LAFF ’10: Vlast (Power)

Over 200 former employees and directors of Yukos, the Russian oil company, have been in some way persecuted by the Putin regime. If that sounds like a coincidence, Prime Minister Putin would like to thank you for your gullibility. Unquestionably, the biggest fish amongst his quarry was Yukos’s former CEO, the visionary Russian entrepreneur Mikhail Khodorkovsky. At one time the sixteenth richest man in the world, Khodorkovsky now resides in a tiny prison cell. How he got there is a chilling story of the not-so-new Russia, compellingly recounted in Cathryn Collins’s Vlast (Power), which screens during the 2010 Los Angeles Film Festival (trailer here).

Collins never confuses Khodorkovsky with a choirboy. She makes it very clear Khodorkovsky’s early years are still shrouded in mystery and unsettling rumors. However, she gives him credit for taking on the decrepit Yukos state enterprise at time when the price of oil was at an all time low, eventually turning around the company, and yes, making billions in the process.

Khodorkovsky was one of the original so-called oligarchs who largely reaped the benefits of Yeltsin’s privatization plan. Yet, he was a crony capitalist of a different color, becoming a prominent philanthropist and advocate of democracy in Russia. He also started championing corporate transparency, only to suddenly find himself behind bars shortly thereafter.

First-time documentarian Collins is admirably even-handed in her profile of Khodorkovsky, never overstating her case or simply appealing to emotion. While giving the incarcerated mogul credit for his business acumen, she is most impressed by his ability to identify and recruit smart, talented young people for his team. Of course, the implications of his story are clear. If a man with an estimated net worth over fifteen billion dollars is not safe in Putin’s Russia, nobody is.

Many of Vlast’s on-camera interview subjects participated at not inconsiderable risk to their well being. In doing so, they definitely convey an unvarnished sense of life in Russia today. Providing clear and concise historical background, Vlast provides the proper context for non-Russophiles and non-Russophobes to appreciate Khodorkovsky’s story. Still, given the long history of Russian and Soviet anti-Semitism, the question of whether Khodorkovsky’s Jewish heritage has contributed to his persecution is strangely never really explored.

Vlast joins the growing ranks of valuable documentaries doggedly raising alarms about the lawlessness of the Putin regime. Unfortunately, previous related films like Eric Bergkraut’s Letter to Anna and Andrei Nekrasov’s Poisoned by Polonium have largely fallen on deaf ears in the West. Given its reasoned tone and access to Khodorkovsky’s inner circle, Vlast should impress viewers concerned about the current state of the world. Highly recommended, it screens this Tuesday (6/22) and Wednesday (6/23) at the LAFF.

LAFF ’10: 1428

For China, the earthquake that devastated Sichuan province on May 12, 2008 has been like Hurricane Katrina and the Gulf oil spill combined. It has laid bare public corruption and put the local and national authorities on the defensive. Like Katrina, it has also been widely documented in films like the Oscar nominated short China’s Unnatural Disaster and Du Haibin’s feature 1428 (trailer here), the winner of the 66th Venice Film Festival’s Best Documentary Award, which screens this coming Sunday and Monday at the 2010 Los Angeles Film Festival.

At 14:28 hours (2:28 pm) China was hit with what is considered the nineteenth worst earthquake in history just three months before the Beijing Olympics were scheduled to open. The Communist government’s official response has been controversial to say the least. Despite the quake’s severity, many suspect it would not have been as deadly had government construction been less shoddy, particularly at schools. Promises have been made to Sichuan survivors, usually by politicians orchestrating media ops, but the delivery of relief has been slow and problematic.

Du focuses his lens on the haunted faces of Sichuan’s dispossessed. They live in shanty towns and temporary housing, enduring shortages of food and power. Many would like to return home, but following a truly perverse plan of action, the government has begun demolishing houses that withstood the quake. Such is the efficiency of China’s emergency management. For many survivors, it appears all the authorities have to offer is an opportunity to wave at the Premier’s tour bus as his motorcade blows through town.

Stylistically compatible with China’s so-called D-Generation (D for Digital), Du eschews conventional documentary techniques, like formal interviews and voiceover narration. Instead, he lets the camera roll capturing the unfiltered reality of the quake’s aftermath at intervals of ten and two hundred ten days after the disaster. It is not pretty.

There is clearly a lot of anger in Sichuan that survivors do not seem to know how to express. One frustrated old man offers perhaps the most direct censure of the government, complaining: “The policies of the Communist Party are good in essence but they have been carried out wrongly.” In fact, the survivors seen in 1428 are much more guarded in their grievances than the grieving parents featured in Unnatural. Of course, it is worth bearing in mind Du’s footage was shot a mere nineteen years after the Tiananmen Square massacre, so he might well have been more circumspect in what he choose to include, for his subjects’ sake.

Like many of the D-Generation films, 1428 obliquely criticizes the Chinese Communist government from a perspective that would be considered left of center in the west. One elderly Taoist mystic (with much prompting) links the earthquake to the lack of observance of the Earth-God (perhaps implying a corresponding paucity of respect for the Earth by extension). However, the most heartbreaking footage of 1428 involves bereaved parents searching for the remains of their missing children amid the wreckage of their schools.

1428 is an eye-opening dose of reality, straight-up without any external editorializing. It is not the popular image of contemporary China the government has worked to cultivate. In truth, it does require some patience (though not as much as Du’s previous film Umbrella) because it so scrupulously represents life as it is for the Sichuan survivors. Highly illuminating, it is definitely recommended to anyone in the City of Angels when it screens at the LA Film Fest Sunday (6/20) and Monday (6/21).

LAFF ’10: The Night Mayor (short)

The nights in Canada get awfully long and dark. That is why Canadians were fascinated by the images generated by a Bosnian immigrant inventor who developed an experimental broadcasting system powered by the Aurora Borealis. Nihad Ademi’s fantastical story forms another chapter in director Guy Maddin’s secret history of his hometown of Winnipeg in the short film The Night Mayor, which screens during the 2010 Los Angeles Film Festival (and is also available for online viewing courtesy of the National Film Board of Canada).

A proud Canadian by choice, Ademi was captivated by the “music” of the Aurora Borealis. He invents the telemelodium, a machine that transformed the energy of the Northern Lights into sound and imagery. However, as more Canadians starting subscribing to his signals, the telemelodium started tapping into the countries subconscious, generating unexpected visuals, including that of Ademi’s daughter in her altogether. Despite Ademi’s patriotic motives, the national government is not happy to have this window opened into the Canadian soul.

Bearing the hallmarks of Maddin’s weirdly elegant style (glorious black-and-white, expressionist set pieces, unsettling music and audio effects), Mayor could easily be considered an addendum to his borderline brilliant feature My Winnipeg. However, where the full length film started with incidents in Maddin’s fictionalized and sensationalized history that seem eccentrically plausible, slowly but surely seducing viewers with its bizarre vision of the central Canadian city, Mayor’s improbability never convinces viewers to suspend their disbelief. Still, it is an undeniably original and more or less accessible bite of post-modern science fiction that should please Maddin’s loyal art-house fans.

Maddin is one of the few genuine auteurs working in film today. While his overall filmography is somewhat hit-or-miss, Mayor is an inventive and subversive short. Entertaining on its own, Mayor would probably be even more effective when viewed as a companion to Winnipeg. It screens at the LA Film Festival as part of Shorts Program 2 tomorrow (6/18) and Tuesday (6/22).

(Photo credit: Rebecca Sandulak)