Harry here with Harold Hellman, and he's got me jazzed as hell to see DEAD OR ALIVE, that sounds awesome as hell.... Read on about it....
Harold Hellman from Movie Geek Central
(Movie Geek) with two new reviews
for Friday's flicks: the world premiere of "Final,"
directed by Campbell Scott and starring Denis Leary,
and "Dead or Alive," the craziest Japanese crime
thriller I've seen in years.
FINAL -- USA, 2001, written by Bruce McIntosh,
directed by Campbell Scott.
"Final" will be compared to Kafka by a lot of people, and in some ways they'll be right. Denis Leary's character, Bill, wakes up in an almost featureless room. At first, his legs don't work; he stumbles as he explores his apparent cell. After a short while, a psychiatrist shows up, indicating Bill is in a mental hospital of some kind. Bill tells the doctor, Ann, he believes it's 400 years in the future, the world outside is a hologram, and he's got 48 hours before somebody comes to kill him with a fatal injection (the "final" of the title).
Rather than comparing the story to Kafka, though, I'd say it's more Pinteresque. The forces Bill perceives to be oppressing him are passive, working only to draw him out, asking him for his explanation of what's going on, rather than the confusingly faceless persecutions of "The Trial." Bill is also a much more assertive character than Kafka's heroes; instead of letting his tormentors come to him, he actively pushes outward to establish the boundaries of his confinement. And even more like Pinter, there are long silences, long moments where we watch Bill pacing the perimeter of his room or staring off into the distance grasping after an elusive memory.
In summary form, this sounds like one of those head-trip stories, where the imprisoned protagonist says he believes one thing, his psychiatrist asserts something different with the stated intent of returning him to sanity, and working behind everything is the vague suspicion that something else entirely is going on. In a more conventional production, the implied "real" scenario would be revealed early on, and the melodramatic paranoia would be played up, as in, say, "Twelve Monkeys."
There are elements of that approach in "Final," but director Campbell Scott and writer Bruce McIntosh are far more interested in character and relationship. Bill is the only one who thinks something weird is transpiring, and as we watch him hallucinate, mixing present reality with past memory -- he sees his previous girlfriend on the tiny metal bed, he imagines Ann in a cheerleader outfit, etc. -- we realize that Bill's point of view is highly suspect. And as Ann patiently explains that Bill was found by a wrecked truck in a quarry, and works him through his last day, trying to help him recall how he came to the hospital, we recognize that the point of the film is the doctor/patient relationship, and not some fantastic plot twist down the line. We still wonder if maybe there isn't something odd going on, but the heart of the movie is the growing connection between Bill and Ann.
Denis Leary and Hope Davis are both very good as patient and doctor. This is an atypical role for Leary; he gets to wield his trademark ascerbic wit, but it's defensive, underlined with fear and mistrust, instead of aggressive. Leary's never done anything even remotely science-fiction related, so even in his delusional state it's weird to hear him ranting about holograms and laser barriers, but aside from that he turns in a surprisingly assured, nuanced performance. (Bill Hicks conspiracy theorists, take a Valium; this is about acting, not standup, and Leary proves he's got the chops.) Davis has the more challenging arc, starting with Ann's detached professionalism and slowly peeling away her layers of defense as her affection for the patient grows, and Davis is quite solid in the role.
I'm not sure how well the movie works, though. When I say I'm not sure, it's because, based on the festival's program blurb, I was expecting more of a mindgame, not a character-and-relationship chamber piece set in a mental institution. I kept waiting for a more conventional plot to kick in, and it took me quite a while to realize what the film was really about. This may also account for what seemed to me to be a reduction in tension and interest every time we leave the two-character drama in the hospital room, the duel between Bill and Ann, for a flashback into Bill's days prior to being brought there: his relationship with his dying father, his marriage proposal to his girlfriend, and so on. In retrospect, of course, this exploration of character is what the movie's ultimately about, rather than the superficial puzzle-plot I had anticipated. Perhaps with this understanding, this clearer expectation, the movie would have worked better for me. Or, perhaps not.
As a character-based drama, the movie pretty much
achieves its goals, thanks primarily to the
outstanding performances of Leary and Davis and the
subtle, restrained direction of Campbell Scott.
However, if you're looking for a brain-twisting,
mind-bending story full of reversals and surprises,
like "Jacob's Ladder," this isn't the movie for you.
DEAD OR ALIVE -- Japan, 2000, written by Ichiro Ryu,
directed by Takashi Miike.
