Dos disparos – Viennale 2014

Nothing really matters, does it?

Dos disparos, ARG/CHL, 2014

Mariano is your typical 17-year-old: dancing frantically in a disco one minute, playing the recorder in a woodwind quartet the next, mowing the lawn and shooting himself twice with a gun he has just found in the shed. Why? Well, it was a hot day and shooting is what you are supposed to do with a gun, isn’t it? Dos disparos starts with very strong and powerful scenes that makes the audience hungry for more. We want to know how Marianos seemingly random act affects his life and those of the people around him. But none of the questions gets answered in this film. Even more, it’s like writer and director Marín Rejtman wanted to tell us everything else but the answers.

Everyone, including Mariano, is quite relaxed about his supposed suicide attempt. His mother does remove all the knives from the house but that might as well be because they were only having fast food anyway. Does Mariano take his antidepressants? No. Does anyone care? No. Is anyone worried that he is suddenly making weird whistling sounds while he is playing the recorder? No, that will surely pass. The world of Dos disparos is one without consequences or developement. If something unusual happens, nobody seems to worry, as it will soon be back to normal anyway. This impression is heightened by the unemotional acting style and the very dry humor that slowly seeps into the film.

Right after the beginning, the film disintegrates into several, loosely connected storylines. There is Marianos brother who falls in love with a girl who works in a fast food restaurant. She has been in the process of leaving her current boyfriend for over 2 years now. He can’t remember if he has had sex with her sister or not, but those things don’t matter, nothing really does. Marianos mother is burnt out from her job as a lawyer. She goes to a psychotherapist but after lying silently on the couch for 10 seconds, it becomes clear that therapy is not working. Instead, she goes on a holiday with some people she doesn’t really know or care for to her seaside appartement she doesn’t really like. There, she spends a few boring days with some boring people. Mariano himself is occupied with his broken and permanently ringing mobile phone, he’s playing the recorder, or being denied access to institutions with metal detectors as one of the bullets is probably still in his body. Or maybe the bullet isn’t in there any more. Nobody knows and, you guessed it, nobody cares.

If this sounds chaotic and strange to you, well, that’s because this film is just that. You can lose yourself in it and it will keep your attention for a while. But its narrative inconsistencies and the sudden changes in tone and atmosphere will sooner or later leave you baffled. You’ll be waiting for the next gag, rather than being interested in the various stories. Much like the film itself, you become indifferent towards the people in it. The potential for satire, that is clearly present in the premise of the film, is therefore sadly waisted on a few funny, but ultimately shallow jokes.

Still, the movie is largely very enjoyable and probably ranks above the average Viennale-experience. I don’t know why this review sounds so negative, if it even does? I’m probably still a bit rusty.

1 or 2?: 1

Goodbye, Nuclear Family

Rebel Without a Cause, USA, 1955

It’s never good to watch a film with high expectations. It’s like asking for disappointment. [Does this apply to life as well?] Unfortunately my expectations for Rebel Without a Cause were quite high. James Dean, cult movie, rebelling youths, you name it, this film has the reputation of delivering it all.
It is deemed unfair to judge any film from nearly 60 years ago, especially one that focusses on social norms and conventions, from a “modern” point of view. But is it? May I be so bold as to question this paradigm, madame or sir? I can’t possibly know what it is like to live in 1955, sometimes I’m not even sure what it is like to live in 2013, to be honest. I can try to understand the significance of a film for its timeperiode, but that doesn’t mean my experience becomes more “authentic”. [Now that I’ve written that, I’m not sure anyone actually claims that. Hm…] But don’t get me wrong, I love films and art in general that breaks conventions and questions the unwritten rules of society.

Somewhere in this confused first paragraph, you might find the reason why I don’t get this film. Or James Dean. They feel very remote. I can understand why this film was important at the time it was made but I don’t quite get its significance for today. Just take a look at James Deans character Jim Stark, the unruly teenager, strong and independent, but deep inside he just wants a real father and a real mother. This ideal of a father-mother-child-family is everywhere in the film. All problems in it are explained by the fact that the teenager don’t have this standardised family to depend on. There is no hierarchy therefore there is chaos.

It also doesn’t help that all the teenage characters in the film look a lot older than they actually are. This may sound like a ridiculous complaint, but it is really irritating. Not as irritating as the fact that no one in this film actually cares if someone dies, though. The whole plot is crammed into 24 hours and yet it’s enough time for Natalie Wood’s character Judy, to get over the tragic and unexpected death of her boyfriend, fall in love with his rival and become best friends with the weird outsider who dies just a couple of hours later. But she doesn’t care because she has finally found a man she can really love. Hm. I’m not quite sure what to make of that.

