Capone's Art-House Round-Up with LIFE, ANIMATED, OUR LITTLE SISTER, and NUTS!!!

Hey, folks. Capone in Chicago here, with a few films that are making their way into art houses or coming out in limited release around America this week (maybe even taking up one whole screen at a multiplex near you). Do your part to support these films, or at least the good ones…


LIFE, ANIMATED
There were moments watching the latest from Oscar-winning documentary short winner (for MUSIC BY PRUDENCE, 2010) Roger Ross Williams where we almost can’t believe what we’re witnessing. LIFE, ANIMATED is the tale of Owen Suskind, a young man who drifted into virtual silence as a child when his autism took hold, and his life was never the same. After his frustrated family tried every means to attempt to communicate with young Owen, they almost accidentally discovered that he was finding important connection and communication tools through his frequent viewings of Disney animated films.

Owen’s journey is one built on pure emotion, as well as a basic understanding of how movies work. Strangely enough, Owen always seemed to identify with the heroes’ sidekicks, and when he would make up stories using his favorite characters and himself in new adventures, he would cast himself in the sidekick role time after time, as if he didn’t believe anyone would take him seriously enough to be the protagonist. Owen’s father is The Wall Street Journal reporter Ron Suskind, who wrote a best-selling book about his son’s continuing journey. Director Williams is able to capture key moments in Owen’s early adult life, including getting his first girlfriend, moving into his own apartment, running a movie club for other autistic young men and women, and even giving a speech on the unique means of breaking through to those with autism.

LIFE, ANIMATED doesn’t just give audiences a glimpse into Owen’s mind, but it attempts to paint a larger picture of how these films were used to give him a structure and set of social cues to make sense of the world around him. With guidance from his parents, Owen has become a highly functioning member of the autistic community who is even able to help others, but his journey was a long and slow one. The filmmakers use their own animation to place Owen in the world of Disney’s other characters to give clear examples of how he pictures himself among them.

I will admit, I was fascinated that most of Owen’s favorite films are from the more modern era of the studio’s animated works, including THE LITTLE MERMAID, ALADDIN, and THE LION KING. He relates to the outsider characters the most, including some of the bad guys. Jafar from ALADDIN is a particular favorite, and the film explores the reason this might be the case. Life, Animated is a constant source of discovery and fascination, and by the end, the juxtaposition of classic Disney cartoons and scenes from Owen’s life make complete sense. In a very real way, Owen is the reluctant hero of his own animated movie, populated by sidekicks and featuring a hero whose greatest enemy is his own mind. Through the animated world, Owen repeatedly defeats this nemesis and brings us along for the journey. This is a truly special and moving experience, especially for film fans.


OUR LITTLE SISTER
Sitting down to see the latest by acclaimed Japanese director Hirokazu Koreeda (STILL WALKING, NOBODY KNOWS, AFTER LIFE, LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON) was something of a rare treat, since I had no clue what the film was actually about. Our Little Sister continues the themes the filmmaker has addressed lately regarding abandoned children, but with a more genteel approach as three close-knit sisters invite their much younger stepsister to live with them after their mutual father passes away, leaving the youngest without many viable options for being raised.

OUR LITTLE SISTER is about family dissension in small doses. While the three sisters—Chika (Kabo), Yoshino (Masami Nagasawa), and eldest sister Sachi (Haruka Ayase), a hospital nurse who raised her younger sisters after their mother abandoned them years earlier—live together in their grandmother’s old house and seem to get along on most major issues, as we get to know them and see them interact, we begin to see the cracks in the relationship. They criticize each others’ taste in men, in the way they live their lives, and in how irresponsible they can be. But when they find out their long-gone father has died, they travel to his funeral, where they meet their half-sister Suzu (Suzu Hirose), a sweet and bright teenager whose existence seems to bring out the best in the older sisters.

And while Suzu’s presence can’t erase all of the hardships and drama in the family’s small universe of friends and extended family members, she gives them hope for a better future. OUR LITTLE SISTER is a work of small measures; there are no true villains in the piece, simply characters who made selfish and poor decisions in the past and are forced to stare them in the eyes years later. The performances are so charming that you wish you would become a part of the family, but they’re still believable enough for you to see where problems will crop up over time. Far from sentimental, the movie still manages to have its heart in the right place, even when something mildly traumatic occurs, such as the older girls’ mother showing up, armed with veiled threats about selling the house they live in.

As Americans, we’re so used to family dramas with overblown, soap operatic and unrealistic situations that I spent a good half the film waiting for melodrama to kick in, and it never does. OUR LITTLE SISTER believes in the power of communication, openness and staying in the room during a harsh conversation. Ayase as the eldest sister also gives the finest performance as a woman who passes a small amount of judgment on her sisters’ personal lives, while secretly dating a married man, knowing full well it’s going nowhere.

Perhaps because the film simply runs its course rather than allowing its story to unfold as overly crafted plot, OUR LITTLE SISTER maintains a dignified front—a staple of Koreeda’s films. I can’t imagine anyone coming out of this film who isn’t a bit jealous of these sisters and their unstoppable bond. Each sister exits the film a little wiser and more aware of who she is, and we feel that young Suzu is being raised by good people. The work is a satisfying and emotionally enriching experience, which is too rare a treat in the movies these days.


NUTS!
Have goat glands ever been this sexy? Actually, they were back in the early part of the 20th century when a country doctor began treating impotence and male sterility by surgically implanting slivers of goat testicles. Scientifically, it didn’t make sense, but his patients claimed to suddenly be able to perform and get their wives pregnant as a result of the procedure, and Dr. John Romulus Brinkley became rich and famous as a result. Demand for the surgery was so great, the good doctor had to start raising the goats himself. His homespun wisdom and devoted patient base made him so popular in his native Milford, Kansas, that he was nearly elected governor of the state.

Then why have you likely never heard of this man, and why isn’t his procedure discussed in medical textbooks around the world? The documentary NUTS! traces Dr. Brinkley’s career, which includes becoming the host of his own radio network (at the time, it was the most powerful in the world), the inventor of junk mail (he sent out unsolicited catalogs of all his medical products), and his path to living in the lap of luxury, until a well-documented court case changed everything. Director Penny Lane (OUR NIXON) has dug up every photograph and available audio recording, which doesn’t amount to much, so the film uses a great deal of simply-rendered animation to fill in some of the blanks. Perhaps the most clever aspect of the film is that it uses Brinkley’s own memoir as the primary narrative device for about half the film, until we begin to sense that the doctor is something of an unreliable source. At that point, newspaper articles and court transcripts get us a little closer to the truth.

NUTS! reveals a man who is so convinced that he’s helping his patients with completely unproven methods and medicines that he starts to believe his own fiction, which includes a great deal of his self-penned biography. More to the point, his followers were so devoted to him that they didn’t seem to care about nuisance like medical science, proof, research or the truth. These folks were so in love with the mythology around Brinkley, they simply chose to ignore any facts that strayed from it. And frankly, the con artist version of Dr. Brinkley is far more interesting than the simpering man on the witness stand having his life picked apart by pesky lawyers.

NUTS! is both a hilarious account of a bygone era that we’ve likely convinced ourselves could never be repeated and a cautionary tale reminding us that con artists come in many shapes and sizes. Somewhere in Brinkley’s head, he thought he was helping people. Or at least he’d been telling himself that for so long, he’d convinced himself it was true. The documentary is as much about the types of people who perpetrate such schemes as it is about those who fall for them. It’s fascinating and intriguing no matter how you slice it.

-- Steve Prokopy
"Capone"
capone@aintitcool.com
Follow Me On Twitter