Movies at the 2008 High Falls Film Festival
Special Events
A
CONVERSATION WITH RITA MORENO
Jack Garner interviews film legend Rita Moreno, recipient of the 2008 Susan B. Anthony
"Failure is Impossible" Award at RHFIFF!
ANIMATION
SPOTLIGHT!
Linda Simensky
Senior Director, Children's Programming, PBS
Join Linda Simensky for a
seminar about animation and what it takes to produce quality children's
programming, with clips from some new shows in production. As Senior
Director of Children's Programming for PBS, Linda Simensky collaborates with
producers, co-production partners and distributors throughout development,
production, post-production and broadcast for existing and new series including
Curious George, Super Why, Martha Speaks and Sid the Science Kid for PBS KIDS,
and FETCH! with Ruff Ruffman, and WordGirl for PBS KIDS GO!
Feature-Length
Films
AMERICAN HARVEST
Documentary, US, 2008, 100 minutes
Writer/Producer/Director/Original Music/Editor: Angelo Mancuso
Assistant Editor: Lidiya Gavrilenko
Angelo Mancuso and Lidiya Gavrilenko in
attendance!
With
the number of undocumented immigrants in the United States estimated at 12
million, anti-immigration sentiment has swept across America and immigration
has increasingly become a central topic of debate. To explore the
issue of immigration from the standpoint of the American farmer as well
as through the eyes of the migrant worker, filmmaker Angelo Mancuso and
crew traveled to more than a dozen states, into Mexico and visited remote
areas of the U.S./Mexico border conducting interviews while covering more than
15,000 miles. The film points out the inconsistencies of the current policy on
immigration, revealing the lives of legal and illegal migrants and farmers
working toward a better life, and documents the symbiotic relationship that has
emerged between them. Is the immigration system in America flawed? And why are
immigrants – quite literally – dying to feed America?
AMERICAN SON
Narrative, US, 2007, 87 minutes
Director/Writer: NEIL
ABRAMSON
Executive Producers: CHRIS FRISINA (Rochester Native!)
Producer: Danielle Renfrew, Michael Roiff
Starring: Nick Cannon, Melonie Diaz, April
Grace, Tom Sizemore
Chris Frisina in
attendance
When we first meet Marine Corps Private Mike Holland, he is
heading home from Camp Pendleton for a 96-hour leave. Fresh off basic training,
he is broad-shouldered and handsome, with a smile that eventually wins him a
shared bus seat with Cristina, a smart young woman with dreams of college. By
the time they reach their mutual destination – the economically-depressed
Bakersfield – it is clear these two have discovered something more substantial
than flirtation. Over the next four days Mike and Cristina struggle to get to build
a relationship, despite objections from her father that Mike is black and
Cristina Hispanic, and the growing irritation of his hard-partying
ex-high-school buddies that he has wearied of their going-nowhere lifestyle.
Mike’s family, as fractured as Cristina’s is whole, adds further strain to the
visit, completing a picture in which the Marines are seen as not only a way
out, but a step up. Youthful idealism meets reality soon enough, however, and
in the final frames we are reminded of the impossible choices so many “American
sons” have had to face, all the more heartbreaking in times of war. (Ruth
Cowing)
AND ALONG CAME
TOURISTS
Narrative, Germany, 2007, 85 minutes; in
German/Polish/English with English subtitles
Director/Writer: Robert Thalheim
Producers: Britta Knöller, Hans-Christian
Schmid, 23/5 Filmproduktion GmbH
A quietly powerful, beautifully rendered companion piece to
the R/HFIFF 2006 documentary KZ, this narrative feature set in present-day
Auschwitz illustrates how insidiously commerce follows tourism, even to the
most sacred of commemoration sites. This heartbreaking realization comes to
life in the story of Sven, a young German who is (unhappily) posted to the
Polish concentration camp as part of his national service. Assigned to look
after Stanislaw Krzeminski, a former inmate who spends his days giving witness
lectures to bored, appallingly uninformed listeners as well as repairing old
suitcases taken from Jewish prisoners, Sven finds pleasure only in the company
of Ania, a vibrant young tour guide. As the days wear on, however, Sven’s eyes
are opened to such indignities as the sponsor-driven dedications at which
Krzeminski is trotted out like a prize exhibit. In the end the question
lingers: at what point does remembrance turn into desecration? (Ruth Cowing)
AUGUSTUS
SAINT-GAUDENS: MASTER OF AMERICAN SCULPTURE
Documentary, US, 2007, 74 minutes
Director/Producer: Paul G.Sanderson, III
Associate Producer: Joshua Wright
Part of a special collaboration with the Gallery Council of
the Memorial Art Gallery (MAG). Film will be followed by a lecture by Marjorie
Searle, Chief Curator, MAG, and a wine and cheese reception
Augustus
Saint-Gaudens (1848-1907) created nearly 150 works (of which the Memorial Art
Gallery owns four), ranging from huge public monuments to cameos and coins,
including the famed Double Eagle gold coin, commissioned for the U. S.
government by President Teddy Roosevelt. He was one of the first to integrate
architecture, landscape design, and monumental sculpture, was artistic director
of the 1893 Columbian Exposition, and a dedicated and influential teacher. Yet
today, few know how the Dublin-born, Paris and Rome-educated artist became
America’s premier sculptor of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Paul
Sanderson’s new documentary weaves narration, interviews with art historians
and public figures (such as Colin Powell), and visually stunning studies of
some of Gaudens’ finest work (such as the contemplative Standing Lincoln, the
intensely moving Shaw Memorial, the stirring Adams Memorial) into a brilliant
portrait of this dynamic, innovative genius.
