Wormwood is a Masterpiece We Deserve

Wormwood (2017) - Morris

One man's 60-plus years of obsession to find the truth about his father's death is the subject of the master documentarian Errol Morris' latest magnum opus, Wormwood, a 6-part Netflix series and/or 240-minute standalone movie.

It is one of the most inventive, refreshing cinematic events you will likely see this year. But this genre bending, indefinable whatsit is not really new to Morris. He made his groundbreaking docudrama, The Thin Blue Line, almost 30 years ago. It was the first 'true crime' documentary, and put him on the cinema map, utilizing cinematic reenactments along with a series of interviews, and spawned countless imitators. The film upset many genre purists then. But whether it was interests of the cinephiles or not, in the end, the film actually exonerated its subject Randall Dale Adams from a death row. Talk about cinema with real life consequences!

Looking through his diverse filmography since then, which includes A Brief History of Time, Mr. Death, The Fog of War and The Unknown Known, what always shines through is not his manipulation of medium, it's his clear-eyed quest for truth. It's always been about his meticulous search for truth by any visual, narrative means necessary -- remember his interrotron where you and your subject converse, staring right into each others eyes through his mirror/camera contraption?

Well, he doesn't use interroton in Wormwood, but instead a scripted narrative, acted out by esteemed actors -- Peter Sarsgaard, Molly Parker, Tim Blake Nelson and Christian Camargo -- and melding it expertly with long, multi-angle shot, wordy interviews, Morris creates something that is truly masterful and meaningful.

Wormwood definitely feels more like the expansive version of The Thin Blue Line, in which finding the truth is much more complex and the consequence of it has a grander implication to all of us and our nation rather than one person. I'm very glad that Netflix has given a filmmaker like Morris a blank canvas to play with. The series format fits the project well to tell a complicated story, rather than a typical two-hour film.

It concerns Eric Olson and his lifelong quest for the truth about the death of his father, Frank Olson, a military scientist who died in mysterious circumstances some 60 years ago. Frank was involved in MKUltra, a project where the US government experimented on mind control using LSD on volunteer subjects, along with other secret government projects.

One day in 1953 during a trip to New York, according to his superiors, he 'fell' from his 13th floor window of his hotel room. It said that it was possible that he might have 'jumped' while under the influence of the drugs. Without any prior drug or mental problems, for his family, this 'accident' came as a shock. Eric, still young, couldn't comprehend what they said. Fall and jump were two very different words and he struggled to reconcile the two.

Like many of Morris' subjects, Eric Olson is a brilliant and obsessive man. He's an extremely articulate man who might have had a promising career if it wasn't for his tireless search for the truth in his father's murder. Morris' interview with him, which takes up a large part of the series throughout, are compelling and absorbing, as he gesticulates wildly in split screen/multiple angle shots. He describes his investigation on the matter as collages and Morris visually makes the best out of these Olson's descriptions.

Olson is a tragic figure, who has spent six decades of his life devoted to finding the truth because he couldn't walk away from his father's ghost. For that, Morris uses and constantly goes back to the scenes in Lawrence Olivier's Hamlet. For any other filmmaker who uses metaphors, it would come across as corny. But not with Morris: everything feels well suited and purposeful.

The Rockefeller commission investigated the CIA in 1975 and the headline on the Washington Post read "Suicide Revealed." Eric realized that headline referred to his father. The report concluded that Frank Olson had been surreptitiously dosed with LSD a week before his death. The Olson family receives an in-person apology from President Ford and a set of documents explaining the event from CIA Director William Colby. But for Eric, the jumbled document doesn't make any sense but only adds more questions. The government is definitely hiding something and trying to quash any more inquiry from the family.

With wealth of home movie footage, documents, reenactments and series of interviews, Morris goes on like an investigative journalist with visual flair or a collage artist. Wormwood works like gangbusters as a 'true crime' doc and it's thrilling to watch. Every little thread is meticulously investigated, each with the same weight and importance.

Rightfully so, as they touch upon America's dark secrets: mind control experiments, germ warfare during the Korean War, brainwashing, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney... One revelation after another, Morris makes Olson's case for the truth playfully and cinematically but with resonance.

Shot by Igor Martinovic and Ellen Kuras, Wormwood looks and feels like a film noir. The period settings and somber mood are beautifully realized. The scripted narrative is mostly visual storytelling as it plays out like a silent film. Peter Sarsgaard, Molly Parker and Christian Camargo give deeply nuanced performances in their roles.

After exhuming the body of his father for further examination of any wrong play, and learning about discrepancies while talking to his father's surviving superiors and colleagues, Eric reconnects with renowned investigative journalist Seymour 'Sy' Hersh.

The year is 2013. Hersh once told Eric to let go of the matter before. He deemed it was impossible to go against the government as he hit the brick wall. But after new evidences Eric dug up, Hersh reconsiders the case, and concludes that it was definitely a murder case. That Frank was murdered and perhaps thrown out the window to his death for what he knew. Possibly regarding the illegal germ warfare. But for protecting his source, Hersh stops short of publishing his findings. Eric now knows the truth. But there won't be any accountability for Frank's murder. Not just yet.

