The Trace We Leave Behind (2017) Scary Movies XI

The original release poster

THE TRACE WE LEAVE BEHIND is rooted in the financial troubles of Brazil. Corruption is rampant and the bid to host the World Cup and Olympics pretty much wrecked the country as contractors and politicians used it as an excuse to rape the country’s coffers for their own benefit. As a result of the rampant greed basic services are being cut and places like hospitals are being forced to close.

In the film one of the city’s oldest and most respected hospitals is being forced to close. They simply do not have the supplies or equipment to serve. They are not taking any more patients and everyone is being sent elsewhere. Because the hospital administrator won’t give up without a fight he takes in a new patient. This causes all sorts of problems but it is handled and the patients are moved and the hospital closes…and then the doctor responsible for the move notices that there is no trace of the last patient. This sets him on quest to find out what happened to her…

Is it madness, corruption or the supernatural? For a while we aren’t really sure what is going on and we are better for it as TRACE generates a good deal of tension as it drives headlong to its conclusion.

A largely tense little thriller TRACE generates chills as we are forced to ponder if things are happening or if our hero is going crazy. At times it isn’t clear and it keeps us off balance. Helped along by a killer visual sense we are disturbed simply by the images. This film looks great. And when the images are mixed with moody score things get even more creepy. It’s so good at creating a mood that it kind of is disappointing when the film resorts to jump scares, it doesn’t need them.

While I like trace a great deal and had a great time watching it, it completely faded from my brain the next day. Watching the film late at night I was creeped out and wondered if I was going to be able to sleep. The next morning I got up went through my day until late in the afternoon when I suddenly realized that I had to write the film up…and realized I had no idea what the film was. I put it back on and fell into it again. Don’t get me wrong it’s a great film it’s just not sticking in this brain.

We The Animals (2018)

Based on Justin Torres‘s book WE THE ANIMALS split the critics at Tribeca. Some of them liked it and some of them didn’t but all of them said that in the end they knew they had seen something and they were glad they had seen it. Now having seen the film I completely understand the split, it is a film that reaches out and grabs you by the throat and shakes you.

The film is the story of a family as seen through the eyes of one of the three boys named Jonah. It is also his coming of age tale. More artistic than the others jonah keeps a journal of sorts of stories and pictures of what he is experiencing. We watch as the family spirals, how the relationship between the parents ebbs and flows, becomes abusive and is mimicked by the children. We also watch as Jonah begins to find himself

Shot for maximum emotion the film bounces between angles, styles and grains in order to perfectly get across what Jonah is feeling. A good portion of the time it is discomfort and frustration as life pushes down and tries to crush him. At the same time we get a sense of the love that is floating around in the family, despite the fact that at times there doesn't see to be any.

This is not an easy film and it’s tough viewing. Sitting in the dark and watching the film I could understand how my fellow critics felt walking out the screenings when the film premiered at Tribeca. Like many of my friends I was left reeling. Why had I chosen to go into this place? Yes, there is some hope, but it is still hard to experience.

My reaction to the film the first time through is mixed. I felt more than a bit battered since some of the film kicked up things from when I was a child that I’d like to have kept boxed up. I’m not completely certain that director Jeremiah Zagar  ties everything up the way he should. On the other hand the film is most certainly an experience and the work of a master director who will not have his hands tied. It is a film one can admire. I’m still trying to work out if I like the film, but it is a work of such power that I don’t think I’ll know that for a while.

What intrigues me about the film is that I think this is a film that will get better the more you see it. I don’t think that this is a film that you can fully come to terms with after seeing it the first time. I know I haven’t. This is partly because it is so raw that it’s like touching a nerve but mostly the fact that the way the film is made, the mixed styles and the POV of a child in a tough situation makes this hard to grasp the first time through. When I finished the I had a sense that I only really began to understand it when I finished it and that I needed another pass through at some later point when things wouldn’t be as raw.

Should you see the film?

Yes, most definitely. I will not even hazard a guess if you will like it. However like my friends who saw this at Tribeca earlier this year you will most certainly feel as though you’ve seen a film, for better or worse.

Mile 22: Peter Berg Directs Iko Uwais

Unfortunately, Congress will probably have to apply the Magnitsky Act to more Russian officials after this explosive kerfuffle. The Russians has compromised the coms of the CIA’s double-secret tactical unit, to feed real-time intel to the terror-supporting security service of a country not completely dissimilar from Indonesia. Their mission is to extract a source who can pin-point large quantities of stolen cesium-137, but it will be a particularly hard day at the office for James Silva’s team in Peter Berg’s Mile 22, which opens today nationwide.

