s rules. Yet, those same rules still supply a huge “hidden in plain sight” twist that definitely surprises.

Torpedo U-235

It is the Red October of German U-boats. U-235 was commandeered by the Allies in hopes it could slip through the Axis naval blockade. Unfortunately, they know it has gone rogue in Sven Huybrechts’ Torpedo U-235, which releases today on VOD.

Belgian resistance leader Stan is not inclined to take prisoners, but it will be hard to blame him when we learn his full backstory. His daughter Nadine is part of his rag-tag team, but the rest of their family was killed by a nasty piece of SS work. As a result, he has earned a rep for ruthlessness that has made him a pariah amongst the Belgian command-in-exile. However, that makes his squad perfectly expendable for this high-risk mission.

Stan and his men will pilot a U-boat loaded with uranium from the Belgian Congo across the Atlantic to supply the Manhattan Project. According to the original plan, captured old-line Naval Captain Franz Jager was supposed to give them several weeks of intensive training and then cut them loose. However, they all find themselves diving for survival when local informers turn them in to the National Socialists.

In many ways, U-235 is like a throwback to old Euro war movies that were filmed in Yugoslavia with vintage military equipment rented from Tito. That’s actually a good thing. This is a lean, unfussy film that clearly enjoys the traditional conventions of the submarine movie. Huybrechts milks the claustrophobic setting with gusto, while not overdoing the predictable conflicts between the Belgians and Jager. In fact, the German captain’s motivations are reasonably believable. (Still, whenever we see a phonograph record in a sub film, we know with absolute certainty someone will accidentally play it at an inopportune time.)

This Magnificent Cake—Animated Imperialism

If you could choose to live under a European colonial power, it would have been the United Kingdom, hands down (a well-educated domestic civil service, public works programs, membership in the British Commonwealth, which even countries that were not British colonies want to join). Belgium was the polar opposite. King Leopold II was determined to have his “slice of this magnificent cake” and exploit the heck out of it too. 19^th Century Belgian colonialism serves as the backdrop for Emma De Swaef & Marc James Roels’ weirdly surreal forty-four-minute stop-motion animated mini-feature, This Magnificent Cake, which opens this Friday in Los Angeles.

In its five loosely interconnected chapters, De Swaef and Roels follow five very different characters, whose fates are intertwined with the Belgian colonial experiment, starting with Leo 2, himself. The King is plagued by insomnia, even though his long cherished imperial ambitions are finally being realized. He is also quite the philistine, silencing a humiliated clarinet player during what was supposed to be his command duet with piano accompaniment. Poor, abused licorice stick.

The experience is enough to drive the poor musician out to the newly opened colony, but he still can’t find respect at the luxury hotel for boozy expats. The same is true for its first pygmy employee, who is forced to stand at attention for hours at a time, with an ashtray strapped to his head. Things fare badly for him, as they also do for the porters accompanying Van Molle, an embezzler who left his family patisserie high and dry. Of course, Van Molle is no worse for the wear, but he will have his own subsequent drunken misadventures. He really is a cad, which is why his deserter nephew intends to confront him, in hopes of restoring the family fortune, if not its honor.

Cake certainly has no love for Leopold II or colonialism in general, but the more strident critics might feel like the film’s surreal visuals and left field plot turns rather soften the blow. De Swaef and Roels unambiguously connect the colonists’ personal corruption and vice with the larger Imperial enterprise, but we also witness as Van Molle befriends a large, trippy snail.

On the other hand, it all makes Cake quite distinctive, in all its felt and fibers. Think of it as a darker version of Adam Elliot or a fuzzier version of Jan Svankmajer. There is also a smidge of Matt Stone and Trey Parker’s scatological impulses, especially in De Swaef & Roels’ Oh Willy…, their 17-minute wordless short from 2012, which screens with Cake during its LA run (along with Niki Lindroth von Bahr’s The Burden, which screened as part of the 2017 Animation Show of Shows). Initially, it take time to warm to this sometime cruel tale of a schlubby everyman who visits his dying mother at her nudist colony (a different kind of colony living), just in the nick of time. However, the weird third act will redeem its mean-spiritedness for most cult cinema fans.

Cake and Willy are being distributed by GKIDS, but they are definitely meant for adult audiences. There are some grotesque moments (particularly in Willy), but the themes and subject matter will definitely be far beyond the scope of most youngsters. It is cool to see GKIDS continue to support challenging animation and reach beyond the implied limits of their name (frankly, they might want to launch a new line for films like this, but that’s a matter for their own internal debates). Recommended just because it is so different in terms of tone and style, This Magnificent Cake opens Friday (3/1) at the Glendale Laemmle.

Cattet & Forzani’s Let the Corpses Tan

Instead of Gialos, Belgian filmmakers Helene Cattet & Bruno Forzani are now paying homage to Italian Poliziotteschi movies, but there is still plenty of patent leather for them to fetishize over. They must swoon whenever they pass a Coach store. It is still a case of style over substance, but at least they give viewers a little bit of plot-like stuff in Let the Corpses Tan (trailer here), which opens tomorrow in New York.

Although it is based on famously untranslated French cult novel, Cattet & Forzani are still more interested in reveling in the images and tropes of Italian genre cinema (as was even more the case in their gialo pastiches, Amer and The Strange Color of Your Body’s Tears), than telling a story, which is so bourgeoisie. In some ways, this orgy of double-crosses and shoot-outs shares a kinship with the remake of Mario Bava’s Rabid Dogs, but it has a far less cohesive narrative than its predecessor.