For its namesake, Wormwood is a timely representation of our troubled times. There are no clear winners in the film. Is Eric satisfied knowing that his father was murdered because of what he knew, giving up his promising career in psychiatry and sixty years of his life to find out that truth? The answer is bitterness.

What makes Wormwood a great one to watch over Morris' other recent projects is that his obsessiveness of finding the truth is matched by his subject here. It's not finding the truth in brilliant yet flawed sociopaths -- Robert McNamara in The Fog of War, Fred Leuchter in Mr. Death or Donald Rumsfeld in The Unknown Known. With the film, he is saying that there is a beauty in seeking the truth while sacrificing everything. That it is something to aspire to, especially in dark times.

Expansive in its scope, engrossing, structurally daring and thoroughly watchable, Wormwood is a true masterpiece in the age of rampant misinformation and distrust.

Wormwood, a Netflix original story told in six chapters, opens in select theaters and globally on Netflix on December 15.

Christian Camargo on Errol Morris' Wormwood

Wormwood, all new 6-part Netflix series created by master documentarian Errol Morris, streams and also gets a limited release in theaters as a 240-minute film on December 15. Morris, known for his unique style and journalistic candor in finding the truth, achieves something truly unique and remarkable here.

I had a chance to talk to one of the stars (in the narrative part of the series), Christian Camargo, a veteran stage actor, known for his dramatic roles in Dexter and Penny Dreadful.

Camargo plays a conflicted military scientist who witnesses a murder of a fellow scientist and the government cover-up. Eager to share his enthusiasm on the project, Camargo elaborates at length on what it's like working with Errol Morris, playing a real life character and being part of the genre blurring, groundbreaking project.

Just finished watching WORMWOOD. Even knowing Errol Morris’ previous work, I was struck by how incredible it was: a really fascinating subject and story and how it was told. Everything was really incredible. I am wondering how you got involved with the project and how the process was for you.

I first got involved with the project through Cindy Toland, the casting director for the project. I’ve known her for a very long time and am a huge fan of Errol Morris. They reached out to see if I was interested. You know, I’d do catering for him. (laughs) I would do anything to see how he works. And I adored working with him. This is not just a lip service, I truly mean it. He is like a… an irreverent Bodhi Satva. He uses everything in his arsonal to create a story that has a cause and direction greater than him. Does that make any sense?

Oh absolutely.

He is manipulating the artform but not manipulating the truth of his experience and of our experience. So what comes through is kind of absolute truth that we as a viewer have to discover. In a way he does it, he does it with great intensity and great joy.

He doesn’t have patient for conflict which is extremely liberating from an actor’s standpoint. The concept of having this double genre - both documentary and narrative fiction is new, you know. It hadn’t been done, even he hadn’t done it quite this way before. So he really surrounded him with the people he was able to trust and entrust with telling the story, including Igor (Martinovic), who is an incredible cinematographer.

He gave us freedom to sort of come up with characters. Robert Lashbrook, the character I play, there was one small picture of him and that was it. You don’t know anything about him. There is nothing online about him. He is very much a mysterious character. But for me it was extremely freeing to discover. Now for Peter Sarsgaard, there was a lot more material to work off of. But still there was a lot of freedom and liberty to be had.

The scripted part, we treated as a movie. Errol really encouraged that. We had a true story - Eric Olson. And the scripted part, we had that liberty. Between Errol and Steven (Hathaway) who edited the series, they found a language that echoed one another.

I think he did this on purpose: he chose actors who are very familiar with Hamlet as he uses that in the story of Eric Olson.

You are very familiar with Hamlet with your background in theater!

Exactly. He wanted that theatrical echo of the piece. But also what I loved about it was he allowed us to get rid of dlalog and work through silence and through image.

Interesting. Haven’t thought about that.

As you know, the amount of dialog that was going with Eric Olson with that storyline, so it was really fun to play from moment to moment.

I imagine that actual script must’ve been pretty short.

Yes, yes it was very short. And it was written in a narrative style, like a book. When I first looked at it, I didn’t know what to make of it. But Errol shot all the interview with Eric before, before we were getting into the scripted part. So he sent that over and I watched that. I was such a fan of Errol’s work, I was more interested in Errol’s interview to be honest. ‘Why do we need this other part?’ I thought. But when I see the cut together and made into the piece, wow, I get it. The use of imagination allows the audience to go, ‘what is the truth?’ ‘What really happened?’

I know what Errol is always after. It’s that kind of rabid passion. In this case it’s Eric (Olson)’s rabid passion for finding out what the truth is. Is that part of insanity or that it part of all of us should be pursuing?

One thing I was struck by is how conflicted your character, Bob Lashbrook is of all characters. Probably the most conflicted character in the whole series. What was your take on the character?

