Avatars

The Congress (2013) - Folman







Ari Folman (Waltz with Bashir) returns with a trippy new live action/animation feature. The selling point of this highly ambitious parody on stardom and movie industry, loosely based on Stanislaw Lem's The Futurological Congress, is first and foremost its dazzling animation. The look of The Congress is decidedly retro - a combination of Astro Boy, Fantastic Planet, Betty Boop on acid.

The story concerns Robin Wright, a middle aged former actress who lives in a airplane hangar with her two kids, Sarah and Aaron. Hollywood had tired of her because she's been a 'difficult' actress all her career. Her long time agent Al (Harvey Keitel) visits her with one last offer which seems to be the norm for the aging actors in the business ('Keanu has done it!') - total body scanning. Once she is scanned completely into the computer system, she will never be able to work again. But her computer generated younger self, forever at age 33-34, will star in whatever studio demands. She will be handsomely rewarded. Aaron having some sort of sensory debilitating disease and half-threat from the ruthless Miramount studio head Jeff (Danny Huston), Robin reluctantly agrees to the deal.

Twenty years later, she visits Miramount again to attend the animated world of Congress, where they announce sensory altering drugs where people can drink the portion of the celebrities of their choosing and become like their idols until the drug wears off. By now Robin's computer generated self is a mega action babe and no one recognizes her old self except for Dylan (voiced by John Hamm), an animator/scan artist who has been in love with her since her 'retirement'. She opposes the drug that suppresses individualism and promotes hiding behind mask in public and pays the consequences. Then there is an animated revolution...

Folman's take on our technology imbued society where people wear masks/live through avatars is an overly ambitious project, so much so its narrative structure has visible cracks everywhere. Yet by the end, you are so dazzled by its colors and style, you find yourself standing dazed, covered in its electric rainbow mist, asking what just happened.

First Look 2014 at The Museum of Moving Image

MoMI (Museum of Moving Image) presents First Look, a bona fide film series showcasing new works by established filmmakers and first timers alike from all corners of the globe, carefully selected by the esteemed curatorial staff (first by Critic Denis Lim now David Schwartz and Aliza Ma). Quietly nestled in post-New Year hangover days with crazy award season just around the corner.First Look is fast becoming one of the most sought after film series in New York City. The series runs from January 9 - 19.

This is where I first saw Chantal Akerman's gorgeous new film Almayer's Folly and Philippe Grandrieux's loving documentary, It May Be That Beauty Has Strengthened Our Resolve: Masao Adachi, on the Japanese New Wave great Masao Adachi in its inaugural edition two years ago. Last year, the series graced me with Bruno Dumont's seldom seen 2011 masterpiece, Hors Satan (one of my very favorites of last year) and a beautiful three-hour documentary on the remote island of Corvo and its inhabitants off of Azores, It's The Earth, Not The Moon.

This year, they are presenting 13 features and 6 shorts on two consecutive weekends, including Godfrey Reggio's new film The Visitors with Philip Glass's score, Glass will be presenting the screening along with Steven Soderberg. The opening night's film, Little Feet is a new work by American Indie staple, Alexander Rockwell (In the Soup, Somebody to Love). I am particularly interested in seeing the Chilean offerings, The Quispe Girls and The Summer of Flying Fish, as well as Ape (pictured above) by Joel Potrycus. For any cinephiles, First Look offers a great start to a new year.

Please go to the MoMI website for more info, schedule and tickets.

Vision Board 2014

Our friend Crystal had her beginning of the year party/get-together/let's-all-draw-something thang at her apartment. We had to trek all the way up to Washington Heights in a slush mess of a weather and there were more than 20 of us drawing on our 'vision board': a piece of wooden board where we draw our personal vision of the new year on our hands and knees. There was homemade coconut, plantains & vegetable stew with beans and rice- Crystal's family's from Puerto Rico = a damn good stew. And I drew this for myself. Since I don't draw regularly, I was quite intimidated by all the artists around me. But I think it came out alright:


Happy New Year Everyone!

Whaling as Art

Drawing Restraint 9 (2005) - Barney
In pictures:
















Japanese culture seems like a perfect match for artist Matthew Barney. In Drawing Restraint 9, his feature length film project, he takes on the ritual of whaling with the help of his girlfriend Bjork. Unlike his Cremaster Cycle films, Drawing actually has something resembling a plot. After elaborate giant whaling ship launching ceremony, two foreigners in fur coats (Barney and Bjork) gets invited (hauled in a basket) on board. Separately they get groomed and put on Matthew-Barney-hybrid kimonos (made out of animal hides) and attend an elaborate tea ceremony with Matthew-Barney-hybrid tea set (made out of various sea shells and sea creatures). In the mean time, the crew are busy hauling in some kind of manufactured sea log and what looks like a gigantic spine made out of wax in place of an actual whale. The night comes and the violent storm hits. The ship is taking in water, slowly submerging B and B. They start cutting each other's legs off with ritual daggers under water, then transform themselves into whales.