Silva was a child prodigy, who still has trouble with that human relationship kind of stuff. However, he can most definitely shoot, fight, and make command decisions on the fly. We see his team take out a safe-house full of Russian agents in the prologue, with only one fatality on their side, so you know they must be tough. Flashing forward to the rest of the film, we find Silva is now stationed in Indocarr, or some such, where the embassy team faces a bit of a quandary.

Li Noor was a top asset recruited by Silva’s human intel specialist, Alice Kerr. He has a Mission Impossible-protected disk, loaded with the locations of the missing cesium, but it will self-destruct if Li is not safely delivered out of the country. Silva’s team will escort him to the CIA transport plane, but they will have to drive through downtown Not-Jakarta. It should be easy with “Mother” and his fellow “Overwatch” controllers guiding them from an undisclosed location, butt they take fire from the elite secret police every step of the way.

Admittedly, there are two considerable issues of internal logic that plague Mile 22. For one thing, you would think a prodigy like Silva, who supposedly has to slow down his mile-a-minute thoughts by snapping an elastic band on his wrist would realize: “hey, isn’t it funny they always know exactly where we’re going? Why, it is like they can hear us talking.” Also, since Li is played by Iko Uwais, why not just turn him loose on the goons commanded by the sinister Axel?

Of course, Uwais is definitely the best thing going for the film. He has a featured fight scene in the embassy clinic that is up there with his best work in the Raid franchise. He also adapts quite smoothly to the run-and-gun style of action that is the stock-and-trade of Silva’s team. Mark Wahlberg also definitely has the right kind of commando presence, while credibly portraying Silva slightly on the spectrum.

As you would expect, Ronda Rousey holds up her end as team member Sam Snow, but John Malkovich is disappointingly restrained as Mother. Likewise, K-Pop star Chae-rin Lee (CL) does not have much to do as Overwatch controller “Queen,” but hey, she looks fabulous. On the other hand, former New York Ranger (and one-time Vogue magazine intern) Sean Avery has a dynamite sort-of-cameo as “Assault One,” during the prologue.

Action fans, especially those who dug Wahlberg’s previous films with Berg will be utterly shocked by how dark Mile 22 gets. However, you have to give them credit for going there. That is why it is unfair of kneejerk critics to automatically dismiss the film. Yes, Berg and screenwriter Lea Carpenter invite viewers to celebrate the sacrifices made by the American military and intelligence services to protect our liberty, but Silva’s team pays an awfully high price and swallows some profoundly bitter pills during the course of the film. It will leave audiences in a mood of wary vigilance rather than triumphalism. (Yet, if the film is a hit, the sequel practically writes itself.)

Regardless, it is quite a zippy commando movie that makes good use of Uwais, Wahlberg, and their action co-stars. Accessible but gritty, Mile 22 is recommended for mainstream genre fans when it opens today (8/17) across the country, including the AMC Empire in New York.

The Coolest Guy Movie Ever (2018)

THE COOLEST GUY MOVIE EVER is a loving tribute to THE GREAT ESCAPE. It is a modern day travelogue of a bunch of fans who travel around Germany looking for the places where the movie was shot. As they travel across the continent are treated to all sorts of stories that might not ever come up in a traditional making of . For example one of the people who lived in the apartments where the stars stayed tell us stories about what they were like after hours. Its an absolute blast and a half for anyone who loves the film.

I don’t know what to say. If you love THE GREAT ESCAPE, you’re going to love the documentary. It’s the sort of thing that has me wanting to go back to see the things in the film that I never noticed before. For example the fact that in many shots the Nazis who chase Steve McQueen on the motorcycles are Steve McQueen. He had to double them because the champion riders hired to place the part couldn’t keep up with him.

I loved the film. I had an absolute blast watching it each of the four times I watched it.

Yea it’s that good.

Highly recommended The Coolest Guy Film hits VOD on August 21 and should be double featured with THE GREAT ESCAPE.

L’Homme Fatal: Alain Delon August 31 – September 14 at the Quad

The Quad celebrates the smoldering screen presence of French sex symbol Alain Delon with a 22-film retrospective (15 on 35mm!)

Highlights include Michelangelo Antonioni's L'Eclisse, René Clément's Purple Noon, Jean-Luc Godard's Nouvelle Vague, Jean-Pierre Melville's Le Samouraï and more!

