Hiff 2008: Part 2

Sunday

No films until 1 pm equals to good night sleep. With plenty of time to spare I decide to walk rather than taking a bus. The wether is fine, and a 50 minute walk never hurt anyone. I eat my regular festival meal kebab with rice (not the best food the town has to offer, but does keep you full till the next morning, which is the main point) at the railway station. They still incorrectly claim in their front window that it costs 8.40€, while the actual price is 6.90€. The correct price can only be seen in a poster pointing inside. It’s been like this for a year already. People not willing to pay 8.40€ will stay away, and anyone entering the restaurant would’ve been willing to pay the full amount. Brilliant business.

Filmwise the day begins with a 142 minute risk; La Question Humaine aka Heartbeat Detector (2007). A surprising connection between modern, male oriented company world and crimes of the past is found this social noir. The overlong piece could do with 20 minutes of trimming, but the execution is stylish, and one can’t deny the film’s merits in introducing an interesting theory. Those who take cinema too seriously will probably grow a healthy bunch of gray hairs before the ending credits roll.

No Parking (2008 ) at Maximun 2. Perhaps the Spanish distributor over-estimated our language skills, or more likely was too lazy to double-check the package heading to the country of polar bears, leaving us with an unsubtitled print. I end up to Kinopalatsi to see Captain Abu Raed (2007). An unfortunate change in schedule, but I don’t feel to upset about it since I had some slight interest for the film anyway. A bigger problem is that I’m feeling hot as hell. Fever perhaps? I try to feel my forehead. It smells of chocolate… no, it’s the girl next to who me eating chocolate cake. Everything fine then.

”Jordan’s Amelie”, one critic praised. The good meaning film follows an old man who delights the kids of the neighborhood by telling them made up stories of his adventures as a flight captain. In reality the poor man is a cleaner at the airport. The hopelessly sugary film later takes a turn into darker family hell territories, without much success. Syrup is cheaper at grocery store, and can be served in smaller portions. Abu Raed runs over 100 minutes. Still, with Nadim Sawalha’s cordial performance you don’t feel like bashing the film completely.

Vexille (2007), a computer animation by Fumihiko Sori, the director of Ping Pong and the upcoming ”female Zatoichi” Ichi, is a prime example of the worst type animated garbage Japan has to offer. Although the setting – future Japan completely isolated from the rest of the world – sounds interesting, the film achieves nothing. It’s loaded with nerve wrecking slow motion action scenes and fearless heroes and robots that share equal charisma. Worst of all is the loud soundtrack that makes the poor viewer develop suicidal thoughts. The positives of this problem-waste are few and far between; there’s a decent piece of music in the opening credits, followed by a rather exiting ”death star invation” 95 painfully long minutes later.

Getting back to respectable movies, it was a few years ago when I saw Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s Climates (2006). Back then I thought this director could easily reach greatness if given a more minimalistic screenplay to work with. Three Monkeys (2008 ) unfortunately takes the wrong path with family drama of a man who takes the blame for fatal traffic accident intead of his boss, and his wife and son now left alone while the father is in prison. However, Ceylan’s use of 2.35:1 aspect ratio is often impressive, and the intentionally slow and detailed pace deserves recognition. The slight disappointment is more because of the director’s huge potential than the film’s failures as an individual product.

Monday

One of the 2008 additions to festival program was screening this year’s Nordic Council Film Price nominees. Included in the competition is a total of five movies, one from each Nordic country. Some of the films have been seen in theaters already before, while some made their Finnish debut at the festival. While I managed to miss each of this year’s nominees, I did find time to examine the winner of the 2007 competition; The Art of Crying (2006).

Crying is fun in this pitch dark comedy from Denmark. The recipe to success is good poker face. Pulsing with seeming Nordic realism – that soon turns out wicked irony – the story of a ”normal” 1970 family takes all the more shocking – and hilarious – turns as it advances. Taboos are broken in the process, and the film is accompanied with a beautiful piano music and countryside setting. Performances are terrific throughout. An intelligent comedy with bite, for once.