Most of the action takes place in the Mediterranean ruins surrounding Luce’s villa, which serves as an artist colony and a crash pad for anti-social anarchists. She has been whiling away the time with her dissipated ex-lover, Max Bernier, a burned out novelist, and Brisorguiel, the slimy lawyer she has been hooking up with. Rhino’s gang is indeed expected, because Luce digs rough outlaw types, but she did not know they had planned to heist gold bullion from an armored car before their arrival (not that she would have cared). Rhino is even sufficiently cool and collected to give a lift to Bernier’s estranged wife, their daughter, and the nanny, after executing the uniformed couriers.

True to criminal form, things get awkward quickly when the gang breaks into two hostile, double-crossing factions, led by Rhino and Brisorguiel. Then two motorcycle cops blunder into the scene. From here on out, the film basically boils down to a series of armed skirmishes. However, the characterization is so thin, it is often impossible to figure out who is shooting at whom.

That is really a shame, because they no-fooling helm some impressively down-and-dirty action sequences. Unfortunately, they insist on punctuating the blazing gun fights with trippy interludes featuring scenes from a scatological passion play, in which Luce plays a fluid-spouting Mary Magdalene-slash-satanic figure. Even if you do not self-identify with Christianity, these nauseating fever dreams are just interminably painful to sit throw. Oh, for the love of Dario Argento and Franco Nero, show us some mercy.

Once again, the real star of Cattet & Forzani’s film is their regular cinematographer Manuel Dacosse, who achieves some amazing visuals with a 16mm camera, the Corsican sun, and who knows how many Red Bulls. The film looks great and it is by far the duo’s most accessible work, but there is still not a lot of there there. Again, style has it all over substance. Recommended primarily for the Belgian filmmakers’ fans, Let the Corpses Tan opens tomorrow (8/31) in New York, at the Quad Cinema.

CIFF ’18: Control

We’re a bit behind on the Vincke-Verstuyft Trilogy here in America. Sony Classics picked up the first film, The Memory Killer, but Dossier K. only had festival play. Fortunately, it shouldn’t be too hard to catch up for their third outing: Vincke and Verstuyft are Antwerp police detectives. They solve murders. Are you with us so far? The friendship between Eric Vincke and his younger, scruffier subordinate Freddy Verstuyft will be tested by the circumstances of their latest, entirely self-contained case in Jan Verheyen’s Control (trailer here), which screens during this year’s Cleveland International Film Festival.

Thanks to a poacher, a serial killer is scared off while disposing of a corpse. Apparently, the unknown subject has done this before, judging from the headless bodies that are subsequently discovered in the open field. Vincke and Verstuyft have very different ideas on how to pursue the case. The former brings in a profiler from Holland and focuses all the task force’s attention on suspects who had recently moved from Cologne, where similar victims had been discovered. However, Verstuyft is convinced that a possible intended victim holds the answers they need, if she can just recover her memories of what happened before she was discovered shivering, apparently drugged, with her hair mysteriously died red.

Rather awkwardly, in addition to being a hard partier, Rina is a psychologist with a history of testifying against cops in alleged brutality cases. Vincke wants nothing to do with her. He prefers to surveil the suspects he considers likeliest, including an American Foreign Service Officer and a video game developer, which is so Euro of him.

Control is an entertaining procedural, even if the final suspect isn’t such a big shock. Aside from viewers themselves, the un-sub the only one left alive or not conclusively eliminated. Still, it is a decent amusement ride getting there. As Vincke and Verstuyft, Koen De Bouw and Werner De Smedt convincingly bicker like old, annoyed friends. De Smedt also forges some surprisingly convincing romantic chemistry with Sofie Hoflack’s Rina, even though he is everything she should despise, and vice versa. Hendrik Aerts is appropriately brutish and twitchy as her most suspicious patient, while Greg Timmermans makes a likably luggish audience proxy as Wim Cassiers, the plugger detective caught between Vincke and Verstuyft’s power games.

At times, Control seems to be hat-tipping elements of Basic Instinct, but it arguably uses its Euro-ness to mislead its domestic viewers, at least with respect to the killer’s true identity. Verheyen keeps it zipping along, while his co-leads dial up their grizzled cynicism and world-weariness. While not exactly a reinvention of the genre, all the elements come together quite entertainingly. Recommended for fans of procedurals and serial killer movies, Control screens this Thursday (4/5) and Friday (4/6), as part of the 2018 CIFF.

The Dardenne Brothers’ The Unknown Girl

Manhattan walk-up residents can all relate to Dr. Jenny Davin’s situation. We have all ignored late-night buzzer-ringings, assuming they are wrong numbers or random mischief. Tragically, when Dr. Davin ignores the doorbell at her practice after hours, the women who rung subsequently turns up dead. Consumed with guilt, the good doctor (which indeed she is), will try to uncover her identity in Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne’s The Unknown Girl (trailer here), opening this Friday in New York.

Dr. Davin was having a bad day. When her patient starting seizing, her intern Julien essentially froze. It was during their rather tense post-mortem of the incident that the bell mysteriously rang. She will greatly regret that moment of harshness for two reasons. According to closed circuit video footage, her mystery caller is also the same woman whose body was discovered at a work-site by the river. Regrettably, the absent Julien also informs Dr. Davin he is quitting medicine.

With the body due to be interned in a Potter’s field grave, Dr. Davin starts investigating the presumptive murder, hoping to put a name to the body. Yet, she still continues to see her patients, at least for the time being. Dr. Davin gave notice to Dr. Habran’s practice largely serving the Belgian equivalent of Medicare and Medicaid patients to join a tony practice catering Liege’s French and Walloon elites. Arguably, her guilt over the Jane Doe just amplifies the guilt she feels for leaving her regular patients, such as bratty young Bryan. During the course of her house call (which she remarkably still makes), she discovers the boy knows something about the deceased woman. Quickening pulses are quite the giveaway. However, Bryan’s father makes it clear he will not allow his son to get involved to any extent.

