10 Seen (Sydney Film Fest preview, part 3)

Following my preview of the upcoming Sydney Film Festival competition and program, here are notes on 10 films I have already seen.



1. The Band's Visit (Eran Kolirin, Israel, 2007)

Eight musicians of Alexandria's Police Ceremonial Orchestra arrive in a small Israeli town to perform at the Arab Cultural Centre. Unfortunately no such centre exists. They've accidentally made their way to the wrong town and must reluctantly accept the hospitality of sultry diner owner Dina. Over a few days of culturally sensitive encounters, band members and locals bond over jazz music, shared experiences of hardship and, in one of the film's funniest scenes, roller disco.

Mark my words, this is an early contender for the Audience Award. The gorgeous and talented Ronit Elkabetz lights up the screen as the charismatic Dina while Sasson Gabai gives a warm, affecting performance as Lieutenant-colonel Tawfiq Zacharya. Richly-drawn, likable characters draw you into this simple story of uneasy cohabitation. Political parables are easy to find if you care to look, but the director's delicate touch steers the film clear of heavy-handed messages. Don't miss the chance to find out why The Band's Visit has been a critical darling at film fests worldwide and was recently named best unreleased film of 2007 by the Australian Film Critics Association.

The Band's Visit screens June 15 at 3:15pm and June 16 at 2:40pm at the State Theatre.



2. Japón | Battle in Heaven (Carlos Reygadas, Mexico, 2002/2005)

One of the real treats for aficionados of adventurous world cinema is the Sydney visit of acclaimed auteur Carlos Reygadas, the enfant terrible of Mexican cinema. Not only that, the Take 3 program gives you a chance to catch up with previous titles Japón and Battle in Heaven before you catch his new Cannes-winning opus Silent Light.

A master at turning ugliness into beauty and morphing the banal into the mystical, Reygadas tackles serious themes - guilt, class, religion - through elliptic narratives and breathtaking cinematic sleighs of hand. Read my full review of Battle in Heaven here.

Japón screens June 6 at 6:15pm, Dendy Opera Quays. Battle In Heaven screens there the next day at 1:40pm.



3. Continental, A Film Without Guns (Stephane Lafleur, Canada, 2007)

A new voice in Quebec cinema makes itself heard with this bleak ensemble drama by Stephane Lafleur. Charting the effects of a man's surreal disappearance in a bland dormitory suburb, Continental exposes the absurdity of the lives we choose for ourselves.

Slow and almost devoid of dialogue, this stark, minimalist picture is nevertheless full of humanity and (dark) humour. Lafleur is a talent to watch. Carefully balancing style and substance, he reigns in stylistic extravagance while conjuring a surreal, visually arresting universe. Precise framing, evocative sound design and pitch-perfect performances all serve a coherent vision, a portrait of contemporary Quebec filled with equal parts pessimism and humanism.

Continental screens June 19 at 9:00pm at the State Theatre and June 21 at 6:30pm at GU George Street.



4. Fugitive Pieces (Jeremy Podeswa, Canada, 2007)

A talented filmmaker takes on a beloved bestseller, surrounding himself with talented actors and crafting a gorgeously shot, ambitious saga about loss and survival. All the ingredients are right for this moving story of Holocaust survival, exile and enduring trauma to push emotional buttons with subtlety: from Jeremy Podeswa, a gifted director accustomed to portraying death and grief intelligently (try his excellent Six Feet Under episodes), to Stephen Dillane, a charismatic actor at the peak of his powers.

Unfortunately Canadian poet Anne Michaels' complex novel proves too big a challenge: the adaptation is strangely inert, burdened by constant flashbacks and maddening repetitions. Important and fascinating themes - how tragedy, guilt and history shape our lives and outlooks, sometimes irreparably - are trivialized by postcard perfect photography, redundant voiceover narration and a pervasive, sentimental score. An abundant and frustrating waste of talent.
Fugitive Pieces screens at the State Theatre June 8 at 12:45pm.



5. Girl Cut in Two (Claude Chabrol, France, 2007)

Claude Chabrol is getting older and possibly wiser. Sometimes this translates into fresh, intelligent insights into the decadent power struggles at the heart of French society, as in 2006's masterful Comedy of Power. At other times, Chabrol's age shows in other ways, such as his insistence on telling repetitive, self-caricaturing, old-fashioned stories devoid of any kind of relevance or realism.