Combine a something-to-prove lit-fuse charisma and a golden-boy-gets-rough assurance with ineffable Gallic cool…and you’re close to gauging the appeal that made Alain Delon one of the biggest movie stars France has ever produced. Virile yet vulnerable, handsome yet malleable, Delon was one of his country’s top draws from the outset of the 1960s until near the twilight of the 20th century. A turbulent childhood and an unsettled early adulthood after military service led him to redirect his energies into an acting career; directors saw that this smoldering, ambiguous young man had screen presence to burn. Equally at home in films d’auteur and crowd-pleasing genre fare (with a penchant for policiers and gangster films), Delon was unafraid of playing unsympathetic or inscrutable characters—which made for an ingrained tension with audience identification that he mined again and again. He took more creative ownership by producing, and on occasion writing and directing. Although he never forsook his home base and native cinema, he successfully courted global stardom through adventurous collaborations and pairings. With this retrospective, the Quad invites you to follow the exploits of his characters, both tough and tender.

Any Number Can Win
Henri Verneuil, 1963, France/Italy, 118m, 35mm

Borsalino
Jacques Deray, 1970, France/Italy, 125m, DCP

Le Cercle Rouge
Jean-Pierre Melville, 1970, France/Italy, 140m, DCP

Christine
Pierre Gaspard-Huit, 1958, France/Italy, 100m, 35mm

L’Eclisse
Michelangelo Antonioni, 1962, Italy/France, 126m, 35mm

Un Flic
Jean-Pierre Melville, 1972, France/Italy, 98m, DCP

Le Gang
Jacques Deray, 1977, Italy/France, 100m, DCP

The Girl on a Motorcycle
Jack Cardiff, 1968, UK/France, 91m, 35mm

Is Paris Burning?
René Clément, 1966, France/U.S., 173m, 35mm

The Leopard
Luchino Visconti, 1963, Italy/France, 186m, 35mm

Notre Histoire
Bertrand Blier, 1984, France 110m, 35mm

Nouvelle Vague
Jean-Luc Godard, 1990, France/Switzerland, 89m, 35mm

Purple Noon
René Clément, 1960, France/Italy, 118m, 35mm

Red Sun
Terence Young, 1971, France/Italy/Spain, 112m, 35mm

Rocco and His Brothers
Luchino Visconti, 1960, Italy/France, 177m, DCP

Le Samouraï
Jean-Pierre Melville, 1967, France/Italy, 105m, 35mm

Scorpio
Michael Winner, 1973, U.S., 114m, 35mm

The Sicilian Clan
Henri Verneuil, 1969, France/U.S., 122m, 35mm

Spirits of the Dead
Federico Fellini/Louis Malle/Roger Vadim, 1968, France/Italy, 121m, 35mm

Swann in Love
Volker Schlöndorff, 1984, France/West Germany, 110m, 35mm

Three Men to Kill
Jacques Deray, 1980, France, 93m, DCP

Two Men in Town
José Giovanni, 1973, France/Italy, 100m, DCP

Icarus Films at 40 at the Metrograph

50+ Films from the Wildly Influential Distributor Include Films by Chantal Akerman, Patricio Guzmán, Chris Marker, Madeline Anderson, Shôhei Imamura, Robert Kramer, Peter Watkins, and more!

In the summer of 1978, Ilan Ziv, fresh off his work helping to organize the first "Middle East Film Festival" in the United States, found himself in possession of a collection of little-seen films and of a passion to expose US audiences to the different points of view that they represented. Towards that end he created the distribution company Icarus Films, helmed since 1980 by Jonathan Miller. Now, forty years on, Icarus Films remains committed to the founders’ pluralistic, embracing vision of cinema, championing socially and artistically significant films that give voice to marginalized communities and express a vital, dissident version of history that’s not always written by the winners. BeginningSeptember 14 and continuing through October, Metrograph celebrates Icarus Films’ milestone birthday with a program of landmark films from South America, Africa, Europe, and points beyond, a program that includes crucial works by Chantal Akerman, Chris Marker, and the other epochal artists they've represented through the years.

From The East (Chantal Akerman/1993) South (Chantal Akerman/1999) From The Other Side (Chantal Akerman/2002) The Nine Muses (John Akomfrah/2010) Integration Report 1 (Madeline Anderson/1960) I Am Somebody (Madeline Anderson/1970) The Ister (David Barison & Daniel Ross/2004) Bitter Money (Wang Bing/2016) Ben Barka: The Moroccan Equation (Simone Bitton/2002) Matamata And Pilipili (Tristan Bourland/1996) Let The Church Say Amen! (St. Clair Bourne/1973) Drowning By Bullets (Philip Brooks & Alan Hayling/1992) Kuxa Kanema: The Birth Of Cinema (Margarida Cardoso/2003) Pierre Bourdieu: Sociology Is A Martial Art (Pierre Carles/2001) In The Name Of The People (Frank Christopher & Alex Drehsler/1984) Edward Said: The Last Interview (Mike Dibb/2004) Last Grave At Dimbaza (Chris Curling & Pascoe Macfarlane/1974) End Of The Dialogue (Antonia Caccia, Chris Curling, Simon Louvish, Nana Mahomo, Vus Make & Rakhetla Tsehlana/1970) Our Daily Bread  (Nikolaus Geyrhalter/2005) The Way Things Go  (Peter Fischli & David Weiss/1987) Fundi: The Story Of Ella Baker  (Joanne Grant/1981) Casting The First Stone  (Julie Gustafson/1991) The Battle Of Chile, Parts I-III (Patricio Guzmán/1975-79) Nostalgia For The Light  (Patricio Guzmán/2010) Devils Don't Dream!  (Andreas Hoessli/1995) Forever  (Heddy Honigmann/2006) A Man Vanishes  (Shôhei Imamura/1967) Karayuki-San, The Making Of A Prostitute (Shôhei Imamura/1975)