AUTISM: THE
MUSICAL
Documentary, US, 2007, 93 minutes
Director/Producer/Cinematographer: Tricia Regan
Producers: Sasha Alpert, Perrin Chiles
The transformative power of theatre is joyously on display in this documentary
about children putting on a musical-comedy revue -- the NY Times called it
“marvelous;” Variety proclaimed it “as riveting as it is revelatory.” Using the
six month rehearsal time leading up to the performance as a central thread,
director Tricia Regan artfully weaves footage shot at home to draw us
inextricably into each child's family life. We quickly learn the diagnosis
presents across a wide spectrum, with our own expectations sometimes the most
limiting factor of all. In one scene at a swing set we are witness to a
wonderfully sophisticated psychological analysis from a boy we have barely
heard speak; in another a child thanks a friend in the play who has told him he
is smart. “Thank you,” he answers. “I have always wanted to hear that.” Parents
are equally candid, addressing with astonishing openness how marriages have
failed and triumphed; how lives have changed. By the end of the film, audiences
have cheered. Expect to join them. (Ruth Cowing)
BEAUTY REMAINS (Mei Ren Yi Jiu)
Narrative, China/US/Hong Kong, 2005, 87 minutes; in Mandarin
with English subtitles
Director/Producer: Ann Hu
Producers: Ira Deutchman, Han San Ping, Ren Zhong Lun
Ann Hu and Vivian Wu in attendance
Set in China in 1948, the dawn of the Communist era, Beauty Remains weaves the
intimate and the epic, psychological insight and grand storytelling, into a
rich tapestry that tells a haunting tale of two sisters bound together - and
torn apart - by the demands of tradition and the force of change. Fei,
illegitimate daughter of master and maid, has grown up in disgrace while her
half-sister, Ying, has lived in opulent leisure. When fate brings them together
again, they realize they have both been shaped by the capricious decrees of the
men in their lives; now they must somehow transcend that influence to forge
their own future. Director Ann Hu, who came to the U.S. from mainland China
after the Cultural Revolution, makes movies that deliberately mix the best of
her two worlds. Filmed in the lush port city of Qingdao, China, Beauty Remains
was co-written by American writers Beth Schacter and Michael Eldridge and
Chinese playwright Wang Bin, a combination that gives the film its distinct
flavor.
BEYOND BELIEF
Documentary, US, 2007, 92 minutes
Director/Producer: Beth
Murphy
Beth Murphy in attendance!
The opening scene of this film is quietly brilliant: a slow
pan through a well-loved home, filled with smiling photographs and other
details that telegraph: family, warmth, comfort…there is an air of anticipation
that kids/Mom/Dad/dog will soon come happily tumbling through the doors. But
playing on the television in the empty living room is an all-too-familiar news
story, and in an instant we realize that tragedy has invaded this household.
The intrusion feels not only startling but personal, and so begins an
extraordinary journey that has invested us from the start. When we first meet
Susan and Patti, two everyday soccer Moms who have lost their husbands to 9/11,
their determination to work through their grief by raising money for widows in
Afghanistan – reasoning decades of war, poverty and oppression are root causes
of terrorism – is impressive. But what starts out as a fundraiser bike ride
from Boston to Ground Zero, complete with national TV coverage, turns into a
deeper commitment and a desire to travel to the war-torn country, despite
kidnapping threats and mounting family concern. The trip is life-altering, and
a reminder of the enormous excess Americans take for granted. In the end, it is
what the Afghani women in this film have to say that is nothing short of
astonishing, and impossible to forget. (Ruth Cowing)
BLIND MOUNTAIN (Mang Shan)
Narrative, China, 2007, 95 minutes; in Mandarin with English
subtitles
Director/Writer/Producer/Editor: Li Yang
Editor: Mary Stephen
Xuemei, a recent college graduate, anxious to repay her parents' debts, travels
with a pair of potential employers to a distant village where she's sold into
slavery and forced to marry the son of the family who purchased her. Unlike the
other kidnapped wives in the village, Xuemei tries to escape across the
picturesque mountain that is a more effective barrier to freedom than her
chains. Li Yang's unsparing follow-up to his similarly brutal Blind Shaft
exposes corruption and ignorance of human rights in the new China, where the
widening gap between rural poverty and cosmopolitan plenty fans resentment and
hatred. At the Cannes premiere of Blind Mountain, the audience cheered when Xuemei
finally gets revenge. A few weeks later, the discovery of a Chinese brick
factory where kidnapped children were forced to labor like slaves was headline
news around the world. Li's film is fiction but it illuminates an ugly truth.
