Sundance ’18: Hedgehog’s Home (short)

Branko Ćopić was one of the few Yugoslavian children’s book writers who could live entirely off his royalties, despite his often-pointed criticism of the Communist Party and its corruption. Of course, that willingness to speak truth to power only increased his popularity. Yet, his books were then and still remain popular in the former Yugoslav states and throughout Europe. For thematic reasons, this one in particular took on additional meaning for refugees during the Balkan War. Previously adapted for Croatian TV as an animated special, Ćopić’s ode to one’s abode gets a richly detailed stop-motion animation treatment in Eva Cvijanovic’s Canadian National Film Board-supported short film, Hedgehog’s Home (trailer here), which screened at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

It is a deceptively simple story. After enjoying a glutinous lunch with the Fox, the stuffed Hedgehog makes his way make to his tree stomp home. Not understanding his attachment to his nest, the not so stealthily Fox follows Hedgy, picking up several gawking predators (Wolf, Bear, Boar) along the way, who all expect to sneer at his titular home. However, old Hedge will give them a real dressing down before things really get ironic.

Stylistically, Hedgehog looks like a cousin of Wes Anderson’s Fantastic Mr. Fox. It has a very tactile vibe, with all kinds of hair and fiber plainly visible. Yet, it is also gently sly film that must have been an enjoyable added bonus for all the Sundance patrons who saw it playing before White Fang (a rather shrewdly programmed pairing).

Cvijanovic is an enormously talented animator, who deserved an Oscar nomination for Hedgehog. It is much better than many of the animated short contenders, especially Dear Basketball, Kobe Bryant’s problematic tribute to himself (so much for all those hashtags). Still, you can’t say Hedgehog has been ignored, considering it played at last year’s New York Film Festival, prior to this year’s Sundance. Highly recommended for animation fans and family audiences, Hedgehog’s Home should continue to rack up festival selections following its screenings at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: Damsel

Ever since John Ford’s genre-defining The Searchers was released, nearly every subsequent western has had to deal with its legacy. That is even true of spoofs like this one. In the case of this goofball oater, the only Native character is just as big of an idiot as the pasty white characters. Nevertheless, echoes of The Searchers can be heard and seen throughout the Zellner Brothers’ Damsel, which screened at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Samuel Alabaster is a bit squirrely, but he seems like an earnest young chap, so sad sack Parson Henry agrees to make the trek to marry him and his beloved Penelope. However, while en route, Alabaster (he’s a white guy, in case you were unsure) informs the nebbish man of the cloth, he has actually joined a rescue mission. Dear Penelope has been kidnapped by the dastardly Anton. Yet, poor Henry agrees to soldier on, because he is moved by Alabaster’s ardor. However, things really get complicated when they arrive at the cabin.

Basically, the Zellners give an ironic O. Henry twist to the Old West premise and then devise ways to repeat the gag, over and over. Mia Wasikowska (well-represented at Sundance) is a formidable western heroine, but to get into specifics would be spoilery. Robert Pattinson is so unselfconsciously loopy as Alabaster, you have to give him credit for taking chances with his image. However, the Zellners’ MVP might just be Brother David, who is surprisingly humane and even rather affecting as Parson Henry.

As movie mash-ups go, Damsel is unusually moody. In fact, it rather dilly-dallies through the first act. Yet, that means the poignant pay-off does not so radically clash with the rest of the film. In many ways, we can see a kinship with the Zellners’ masterful Kumiko the Treasure Hunter (which also features a terrific supporting turn from David Zellner). It also directly addresses loneliness and the need for connection, but the outrageous gags give Damsel a partially split personality.

The Zellners clearly use the film’s Utah locations to evoke memories of The Searchers and other Ford westerns. They crank up the Utahness further by featuring Landon Weeks, a quite remarkable pianist from Ogden, as a saloon piano player, which is cool. It is an inconsistent film, but it proves movie spoofs need not be a brainless and soulless stretch of gags. Frankly, Kumiko was so great, it was wise of them to follow-up with something completely different. Recommended for viewers in the mood for some idiosyncratic humor that takes a few risks, Damsel is sure to get picked up by someone after it screened at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: Genesis 2.0

It is only a matter of time before Jurassic Park becomes a reality. We are already living with the weird hybrid technology of Dr. Moreau. In fact, high school students from around the world compete in the annual International Genetic Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition, like Science Fair for prospective Dr. Frankensteins. What does that mean for humanity, as we have thus far known it? It is hard to say, but the woolly mammoth may yet get a new lease on life, thanks to the paleontologists and researchers working to revive the extinct species in Christian Frei & Maxim Arbugaev’s Genesis 2.0, which screens again today as the winner of the World Documentary Special Jury Award for Cinematography at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

The woolly mammoth once roamed free throughout Siberia and its remains can still be found just beneath the ground of the New Siberian Islands. When the weather permits access to the archipelago, hearty fortune hunters band together in search of tusks. They really do not care about the rest of the skeleton, but sometimes they will pass on word of a particularly complete looking specimen. Peter Grigoriev, the primary representative tusk hunter is probably better about that than many of his colleagues, since his brother is paleontologist Semyon Grigoriev, the director of the Mammoth Museum in Yakutsk.

Thanks to tips from tusk hunters, the adventurous academic recovers a mammoth body that still has preserved, running blood. Eventually, Grigoriev will take those live cells to Hwang Woo-suk—yes, the very same Hwang of the stem cell research scandal—whose Sooam Biotech regularly churns out perfect clones of deceased family dogs. However, for a prospective job like this, they will need the resources of the National GeneBank in China.

So, if you want to see a live woolly mammoth in your lifetime, eat healthy, exercise regularly and maybe it will happen. However, if the mammoth is resurrected, it will most likely happen in China. Frei hints at the possible downside to conceding the future of genetic engineering to China through a tense exchange between Hwang and the PR liaison for the National GeneBank, who seems completely baffled when Hwang’s American colleague expresses ethical qualms regarding the prospect of genetic engineering Down Syndrome out of existence. Who knows what else might be targeted?