I’ve played few bad guys in my career. And I really love the psychology behind what makes people do certain things. That it is never black and white in my mind. The little I knew about Robert Lashbrook is that he wasn’t a heavy, muscle man. He was more of an intellectual on the science side of it. So I really looked at the situation - playing on both sides, and how tenuous, how in different waters they were all walking. In a time where we had Cold War and all the pressures from the administration and J Edgar Hoover and what was happening in America at that time…which is not completely dissmilar to what’s happening right now. You know there is nationalistic front and we are sort of heading back to McCarthy era.

There was a tremendous amount of concept and senses of ‘what is duty?’ you know? ‘What is right thing to do?’ The tragedy of Lashbrook for me was his sense of powerlessness. Following orders. There is sinister quality to him and I wanted to feel like he was sinister force but all of sudden I realized that he didn’t have any power. He just allowed the murder to happen. We found a lot of these conflicted moments. He just allowed that to happen. I enjoyed playing him. It gave more dimension.

The historical aspect of Wormwood. With MKUltra and germ warfare and all the so-called conspiracy theories, I found very interesting. I grew up in Korea but no one really talked about germ warfare in Korean War at all. Did you have any knowledge of these events prior to the production?

Actually I had some knowledge of the (POW's) confessions. But I thought they were just coersions and they ere brainwashed and that this was all part of war system. With the amount of information that are out now, it’s not hard. There is enough to give you the shadow of doubt about whether this was coersion or whether this was in fact, people telling the truth. And we do know now that the chemical weapons were made at that point in America.

I think this is one of the big things that Errol is opening up. With great art, it always knows when to appear- generally it’s not an artist planning it, it just happens, in the nature. He tapped into very astute presentation of America. I mean, there’s a lot of us, well some of us don’t, but a lot of us looking at Trump and go 'oh my god I can’t believe what America is right now!'

Right.

And yet, this little dark secrets have been going on for decades. And we need to understand as Americans that we are all culpable. We are complicit. And in the whole grand scheme of what is… in some circle, what’s wrong with humanity? That’s also another subject that is very Hamlet-esque.

True.

Errol has tapped into this, at such a time where the country is so polarized. And a lot of left-leaning liberals are pointing to this presidency as ‘this is the time where America is the worst’. No, this has been going on like this for years and years. It’s only through people like Eric Olson who are commited to figuring out what the truth is that that the light is shined on these indiscretions. It’s a momentous subject to have in our time right now to get to people to seek the truth. Unfortunately it was at the cost of very brilliant career that Eric had.

Right.

And hopefully that’s not over. He will continue this work now that this story has come out. Because he is really a fascinating person whose work needs to be recognized.

As Errol concludes that Eric knows the truth now, we have to reconcile the fact that there is no clear cut winner in this situation. Like wormwood, everything is bitter, everything is contaminated.

Absolutely. That is what will come out is that there isn’t. It’s all dirty. It’s one of the human conditions. What comes out is that there is no clear winners. There are definitely losers. I mean, Frank Olson was on the losing end.

But there are no winners. No one comes out with their hand completely clean. Really the underneath point to all this is that this legacy is handed over to us, to the viewer, the audience that our hands are not clean either: ‘If I allow this to go on, my hands are not clean’.

You think WORMWOOD is going to be the momentous occasion for the visual, storytelling medium that will change everything- cinema, TV, streaming services, etc.?

Yeah. There has been a lot of interests in reality based long form non fiction. But it’s not being done the way… well, it has been done in a subversive way, as in ‘we are following this documentary along then it becomes narrative'. But in that way the filmmakers are skewing it for their own purpose. But it’s never been done in such, ‘here we are, we have a real person, we have fiction, we have script, we have freedom. It’s hysterical because I think this is up for Academy Awards for Narrative but not Documentary category. (laughs) Classic human condition. Real life is like this. It gets all murky.

There is no genre here. It’s completely hybrid. It’s totally new. And I think it will open doors to whole diferent types of storytelling and people don’t have to pigeonhole them. And the industry has to catch up. Many people ask me what the project is like- is it a thriller? Is it this or is it that? I really hope and I can’t imagine that this won’t be successful enough to influence whole new way of thinking that we can allow the viewer, which Netflix does so well, to choose. You don’t have to be fed a genre. It’s not about statistics. I’m pretty hopeful and sort of idealistic that Errol is bringing the art back to the form.

Wormwood will be released in select theaters and will be available globally on Netflix starting December 15.

Dear Macy

Paranoid Park (2007) - Van Sant





Alex (Gabe Nevins) is our unreliable narrator. He apologizes he's never taken creative writing class so the orders of his recounts are not in order. But the film is far from whodoneit or a thriller. Alex struggles with guilt that he caused the death of the security guard. But it's not Crimes and Misdemeanors. It observes Alex's life plainly and simply. He is a good kid in a divorcing parents household. He is a kind of kid who is more interested in skating than taking virginity of his pretty girlfriend who is constantly nagging him for it.

