Accident: Things Happen for a Reason

Ho Kwok-fai is not living in a random universe.  Accidents happen for a reason: money.  He would know.  He is the mastermind behind a team of “accident choreographers.”  Unfortunately, they have apparently attracted the wrong sort of attention from a competitor in Accident (trailer here), Soi Cheang’s moody thriller produced by HK action legend Johnnie To, which releases today on DVD and Blu-ray from Shout Factory.

Though not quite as Rube Goldbergian, Ho’s team are like a Final Destination movie unto themselves.  Just ask the Triad boss in the opening sequence, while you can.  “The Brain” runs the show with tick-tock precision, but a dark cloud seems to hang over their latest gig.  “Uncle” starts to show signs of dementia and the necessary rain will not come.  Then the wheels come totally off.

Going underground, Ho starts surveilling an insurance executive he suspects played a part in the disastrous non-accident.  Already haunted by his wife’s fatal auto crash, his psyche will sink to some pretty low places.  Rather than a standard hitman-on-the-run film, Accident treads a more existential path, in the tradition of Coppola’s The Conversation (granted, it is not exactly in the same league).

In the years since To’s Election epic most of what American audiences have seen of Louis Koo were romantic or comedic features, like Mr. and Mrs. Incredible, Magicto Win, and All’s Well Ends Well 2012, 2011, 2010, and 2009.  Nonetheless, he shows plenty of screen grit in Accident, brooding like mad, yet getting stone cold medieval when necessary.  As a bonus, Lam Suet, To’s regular comic relief specialist, brings his usual energy, but plays Ho’s stout but not shticky henchman “Fatty” with considerable restraint.

Viewers who have seen a lot of Hollywood-produced thrillers will probably be downright shocked by Accident, precisely because of their preconditioning.  Indeed, Cheang is willing to take it in a direction studio filmmakers never would, which is cool.  Of course, knowing it is produced by To and his Milkyway Image team is something of a seal of approval in and of itself.  Enthusiastically recommended for fans of noir thrillers and HK cinema, Accident is now available on DVD at online and quality brick-and-mortar retailers everywhere.

Demy’s Americano

Considering Martin, the deeply depressed Frenchman, holds dual American citizenship, one would expect him to be a shrewder traveler.  Instead, he blunders through Tijuana asking for trouble.  He finds plenty in Mathieu Demy’s Americano (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Martin has issues with his estranged mother that now may never be resolved.  She has recently died after years in Los Angeles without contact.  Reluctantly, Martin flies out to dispose of the flat holds only unpleasant childhood memories for him.  However, family friend Linda paints a far rosier portrait of his childhood years.  Intrigued by references to his mother’s life-long confidante Lola, Martin heads south of the border in Linda’s Mustang convertible to track her down.

It turns out Lola is a stripper about his age, working as the featured act at the extra divey Americano club—a fine place for the French tourist to have his midlife crisis.  Martin wants insight into who his mother really was, but Lola does not want to talk.  She just wants his money.  Over and over again, characters have the opportunity to save themselves and others so much grief if they would just act reasonably.  Yet, each time they pass it up, which becomes dashed distracting.  Leave a vintage car parked on the Tijuana streets with your passport and cash in the trunk?  Sure, why not?

As the son of Jacques Demy and Agnès Varda, any film from director-screenwriter-lead actor Mathieu Demy will come loaded with expectations.  Clearly, the name Lola is no coincidence.  However, the younger Demy raises the stakes, incorporating entire scenes from his mother’s Documenteur, in which he appeared as a child actor, while also lifting George Delerue’s melancholy soundtrack themes.  While it positions Americano as a pseudo-sequel, it also highlights the contrast between it and the work of his parents.  At times, viewers can maybe possibly see some of humanistic solidarity of Varda’s The Gleaners and I in his depiction of the down-trodden Tijuana working poor, but that’s pushing it.

It must be like old Dusk Till Dawn times for Academy Award nominated Salma Hayek, once again playing a bordertown stripper.  At least her Lola is only a metaphorical vampire.  In truth, she ultimately plays the character with admirable sensitivity, yet that makes her early set-up scenes somewhat problematic in retrospect.  As Martin, Mathieu Demy is a bland screen presence leaving little lasting impression.

Despite its seedy setting, Americano is not aiming for cheap titillation.  Nonetheless, the sluggish pace makes the characters’ dubious decision-making all the more conspicuous.  Given its lineage, there will definitely be a constituency for this film hoping it will be better than it is.  Fatally underwhelming, it opens this Friday (6/15) in New York at the Landmark Sunshine.

Marina Abramovic: the Performance Artist is Present

An innovator in her field, Marina Abramović made the seemingly ephemeral performance art collectible.  The limited edition photographic prints of her performances would play a role in her 2010 trailblazing career retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art.  While it also featured re-stagings of her famous work by a troupe of young collaborators, the cornerstone of the exhibit was a brand new Abramović performance conceived specifically for the show.  Deceptively simple, it would prove one her most physically and emotionally grueling undertakings.  Matthew Akers follows her preparations and 736 hours of on-site performance in the HBO documentary Marina Abramović: the Artist is Present (trailer here), which opens theatrically this Wednesday in New York at Film Forum.

The concept is pretty simple.  There are two chairs.  Abramović sits in one and the public queues up to sit in the other.  For a while there was a table between them, but Abramović removed during the performance.  There is no talking, just eye contact.  However, many participants find great significance in their real or perceived unspoken communication. 

From March 14^th to May 31^st, as long as the museum was open to the public, Abramović was in her chair.  Though her prior work is rather notorious for its extreme transgressiveness (often featuring nudity and self-inflicted physical pain), the need to be constantly “on” throughout The Artist is Present pushed her to her limits.  After all, these are New Yorkers she was facing, at least for the most part.  Any questionable character could walk in, including even James Franco, who shockingly comes across like a shallow, self-absorbed twit during his brief sit with Abramović.