Continuing the theme and motifs from his Cremaster Cycle and marrying them with whaling - sperm, sperm whale, wax, blubber, amber gris, etc., Barney creates some stunning images accompanied by Bjork's score. All the rituals are loooong drawn out, but luckily, there are no repetitions of images or movements. I can't think of an art project that is this big in scale and ambitious yet quite coherent. Drawing Restrain 9 is quite an experience.

Sink or Swim

Drowning by Numbers (1988) - Greenaway






Satunning: visual symmetry, use of background/foreground, lighting, insanely elaborate mise-en-scene.... Drowning by Numbers is just out of this world. The work of a true obsessive compulsive. The plot involves women, all named Cici, drowning their husbands.

A Nightcap

Merci pour le chocolat (2000) - Chabrol
Delicious. Since it is a Chabrol film, I knew going in that it won't have a satisfying ending. I enjoyed the heck out of it nonetheless. He lays all the traps first, going through characters' histories and slowly building up the tension. A simple intrigue- a remote possibility of 2 babies switched at birth, expands to a full blown murder mystery centered around the chocolate factory heiress Mika (Isabelle Huppert), her pianist husband Andre (Jacques Dutronc) and Jeanne (Anna Mouglalis) who might or might not be Andre's daughter. Mika's motives are not well defined but hinted throughout the film. It's not those puzzle pieces that relishes in their own cleverness that only happens in movies. There is no internal logic in Chabrolian world, just a lot of intrigue and people behaving mysteriously but not in a calculated way. I feel that I can easily get lost into his world. More Chabrol please.

Top 20 Discoveries 2013

Looking through the list, I admit my film viewing wasn't as adventurous as the last year's. I don't even have anything before 1969 on the list. Shame on me. I did exercise some concerted effort to explore certain filmmakers which I never consciously have in my film viewing previously, ever. Still there are so many filmmakers to explore...

Top 20 in order watched:
*Click on the titles for full reviews

Life and Nothing More... (1992) - kiarostami

Kiarostami's moving picture continues. A middle aged man and his young son are on the road to Koker, a northern rural town leveled by the devastating earthquake in 1990. It is only revealed later on that the man is a film director (a Kiarostami stand-in) who is looking for a child actor who starred in his previous film, Where is Your Friend's Home? (AK's 1987 film also taking place in that region). As they encounter monstrous traffic jam and many victims of the 'god's will', the line between reality and fiction evaporates: the traveling pair encounters an old man who was also in the said film, carrying a porcelain sink to his house amid devastation around him. He explains, "You never know when you need it." When asked if the big house he is entering (but doesn't have a key to) is his, he replies, "This is not my house. It's only my house in this film. My real house collapsed in the earthquake."

Shot shortly after the real earthquake that took the lives of 50,000, and based on his own experience driving around (with his real son), Life and Nothing More... shows resilience of the people amid a horrible disaster. As they make ends meet, digging out their household items from debris, they still look forward the better future. They fidget a TV antennae to watch a World Cup match in ruins. With Through the Olive Tree (a fictional 'making-of' Life and Nothing More...) as the third film taking place in Koker, these films are seen as the Koker Trilogy. There are many elements here that are present in his later films: interior driving shots, wide scenery long takes, no close-ups. Elegantly simple and captivating throughout with an open ending, Life and Nothing More... is a beautiful film.

Taste of Cherry (1997) - Kiarostami

Inquisitive dialog, just like intimate questionnaires in documentaries is where it's at with all Kiarostami's films, staged usually in moving cars. The beauty of Taste of Cherry lies in its simplicity- a man drives around looking for someone to assist him in his suicide. They don't have to do the deed. He will take sleeping pills and lie down in an already dug up grave. In the morning, they can put some earth on him if he's dead. They will be rewarded handsomely. First, a young soldier runs away after finding out what the man is up to. Second, a seminary student from Afghanistan objects because of his religious beliefs and tries to dissuade him. Finally, an old taxidermist agrees to it, because he has a sick child.