Paranoid Park isn't really about anything. Sure it deals with skater kids in High School setting and an accident where a railroad security guy gets killed. Gus Van Sant and DP Chris Doyle rather ringer on their angelic looking young subject with shallow focus and all. As Alex struggles a little with his guilty conscience, he gets a little help from a goth girl Macy. She suggests to write what's on his mind and take the weight off his chest. So he goes along with it, simply leading his teenage life. And it's a sublime experience.

Natural Sensual

Beach Rats (2017) - Hittman

Finally, an American female filmmaker who is not afraid of depicting sexuality frankly on screen! Eliza Hittman hit all the right notes with her new film Beach Rats, set in Sheepshead Bay, a seldom represented Brooklyn neighborhood in movies.

It concerns Frankie (Harris Dickenson), a boyishly handsome young man with a sculpted body, hanging out in the lazy Summer with his cropped haired buddydudes, sucking at vapor at a smoke shop and strolling on the beach and boardwalks. But at night, he prowls gay internet site for quick meet-and-fucks. It's a secret no one- his family (mom and younger sister) and his buddydudes, knows about. He usually prefers older man. With his dad dying of cancer at home, the boy's got some daddy issues. On the Coney Island boardwalk, he hooks up with pretty party girl Simone (Madeline Weinstein). She is a good front to hide his homosexuality. The only problem is he can't really be intimate with her unless on drugs or some sort of stimulant.

Beach Rats is obviously influenced by Denis's Beau Travail in its sensuality and lyricism. Running just over an hour and a half and shot on grainy 16mm, the film is a tight sketch of an ordinary young man unsure of his sexuality and seeking acceptance. Hittman doesn't shy away from showing graphic depiction of teenage sex and gay sex. She is also keenly aware of voyeuristic, narcissistic culture we are living in with abundance of selfies and social network. But what I'm most impressed with is her command with characters. Even though its young leads are exceptionally, almost stereotypically (in Abercrombe Fitch advert sense) good looking, that fact never overwhelms the story she tells, and same with its her aesthetics: sensuality comes off naturally, not staged - there are no lingering body shots or slow-mos.

Dickenson, a fair-haired, blue eyed star of the film is nothing but revelation here. His vulnerability and confusion, shared with youthful narcissism and goodness hidden behind the pretty façade are all staggering. Without ever delving into stereotypes, Beach Rats succeeds in telling a lean, sensual coming-of-age story that feels both very real and truthful.

Euclid and Pascal

JLG JLG: autoportrait de décembre (1994) - Godard







This is my initial thoughts on JLG JLG (will have to rewatch very soon):

With Anna Wiazemsky passing this year, it hit me that Godard, who just turned 87 today, outlived most of his contemporaries. Even though lately he hasn't been as prolific as past several decades, he is still at it. With JLG JLG, which came out more than 20 years ago now, in his 60s, I think his carrier gave him a chance to look back to see what he had gained, what he had lost. He looks mighty lonely at the empty shore of Lake Geneva.

Godard tells that JLG JLG is not a autobiography, but autoportrait near the end of the film. The year is 1993- The Bosnian War is still raging, Israel/Palestine conflict saw the signing of the uneasy Oslo Accord after much bloodshed and injustices, European Union was formed to compete economically with America. The film reflects Godard's contemplation on these matters and mortality, art and culture, and of course, cinema.

Dark empty corridors contrasts wintry landscape of Lake Geneva, as Godard narrates in his usual intentionally distorted, gravelly voice. The scenes are accompanied by hollow footsteps and nature. But usually the shots are mostly devoid of humans. He appears on screen, scribbling and reading, conversing with nubile housekeepers. There are a peach fuzzed studio exec who looks like 19, a blind assistant editor and an old woman who's sitting in the snow ominously speaking in Latin.

Godard's seemingly abstract connections through politics, history and art are not without fangs. Like light and darkness, there's two sides always competing, but what if there is only one side but the other is just an reflection of one's self? "JLG by JLG," he says at one point. It's only you who can truly represent yourself and on the same token, truly judge yourself. "I am legend." He declares on the pages of his note book- he is thoroughly aware of his past. The past is never dead. He's the director of Breathless and Pierrot le fou among others. But over the years, his persona (his name) has taken over a center stage rather than his films. How do you reconcile the two? He also has to live up to his name. With everything that was going wrong in the world at the time, speaks of love, as if there is a chance in the rotten world that gives us meaning to all of this. He will be remembered in art history. He is legend. He has been tirelessly exploring and in turn, elevated cinema as an art form. Happy Birthday Monsieur Jean.

Creepy Adults, Cool Children

The Girl Who Lives Down the Lane (1976) - Gessner







Rynn (Jodie Foster) just turned 13. She seems to be living in a big house in a small seaside New England town alone. She doesn't go to school and lives off of cashing traveller's checks which she keeps in a safety deposit box. She tells any adults who stop by, including her nosy landlady, Mrs. Hallet (Alexis Smith) and her pedophile son, Frank Hallet (Martin Sheen) & the town cop (Mort Shuman) that her poet father is either indisposed or out of town. She is very bright and cultured for her age and she is definitely hiding something.

