Tons of stuff from our man in Sweden, TheNorthlander, as he wraps up his coverage of the Stockholm Film Festival in three or four more reports today and tomorrow.
First up, he’s got reports on four films he saw, along with an account of exactly the kind of scheduling crisis that all festivalgoers eventually wrestle with. Good stuff:
Hi again, The Northlander here with the 5th report from this year's Stockholm International Film Festival.
Every morning when I wake up, the first thing I do is check my pocket schedule for what to see today, I've marked every movie showing to be better able to choose on a whim in case I don't get in on one screening and have to go somewhere else. I'll tell you though, so far it's been pretty easy to get in because even when the show is sold out there's always a seat empty for one reason or another. Last minute cancelations, people changing their minds, what have you.
I also always check the pocket schedule every morning against the festival's website to see which ones of the marked for viewing I need to catch today because I won't get another chance later on. This morning, I noticed by complete chance that the film DOG EAT DOG, was removed from the schedule and replaced with another film called THE SKY CRAWLERS. I clicked it to see what that was, and it turned out to be an anime. 'Ok, that's nice' I figured, and looked it up on imdb where it said it's the new film by Mamoru Oshii, who directed one of my favorite animated films ever - GHOST IN THE fucking SHELL. Not only that, but with music by Kenji Kawaii who's like one of my favorite film composers - This guy made not only the unforgettable and absolutely amazing score to GHOST IN THE SHELL, but also two other of my favorite films ever - DARK WATER and RINGU, both by Hideo Nakata who's like also one of my favorite directors. Get me drunk and ask me about music in horror movies, and I will rant on and on about Kenji Kawaii's musical timing.
Not only that, but THE SKY CRAWLERS opened in August 2008 in Japan, and hasn't really had a big release yet it seems according to imdb.
And this was the last of two screenings they were doing with this film in Stockholm. Naturally, it was sold out.
How could I have missed this? Fudge.
On top of this, to make matters worse, this film was starting at 9pm, and at 8.30pm the last screening of BROTHERS BLOOM for this festival was held. I missed the press screening, and both previous showings of this. It was sold out as well, but I figured I might get lucky. Afterwards, the plan was to get over to Grand to see CHOCOLATE at 11pm.
Now, SKY CRAWLERS is 122 minutes long (including after credits), and it's a good five or ten minute run between theaters. Would I get in at all? If I tried and failed I would have missed THE BROTHERS BLOOM as well. If I tried and succeeded, I might not be able to see CHOCOLATE or I would at least probably miss the first five minutes.
But damn, if I succeeded... I would get to see THE SKY CRAWLERS, and based on the director and composer - there was just nothing else I could do.
I had to try.
THE SECRET LIFE OF BEES
USA
Directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood
I started out today with a film with Dakota Fanning. The real one this time, and not her sister. This is yet another one that's already opened in the US, it seems this year the Stockholm Film Festival is late with a lot of these movies focusing more on what's been shown in Sundance last year, and less on what's going to be shown at festivals next year. Not that many world premieres.
THE SECRET LIFE OF BEES is the story of 14 year old Lily Owens, played by Dakota, who grows up alone with her overly strict and not very nice guy father T. Ray (Paul Bettany) in South Carolina 1964. What happens is, when she's four, her mother and father have a falling out. Her mother leaves and disappears for a while, and when she comes back there is a fight during which four year old Lily gets hold of the gun. The gun goes off and kills her mother, something that her father will blame her for the rest of her life, and subsequently so will she.
Ten years later, a chain of events is triggered involving the African-Americans' right to vote, racism in the American south at that time, and Lily and T. Ray's dysfunctional relationship; which leads to Lily taking off together with their African-American housekeeper Rosaleen (Jennifer Hudson). They end up searching for clues about Lily's mother and where she disappeard off to before she came back and got killed, and find sanctuary at a bee keeping farm owned by three black sisters, played by Queen Latifah, Alica Keyes and Sophie Okonedo.
There is something very CIDERHOUSE RULES about this film, only it's set in the south.
It's got all your regular stuff in it that we've come to expect from a Hollywood movie about the American south in the 60s (except maybe the soundtrack isn't filled with nostalgic pop songs). It's got a great well balanced drama and goes into so many different things, like the political climate of that time and place, the atmosphere of the south, family tragedies, getting to know your parents...