Holy Mary, sweet Mother of God, but this is a wild-ass movie.
The first six or seven minutes of "Dead or Alive" is far and away the most audacious introduction to a film I've ever seen, ripping at full turbo through a sequence of violent confrontations, so quickly we almost can't follow it: A guy snorts a twenty-foot line of cocaine at a dead run, a naked woman plummets off a roof, a drug dealer sodomizing somebody in a bathroom gets his throat cut, a clown hands off a shotgun to a trenchcoated killer, a gangland kingpin sucks down bowl after bowl of noodle soup until the aforementioned shotgun blows out his stomach in a yellow cloud. It's dazzlingly shot and edited, and moves so fast it makes Guy Ritchie look like a painter of fruit bowls.
The movie calms down considerably after that, presenting what seems, on the surface, to be a fairly conventional story of an unorthodox cop chasing a ruthless yakuza killer. Some of the story seems like boilerplate, such as the fact that the cop's daughter needs an expensive medical procedure he can't afford, or the yakuza being reunited with a younger brother. However, the movie tweaks these conventions a bit: The cop is far more engaged with his casework than his family, barely acknowledging his daughter's health problems, and the yakuza and his brother likewise don't see eye to eye.
Even through the comparatively sedate middle section (which occasionally recalls Takeshi Kitano in its deliberately paced austerity), director Takashi Miike finds time for some truly warped interludes. One of the cop's best confidential informants, for example, is a pornographer who makes bestiality clips; we watch the cop questioning the man while an assistant prepares a dog in the background and a naked woman waits on a mattress nearby. The movie also displays a preoccupation with bodily fluids, and not just the copious amounts of blood you'd expect. There's also a scene where a boatload of bad guys chows down on a pile of bananas before becoming violently and explicitly seasick, not to mention the wading pool full of watery feces.
After the head-spinning introduction, and the relative (but very stylish) tranquility of the next forty-odd minutes, the energy very slowly begins to ramp back up, exploding with an incredible shootout in a below-ground dinner hall. And then, when the yakuza finally confronts the cop in an open field (the criminal actually says, "Here's the final scene"), you wonder how the movie will top its outrageous opening. Believe me: it does. The finale is completely out of control, like nothing you've ever experienced, and had the audience whooping and cheering at almost two o'clock in the morning.
Obviously, the movie's grotesqueries give it a limited audience, but those who can take it will absolutely adore it. And what's more, it isn't just randomly goofy violence, like the Hong Kong flick "The Story of Ricky." Director Miike really does have something on his mind, as is made clear by his careful handling of the parallel familial detachment of the cop and the yakuza. The last ten minutes go way, way over the top, and the final sixty seconds will blow your skull apart -- but part of the fun is in thinking back and starting to realize that the movie, incredible as it may seem, might actually be about something.
"Dead or Alive" is simply one of the coolest pieces of mind-bogglingly extreme crime cinema I've ever seen. I can't believe Takashi Miike hasn't gotten more exposure in the U.S. before this (outside a rabid underground following), but after the festival is over, I'm going to track down as many of his movies as I can.
Harold Hellman from Movie Geek Central
(Movie Geek Central), with reviews of the
four movies I saw on Saturday. It was definitely a
good day, all the movies ranging from good to
excellent. Here you go...
THE FOUL KING -- South Korea, 2000, written and
directed by Kim Ji-woon.
The hero of "The Foul King" is a hapless nebbish named Dae-ho. He's a failure at his bank job, where he works under a tyrannical boss who likes disciplining his employees with a vicious headlock. Dae-ho's dad lives with him, spending his days playing solitaire games (which Dae-ho invariably screws up or trips over) or watching TV. Then, early in the movie, after a bad day at work that culminates in an encounter with some street toughs, he happens across a run-down gymnasium offering lessons in pro wrestling.
No doubt, you can predict where all of this is going, and you'd be more or less correct. This is definitely formula entertainment, from the Miyagi-like mentor figure through the love interest the hero can't see because he's blinded by an untouchable dreamgirl on down to the big wrestling match that climaxes the story. This film knows the expected beats, and it hits all of them, one after the other. It even aknowledges its construction with a handful of chapter titles that break the action into its thematic chunks.