If nothing else, Present the documentary will give viewers a deep appreciate for the professionalism of the MoMA’s security personnel.  They are quite impressive sweeping down on the inevitable freaks crossing the line.  However, the film makes a crucial miscalculation, assuming Abramović’s performances are so self-evidently “art,” they require no case to be made on their behalf.  Yet, the film could rather use such a manifesto moment.  It is clear Abramović’s performance becomes a cultural phenomenon, but that does not necessarily make it art.

Indeed, more cultural-historical context would help aesthetically conservative viewers come to terms with Abramović and her performances.  The daughter of an overbearing military martinet of a mother, recognized as a hero of Communist Yugoslavia, Abramović herself acknowledges the influence of her excessively disciplined early years on her outré art.  However, the subversive use of Communist and Russian imagery in her early performances is never explored in depth.  Neither does Akers ever push for her perspective on the early 1990’s Bosnian War as an expatriate Serbian, even though it is an issue that will surely cross the mind of most viewers.

An accomplished cinematographer, director-dp Akers films Abramović with sensitivity bordering on reverence.  Frankly, he might have become too close to his subject.  While the overwrought emotional responses of many sitters may have seemed appropriate to those sharing the moment, it looks more than a little bizarre on screen.  The resulting film is often fascinating, but it rather feels like reality television for the elite of the gallery world.  Recommended for partisans of the avant-garde, Marina Abramović: the Artist is Present opens this Wednesday (6/13) at Film Forum, ahead of its HBO broadcast on July 2nd.

Private Eye: Wearing Hats and Solving Crimes in 1910 Korea

In 1910, the Korean Empire was a far cry from Burke and Hare’s 1820’s Edinburgh.  Nonetheless, when a medical student finds a corpse in the woods, he cannot resist the rare opportunity to dissect a human cadaver.  When his specimen turns out to be the well-heeled victim of a serial killer, Jang Kwang-soo turns to a professional to guide him out of the mess.  At least that is the idea in Park Dae-min’s Private Eye (trailer here), now available on DVD from Pathfinder Home Entertainment.

Justice is no longer Hong Jin-ho’s business.  The ex-cop turned gumshoe now specializes in divorce cases.  He wants nothing to do with Jang’s case, but the prospective reward for information on the magistrate’s missing (and in fact dead) son along with his former colleagues’ incompetent handling of the case hook him in, despite his better judgment. 

When the body of a sleazy commissioner also turns up in the same manner as Jang’s cadaver, detective and client quickly realize they are onto something much larger.  Not exactly CSI specialists, the Seoul police are more concerned about cleaning up the crime scenes, lest they offend the victims’ powerful relatives.  This gives Hong an advantage, thanks to his secret ally, Park Soon-deok, a noble born lady scientist, who frustrated by the era’s gender norms finds an outlet by serving as both Hong’s Quincy and Q.  Yes, they share some ambiguous history, but that is the least of Eye’s concerns.

Given the conspicuous corruption of the authorities, it is not hard to figure who, in general, the bad guys are.  Still, Park and two credited co-writers keep many of the details of the lurid plot relatively murky, while throwing viewers a few twists worthy of the Victorian mysteries obviously inspiring the film.  However, sensitive viewers should be aware the conspiracy involves some disturbing death-of-innocence crimes.  (Just once, it would be nice to see the villainous pervs targeting middle-aged genre filmmakers.)

Appropriately roguish, but far from invulnerable, Hwang Jung-min makes an engaging hardboiled hero bordering on anti-hero.  Though he is occasionally a just a tad shticky, for the most part Ryu Deok-hwan’s Jang is a restrained, wide-eyed sidekick.  Unfortunately, Um Ji-won is not allotted nearly enough screen time as Lady Park, because she brings an intelligent and charismatic presence to easily the film’s most intriguing character—partly an early feminist role model and partly a virtuous Irene Adler figure.

While the Sherlock Holmes comparisons have been a little overdone (Hong has a straw hat to Holmes’ deerstalker, get it?), Eye ends on a rather clever Scandal in Bohemia homage that could easily function as a jumping off point for the sequel.  Despite the often dark themes, the fast-paced Private Eye is a rather entertaining period noir.  Recommended for fans of Korean cinema and the hardboiled crime movies, it is now available on DVD from Pathfinder Home Entertainment.

BFF ’12: Old Dog

In news of yet more outrageous but hardly surprising interference in Tibetan affairs, China has just announced an open-ended ban on foreign tourism to the occupied country.  However, friends and admirers of the Himalayan nation can still get a glimpse into the on-the-ground realities there through Pema Tseden’s narrative feature Old Dog (trailer here), which screens tonight at the Brooklyn Heights Cinema, as part of the 2012 BrooklynFilm Festival.

Not content with Tibet’s sovereignty, China also covets its dogs.  For the Chinese nouveau riche, nomad mastiffs are the newest status symbol.  It is a seller’s market, assuming unscrupulous dog merchants do not steal the traditional family canines first.  Dog-nappings are so pervasive, Gonpo figures he might as well sell his father-in-law Akku’s beloved pet and at least get some money for him.  Akku does not see it that way, enlisting the help of his a local copper kinsman to retrieve the shaggy pooch.  Unfortunately, the dog brokers are not about to forget about so prized a pooch.

If Jia Zhangke remade Old Yeller, it might look something like Old Dog.  Helmed by Tibetan auteur Pema Tseden (a.k.a. Wanma Caidan when he is in China), it is a slight departure for distributor dGenerate Films, the independent Chinese cinema specialists.  However, Tseden’s naturalistic documentary-like approach is quite in line with the Digital Generation style for which they are named.  He and cinematographer Sonthar Gyal capture the sweeping grandeur of the landscape, as well as the hardscrabble nature of life for Tibetans, both in cities and in the countryside.  It is also clear the last fifty-three years have been devastating for contemporary Tibetan architecture.

Amongst a cast clearly at home on the Tibetan Steppe, Lochey gives a remarkably assured performance as Akku.  Deeply human and humane, his character bears witness to the steady corrosion of traditional Tibetan values, but he does not necessarily do so silently.  Drolma Kyab’s performance as the hash-up son-in-law Gonpo is also quite honest and engaging.  Indeed, the small ensemble is so completely unaffected and natural on-screen, Old Dog could easily pass for a documentary.  Yet, it has a very real dramatic arc.