Being a white dude growing up in a small town in the northlands of Sweden (I think there were two or three colored people in my school growing up, all of them adopted), I'm not gonna lie and say I can ever fully relate to racism on this level that these people had to go through. But I can certainly identify with growing up with one parent and searching for the truth about the other one that you never knew. There is so much about that part of this story that the movie gets right, and at the end when Lily confronts her dad - it's so easy to just do something stereotypical there but this film manages to keep it on a real level showing a true depth to even T.Ray's character. He's an asshole in the film, and whatever happened between him and Lily's mom, who also had her share of issues, is complicated to say the least. The fact that we only experience this through the eyes of their young daughter, and we only find out what she finds out is a great strength in this piece of writing. I don't know if it's the same in the novel it's based on, these things tend to be more detailed in the source material often, but the film works brilliantly.
If you haven't seen this film yet, and you want a good drama, get this on your Must-See list. You'll want it there.
BACK SOON (SKRAPP ÚT)
Iceland
Directed by Sólveig Anspach
This one was a gamble. There really wasn't much showing at this time, and the choice was between this one and another one called EVERYBODY DIES BUT ME about teenagers in a Moscow suburb. I chose this because it was different and because I had a friend who showed up for it as well.
BACK SOON is a film about a pot dealing woman in Iceland who also writes poetry. She's got two kids, an ex husband and a big marijuana deal going. Things happen on top of eachother and we're introduced to a number of characters and weird events involving a French kid who wants to write a thesis about her poetry, her ex husband trying to kill himself, a goose swallowing a cell phone and a drug party.
BACK SOON isn't bad per se, but it does have a lot of problems though. One of them being I'm not sure what it's supposed to be or if even the writer knows. It's not funny enough to be a comedy, it's not dramatic enough to be a drama, it's not really anything enough to be anything. It's an indie film that never really gets off the ground. I'm sure there's stuff in it that could have become something, but I sort of get the feeling Sólveig Anspsach doesn't have full control of this story. Maybe that's deliberate, I don't know. But that's what it felt like, and I think this film COULD have been better than it actually is.
THE SKY CRAWLERS
Japan
Directed by Mamoru Oshii
Around 8pm, or shortly after, credits start to roll on BACK SOON and I make my way out. I've still got 30 minutes until THE BROTHERS BLOOM, which is sold out and I might get in if I'm lucky - or I could wait an hour until 9pm for THE SKY CRAWLERS - which is also sold out.
Of course I decide to wait. Thing is, when it's a film that's been switched like this in the last minute, a lot of people who come will want to refund their tickets. There will be seats available. After getting a hot dog from 7-Eleven, I talk to the festival people, get first in line for a spare seat and wait. They can't start letting people with Industry passes in until after the introduction because tickets go first, and around ten minutes past nine I'm in. Awesome-O.
THE SKY CRAWLERS start off with an absolutely breathtaking areal dog fight between figher planes in a cloudy sky - with some amazing sound editing and sound design. The rattling machine guns, the propeller planes, the score (naturally) - and I've got to also mention the actual soundmix - are fantastic. The animation is gorgeous with lots of different styles blended together through out this movie - you got the traditional 2D animation, the CG stuff looks very real but blends in too in a way it often does not in anime... there's just so many things going on here - and that's just the during the opening sequence.
We move on as these weird propeller driven fighter planes finish up their fighting, and move through the clouds with the opening credits. After a while, as we move down towards the ground and the camera approaches a small landing strip, when we get close to the strip I notice how the actual credits - that all this time have had a line drawn through them - casts a shadow on the ground when we move in, and now that line looks kind of like wings for the credits even though it's just a line.
Details like that is why I love the work of Mamoru Oshii.
Oshii's trademark Basset hound hangs around the airfield as well, and in his first appearance, he's running towards the new recruit and main character, Kannami Yuichi, after he lands there; the Basset's big ears flapping exactly like wings as it runs.
Kannami is there to take over after another pilot, and is expecting to meet the last one as he comes in, but finds out he won't be. Also, he won't be allowed to keep his plane, he'll use the last pilot's, which is exactly the same model. This is odd to him, but he goes with it. Other things are odd too, like how the other pilots there seem to know him a little bit already and how things there seem vagely familiar but he can't place them from where... but he still goes with it and accepts things for how they are.
As the story goes on we find out more and more about how things really work here, who these so called 'Kildren' who can't grow old are and why things seem to be a bit off with the world for them.
The music, like I said is great, and it's got this sadness to it but other times like during battles it almost a cross between GHOST IN THE SHELL (with the otherworldly singing) but with a little bit of TOP GUN flavor to it almost. Which works really well for some reason.