Carrying on sad themes next up is Appleseed: Ex Machina (2007), where it’s the audience’s turn to cry. Hong Kong maestros Terence Chang and John Woo in the producer’s chair have brought little extra quality to Shinji Aramaki’s second Appleseed animation, which, according to my weak recallings, fares very poorly even compared to the 2004 original. It’s a rock and roll scifi actioner with plenty of dull slow-mo gunplay and zero character depth. The original source is Masamune Shirow’s manga. While far from the worst garbage the genre has to offer, Ex Machina features no redeeming qualities. It can be watched, but I can’t think of any good reasons to do so.

A notably better movie is Cristian Mungiu’s Occident (2002) that found a new life in the festival circuits after the directors 4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days (2007) was crowned in Cannes last year. Occident is a small drama comedy, decently entertaining and most definitely worth a recommendation for the director’s fans, but fails to be anything exceptional. It will probably find it’s fans nevertheless. To me perhaps most memorable about the film was a couple of great moments with the playful soundtrack.

A complete U-turn in terms of content takes place when Gomorra (2008 ), described as the most realistic Italian mafia movie ever made, starts in Kinopalatsi’s sold out screening. With a wide variety of characters and determination to aim at maximum level of realism, the film sacrifices entertainment values a few times along the way, but definitely offers something to think about when leaving the theatre. Because of the scattered structure I also suspect the film might hold up better on a repeated viewing. Those interested in the subject will probably gain their reward immediately.

The break

6:30 tuesday morning. I don’t want to get up, but I’ve got a train to catch. The festival is not over yet, not even for me, but I’m forced to go back to school for a few days. My Foreign Trade teacher has promised me to place a boot in my ass if I don’t deliver my assignment in time. That’s the last thing I need after four days of sitting on rough seats and sleeping on the floor. Besides, there’s a couple of other teachers who also might develop murderous thoughts if I scored too many absence marks. Back to school I go.

Hiff 2008: Part 1

Forewords

The 21st Helsinki International Film Festival, or Rakkautta & Anarkiaa (Love & Anarchy) as it is known in Finnish, was held 18-28.9.2008. Initially I found this year’s selection, especially from an Asian film fan’s point of view, a bit disappointing. However, with approximately 130 films playing in various theaters around the centrum of Helsinki for 11 days I found enough motivation to draw up a festival schedule and prepare for the movie marathon to come.

Friday

I’m sitting in a train, with a four hour ride ahead of me, and not feeling very good. The day has not gone as planned. I was supposed to attend a short test in Marketing Management in school this morning, and then skip the afternoon classes of Financial Accounting in order to make it to Helsinki in time. But yesterday, with a less than 24 hour warning, our class got the updated information; the order of the lessons has been switched. The test begins at 1 pm, my train leaves at 1:30.

I decide to give it desperate try; I appear in school with a huge backpack, and make a world record by finishing the test in 14 minutes, answering to most questions. Some of the question are too long and I don’t even have time to read them, let alone answer to them. My good luck is that the test is a brief one, actually a quiz, that you are supposed to complete in 60 minutes. The first of the many to come, in fact. Now, it’s time to run to the train station.

Due to mismatches in schedules between me and a friend of mine, who allows me to stay at his place during the festival, I have to carry my luggage with me the whole evening. It’s not a big deal – I much prefer doing it this way than causing extra inconvenience to my friend who’s already kind enough to provide me free accomomdation in the expensive city of Helsinki – but other festival visitors may wonder how on earth did a mountain climber end up in movie theater.

5:30. I arrive Helsinki. First I need to go redeem the tickets from two different theaters (representing different cinema chains). Bio Rex is hell, at least 40 people in queue. I decide to go to Kinopalatsi first. Hardly any people there. With the first 5 tickets in my hand I head back to Rex with hopes of making it to one of the 6:30 screenings. After 25 minutes of standing in queue I realize that isn’t going to happen.

The positive aspect of this unfortunate event is that now, while sadly missing gay zombies (Otto; or, Up with Dead People), I actually have time to eat. Later, while killing time in Kinopalatsi and wondering whether the Japanese photographer that passed me was a sign of a directors visit to come, I get the idea to write a festival diary. But enough about forewords, lets move in to the cinema.

As I suspected, Shinji Imaoka, a man of few words, is attending the screening of his half-recent pink fare Uncle’s Paradise (2006). While it could be a considered a dubious start for the festival on my behalf, the pic makes it to the positive side. Imaoka obviously possesses decent audio-visual skills, and some single scenes of pure insanity make comparisons to the works of Takashi Miike and Teruo Ishii seem at least half-justified.