It gets a little too invasive whenever the mom and son Hallets keep barging in unannounced, for different purposes. Rynn can't disguise the fact that she has been living alone any longer. Things get hairy when Mrs. Hallet goes missing. With the help of a limping amateur magician teen Mario (Scott Jacoby) who also happens to be the cop's nephew, Rynn trudge through the cold world of calculating grownups, finds comfort in being an outsider.

I do have a soft spot for cold New England movies sometimes - a fireplace, wool blankets, pea coats with hoodies, etc. The film has that comfortable loneliness to it. Taking place mostly in the house and originally conceived as a play, The Girl Who Lives Down the Lane has that teleplay vibe. Young Foster is great as a smart kid who is left all alone in the world and has to fend for herself. It's uncanny that she retains that all knowing smirk and directness since early in her career. Sheen is also great as a menacing pervert who really knows how to get under your skin.

It's a weird little film. I guess one can call it a psychological thriller. There are some 70s childsploitation elements with nudity and stuff but I was surprised how tender the film was. And the payoff at the end is great.

Tentacles

La región salvaje/The Untamed (2016) - Escalante

Mixing naturalistic portrait of domestic disintegration and Lovecraftian Sci-Fi, Mexico's other bad boy of cinema, Emat Escalante creates an intriguing but ultimately empty study of toxic masculinity in a still very much religious and patriarchal society.

We are introduced early on to an alien creature through its fat, dirty-pink tentacles near the naked body of Veronica (Simone Bucio). It seems that two aging scientists couple living in a cabin in the woods have been keeping the creature in their barn ever since it landed on earth carried on by a meteorite (as seen on the first shot of the film). The old couple warns Vero not to come back. See, the creature gives them extraordinary pleasure but it's also very dangerous.

So this is the set up of the film:

Veronica, waifish, socially award girl on her motor bike, injured by the creature (the alien being gets tired of its sex objects and becomes violent), feigns her wounds on her side as a dog bite in the hospital. There she strikes up a friendship with Fabian (Eden Villavincencio), a kind gay nurse who's been having an intense sexual affair with his brother-in-law, Angel (Jesus Meza) who has repressed sexuality issues and happens to be a brutish construction worker (naturally!). Fabian's sister Alejandra (Ruth Ramos) is an unhappy, unfulfilled house wife with two young boys, dreaming of getting away from bleak reality.

With Vero as a lure, Fabian gets to experience the alien encounter. He gets his head bashed in and falls in to a coma (alien don't go that way?). According to the police, he also suffered sexual aggression. With their explicit sexual texting and eye witnesses accounts, Angel gets the blame and goes to jail. Vero then introduces Ale to the scientists and the creature.

Escalante dedicates the film to Zulawski, the Polish master known for his emotionally explosive, psychological dramas and whose film Possession is an obvious inspiration for the film. But unlike the tentacled creature in Possession which was more of a personification of a couple's tumultuous relationship, it seems thinner here in its metaphorical meaning - the reptilian sense of carnal desire. It's very much flesh and blood rather than the work of imagination or will.

There lies very thin line between the boyish horse playing of two grown men (construction workers) trying to grab each other's dicks in the field and the gay sex in a club bathroom. But Escalante is too timid for showing male nude or penetration on male subjects (there are some but not explicit). With alien encounters it's all one sided, male gaze. All women are waifs, except for the monstrous mother-in-law. If you want to shed a light on rampant sexual violence and repressed sexuality and make folly of male dominant macho culture, the tentacle porn would be the very last thing I would think of using to make that point.
But Escalante thinks he can have the cake and eat it too. So here we are, we end up seeing tentacle sex, all flesh and blood, explicitly. I feel bad for its actors.

Going Up the River

Crosscurrent (2016) - Yang

















Yang Chao's Crosscurrent is an ambitious undertaking- he tries to show China's changing times up through the Yangtze River, both literally and in metaphysical sense, on a small cargo boat. And it's a glorious one.

Gao Chun (Qin Hao), just lost his father and as the tradition calls it, he needs to keep a black fish caught in the river in an urn until it expires naturally, so he can set his father's soul free. But he also inherited his father's tattered small cargo boat, a broad headed hunk of metal all rusted blue and red with age. Hired by some hotshot shady businessman, he is tasked to carry some unseen illegal cargo up the river. With an old man and an impatient young deck hand, and narrated by a diary found inside the boat -poems on each port Chun visits, he embarks on a long metaphysical journey through waterways, from Shanghai all the way to the source of the river near Tibet.

Chun lays his eyes on beautiful An Lu (Xin Zhilei), first as a prostitute on a floating riverboat in Shanghai, but she appears on every port Chun's boat docks along the river, waiting for him. Sometimes they meet, sometimes they miss each other, but without fail, she is there on the next port, reappearing again and again in a different form or another. An Lu in Mandarin is safe road/inner path, therefore the presence of An Lu serves as a nature spirit/old China left at a port as the ship sails.

