BETWEEN TWO WORLDS: friendships on really bad job

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Photo caption: Hélène Lambert and Juliette Binoche in BETWEEN TWO WORLDS. Courtesy of Cohen Media Group.

The workplace drama Between Two Worlds, starring Juliette Binoche, is based on a recent French bestseller that explores workers scrambling for precarious, crappy employment amid rampant job insecurity.   It’s a harsh new reality in France, felt even more keenly in a nation where robust employment protections were the norm until recent “reforms”.

Binoche plays a character new in town, purportedly starting her life over from scratch after a bad break-up. She’s looking for a job – any job – and navigates the unwelcoming world of employment office job fairs to get a minimum wage gig with a cleaning company. That job goes so NOT well, that she ends up on everyone’s job of last resort – on the cleaning crew of the vehicle ferry between Ouistreham, France, and Portsmouth, England. (The movie’s French title is Ouistreham.)

This ferry job is acknowledged by everyone – even the supervisor – to be a hellish job. 230 en suite berths must be serviced, with bed linens changed and the toilets cleaned, in the 90 minutes between voyages. It’s physically taxing and disgusting drudgery – and it’s a race against the clock. Our protagonist is accepted and guided by more experienced local women on the crew and forms friendships.

At the beginning of the second act, there is a significant revelation, which explains some vibes we have picked up and adds another element of tension through the rest of the story, to its perfectly modulated ending.

I’ve been watching Juliette Binoche movies since The Unbearable Lightness of Being, and Binoche is always glorious. That’s true here, too, in a role where she is often concealing her thoughts and feelings from the other characters.

Remarkably, director Emmanuel Carrère has surrounded Binoche with first-time actors who play her colleagues in the underclass; they are great, particularly Hélène Lambert, who is effectively the second lead, Léa Carne and Emily Madeleine.

Between Two Worlds is two movies in one – a political exposé and a relationship melodrama. At the ending, I couldn’t help thinking of the Pulp song Common People (and the William Shatner/Joe Jackson version is my fave).

The US release of Between Two Worlds is rolling out; it’s opening at San Francisco’s Opera Plaza this weekend.

The Best of Cinequest

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Photo caption: Sabrina Jie-A-Fa and Louis Tomeo in EGGHEAD & TWINKIE. Credit: Olivia Wilson, Courtesy of CanBeDone Films and Orange Cat Films.

Cinequest runs through through August 30. Here are the films that in the program that I hadn’t posted about yet:

Egghead & Twinkie: In this remarkably funny, sweet and genuine coming-of-age film, high school senior Twinkie (Sabrina Jie-A-Fa – real talent) is trying to navigate her sexual awakening as a lesbian, and goes on a roadtrip with her lifelong bestie, the neighbor boy who is now sweet on her. Perfectly paced, with just the right amount of whimsical animation sprinkled in, Egghead & Twinkie is an impressive debut feature for writer-director Sarah Kambe Holland. IMO this is one of the best coming-of-age films of the decade. World premiere.

Scrapper: Georgie, a precocious 12-year-old girl, thinks that she is independently living her best life, until the unexpected appearance of the dad she hasn’t known. In her first feature, British writer-director Charlotte Regan has created a deliciously charming character, played to roguish perfection by Lola Campbell. Harris Dickinson (Triangle of Sadness) is very good as the dad. The screenplay, about loss, connection and second chances, is brimming with humanity. Won the Grand Jury Prize for World Cinema/Dramatic at Sundance.

Share? In this very funny think-piece, an unnamed Everyman (Melvin Gregg) finds himself locked up in his civvies in a high tech cell – and he’s on camera. Through trial and error, he learns that he can acquire necessities and on-screen social interaction with other captives, by performing for the camera; the currency is not unlike the likes and follows of social media. There are many layers of metaphor in this exploration of human behavior and the human appetite for bread and circuses. First feature for director and co-writer Ira Rosensweig. World premiere.

Destiny on the Main Stage: In this brilliant documentary, a female director (and almost all-female crew) chronicle four years in the lives of Dallas-area strippers – and it’s authentic and NOT sensationalist or exploitative. Hearing the strippers’ voices through a female lens/gaze/perspective is both novel and insightful. The strippers include both a 20-year veteran very comfortable in her vocation to a former stripper organizing to help women exit the business. And, of course there are the very young women who are puddles of bad choices. Over the four years, the subjects’ lives take some very gripping turns. This is a serious film that could become an audience favorite, too. Second feature for director Poppy de Villenueve. World premiere.

Kaymak: Oscar-nominated filmmaker Milcho Manchevski returns to Cinequest with his raunchiest and most overtly comedic film. Kaymak is a sex romp that explores both the imperative to parent and the elastic strictures of of monogamy. US premiere.