For some reason, Unknown Girl has been tagged as a rare dud from the lauded Dardenne Brothers, but it is a highly compelling, realistically muddled morality play. It is probably the closest they will get to a hardboiled noir, while staying true to their gritty, neo-neo-realist aesthetics. Granted, the resolution of the “mystery” is not exactly shocking, but in Liege’s immigrant quarter, they just don’t have the time or resources for the kind of complex cyanide poisonings that would require the attention of a Hercule Poirot (you know he was Belgian too).

The film also benefits from a remarkable lead performance from Adèle Haenel, who takes her craft to a higher level, following the inconsistent work in films like In the Name of My Daughter and Love at First Fight that first made her name. She vividly portrays Dr. Davin’s intelligence and conflicted ethical compass, both of which are always interesting to see portrayed on screen. Nearly the entire Dardenne company repertory players will turn up in small supporting roles, but the two who really make an impact are Jérémie Renier and Olivier Gourmet as Bryan’s father and the thuggish son of a possible suspect.

Granted, Unknown Girl might not pack the emotional gut punch of Two Days, One Night or The Kid with the Bike, but it would be plenty soul-trying for anyone to live through it in real life. In fact, they get at some acute truths of contemporary, stratified urban life. Recommended for all patrons of Francophone cinema, The Unknown Girl opens this Friday (9/8) in New York, at the IFC Center.

Submitted by Belgium: The Ardennes

Trust me, Belgium is a lovely country. You just wouldn’t know it from the cinema it exports. They might show an unusual affinity for naturalism, but films like Michaël Roskam’s Bullhead, Felix van Groeningen’s over-hyped Broken Circle Breakdown, the Dardenne Brothers’ Two Days, One Night, and Christophe van Rompaey’s Moscow, Belgium paint a picture of an economically depressed, crime-infested backwater nation. Their official Oscar submission for best foreign language feature will not help their image much, but the withering portrayal of human nature certainly distinguishes Robin Pront’s The Ardennes (trailer here) opens this Friday in New York.

Ardennes was produced by Bart Van Langendock,, who also produced Bullhead. He seems to have the Dardennes’ number, since both films were submitted instead of the auteur brothers’ more high profile releases. In the case of Bullhead that worked out okay for Belgium. Maybe this time they inadvertently left off “D” and submitted Ardennes by accident (a film about brothers). Or maybe it was politically expedient to submit a largely Flemish film this year.

Regardless, Dave de Swaef’s brother Kenny is about to get out of jail and nobody is happy about it, least of all his former girlfriend Sylvie de Winter. She and Dave are now together, but neither has told Kenny, because of his psychotic tendencies. Dave does his best to keep his brother on the straight and narrow, but it is a losing effort. The only real question is how far will Dave allow Kenny to drag him down. That will probably be answered when Kenny forces Dave to accompany him on a rather nefarious errand—one that requires the help of Stef, his seriously nutty former cellmate now living in the Ardennes region.

Frankly, The Ardennes really takes its sweet time getting going. The first hour or so plays like the sort of miserablism you could find in van Groeningen’s work. However, the third act veers hard into bile-black genre business. Knowing the de Swaef Brothers is not a safe proposition, but neither is being one. Pront and co-screenwriter Jeroen Perceval throw in the kitchen sink down the stretch, including a homicidal transvestite (Social Justice Warriors be damned), a flock of runaway ostriches, and a nasty punch line.

Most of the cast (particularly Veerle Baetens’ de Winter) seems thoroughly beaten down and hopeless, in a very Belgian way, but not Jan Bijvoet as the bizarrely flamboyant, alarmingly rustic Stef. He is one villain you really do not want to mess with. Peter Van den Begin and Eric Godon add further eccentric flair as the de Graef’s compulsive gambling boss and the forest ranger tracking the fugitive ostriches. As the Brothers de Swaef, Kevin Janssens rages like a tempest and screenwriter Perceval broods like crazy, representing opposite sides of the same dysfunctional coin.

When it finally gets to those wooded foothills, The Ardennes packs a mean punch. It did not make Oscar’s nine-film shortlist, but that is true of much more heavily championed films. It is definitely worth seeing if you can handle its dark Flemish soul. Recommended for fans of gritty crime dramas, The Ardennes opens this Friday (1/6) in New York, at the Village East.

The Brand New Testament: God and Man in Brussels

Surveys suggest Americans are more religious than Europeans, but you can find conclusive proof in the movies. When God appears in American films, we cast the likes of George Burns and Morgan Freeman, but the Belgians opt for Benoît Poelvoorde. We’re not being snarky here. Viewers are meant to be under-awed and even contemptuous of him in Jaco Van Dormael’s The Brand New Testament (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

God according to Van Dormael and Poelvoorde is neither infinite in his mercy or a benignly disinterested watchmaker. He is a Belgian grump, who regularly devises new laws to make mankind miserable, like dropped toast always lands with the buttered-side down. He is a domineering sod with his wife and daughter Ea, frequently becoming borderline abusive. Yes, there was once a prodigal son, but nobody talks about JC anymore.

After one particularly dramatic flare up, Ea strikes back at her father, texting everyone on Earth the date of their death and then locking the mid-1990s vintage PC on which her father does all his deity business, before running off the earth in search of six apostles of her own. It turns out, this leaves her father at a distinct disadvantage. While Ea and JC could perform light miracles, their father was completely dependent on his computer. When he follows Ea into terrestrial Brussels, he is just crank with a bad temper claiming to be God.