Oxhide  (Liu Jiayin/2005) Time Of The Locust  (Peter Gessner/1966) Finally Got The News  (Stewart Bird, Rene Lichtman, & Peter Gessner/1970) FALN (Peter Gessner & Robert Kramer/1965) Milestones  (John Douglas & Robert Kramer/1975) Rocky Road To Dublin  (Peter Lennon/1967) The Making Of 'Rocky Road To Dublin' (Paul Duane/2004) Taking Back Detroit   (Stephen Lighthill/1980) Marcel Ophüls And Jean-Luc Godard: The Meeting In St. Gervais (Frederic Choffat & Vincent Lowy/2010) The Patriot Game  (Arthur MacCaig/1979) The Jackets Green  (Arthur MacCaig/1988) Le Joli Mai  (Pierre Lhomme & Chris Marker/1963) A Grin Without A Cat (Chris Marker/1977) Remembrance Of Things To Come (Yannick Bellon & Chris Marker/2001) Mobutu, King Of Zaire (Thierry Michel/1999) Decasia  (Bill Morrison/2002) Hotel Terminus  (Marcel Ophüls/1988) Chronicle Of A Genocide Foretold (Danièle Lacourse & Yvan Patry/1996) Profit And Nothing But!  (Raoul Peck/2001) Moi, Un Noir  (Jean Rouch/1958) The Human Pyramid  (Jean Rouch/1961) Investigation Of A Flame  (Lynne Sachs/2003) Tosca's Kiss  (Daniel Schmid/1984) Cul De Sac: A Suburban War Story (Garrett Scott/2002) La Commune (Paris, 1871)  (Peter Watkins/2000) An Injury To One  (Travis Wilkerson/2002) People Power  (Ilan Ziv/1989) The Junction  (Ilan Ziv/2003) Far From Vietnam (Jean-Luc Godard, Joris Ivens, William Klein, Claude Lelouch, Chris Marker, and Alain Resnais/1967)

Dead Calm (1989) Scary Movies XI

Sam Neil and Nicole Kidman are sailing the seas when they come upon a drifting sailboat. Aboard it they find the ship is sinking a young man, Billy Zane, all alone. They offer to help, but Zane has other ideas, taking their boat and Ms Kidman and leaving Neil to die when his prison eventually sinks. As Neil struggles to get the boat moving, Kidman has to play cat and mouse with the increasingly deranged Zane.

A super little nail biter DEAD CALM is one of the great sea adventures. Brilliantly marrying the lost at sea subgenre with the psycho on the lose one we have two great stories working in tandem to keep our attention. One of the best things about Philip Noyce’s take on the tale is that in stripping the source story to its basics (several additional characters were removed) it allows Kidman to be not just a reactor waiting to be rescued but a woman in charge of her life.

Beautifully shot to maximize the isolation and the claustaphobia DEAD CALM works best of the big screen. It’s not a matter of the size of a picture but the fact that in a theater you are away from distractions so the you really feel isolated and a drift.

This is a great film.

See it Sunday at Lincoln Center as part of Scary Movies XI

SUSHI TUSHI OR HOW ASIA BUTTED INTO AMERICAN PRO FOOTBALL

One of the worst comedies of the decade has a desperate football team hiring sumo wrestlers to play on their offensive line.

Suffering from deficiencies on every level (bad cast, bad script) the film is DOA. If you need proof look at the altered visual style the film takes during the football games. clearly using green screen and overlays on the images. Its a desperate attempt to hide that the filmmakers went no where near a football field. Its a failed ploy to trick us into thinking they were clever, but it just looks awful.

The most awful thing of all is the complete lack of understanding of the rules of football and how the pro game works. The fact that the film doesn't understand the game it is about is going to piss off the only potential audience for the the film, drunken football fans. The mishandling of the game is so bad that anyone watching it will turn the film off ten minutes in.