Already the focus of a career retrospective at the Asia Society (amounting to two films at the time), Tseden is a filmmaker of international stature.  Taking some subtly implied but recognizable jabs at Chinese hegemony over Tibet, Old Dog is his boldest film yet.  Cineastes will earnestly hope there will be more to follow.  Quietly powerful, Old Dog is highly recommended during this year’s BFF.  It screens tonight (6/8) at the Brooklyn Heights Cinema, with Tseden appearing for Q&A afterward, as well as this Saturday (6/9) at IndieScreen in Williamsburg.

In Bed with Ulysses: What Better Way to Spend Bloomsday?

In addition to its now universally acknowledged literary significance, the efforts to publish James Joyce’s Ulysses in the face of widespread censorship was the major publishing story of its day.  Actually, the novel’s publishing history is still unfolding.  Many scholars recently rejoiced when it along with most of Joyce’s early works went into the public domain, liberating them from what they considered an unreasonable and erratic estate executor.  It should make this year’s Bloomsday celebration quite lively.  Joyceans in Brooklyn will also be able to mark June 16^th, that fateful day spent with protagonist Leopold Bloom, by attending the premiere theatrical engagement of Alan Adelson & Kate Taverna’s In Bed with Ulysses, which opens this Monday at the Brooklyn Heights Cinema, irrespective of Stephen Joyce's controversial stewardship.

Throughout Bed, Adelson and Taverna celebrate Joyce’s language, but not necessarily his personality.  Indeed, many leading Joyce scholars make no bones about the author’s self-centered neuroses.  They certainly do not make him sound like a particularly pleasant husband, plundering his relationship with wife Nora for his autobiographical novels, while bizarrely prodding her to justify his extreme jealousies.  Still, it provides good fodder for documentaries.

Fortunately, his work is something else entirely.  In staged readings of Ulysses, performed by established legit actors, including Kathleen Chalfant (known for the original New York production of Wit) reading in the Molly Bloom persona, the film luxuriates in the rhythms and ribald tartness of Joyce’s language.  While we do not hear anything to make the typical Brooklyner blush, there might be just enough to make a PBS broadcast, as is, a tad tricky.

All of the performers have a good feel for Joyce’s words and the archival images of 1904 Dublin that often accompany their readings give viewers a vivid sense of where the novel came from.  Adelson and Taverna also incorporate a fair amount of focused and on-point expert interviews, the most notable being novelist and Joyce biographer Edna O’Brien, an impressive literary figure in her own right.  Of course to nobody’s surprise, grandson-executor Stephen Joyce never makes an appearance.

In Bed with Ulysses is an easily digestible combination of Joyce biography and Ulysses crib notes, with fair servings of Irish history and theater arts mixed in.  Obviously, Irish cultural institutions should be very interested in the film, but its exploration of Bloom’s Jewish heritage and the extent to which Limerick’s 1904 anti-Jewish riots and boycotts informed the novel should expand the demographic audience considerably.  Yet, the Joyceans who continue to be intrigued by the literary icon’s revolutionary novels are the real target market. 

Informative but never too heavy, In Bed with Ulysses is readily recommended for those who appreciate literary biography or looking for a way to ease into the somewhat intimidating novel.  It is also a chance for borough loyalists to support Brooklyn filmmakers at the Brooklyn Heights Cinema, before the scrappy art-house goes into temp space while their current location is redeveloped.  It runs there for at least one week, beginning this coming Monday (6/11), which indeed includes Bloomsday next Saturday (6/16).

BFF ’12: Labyrinth

Turkey is still the modern, secular republic founded by Ataturk, but there are those who would like to turn back the clock.  Nobody understands that better than the agents of Turkey’s counter-terrorist agency.  They will risk their lives to thwart a violent group of Islamist fanatics in Tolga Örnek’s Labyrinth (trailer here), which screens during the 2012 Brooklyn Film Festival.

A horrific homicidal suicide bombing has murdered 95 innocent souls, including thirty Americans and five Brits.  Unfortunately, the shadowy mastermind (who never delivers the bombs himself, mind you) is working on a more ambitious attack.  For Fikret, the moody Turkish Jack Bauer, it is not just an assignment, it is personal.  He is out to avenge the partner kidnapped and presumably murdered by the newly resurfaced terrorist ringleader.

Fikret has one ace card in his hand.  He has been running a confidential informative more-or-less off the books, whose brother has fallen in with the elusive terror cell.  He only trusts Rasim’s identity with his loyal colleague (and prospective romantic interest), Reyhan.  A valuable source, Rasim is coveted by British intelligence, who offer information on Fikret’s missing partner in return for the mystery source.  The proposition is not appreciated.

Frankly, the tension between the Turkish and British security services never escalates beyond trash talking.  In point of fact, Labyrinth is a refreshing corrective to the notoriously anti-American and anti-Semitic Valley of the Wolves: Iraq, the Turkish Islamist agit-prop film co-starring Gary Busey and Billy Zane.  Here, it is the Islamists who are explicitly identified as the terrorists, freely murdering their own more moderate co-religionists for the sake of their extreme agenda.  Of course, their preferred target is Turkey’s Jewish community.  They even use inconvenient terms such as “the caliphate” in the pre-bombing videotapes.  The American military only appears in passing, productively collaborating with their Turkish counterparts on a mission in Northern Iraq.

While there are some moments of inspired movie violence, Labyrinth is more cerebral than action-oriented.  As Fikret, Timuçin Esen power broods like nobody’s business, while also developing some nice chemistry Meltem Cumbul’s smart and mature Reyhan.  They make it clear they care about each other in ambiguous ways, without ripping their clothes off.  As for their quarry, the effective supporting ensemble is flat-out chilling when portraying the face of Islamist terror.

We could be proud of Hollywood if it finally tackled terrorism with a film like Labyrinth.  That it was produced in Turkey is downright shocking, in a good way. Engrossing and tragically realistic, Labyrinth is a standout selection of this year’s BFF.  Highly recommended, it screens again this Sunday (6/10) at IndieScreen in Williamsburg.