(Amy Taubin)
BRIDE OF FIRE
Narrative, Iran, 166 minutes, in Farsi
with English subtitles
Director: Khosrow Sinai
Discussion leader: MCC Professor Shahin Monshipour
Like
many other recent Iranian films, the intensely moving Bride of Fire
uses a deceptively simple cinematic style to cloak an extremely sophisticated
sensibility. Its central female character is a modern, urban, educated,
well-employed young woman with an equally modern boyfriend. But her roots lie
in a small village where the tradition is that women marry their first cousins
to ensure the continuation of the family line. When she visits the village, she
finds she's expected to stay and marry her cousin. What gives this film its
great power is the complexity of its characters and the internal conflicts they
endure. Neither the would-be groom, nor the grandmother who at first argues for
the “old ways,” are mere “ignorant peasants.” Both recognize the need to adapt
to the present; both struggle against the overwhelming power of tradition, a
force an individual cannot easily withstand. The film's climax is one you won't
easily forget. (Sid Rosenzweig)
CHRIS & DON: A
LOVE STORY
Documentary,
US, 2007, 90 minutes
Directors/Producers/Editors: Guido Santi, Tina Mascara
Producers: Julia Scott, James White
Tina Mascara, Guido Santi and Don Bachardy in attendance
The distinguished writer Christopher Isherwood, whose Berlin Stories was the
basis for the much-loved CABARET, was 49 when he met 18-year-old Don Bachardy
on the sunlit beaches of 1950s Malibu. CHRIS & DON chronicles this rather
unlikely pair's fascinating three decades together, mixing archival footage,
rare home movies (with glimpses of W.H. Auden, Igor Stravinsky, Tennessee
Williams) and whimsical animations based on their personal correspondence. Most
telling is the present-day reminisces of Bachardy, whom, as he pads around the
art and light-filled home he shared with Isherwood until his death in ‘86,
humorously and at times wickedly recalls the highs and lows of one of the most
poignant and heartfelt relationships to be seen on the screen in years. Having
emerged later in life with his partner's encouragement as an American portrait
painter of note, Bachardy's daily paintings of Isherwood in the months leading
up to his death -- as well as his words -- are a testament to the incredible
bond and commitment these two extraordinary men shared. (Ruth Cowing)
CONVERSATIONS
WITH MY GARDENER (DIALOGUE AVEC MON JARDINIER)
Narrative, France,
2007, 110 minutes; in French with English subtitles
Director: Jean Becker
Producer: Louis Becker
Production Designer: Thérèse Ripaud
Starring: Daniel Auteuil, Jean-Pierre
Darroussin
A successful painter (Daniel Auteuil) decides to leave Paris
and his life there, and return to his childhood home in the remote French
countryside. He'd like to return the place to the condition in which his mother
kept it, and advertises for a gardener. Enter an old primary school friend
(Jean-Pierre Darroussin), who has spent his life in the area, working the soil,
and doesn't regret it. A mature, friendly bond develops between the two men,
enriched by the vastly different experiences they have had in life. The painter
is honestly captivated by the gardener's directness and unassuming wisdom. Life
intervenes, of course, with a low blow, and the bond is tested. Jean Becker
directs this quietly beautiful, grown-up story with an elegant simplicity that
allows the two formidable actors all the room they need to inhabit their
characters fully and expansively. They are a deep pleasure to watch. Certainly
one of the best French films of the year. (Catherine Wyler)
DIMINISHED
CAPACITY
Narrative, US,
2008, 92 minutes
Director: Terry Kinney
Producers: Tim Evans, Daniela Taplin
Lundberg, Celine Rattray
Starring: Matthew Broderick, Alan Alda,
Virginia Madsen
Months ago, while breaking up a fight, Cooper (Matthew
Broderick) suffered a severe concussion, and he's still dealing with the after
effects - headaches, memory loss, inability to focus. He's a copy editor at a
Chicago firm, which has been carrying him since the accident, but his situation
is precarious. When his mother begs him to return to tiny LaPorte, Missouri to
help care for his increasingly demented Uncle Rollie (Alan Alda), Cooper goes
willingly enough, but soon finds himself entangled in his past, including his
old flame Virginia Madsen and the shenanigans of his eccentric family. A
valuable baseball card sets them on an antic quest for the fortune that will
solve everyone's problems. Smartly written and beautifully played by a large
cast in memorable roles big and small (especially Dylan Baker and Bobby
Canavale), Diminished Capacity will delight anyone who has a taste for the
follies of the human race and the cares that bring us together. (Catherine
Wyler)
THE
EDGE OF HEAVEN (AUF DER ANDEREN SEITE)
Narrative,
Germany/Turkey, 2007, 116 minutes; in German/Turkish and English, with English
subtitles
Director/Writer/Producer: Fatih Akin
Producers: Andreas Thiel, Klaus Maek
Starring: Nurgül Yesilçay
This sophisticated tale of intertwined lives that move
between Turkey and Germany could only have been imagined by a product of that
migration, the Turkish-German filmmaker Fatih Akin. EDGE OF HEAVEN won the
award for Best Screenplay at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival. Nejat is a young
professor of German literature in Bremen. His lively father invites a
prostitute to share his home, to assuage his loneliness. She, Yeter, agrees,
because Muslim fundamentalists have been threatening her. Yeter sends her
daughter, Ayten, to university in Istanbul, but hasn't heard from her in
months. Ayten has become a radical activist who's fled Turkey for Germany, and
is now searching for her mother, and falling in love. These four people and
their dreams and desires are the basis of the film. Moments of violence
punctuate their lives and death is always close, but Akin deftly balances the
competing stories, and his empathy for the protagonists makes them all
extremely compelling. The settings are exotic and the politics undeniably 21st
century. (Catherine Wyler)
FERMAT'S
ROOM (La Habitación de Fermat)
Narrative, Spain,
2007, 88 minutes; in Spanish with English subtitles
Directors/Writers: Luis Piedrahita, Rodrigo Sopeña
Producers: César Benítez, Adolfo Blanco
Make-up Artist: Eva R. Fontenla
While a handsome young mathematician is explaining the
meaning of prime numbers to some wide-eyed coeds in a university in Spain, his
room is ransacked and his cutting-edge math project destroyed. Months later, a
group of mathematicians each receive a letter inviting them to resolve a
problem. The four (3 men and a woman) who solve it are invited to meet for a
mysterious weekend encounter to solve an even more fascinating enigma. The
invitation comes from someone who calls himself Fermat, in honor of the great
mathematician. They meet at a deserted lakeside, and follow increasingly
abstruse clues, expecting to arrive at a comfortable retreat where they will
spend a jolly weekend playing mathematical games. What happens instead is an
absolutely original thriller - terrifying but without violence -- that will
keep you on the edge of your seat and riveted to the screen, while four very
smart people try to use their brains to stay alive. This movie is a real
sleeper; don't miss it! (Catherine Wyler)
FLOW: FOR LOVE OF
WATER
Documentary, US,
2007, 93 minutes
Director: Irena Salina
Producer: Steven Starr
Irena Salina in attendance!