It's a film you have to see more than once, that's evident. I already want to see it again to find more little things about it that I didn't notice the last time, and to understand the plot better. You do get to find out in the end though, it's not one of those inaccessible open endings, but there's a lot of other things going on as well and multiple viewings is recommended.
Great film, it's been a while since I saw an anime last so that was fun.
I hear after the credits there's one more scene, but I didn't get to see it, because once the credits start to roll, I'm running like hell to get to the CHOCOLATE screening after this one.
CHOCOLATE
Thailand
Directed by Prachya Pinkaew
When I finally get to the cinema, they had just started the film. I go in, and the studio logo is still showing.
I friggin' made it.
This, I thought to myself, would be awesome. I'd seen the trailer when it came out, the one with all the injuries and stuff. You've all probably seen it as well. It's a good trailer. Looks kinda like if ONG BAK had a baby with KILL BILL, and then that baby is autistic but learns martial arts by watching movies.
Cool concept, fun to see a girl in an action role like this for a change, could be nice indeed.
It starts out okay. the girl's (she's called Zen) brother discovers her talents to be able to catch things. He sorts of half takes advantage of that to get money by letting her perform and have people throw balls at her that she catches, but since the money is going to medical bills anyway I guess it's okay.
The story goes, that Zen's mother and father were separated before she was born. Her father is Japanese and the mob boss forces her mother away from him and says if they ever have contact again he'll kill them, or do something bad to them (maybe he'll make them watch SOI COWBOY?) or something. I have to say the translation of this was really bad. I noticed, because it's subtitled in both Thai and English, and there are a few lines spoken in English but it seems the translator has translated from the Thai subtitles for some reason, and it's kind of off.
Basically what happens is, Zen ends up fighting first a bunch of people they're collecting money from - see they find this book with people owing their aunt money. Then, they end up fighting the mob. Let's just get straight to the point here because what matters is the fighting. There really isn't much else to this.
I would say even, this is structured more like a videogame than an actual movie, with her fighting henchmen - at one point on platforms outside the house in a way that would make Super Mario want to call his lawyers.
Unfortunately, while the story is way thinner and less interesting than that of Pinkaew's earlier film ONG-BAK - it COULD be due to poor translation - BUT, be warned that the action, and the choreography and the girl in the lead role isn't nearly as good as it looked in the trailer either. There are just so many chosen angles and edit cuts and shots that are there to make her look a lot better than she actually is, it's kind of hard not to notice. Since the drama of this isn't really that interesting, it's hard to invest any feelings towards anything but the action and that's very... early 90s. Not early 90's like SHOOTER was, because I liked SHOOTER. It doesn't really work here, even on a retro level, in an age where people are either used to BOURNE or THE MATRIX.
It's not the fresh breeze ONG-BAK was, because ONG-BAK is ten times better than this. I'm sad to say it, but I didn't like CHOCOLATE at all. There just wasn't anything there for me to like. And that fight towards the end... You know, in some martial arts films the big boss has a henchman that's just been hanging around until the end? Or in some martial arts films, they have a boss fight at the end where the fighter has a stupid gimmick? This is stupid gimmick fighting at it's worst.
Ok so you got this autistic girl who's been fighting and defeating everybody in the mob (the credibility of this I will not touch because they don't go for being credible here) but here's the thing: at the end, when she's finally there, and she's facing off against The Big Boss and his crazy 88, who do they bring out? A fucking breakdancer complete with adidas clothes and nerd glasses. What else? He's got twitching ticks - and because of this, logic would apparently dictate it seems, that Since She Is Autistic And Has Therefore Become A Good Fighter, and he has twitching ticks --- he also has to be a good fighter and is the only one who could beat her.
Yeah... Uh-huh.
So what does she do to beat him? She immitates his style and kicks his ass, because I guess that worked with The King of Kicks in TAI CHI BOXER. See, this is gimmick film making at its worst. This is the martial arts equivalent to the Farrelly brothers finding a new medical condition for their latest comedy and cast Jim Carrey as an epileptic guy and we're supposed to laugh because he's got a seizure. Der!
DAMN I really wanted to like this movie. The trailer looked so awesome. ONG-BAK was really good, had crazy fights and that elevated it above the rest.
CHOCOLATE was a big disappointment although I'm sure it has a less demanding audience out there somewhere.
It's not for me though. I'm not impressed.
So that's it for me today, I'm starting to finally having seen most of the ones I really wanted to see, but there's still a week left and still a few to come.
It's not over yet.
/The Northlander