What isn't expected, though, is how incredibly funny the whole thing is. The overall structure is straight out of Screenwriting 101, but within the bounds of the formula, the movie comes up with some truly sublime physical humor. Some of it's silly and broad, like Dae-ho fantasizing a wrestling match where he's dressed as Elvis; some of it's simple, like Dae-ho's reaction to getting caught peering in a window; and some of it's brilliantly subtle, like the street punk who pauses in mid-attack, unaware he's mirroring the huge athletic mural behind him. Even the chapter titles mentioned above are funny; the first one, introducing the supervisor's disciplinary methods, says "The Headlock of Horror." There's a lot more, and almost all of it works.
I say almost, because a few times director Kim Ji-woon lets the slapstick get too rough, with non-cartoony blood and bruises. Yes, comedy is usually most successful when it has an undercurrent of pain, and for the most part "The Foul King" stays on the right side of the line. During the final match, for example, it's okay to go that far, since we've spent enough time with the story that we don't mind taking it a little more seriously. But during an earlier bout, when Dae-ho mistakenly grabs a real for instead of the prop he's supposed to use, the resulting spray of gore is more distasteful than funny.
Thankfully, moments like that are few and far between,
and "The Foul King" remains warm, charming, and very,
very funny. Song Kang-ho, playing the hero, proves
himself a talented physical comedian in the classical
vein; with an open, friendly, yet melancholy demeanor,
and an easy grace that turns Dae-ho's clumsiness
almost into dance, he earns comparisons with Buster
Keaton. The movie won't win any awards for
re-inventing storytelling, but it's definitely a
hilariously entertaining entry in the genre.
MIRACLES -- Hong Kong, 1989, written and directed by
Jackie Chan.
"Miracles" is Jackie Chan's "lost" movie. A remake of Frank Capra's "A Pocketful of Miracles," it wasn't a box-office success on its initial Hong Kong release, apparently because its period setting -- an homage to 1930's gangster movies, complete with pinstriped suits, tommy guns, and big-band jazz soundtrack -- was too much of a departure. After its failure, Jackie returned to safer terrain, cop movies and an "Armour of God" sequel. "Miracles" (also titled "Mr. Canton and Lady Rose") almost disappeared, becoming impossible to find on video in the United States; even Scarecrow, the Best Video Store in the World, has only an imported copy with a poor print and no English subtitles.) Now, it's finally getting a small re-release, so we all get to see what we've been missing.
It turns out to be a gorgeously produced cornball epic, the kind of silly nonsense that's obviously close to Jackie's heart. From the Capra film, he borrows the story of a poor street vendor who enlists help in hiding her poverty from her visiting daughter (who also brings her fiance and his father). To this Jackie grafts a typical tale of criminal rivalry, with himself as a good-hearted bumpkin who, through a ridiculous plot twist, finds himself named as head of a local gang.
There are several fabulous action scenes, showing Jackie at his prime (it was made in 1989), including a brawl in a restaurant and, of course, the legendary final showdown in a rope factory. The production design is fantastic, with great sets and costuming (some of the sunglasses don't look strictly accurate, though). Jackie's use of the camera is remarkable, with several long, sweeping camera moves that enhance the story's epic comedy. Anita Mui is great fun as a nightclub singer who convinces Jackie to help the penniless flower vendor, and many of Jackie's familiar ensemble are on hand as well.
Some of it's too goofy to take seriously, such as the muted-trumpet "wah-wah-waahhh" that frequently underlines gag punchlines. The two storylines aren't well integrated, either; the gangland rivalry takes focus for the first hour, then it's set aside for the flower lady plot, which is an hour of screwball comedy and almost no kung fu. Then, finally, the last ten minutes quickly wraps everything up in an implausible but still feel-good fashion. There's also a fair amount of Jackie's trademark idealism, in which he says with earnest seriousness, in effect, "Hey criminals! Wouldn't it be neat if you quit doing crime?"
The real reason to see this, of course, is that it's a good Jackie Chan movie that up to now has been difficult to locate. On that score, the re-release is a mild disappointment. The print screened at the festival wasn't in the best of shape; it was mostly free of scratches and pops, but about midway through the soundtrack developed an annoying buzz that suggests some deterioration. "Miracles" represents an important film in Jackie's canon, and it deserves better treatment than this.
That aside, it's still a must-see for Jackie's fans.
It's funny, it's great to look at, and even if it does
get bogged down here and there, it's still marvelously
entertaining. When the re-release comes to your area,
it's definitely worth making time to see it.
MY FIRST MISTER -- USA, 2001, written by Jill
Franklyn, directed by Christine Lahti.