W.H. Auden once said: “Thousands have lived without love.
Not one without water.” For most of us living in a country where endless
varieties of outrageously-priced bottled water line grocery aisles, it is hard
to imagine not having access to this life-sustaining commodity, er…resource.
But as director Irena Salina points out in this Grand Jury prize-winning film
from Sundance, that is just the situation we face: a global crisis of epic
proportions due to an ever-shrinking supply of water. And lest the scenes from across the world – Africans in shanty
towns trying to desperately reconnect water pipes under cover of night; rivers
in Bolivia turned red from run-off from a slaughterhouse; the piracy of the
Ganges – aren’t enough to give us pause, Salina is quick to illustrate the
problem is very much in our backyards. A billion dollar water company executive
argues privatization as the wave of the future; a California scientist details
public water toxicities far beyond recent headlines. And as for the “purity” of
bottled water? Less regulated than tap, one bottler goes as far as to dig his
well on an old industrial waste site. Very much a call to action, this
unflinching look at politics, pollution and human rights is a must-see for all
those interested in survival in the 21st century. (Ruth Cowing)
GONZO: THE LIFE
AND WORK OF DR. HUNTER S. THOMPSON
Documentary, US,
2007, 119 minutes
Director/Producer/Writer: Alex Gibney
Producers: Graydon Carter, Alex Gibney,
Jason Kliot, Eva Orner, Joana Vicente
Producer/Editor: Alison Ellwood
Narrator: Johnny Depp
Whether you think you've heard more about Hunter Thompson
than you ever want to - or you weren't there and want to know more, this
exceptional, brilliantly edited documentary provides a riveting view of the
life and times of “a complex, walking monument to misbehaviour”, as one
obituary put it. Narrated by his friend Johnny Depp, who also appears in the film,
Hunter's rabid prose and seductive energy coupled with the creativity of
director Alex Gibney and editor Alison Ellwood thrust the viewer into the
middle of the action in the decades during which Thompson practiced the
participatory journalism he called Gonzo. Thompson's story encompasses one
crazy ride through the major events of his time, and the major players -
politicians, actors, athletes, Hells Angels - whose antics he related and
embellished. When he ultimately became the story, the decline was swift, and
the end not unexpected…but it was original, just like Hunter. (Alex Gibney's
previous doc, TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE, just won the Academy Award in 2008.)
(Catherine Wyler)
THE GREATEST
SILENCE: RAPE IN THE CONGO
Documentary, US,
2007, 76 minutes; in French/Swahili with English subtitles
Director/Writer/Producer/Cinematographer/Editor: Lisa F.
Jackson
Their story has never been told. It is a story of
unimaginable barbaric atrocities. Tens of thousands of women and girls have
been kidnapped, raped, mutilated, and tortured by soldiers waging a seemingly
unstoppable war in the Democratic Republic of Congo since 1998. Award winning
documentary producer and director, Lisa F. Jackson, breaks the silence by
giving these heroic women a platform from which to speak frankly of their
plight. With grace, dignity and uncommon directness we witness great numbers of
women and girls give testimony to the incomprehensible. As a victim of gang
rape herself, Ms. Jackson's personal quest is to understand the universal
stigmas that are attached to rape and its survivors. It is her hope that the
film will be a catalyst in focusing world attention on these unspeakable
horrors and to explore, witness and contribute to these women's healing through
the empowerment of personal narrative. (Diane Brinkman)
HOLLYWOOD CHINESE
Documentary, US,
2007, 89 minutes
Director/Writer/Producer/Editor: Arthur
Dong
Featuring: Joan Chen
Arthur Dong in
attendance
From Charlie Chan to Flower Drum Song to Memoirs of a Geisha
(with a Chinese actress playing a Japanese character), the image of Chinese and
Chinese-Americans has assumed some strange shapes in Hollywood movies. But
Arthur Dong's smart, funny, groundbreaking documentary tells a far more
fascinating and complex story than you might imagine. Of course there are the
shameful but unfortunately unsurprising stereotypes. But there are also the
often unexpected reactions by Chinese-Americans to these stereotypes, the
efforts by powerful (and sexy) performers to undermine or parody them, and the
now little-known series of Hollywood films made by Chinese for Chinese.