There is much to consider in Genesis 2.0, but Frei gives us time to do so. This is a ruminative film that values imagery and symbolism over information downloads. Both Frei and Arbugaev, the former hockey player turned filmmaker, who documented the tusk hunting as co-director and Siberian cinematographer, are clearly fascinated by the parallels between the genetic and primeval trophy-hunting pursuit of the woolly mammoth, occurring simultaneously and represented by the odd couple brothers. They certainly capture some remarkable images, especially Arbugaev, who likely deserves most of the credit for the Jury’s cinematography award.

Some slight pruning would probably make Genesis 2.0 stronger, because it is a bit slow at times. However, it dramatically illustrates our current technological tipping point. Neither Frei & Arbugaev nor Grigoriev or even Harvard genetic engineering guru George Church tell us what we should think about of all this, but the film makes it clear we should start giving it some serious thought. Recommended for science buffs and armchair futurists, Genesis 2.0 screens again today (1/28) as an award-winner at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: The Happy Prince

Most author’s biographies are boozy stories, but to be fair to Oscar Wilde, he had more than his share of sorrows to drown. He also had the defense mechanism of his caustic humor, but it started to fail him during his final years of disgrace. After his release from a British prison, Wilde lived like a refugee in France and Italy, but the “Bosie Affair” continued to reverberate. First-time helmer Rupert Everett directs himself returning to the role he previously played on-stage (Hare’s The Judas Kiss) in his literary biopic, The Happy Prince, which screens during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Due to his disastrous libel action against the Marquess of Queensberry, Wilde was imprisoned and humiliated, but he was still profoundly attached to his nemesis’s son, Lord Alfred “Bosie” Douglas. Broken by the scandal, Wilde now survives on a small allowance provided by his long-suffering wife Constance and the charity of a small group of friends, including novelist Reggie Turner and his besotted literary executor Robbie Ross. However, Wilde pushes away Ross and risks permanently severing ties with Constance when Douglas joins him in exile.

Everett has garnered raves for his performance as Wilde and raspberries for filmmaking prowess, but frankly Happy Prince is perfectly presentable. Despite the exquisitely cinematic locations (seriously, we should all be tarred with scandal if it allows us to stay in such picturesque digs), Everett’s film is meant to be a memory play in the tradition of literary theater. It meanders, because that is what the genre does.

Regardless, Everett is downright spooky channeling Wilde’s acerbic wit and soul-weary moroseness. To his credit, he does not sanitize the literary icon, fully expressing all the bitterness and depression sapping his strength. Yet, there is something quite poignant about the rapport he develops with Colin Morgan, as the entitled Douglas. Problematic in several ways, Morgan is both a callow and sentimental figure, which is a tricky role to play, but Morgan pulls it off nicely. Executive producer Colin Firth basically roller-skates in and out as Turner, the concerned bystander, but Tom Wilkinson adds some much-needed energy and flair, as Father Dunne. He literally appears in deathbed scene, but he still invigorates the film.

Fans of literary dramas will be pleased by the film’s classy package. Cinematographer John Conroy gives it a gauzy, painterly look, while Gabriel Yared’s score isn’t particularly memorable after the fact, but it always unobtrusively supports the drama on screen. Expectations might be a factor into how Happy Prince is received. It is not a definitive statement on homophobia or a brilliant directorial debut, but it is a very nice British period piece. Regular viewers of Merchant-Ivory films and PBS’s Masterpiece will find it satisfying, while they wait for the next big mini from Julian Fellowes. Respectfully recommended, The Happy Prince screens again today (1/28) in Salt Lake, as part of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: You Were Never Really Here

Don’t be surprised if authoritarian advocates of the nanny state start agitating for restrictions on the unregulated sale of hammers. After all, they easily to conceal and potentially lethal. That is why they are the weapon of choice for “Joe,” a psychologically tormented vigilante, who specializes in rescuing teen runaways from white slavery. Unfortunately, Joe’s death wish might get fulfilled in Lynne Ramsay’s You Were Never Really Here, which screens during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Aside from his aged mother, Joe has little contact with the outside world. Most of his jobs come through intermediaries. He works outside the law, invisibly passing through the low-rent no-tell motels where his prey can be found. Through flashbacks prompted by auto-asphyxiation (with no erotic component), we come to understand the abusive childhood he suffered. Apparently, it was all at the hands of his father, because the empty hulk of a man still dutifully cares for his elderly mother. She is clearly declining physically and mentally, but she still seems to recognize her son.

Joe’s deliberately withdrawn life will be up-ended by his latest assignment. Distraught State Senator Votto retains his services to save his daughter Nina. Initially, it seems like business as usual, but the job mires Joe in a political conspiracy largely beyond his comprehensive and mostly outside the scope of the picture. Regardless, bad guys with guns and badges are coming for him—and the handful of people he knows.

Joaquin Phoenix bulked up De Niro-style for a quietly harrowing performance that just might be a career best. As Joe, he broods and seethes like nobody’s business, but he never resorts to cheap theatrics. It is work that seems to dredge up genuine pain buried deep within. Seriously, Phoenix really is everything reports from Cannes cracked him up to be. Yet, Ramsay sometimes gets in the way with her attempts to put her own narrative-fragmenting stamp on the material. We do not need the constant intrusion of flashbacks to childhood and suicidal fantasies. We totally believe he is profoundly damaged already.

Despite Ramsay’s showiness, young Ekaterina Samsonov matches Phoenix’s taciturn intensity as the equally haunted Nina. They develop an awkward but poignant rapport that makes YWNRH something like the art-house analog of Man on Fire (either one). Judith Roberts is also tragically convincing and compelling as Joe’s ailing mother, while John Doman adds some gritty genre color as McCleary, Joe’s employment agent.