Who ever thought there'd be a sweet movie about a goth chick?
We meet Jennifer (Leelee Sobieski) during the opening credits. Her hair is jet black, she's pierced and tattooed, and her bedroom is a shrine to depression. Our first view of her is of blood, as she pricks her fingertip to decorate her bleak, spidery poetry with smears of red. She doesn't see eye to eye with her relentlessly upbeat mother (Carol Kane), who sings "I like being a girl" in the car, and she definitely doesn't connect with her stepfather (Michael McKean), a vapid twerp with a hideous toupee.
And then she meets Randall (Albert Brooks), manager of a mall clothing store, while she's prowling for a job. He gives her a position in the stockroom, and against all odds they begin talking. Over the rest of the film, the 49-year-old Randall and the 17-year-old Jennifer get to know each other, and establish an extremely unlikely but warm and open friendship. There are surprises along the way, including laughter, tears, and new maturity for both of them.
Based on the premise, I know, it sounds horrible -- contrived, cloying, and unwatchable. And in many ways, it is contrived: There's really no reason Randall wouldn't wash his hands of Jennifer the first time she curses at him, or fire her when she does something inexcusably outrageous at his store. The idea of a cynically depressive goth teen with cluelessly chipper parents is a cliche, and many of the plot developments, especially late in the film, seem more like authorial imposition than natural outgrowths of the situation.
But it works anyway, and works surprisingly well. Director Christine Lahti, making her feature debut, rescues what could have been a hokey story, ensuring that even when the script asks for an artificial plot twist, the emotions are deep and real. She's always been an excellent, well-grounded actor, and she gets the same out of her cast. The simple honesty of the film's presentation is most evident in Leelee Sobieski's Jennifer; it's the first time I've ever seen a mainstream movie get a goth teen right. She's angry, but not theatrically so, and her tattoos and piercings are more than one of those cheaply facile masks Hollywood uses to dress up its misguided notion of an Average Teen. This is simply who she is, and the movie never violates it.
As good as Sobieski is -- and she's very, very good -- the rest of the cast shines as well. Albert Brooks is amiably anal-retentive as Randall; watch how he subtly fixes his magazines after Jennifer disturbs the stack. Carol Kane, as Jennifer's mother, while on the surface a burbling suburbanite, gives the part just the right undercurrent of despair. Mary Kay Place is solid as a friend of Randall's, and John Goodman is hilarious in the small role of Jennifer's ne'er-do-well father. The humor is dry and based in situation and character, and the movie earns its very poignant ending.
It's a credit to Lahti and her remarkable cast that
every time the movie makes a potentially phony turn,
the honesty of the performances settles us back down.
Whenever a plot twist makes us wince, and we think,
"Uh-oh," we're soothed back to enjoyment by the film's
gentle tone and emotional sincerity. The good-hearted
"My First Mister" is not a movie for cynics or
misanthropes, but for everybody else, I can recommend
it highly.
THOMAS IN LOVE -- Belgium, 2000, written by Philippe
Blasband, directed by Pierre-Paul Renders.
It's not every day you see a unique and fiercely original film, one that doesn't just break rules but that invents a whole new lawbook. "Thomas in Love" is just such a movie, and my head is still spinning at what it was able to accomplish.
The film tells the story of Thomas, a severely agoraphobic man who has locked himself inside his apartment for the last eight years. The setting is the near future, and Thomas interacts with his world entirely by videophone, talking to his mother, his psychologist, and a variety of customer-service people only via computer screen. His psychologist, hoping to make progress treating his agoraphobia, signs him up for a computer-dating service, and at the same time his insurance company (which in this world acts as sort of a life concierge) connects him with a prostitution service that handles invalids like him. These small alterations, minor at first, eventually upset his carefully constructed world, and threaten to bring it down around him.
As interesting as the story is, what's really unique about it is the presentation. To wit: The movie screen is, from beginning to end, Thomas's videophone screen.
We never see Thomas; all we know of him is his voice. And all we see is what he sees, exactly the way he sees it, on the videoscreen. In a very real way, we become Thomas, as the people he talks to look straight out into our eyes. All of the actors play their roles subtly, naturalistically, enhancing the illusion that they're real people on the other end of a phone connection. Some of them move around their rooms, paying only partial attention to the screen; they glance off to the side, their attention caught by something we don't see; they pick up and move their own phones if they change location.