There is an offputting amount of characters seeking male approval in this film. Jim Stark and his mother need a strong father figure to function “normally”. Judy needs Jim to compensate for the rejection she experiences from her father, but only after Jim has proven to be manlier than her boyfriend, who dies in the process. There is the überfather working for social services, whose absence in a time of need triggers even more tears. Plato, whose absent father is the reason he feels so attracted to Jim. Insert homosexual tension here. But of course these forbidden feelings result in Plato’s death, there is no room for such perverted affections in this film. [Now that was unfair. Or was it?] And it just goes on and on.

You might have guessed by now, Rebel Without a Cause is not going to be one of my favourite films of all time. I can understand why people are fascinated by it or think it is an important movie. But is it really good?

There is nothing original about you

Oslo, 31. august, NO, 2011

I have got a problem with drugs in films. It has become commonplace, especially in “indie” or “alternative” (or, indeed austrian) movies, to use them to characterize your protagonist. 99% of the times, taking drugs in films has got nothing whatsoever to do with the story, it’s just a way to say “yeah, she/he is really THAT messed up!”. You are “cool” and “realistic” and “edgy” if you show someone snorting a line of cocaine, you don’t have to explain it, it doesn’t have to be consistent with the rest of the character’s personality, it explains itself and much more than that. A handy plot device you don’t have to take seriously.
Needless to say that this film actually does take the issue seriously, otherwise why would I write this long introduction?

But the film is not really about drug addiction, at least not for me. It is about finding a way to live your life or rather failing to do so. Everyone in this film is somehow lost in his or her own idea of what life should be like. Some characters are still fighting, desperately clinging to ideals they held when they were younger, some have given up and just accepted that they can’t change anything about their lives. It’s a rather bleak and unwelcoming world into which Anders, the protagonist, returns after spending several months at an institution for recovering drug addicts. Even his closest friends are too busy keeping up with their own expectations of their lives, to realise how much Anders could need their help right now. “Don’t do anything stupid. You’d fuck me up so bad.”, his best friend says to Anders, after he has just told him that he is thinking about killing himself.

There is one particularly powerful scene: Anders sits in a café, listening to the conversations of people at the other tables. After he has listened to a couple of people talking about their problems, his attention shifts towards two students who read out a list of things that are guaranteed to make you happy. The kind of list you get on facebook ever so often, containing cliché things like planting a tree, swimming with dolphins and winning a lot of money. But listening to the list does not just make you thing about how ridiculous these things are, it makes you question our own plans for your life. It exposes how much of our lives is determined by expectations we just blindly copy from others.

If you don’t like films that make you sad or pensive, you should probably not watch this one but you would miss a really thoughtful and well made film. And had it not been for About Chocolate Parfaits, I would have probably never seen it. So go and read her review of this film, it’s actually a lot better mine. So why didn’t I just post the link without all of these unnecessary words around it, I hear you ask? Well, I don’t know.

And the Winner is… The Top Hat!

Lincoln, USA, 2012

This seems to be the right time so say something profound: Nothing lasts forever. Once upon a time, when we were kids, we all forgot to check our brightly coloured wristwatches and suddenly here we are, all grown up, discussing politics and wedding dresses just like the adults whom we used to find incredibly boring. All good things are in the past. The present doesn’t offer anything that will ever bring you as much joy as the things you experienced in your childhood, the memories of which you will soon forget, one by one, again proving that nothing lasts forever. There is only one thing that could make this depressing thought worse: In the present there are films like Lincoln, that are not only bad but also prove you wrong by simply refusing to end. Ever. [This was a very complicated way of saying, “The film is too long.”, and, ironically, it was also much too long.]
Should you choose to watch it, though I would strongly advise you against that, here is a useful rule of thumb: There is this awful joke that operas end once the fat lady stops singing, similarly, Lincoln ends once every character has given a pathetic [nice double meaning there] speech of epic proportions.

Although the story itself is definitely interesting, it is drawn out, stretched, diluted [please choose the metaphor you like best] until you just don’t care anymore. Somewhere in this unsavoury mix of pathos, patriotism, good white men liberating slaves, humble and grateful black servants, long and boring anecdotes, good Republicans, bad Democrats, slaughtered civil war soldiers, more patriotism and some moments of patriotism, there is Daniel Day-Lewis trying his best. Most of the other actors are incredibly stiff and really painful to watch, maybe with the exception of James Spader, but unfortunately his scenes just don’t fit together with the rest of the film.