There is – to quote a reviewer whose name I’ve forgotten – enough sex to put the main character into grave, but the film is humoristic and blessed with a sympathetic cast. The storyline follows and elderly man who’s too afraid of his horrible nightmares to sleep, and only finds consolation in overuse of vitamins, and occasional erotic adventures, mostly provided by his fisherman nephew’s cute girlfriend.

The evening continues in less perverse fashion with Shusuke Kaneko’s live action manga adaptation Death Note (2006). The transition from erotica to big scale blockbuster is actually more fitting than it may first seem; Kaneko himself is a former pink director. In Death Note the director stumbles a bit in the beginning – especially with one cgi generated character that caused some amusement in the audience – but the quality improves before long. The fantasy tale of a man who is granted an opportunity to take the justice into his own hands is surprisingly dark and captivating. Teen idols Tatsuya Fujiwara and Kenichi Matsuyama both convince in the lead roles. Not being familiar with the source material the true success of the adaptation process remains a mystery, but as an enjoyable and occasionally silly mainstream effort Death Note more than does its job.

Saturday

Ahh, shower. God knows I needed it after carrying around my backpack all day yesterday. I slept well, performing a successful blackout around 3 am after watching the first 40 minutes of Werner Herzog’s stylish new documentary Encounters at the End of the World (2007) at my friend’s place. We would finish the quality doc a few days later, yesterday I was too tired. My friend, the tough fighter he is, continued with an episode of Dexter after I had started taking the count. The first film will begin at noon, leaving me with just enough time to grab a cheese burger on my way to the movies.

My statistical competence as a reviewer takes left hooks as I enter Bio Rex to see yet another adaptation of a source material unknown to me; Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone (2008 ). Hideaki Anno’s life achievement in anime, Neon Genesis Evangelion, has been given a reworked cinema treating; 1.0 is the first of the four films to come, and covers the events of the first 6 episodes of the TV series. The opening is fast and confusing, but the pic soon finds its track and gets better scene by scene. The scifi action becomes secondary next to themes of war and loneliness. Carefully crafted characters provide a good grounding for the epic final battle.

After lunch break it’s more anime, this time Hayao Miyazaki’s Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984) making its Finnish cinema premiere (later coming to wider distribution). While I consider My Neighbor Totoro (1988 ) and Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989) delightful pieces of cinema, this Miyazaki doesn’t convince, apart from the opening scene. The dialogue is miserable, mostly repeating things that have already been already seen on screen and understood by the audience, and the preachy storyline doesn’t reach its end in acceptable time. Not even Joe Hisaishi score manage to stand out.

Director pair and brothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne have gained some recognizition among art house audiences, which made me eager to see their latest offering. Lorna’s Silence (2008 ) follows and a foreign woman who marries Belgian drug addict only to achieve the country’s nationality. As expected, the film is a very European character drama with some slight crime film connections, but fails to achieve a great level of detail. It keeps your interest up till the end, and comes with adequate performances from the leads, but ultimately doesn’t leave you with much worth remembering.

Next comes what, according to the organizers, is the film this year’s festival will be remembered for. Pascal Laugier’s Martyrs (2008 ) was the hot potato in this years’s Cannes, and reportedly considered a too risky pick for some international film festivals that decided to drop it from their selection. Laugier himself was meant to attend the screening with us in Helsinki, but unfortunately all we got was a polite letter explaining the man is stuck in L.A with Hollywood producers looking for a chance to work with him. What a shame.

The French have worked hard in the recent years to put out some of the most hard hitting horror movies on the market. But Martyrs needs a big warning stamp attached to its film reels; it is makes films such as Haute Tension and À l’intérieur seem harmless joyrides in comparison. The ultra strong thriller opens with montage showing its main characters, two young women, being tortured by an unknown organized group when they were children. The actual storyline picks up frome here and is better left unrevealed. Undeniably Laugier makes some bad misjudgements along the way, but the entirety, even described as existential by some, is fascinating. The experience is likely to be stronger than the last 100 movies you saw put together.