Director Pierre-Paul Renders underlines the device with a variety of understated effects, including tiny frame drops and bursts of pixelization (indicating transmission errors) or computer icons and logos unobtrusively added to the corner of the screen. The quality of transmission varies widely, implying that some people can afford better equipment than others. Renders also throws in answering-machine-style recordings, downloads, and an assortment of angles for Thomas's conversation partners: deskcam, wristcam, and so on, plus the common home model.
Beyond that, though, there's also a wealth of subtle detail that fills out the future world. Many people sport small facial decorations, either tattoo or makeup, of astrological or elementary symbols. In the background of some of the shots are throwaway details, like constantly shifting photographs on one woman's wall. We get just a suggestion of the social structure, with the omnipresent insurance company (named, implicatively, "Globale") performing all sorts of tasks on Thomas's behalf, and the revelation of the background of the prostitute Thomas eventually selects from the agency. None of this is ever explained or explored in detail; it's all just there, taken for granted by the various characters, and as such is totally believable.
For a while, our enjoyment of the film is in its endless invention of detail, like the computer-animated sexual simulation Thomas uses when he's bored, or the way a picture-in-picture appears when someone knocks on Thomas's door while he's on another call. And what's more, the movie is drop-dead hilarious, from the ridiculous scenarios used by the cybersex simulator to justify the various encounters, to the vacuum-cleaner repairman who shows up at Thomas's door wearing a biohazard suit.
And then, somewhere past the midpoint, we suddenly realize that an actual story has been set up, almost without our noticing. Renders and writer Philippe Blasband carefully establish the vocabulary of the film and its world during the opening half hour, and we're so mesmerized by their imagination and artistry -- not to mention how hard we're laughing at everything -- we don't realize a story is being constructed until it's well under way. And in the last five minutes, we're literally on the edge of our seat.
It would have been easy for "Thomas in Love" to have
been nothing but a superficial gimmick, like those
novels that are written entirely out of newspaper
articles or email messages or whatever. Instead, it
transcends its cleverness, creating a totally
plausible world, sympathetic characters, and a
riveting climax. It's based on such a unique and
powerful idea that a lot of second-rate filmmakers
will be tempted to rip it off, but most of them will
be dissuaded by the knowledge that anything they might
come up with would pale next to the masterpiece of the
original. I don't say this very often, but "Thomas in
Love" is nearly perfect, and I can't recommend it
highly enough.
DAY SEVENTEEN: Sunday, June 10
IRON LADIES -- Thailand, 2000, written by Visuttichai
Boonyakarjana & Jira Maligool Thongkongtoon, directed
by Yongyooth Thongkongtoon.
"Iron Ladies" is based on a true story about a team of drag queens who beat the odds and won Thailand's national men's volleyball championship in 1996. (Volleyball, you ask? According to an article I found in The Economist, volleyball is second only in popularity to soccer for Thai sports fans.) It was a huge hit in Thailand, becoming that country's second-highest-grossing movie (after "Nang Nak") at the time, and the Seattle audience I saw it with loved it as well. I must confess, though, that up until the end credits rolled, I had definite mixed feelings about the movie.
This is one of those real-life stories that seems far too good to be true, but apparently the director is on record as saying he had to change almost nothing for the movie. If that's true, then it's a case of reality imitating inspirational fluff. To wit: Mon just wants to play competitive volleyball, but the other players won't have anything to do with him because he's homosexual. His flamboyantly gay friend Jung tells him to forget about it, but then leadership of the team is reassigned, and new tryouts are held. When the new coach appoints both Mon and Jung to the team, all the other players except one, Chai, walk out. The survivors recruit new teammates from among their acquaintances -- one's a soldier, one's a cabaret performer, etc. -- and together they overcome adversity, prejudice, and formula storytelling.
The movie isn't shy about its message of tolerance. The head of the volleyball league, an obnoxious traditionalist with bad hair (who reminded me of the dance-contest chairman in the similarly programmatic "Strictly Ballroom"), hates the team and throws whatever obstacles he can in their way, all the while calling his secretary sexist names and leafing through Playboy at his desk. In the middle of the movie, the team puts on a drag/burlesque show for their coach's birthday, and they sing a song with lyrics like "We were born this way" and "Just accept us for who we are." The movie also makes a point of showing that Jung's parents have no problem with who he is; his father even asks him what kind of foundation he's wearing.