I don’t doubt for a second that this film is going to win some of the 12 Oscars it is nominated for. It was made to win Oscars, it is Schindler’s List II. Let’s just go through the categories quickly:
Cinematography, Costume Design, Production Design, Sound Mixing, Editing: standard Stephen Spielberg-stuff, nothing really noteworthy there, sometimes even painfully uncreative;
Music: John Williams of course, horrible, melodramatic, drowning out all other emotions, garnished with allusions to the national anthem of the USA, just to remind you of what the film is really about.
Supporting Roles: Tommy Lee Jones is probably ok, but Sally Field? Really? Why? For standing in front of the camera?
Screenplay: Confused, disorganised. Let’s leave it at that.
And finally: Directing and Best Picture of the Year: Why? There is nothing about this film to justify that. It feels as clumsy and amateurish as these reenactments you get in bad documentaries. Every second you expect someone from Leeds University to appear on the screen to tell you something you already knew about the civil war or Lincoln’s family life… or soup.

Even worse, the film assumes that you are stupid and incapable of following a story. Everything is explained ten times, thoughts or feelings of any character are immediately verbalized and discussed at great length. During what should probably be the climactic scene, in which the members of the Congress take the deciding vote on the abolition of slavery, there are actually shots of people writing down things like “8 more to win”. And instead of getting excited about a vote, the result of which you already know for your history lessons at school, you think about why anyone would ever bother to write something like that down. And then you realize that this shot was just for you, in your seat in a cinema full of people eating popcorn, so that you may understand what is happening on that screen opposite of you. This is not the only scene in which the film destroys itself. Actually, you never even get the opportunity to get into it because there is nothing behind the lifeless images you can connect to, nothing to discover or feel.

When I started this blog, I promised myself, that I would never write posts in which I just go on about what I dislike about a film. I just don’t think that that is constructive, interesting or helpful. But I’m really struggling here. Sure, Daniel Day-Lewis is good, as I’ve written above. But apart from that?
Anything I write now is going to sound sarcastic anyway, so I should probably just stop writing. Which is exactly what I’m going to do now.

I did like Abraham’s top hat though.

A kidnapped wife has never been funnier

Frantic, USA/FR, 1988

The 80s must have been just great. At least the 80s in movies are. Bad hairstyles, tacky music, drugs everywhere, good Americans, bad Arabs, “bof” French supersexed cool people. Oh, wait, that’s exactly what they will say about the 2010s in 30 years time. Or maybe they will just laugh at us while they sit in their hovercars stroking their perfectly moisturized skin. You bastards from the future, how dare you judge us!

I really didn’t know anything about the film when I went to see it, just that it is by Roman Polanski and that there is some sort of luggage-mixup at an airport, that results in… something. And as the film unfolded I was fooled into thinking that this was going to be just one of those films we all know: woman gets mistaken for someone else, is kidnapped, husband has to save her and possibly the world. But there is so much more to this film than that!

First of all, it doesn’t take itself too seriously. (Which is always good.) Harrison Ford’s character (yes, it’s one of the good Harrison Ford films) is wonderfully clumsy and inept. He is not the cool hero, who goes mental until he is surrounded with corpses and holds the fair maiden in his hands, most of the things he tries to do, go wrong, very wrong indeed. He is chased from one embarrassing situation to the next, but that’s exactly why we feel for him. The problems he is faced with are problems we all know (maybe apart from the one, where your spouse is kidnapped by someone and you have to prevent world-wide war), they are not action-hero problems. He has to deal with bureaucracy, people hanging up phones because they don’t take him seriously and he has to go to clubs he is just not cool, hip or whatever enough for. (That last one may be a very personal problem of mine)

As the story progresses, the film gets more and more funny. There is situational comedy, satire, slapstick, some quite surreal moments. It’s these humorous elements that make this film so entertaining, without them it would just be another boring kidnap-and-rescue film. It also contains the best and funniest dance scene I’ve seen in a long time. I wanted to describe it, but that’s kind of impossible, so just watch it here NOW! Or watch the whole film, I really don’t want to pressure you either way.

5 Films in less than 20 words. No.1

1. Amour (2012): Reminded me of my civilian service. Excellent acting, but the film just didn’t leave a lasting impression.

2. Them! (1954): A-Bombs are bad for your children! The message behind the giant ants and casual misogyny still feels very relevant.

3. Duck Soup (1933): Great slapstick, awful songs. Still, laughed my head off.

4. Modern Times (1936): I love this film! Not only about a film on industrialisation but also on the end of silent films.

5. 300 (2006): Worst film I’ve seen in 2012. There is just one thing that could be worse: a prequal.

Exactly what it said on the tin

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, 2012

Ok, I’ve seen the movie twice now so here is something really banal-sounding I wanted to share with no-one: I could just write: “Well, it’s a Lord of the Rings-film, what do you expect?”, but that would be too easy. And what’s more, I recently posted that under a comment by the brilliant Nora on Facebook, only to be corrected by someone, who argued: “everybody has to stop comparing this to Lord of the Rings. it’s a different story, lighthearted and funny. it’s not about the fate of the world […] but about dwarfs who want to return to their treasure and their village. pce out”. Pce out indeed, I can’t argue with the last part of that (because that’s the story) but I’ve got some problems with the first half. [I just noticed that this post is really starting to be bitchy and whiny… get to the point already!]