As we go up the river, we are presented with China old and new - ruins of flooded towns, pagodas on top of the mountains, natural beauty of the waterways contrasting with ultra modern bridges and gigantic steel walls of Three Gorges Dam. Tears roll down on Chun's face when he observes the wonders of human ingenuity of the dam and when he encounters An Lu for the last time, indiscriminately.
Yang's approach might be too broad and can be seen as too arty farty and pretentious as the film tackles grand themes like the country's identity and its past and present in a poetic and spiritual way. And it many ways it is. But who cares. Mark Lee Ping Bin's cinematography is insanely gorgeous here.

Sentient Beings

Testről és lélekről/On Body and Soul (2017) - Enyedi


A handicapped, lonely and aging financial director, Endre (Géza Morcsányi) at an industrial slaughterhouse is intrigued by Maria (Alexandra Borbély), a new quality inspector who lacks any social niceties. It happens that they dream the same dream every night - that they are a deer couple, roaming the snowy forests, enjoying each other's company in silence. But even though they share the serendipitous events, unlike a regular romance, they have some big huddles to leap through - Endre has given up his love life a long while ago and Maria suffers from haphephobia for whatever reasons.

Hungarian director Ildikó Enyedi (My Twentieth Century) does whimsy right while contemplating all animals as sentient beings. On Body and Soul is a grown-up fairytale (as opposed to grown-up's fairytale). I liked that Enyedi doesn't rely on cuteness of the premise. It's mature and beautifully realized. I hate when a film makes sex as a clutch that solves every problem its characters have. Even though Maria's characterization is shorthanded, I loved the idea of her ethereal being coming down to earth by her elopment with Endre, realizing the love is accepting breadcrumbs on the table.

Selfish Love

The Day After (2017) - Hong

The Day After is just as delicious as Alone on the Beach at Night. Clocking just over an hour, it tells an illicit love affair of a small time book publisher (Kwon Haehyo) and his mousy employee (Kim Saebyeok) from the point of view of a new employee named Arum (beauty in Korean, played by Hong's muse Kim Minhee). Arum gets tangled up in the publisher's messy life on her first day on the job, when she gets assaulted by his suspecting wife. After half-convincing the wife that Arum is not the one, and telling her that the girl he was seeing went away, and asking Arum not to quit after one day at the job, to complicate the matter, the mousy lover comes back the same night. So he has to let Arum go (he can only afford one employee) after all. Arum is dejected and disgusted by this love affair she was involuntarily ensnared into, but ultimately could care much since it's not her problem.

As always in Hong fashion, The Day After is shot unremarkable and is in ugly black and white. Don't matter, it's still great human comedy about fickle relationships. Not as angry as Alone on the Beach, but just as confessional, Hong makes a case for how hurtful affairs can be. He and the publisher know too well that the affair is not going to end well. But when you are in love nothing really matters- you will sacrifice everything including a stranger who just happens to be there. Love can be a very selfish and ugly thing.

It's sad, funny and poignant all the same. Grown to love Hong's naturalism. There is no movie phoniness or over the top self-reflexiveness in his work. Kim's natural performance, as a kind of shy, yet frank beauty is a great fit in his films.

Clear-Eyed Humanism

Le fils de Joseph (2016) - Green





Vincent (Victor Ezenfis) is a good kid. He's a kind of kid who shies away from fellow schoolmates torturing the rat in a trap and steals from a Hardware store but only to put the item back later, smiling to himself. He is also a serious kid who'd have Caravaggio's Sacrifice of Issac on his bedroom wall. Raised by a hardworking single mom (Natasha Régnier), he has never known his dad. He becomes increasingly unhappy about this and starts resenting his mom.

After snooping around the house, Vincent finds out who his dad is- Oscar Pomenor (Mathieu Amalric), a big time playboy and important literary figure in Paris. After gaining access to one of Pomenor's parties by pretending to be one of his literary pupils, Vincent sneaks into his posh office only to witness his dad's extramarital thryst. It turns out that Pomenor is a grade A asshole and a terrible human being, not worthy of being a dad. He makes a decision to kill him, Abraham style. But when the moment comes, he can't do it. And there in the hotel bar where Pomenor's office is located, he meets Joseph (Fabrizio Rongione), who has just been rejected a loan by Pomenor.

Joseph, a never-do-well brother of Oscar, who dreams of owning a farm in Normandy where he grew up, strikes up a good friendship with troubled Vincent. The kid, longing for a good dad and a family, in turn introduces him to his mom. The romance blossoms.

Even though Le fils de Joseph is steeped in religious references, you can't not be moved by its clear-eyed humanism. Green, a unique filmmaker whose Bressonian approach might need some getting used to, once again, makes a deeply touching parable showing that goodness exists in people. Solid performances all around. Régnier's beautiful in this. SHer subtle, warm, vulnerable performance really shines.

Good Time for Whom?