The cast is devastating, but stylistically, this is a case where less would have been more. Nevertheless, Phoenix and company power through Ramsay’s fractured prism. Ultimately recommended as a flawed but visceral character study of a flawed but viscerally-driven man, You Were Never Really Here screens again tonight (1/27) in Park City, as part of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: The Cleaners

They are called “moderators,” but the net effect of their work has not made the world a more moderate place. These young underpaid workers specialize in flagging objectionable content from the internet, such as extreme pornography and incitements to violence. However, any real Free Speech advocate will argue one man’s hate speech is another man’s trenchant political analysis. Yet, the really consequential decisions regarding what to block and what to allow happens several hundred pay-grades above them. The state of the internet as a public forum is critically examined in Hans Block & Moritz Riesewieck’s documentary The Cleaners, which screens during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

The major social networks, especially including Facebook, are sensitive about the word “censorship,” so they all outsource their content moderation to tech firms in the Philippines (cheap labor, high English fluency, and incidentally overwhelmingly Catholic and currently supportive of Generalissimo Duterte). One can argue overwhelmingly egregious images should be policed, but you have to wonder who would put their names to such vileness in the first place. Of course, the slope quickly gets slippery when violent or sexual imagery is incorporated into political commentary.

While anonymous moderators are flagging naked Trump cartoons, their client bosses are cutting deals to censor criticism of the increasingly Islamist Erdogan regime for Turkish IP addresses. Conversely, they allow genocidal hate speech directed at Burma’s Rohingya minority to continue unabated. Likewise, dubious fake news (approaching deliberate misinformation) peddled by Duterte’s supporters, including his high-profile cheerleader, Mocha Uson, a former pin-up model turned Spice Girls-esque pop-star, are allowed to flow freely.

There is a great deal of eye-opening and disturbing stuff in The Cleaners, but it is mostly anecdotal and often at odds with itself. Social networks should censor more in Burma (nobody calls it Myanmar, except maybe tech company staff attorneys) and the Philippines, but far less in China and Turkey. Essentially, Block & Riesewieck argue whenever a judgement call is needed, Facebook and YouTube have almost always gotten it wrong. Most people can be easily convinced of that (frankly, its like shooting fish in a barrel), but that doesn’t leave us much in terms of policy implications and action item takeaways.

Okay, so Facebook is evil. Now what? Granted, there is some interesting stuff in The Cleaners. Uson with her racy past and BFF relationship with Duterte cries out for her own, snarkier documentary. However, the film is too unfocused and contradictory to be an effective catalyst for reform. We wish this film was better than it is, but it is still pretty frightening. Despite its flaws, socially engaged viewers might want to check out The Cleaners anyway, when it screens this afternoon (1/27) in Park City, as part of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: Arizona

Everybody knows somebody like Sonny. No matter what happens, its never his fault. Sure, he signed an adjustable rate mortgage, but nobody told him the rate might actually go up. Yes, he also killed his realtor, but he was provoked. He then takes his put-upon employee Cassie Fowler hostage, because she made him nervous talking about cops and ambulances.  Sonny never takes responsibility, but nobody gets off easy in Jonathan Watson’s Arizona, which screens during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

The recently divorced Fowler is in roughly the same boat as the man who abducts her. She bought her home from her future boss, only to soon find herself underwater when the market turned. Now, she is struggling to unload similar houses on not-so-unsuspecting buyers, in hopes of making a commission to apply to her deeply-in-arrears mortgage. Sometimes the erratic Sonny will see her as a fellow victim and sometimes as a sub-prime predator, but he has a nasty habit of killing people in front of her, like his callous ex-wife. Of course, it is never his fault, mind you.

The stakes start to rise when Sonny sets out to abduct Fowler’s daughter for more leverage. Since the gated communities cratered, people moved away, so there was no much pressure on the one-cop police force to expand. Eventually, the resourceful Fowler slips loose, but there is really no place for her to go. At some point, accounts will just have to be settled.

The screenplay by TV writer-producer Luke Del Tredici desperately wants to be topical, but it works better when it settles down and focuses on genre business. If anything, the utterly irresponsible behavior it chronicles undermines its sub-prime messaging.

However, the cast still manages to do wonders with the inconsistent material. Rosemarie DeWitt is highly charismatic on screen, which helps make Fowler an appealingly proactive character. Danny Masterson plays Sonny like a Man-Boy from Hell, basically falling back on his established shtick, but casting it in a darker, more sinister hue. David Alan Grier isn’t around for long, but it is hard to forget his appearance as Coburn, the Keystone-esque cop.

Watson fully capitalizes on the loneliness of the Arizona desert (technically shot in New Mexico, but close enough) and the sinister possibilities of the winding lanes and dead-end cul-de-sacs lined with empty foreclosed houses. Its like Detroit in the desert. In truth, it is a tense, competently executed thriller, but it does not belong in the Midnight section (not enough blood or attitude). Earning a moderate recommendation for thriller fans, Arizona screens again tonight (1/27) in Park City, as part of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: Hereditary

Like the saying goes, emotional problems do not run in Annie Graham’s family, they gallop. She always blamed her mother, perhaps with good reason. However, she starts to feel guilty about her long simmering resentments when the semi-estranged matriarch finally passes away. Yet, the full toxicity of Grandma’s legacy soon becomes apparent as the Graham family tragedies compound in Ari Aster’s Hereditary, which screens during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Annie Graham lives with her family in a remote chalet-style home, where she works as a scale-model artist, thereby establishing a creepy locale and décor for Aster to build off. Their teen son Peter can’t even fit in with his stoner friends, but his younger sister Charlie is the real odd duck. Maybe not so coincidentally, Annie and her husband Steve allowed Grandma more access to Charlie, but they totally froze her out during Peter’s early years.

Graham was already unsettled, but further family tragedy sends her hurtling down to some dark emotional places. In some ways, Hereditary evokes the spirit of The Babadook as Graham’s relationship with her son becomes increasingly poisoned. Yet, there is also plenty of The Conjuring, including some seance business, which always works out so well in horror movies, right?

