Father Geek here with our first 2 reports from the Melbourne, Australia Film Fest currently delighting the film fans from that faraway land down under. Looks like fun... I guess its time ol' Father Geek broke out an icey cold Foster's, or two...
I have a Gold Pass to the 50th Melbourne International Film Festival and I usually do little reviews after each day of intensive film-watching for my friends. The Melbourne Film Fest offers access to a diverse range of world films which certainly opens ones' eyes to the massive influence film has on the entire world (rather than just the LA Box Office).
Love your honest, personal reviews and your entire page.
The first film we saw was called "Under the sand". It was a beautifully shot and wonderfully paced French film about a woman who has to deal with the sudden disappearance of her husband. Definitely worth seeing.
Next up was "Revelations" the follow-up documentary to one that I saw about five years ago, called "Paradise Lost: Murder at Robin Hood Hills" about the trial of three teenage boys accused of the murder of three young boys. It was made by the guys who did Blair Witch 2. Unfortunately they didn't have as many people to interview in the second as the first, as many of the families wanted nothing to do with them after the release of the first. Therefore, much of the really juicy follow-ups were missing (all the info about all the people involved is on one of the websites dedicated to helping the boys get released from prison), and a lot of the doco was spent interviewing the psycho Dad of one of the dead boys who has been implicated in the murders. This guy is on so many different drugs that no matter what he says it is pretty unbelievable and over-the-top that it is stupid to use him as a source of reliable evidence. I was disappointed in this doco as I had high expectations.
Next up was a Canadian film called "Possible Worlds". The premise of this film was certainly enticing - two detectives search for a brain-stealing murderer who has stolen the brain of a man who lives in a number of different worlds...or does he??? The dialogue was a little Hal Hartley-esque and some of the acting was wooden, but it was definitely worth seeing for some of the imaginative ideas in it and a couple of lovely shots.
Now we reach the first Aussie film of the fest, which was also shot in Melbourne, called "The Bank". This was a pretty empty, boring film with bad dialogue and one main idea. It was cheap (AUS$5m which is US$2.5), but unfortunately, lacked a strong, gripping throughline. It was high concept without the budget to sustain the idea.
The last film was a Michael Winterbottom film. This was "The Claim" starring Wes Bentley, Sarah Polley, Milla Jovovich. It was set in 1867 during the building of the railway through the US and was pretty much high- budget Hallmark. Some pretty bad lines. "The Bank" beats it because the budget was so damn high on this one and they really should have been able to come up with something better. Thought they do get some points for shooting in the snow. But, they lose massive of points for the ponderous Michael Nyman score which really pushed me over the edge.
Overall, it was a successful day as we saw one which I loved,
one which I had to see anyway even though it was a little
disappointing, one which was inventive and enjoyable, one
which had beautiful shots of Melbourne and the last which was
boring but high-budget. Six more tomorrow...
Tamsin
Father Geek here again with Norman's report of his day at the fest...
Father Geek here again with Norman's report of his day at the fest...
Last year MIFF scheduling meant I missed out on Francois Ozon's WATER DROPS ON BURNING ROCKS, so I hurried the trusty old roadster down Bourke Street to catch his latest effort, UNDER THE SAND (France). Marie and Jean have been comfortably married for 25 years, a relationship that Ozon paints in deft, light touches as they arrive at their coastal villa for an overdue holiday. The story proper is kicked off when Jean disapppears one day on the beach, apparently while swimming. In a neat touch, we're kicked forward almost a year. Jean is still missing, but is part of Marie's life as a house-bound ghost. And Marie is agonising about moving on, letting herself get attached to someone new. I don't deny this is an important choice. Perhaps it's one of the most important decisions that someone recently bereaved could make. It's just that Ozon didn't quite explore the dimensions of that choice. What could have been a rich exploration became a bit of a narrrative cul-de-sac. I can't deny the stark beauty of the final image though, where Ozon lets us just watch Marie make that choice in the most visual way possible. He's a mature filmmaker that is - I sense - approaching the height of his powers.
Hands down, PARADISE LOST is one of the best documentaries I have ever seen. Three American teenagers who comitted the sin of looking different, convicted of triple-murder in a witch-hunt (implicating both the police and the legal system) that beggars belief. So I was eagerly looking forward to Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky's PARADISE LOST 2: REVELATIONS. What's new in crazytown, USA? "Same same" as my local Chinese takeaway proprietor likes to say. Damian Echols, Jessie Misskelly, and Jason Baldwin are still behind bars despite the growing weight of evidence that suggests they are just patsies. Aiding their cause now is a support group angered by the questions raised by the original doco, and given shape by the internet. I won't summarise the contents further as I don't want to spoil it for those yet to see it (and I suspect that much water has passed under the bridge since this 1999 doco was made anyway), but this was rewarding viewing. Berlinger and Sinofsky are gifted documentary makers, even if the 135 mins running time made for several flat spots. Also contains the most, well, amazing version of 'Amazing Grace' I've ever heard. Better even than the version I used to close my shows with.
Next up, the Canadian POSSIBLE WORLDS. This was awfully bad. And it was all my fault too, not applying the Tilda Swinton Rule and running a mile from this dog of a film. As is the case with many ambitious films, director and co-writer Robert Lepage aims high and falls short. It kicks off with a stockbroker, Georger Barber, found murdered in his home - minus a brain. Interspersed with the police investigation are dreamlike threads of George exploring alternate identities - possible worlds - in each encountering the dreaded Tilda. Why was George's brain stolen? Early on I thought Lepage was riffing on THE PRISONER - George apparently privileged with special information which an unidentified organisation is trying (by hook or by crook) to extract. Perhaps that's a red herring, or Lepage might have just forgotten about it. It appears George's brain was stolen because... well, I won't give it away, but neither does the evil brain-extracting scientist. The dreaded Tilda mutters "It's over". "Thank God" replies George. "How apropos" mutters the film-queen behind me, and I suddenly forgive him his sins.
Good to see an Aussie film closing out the day. THE BANK stars David Wenham (Faramir in LOTR) as Jim Doyle, a brilliant mathematician who has set up a program that will (can you guess) predict changes in the stock market. Hardly an original premise, but THE BANK is rare amongst recent Australian cinema fare in being an unashamed genre pic. It's a thriller, right down to the over-eager Saul Bass/Bernard Hermann quotations during the opening credit sequence. Jim has been poached from his PHD studies by a very generic, very powerful bank, and given carte blanche to perfect his stock system - it's all about chaos theory and fractals, rather obvious really - with the understanding that it will eventually make squillions of money for his corporate masters. There's the usual crisis of conscience moments, the rather unconvincing Wenham bullied along by a low-rent Gordon Gekko figure (Anthony Lapaglia). And the writing... I surprised my neighbour by hissing at the screen when Wenham started talking about his "first inciting moment". In the Q/A afterwards it was revealed that the film was subject to late rewrites. Too little too late, I'd suggest.
Next up was Micheal Winterbottom's THE CLAIM but the Bex was starting to wear off and my supply of Minties was running low. Besides, Mum goes to bed at 9:30 and she worries if I don't call. So, I turned my roadster back round and cycled away... tomorrow, a debut screening of another Oz film, LANTANA, the doco VIDEO DIARY OF RICARDO LOPEZ (famous for sending Bjork a letter-bomb and then blowing his head off), Takeshi Kitano's BROTHER, and a Herzog doco double!
