Hey folks, Harry here with Quint's final report from the Mill Valley Film Festival in Marin County. I don't know if this will post given the buggy damn server at the moment, but if it does, enjoy, if not... well fuck it, I give up. I hate tech problems!
Ahoy squirts! Quint, the wondrous crusty ol' seaman, here with a couple reviews of two of the smaller flicks I saw during my stay in Marin County, while attending the Mill Valley Film Festival. The first up is a really nifty flick that plays with the domino effect and the second one is a Norwegian "coming of age" flick. Quite a pairing, huh?
BUG
BUG is an indie flick about how a miniscule event can have a huge impact on the lives of unrelated people. The film opens with a badass opening title sequence, this hyper kinetic basic introduction to all the characters in the film where lines are drawn from one face to another to another that leaves us with this complex design, a mess of character's faces, connections to other characters and little sentence descriptions of each. If it didn't go by so fast, you'd probably have the whole movie outlined before the first scene.
This film uses a fairly common indie structure, that of jumping from character to character to character. Think of each character as a domino. We follow each little domino as it falls, knocking the next one down and so on, one character doing something that affects another, that character then does something that they wouldn't have done had they not be nudged off course of their daily routine... Like I said, it's a fairly well used indie film structure, but the film manages to make it fresh and not feel like a lift of Linklater's SLACKER.
I think directors Phil Hay and Matthew Manfredi, who co-wrote CRAZY/BEAUTIFUL, knew they were skating on thin ice when gearing up for this project because they anticipated every pit fall that almost all the other films that use this plot device have fallen into. It would have been very easy to be super pretentious or extremely boring, but luckily for us, they make a very entertaining movie to go along with intricate character relationships shown.
Also, they stunningly cast the movie with great actors of all levels... Famous, semi-known and unknown. Top of the cast is Brian Cox (L.I.E., MANHUNTER, upcoming X-MEN 2) playing a side character in a movie with nothing but side characters. He's a hypochondriac owner of a Chinese take-out restaurant, obsessed with germs. Cox gives a funny, very real performance. We also have Jamie Kennedy, who I still hold as the best thing about the SCREAM films, finally in a role with more than 2 lines, playing a fortune cookie employee in charge of coming up with the fortunes. One of the best and also one of the smallest roles in the film goes to noneother than Ed Begley Jr. who... well... Let's just say he's a presence felt through out.
I don't know when you'll be able to take a look at this flick for yourself. As far as I know it hasn't been picked up, which is a shame because it's the perfect art house film. The setup might be a little artsy for mainstream theaters, but this is the perfect kind of film to release through Landmark Theaters, a really funny and touching film that never becomes uninvolving. And this flick is hilarious! The audience I saw it with was in stitches through most of the film.
I know I've been pretty vague, but this is a really hard film to break down as each scene is so entwined with the one that came before it that to pull it out of context would be to do the film a disservice. All I can say is if you see this film playing at a festival near you make sure to check it out. It's well worth your time. Here's hoping you'll get to see this flick in an art house near you sometime soon!
SCARS
This next film is a bit more traditional in its storytelling. SCARS is a Norwegian flick starring a bunch of people you've most likely never heard of like Eirik Evjen, Martin Jonny, Raaen Edissen and Eirik Stigar.
SCARS is the story of young Viktor, played by Eirik Evjen who looks freakily like part of the Culkin family, and his two best friends as they discover girls, bullies, cars and family tragedy. Viktor's life is changing dramatically and he's doing all he can to keep up with it. He finds out a secret about his mother and father, he sees his older brother, whom he idolizes to no end, is getting sick all the time and all while he's going through puberty.
I know that kinda sounds a bit... heavy... but I promise, this film is very easy to get into and even easier to stay involved in. It's a very charming and very warm picture... But hey, this is coming from a guy who has loved coming of age movies since before I myself came of age. STAND BY ME has always been one of my favorite films and I have a soft spot for flicks like NOW AND THEN and damn near every John Hughes movie ever made.
Like BUG, I don't know if you'll ever have the opportunity to see this flick. IMDB doesn't have any release dates for the US, but it does have the Norwegian website where you can order a VHS or DVD: http://www.glasskar.no/ Now, this film is damn good, but I'd only suggest buying it if you're really a sucker for this kind of movie. I don't know what the cost would be, but I'm sure it's substantial. This film wouldn't make my top 10 best films list like FORE STORMEN (BEFORE THE STORM) did last year when I saw it at the Vancouver Film Festival, but it's a very sweet film that's full of heart.
I know the above reviews were pretty short, but oh well. Hopefully some of you film festival goers will be helped by these reviews and maybe even one of you studio people out there might want to take a look at these flicks. Who knows? I'll be back soon, squirts, with a damn nifty way way way advance review and even an interview or two. 'Til that day, squirts, this is Quint bidding you all a fond farewell and adieu.
-Quint