Overflowing with captivating film clips and intriguing interviews that range
from the poignant to the hilarious, Hollywood Chinese is an absolute must for film
buffs, ethnic history buffs, and anyone else looking to explore a previously
unexamined piece of American popular culture. (Sid Rosenzweig)
I
SERVED THE KING OF ENGLAND (Obsluhoval Jsem Anglického Krále)
Narrative,
Czech Republic/Slovakia, 2007, 120 minutes; in Czech with English subtitles
Director/Writer: Jirí Menzel
Producer: Rudolf Biermann
Editor: Jirí Brožek
The screenplay focuses on two parallel stories. The first
follows the youthful exploits and gradual maturing of an ambitious little man
before the War and during the German occupation when, in love and guided by
stupidity rather than opportunism, he finds himself on the side of the
occupying power. The second story, interlinked with the first, concerns only a
short period in his later life when, after years in prison, he seeks peace and
solitude in an abandoned German village whose inhabitants were expelled after
the war. His peace is only briefly disturbed by the arrival of a young
working-class woman. Her youth and vitality bring back memories of his amorous
adventures as a young man.
IRINA PALM
Narrative,
Belgium/Luxembourg/UK/Germany/France, 2006, 103 minutes
Director: Sam Garbarski
Producers: Sébastien Delloye, Diana Elbaum,
Thanassis Karathanos, Karl Baumgartner, Jani Thiltges, Claude Waringo,
Christine Alderson
Starring: Marianne Faithfull
Widowed, respectable, middle-aged Maggie desperately needs
money for her grandson's lifesaving medical treatment. Spotting a “Hostess
Wanted” sign, she naively stumbles into “Sexy World,” and soon discovers the
actual job description is not quite what she expected. Taken in hand by a
wisecracking colleague and the club's tough-guy-with-a-soft-spot owner, Maggie
soon becomes the local favorite, her specialty suggested by her “nom de work,”
Irina Palm. Can she earn enough to save the day - without compromising her
honor, scandalizing her family, or getting thrown out of her quiet suburb by
her gossipy neighbors? That question may sound like a parody of traditional
soap opera, but Irina Palm is anything but traditional, and while it is very
funny, it also explores serious matters in an honest and quite moving manner.
As Maggie, 60's-rock-goddess-turned-critically-acclaimed-actress-and-singer
Marianne Faithful delivers an amazing performance that expresses every nuance
of this complex, courageous, and quite wonderful woman.
JELLYFISH
Narrative,
Israel/France, 2007, 78 minutes; in Hebrew with English subtitles
Directors: Shira Geffen, Etgar Keret
Writer: Shira Geffen
A delicately beautiful tale that won the coveted Palme d’Or
at the Cannes Film Festival, Jellyfish is the story of three women living in a
Tel Aviv we never quite have experienced. Purposefully shot to remove the layer
of bustling tension so often felt in Israel, this cinematically gorgeous film
has as its center the blue-toned sea. Among the characters fighting the
currents that seem to move them through life with no reason (a nod to the
title) are Batya, a lonely waitress who finds a lost little girl on the beach;
Joy, the Filipino domestic worker who has been forced to leave her young son
behind so she can care for an actress’ aging mother (a scene from an
experimental Hamlet is one of several wryly humorous moments in the film); and
Keren, the gorgeous bride whose new husband starts to stray when their
honeymoon is ruined by her broken leg. Whether these women will learn to swim
on their own, or continue to drift helplessly along, provides the quiet and
compelling undertow of this story. (Ruth Cowing)
A JIHAD FOR LOVE
Documentary, US/UK/France/Germany/Australia, 2007, 81 minutes; in
English/Arabic/ Hindi/Persian/Urdu/French with English subtitles
Director/Producer: Parvez Sharma
Producer: Sandi DuBowski
Editor: Juliet Weber
Juliet Weber in attendance!
What's it like to be both gay and a believing, committed member of a religious
faith that harshly condemns homosexuality? That's the question asked of Muslims
in Asia, the Middle East and Turkey in this revealing documentary. What's truly
surprising is the range of answers that come from the troubled, brave, and
appealing people whose lives the film explores with insight and compassion.