Kiarostami lets us know that we are watching a film. With Louis Armstrong's St. Jame's Infirmary playing at the end over the image, he tells us that death is inevitable for all of us and makes us think. His cinema is precious because it doesn't resemble any other. If Tarkovsky tried to make us feel the 'passage of time' with his virtuosic camera movements, framing and lighting, Kiarostami succeeds in astounding simplicity, in one hour and forty minutes. Life is a moving car. Done. The impact is still immense. The abrupt intrusions of continuity in the middle and at the end are quite delicious in cinematic terms. It all fits nicely with his theme of life, death, cinema, reality... just amazing!

Hadewijch (2009) - Dumont

Austere and sincere. Another masterpiece from Dumont.

The White Ribbon (2009) - Haneke

Masterful examination on the existence of 'innocence'.

It's the Earth Not the Moon (2011) - Tocha

Loved every single moment of this 3 hour Portuguese documentary.

Le pont du nord (1981) - Rivette

Loveliness of Pascal Ogier is just an icing on the cake in this playful comedy by one of the unsung heroes of French New Wave.

La captive du desert (1990) - Depardon

Desert + Sandrine Bonnaire = cinematic heaven

Céline et Julie vont en bateau (1974) - Rivette

One of the classics I hadn't seen that I was able to get to this year. It lives up to all the praises.

A Nous Amours (1983) - Pialat

One of the best cinema debuts ever- 16 year old Sandrine Bonnaire ignites the screen. Pialat's uncompromising direction goes down in my book as one of the best coming of age movies of all time.

Coup de Torchon (1981) - Tavernier
The most hilarious Jim Thompson adaptation ever!

Emperor's Naked Army Marches On (1987) - Hara

Crazy documentary. You can totally see the continuation of Japanese New Wave in this anti-gov/anti-war film.

Peppermint Candy (1999) - Lee

Dehumanization of a man who experienced the Gwangju Massacre in Korea, 1980, told in reverse timeline. It's definitely the best Korean film I've ever seen.

City of Sadness (1989) - Hou

Hou's history lesson of Taiwan is masterful and affecting.

Mon Oncle Amerique (1980) - Resnais

Slowly getting into master filmmaker Resnais's artistry. There are still so much to explore in his filmography!

Mandala (1981) - Im

I grew up watching Im Kwontaek's films. I was too young to appreciate them back then. Beautiful, if not a little conventional storytelling. If you want good films about Buddhism, look no further than Im's films.

Heart of Glass (1976) - Herzog

This was One of my blind spots in Herzog's filmography. As expected, a grand experience at the cinema.

35 Rhums (2008) - Denis

So simple yet so perfect. This quiet family drama reaffirms why Claire Denis is one of my favorite director of all time.

Caravaggio (1986) - Jarman

I was planning on taking large volumes of screenshots from this visually stunning film. But it turns out the dvd I got from netflix is too scratched to play on my computer. I'm seriously thinking about buying this. Jarman was a true visionary. Taking on the well known cocky post-Renaissance painter Amerighi Caravaggio's life with his painterly, dramatic style that surpasses even the best of Greenaway's bombastic visuals, he shows the painter's lust for life and disdain for what was socially acceptable in a very Catholic era. Young Tilda Swinton and Sean Bean are sculpted with theatrical light skillfully thus their youthful beauty immortalized on the celluloid forever. Nigel Terry (King Arthur in Excalibur) plays famed painter with messy private life who was attracted to many of his subjects, including young Tilda and Sean. It wouldn't have worked if it was done by any other, but when Jarman mixes old and new (modern costumes, typewriter etc), transcending time and space, it works wonders. Amazingly beautiful and playful, I am totally blown away by this.

Days of Eclipse (1988) - Sokurov

Yes, Sokurov is quite different from Tarkovsky as a director and visual storyteller. I realize that after seeing this film. It's quite hard to describe this 'Sokurovian cinema'. But this film was an eye opener.

Shame (1969) - Bergman

What more can I say about this? Bergman is a true master of cinema.

Directors explored:

Jacques Rivette:
Le pont du nord
Celine et Julie vont en bateau

Maurice Pialat:
A nous amours
Loulou
Police

Abbas Kirarostami:
Life and Nothing More
Taste of Cherry
Homework
The Reoprt

Hou Hsiao Hsien:
City of Sadness
Millennium Mambo

Bruno Dumont:
Flandres
Hadewijch
Hors Satan
Camille Claudel 1915

Alain Resnais:
Mon oncle Amerique
Muriel
Vous n'avez encore vu

Raymond Depardon:
Une femme en Afrique
La captive du desert
L'homme sans O'ccidental

Alexandr Sokurov:
Days of Eclipse
Mother and Son
Moloch

Hong Sangsoo:
In Another Country
Nobody's Daughter Haewon

Top 20 Discoveries 2012