Hannah’s Law: She Brings ‘em in Alive, Mostly

As a principled lawman, Wyatt Earp respects a bounty hunter like Hannah Beaumont, who always brings her fugitives in alive, rather than dead.  A scoundrel like Doc Holliday can also appreciate Beaumont, because she’s a woman.  Before the O.K. Corral, they will all meet up in Dodge for some frontier justice in Hannah’s Law (promo here), a Hallmark Movie Channel original feature, premiering this Saturday.

As a girl, Beaumont witnessed Frank McMurphy’s gang kill her family in cold blood, unbeknownst to them.  She became a bounty hunter to track down every last man.  Refusing to become a murderer as well, she forces them to face justice.  At least that had been the plan.  It seems McMurphy has gotten wind of her.  Rounding up a new gang of cutthroats, McMurphy is headed to Dodge and Hell is riding with them.

The “Earp & Holliday: the early years” concept is reasonably fresh and showing it from a woman’s perspective is a nice Hallmark-friendly twist.  However, Law is not particularly ambitious by western genre standards, essentially knocking down the revenge dominos as soon as it sets them up.  Beaumont could also use a few humanizing flaws, besides hooking up with a certain consumptive dentist.  Not only does she refrain from killing, Beaumont always donates her bounties to the local orphanage.  Indeed, she is quite modern in her thinking for the 1870’s.  Two of her nearest and dearest friends are African American: her mentor, Isom Dart, and her BFF, Stagecoach Annie.  She even marks off all the voluntary donations on her income tax—at least she probably would have, if there had been one at the time.

Sara (Vampire Diaries) Canning is perfectly presentable as Beaumont, but she never really conveys much righteous intensity.  While darker days are in store for his character, Greyston Holt brings a likability and sense of integrity to Earp that works well enough for television.  Danny Glover also plays off his “too old for this . . .” persona quite effectively as Dart.  However, Kimberly Elise’s Stagecoach Annie (conveniently, her job is part of her name) is annoyingly codependent on Beaumont.   In contrast, Ryan Kennedy seems to be having great fun as Holliday, which is exactly how the part is traditionally played.

While not redefining the genre, Law screenwriter-co-executive producer John Fasano has the good sense to end it with a shootout.  Frankly, this is a convention that never gets old and director Rachel Talay stages it rather well.  While she has an extensive television resume, Talay’s early directorial credits include Tank Girl and Freddy’s Dead: the Final Nightmare, two features you are not likely to be thinking of while watching Law.

Hannah’s Law is a serviceable western overall, with a few notable dramatic moments from the supporting cast and some decent action sequences.  Still, it is kind of nice to see an original western on television and the Hallmark Movie Channel deserves some credit for programming them semi-regularly, even before the breakout success of AMC’s Hell on Wheels.  For western diehards, it should provide an okay sagebrush fix when it airs this Saturday night (6/9) on the Hallmark Movie Channel.

Japanese Shorts, Made in America, at the Asia Society

Japan has long been a source of inspiration for American artists, and vice versa.  In that spirit, the Asia Society hosts a screening of seven short films of varying degrees of Japanese-ness from filmmakers working in America.  Diverse and intriguing, the New York Japan CineFest: Short Film Program will be a treat for short film connoisseurs this Friday night at the venerable Park Avenue institution.

For diehard fans of Japanese cinema, the highlight of the evening will doubtless be Justin Ambrosino’s The 8^th Samurai (trailer here).  Absolutely not purporting to tell the behind-the-scenes story of Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai, it speculates what might have happened if a cap and sunglasses donning director had a dream telling him to cut one of the eight samurai from his upcoming epic, just prior to the start of shooting.  While Kurosawa’s film is an obvious inspiration, one luckless actor’s wickedly supernatural mother issues suggest the influence of Kaneto Shindo, the director of ambiguous horror classics like Kuroneko and Onibaba, who recently passed away after reaching the century milestone.

Filmed in glorious black-and-white by cinematographer Lucas Lee Graham, the subtitled Samurai is a moody but loving valentine to Japanese cinema.  Though Ambrosino is not anymore Japanese than he sounds, Samurai features almost the entire Japanese supporting cast of Eastwood’s Letters to Iwo Jima.  The second longest selection of the program at twenty-eight minutes, it is a fully realized, enormously satisfying film, by any standard.

Yet, perhaps the best film of the evening is the hardest to describe, combining elements of narrative, essay, and experimental filmmaking.  Observing the terms of his mother’s will, the introverted narrator of Ken Ochiai’s Frog in the Well (trailer here) travels throughout Japan spreading her ashes as directed.  Sometimes employing quick-cut film stills to create a live-action flip book effect, Frog has a decidedly unusual visual style yet it never overshadows the emotional significance of the grown son’s travels.  Indeed, it is surprisingly touching, while also enticing viewers to visit Japan.  Frankly, considering how gorgeous it makes the country look, starting in the snowy north and traveling down to Okinawa, the Japanese tourism board ought to buy television air time for it around the industrialized world.

Though much simpler and more straight-forward, Chisa Hidaka’s three minute Together: Dancing with Spinner Dolphins is also lovely to look at, following a swimmer as she frolics underwater with the beloved marine mammals.  It sounds great too, thanks to a shrewdly chosen excerpt from Ketil Bjørnstad’s The Sea, featuring ECM label mates Terje Rypdal, David Darling, and Jon Christensen.

Though something of a brief irony-driven short, Yoriko Murakami’s richly rendered stop-motion animated Corazon en Fuego / Heart on Fire puts a twist on the O. Henry twist, ultimately guiding its bereaved protagonist somewhere quite life-affirming.  Yasu Suzuki’s New York set Radius Squared Times Heart is even more upbeat, depicting a shy Japanese scientist courting a fellow tango dancer through his skills in the kitchen.  With its accessible Friends-style humor, it could easily be the crowd favorite of the evening. 