There is a reason for those six additional apostles, beyond the fact it allows Ea to recruit six colorful characters, several of whom are played by some of Francophone cinema’s top stars. That is indeed Catherine Deneuve, as the recently spurned Martine, who finds the romance of her life with a gorilla. Frankly, it is really no big deal, considering how often she played opposite Gérard Depardieu.

For further French star power, there is also François Damiens (Delicacy, Les Cowboys) as his namesake assassin, whose line of work becomes almost absurdly irrelevant when everyone knows their expiration date. Of course, Poelvoorde hams it up shamelessly as the prickly creator, while Yolande Moreau is painfully mousy as “the Goddess,” even when it is her time to shine.

The broad strokes of BNT might sound like cloyingly cutesy blasphemy, but it has a darkly cynical attitude nobody will confuse with the Oh, God movies. Yet, somehow it mostly manages to avoid direct critiques of any particular religion or denomination. Basically, Van Dormael and co-screenwriter Thomaas Gunzig offer up some warmed-over Gaia-friendly feminism, in between the gallows humor, porn-related subplots, and sex with primates.

In fact, all the edgy, risqué, and potentially offensive material is pretty funny. The film only really gets tiresome when it wimps out and gets politically correct and sentimental. Highly episodic in its structure, the film largely plays like a series of sequential comedy sketches rather than a narrative to emotionally invest in, but at least it delivers the laughs. Recommended for those not put off by the premise, The Brand New Testament opens this Friday (12/9) in New York, at the IFC Center, just in time for the Christmas season.

A Town Called Panic: Double Fun

Stéphane Aubier & Vincent Patar’s molded plastic toy characters are the natural heirs to Mr. Bill, but unlike SNL’s vintage put-upon victim, they give lip right back. If social justice warriors think Cowboy and Indian sound offensive, just wait until they hear them start to squawk and complain. Of course, their relentless immaturity makes them quite a positive influence on youngsters. Therefore, as a special Art House Theater Day gift to the future leaders of America, GKIDS is releasing the short film collection A Town Called Panic: Double Fun for one day only this Saturday, in participating cinemas.

In Christmas Panic (a.k.a. The Christmas Log), the ever bickering Cowboy and Indian have not matured one whit since the Panic feature film.  They still live with the infinitely more responsible Horse, trying his patience daily. When their fooling around accidentally ruins the Christmas log for Horse’s dinner party, they finally push him too far. Exasperated, Horse calls up Santa and cancels their gift delivery. Naturally, Cowboy and Indian try to fix the situation, but only make matters worse.

Right, so Merry Christmas one and all. Do not look for any cheap sentiment here. Linus will not explain the true meaning of Christmas, nor will the Grinch be joining the citizenry of Whoville for a Christmas roast. Instead, Town Called Panic delivers a feast of increasingly reckless lunacy that only small hardened plastic toys could survive.

If Christmas was chaotic, the first day of class in Back to School Panic will be utterly nutty. Naturally, Cowboy and Indian are not down with it, but Horse lays down the law. As we would expect, they are the bad kids who sit in the back and never study, but they suddenly get interested when Yuri the Cosmonaut promises a trip to the moon to whichever student can calculate its distance from the earth. Knowing they are idiots, Cowboy and Indian resolve to cheat, but their scheme takes on trippily surreal dimensions. Arguably, Back to School is the weirdest Panic ever, but that is a good thing.

As a bonus, two fan favorite short Panic shorts will play in the “intermission” between Christmas and School. For a change, Cowboy and Indian are not the ones acting badly in Lisa & Jan Instead, it is the titular hipster hikers causing all the ill will. Cowboy returns to being the culprit in Cow-Hulk, but really the alien shape-shifting virus is to blame for all the damage.

All the Panic shorts are rollicking good fun, but Back to School Panic is probably their best misadventure since the laugh-out-loud, loose-control-of-your-functions feature film. Charmingly subversive, the A Town Called Panic: Double Fun shorts package is highly recommended for animation fans of all ages when it screens this Saturday (9/24) at select theaters, including the Cinema Arts Centre in Huntington.

SFIFF ’16: The White Knights

The line between humanitarianism and human trafficking is hardly what you would call “fine.” there is a big, fat demarcation there. Yet somehow the NGO Zoe’s Ark still had trouble keeping on the right side. Their “enthusiastic” efforts to place orphans with French families remains controversial in both Chad and France. Their fictional analog, Move for People, will get some of benefit of the doubt. Even so, the paving on road to Hell is still the same as it ever was. Even if they had good intentions, they certainly make an appalling mess of things in Joachim Lafosse’s The White Knights (trailer here), which screens during the 2016 San Francisco International Film Festival.

When Move for People’s Jacques Arnault arrives in-country, his top priorities are “acquiring” orphans five-years-old or younger from the surrounding village chiefs and securing air transportation out of the country. It almost seems like he foresees a need to leave in a hurry. Nevertheless, he has approved the presence of an embedded journalist to document their work. Of course, he neglected to tell her the organization is facing an official investigation in France. That little tidbit she learns from her editor after settling in at the NGO’s compound.

The irony (really, one of several) is Arnault’s scheme would not be so bad if the chief’s more scrupulously followed their instructions. Unfortunately, we soon suspect many parents have been convinced to give up their children so they can receive medical treatment and an education, with the expectation they can readily be visited.