Though most fear social ostracism (and perhaps legal penalties), some enjoy the
relative tolerance of don't-ask-don't-tell Turkey, while others face the rigors
of more repressive countries, and still others plan to emigrate to what they
hope will be the freedom of the West. The film also offers a fascinating
examination of the complexities of Islam and the varying interpretations of its
attitudes towards gender and sexuality. But above all, A Jihad For Love is an
intensely human story of ordinary people struggling to deal with the
extraordinary difficulties life has given them. (Sid Rosenzweig)
THE
LAST MISTRESS (UNE VIEILLE MAÎTRESSE)
Narrative, France,
2007, 114 minutes; in French with English subtitles
Director/Writer: Catherine Breillat
Producer: Jean-François Lepetit
Two brilliant “bad girls” of European cinema - director
Catherine Breillat and actor Asia Argento - inspire each other to pull out all
the stops in the depiction of female desire. In Breillat's erotic head-trip,
Argento plays “La Vellini” a 19th century courtesan, locked in a love/hate
relationship with a young handsome libertine (talented newcomer Fu-ad Ait
Attou.) Masquerading as an mockingly overheated bodice ripper, the film is in
fact a complex investigation of the changing dynamics of power and sexuality during
the transition from the 18th century Age of Reason and the bedroom philosophies
of De Sade and De Laclos to the 19th century Romantic age, the era of melodrama
and l'amour fou. Argento may pose like a Goya odalisque, but when she locks
eyes with you, she's Manet's Olympia, the figure that turned the act of looking
into sexualized struggle for power. (Amy Taubin)
MISTER FOE
Narrative, UK,
2008, 95 minutes
Director/Writer: David McKenzie
Producer: Gillian Berrie
“Hallam's a weirdo and I think the future belongs to the
weird.” So says director David McKenzie about Hallam Foe, the teenage hero of
his latest film. Played by Jamie Bell (who literally leapt into the limelight
as the title character in the wildly popular Billy Elliot), he spends his days
spying on people from his tree house in the Scottish Highlands, pining for his
dead mother, lusting after his beautiful stepmother, and generally struggling
(without much success) to figure out what the world is all about, and what his
place in it is. Eventually he moves from rural tree house to urban rooftops in
Edinburgh, but his spying and his struggle continue - with some intriguing new
characters added, including a young woman who looks uncannily like his mother.
Alternately hilarious, poignant, bizarre, and sweetly romantic, Mister Foe
chronicles the escapades of an oddball but endearing character who just may
make peace with the most troubling of issues.
MONGOL
Narrative, Kazakhstan, 2007, 121 minutes; in Mongolian with
English subtitles
Director/Writer/Producer: Sergei Bodrov
Writer: Arif Aliyev
Producer: Sergey Selyanov, Anton Melnik
Starring: Khulan Chuluun
“Do not scorn a weak cub, he may become a brutal tiger,” exhorts the opening
line of this epic drama. Do not miss this tale of the violent rise of Genghis
Khan and the birth of modern politics, which was Oscar-nominated for 2008 Best
Foreign Language Film! Shot in Mongolia with sweepingly dramatic scenery,
rampant cavalry, sizzling swordplay, the Mongols cherish their traditions and
codes of honor as Khan leads them through the birth pangs of nation building.
Experience the majesty and excitement of life in the steppes in 1192, The Year
of the Rat… If you appreciate a love story, combined with war, politics,
steaming horses, fractured armor, and archery used as artillery, this unique
epic is for you. (Plus, the people are beautiful and courageous, and everyone
is magnificently garbed, including the horses.) Don't come alone, insists one
early viewer; you will need help leaving the theatre! (Catherine Wyler)
THE OLDEST MOTHER
ON THE BLOCK
Documentary, US,
2006, 60 minutes
Director/Writer: Cat Ashworth
Cinematographer: Virginia Orzel
Cat Ashworth in
attendance
Everyone over the age of twelve knows how a baby is made.
But for the fastest growing age group of women having babies, the magical
process of sperm meeting egg takes place in a Petri dish. Many women over age
forty soon realize that their own eggs have expired. These women decide to use
eggs donated from a younger woman. This film follows three older women, as they
struggle to achieve a pregnancy and later, as they cope with the unique
problems of being an older mom.
Eileen and Mike visit a fertility specialist who talks about
Eileen's "egg problem." At first, they are told that there is less
than a five per cent chance of conceiving using her own eggs. In the end they
use donor eggs after considering all their options. Another woman uses donor
sperm, chosen online. She gives birth to twin baby boys. The filmmaker and her
husband conceive with donor eggs "...after wasting 25 years of good
eggs!" She becomes pregnant at age 47 and now has a healthy five year old
daughter who is asking them uncomfortable questions about her biological
mother. These women are all pushing the limits of their biological clocks. They
are struggling with pregnancy and small children at an age when many of their
peers are becoming grandmothers, and they are redefining the image of
motherhood. Included are interviews with several doctors and with Nancy London,
MSW and author of Hot Flashes, Warm Bottles: First-Time Mothers Over Forty, who
discusses how fertility declines with age.
OPERATION
FILMMAKER
Documentary, US,
2007, 92 minutes
Director/Producer/Editor/Cinematographer: Nina
Davenport
Producer: David Schisgall
Editor: Aaron Kuhn
Nina Davenport in
attendance
A year after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, MTV aired a segment
on Baghdad film student Muthana Mohmed, whose school had been destroyed by
bombs. Watching that night was actor Liev Schreiber -- taken with the
25-year-old's vibrancy and stricken with a sense of guilt, he resolved to help
him. Soon Mohmed was bound for Prague, hired to work as an assistant on
Schreiber's directorial debut Everything is Illuminated, doc director Nina
Davenport in tow to record what all hoped would be a meaningful and
life-altering experience. But Mohmed's adjustment to life on the crew proves
rocky, and his at-times unreasonable requests for help begin to alienate his
original supporters. Eventually he turns to, then on, Davenport. Her plan for
one month of filming turns into a 1½ year commitment, and her lens allows the
tension between helmer and subject to be shown without pretense. In the end, as
she says, no one has a good exit strategy…leaving all to ponder the
implications of good intentions gone wrong. (Ruth Cowing)
PHOEBE IN
WONDERLAND
Narrative, US,
2008, 96 minutes
Director/Writer: Daniel Barnz
Producer: Lynette Howell
Starring: Elle Fanning, Felicity Huffman,
Patricia Clarkson, Bill Pullman, Campbell Scott
Special appearance
by Bill Pullman!