Hereditary is getting a lot of buzz, because its depiction of family dysfunction is nearly as harrowing as its supernatural horrors. As Annie Graham, Toni Collette gets frantic and feverish beyond on all reason. It is sort of a cross between Isabelle Adjani in Possession and a dramatically less shticky Meryl Streep in Ossage County. In a straight domestic drama, she would be excessively over-the-top, but in a claustrophobic horror film like this, she is just what the mad doctor ordered.

Aster’s narrative takes some shockingly dark and insidious turns, but it all seems believable, thanks to his masterful control of atmosphere. Each time he drops a revelation, it raises the hair on your arms. His horror movie mechanics are spot-on, especially in his use of Graham’s diorama models. Plus, there is an attic to the Graham house that you really wouldn’t want to rummage through.

Gabriel Byrne nicely counterbalances Collette as the painfully reserved Steve Graham. Milly Shapiro (one of four young actresses who originated the role of Roald Dahl’s Matilda on Broadway) gives a remarkably weird performance as Charlie, making the more conventional teen angst of Alex Wolff’s Peter, pale in comparison. Of course, Ann Dowd is rock solid as Joan, Graham’s séance buddy, in scenes reviewers will want to revisit after the fact.

Hereditary is an unusually good-looking horror film, thanks to Pawel Pogorzelski’s eerie cinematography and the richly-detailed, award-worthy work of production designer Grace Yun, art director Richard T. Olson, and the rest of the design team. This is a deeply scary film that fans of James Wan ought to flip over. Highly recommended, Hereditary screens again this afternoon (1/27) in Park City, as part of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: Beirut

There was a time when Lebanon’s capital city was a prime tourist destination, renowned for its night life. Then the PLO moved in and the party came to a screeching halt. Up-and-coming Foreign Service Officer Mason Skiles was stationed there when things first started to go bad. Reluctantly, he agrees to return ten hard years later in Brad Anderson’s Lebanon, which screens during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

In 1972, Skiles’ star was on the rise. Lebanon was getting more violent, but it was not the wasteland ruled by the Hezbollah terrorist group that it is now. Skiles and his wife were in the process of adopting a war orphan named Karim, but unbeknownst to the Yanks, the scruffy thirteen-year-old is actually the younger brother of notorious Munich terrorist Abu Rajal. That is why the Mossad crashes the Skiles’ soiree hoping to grab Karim, but his brother’s faction gets him first.

Flashforward ten years. Skiles is now a boozy labor mediator, who wants nothing to do with the Middle East. However, he gets pulled back in when all-grown-up-terrorist Karim abducts Skiles’ old pal, Cal Riley, the local CIA hand. Karim demands the release of his brother in exchange for Riley and he insists on Skiles as the negotiator. Rather inconveniently, the CIA is not holding Rajal and they are far from sure the Israelis are, either.

Tony Gilroy’s screenplay is very le Carré-esque, in that it posits mixed motives and duplicity on all sides. At least in this case, that includes the PLO, who might be the scummiest of all, which indeed they are. Regardless, there is plenty of enjoyable intrigue and a fair degree of action. Using Morocco and CGI, Anderson also gives us plenty of opportunities to gawk at the wreckage of the city, Holidays in Hell-style.

As Skiles, Jon Hamm makes a perfect boozy anti-hero in the Graham Greene tradition. He has the right look, size, and presence to be a disillusioned policy wonk who can mix it up with terrorists. Frustratingly, Rosamund Pike is largely squandered as Riley’s trustworthy protégé, but Mark Pellegrino exhibits his usual flintiness as the hardnosed Riley.

Beirut is a cynical film, but what can we expect, given the backdrop? If anything, the prognosis for the Hezbollah-dominated nation is even worse now, than during the civil war-torn 1980s. Anderson maintains a healthy pace and juggles the large cast of characters adroitly enough. Recommended for fans of murky international thrillers, Beirut screens again tomorrow (1/27) in Park City, as part of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: Revenge

This country wouldn’t be so violent, if we could just keep out the French. That seems to be the clear take-away from this new vengeance horror-thriller. The director happens to be French too, but she is also a woman—an inescapable fact that gives her a different perspective on the brutality of the New French Extremity movement and the grindhouse tradition of the rape-revenge thriller. Jen, the party girl, is in for a hard time, but she will give back even more than she gets in Coralie Fargeat’s Revenge, which screens during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Jen does not mind that her French lover Richard is married—and neither does he. The important thing is he has money and the right kind of looks to be with her. It is maybe implied that he and his frog hunting buddies work for some sort of merc contractor, but details are kept deliberately vague. Regardless, Richard, Stanley, and Dimitri certainly seem to be comfortable with guns. The latter two were supposed to arrive after Jen had already left the isolated desert vacation home, but Jen is a good sport when they show up early. Unfortunately, Stanley takes her flirtiness as sufficient grounds to rape her during Richard’s absence. When he returns, he is quite disappointed by the state of affairs, but when Jen rebuffs his hush money he decides to kill her instead.

Usually, getting pushed off a cliff and impaled on a jagged tree trunk is enough to kill most people, but not Jen. Despite her hard-partying ways, she instinctively adapts to the hunter-prey cat-and-mouse game. She also discovers the healing power of peyote. Frankly, her epic cauterizing scene has some logical potholes (kids, do not try this at home), but you have to give the film an “A” for effort. However, Revenge really locks in during Jen’s big showdown with Richard, back at the ranch. Let’s just say Fargeat fully capitalizes on the sticky, slippery nature of blood (when it flows and pools).

It is a simple title, but that is what Revenge is all about. Matilda Lutz handles Jen’s transformation from sex kitten to spiritual vengeance warrior as convincingly as anyone could. Kevin Janssens does a similarly credible job with Richard’s evolution from loverboy to stone cold man-hunter. Vincent Colombe basically makes us hate Stanley more and more, taking him from callous attacker to sniveling cowards, but he is certainly effective.