Good Time (2017) - Safdie

I understand what Josh and Benny Safdie are going for. From what I've seen and heard, their films are all about small moments - not narratively gregarious, concentrating on small encounters, naturalistic settings, characters in motion. And there are quite few of those moments in Good Time. When they work, they work great. But does the movie work as a whole? I'm not so sure. Good Time has many things going for it - solid performances by wide eyed Robert Pattinson, playing a small time crook taking charge over his mentally handicapped brother (Benny Safdie), heart pumping score, 16mm gritty cinematography... But it also is very unsatisfying especially when there is no one you can root for. Pattinson's Connie is a hard character to sympathize with, as he works his charm over various women and resort to violence when things get dire. I get that he cares for his retarded brother but there is no indication of his background or what his real motives for the bank robbery is - in short, who he is.

OK, so those moments. Loved the interaction btwn Pattinson and Safdie in the bathroom of Pizza Hut after their robbery has gone horribly wrong. Loved the teen black girl in the house in Queens where Connie invites himself into. It's very unlikely that a sassy, pot-smoking black teen would be hanging out with an older white stranger, but I let that go because their interactions are really great. Loved the idea of breaking into an amusement park at night. But that moment's also somewhat tampered by that Somali actor (Barkhad Abdi) who is in everything now- the treatment he gets (from Connie) was almost racist.

People stop comparing Good Times to 70s NY movies. The Safdies ain't no Lumet. Their aim is quite different- it's smaller and narrower. But it's as if they don't ever wanna bite off more than they can chew. If getting those couple of moments are their aim for two hour movie, that's fine. But I feel they are putting emphasis on the wrong things- for instance, extensive (and surely expensive) aerial shot of the city in the beginning and following Connie's car on the street from aerial view. Good Time feels like as if they are afraid to tackle something bigger, grander things. I don't know. I guess I don't like their timid ways.

"Let It Happen." Alan Gomis Talks about His New Film, Félicité

After winning Grand Jury Prize at Berlin early this year, Alain Gomis's Félicité played as part of the slim but always robust Main Slate at New York Film Festival. Featuring great Véro Tshanda Beya Mputu as the title role, a single mother and a singer struggling to survive in the bustling streets of Kinshasa while trying to find love, Félicité is a structurally daring, vibrant, sensual and hopeful African film that you don't get to experience often. For me it was one of the highlights of the festival.

Gomis, a Senegalese director, was in town for the festival and I was lucky enough to have a chat with him about doing a film in Congo for the first time, the state of African cinema, his relationship with his generous and talented collaborators and on his method/non method- letting things take its own course. Even though suffering from a cold, Gomis was very generous and open with his answers.

And I am very happy that the film was announced Senegal's official entry for the Oscars and is getting a theatrical run here in the States starting 10/26 at Quad Cinema in NY.

The music seems to be the heart of the film. I heard that you are a big fan of The Kasai All-stars and the whole project began with them in mind. So if you can tell me about that a bit?

I’ve heard their music a few years before, introduced by a girl I know. It was through their album called Congotronics- several music groups from Kinshasa, playing the music called ‘Tradi-moderne’ in French, a mix of traditional Congolese music and modern stuff. Most of it is traditional music but the fact it’s played in the city of Kinshasa, it’s mixed with electric guitars and… they made this music that is perfect embodiment of life in a big African city. It’s really connected to cosmogony and transcendental music, so it’s steeped in tradition but mixing with the urban way of life. So it was perfect for me to start the project with this music to portray the urban African life.

With your previous films, it was Dakar and now it's Kinshasa. These cities themselves become very important characters in your films.

It’s always interesting to see the effect of the city on its people, and conversely, how they change it. How we are played by the city and how we influence it. Africa has a very small cinema industry. And there is this need for the symbiotic relationship with cinema and the society itself to present the life on the street.

Most of the time the films are coming from the outside which is a big problem because you identify yourself with the culture that is not yours. Of course it’s cool to have relationship with the rest of the world but you also need to have access to yourself. So it’s also important to me to try to portray what it’s like there. It is part of my mission in a way.

I talked with Ousmane Cisse when he was here presenting Timbuktu. And he told me how hard it was for him to finance his films. Is it the same way with you? How did the funding for Félicité come about?

It is not easy, but it’s getting better. This film if very concretely funded by Senegalese Production Fund which was set up in 2013. We had a French production company and post-production is done in Belgium. We had some Lebanese co-production too, German, Gabonese…

Wow.

So yes, we try to get money from here and there and everywhere. But the good part of it is that I had total freedom. Because if you had one financial partner, they have much more influence on you and what you are doing. (laughs) Having little here and there, you have more freedom.

It was really interesting to see the film in distinctly two parts. The first part is like a social docu-drama in terms of pacing and everything. And the second half, the tempo slows down a lot and it’s a love story between Tabu and Félicité. I liked that a lot. Is the pacing of the film connected to the music?

Yes. First I wanted to have easy entrance to the movie. I wanted to have a simple drama structure for everybody to be able to get into it easily. And then coming in to the heart of the movie which is Félicité’s journey of falling flat on her face then coming back up. But that part of the film is not something to tell but something to live, something to experience.