Far heavier, Haruhito Naka’s Into the New World rather awkwardly addresses big picture topics like God and 9-11 through half-baked magical realism.  Fortunately, Kosuke Furukawa’s only slightly metaphysical Uguisu is much subtler.  It also features an excellent supporting turn from Seiji Kakizaki, who has such presence as a diner customer getting under the skin of a hipster artist simply through his soft-spoken honesty, he sort of fools viewers into investing undue significance in his character.  Furukawa’s sparing use of color is also quite distinctive, as are the sly hints at the fantastical.

Overall, the New York Japan CineFest night of shorts is very strong, including two excellent films, 8^th Samurai and Frog in the Well, plus several other quality selections.  Since most films are American productions, at least to an extent, it also represents an interesting change of pace for the Society, while still staying true to their mission and focus.  It is another example why New York cineastes need to follow their programming closely.  Definitely recommended, the short film program screens this Friday night (6/8) at the Asia Society.

Double Trouble: Jaycee Chan Takes Over the Family Business

Some were skeptical when fifty-eight year old Jackie Chan announced his retirement from the action movie genre at Cannes.  Whether this is one of those Depardieu retirements or he actually really means it, only time will tell.  Regardless, the scheduling is fortuitous for the release of an old-fashioned action-comedy starring Chan’s son.  Jaycee Chan steps into some big shoes as half of a pair of mismatched security guards trying to foil an art heist in David Hsun-wei Chang’s Double Trouble (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Jay is a take-charge loose cannon, which earns him plenty of demerits for poor team-building skills.  However, his reckless disregard for procedure is rooted in a tragic episode from an earlier period of his life.  He is the one Taipei Palace museum guard an elite gang of art thieves would not want to tangle with, but he is the perfect candidate for a frame-up.  Frankly, that was not part of the plan for two slinky Cat Woman-attired robbers, but the result of the bumbling interference of Ocean, the comic relief security guard-tourist visiting from Beijing.  Dragging along Ocean is a lot like taking the proverbial accordion into battle, but Jay is forced to, for the sake of clearing his name.

As the earnest Jay, Jaycee Chan exhibits something of the rubber face and rubber bones that made his father an international movie-star.  He also has a similarly likable on-screen demeanor.  Unfortunately, Double Trouble is a bit too much like late Hollywood period Jackie Chan than his early cult favorites for fans to pronounce the baton has been fully passed.  However, it is safe to say HK model Jessica C. (a.k.a. Jessica Cambensy) has arrived as an action femme fatale.  After all, there is a reason she is on the poster with Chan, even though they are bitter foes in the film.  As for his reluctant crime-fighting partner, a little of Xia Yu’s Ocean goes a long way.

Indeed, the bickering bromance is laid on rather thick and the humor is almost entirely of the slapstick variety.  Nonetheless, the depiction of border-crossing friendship (and maybe even romance with another member of Ocean’s tour group, appealingly played by Deng Jiajia) is rather pleasant, because it never feels overly soapboxey or clumsily forced.

There are some nice stunts in Double and it also has Jessica C. going for it.  It sincerely aims to please, but it is hardly has the grit or heft of a Police Story or even the relatively recent Shinjuku Incident.  A harmless distraction, Double Trouble may indeed be remembered as a stepping stone for its promising young cast.  It opens this Friday (6/8) in New York at the AMC Empire and Village 7, as well as in San Francisco at the AMC Cupertino and Metreon, courtesy of China Lion Entertainment.

Safety Not Guaranteed: Best Temp Gig Ever

The cynicism of journalism is about rub up against the idealism of science.  However, the science practiced by Kenneth Calloway is a decidedly scruffy, DIY affair.  His unusual classified ad attracts the attention of a Seattle magazine writer, who brings along two lowly interns to help investigate Calloway’s time travel claims in Colin Trevorrow’s Safety Not Guaranteed (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York and the Pacific Northwest.

Based on a real classified that became a minor internet sensation, Calloway’s ad seeks: “Someone to go back in time with . . . You’ll get paid after we get back. Must bring your own weapons. Safety not guaranteed. I have only done this once before.”  To Jeff Schwensen this sounds like the perfect set-up for a mock-the-rube piece (and also represents a good opportunity to hook up with an old summer fling).  At first, Darius Britt, an intern who makes Janeane Garofalo look upbeat, sees it pretty much the same way.  However, when Schwensen’s direct approach spooks the self-styled time traveler, he sends Britt in undercover to win their subject’s trust. 

Much to her surprise, she starts to like the guy—kind of a lot.  After all, Calloway is a socially stunted paranoid delusional—what’s not to like?  Of course, Derek Connolly’s consistently clever script leaves the door open just wide enough for viewers to consider the possibility Calloway is not so crazy after all.  Like they say, just because you’re paranoid . . .

Mark Duplass’s beefy Calloway (somewhat resembling Lon Chaney, Jr. before his transformations) and Aubrey Plaza’s much younger and very petite Britt look like a wildly mismatched couple, but the way they click as kindred outsider spirits makes perfect sense in the film’s’ dramatic context.  Frankly, their romance-in-denial chemistry is shockingly endearing.  Meanwhile, Jake Johnson delivers generous helpings of outrageous humor, of both the politically incorrect and ribald varieties.  You know that obnoxious guy you put up with because he is so unfiltered you want to hear whatever crazy thing he says next?  Johnson nails that vibe as Schwensen (sort of like a Tom Hanks circa Bachelor Party).  Poor Karan Soni is also good sport playing the Arnau, the nebbish straight-man intern, looking appropriately lost amid all the bedlam.

Helmed with sensitivity rarely seen in a genre send-up, Trevorrow nicely balances the comedic bravado with a humanistic sensibility.  Indeed, Safety never moderates Calloway’s twitchiness, nor does it judge him.  Yet, the film offers an unmistakable rebuke to the urban hipster condescension for small town America.  Don’t let the “from the producers of Little Miss Sunshine” copy line set off your quirky indie alarm bells.  It is a film with a sharp edge and a big heart, but it always stays true to its geek roots.  Thoroughly satisfying, Safety Not Guaranteed is enthusiastically recommended for general movie-going audiences when it opens this Friday (6/8) in New York, Los Angeles, Portland, and Seattle.