The film is oozing gravity. The simple plot of the return of the dwarfs to their old home is completely lost in heaps of pathos and hundreds of profound-looking faces. And it is actually about the fate of the world, if we believe Gandalf and creepy Galadriel. And the story is not lighthearted at all. The dwarfs are constantly running away from creatures that try to kill them and some scenes are really unpleasant, especially everything Gandalf does in the lair of the goblins. (What’s wrong with you, Gandalf? Slitting open bellies and very nonchalantly knocking off a goblin’s head you have just severed from its body? Tarantino would be proud!)

Still I enjoyed the film. [Probably the right time to say that.] Not so much because of the story, rather
in spite of it. All these pledges of allegiance to the Aragornesque dwarf king and bonding processes and acts of melodramatic heroism are not my cup of tea.
I enjoyed it because of Ian McKellen (just lovely), Andy Serkis (brilliant) and Martin Freeman who does his very best to draw our attention away from the fact that he has got no motivation whatsoever to go on that journey by being a bloody good actor. (No need to say that he is a hundred times better than Elijah Wood, is there? [Here I go again, comparing LotR and The Hobbit, I just can’t help it])

Maybe all the things I have criticised are not at all bad, and now that I’ve written them down my complaints seem rather petty and unimportant to me. There is something behind all of that, that I really hated: the camerawork. By that I don’t mean CGI, 3D and HFR (which my inner tech-nerd is really excited about. It actually makes a huge difference!). I mean the images themselves, the mise en scène, if you pardon the poncy expression. Why is there always someone in the frame whose face tells us how we have to understand the scene? Oh, Gandalf looks concerned, oh that dwarf’s expression tells me that this anecdote is going to be really important for the rest of the film. And why the swooping shots at the beginning? Of course it looks nice but you don’t have to shove our faces into it! And all the heroic moments and reconciliations would be a lot less cheesy if they were not always taking place at dusk or dawn, dramatic lighting included.

Well, this has been therapeutic! It feels bad ending this entry like that, so let me just say that I am looking forward to the next two films and repeat that I also enjoyed this one. That bit at the end was just a little bit of unfiltered rage. It’s late, you know.

P.S.: Am I the only one who felt that the bromance between Fili and Kili is a bit … weird? Yes? Ok, I’ll shut up then.

On the [Rail]road with Buster Keaton

Last night I was at the Vienna Filmmuseum and watched three the last films of Buster Keaton. A brilliant episode of The Twilight Zone [it’s called Once upon a Time, watch it, watch it now!], a very strange short written by Samuel Beckett [just called Film] and this little gem here, which is probably going to be in my list of favourite films for a very long time:

Whisky for Optimists

The Angel’s Share (Dir.:Ken Loach, SP.:Paul Laverty) UK/FR/BE/IT, 2012

I guess I would have never watched that film, had I not won the tickets for it. So I should probably thank the almighty chance that I did (even if it was after what seemed like hours of speeches and boring pseudo-reflective trailers on “the past, present and future of cinema)

The plot of the film is rather simple: Scottish troublemaker Robbie gets one last chance to get his life back on track or it’s off to prison and good-by girlfriend & newborn son. During his community service he becomes good friends with Harry, who introduces him to the fine and delicate world of whisky. When Robbie hears of the discovery of a very rare and valuable barrel of whisky, he thinks he has found the perfect way out of his misery: together with three friends he is going to steal the barrel.

Don’t be fooled by the apparent simplicity of the story. The first half of it is actually a very well constructed portrayal of Robbie’s messed-up life, without ever being sensationalist or overly dramatic. The acting is really good throughout the film, I was especially impressed by a scene in which Robbie, who has just become a father, is confronted with a guy he had once beaten up severely and his family. The only thing I really missed was a female character with some complexity. The plot-driving-girlfriend and Robbies kleptomaniac co-worker are both a bit shallow.
The second part of the film is quite different to the first. There is lots of humour (although sometimes it’s a rather broad one, and there’s one running gag i grew tired of really quickly), some nice suspence moments and a naive optimism you wouldn’t suspect by just watching the first half of the film.

There is a strange, unsentimental and very positive notion of humanity running through the film. Sometimes that may strike you as a little strange (e.g. if some random woman, you have never seen before offeres to let Robbie and his girlfriend live at her flat for a while) and almost american-dream-like but in the end the lightness of the film just drags you along and you can leave the cinema with a smile on your face – at least I did. Which is rare, I guess.

Oh and one more thing: it makes you want to drink whisky. So good marketing, everyone, well done!