So, where can we build a wall to keep the French out? As this grindhouse subgenre goes, Revenge is about as brutal as it gets, while still preserving the cathartic satisfaction of the payback. Granted, it is a small body of work to judge from, but Revenge still represents a radical departure from Fargeat’s previous work, the relationship-driven science fiction short film, Reality+. Nevertheless, she clearly knows what she is doing. Along with cinematographer Robrecht Heyvaert, she clearly evokes the look and spirit of “classic” exploitation cinema. Even more intense than Cravioto’s Bound to Vengeance (a.k.a. Reversal), Revenge is recommended for hearty viewers who can handle its graphic extremes, when it screens again tonight (1/26) in Park City, as part of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: The Catcher was a Spy

According to Michael Frayn’s play Copenhagen, Werner Heisenberg’s commitment to Germany’s atomic bomb program was an ambiguous uncertainty that bedeviled the great Danish physicist Niels Bohr years after the war ended. An American OSS agent had to make that determination based on a few hours observation and a brief conversation. He was not a physicist, he was a professional baseball player. Nicholas Dawidoff’s bestselling chronicle of Morris “Moe” Berg’s WWII service is now dramatized in Ben Lewin’s The Catcher was a Spy, which screens during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Berg was a member of the Boston Red Sox, but please do not hold that against him. He was a dependable but not spectacular journeyman player, who held roster spots on several teams. He spoke several languages, including German and Italian, and regularly read foreign policy journals. As a result, he had the foresight to film Tokyo harbor during a 1934 exhibition tour, well before Pearl Harbor. Once the war started, Berg’s talents and his 16mm film attracted the attention of “Wild Bill” Donovan and the OSS, the CIA’s predecessor agency.

Eager for field work, Berg gets his chance when Donovan orders him to prevent the retreating Germans from abducting or killing Italian scientist Edoardo Amaldi, with the help of Dutch physicist Samuel Goudsmit and Major Robert Furman, the Manhattan Project’s intelligence chief (who would later oversee construction of the Pentagon). However, their Italian mission will lead to a trickier assignment in Zurich. Berg is to meet with Heisenberg, assess the status of the German Atomic program, determine whether Heisenberg is trying to advance or hinder its progress, and if the former proves true, kill him.

Without question, Berg is one of the great, under-heralded figures of World War II history. Arguably, he is the sort of renaissance man you just do not find anymore. He was also a “confirmed bachelor,” which led to plenty of speculation that Robert Rodat’s screenplay continues to stoke. Be that as it may, the film also nicely captures the intriguing milieu of the Donovan-era OSS.

Paul Rudd is does some of his best work bringing out the personal contradictions of the deeply patriotic and borderline-savant-like Berg. He also develops some ambiguously potent chemistry with Sienna Miller in the otherwise under-written role of Berg’s lover, Estella Huni. Catcher is also packed with colorful and convincing supporting turns, including Paul Giamatti as the humanistic Goudsmit, Mark Strong as the evasive Heisenberg, and the great Tom Wilkinson as Paul Scherrer, the Swiss anti-Nazi physicist, who brokered the meeting between Berg and Heisenberg.

It is just tremendously refreshing to see a film that celebrates American intelligence operatives as heroes. It also thinks quite highly of scientists and soldiers. It is a fascinating true story and a well-crafted period production. Very highly recommended for fans of historical intrigue (like Bridge of Spies), The Catcher was a Spy screens again this morning (1/25) and Saturday (1/27) in Park City and Sunday (1/28) in Salt Lake, as part of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: Science Fair

Most high school students participating in this competition do not have the opportunity to earn a varsity letter, even though their work could save lives and alter the future. That isn’t an exaggeration. The projects brought to the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) are amazing. Not to belabor the obvious, but imagine what these kids could accomplish (for our benefit) if science fair competitions enjoyed roughly comparable support and prestige to what most schools bestow on football and basketball. Regardless, the young scientists and engineers keep plugging away in Cristina Costantini & Darren Foster’s kid-friendly documentary, Science Fair, which screens during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

As is the case for typical high school athletic tournaments, students qualify for ISEF by winning various state and regional science fairs. To do so, they produce real research and original inventions. For instance, Anjali Chadha invented a compact detector for Mercury contamination in bodies of water. Costantini & Foster also closely follow Myllena Braz de Silva and Gabriel de Moura Martins from a hardscrabble rural district in Brazil, who have developed a low cost, scalable method for diagnosing Zika. We’re not public health officials here, but these sound like useful projects to us.

Like football or College Bowl, science fair competitors need coaches. Frustratingly, none of the science faculty at Kashfia Rahman’s gridiron-centric South Dakota high school were particularly keen to coach her, but the football coach was happy to support her (good for him, but frankly, most viewers will want to see those so-called science teachers get called out on camera). On the other end of the spectrum, Long Island’s Dr. Serena McCalla is a hands-on coach and dogged motivator, who has an impressive nine students qualify for ISEF.

The students Costantini & Foster follow run the gamut from popular Zenned-out surfer dude to the driven first-generation sons and daughters of immigrants, but they are all wickedly smart and have genuine screen presence. These are good kids, whom the audience will fully and deeply invest in, on an emotional level. With the help of editors Tom Maroney and Alejandro Valdes-Rochin, Costantini & Foster balance their large cast of character with remarkable dexterity. We get a very good sense of who they are as people and decent thumbnail understanding of what their projects are all about.  They also keep the pacing peppy, while building towards the suspense of the ultimate best-in-show announcement.