There is plenty of blame to go around in this ripped-from-the-headlines morality play, starting with the NGO, but also including the chiefs and villagers, as well as the journalist who largely succumbs to Arnault’s gruff charm. He is played by Vincent Lindon, so it is hard to judge her too harshly. What is really shocking is how true-to-life the narrative is. Frankly, White Knights could be used as an infomercial for Guidestar and other non-profit watchdogs.

Lindon does his thing, blustering and bullying those who start to doubt, while tearing up when talking to prospective adoptive parents on the phone. The duality of his persona well suits Lafosse’s equivocal tone. Even when the bottom completely falls out of Move for People’s scheme, it is still hard to judge their intentions with certainty.

White Knights is the sort of ensemble piece that is best served by actors blending in rather than standing out. In that respect, it is remarkable to see Louise Bourgoin (so glamorous in The Girl from Monaco) disappear into the role of Laura Turine, Arnault’s ardent worker bee deputy. However, Reda Kateb brings some edge as their fixer, Xavier Lipert.

Even with the prominent names attached to White Knights, its jaundiced view of NGO do-goodery will not likely endear it critics and art-house programmers. It is just too subtle and challenging. Indeed, there is absolutely nothing simplistic about it. Recommended for Francophiles and internationalist skeptics, White Knights screens tomorrow (4/25), Wednesday (4/27), and Friday (4/29), as part of this year’s SFIFF.

Sundance 16: Belgica

You know what they say goes with rock & roll? Well, you can find plenty of both at the pseudo-grungy hipster nightclub mismanaged by two Belgian brothers. It starts with the best of rock & roll intentions but founders on the worst of rock & roll excesses. The music would not be out of place in the Knitting Factory, but the sex and drugs are worthy of Studio 54 at its peak in Felix van Groeningen’s Belgica (trailer here), which screens during the 2016 Sundance Film Festival.

Jo Cannoott is not his older brother Frank’s keeper, but he could use one. The younger Cannoott sibling is the relatively responsible one, but remains somewhat submissive when facing the unapologetically wild Frank. Partly this is due to the protection from bullies provided by the elder brother when Jo lost an eye due to an early childhood infection. Jo Cannoott dreams of remodeling the dingy Belgica, turning it into a hip but egalitarian club that will feature the latest Belgian electronica, alt rock, and hyphenated fusion bands. Initially, it smells more like the notorious CBGB bathrooms, but with a little elbow grease and palm-greasing, the Cannoott Brothers reshape it into a happening spot.

For a while, everything seems to be good, but Frank’s reckless drug use and shameless hook-ups start to rub Jo the wrong way. Frank’s wife is not too crazy about them either, especially since she is pregnant with their second child. Frustrated with his own failing relationship and baffled by some of Frank’s dubious unilateral business decisions, Jo starts to withdraw from the bad scene, but of course, he keeps getting pulled back in.

This film is over two hours, which is unnecessarily indulgent. We could easily get everything we need in ninety minutes, give or take. On the plus side, this time around, van Groeningen foregoes the ideological ax-grinding that made Broken Circle Breakdown so cringe-inducing. Admittedly, there is something perversely enjoyable about watching the brothers’ hedonism-driven fall, but after a while, the guilty pleasures all start to look the same.

Stef Aerts and Tom Vermeir are terrific as the two brothers so very flawed in so very different ways, but it is Hélène De Vos who shows real star power as Jo’s seductive but self-centered girlfriend Marieke. However, the film’s nagging problem is all the diverse musicians who make their way to Belgica’s stage seem more interesting than the characters hooking up and doing drugs around them.

In all honesty, it gets tiresome watching a man-child like Frank Cannoott make every possible mistake and basically ruin everything for the people around him. Van Groeningen is not shy about rubbing our noses in his failings. Belgica probably devotes ten times more space to the brothers’ downfall than their initial flush of success. Still, for adventurous rock and electronica fans, it boasts a rich and varied soundtrack. Earning a mild recommendation for fans of nightlife melodramas (it is better than Club Life, but not as good as Northern Soul), Belgica screens again this morning (1/22), Wednesday (1/27), and next Friday (1/27) in Park City, as part of this year’s Sundance.

Du Welz’s Alleluia

As usual, no internet use goes unpunished in the movies. This time, Michel Bellmer will provide our object lesson. He is an adventurer who specializes in conning lonely women out of money. He also engages in strange occult rites, but he is nothing compared to the psychopathic women he unfortunately charms. Belgian extreme auteur Fabrice du Welz darkly riffs on the already pretty macabre case of the “Lonely Hearts Killers” throughout Alleluia (trailer here), which releases today on DVD, from Doppelganger Releasing.

Evidently, Bellmer’s pre-date photo burning ritual worked, because mousy Gloria falls for him hard. After an uncharacteristic one night stand, she is only too happy to loan him money for his supposedly struggling business. Of course, women like Gloria are Bellmer’s business—and he is already working on his next deal. However, Gloria is not ready to move on. She tracks him down, but instead of demanding her money back, she offers to be his accomplice, as long as they can periodically steal some intimate time together.

Gloria has one stipulation—no more sex with the marks. Although Bellmer agrees, he knows there is no better way to seal the deal than offering a little sugar. Unfortunately, whenever he tries to hurry things along, Gloria erupts in a lethal jealous fury. Frankly, she is the past the point of being bad for business, but Bellmer is stuck with her.

As if Alleluia was not creepy enough, lead actor Laurent Lucas was the victim of an internet death hoax a few months ago. Happily it was bogus, but this feels exactly like the sort of film that could become notorious for the curse-like deaths of its cast-members. Strictly speaking, it is an earthly serial killer film, but Manu Dacosse’s tripped out, massively feverish cinematography gives it all a supernatural looking haze. Du Welz and co-screenwriter Vincent Tavier are pretty vague on the geo-particulars, so for all we know, it could be in one of the outer circles of Hell. It certainly starts to feel that way for Bellmer.