Hands down one of the worst films I've seen in the last decade or two. Its so bad that even MST3K or RiffTrax couldn't improve it since it keeps shooting itself in the foot and you are dumbstruck by its awfulness.

Avoid this film at all costs

(Full disclosure SUSHI TUSHI won the audience award at Kew Gardens  for Best Feature Film.)

AHOCKALYPSE (2018) Hits VOD and DVD Friday

You're really going to read this piece and think I'm going to have a real review? Do you really think a hockey/zombie comedy can be taken seriously? I'm going to say a few words about AHOCKALYPSE but do you actually think anyone who is going to watch it really cares about "quality?" All that matters is is are there laugh and are the effects good. (Yes on both counts)

AHOCKALYPSE concerns a zombie out break right after a championship hockey game. As the winners party, the zombie plague spreads.

Full of knowing laughs and intentionally over the top blood and gore AHOCKALYPSE is a blast. I laughed and chuckled at both the jokes and the fire hose sprays of blood. Yes this is silly, and the filmmakers know it and use that to milk laughs such as the guy ho goes to help two frightened children but who are clearly undead monsters. We know how the sequence will go and it does, but its twisted in a knowing way to make the laughs come.

I had blast. And assuming you just go with the mirth and mayhem you will too.

A wonderful bloody delight, so get some popcorn and a beverage of choice and enjoy

Alligator (1980) Scary Movies XI

Lewis Teague’s ALLIGATOR is based on a story and script by John Sayles. That should be enough to tell you that this version of the alligator in the sewer story is not going to be your typical one.

The plot takes the well-worn mythic story about a baby alligator flushed down the toilet growing up to be a terror and spins it with genuine scares and humor. The film is genuinely chilling and appropriately funny in all the right spots. That it works as well as it does is largely due to Sayles stellar script which walks the fine line between serious and satire. It is pushed over the top by the cast head by Robert Forester and Henry Silva who play it perfectly, selling it to us at every turn.

Being old enough to remember the film’s original release in 1980, I remember the delight reviewers had at the film. Coming late in the wake of horror films that resulted from JAWS, ALLIGATOR was a film none of the critics really wanted to see, until they saw it in which case they gushed delightedly about how the film subverted conventions and balanced the horror and humor.

I don’t think that the film is remotely scary any more but it is still a great deal of fun. It is both still funny and surprising tense. I go for years between screenings and each time I see it always forget bits of what happened and find I’m leaning in waiting for things to happen.

If you’ve never seen ALLIGATOR and live in New York I highly recommend you make a mad dash for Lincoln Center on Saturday and see the film when it plays Scary Movies

Shock Waves (1977) Scary Movies XI

Criminally underappreciated throw back horror film about a group of vacationers stranded on an uncharted island where a mad Nazi doctor is still working on his super warrior project involving zombies.

Say what you will but when the freed zombie warriors come out of the ocean wearing their dark goggles one is filled with a deep sense of dread, sure this isn’t the scariest of horror films, as such, but at the same time you know that good things are not going happen and that people are going to die- badly. It’s one of those moments that once you’ve seen it becomes iconic in your memory. It’s an image that instantly locks the movie in your memory and makes the film something you carry with you.

I’m not going to lie and say the film breaks any new ground. It doesn’t do anything we haven’t seen before, especially if you are a fan of the mad scientist on the loose genre…however what it does do is take the tropes of the genre and shines them up as bright as possible. To my mind this is as good a mad scientist movie as you are likely to see.

I think the film works as well as it does because the cast headed by Peter Cushing sells the whole affair. We believe because they believe. The don’t play anything except straight on. This is the situation so this is how it goes. There is no nudges or winks, just the characters.

This isn’t to sell the technical aspects short. Director Ken Wiederhorn keeps things reigned in and under control. He doesn’t go for big sweeping moments, he keeps it tight and claustrophobic. He and his technical crew wisely don’t shoot for the moon but keep things with in their budget, they don’t try to do too much, which I like. Too many times low budget horror films try to over compensate for their financial short comings by over doing say in the monster department with the result either it’s too good or more often it’s completely over done for its circumstances.

This is a great great exploitation horror film and one any horror film lover worth their salt should see at least once.

Search this one out the next time you’re going to curl up on the couch on some rainy Saturday night or this Saturday afternoon when it plays at Lincoln Center a Part of their Scary Movies XI

Do You Trust This Computer? (2018)

How you react to DO YOU TRUST THIS COMPUTER will be determined on how much reading and watching you’ve done on the subject of artificial intelligence and our rapidly changing technological existence. The film is a kind of greatest hits that’s explores many of the ideas that having computers that thing in our lives means and will mean as they get closer to matching real living beings.