Forgive the cliched term, but Science Fair is indeed a “feel-good movie.” Cheers to Sundance for programming it in its kids section, because has the potential to get youngsters fired up about science. If it could even get science teachers at Rahman’s public high school interested in science, then it would really be getting somewhere. Enthusiastically recommended, Science Fair screens again this Saturday (1/27) in Park City, as part of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: White Fang

Jack London’s bestselling animal adventure novel has been adapted as Japanese anime, a 1970s Italian franchise starring Franco Nero, a Disney live-action movie, a 1926 Hollywood silent featuring Strongheart the Dog, and a 1946 Soviet version Red Jack probably would have liked best. Clearly, the story’s popularity has never flagged, but the most visually accomplished take now happens to be a Francophone production (subsequently dubbed into English). The Yukon Territory is still a savage environment for London’s titular wolf-dog, but he will adapt and survive in Academy Award-winning animator Alexandre Espigares’ White Fang, which screens during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

White Fang grew up under the watchful eye of his mother Kiche, a former sled dog gone wild. The winter has already been hard on the dogs, when an encounter with a lynx leaves Kiche badly injured. Nevertheless, White Fang will nurse her back to sufficient health for her to seek out and rejoin the pack dogs driven by Native trapper Grey Beaver. Although the other dogs resent White Fang’s strength and spirit, he will eventually claim his place as top dog. Unfortunately, he will also attract the unwanted attention of Beauty Smith, a nefarious dog-fighter intent on swindling him away from Grey Beaver.

Smith’s brutal training will mold White Fang into a ferocious fighter, but as we see in the in media res opening, the wolf-dog never develops a taste for fighting. Eventually, he will cross paths again with Weedon Scott, an honest lawman, with whom he had a brief encounter years ago, while he was still just a pup.

In a way, White Fang was like the Dog’s Purpose of 1906, following the wolf-dog as he changes hands and passes through metaphorical lives, except it features animal savagery in place of New Age spirituality. Espigares’ animated feature debut (he won the Oscar for his short, Mr. Hublot) is a manageable ninety minutes, but it feels pretty epic and remains relatively faithful to the source novel. However, the trio of screenwriters, Serge Frydman, Philippe Lioret, and Monique Monfrey water-down the abuse Grey Beaver metes out in the novel. While that might sound like a politically correct decision, it is wise to give younger viewers a respite from London’s harshness.

Espigares’ animation is indeed superb, merging a lush, painterly style with motion-capture technology. His wolves and dogs look scrupulously realistic, but exhibit distinctive personalities. The vibrant landscapes and vistas also evoke N.C. Wyeth’s great James Fenimore Cooper illustrations.

For the English dub, the voice of Paul Giamatti is perfectly cast as the scheming Smith. Nick Offerman and Rashida Jones are fine as Weedon and Maggie Scott, but probably the most distinctive vocal turn comes from Eddie Spears as Grey Beaver.

Espigares and his team have produced a White Fang that is lovely to look at, but is still quite tough minded. They have simplified London’s narrative to a minor extent (sorry One-Eye, maybe next film), but they definitely retained its essence. Enthusiastically recommended for adults and older kids, White Fang screens again this Saturday (1/27) in Park City, as part of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: Summer of ’84

If the Losers’ Club can take on an all-powerful demonic clown like Pennywise and Charley Brewster can face off against a vampire next-door, four nebbish but scrappy eighties kids ought to be able to handle their neighborhood serial killer. However, there is one slight complicating factor. It is not absolutely certain Wayne Mackey is the killer stalking Cape May, but there is no doubt he is a local copper. Of course, Davey Armstrong is not about to be dissuaded by awkward facts like that, but his friends will need constant convincing in François Simard, Anouk Whissell & Yoann-Karl Whissell’s Summer of ‘84, which screens during this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

It is 1984. The Reagan-Bush ticket is cruising to re-election, college grads actually expected to land jobs, and fifteen-year-olds like Armstrong and his buddies were not nearly as jaded by the media and pop culture as they think they are. Armstrong, Tommy “Eats” Eaton, Dale “Woody” Woodworth, and Curtis Farraday are all preoccupied with girls, but Armstrong also has an abiding interest in lurid conspiracy theories. While most Cape May residents are alarmed by news of the serial killer, he is thrilled by it.

As luck would have it, Armstrong, the paperboy, happens to spy some rather suspicious but circumstantial details around Officer Mackey house while collecting for the month. Aided by his own imagination and his friends’ boredom, he manages to convince the gang to launch an ambitious surveillance operation. The stakes will raise dramatically when the boys inevitably blow their cover. However, Armstrong’s attention will also be somewhat divided when Nikki Kazsuba, the somewhat older literal and proverbial girl-next-door starts paying (essentially platonic) nocturnal visits.

Obviously, Summer of ’84 hopes to ride the 1980s horror nostalgia wave, launched by Stranger Things and It. Be that as it may, Summer happens to be smartly written and skillfully executed. It hits all the right notes, but it is also willing to go to some surprisingly dark places. In terms of tone and aesthetic, Summer is a dramatic departure from the directorial trio’s prior film, Turbo Kid, but it is clear from both works, the tandem knows and appreciates their 1980s genre films.

The four young co-conspirators all look age and era appropriate, but Judah Lewis really stands out as the spectacularly foul-mouthed Eaton. Yet, Tiera Skovbye scores some of the biggest laughs as the sly but sensitive Kazsuba. However, it is Rich Sommer who really makes the film work by maintaining audience uncertainty with a performance of perfectly calibrated ambiguity.

Summer of ’84 is a great deal of fun, because it convincingly evokes the eighties era and suburban milieu. It also proves Simard, Whissell, and Whissell have considerably more range than we might have thought. Easily the most enjoyable selection of the midnight section, Summer of ’84 screens again tomorrow night (1/25) and Saturday (1/27) in Park City, as well as tonight (1/24) in Salt Lake, as part of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: Lizzie

Lizzie Borden was the late Nineteenth Century equivalent of the Menendez Brothers. You might remember how she “took an axe.” At least she had her reasons, according to Craig William Macneill’s somewhat speculative Lizzie, which screens during the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

You know the Borden household must be dysfunctional when they insist their new live-in maid, Bridget Sullivan, must be henceforth known as “Maggie,” just like her predecessor. Only Lizzie, the younger Borden sister, shows her the respect of calling her Bridget (actually, the internet says it was the exact opposite, but whatever). Quickly, a friendship blossoms between the socially dissimilar women that slowly evolves into a forbidden love.