Ludivine Sagnier plays against type as an innocent weathergirl who falls for a Parisian intellectual three times her age (Francois Berleand). Benoit Magimel is the infatuated young aristocrat hell-bent on breaking them up. Weak satire turns to unconvincing melodrama as Chabrol recycles his love/hate relationship with the French upper-crust into one more convoluted comedic thriller. It's competent in many respects, from the fluid direction to the top-notch acting, too bad it's neither funny nor thrilling. Ed Gonzalez says it best over at Slant, "the film is only as artful, amusing, and thoughtful as the last Woody Allen picture."

Girl Cut in Two screens at the State Theatre June 16 at 6:30pm and June 18 at 10:00am.




6. My Winnipeg (Guy Maddin, Canada, 2007)

A film for anyone who's ever felt the need (but perhaps found it difficult) to leave their home town, My Winnipeg is a warped portrait of a place both real and imagined. The director narrates a deeply personal travelogue about the cold prairie city where he grew up and resides to this day, mixing fact and fantasy, exaggerations and psychoanalysis. The result is frequently hilarious, beautiful like a dream yet haunting like the remnants of shameful nightmare.

Without eschewing his idiosyncratic style, silent era obsessions and hyper-confessional tone, Guy Maddin delivers perhaps his most accessible film yet. If you're not yet familiar with the neurotic fantasia of this Manitoban maverick, My Winnipeg is an inviting gateway into the weird and wonderful world of a true original.

My Winnipeg screens at the State Theatre June 10 at 7:30pm with live narration from Guy Maddin himself, as well as June 11 at 10:00am.



7. Phase IV (Saul Bass, USA, 1974)

The only feature by Saul Bass, the king of poster design and title sequences, Phase IV is a must for B-movie fans. Due to some unknown cosmic event ants undergo rapid evolution and develop aggressive behaviour and a hive mind possibly controlled from space. Slowly and silently, they take on the humans. Annihilation ensues.

Deliberately paced and taciturn, Phase IV is more Close Encounters than Independence Day. Filled with disturbing hard-to-shake images and imbued with Cold War paranoia, this is the kind of angst-ridden American sci-fi which defined an era.

Phase IV screens June 11 at 5:50pm, Dendy Opera Quays




8. You, The Living (Roy Andersson, Sweden, 2007)

Bleakness and hilarity come together to great effect in Roy Andersson's follow up to the magnificent Songs from the Second Floor. The residents of an unnamed grey urban sprawl lead their often pathetic lives in a symphony of failures, disappointments and embarrassment. A series of laconic, meticulously staged tableaux, You, The Living is occasionally poetic, sometimes depressing and frequently laugh-out-loud funny.

Visually arresting and peopled with Nordic eccentrics, it takes you to an alien planet and threatens to leave you there. If this peerless film belonged to a genre, it would be the miserable musical. Full of deadpan irony and schadenfreude, You, The Living exists halfway between Tati and Kafka, at once quick to find unexpected beauty and joy in the everyday and prompt to bring the skies crashing down in a bout of gloomy despair.

You, The Living screens June 7 at 5:45pm and June 9 at 1:45pm, Dendy Opera Quays



9. Grace is Gone (James C. Strouse, USA, 2007)

John Cusack gives an understated and moving performance as an anguished father of two in this contrived and ultimately frustrating exploration of grief. Upon learning that his wife Grace has been killed in service in Iraq, Minnesotan Stanley Phillips is faced with the difficult task of revealing the truth to his young daughters. The film follows the fractured family on a road trip to an amusement park as he works up the nerve to break the news. Along the way they meet an assortment of characters each illustrating different perspectives and opinions on the war in Iraq.

The film asks fascinating questions: how to you come to terms with impossible truths? How do you speak those truths, and in doing so, what do you reveal about your place in the world? Many disagree with me (it won both the screenplay and audience awards at Sundance), but I feel Grace is Gone doesn't live up to its ambitions, going quiet - literally, during the film's key scene - precisely when it should speak up.

Grace is Gone screens 15 June at 6:30pm, GU George St



10. Black Narcissus (Powell & Pressburger, UK, 1947)

Deborah Kerr plays an Anglican nun in charge of setting up a school and hospital in the Himalayas in this superb Powell & Pressburger classic, sumptuously photographed by Jack Cardiff. Jealousy, lust and moral righteousness battle it out as at high altitude in this studio-shot melodrama which owes a debt to horror and fantasy as repressed love makes way for hysterics and, eventually, madness.

Black Narcissus screens June 14 at 2:10pm at the State Theatre.

For an overview of the program click here or visit the Sydney Film Festival website. Kids this is the biggest game in town, if you live around here and you read this blog this is what you've been waiting for all year. See you there!

10 Seen (Sydney Film Fest preview, part 3)