The delicate line between fantasy and reality, between
creativity and disorder, is exquisitely explored in this story of a young girl
(a luminous Elle Fanning) who longs to be in the school production of Alice in
Wonderland. A bright but quirky kid whose odd rituals mystify her parents and
peers, Phoebe finds acceptance only behind the closed doors of the auditorium,
where a strange yet charismatic drama teacher casts her in her dream role of
Alice, while overseeing the famous Lewis Carroll adaptation as if she were the
Cheshire Cat herself. Despite the fact she shines on stage, however, Phoebe's
years of difficult behavior have taken their toll on her parents, particularly
her Mom who longs to succeed at a career stunted by parenting duties. When
disaster strikes after a series of painful events, Phoebe, and all those around
her, must decide which side of the looking glass they prefer. (Ruth Cowing)
POISONED
BY POLONIUM (aka REBELLION: THE LITVINENKO CASE)
Documentary,
Russia, 2007, 110 minutes; in Russian/English with English subtitles
Director/Writer/Editor: Andrei Nekrasov
Producer/Writer/Editor: Olga Konskaya
The story of the former KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko
poisoned last November in London told in his own words and in interviews with
his widow, his friends and his alleged killers unravels the dark secrets of the
Kremlin. During five years between his escape from Russia and his poisoning
with radioactive Polonium-210 last November in London, former FSB (ex-KGB)
agent Alexander (Sasha) Litvinenko spent hours with filmmaker Andrei Nekrasov
explaining the reasons of his rebellion and detailing the rise of the police
state in Russia in the past decade. His narrative, interrupted by flashbacks into
history, explains how the hopes for freedom and democracy after the collapse of
Soviet Communism have been dashed by the war in Chechnya and the consolidation
of power by President Vladimir Putin. Litvinenko's entanglement in the power
struggle between his FSB employers and dissident oligarchs led to his arrest
and brief imprisonment followed by a daring escape with his family into the
safety of political asylum in London. His subsequent investigation of the
alleged involvement of FSB in the 1999 bombings of apartment houses in Moscow,
which was blamed on the Chechens and served as the pretext for the war, made
him the sworn enemy of the Kremlin. From a string of unexplained deaths and
unsolved murders of opposition figures and journalists, Litvinenko predicted
his own end. At his deathbed he accused President Putin of ordering his
assassination. His two former KGB colleagues who allegedly slipped Polonium-210
into his tea during a meeting in a London bar, denied any wrongdoing in an
interview in Moscow. President Putin angrily rejected allegations of official
involvement.
SECRECY
Documentary, US,
2008, 86 minutes
Directors/Producers: Peter Galison, Robb Moss
Narrator/Animator: Ruth Lingford
Ruth Langford in
attendance!
With a declared war on terrorism and the battle over civil
liberties in the headlines, filmmakers/Harvard professors Robb Moss (The Same
River Twice, RHFIFF ‘04) and Peter Galison explore the question of whether
secrecy - keeping “secrets secret” -- erodes or enhances democracy in this post
9/11 world. The film details several staggering statistics: costs in the $8
billion per year range and over 1 million people involved in the
“classification universe” -- the production of governmental classified secret
documents. The filmmakers take care to talk to proponents on either side of the
fence, as well as some who have had their beliefs shaken by recent abuses of
power. These fascinating interviews with journalists, NSA, CIA, military vets,
lawyers and everyday people don't guarantee answers or easy solutions, but they
will have you talking long after the last frame of this riveting documentary
fades (Ruth Cowing).
SITA SINGS THE
BLUES
Animated Feature,
US, 2008, 82 minutes
Director/Writer/Producer/Designer/Animator: Nina
Paley
Sita is a Hindu goddess, the leading lady of India's epic
poem, The Ramayana and a dutiful wife, who follows her husband into exile, only
to be kidnapped by an evil king. She undergoes many tests, but remains faithful
to her husband. Nina (the filmmaker Nina Paley herself) is an artist who finds
parallels in Sita's life, when her husband - in India on a work project -
decides to break up their marriage via email. Three hilarious Indonesian shadow
puppets with Indian accents - linking the popularity of the Ramayana from India
all the way to the Far East - narrate both the ancient tragedy and the modern
comedy and can't resist commenting on the action. Paley, a formidable talent
making her first feature length animated film, juxtaposes multiple narrative
and visual styles with assurance and originality. Musical numbers are
choreographed to the gorgeous 1920's jazz vocals of Annette Hanshaw, making for
a multi-cultural stew that's both very entertaining and moving as well.
SMOKING LAWS
Narrative, US,
2007, 83 minutes
Director/Writer: Matthew Ehlers
Producers: Jane Ford
Matthew Ehlers and
Jane Ford in attendance
There's a smoky new perimeter in the barfly subculture.
Across the globe, more and more tobacco users are being forced outside of their
favorite haunts. As temperatures drop, their whining increases. Smoking Laws
explores a night in the life of a smoke-free bar during the coldest night of
year. The film takes you inside the conversations and confrontations that last
the length of a cigarette. It offers a voyeuristic look at the random strangers
brought together by addiction. Smoldering in the haze of dirty secrets, dirty
habits, beginnings, endings, even life-and-death, it's smoking good fun.