Borden resents her father Andrew Borden’s strict rules and suspects he has allowed their wastrel uncle to squander her inheritance through his dodgy schemes. Of course, her father and step-mother Abby find mere friendship between the two young women highly problematic. When they discover the true nature of the relationship, the Borden’s continued domestic life becomes untenable. She will take proactive steps, but it all might be too much for the overwhelmed Sullivan to handle.

Macneill’s previous film The Boy was quite a sinister slow-burner, but the slow-burn of Lizzie is even slower. It truly stacks the deck against Old Man Andrew Borden so thoroughly, it is hard to understand how a just God could allow him to live so long. Of course, it is clear Macneill and screenwriter Bryce Kass set out to court favor with social justice mafia by giving Borden the most feminist, straight male-demonizing spin possible. Perhaps that is all well and good up to a point, but the conspicuous manipulativeness gets exhausting over time.

Still, there is no question Kristen Stewart and Chloë Sevigny do fine work as Sullivan and Ms. Lizzie, respectively. The development of their relationship always feels convincingly organic. Frankly, as Andrew Borden, Jamey Sheridan might as well be reprising the demonic role of Randall Flagg in the 1994 miniseries adaptation of Stephen King’s The Stand, except that was a much subtler performance. Alas, Kim Dickens and Fiona Shaw are stuck with entirely disposable parts: older sis Emma and stepmom Abby.

Regardless, we give ample credit to the design team that made modern day Savannah credibly pass for turn-of-the-previous-century New England. This is not a bad film, but it will disappoint genre fans who were blown away by the insidious subversive flavor of The Boy. Recommended primarily for Stewart fans and Lizzie Borden obsessives, Lizzie screens again this Thursday (1/25) and Friday (1/26) in Park City, as part of this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: Search

The internet most likely contributed to Margot Kim’s disappearance, but maybe it can also help find her. Technology is probably neutral at best in this case, but the film in question still won the Alfred P. Sloan Prize, bestowed on films addressing science and technology, at this year’s Sundance. It is every parents’ nightmare, but Margot’s father David will find plenty of clues on her laptop in Aneesh Chaganty’s Search, which screens during the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

The last time David Kim talked to his daughter before she went missing, he scolded her over a face-time chat. The Kims are very connected and online, so we can follow their story via various computer and iPhone screens. Tragically, the Kims are still reeling from the untimely death of their wife and mother Pamela Nam Kim. Now, it is just the two of them, unless you also count stoner Uncle Peter.

Alas, Kim was not awake when his daughter tried to call him late the night of her disappearance, but circumstances initially conspire to offer false explanations for her absence. Unfortunately, after a few days, Kim is forced to file a missing person report. The detective assigned to the case is one of the stars of the department, but the trail is cold. Working with her, Kim will scour his daughter’s social media accounts for leads. Eventually, he takes deep dives into her online browser history, which will indeed produce clues. However, it also leads to the unsettling realization he did not know his daughter as well as he thought.

This story told on computer screens already has ample precedent, including “The Sick Thing that Happened to Emily When She was Younger,” Joe Swanberg’s segment in the original V/H/S film and Matthew Solomon’s Chatter. However, Chaganty refines the technique in a way that develops character much more than its predecessors. After the first act, the audience will be deeply invested in all three Kims, including the late mother.

Despite his Star Trek fame, John Cho still has the appropriate everyman quality necessary to carry off a role like David Kim. He covers a wide emotional range and develops some genuine paternal chemistry with Michelle La’s Margot. La gives a remarkably poignant and vulnerable performance that also greatly helps Chaganty manage the revelation of Margot’s secrets. Sara Sohn is simply devastating as Pamela Kim and Joseph Lee perfectly calibrates the surprisingly complicated Peter Lee. That makes sitcom star Debra Messing the weak link as the problematically pedestrian Det. Vick. Still, the rest of the ensemble more than compensates.

You could say Search is built around a gimmick, but the execution is tight and tense, so viewers will get caught up in it anyway. Editors Nick Johnson and Will Merrick deserve special credit for cutting all the disparate clips and screens together so smoothly. Search happens to be one of several films currently playing Sundance that inspire caution and paranoia with respect to social media. However, Chaganty and co-screenwriter Sev Ohanian present a fuller, more nuanced vision of online technology and its proper functions in society. Highly recommended, Search screens again this morning (1/23), Thursday (1/25), and Friday (1/26) in Park City, as well as Saturday (1/27) in Salt Lake, as part of this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Sundance ’18: The Death of Stalin

Maria Yudina was such a brilliant classical pianist, she survived the Great Terror, even though she made no secret of her Orthodox faith and her contempt for Stalin’s brutal regime. According to a story mostly considered apocryphal, she was dragged back for a repeat concert performance (with full orchestra) after Stalin requested [demanded] a recording of her live radio broadcast of Mozart’s Concerto No. 23. That true-in-spirit historical legend inadvertently ignites a political crisis in Armando Iannucci’s The Death of Stalin (trailer here), which screens during the 2018 Sundance Film Festival in Park City.

The poor, harried director of Moscow Radio does indeed call back Yudina and the orchestra to accommodate Stalin’s whims. She is not inclined to be so agreeable, but her participation is quickly purchased. It is also an opportunity for her to slip a personal note of pointed condemnation to Stalin, who is so surprised to be criticized in such terms, he has a massive coronary and dies.

Of course, this ignites a power struggle within the Central Committee. Technically, the pompous Georgy Malenkov is next in line as the Deputy General Secretary, but the real contenders are Lavrentiy Beria, the sadistic chief of the NKVD and Nikita Khrushchev, the closest thing to a reformer in Stalin’s inner circle. Thanks to his de facto control over Kremlin administration, Beria gets a jump on Khrushchev, hypocritically positioning himself as reluctant participant in the purges and a would-be liberalizer. However, Khrushchev will win over key allies, such as Field Marshal Georgy Zhukov and the dithering senior statesman, Vyacheslav Molotov.