The last film of the night is Big Bang Love – Juvenile A (2006) by one of Japan’s most prolific madmen; Takashi Miike. This murder mystery set in prison, also going by a more lyrical title 4.6 Billion Years of Love, is loaded with gay themes and skilfully light images. It suffers from intentionally artistic outcome, but still manages to entertain even on repeated viewings. Masanobu Ando and Ryuhei Matsuda play the lead roles. Worth mentioning is also the ending, which is one of the best in recent memory. Perhaps it would soon be time to ask Miike to visit the festival; Hiff has a long tradition of screening his movies, often more than one per year.

Jun Ichikawa dies at 59

This is not a news blog, but I’ll make a one time exception to pay my respects to Jun Ichikawa, who, according to Variety, collapsed while editing his latest film, and died later in a hospital. Ichikawa, best known for films such as Tokyo Marigold, Osaka Story, Tony Takitani and How to Become Myself, was one of the few active directors I still had faith in. A terrible loss to cinema.

Recently seen movies #86

Sakuran (Japan, 2006) – 2,5/5

Punk girl Anna Tsuchiya stars as a courtesan in the most colourful period film – or perhaps a film in general – ever made. A 300 million yen screensaver for flat screen TV owners. The film looks gorgeous, but doesn’t go far beyond that. Tsuchiya of course is a pleasant sight in the lead, but doesn’t manage to rise far above the unoriginal screenplay. It should also be noted that the cinematography itself is nothing exceptional; rather it’s the set, colour and costume design that shines. By far the best thing about the film is the pop/rock soundtrack by Shiina Ringo. It creates some stunning moments, but is unfortunately under-used as a whole. Also worth mentioning is the nudity filled bathing scenes; in such mainstream production they might have raised some eyebrows if the director wasn’t female.

Recently seen movies #85

This World of Ours (Japan, 2007) – 2,5/5

Ryo Nakajima’s debut feature borrows from the ’new digital jp wave’ and throws in a more violent focus and blown out contrasts. It’s a decently strong experince with several good scenes and some visually impressive shots, but also has a lot of student film style angst visible. Occasionally the use of classical music and handheld cinematography feel more intentionally artistic than appropriate. The central characters are high schoolers who party, rape and blame the society for their anxiety. One of the characters is named after the director as a reference to his own past. Before turning into a filmmaker Nakajima used to isolate himself from the surrounding society. He started working on the screenplay at the age of 19. The 4 year therapy session was finished in 2007, titled ’This World of Ours’, and has been playing in film festivals to mostly favourable response.

Recently seen movies #84

Rainbow Song (Japan, 2006) – 3/5

This one gained initial interest points by being based on Shunji Iwai’s scrip. Vaguely described it’s Hana and Alice with less humour, male lead, and the death of one character written into the story. The master’s magic is missing, there’s no going round that, but Nana plastic this is not. Naoto Kumazawa isn’t an exceptionally talented director, but he’s attempting the right thing most of the time. Major melodrama and sobbing is kept out, although there’s a couple of weaker moments like one part that plays out almost like a farce (story wise, not visually). The film is divided into chapters and often you can tell the quality of the following scenes from the sub-title; Stalker Days is not as good The Kodak Girl. The storyline follows two university students making a film. Juri Ueno, as a novice director, and Hayato Ichihara as her assistant / actor both fare well, but it’s Yu Aoi’s brief but enjoyable appearance that stands out. Bright and slightly washed out visual look supports the film.

Recently seen movies #83

An Adolescent (Japan, 2001) – 3/5

Junior high school student falls in love with a middle aged cop (director Eiji Okuda himself) in an interesting if not entirely succesful drama. One of the strong points is that the film doesn’t make its love story too polished – Okuda’s character for example is more of an asshole than your typical tragic jdorama hero. On the minus side the film does lose its credibility more than once. There’s slight pretentiousness over the whole production but it’s the supporting characters – mainly the girl’s mother and brother – that come close to killing the film a couple of times. But if you can get over those flaws it’s ultimately an entertaing and even slightly humoristic ride. The female lead, Mayu Ozawa, was 20 years old at the time of making, but she looks young enough to pass for a 15 year old. Veteran star Hideo Murota plays her grandfather, and Okuda pulls his role in Kitano mode.