BFF ’12: Pyrammmid

Only Russia could celebrate a Ponzi scheme con artist as a national hero.  It’s a complicated place.  Transparently based on Sergei Mavrodi, the Russian Madoff, a bizarre episode of post-Soviet economic history is only slightly exaggerated in Eldar Salavatov’s Pyrammmid (trailer here), which screens during the 2012 Brooklyn Film Festival.

Mavrodi’s dodgy financial empire was also known as MMM and its commercials promising forty percent returns on investment were a constant presence on Russian television during its heyday.  Many Russians blamed its inevitable collapse on the government thanks to conspiracy theories no doubt nurtured by Mavrodi.  However, the fictional Sergey Mamontov’s MMM really is the target of the corrupt national government and their oligarchic allies.  Understand Mamontov is no mere charlatan.  He is scamming all that money in order to preserve Russian ownership of the old state-owned enterprises being sold to the well-connected at fire-sale prices through the dubious privatization process.  Well, that’s Pyrammmid’s story and its sticking to it.

It gets quite complicated though.  Raking in cash, Mamontov plans a fatal run on his major banking rival, while getting involved in weird sidelines, like buying the major Russian beauty pageant.  Most of those distractions are the brainchild of maverick mathematician Anton who loses sight of the big picture.  Frankly, the film is a bit overstuffed with plot, sacrificing the dead weight of transitions to fit it all in.  As a result, audiences watching it in subtitles really have to keep on their toes.

Reportedly, Pyrammmid is based on an unpublished manuscript by Mavrodi, which must be considered either a novel or a memoir, depending on whether or not you happen to be Sergei Mavrodi.  Ideologically, it is a bit of a head-scratcher, unambiguously lionizing exactly the sort of financial plunderer the current regime made its name inveighing against.  Still, the symbolic significance of Mamontov’s choice of car is hard to miss: a vintage Soviet Chaika sedan.  In fact, the film has nothing to say regarding the lack of consequences faced by the oppressive former Communist hardliners.  Indeed, that refusal to account for the past has led the country precisely where it is now.  The presence of Putin favorite Nikita Mikhalkov’s son Artyom and daughter Anna Mikhalkova in the ensemble cast further muddies the waters.

Having played more traditionally action-oriented protagonists in previous films (such as the Da Vinci Code-ish Golden Mean), Alexey Serebryakov is surprisingly convincing as the owlish Mamontov (those specs are another Mavrodi trademark).  Unfortunately, he is largely surrounded by stock characters existing simply to serve the plot, like Gutov the shifty lawyer and Vera the ambitious muckraking photojournalist.

Frankly, the fact that this movie exists is downright mind-blowing.  Imagine a slick, big budget American film positioning Bernie Madoff as a misunderstood hero, whom we should give good money to, for the sake of the country.  That is about how Pyrammmid shakes out.  It is a fast-moving big-canvas conspiracy thriller that does not always make a whole lot of sense.  Yet, it is more stylistically grounded than the thematically related Generation P.  Flawed but fascinating for Russia watchers, it screens again this Wednesday (5/6) at IndieScreen as part of this year’s Brooklyn Film Festival.

KAFFNY ’12: Magic and Loss

Kiki Sugino could be considered Asia’s Parker Posey.  As an actress and producer, she has helped get numerous indie films off the ground in several countries.  Though her career is still young, she has already been the focus of a mini-retrospective at the most recent Tokyo Film Festival.  New Yorkers will have the chance to see some of Sugino’s indiest work in Lim Kah Wai’s Magic and Loss (trailer here), which screens as part of the 2012 Korean American Film Festival New York’s opening night double feature.

Two women have come to a picturesque Mui Wo beach resort that looks like it could have been inspired by Patrick McGoohan’s The Prisoner.  The sign at the registration desk says “full,” but there do not seem to be any other guests besides Kiki and Kkobbi—and they both have coupons.  However, since the bellhop seems to be the only employee, overhead must be low.  He is quite solicitous of Kkobbi, knowing she is Korean, but his reception is less gracious for Kiki after learning she is Japanese.  Playing her namesake, Kiki Sugino’s well known Zainichi Korean heritage (a native born Japanese citizen of Korean descent) might indeed be significant to international audiences watching M&L.

Kiki and Kkobbi become fast friends, or so it seems.  Frankly, the latter’s attitude appears ambiguous to say the least.  Nonetheless, they explore the natural beauties of the HK island paradise.  Yet, there are hints of something unsettling, in addition to the generous servings of sexual tension.

M&L is not the sort of film to put all its cards on the table.  After all, that would be telling.  It is perfectly content to leave viewers in a state of unresolved ambiguity (only heightened by the post-credits stinger).  Yet, for hardy cineastes, it is still quite watchable thanks to the combination of the pleasant scenery, the wonderfully expressive (and cute) Sugino, and the attractive Kim Kkobbi.

Though Lim tries not to overdo the Lychian excesses, M&L seems to parallel Mulholland Drive in several respects.  There is certainly an ominous vibe to the proceedings, despite the sun and surf.  In fact, he creates quite an effective atmosphere of mystery, but the drama (unfolding through largely improvised dialogue) is frustratingly ill-defined.  Really, would it have killed anyone to give us a few more concrete narrative hooks to hold onto?

Regardless, for hardcore film students, M&L offers plenty to debate. Its plethora of multi-multi-hyphenating (directed by the Malaysian-Chinese Lim and co-produced and co-starring the Korean-Japanese Sugino) also makes it quite the fitting selection for KAFFNY.  Make no mistake, it is a serious film, requiring serious patience.  Recommended for rabid Lynch cult-followers and admirers of Sugino’s work, Magic and Loss screens tomorrow night (6/5) and Saturday afternoon (6/9), when this year’s Korean American Film Festival New York opens at the Anthology Film Archives.