The hopefully very alive and kicking Lucas is terrific as Bellmer, convincingly portraying his unique character development arc, from sociopathic ladies man to psychotically henpecked common law husband. However, Almodóvar regular Lola Dueñas is the black soul at the center of the film. She is profoundly unsettling as the deeply disturbed Gloria (and vice versa). It is also worth noting the fine work of Héléna Noguerra as the rebooted Lonely Hearts Killers’ third prospective victim, the well-to-do widowed mother, Solange. She brings real presence to what could have been a largely disposable role.

This should go without saying, but if the French lover you just met over the internet wants to move in with his unstable Spanish sister, you need to put your foot down and say no. Alleluia should surely will not do any favors for online dating services. Instead, it is an unusually impressive genre film, but it might actually be too effective, by not giving us any breathing space in between the psychotic episodes. Tense and disorienting, Alleluia is recommended for fans of art-house horror when it releases today (10/6) on DVD and BluRay.

First Look ’15: I for Iran

You can find some rather unpleasant images and references in the text books of post-Islamic Revolutionary Iran. Nobody understands that better than an Iranian-Persian filmmaker’s Persian tutor. However, he still uses a problematic text due to a lack of better options. His language lessons will illuminate deeper truths in Sanaz Azari’s I for Iran (trailer here), which screens during the Museum of the Moving Image’s 2015 First Look.

Azari was born in Iran, but lived in Brussels since early childhood. As a result, she did not speak Persia until she enrolled in classes as an adult. During her studies, she was struck by the way language carries cultural specific codes and meanings. This was particularly so with respects to Persia and Iranian identity, even and especially following the revolution. As he bemoans their textbook, Behrouz Majidi will expound on the beauties and ironies of Persian culture in a series of improvised lectures.

That might sound rather academic, but Majidi is the sort of screen presence who could read the Brussels phone book and keep the audience riveted. His delivery is sort of like vintage Mark Twain—drily witty and deceptively elliptical. Just when you think he is hopelessly off point, he brings each mini-monologue home with panache. At times he waxes nostalgic for lost Iranian treasures, like the storied Shirazi wine the Islamist government has long since forbidden. When he addresses current events, such as the 2013 presidential elections, his analysis also sounds pretty darn spot-on.

Unfortunately, that means Majidi is more of a realist than an optimist. However, his love for Persian culture and nostalgia for the Iran that once was is wholly engaging and at times quite touching.  In between his improvised riffs, Azari presents a sort of visual free association based on the particular Persian letter under discussion. Frankly, these seem to work better over time, with the latter chain of images taking on far more evident meaning. Still, for the most part, they just take viewers away from the heart of the film.

I for Iran might sound simple and in terms of its formal structure it certainly is. However, despite its mere fifty minute running time, it overflows with thoughtful insights on human nature and grand themes like freedom, cultural survival, and human dignity. For such an unassuming film, it really sticks with viewers. Even though it is hard to define its cinematic category and the exact nature of Majidi’s performance, it still ought to be a star-making turn. Surprisingly moving, I for Iran is very highly recommended when it screens this Saturday (1/17), with the equally difficult to classify International Tourism as part of this year’s First Look at MoMI.

The Dardenne Brothers’ Two Days, One Night

So much for labor solidarity. The workers of Sondra’s local have voted to allow management to lay her off so they can keep their bonuses. It will be a devastating blow to her and her family, but that’s her problem, not theirs. However, she has been granted a second vote, due to the foreman’s improper attempt to influence the outcome. With the encouragement of her husband Manu and a supportive workmate, Sondra will fight for her job, practicing retail politics at its most personal in the Dardenne Brothers’ Two Days, One Night (trailer here), which opens this Wednesday in New York at the IFC Center.

Sondra was already grappling with the debilitating clinical depression that contributed to her extended sick leave. Obviously, this will not help. Unfortunately, her time away convinced management they could make do with one less person and the unseen, barely referenced union agreed. Reportedly, the foreman told her co-workers management was determined to lay off somebody regardless of the vote, so they might as well get their bonuses out of the deal. The truth of that contention is a bit murky.

Armed with this new information, Sondra tries to buck-up and lobby her colleagues to allow her to stay, despite the very real financial cost they would have to bear. Thus proceeds a series of incredibly awkward conversations. Some react with bitter resentment, while others overflow with guilt. Each becomes an intense one-on-one encounter, but they all essentially start the same way. Unfortunately, the Dardennes’ naturalist ethos precludes them from fast-forwarding through Sondra’s familiar expository intros, but at least they always go someplace uncomfortably honest. In fact, she even learns some of her co-workers are in an even worse position, due to their abusive home lives and dicey legal standings.

Two Days is being billed as the Dardenne Brothers’ first collaboration with a major movie star, which must be news to Cécile de France, who starred in the Dardennes’ The Kid with a Bike, as well as Eastwood’s Hereafter and scores of high profile French films. Regardless, it is easy to see why the New York Film Critics Circle named Marion Cotillard best actress for her work as Sondra. It is a raw, earthy performance that eschews superficial flash for a deeper, darker means of expression. Sometimes it is painful to watch her (of course that was true of the ludicrously twitchy Meryl Streep in Ossage County, but for the opposite, less edifying reason).