I mention the idea about how much you know as the key factor for this review because I was sitting at lunch during my day job watching the film when one of my co-workers came in to the room to ask me a question. Intrigued by the little bit she saw she wandered out and came back with her lunch and joined me for the majority of the film.

When the film was done we started to discuss the film and my friend talked about how much she liked the film. For her it was a revelation concerning how AI is changing the world and what it may mean for society. I, on the other hand, liked the film but having been fed a steady diet of similar films over the last few years I didn’t quite like it as much. To be certain I thought it was an excellent primer but it’s 70 odd minute run time kept it from fully exploring some of the ideas it brings up.

Is the film worth a look? Yes. Just be aware how much you ponder AI will determine how much you like the film.

DO YOU TRUST THIS COMPUTER opens Friday in theaters and VOD on August 21st

A Whale of a Tale (2017) opens Friday

This is a repost of my review which ran last year when A WHALE OF A TALE played Japan Cuts

A WHALE OF A TALE is one of the most important documentaries I’ve seen this year and I know it will also be one of the least seen. The film is a text book example of how to make a fair and reasonably unbiased film but no one will see it because it doesn’t follow in absolute lockstep behind the Oscar winning film The Cove. Additionally if a distributor wanted to release the film odds are it’s far from black and white portrayal of life in the Japanese town of Taiji would inflame animal rights activists to the point no one would want to run it.

A WHALE OF A TALE is a deeper look at the town at the center of the events depicted in the Oscar winning film THE COVE. The film was a brutal look at the killing of dolphins in the Japanese village of Taiji. It focused on how the animals were driven into the shallow water and killed. It was a film soaked in blood and made to provoke a reaction. Using THE COVE as a starting place WHALE OF A TALE returns to Taiji to look at the town, the people, the hunt and the protesters. It is a film that makes every effort to shine a light on every aspect of the story with the result the viewer is not quite as inflamed as one they were after seeing THE COVE.

Megumi Sasaki has made a brilliant film. A stunning piece of journalism the film walks us through the middle of everything so that we quickly realize that what seemed black and white is really much more gray. Sasaki's ability to do this is because she has placed at the center of the film journalist JayAlabaster an American who has been living in America. Sent by his bosses to get the story after the release of The Cove he quickly realized that there was more to the story than was being shown in the film. The people were not monsters and what was happening was nowhere as clear cut. Doing what any most people would never do he moved into the village and got to know everyone on all sides.

Over the course of the film are opinions of everyone fighting over the hunt changes. The villagers soften from the monsters of THE COVE into people we’d want to hang out with. We get to know them and their way of life. We see that there is more to what they are doing then slaughter for the sake of slaughter. (As they ask how is this different than how we kill beef or lamb).

The protesters meanwhile are fare a little worse. While we can see their point of view they come off as gruff, one note and rather annoying. They scream and yell, shoot video footage but they make no effort to understand the people they are screaming at or the culture that enjoys the food. When one of the women in the village says that if the white protesters from America simply stopped telling them how to live their lives the hunt would stop you really believe it. Nothing inflames feelings for something like attacking one’s way of life, even if it’s a fading one.

When the film ended I stared at the screen my mind racing. What did I just see? What does it mean? How do I feel? I’m still parsing that all out. Its been a long time since I’ve been affected on so many levels. I was moved both emotionally and intellectually. My heart went out to the villagers, while I was forced to consider how we treat the animals we use for food. While I’m not going to get into a discussion of animal rights the film made me really think about the issues connected with it.

A WHALE OF A TALE was easily one of the best films at Japan Cuts 2017. It was also one of the best films of 2017. Certainly any film that takes what you think you know about a subject and jumbles it up is worthy of praise. When it does it on a larger level and makes you think about not just its subjects (animal rights and protesting) and makes it bigger (not just one village but globally) and then forces you to rethink how you see the form (what are unbiased documentaries really?)

A must see when the film opens Friday.

Scary Movies XI starts Friday

The 11th edition of Lincoln Center’s Scary Movies is happening starting Friday. As many of you know the festival used to run in October around Halloween but the glut of fall programming it was being buffeted about so they moved to the summer to put a chill in the humid air.

I’m not going to go into a long gushy mash note for the festival because as long time readers will know I love the fest. Also one of the programmers is Rufus de Rham, one of the guiding spirits of New York Asian Film Festival so you know it's going to be good. Rufua is also a great guy and one of the best people I’ve met since starting Unseen Films. You know if he is involved in any project then it is worth your time, money and effort.

We will be dropping reviews all through the fest so keep checking back.

In order to help you choose a film or two or three or more before they all sell out I’d like to make a few suggestions.