KAFFNY ’12: Ghost (short)

A condemned neighborhood in Pusan is haunted, but it is not necessarily paranormal.  Yet, a sense of unnatural menace palpably lingers in the air throughout Dahci Ma’s Ghost (disturbing trailer here), a macabre short that competed in the prestigious short film competition at last year’s Cannes Film Festival and finally screens in New York this week as part of the 2012 Korean American Film Festival.

A criminal is hiding from the police in a boarded up house steps away from where his crimes were committed.  It could be the setting for a Grudge-like film, but he has apparently generated the lingering ill karma himself.  He is also losing his grip on reality, finding companionship in his animated chicken bones.

Featuring some bizarre Ray Harryhausen-esque effects and an eerie sense of place, Ghost is certainly a creepy film.  Whether intended or not, it also clearly dampens viewer enthusiasm for urban renewal projects, using the actual exteriors of Pusan “redevelopment” locations where similar crimes were committed in real life.  It also includes one of the most counterproductive product placements ever, for an unfortunate KFC.

 

Ghost is like an upscale K-horror movie, de-emphasizing gore in favor of psychological ambiguity and condensed into ten minutes.  It is art cinema for genre diehards, or genre filmmaking for demanding cineastes.  An accomplished and unsettling film, Ghost is definitely one of the highlights of the short films selected for this year’s Korean American Film Festival in New York, suggesting Ma is a filmmaker to watch out for.  It screens as part of the Shorts 1 programming block this Thursday (6/7) and next Sunday (6/10) at the Anthology Film Archives.

BFF ’12: Rose

The war is over, but for many Polish women, it is hard to call the aftermath “peace.”  This is especially true for the ethnic German Masurians, formerly of eastern Prussia, like Rose Kwiatkowska.  Though Poland has been “liberated,” they are constantly reminded “their side” lost, and are treated as treasonous pariahs, accordingly.  Yet, Kwiatkowska’s situation is especially dire, as a mysterious Polish veteran slowly discovers in Wojtek Smarzowski’s uncompromising Rose (trailer here), which opened the 2012 Brooklyn Film Festival last night at the Brooklyn Heights Cinema.

Tadeusz Mazur is a world-weary Home Army veteran, who witnessed things during the Warsaw Uprising no man could forget.  He watched as his wife was raped and murdered by the rampaging National Socialists and was also present during the death of Kwiatkowska’s husband.  She is not exactly welcoming when he turns up to deliver some of her husband’s effects, yet a bond slowly forms between them.  Kwiatkowska needs protection from the Soviet-aligned bandits, literally raping and pillaging the Masurian countryside.  She could also use his help clearing the landmines from her fields, so they can harvest the potatoes.  As for Mazur, he has his reasons to lay low, hoping not to attract the attention of the NKVD.  However, Masuria is not the best place to be to avoid trouble.

Michał Szczerbic’s screenplay is brutally direct and honest about the treatment of women during wartime, by the Germans, the Soviets, and their minions (indeed, they all seem to blend together throughout the film).  The sheer volume of sexual assaults in Smarzowski’s historical drama is overwhelming, but they are never treated in a lurid or sensationalized fashion.  Rather, it is a harrowing depiction of an ugly period of institutionalized score-settling.

Yet, incredibly, Rose is a fundamentally a love story, sensitively bringing to life the brief but intense relationship that develops between Kwiatkowska and Mazur.  There are no cute courtship rituals or romantic contrivances.  They simply fall in love (or something near enough to it), while banding together to survive.  It is definitely not pretty, but in a way, it is kind of beautiful.

Marcin Dorociński is riveting as Mazur, portraying him as both a flinty man of action and a tragic romantic hero.  It is a bit surprising how thoroughly he dominates the film (since it is called Rose), but he does.  Agata Kulesza is also quite haunting as Kiatkowska, creating a profile of herculean endurance.  Their scenes together are quite special.

Despite somewhat rushing the third act (which features a few “wait, he did what?” moments), Smarzowski (previously represented at BFF with the gritty Martial Law-era noir TheDark House) deftly helms Rose, capturing the sweep of terrible historical forces, but maintaining an intimate focus.  He forces viewers to confront the nature of the crimes committed against Kiatkowska and other Masurian women, up close and personal.  Polish free jazz bass clarinetist Mikołaj Trzaska’s eerie minimalist score also heightens the unsettling mood.  Rose can be tough to watch, but it is an excellent film.  Highly recommended, it screens again this coming Thursday (6/7) at IndieScreen, as part of this year’s Brooklyn Film Festival.

DWF ’12: Dig (short)

For David, a Holocaust survivor studying philosophy, Nietzsche is bound to be a difficult figure to approach.  Particularly vexing are the passages his study group is chewing on: “He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster. And when you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you.”  Maybe so, but sometimes the abyss really has it coming.  Nietzsche’s questions cease being philosophical when David confronts the old National Socialist who killed his family in Joshua Caldwell’s short film Dig (trailer here), which screens during this year’s Dances with Films.

It is 1962.  Having survived concentration camps, David is now a reasonably well liked American college student.  Yet, when he observes Heinrich Berger walking into the diner, he is shaken to the core.  The next time viewers see Berger, he is trussed up in the back seat of David’s car, headed out to the desert.  The student has brought a gun and a shovel, which he intends for Berger to use.  However, being intimately acquainted with death, Berger is more comfortable than David in its company, launching into a verbal cat-and-mouse game with the understandably emotional young man.

Aaron Himelstein is actually quite compelling as the deeply conflicted David.  Indeed, it is an impossible situation to imagine one’s self in.  Nonetheless, one cannot help wondering if the character’s agitated state is right for the story or whether a sense of resignation, recognizing the inadequacies of his planned actions yet proceeding just the same, would have better made its points about the limits of justice.  It certainly would have produced a more existential film.

Regardless, Aronofsky regular Mark Margolis is eerily effective as the stone cold evil Berger, while Himelstein viscerally conveys the grief and anguish of his victim.  Granted, the Nietzsche prologue is hardly subtle, but Dig is in no way exploitative.  Painting a dark picture of a morally problematic universe, it is a pretty ambitious short film (executive produced by CSI creator Anthony E. Zuiker).  Not exactly uplifting, but quite cinematic, it screens this coming Tuesday (6/5) as part of Fusion Shorts-Group 2 at the 2012 edition of Dances with Films.