Clearly, this is Cotillard’s show, but Fabrizio Rongione’s turn as the more stable Manu also makes quite a quiet impact. In fact, the entire ensemble is remarkably assured and uncompromisingly convincing, despite their radically differing levels of professional experience (as per usual in the Dardennes’ films). Arguably, each confrontation between Sondra and a co-worker could stand alone as a self-contained film, given the strength of the supporting cast.

Although Belgium selected Two Days as their official Foreign Language Academy Award submission, it did not make the shortlist. There is always critical favorite that gets snubbed and ironically this year it is Two Days, a film driven by the process of vote-counting. Although it is a bit repetitive as a whole, the individual performances and in-the-moment flashes of truth more than carry the film. Recommended for those who appreciate social drama and Francophone cinema, Two Days, One Night opens Christmas Eve (12/24) at the IFC Center in New York.

AFI’s EU Showcase ’14: Waste Land

Géant is the Col. Kurtz of Belgian art dealers. He has definitely embraced the heart of darkness in the Congo. He even has his personal “witch doctor.” It is not clear that he really believes, if the cop pursuing him believes he believes, or even whether the cop starts to believe himself. Regardless, Det. Leo Woeste is in for a rough final investigation in Pieter Van Hees’s Waste Land (trailer here), which screens during the AFI’s 2014 EU Film Showcase.

Woeste is your basic cop on the edge. He tries to me a good husband and a responsible father to the step-son he has helped raise since infancy, but he has seen some terrible things. The fact that his new partner, Johnny Rimbaud, is a coke-fueled hedonist hardly stabilizes his erratic mood swings. When his wife Kathleen announces her pregnancy, but doubts the wisdom of keeping the baby, Woeste promises to retire from the force and start acting normal. Unfortunately, he has one last case to solve.

When an African immigrant is murdered and dumped in a garbage bag, the initial clues point towards Géant. Woeste tries to be extra-supportive to the slain man’s grieving sister, Aysha Tshimanga, perhaps because his fatherly instincts have been stimulated. However, their relationship soon takes on weird sexual overtones. She will accompany him to various underground boxing matches and hipster night clubs, where the throbbing hot house atmosphere will keep his head spinning.

Waste Land flirts with a lot of genres, but it never fully commits to any. It also injects some clumsy commentary on imperialism, particularly a running non-joke supposedly claiming Woeste is descended from Leopold II. Nevertheless, much of the second act investigation is rather compelling procedural stuff. Unfortunately, the climax is so self-consciously feverish, it undermines the gritty mystery and ambiguous genre elements that proceeded it.

Still, there is no denying Dardenne Brothers regular Jérémie Renier puts on a clinic as Woeste. This is fierce, no-holds-barred, rub-your-nose-in-the-self-destruction work, but it is never self-indulgent. In fact, he balances the inward burn with the outward rage quite adroitly. Babetida Sadjo also finds a spark in Tshimanga that elevates her beyond a mere victim, while Peter Van den Begin gorges on scenery as the roguish Rimbaud.

Despite its narrative frustrations, Waste Land is a massively stylish film. Cinematographer Menno Mans makes Brussels look like a real life Sin City, where most of the buildings are either abandoned warehouses or underground dance clubs. The opening sequence is especially evocative, in a disconcerting way. Nicely played and skillfully put together, Waste Land just lurches out of control down the stretch. Recommended for those who will admire its ambition, Waste Land screens this coming Tuesday (12/16) and Wednesday (12/17), as part of the AFI’s EU Film Showcase, outside of Washington, DC.

ND/NF ’14: The Strange Color of Your Body’s Tears

Sometimes you have to wonder if Fifty Shades helped normalize some downright dangerous behavior. This is one of those times. Sex and violence are intimately linked in Hélène Cattet & Bruno Forzani’s latest Benelux giallo pastiche, but it is not clear whether this is intended to horrify or titillate the audience. Fasten your restraints, because The Strange Color of Your Body’s Tears (trailer here) will be a heck of a bumpy ride for most viewers when it screens during this year’s New Directors/New Films, co-presented by the Film Society of Lincoln Center and MoMA.

Dan Kristensen is in for it. Returning from a business trip, he finds his creepy Brussels flat is chained from the inside, but his wife Edwige is missing. When the cops finally show up, he has roused all his neighbors and heard a rather unhelpful story from the old lady in number seven, explaining how her presumably late husband also disappeared under similarly murky circumstances. Naturally, the flatfoot suspects Kristensen, especially when he subsequently wakes up in bed, next to her severed head.

So, Tears would be downright plotty compared to the Grand Guignol memory play, Amer, Cattet and Forzani’s previous valentine to the giallo genre, if it were not for their myriad excesses. Repetitive cycles are a really big deal for them, but it is hard to feel much suspense or dread when the same crummy things keep happening to Kristensen, with only mild variations that make matters progressively worse for the poor slob each time.

There is no question the filmmaking couple has quite the eye for composition and cinematographer Manu Dacosse gives it all a lushly lurid look. Even though they are not original, the musical hat-tips also set quite the mood. However, their constant jump cuts, violent expressionistic interludes, and is-this-a-dream game-playing hobble the film’s pacing, narrative cohesion, and basic sense of flow.

Frankly, despite all the stylistic madness going on around him, Klaus Tange still gives an admirably presentable performance as Kristensen. Nonetheless, it is production designer Julia Irribarria’s team that takes the honors, creating a truly creepy, yet luxuriant backdrop, like the Belgian (or pseudo-Italian) equivalent of the Dakota in Rosemary’s Baby. With its marble floors, gold paneling, and Mucha-esque screens (much like the awesome one-sheet), it might just be worth losing the occasional spouse to live there.