TIGERS ARE NOT AFRAID is one of 2018’s best films. Think of it as a film by Guillermo del Toro but better. (Click on the this link to go to my review from Fantasia and this link to go to Nate Hood’s review)

LORDS OF CHAOS is hypnotic true crime tale about the early days of the Norwegian Black Metal band Mayhem which were filled with suicide, murder, arson and madness. It’s not really a horror film but it is a walk on the dark side (with an occasional laugh). It surprised and delighted me.

THE INHABITANT is a creepy little film about two sisters who break into a house to steal money and find something they shouldn’t have.

THE TRACE WE LEAVE BEHIND has the search for a missing patient in a hospital turning spooky. Grounded in real world problems this is a neat little chiller whose images will haunt you

Also all the Tainted Waters side bar films DAGON, DEAD CALM, ALLIGATOR and SHOCK WAVES are highly recommended.

I want to state that I saw and liked WHAT KEEPS YOU ALIVE but that the review will run after the Scary Movies screening and closer to the theatrical release.

Scary Movies runs August 17 to 23. For tickets and more information go here.

And a quick note to anyone who is going to look around for reviews of the films playing the festival- HURT World Premiered at Fantasia a couple weeks back the version that was supplied to reviewers, myself included, was not the finished film. It was a different cut running longer and with different edits and music. The mistake was discovered after the film premiered and after some reviews (including mine)  had run. We were told that we would have a chance to re-screen the film but it never happened because it happened so late in the festival. As of this writing I am looking to re-review the film because of the differences.   If you are looking at reviews from Fantasia of HURT see if you can work out if the review was based on the public screening or the screener (anything from July 26th or 27th is probably from the wrong cut). I say this because apparently there is a difference in reaction to the film.

In Brief: Chaos (2005)

Jason Statham is brought back to the police force to chase Wesley Snipes who stages a spectacular bank robbery. Paired with Ryan Phillipe things begin to get weird as they are forced to look for a pattern in the chaos that Snipes is causing.

This is a better than you think is should be action thriller. Don't let the by the numbers opening and early moments put you off. Once this gets going its a really good little thriller because it doesn't behave in the ways you expect it too. Indeed there are a couple of twists that really surprised me. And of course the action scenes are very well done. I liked it a great deal.

Worth some popcorn on the couch

Hangman (2018) Hollyshorts Film Festival

Zwelethu Radebe’s HANGMAN will move you. Even if you kind of figure out what it’s all about, the beauty, simplicity and grace of its telling will leave you moved and staring at the screen misty eyed.

The plot of the film has a black prison guard during Apartheid discovering his long absent father in a group of prisoners brought in to ne executed. As the time for execution approaches the story of the past is revealed.

Half way into the film I was rocked. My legs had been kicked out from under me. I was watching the lunch during my lunch break at my day job. One of my co-workers could hear me audibly reacting.

“Are you okay?” they asked.

“yea” I sighed. “Just watching a movie”

“That must be some movie.”

“It is” I replied.

HANGMAN is brilliant. It does more in its 22 minutes than most features do in 100.

While I could wax poetic about every bit of Hangman, the one thing you absolutely need to know is that what makes the film so powerful is that it gets every emotion dead on perfect. Every inflection, every gesture, every look everything that any one on screen does perfectly conveys the emotion of the situation. To take it further not only does the film get the emotion right it always feels right and true. Yes the film is playing with what we feel, but it doesn’t yank our chain or do something because it will get a reaction. When we reach the conclusion we find ourselves broken because we arrived there honestly. It is rare to find that depth of emotion in a feature film, but to find it in a short a form where directors take short cuts to get their points across is rarer.

It is a true cinematic treasure.

Hangman is a must see. It is one the best films you’ll see all year.

HANGMAN plays at Hollyshorts FIlm Festival Friday August 17th

THE MEG (2018)

When the director says in interviews that there is no deep meaning to his film and it is only about sharks eating people you know you are not going to be getting Hamlet. I'm more than fine with that especially when it is a film as fun as THE MEG.

It begins on an underwater rescue where Jason Statham is rescuing the crew of a sunken sub. When it begins to go south he realizes that there is something outside the subs. He leaves his two friends behind just as something crushes the sub in trouble. He saved 11 but lost two friends.

Five years later Statham is called into service when his ex-wife is in a crippled sub deeper than anyone has ever gone before. It seems a megladon has attacked the sub. He rescues his ex but something has followed them to the surface.

Grand diverting thriller has chills and laughs aplenty as Statham and his fellow actors tear into the nonsense with gusto and sell every damn minute of this. No it is fundamentally scientifically inaccurate so don't get your head in a tizzy about things not making sense, just go with the fun as rescues turn to flights from sharks and then the tables turn again and again as hunters become hunted and vice-versa

I do have to say that one of the things I liked from the trailers is that while the shots are in the film how they actually lay out is not what how you'd think. What happens really surprises

High art? Only of the entertaining kind- which is the best kind and as a result I had a great time.