Found Memories: Time Stands Still in Brazil

Existing in a state of near suspended animation, routine and religion are sufficient to sustain the old tradition-bound inhabitants of Jotuomba.  Brazil’s economic revival has passed them over, but it probably wasn’t welcome anyway.  However, one young backpacking photographer will find a reasonably warm reception there in Júlia Murat’s Found Memories (trailer here), which opens today in New York.

Before first light, Madalena bakes the bread she does not particularly like.  She delivers it to Antonio’s customerless coffee shop, where they engage in ritualistic bickering before enjoying the simple pleasure of their morning java.  Then it is off to mass, followed by an early sit-down supper shared by the handful of remaining villagers.  This pattern repeats every day, until Rita’s arrival introduces a slight bit of variation.

Initially, Rita clashes with her headstrong host, but she soon begins to appreciate Madalena’s quiet dignity and grace.  Nostalgic for a past she never lived through, Rita is attracted to the decrepit buildings and weathered townsfolk.  Through their meeting, she might find her destiny, but it will be in no hurry to arrive.

While Murat drops the occasional suggestion of magical realism here and there, Found is very definitely grounded in the hardscrabble environment of Jotuomba.  It is so far removed from the passage of time, the priest has locked the cemetery, a detail dripping with significance.  Often filmed by the light of gas lamps, Lucio Bonelli’s cinematography has the warm chiaroscuro glow of the old masters.  Viewers can practically feel the heat, even at night, and smell the coffee beans in the morning.  It might move at a slow pace, but Murat’s film is very definitely headed someplace specific, with intent.

As Madalena, Sonia Guedes conveys a lifetime’s worth of hardship, with poise and subtlety.  It is a wonderfully earthy, unpretentious performance.  The same is true for Luiz Serra’s deeply compassionate and rather touching turn as the prickly Antonio.  While Lisa A. Fávero’s Rita is a bit of a pill at times, watching her and the villagers warm to each other is oddly engrossing.

Found is likely to frustrate casual viewers with its deliberate tempo and coy approach to potentially fantastical elements.  It looks great though and boasts several remarkably natural performances.  Given the eleventh hour decision of Brazilian state petroleum giant Petrobras (the potential recipient of controversial U.S. Export-Import Bank loans) to withdraw funding from the New York edition of the Brazilian film festival bearing its name has resulted in the cancellation of this year’s fest (save for the Central Park kick-off screening of rock doc Raul), the timely release of Found will still allow City cineastes to get a bit of their Brazilian fix.  Recommended with respect for hardcore art-house patrons, Found Memories opens today (6/1) at the Lincoln Plaza Cinemas, followed by a San Francisco Film Society engagement the week of 6/22-6/28, courtesy of Film Movement.

Not Quite the Fairest: Snow White and the Huntsman

These dwarves do not whistle while they work.  They are not so hot when it comes to comic relief in general, but they are still devoted to a certain princess, as is most of their fairy tale realm.  That is why she is such a threat to the despotic Queen Ravenna, her wicked stepmother. Straying from familiar Disney territory, the latest live action adaptation of the Brothers Grimm fairy tale takes on overtones of Joan of Arc as the protagonist rallies the troops in Rupert Sanders’ Snow White and the Huntsman (trailer here), which opens today nationwide.

King Magnus, Snow White’s widower father chose the wrong second wife.  He does not even make it to the honeymoon.  The narcissistic Ravenna’s reign is harsh, even depressing the natural environment around her imposingly cinematic castle.  However, she gets a rather unwelcomed surprise from her magic mirror when Snow White comes of age.  She is no longer the fairest of them all.  The prisoner of the North Tower is.  Thanks to the help of sundry beasts and birds, Snow White escapes her captivity, only to find herself in the supernaturally ominous Dark Forest.

Wanting Snow White’s purity for uncanny purposes, the Queen sends in Eric, a drunkard huntsman who happens to be one of the few mortals to venture through the forest and live to tell the tale.  Fortunately, the Huntsman does not take direction well.  As a result, he will have to contend with her loyal Game of Thrones-ish brother, his armored forces, and a fair number of monsters.  A small band of short eccentrics might be able to help them.  There is also some business with an apple.

This is Snow White, done kind of-sort of faithfully.  However, it spends far too much time aimlessly trudging about the Dark Forest.  Frankly, the film really starts to take off when it diverges from Grimm, becoming an old fashioned fight-for-freedom epic.  Indeed, it is refreshing to see a less passive Snow White, leading the resistance into battle like its St. Crispin’s Day.

In fact, Kristen Stewart rather exceeds expectations balancing vulnerability and a suitably regal presence as Snow White.  Chris “Thor” Hemsworth might not be venturing too far out of his comfort zone here, but he swings the battle axe as well as the war hammer.  Though played by great (full sized) actors like Ian McShane, Ray Winstone, Bob Hoskins, and Eddie Marsan, the dwarves just look weird.  They are not funny, but they are still rather shticky.  However, it is Charlize Theron who really puts a stamp on the picture, vamping it up and chewing the scenery with sheer evil delight as Ravenna, while her apparent age yo-yo’s up and down (getting a crucial assist from the crack team of make-up artists).

Graduating from commercials to big special effect-laden features, Sanders creates a richly detailed fantasy world, particularly the striking castle, in both interior and exterior shots.  However, one has to wonder just who is the intended audience for a dark brooding version of Snow White, served with a reasonable helping of hack and slash action.  In fact, those looking for happily-ever-after romance might find the film leaves them cold, while the laughably clunky dialogue is not likely to do much for anyone.

Snow White and the Huntsman is an odd assortment mismatched parts, but some of those pieces are admittedly entertaining.  Ironically, it would not be a good date movie because those who are reluctantly dragged into it might find it more enjoyable than expected, whereas their dates will likely be disappointed by it.  A mixed bag best saved for post-theatrical viewing options, it opens nationwide today (6/1), including the AMC 34^th Street and AMC Kips Bay in New York.