On a technical level, Tears is quite polished. Cattet and Forzani accomplish everything they set out to do, but the resulting film is deathly static. Masterful visuals are all very nice, but they cannot compensate for ill-defined characters and muddled plot points. Instead of a sensationalistic indulgence, it becomes a rather taxing chore to watch. Recommended for fans of the Maria Beatty fetish films John Zorn scored, The Strange Color of Your Body’s Tears screens again tomorrow (3/30) at the Walter Reade, as the 2014 edition of ND/NF comes to a close.

Sundance ’14: Ernest and Celestine

This might be a happy morning for a Belgian bear and mouse.  Based on Gabrielle Vincent’s children’s books, it is considered another serious animated Oscar contender from GKIDS.  Regardless of what the Academy did (can you tell this piece was pre-written?), Benjamin Renner, Stéphane Aubier & Vincent Patar’s Ernest and Celestine (trailer here) will hold the distinction of being one of the first two films selected for the inaugural Sundance Kids section at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival, kicking off tonight in Park City.

Bears live above ground, in a human-like state of middle class respectability.  The mice live below, toiling away in a Dickensian subterranean city.  Neither Ernest the busking bear nor Celestine the artistic mouse fit comfortably within their respective communities.  Like most mice, Celestine is expected to scavenge coveted bear’s teeth from the surface world for the mice dentists, who sit atop the social order down below.  Naturally, she is terrible at it.  However, a chance encounter with Ernest leads to some rare cross-species collaboration—teeth for Celestine and food for Ernest.

Alas, word of their scandalous association leads to pariah status for them both.  Yet, for a while they live happily together as outlaws in Ernest’s remote forest bungalow.  Of course, neither the world of mice nor bears will be content until they are apprehended.  Still, that will be the best opportunity for E&C to teach them a lesson in tolerance.

E&C’s hand-drawn animation has an elegant old European feel that is refreshingly nostalgic. While sometimes the message is laid on with a heavy hand, the vibe is usually quite gentle and sweet.  Frankly, one would never expect such a graceful and well intentioned film from Aubier and Patar, the team behind the anarchic bedlam of the Town Called Panic franchise, but here it is—and it is indeed a fine work of animation.  Their figures are expressive and endearing, but not cloyingly cute.  Jazz cellist Vincent Courtois’s lightly buoyant score also reinforces the sophisticated atmosphere.

While only the celebrity English version of C&E will play at Sundance (featuring Forest Whitaker as Ernest), its announced March release will also include select subtitled screenings of the original French (with Lambert Wilson gruffly giving voice to Ernest).  Visually it is an absolute charmer and the characterization is strong enough to overcome the not so subtle teaching moments.  Recommended for all children and fans of animation, Ernest and Celestine screens this Saturday (1/18) and next Saturday (1/25) in Park City, as well as this Sunday (1/19) in Salt Lake, as part of this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Broken Circle Breakdown: The Belgian Bluegrass Oscar Submission

He has a lot of facial hair, she is covered in tattoos. They are Belgian, but old time American roots music, particularly bluegrass, tells their painful tale.  There will be banjos and tears in Felix van Groeningen’s The Broken Circle Breakdown (trailer here), Belgium’s official foreign language Oscar submission, which opens today in New York.

As a single chap, Didier just puttered about his once grand country house when not performing with his bluegrass band.  That was how he caught the eye of Elise, a tattoo artist with more personal ink than the general population of San Quentin.  What starts out as a physical thing evolves into something musical when she joins the band as a vocalist.  While actress Veerle Baetens’ voice is not showstopppingly powerful, she still sounds quite haunting performing Elise’s old school standards, like “Wayfaring Stranger.”

Eventually, Elise gets pregnant.  After Didier’s brief freak-out, they settle into an idyllic family life together, until five year-old Maybelle is stricken with cancer.  Elise and Didier try to keep it together for her sake, but the wheels are clearly coming off their relationship.

You might think a family tragedy like Circle would have no political axe to grind, but you would be wrong.  Van Groeningen’s adaptation of lead actor Johan Heldenbergh’s stage play retains his “reason vs. faith” themes, presenting them in the most simplistic manner possible.  Frankly, there is already widespread confusion regarding the differences between adult, amniotic, pluripotent, and the controversial embryonic stem cell treatments, but Circle does its best to muddy the waters even further.

Arguably, a case could be made Didier’s foaming-at-the-mouth outbursts of aggressive atheism undermine his character’s position, but that does not make them any more pleasant to sit through. Indeed, his utter inability to offer his daughter any form of spiritual reassurance is hard to buy.  You just have to wonder why scene after scene made it to the final cut.  Then they start singing and suddenly the film makes sense again.

Van Groeningen might only do one thing right throughout Circle, but he rather brilliantly uses song to express his characters’ inner turmoil.  When Didier and Elise perform “If I Needed You,” it cuts to the bone.  This could definitely be a case of the soundtrack eclipsing the source film’s popularity, as it just so happened for O Brother Where Art Thou? 

Baetens and Heldenbergh sound great together on the bandstand and are uncomfortably real together, both in the throes of passion and when emotionally torturing each other.  Young Nell Cattrysse is also quite compelling, giving some flesh-and-blood dimension to the ailing Maybelle.

The music and fundamental drama of Circle are so powerful, it is a shame the film has such an ADD compulsion to express a wider macro-level significance.  Van Groeningen and Heldenbergh should have placed more trust in its micro essence.  When it consents to jerk tears, it gets them flowing good, which is why it cannot be counted out in the foreign language Oscar derby.  The Broken Circle Breakdown is a messy film, but it has its moments.  Recommended with reservations for hardcore fans of bluegrass and Flemish cinema, it opens today in New York at the Landmark Sunshine.