But at the same time, the film uses the broadest possible gay stereotypes for its characters. They mince, they flounce, they catfight over which of them saw a cute guy first, and they squeal in horror when something happens to their nails. The one heterosexual player has a standard "must learn acceptance" arc, capped by a scene in which one of his teammates says he has no right to judge because he's never had any gay friends before. The one gay player who doesn't play dressup, who looks relatively conventional, is of course deeply closeted. When he's recruited to the team, he's pulled out of a traditional engagement ceremony, and at the end he has a showdown with his father.
Overall, with its stereotypical characterizations and overt moralizing, the feeling of "Iron Ladies" is weirdly dated, like a Hollywood movie from 1973. It's notable that the movie doesn't present the gay characters as victims in any way, but the giggling, sashaying, and eye-rolling still seems like a serious throwback. I discovered in reading about the film that all the players but one are played by straight men, which to me is another big red flag regarding the campy tone. Now, I suppose it's possible that the filmmakers did this on purpose, that in order to make the message palatable to a mainstream audience they had to wrap it in comfortable behavioral expectations (the proverbial spoonful of sugar). It's also possible that sexual customs are sufficiently different in Thailand, compared to the U.S. dynamic I'm used to, that my reaction is due to my cultural perspective, and not so much the movie. (My moviegoing companion felt the same way.) Apparently men of alternate sexuality (called "katoeys") are tolerated on the fringes of Thai society, without the streak of ugly, violent homophobia that sometimes rears its head here in the U.S., so the exaggerated behavior in the movie might very well be realistic for the setting.
That's why the closing credits were a minor revelation, because they include documentary footage of the real-life Iron Ladies and some of their athletic events. The resemblance of some of the characters to their authentic counterparts is striking, and the behavior, including their effiminate prancing on the volleyball court, is spot-on. My mouth fell open; I'd watched the movie figuring that reality had been camped up for entertainment purposes, but then we get to see the actual players in action, and if anything the movie seemed comparatively tame.
It's strange that such a simple closing touch could
have made that much difference, but it did. The story
is clumsy feel-good formula, but apparently it's all
true; the tone is sentimental, but apparently it's
appropriate; the characterizations are broad and
silly, but apparently they're accurate. The funny
stuff is pretty funny, and the rest of it can be
viewed for its curiosity value, plus what it says
about the state of Thai sexual politics. So, in the
end, I give "Iron Ladies" a lukewarm thumbs-up.
STEAMBOAT BILL JR -- USA, 1928, written by Carl
Harbaugh & Buster Keaton, directed by Charles Reisnier
& Keaton.
There are two things to talk about regarding SIFF's presentation of the silent comedy classic "Steamboat Bill Jr.," with the Alloy Orchestra playing live accompaniment.
First, of course, is to observe how funny the movie is, even though it's a silent movie made in 1928. It doesn't really have the emotional resonance of Keaton's "The General," or the dramatic payoff, but it's very entertaining nonetheless. It demonstrates that basic comedy -- people falling down or reacting to unpleasant surprises -- is funny if it's well-timed and flawlessly executed, even more than seventy years later.
The story's fluff, not worth much comment. Keaton plays the son of a riverboat captain, a rough-and-tumble fellow who's surprised when his son, returning from the city, turns out to be a citified chap. There's a rivalry with a local magnate, and a romance between Keaton and the magnate's daughter. All of this is an excuse for pratfalls, double-takes, and some of the most elaborate physical comedy you've ever seen, as a windstorm descends on the town and blows cars, trees, people, and buildings hither and yon. It's all very silly, but Keaton's trademark deadpan expression keeps us engaged even amid outright fantasy, and very few of the gags fall flat. (By the way, if you've never seen Keaton's movies, I'm assigning this one, "The General," and "Our Hospitality" as homework. Clear your calendar.)
The other major discussion point is this: Where was everybody? The theatre was only two-thirds full, the emptiest I've seen it for almost any screening so far at the festival. It's not every day you get to see a Buster Keaton movie up on the big screen, where his fluidity and grace has room to breathe, as opposed to being cramped on a television screen. And the Alloy Orchestra doesn't come to Seattle every year; the last time they visited was for SIFF in '98, accompanying "Nosferatu." They're among the best, if not the best, creators of musical accompaniment for silent movies working right now, and it seems almost criminal to me that the house wasn't packed for this special event.
Ah well, I was there, along with a couple of hundred other people, and we all enjoyed it tremendously. If you notice the Alloy Orchestra on your city's film calendar, take it from me, their work can't be missed.
Hellman Out