No Right Way: This affecting family drama is compelling without any tinge of soapiness and a remarkably promising debut feature for writer-director-star Chelsea Bo World premiere.

Fallen Drive: A very strong screenplay by first-time writer-directors Nick Cassidy and David Rice with complicated characters and a touch of ambiguity elevates this revenge noir. You’ll never guess the two characters driving off together at the end. World premiere.

This is the thirteenth year that I’ve covered Cinequest. My Cinequest coverage, including of past festivals, is on my CINEQUEST 2023 page.

Melvin Gregg in SHARE?
DESTINY ON THE MAIN STAGE. Courtesy of Cinequest.

FALLEN DRIVE: revenge noir with complications

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Jakki Jandrell and Phillip Andre Botello in FALLEN DRIVE. Courtesy of Cinequest.

The neo-noir thriller Fallen Drive begins with some 20-somethings congregating in a suburban Airbnb ranch house, having returned to their hometown for a high school reunion. It looks like the successful Liam is really more interested in reuniting with his mysteriously estranged younger brother Dustin. Tightly wound Charlie (Jakki Jandrell) and her boyfriend Reese (Phillip Andre Botello) arrive, and it’s apparent that they have an agenda that could be more grim than drinking with high school buddies.

Soon we are enmeshed in revenge noir, in a variation of the perfect crime film. Things get more intense – and more unpredictable – as the story evolves. There are Hitchcockian touches – he suspects us.

Fallen Drive is written and directed by Nick Cassidy (who also plays Liam) and David Rice; it’s the first feature for both. A very strong screenplay elevates Fallen Drive from the paint-by-numbers thriller we see so often. Here Cassidy and Rice have made the characters complicated and added some ambiguity to the back story. There are subtle hints about the relationships of Liam and Dustin and of Reese and Charlie, and the audience is asked to fill in the blanks. You’ll never guess the two characters driving off together at the end.

There’s also a minor character who still parties too much, who could have been written merely for comic relief; but Cassidy and Rice make it clear that his alcoholism has left him immature – that’s why he behaves like a jerk.

The performances are strong. Jandrell is superb as the coiled Charlie. Donald Clark Jr. is also excellent as Dustin, who the others have always found creepy. Cassidy makes for a sufficiently smirky Liam.

An uncommonly textured revenge thriller, Fallen Drive should be a crowd-pleaser. Cinequest is hosting the world premiere of Fallen Drive.

NO RIGHT WAY: no good deed…

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Chelsea Bo and Ava Acres in NO RIGHT WAY. Courtesy of Cinequest.

In Chelsea Bo’s affecting family drama No Right Way, Harper (played by Bo herself) is a 27-year-old go-getter in LA. She gets a call from child protective services in Las Vegas, informing her that her 13-year-old half-sister Georgie (Ava Acres)can no longer stay with her mother. Because their father is away on a work assignment, Harper drives to Vegas to pick up Georgie herself.

Harper finds that Georgie’s mother Tiffany (Eliza Coupe of Happy Endings) is a hot mess. There may be no one right way to raise a child, but there are wrong ways, for which Tiffany is the poster girl. Addled by a serious drug addiction, Tiffany runs with scary men and can’t even manage to kep the electricity on; as a result, Georgie, very smart with a big personality, is essentially feral.

A fundamentally decent person, Harper is appalled by Tiffany’s failure to provide Georgie with guidance and stability, let alone a safe environment. The dad is comfortable with his current hands-off parenting and gun shy of engaging with Tiffany, so Harper sees herself as Georgie’s last chance and tries to get custody of Georgie from Tiffany.

But Harper is out of her depth dealing with an addict’s denial and sociopathy, and doesn’t reckon that Tiffany, who has no boundaries at all, will explode in manipulative drama and involve Georgie herself in the vortex. Harper makes a mistake that keeps her from gaining control of the situation, and soon Harper is getting a big dose of no good deed goes unpunished. Even neglected kids often prefer to stay with the parent they know, and teenagers relish the freedom of an unengaged guardian.

Chelsea Bo wrote and directed No Right Way, and the exceptionally smart screenplay indicates that she is a perceptive observer of human nature, and her characters are authentically complicated.

Harper is responsible, but she’s naïve and a little judgy. When she observes the untidy household of Tiffany’s friend Amy, we can see Harper aghast at both red flags (the littlest kid is encamped in a closet) and Amy not meeting middle-class norms (we can see her thinking OMG she’s smoking in front of the kids!); but Amy’s teenagers happily play games with the family after dinner – an accomplishment most American parents would envy.

Amy (Sufe Bradshaw of Veep) naturally relates more to Tiffany than to the privileged Harper. But Amy has seen some bullshit in her day, and her sympathy to Tiffany is tempered by a focus on Georgie’s welfare.