SURFWISE
Documentary, US, 2007, 93 minutes
Director/Writer: Doug Pray
Producer: Graydon Carter
Executive Producer: Joana Vicente
On
paper, it sounded like a countercultural dream: sell all material goods, pack
up the kids and hit the open road, your only road map the search for the
perfect wave. For a decade that spanned the ‘60s and ‘70s, that's exactly what
M.D./health guru/one of surfing's original legends Dorian “Doc” Paskowitz did,
with third wife Juliette, nine kids and a 24-foot camper. Sun-kissed archival
footage shows the family in the early days as smiling, championship-winning
media darlings, each tanned face and lean body more gorgeous than the next.
But, as this film by American subculture master Doug Pray (Hype!, Scratch)
progresses, fascinating glimpses into the now grown-up children's lives reveal
that all was not as idyllic as it seemed, and years of no exposure to the
outside world (school, peers, community) took its toll. With gut-wrenching,
oft-times hilarious detail, we follow each child's path as they each broke away
to embrace the very world their father rejected, issues of love and forgiveness
hanging (ten) in the balance. (Ruth Cowing)
URBAN EXPLORERS:
INTO THE DARKNESS
Documentary, US, 2007,
85 minutes
Director/Producer/Cinematographer: Melody
Gilbert
Production Coordinator: Carrie Bush
With a pulsating beat from top indie bands setting the mood,
join adventurers Mac Action, Mr. X, Catwoman, Slim Jim and their international
friends as they covertly climb/rapel/infiltrate secret abandoned government
sites, old lunatic asylums, sewers, drains and the forbidden catacombs of
Paris, capturing photographs almost too cool to be believed along the way. Some
are in it for the danger, some are in it for the discovery, many do it to put
on record a forgotten piece of history before it disappears. Whatever their
reasons, these thrill-seekers – students, workers, Clark Kents by day – are
part of a rapidly growing, internet-based subculture that will have you eyeing
“Do Not Enter” signs with a new appreciation…and perhaps even a tool or two.
(Ruth Cowing)
VITO AFTER
Documentary, US,
2005, 49 minutes
Director/Producer/Writer: MARIA PUSATERI
In attendance:
Maria Pusateri, Vito Friscia!
A documentary bursting at the seams with the indomitable
energy and life force that is Brooklyn homicide detective Vito Friscia, VITO
AFTER is an intimate, surprisingly uplifting portrait of a first responder who,
after helping thousands leave NYC on 9/11, spent months with 50,000 other
police, firefighters, and volunteers sifting through toxic rubble for signs of
those who had perished, in the hopes of bringing closure to the victim's
families. Unwittingly breathing in an unprecedented mixture of carcinogens
(asbestos, lead, mercury, chromium, PCBs, dioxins, to name a few), Vito, along
with over 70% of those who helped, developed distressing respiratory and other
symptoms. Not one to seek either acclaim or assistance, however, Vito drags his
feet getting medical attention. By the time he does we realize we are as
invested in his final diagnosis as if he were a family member - so endearing a character
has he become throughout the course of the film. For while we recognize the
telltale sadness in so many of his cop buddies eyes, it is Vito's humor and
vibrancy we are drawn to, perhaps in our desire to rediscover it in ourselves
(Ruth Cowing).
WHO
AM I? THE FOUND CHILDREN OF ARGENTINA (Quien Soy Yo?)
Documentary,
US/Argentina/UK, 2007, 75 minutes
Directed by Estela Bravo
Estela Bravo in
attendance
During the 1970's, when a right wing dictatorship ruled
Argentina, thousands of people who were not in sympathy with the government
were “disappeared”. Often they were young activists, and sometimes they were
pregnant. The mothers of the “disappeared” began to meet every week in the
central Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires, chanting for the return of their
children. They became known around the world as the Mothers of the Plaza de
Mayo. Hundreds of babies were born in Argentine jails, taken from their mothers
who then “disappeared”, and the babies were given away - to all sorts of
people. Those babies are now adults living in a democratic Argentina. Once they
realized they would not see their children again, the Mothers of the Plaza de
Mayo began to search for their missing grandchildren, with equal fervor and
tenacity. This is the heartwrenching story of the young people they found, and
some who found them, told with passion and clarity by the accomplished
filmmaker Estela Bravo. (Catherine Wyler).
WOMEN BEHIND THE
CAMERA
Documentary, US,
2007, 90 minutes
Director/Producer/Writer: Alexis Krasilovsky
Editor: Katey Bright
Alexia Krasilovsky
in attendance
Filmmaking may be an art, but it's also an industry, and an
infamously sexist one. So it's no surprise that women have had to struggle to
be accepted as cinematographers. What is surprising is how many of them (mostly
more recently) have succeeded in that struggle. Even more surprising is that
those women live and work not only in the U.S., but also in many unexpected
places around the world. Based of director Alexis Krasilovsky's book of the
same name, Women Behind the Camera reveals the courageous lives of more than
fifty pioneer camerawomen surviving the odds in Afghanistan, China, India,
Iran, Russia, Senegal, and Mexico, as well as in Australia, Canada, France,
Germany and elsewhere. Whether shooting underwater, out of helicopters, in war
zones, or on high-priced sets in Hollywood or Bollywood, these women daily
prove their courage, strength, and technical skill, while creating images of
awesome beauty that express their own artistic visions. (Sid Rosenzweig)