Adapted from Fabien Nury and Thierry Robin’s French graphic novel, Death of Stalin is a wickedly funny, pointedly scathing satire of corrupt power run amok. Frankly, the succession battle waged by Khrushchev and Beria ranks up there with the rivalry between Simon Yam and Tony Leung Ka-fei in Johnnie To’s Election, but Iannucci’s film has a higher body-count—by a factor of at least one hundred. Despite the mordant wit and subversive slapstick humor, Iannucci and his platoon of co-screenwriters make it chillingly clear what happened to inconvenient witnesses and ninety percent of the victims Beria swept up during the Stalinist Terror. It is hard to believe one can laugh so much during a film openly discussing torture and mass executions, but such is the case.

It is also hard to believe that A: we can find ourselves openly rooting for Nikita Khrushchev and B: pencil-thin Steve Buscemi would be the perfect actor to portray him, but both also prove to be true. In fact, Buscemi gives a tour-de-force, possibly career best performance as Khrushchev, with the help of a little stomach padding. Arguably, Iannucci’s conception of Khrushchev as shrewd opportunist and a fount of nervous energy rather puts him in Buscemi’s wheelhouse.

Buscemi is perfectly counterbalanced by Simon Russell Beale’s wonderfully sly and flamboyantly sinister portrayal of Beria, which rather helps align viewer sympathies with Team Khrushchev. Jeffrey Tambor basically does his regular shtick as Malenkov, assuming he won’t be replaced by Christopher Plummer for the film’s American theatrical release. However, it is a real stitch to watch Jason Isaacs ham it up as Zhukov. Yet, maybe the best surprise in DOS, is a late-career comedic gem from Michael Palin as the astonishingly indecisive Molotov. Plus, Olga Kurylenko adds some class and poise as Yudina, while Andrea Riseborough gives it greater human dimension with her vulnerable and conflicted turn as Stalin’s future-defector daughter, Svetlana Stalina.

Satirizing a period of such widespread fear and suffering is a tricky business, but Iannucci and company pull it off with flying colors. DOS manages to be absolutely hilarious and totally chilling, simultaneously. It is a terrific film, but don’t take my word for it. The Putin regime is considering banning it, so you know it must be good. Very highly recommended, The Death of Stalin screens again on Saturday (1/27) in Park City, as part of this year’s Sundance.

Sundance ’18: Un Traductor

Malin is a professor of Russian literature living under the Castro regime, so he ought to be well prepared to deal with tragedy. However, his specialty was quite in favor with his dictator (at least until the whole Glasnost business started), so he enjoyed perks under the corrupt system. Unfortunately, the bill will come due just before the plug is pulled on Russian aid. Assigned to translate for young victims of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster transported to Cuba, Malin will become overwhelmed by the enormity of their suffering, to the exclusion of nearly everyone else around him in Rodrigo & Sebastián Barriuso’s Un Traductor (a Translator), which screens during the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.

Malin is closely based on the Barriuso Brothers’ father Manuel Barriuso Andino and his contemporary art gallerist wife Isona is also modeled on their mother, Magda González-Mora. As the film opens, Malin and Isona do not let trifles like human rights and free expression trouble them, because they live well. It therefore comes as a rude shock when the Russian lit department is summarily closed and the faculty are assigned to serve as translators for the newly arrived Chernobyl patients. Malin really draws the short straw: night shifts in the children’s ward. He threatens to quit, but when told to “take it up with Fidel” he duly straightens up and toes the line.

Soon, Malin is leading a regular story-time. Not long after that, he starts to get deeply emotionally involved with the kids and their parents, especially young Alexi in the isolation ward and his school teacher father Vladimir. Meanwhile, with the cutting of Soviet aid, Cuban stores are now empty and Malin no longer receives gasoline vouchers—not that there is any gas left in filling stations anyway. The poor nutrition starts taking a toll on his son Javi’s health, but Malin hardly notices. He and the uber-pregnant Isona do not talk anymore, because he is so physically and emotionally exhausted.

Aside from Michael Moore, most grown adults now acknowledge the hype surrounding the Cuban medical system was really just hype. Still, it apparently beat the facilities available in both the USSR and Putin’s Russia, considering the Cuban Chernobyl program continued up through 2011. At times, the Barriusos clearly show a nostalgia for the Cuba Rodrigo never really knew. Yet, it is hard to gin up nostalgia for any of the circumstances surrounding the Chernobyl disaster.

Indeed, Un Traductor is not shy when it comes to playing on our emotions. There are an awful lot of sickly children in this film. Yet, the clear standout is Genadijs Dolganovs, who brings real dignity to the proceedings as Vladimir. His big climatic scene with Malin earns the inevitable lumps in the audience’s throats. Maricel Álvarez is also quite compelling as Gladys, the treasonous Argentine RN, who first busts Malin’s chops and then comes to respect his commitment. However, Brazilian international crossover star Rodrigo Santoro is problematically quite the cold fish as Malin and Yoandra Suárez’s Isona comes perilously close to a cliched scold.

In an enormously telling scene, Malin watches news footage of the fall of the Berlin Wall, described as a “monument to socialist workers” or some such nonsense on the Cuban state news report, with conspicuous alarm. The fact that this was a triumph for human freedom and dignity is completely lost on him, and most likely the film. The truth is East Germans, Czech, Poles, and Hungarians do not look back on subsidizing Castro’s police state with much more fondness than the midnight knocks on the door and the invading tank columns. Frankly, the degree to which their economy depended on Soviet largess proves how dysfunctional the Socialist system was and remains. Decidedly mixed, Un Traductor should not be a high priority during the limited time of the festival, but for those with an abiding interest in the Chernobyl experience, it screens again tomorrow (1/22) in Provo and Friday (1/26) and Saturday (1/27) in Park City, as part of this year’s Sundance.