Recommended.

Trauma (2018) Kew Gardens Festival of Cinema 2018

Warning: Due to the extreme graphic content of this film, absolutely no one under the age of 18 will be permitted. I.D.’s will be checked at the door.

**Absolutely no refunds will be given under any circumstances, including walk-outs.

That is the warning given on the Kew Gardens website for TRAUMA and it makes it clear they are expecting walkout- and they will get them in abundance. I'm convinced that the film was programmed with an eye toward both clearing the out the theater and locating the psychopaths that lurk in the borough (I hope they cart off anyone who stays to the end).

The film is essentially 106 minutes of brutality committed toward women as some friends go on vacation and are brutalized by the people they find there. It somehow relates to the evils of the past but I never really cared since I was disconnected from the start when a son is forced to rape his mother by his father who just beat him half to death. It gets uglier from there. Care Bears this is not.

I don't care that this film is supposed to reflect the pain and suffering of what happened in Argentina, this film is damn close to being morally reprehensible and is ultimately nothing more than torture porn. It's so far removed from the other films playing at the Kew Gardens Festival of Cinema that I would love to know which of the programmers picked it and then make sure they get psychological help.

My objection to the film is not because I don't like it but rather it is just ugliness for no real reason. Yes, I don't like the film, but I  hate the whole torture porn genre on the face of it.  Unless you can justify it some how (MARTYRS anyone?) I don't get the point of watching people brutalize each other to the point of death, more so when it is misogynistic .

To be honest the reason I'm getting my panties in a bunch is two fold- first this film being at Kew Gardens is a huge WTF. I've seen a chunk of the features and there is nothing close to this at the festival. If the film had played at Fantasia or one of the genre festivals I wouldn't have paid it any mind. Not only would I have paid it no mind I wouldn't have reviewed it. But with in the context of a sweet neighborhood festival this film doesn't belong. It's too much of a left turn into genre.

Additionally what the hell is this doing at a festival in the #metoo era? How can a festival justify showing a film that begins with not only an ugly rape but one that ups the ante several times, and which then proceeds to brutalize women, children and men for another 100 minutes? And while I'm sure there are reasons, why do you inflict a film like this on your patrons who are probably not going to be ready for it? This is like a 50 on a scale of 10.

And yes it's really well done, but I don't see any point other than to show the carnage. If I saw the reason I could accept the film. But there is no reason for the film to exist other than button pushing and no reason to be playing at Kew other than a mistake.

Trauma plays tonight at Kew Gardens at midnight and is not recommended for anyone other than torture porn fans and sociopaths.

MAKOTO SHINKAI at the Metrograph this weekend

With the Metrograph running a retrospective of the work of Makoto Shinkai I'm wanted to post the links to all of Unseen's coverage of his films

VOICES OF A DISTANT STAR
GARDEN OF WORDS
YOUR NAME
5 CENTIMETERS PER SECOND
CHILDREN WHO CHASE LOST VOICES

(And because apparently I have never posted a review of THE PLACE PROMISED IN OUR EARLY DAYS here is a link to a review by JB)

For tickets and more information go here

The Swan (2017) opens tomorrow

THE SWAN maybe one of the most beautiful films I’ve seen in 2018. The images are truly stunning. Mixed with an ethereal score it has the power to lift you out of your seat and transport you to the most beautiful places in Iceland. It is the sort of thing that makes the film a must see on a big screen.

On the other hand the story, about a young girl sent to stay with her aunt and uncle on their farm far from the coast is murky.

Nine year old Sol has been caught shoplifting and was sent to her aunt and uncle's farm to perform penance. There she runs straight into the hard life of the farm. Kept at a distance by those around her (and filmmakers who go out of their way to accentuate the isolation) Sol has to fend for herself. We also get a glimpse of the adult world that she doesn’t fully comprehend, or even notice.

While I admire the fact that director Ása Helga Hjörleifsdóttir’s doesn’t give us all the answers, Sol doesn’t know or doesn't understand life fully so we don’t either, I am not so keen on how it keeps us distant from everyone including Sol. We should be connecting to her but in a lot of ways she remains a cypher. I never was emotionally invested. And while I was not really emotionally invested I was kind of creeped out by her relationship with the farmhand because it is not kosher and darkened everything.

While I like THE SWAN, I don’t love it. It has the feel of a film that is trying way too hard to be deep and meaningful thanks to an artifice that gets in the way of a good story.

Worth a look for the cinematography but it’s going to end up a film you'll like more than love.