So yes, its inspired by musical structure. I think that’s the relationship that I have with music and I assume everybody else too. You listen to music and you start to cry and you don’t know why. Just like a concert, like a space between the stage and the listeners, I wanted to build a relationship between the screen and the audience.

I really appreciate the handheld photography by the great Celine Bozon in the streets of Kinshasa. How was the working relationship with her?

It was a first time working with her for me. It was like love at first sight! It was an incredible relationship. She was so devoted to the film and the filmmaking. She has no fear. She is completely into creating sensations I was looking for.

It was also my first time having relationship through books. Just last week, she sent me this book and I was reading it on the plane on the way here. It’s a book about the art of archery. This relationship is like not to interfere with your sensation with your gesture in a way. We’d have incredible conversations – not about the frame or contrast, just trying to be more direct as possible. She suggested using the headphones, so she had a headphone set and I had a microphone. We had dialog during the takes, to find a good angle or sometime she would be just proposing something and I just try to say few words and she answers. sometimes it would be contrary…. The film was a true collaboration.

We have built a crew to shoot on the streets and interact with people. So we come several weeks before, talking to people. Some of them became part of the crew also while shooting. We had no boundaries. Someone was getting in the frame and it was possible. It wasn't like a traditional 'film set'.

Somewhere you mentioned that you were influenced by Yasujiro ozu. Can you elaborate on that?

I remember I was watching this film, it was a shock. I can't remember the English title of it.... It was... I Was Born But... Taking place in Tokyo about these two kids. The thing is, these kids were really me. They are trying to fit in their new surroundings, trying to fit in. I especially loved the relationship between them and their fathers. It was really shocking to me because it was an old film, black and white and a silent film at that. But it was me! That’s what cinema is for me. You can find that intimacy in a film that is made long ago on the otherside of the world. Cinema is creating that common space. The film really had a big influence on me.

I can see that in your films. Just watched Aujourd'hui. It’s very contemplative and very quiet, compared with other contemporary African cinema I’ve seen. You have a very distinctive style and approach. You possess this quiet sensitivity I admire.

Thank you.

How did you find the main actress, Véro Tshanda Beya Mputu?

She came in the audition. I’ve seen a lot of actors in theater and other auditions and so on. But this was an open casting- it was open to everybody. She came to it by chance because her friend told her to try it. She came in and I see her and I had the character in mind and she was quite different from Félicité I imagined. So OK, 'let’s try her in the part of the nurse', I thought. But she was so powerful in her performance and presence. So concrete, even when she remain silent, she had this energy that kept going through her. So I asked her to come back.

So we had these interactions for 6 months, I wanted her to come back and forth and we continued to build a character together during that time. At the end, I had to accept her as the character which meant I had to follow her. All these things- Vero, the language I didn’t speak, the fact that I didn’t know Kinshasa- what I had to do was to…just let the film happen. It was me just trying to hear, not dictate, not “this is the story I want to tell!” I had to accept the fact that it’s not about me.

It’s telling that the film has its own flow that I really like. It feels organic and natural to me.

Is it common to have kind of an open relationship between Tabu and Félicité in modern African city?

For sure. I mean, in this time of economic pressure, the traditional sense of family is blown. We have young girls with children and everything like that is absolutely new. The film was my interrogation on what it means to be a couple. It was about accepting the freedom of the other person and of yourself. 'What part of the freedom am I giving up to be a couple?' I wanted to show these kind of new situations in urban African life and ask the audiences what would they give up.

Memory Mystery

L'Immortelle (1963) - Robbe-Grillet









More so than Robbe-Grillet scribed Last Year at Marienbad, L'Immortelle plays with the images and its hidden meanings. In Robbe-Grillet's world, every ordinary gesture, pose, object resonates to its nameless protagonist, and in time, to us. A pair of woman's sandals, a caress of a neck, a view from a window - every shot becomes iconic and powerful.

It tells a story of a French teacher in Istanbul, just arrived and don't know the language or custom of the locals. He meets a mysterious, beautiful woman (Françoise Brion), who wouldn't divulge anything about her - address, profession, not even a name. "It's the mosque of your dreams," she says as they pass by the famous New Mosque by the water on a boat, suggesting that what he sees and perceived as reality might be all but an illusion. She interacts with the locals in their native tongue in front of our frenchman. But when asked, she plays innocent, pretending she didn't understand a thing they said, keeping him in the dark. But we as an audience understand the exchanges via subtitle. After some intimate days, she disappears. Left only with the memories of her, he takes a detective role to find her or rather, to find about her. But since he doesn't know the language, the investigation turns futile. Even though she turns up later, he loses her again before he finds out about anything.

L'Immortelle is an intricate visual puzzle piece that's beautifully put together: repetition of images, still and panning shots and the accumulation of these give meanings in edits. Just like the palace in Marienbad (Schloss Schleissheim), Istanbul and its waterways serve as a magnificent backdrop. Brion, as the mystery personified. is magnetic. The elliptical narrative and the images give the feeling that time doesn't exist in the film. Your own memories are immortal for long as you live, the film tells us.