Coupe is brilliantly twitchy and volatile as Tiffany, who, despite mountains of evidence to the contrary, erupts to make everything someone else’s fault.

Both lead actors – Bo and Ava Acres – are believable and relatable. Acres, who already has 57 screen credits on IMDb, is a force of nature as Georgie.

No Right Way is compelling without any tinge of soapiness. A scene where the dad reams out Harper on the phone as disfunction swirls around her is especially strong. This is a remarkably promising debut feature for Chelsea Bo. I screened No Right Way for its world premiere at Cinequest.

KAYMAK: ménage à trois times two

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Sara Klimoska in KAYMAK. Courtesy of Kaymak.

Kaymak follows the relationships of two couples in the same apartment building in teeming Skopje, North Macedonia. Eva (Kamka Tocinovski), a rich banker, lives in the penthouse with her husband Metodi (Filip Trajkovic), who wants a child; Eva, not a candidate for Mother of Year, doesn’t want her life disrupted by the bother of pregnancy and childbirth, so she plucks a young relative, Dosta (Sara Klimoska), from the countryside to serve as a surrogate. Dosta is developmentally disabled and lives with her family in an impoverished, backward village. Soon, Eva and Metodi are getting more than they expected and more than they can handle.

The other couple lives in a modest ground floor apartment. Caramba (Aleksandar Mikic ) is a goofy security guard; Danche (Simona Spirovska) is always exhausted from pulling double shifts at a bakery. Day to day drudgery has drained their relationship of passion, and Caramba is always on Danche’s very last nerve. When Caramba meets the comely and oversexed cheese vendor Violetka (Ana Stojanovska), their lives, too, are upended.

The characters have lots of sex, both joyously kinky and cringingly transgressive. It gets very funny, and Manchevski even drops in a delicious nod to the Spaghetti Westerns of Sergio Leone.

Ana Stojanovska and Simona Spirovska in KAYMAK. Courtesy of Kaymak.

However, Manchevski imbues Kaymak with more meaning than a mere sex romp, exploring both the imperative to parent and the elastic strictures of of monogamy. There’s tragedy (and apparent tragedy) here, amid all the absurdity. Manchevski told A Good Movie to Watch, “People usually want their films to have a consistent and predictable tone. Now, my preference as a film viewer, but also as a filmmaker, is more adventurous. I don’t mind disruption. On the contrary, I cherish it.“

All the characters, rich or not, enjoy kaymak, a versatile creamy milk reduction used in the Balkans as an appetizer, a condiment and a fast food breakfast. 

Manchevski was Oscar-nominated for his acclaimed 1994 Macedonian feature Before the Rain. That Manchevski debut won the Golden Lion at Venice and was singled out as a masterpiece by Roger Ebert and The New York Times.  Since then, Manchevski has been teaching in New York and directed an episode of The Wire. 

Kaymak is his third film to play Cinequest, after Bikini Moon, my choice as the best film of the 2017 Cinequest, and Willow, a triptych that plumbs the heartaches and joys of having children. Kaymak is the raunchiest and most overtly comedic of the Manchevski films I’ve seen

The performances in Kaymak are all excellent. (Klimoska bears a passing resemblance to Kristin Stewart.)

Cinequest is hosting the US premiere of Kaymak. Find the trailer on the Cinequest Kaymak page.

UNDER THE INFLUENCER: living for likes

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Taylor Joree Scorse in UNDER THE INFLUENCER. Courtesy of Cinequest.

The comedy Under the Influencer is a fable of identity. Tori (Taylor Joree Scorse) is a YouTuber who has built an immense following by appealing to the most frivolous interests of 13-year-old girls. But she’s becoming stale to that audience, and her popularity is tenuous. Having achieved so much success by selling a version of herself, Tori has become very invested, perhaps melded, with her screen persona. Tori is bratty, despite the shallow silliness that she trades in, and she’s ripe for a comeuppance.

Tori seeks to pivot her brand, but her audience is fickle, and she is ambushed by the treachery of two other social media stars. Since her self-confidence rises and falls with the toxicity of on-line comments, she’s at risk of implosion.

This is a glimpse into a professional social media world unknown to some of us, but writer-director Alex Haughey, having spent a year producing for a major YouTuber, knows the scene.

It looks like we’re in for a savage mockumentary until there’s major change in tone when Tori is forced to come to terms with how her own identity is so wrapped up in the validation of views and instant likes or dislikes. It turns out that Tori may not be a ditz after all – she’s just been playing one on YouTube. There’s a revelatory flashback showing how the 13-year-old Tori first dipped her toes into social media (after we have already seen what she’s become).

Taylor Joree Scorse explodes with energy as Tori, completely believable as both the superficial and the more reflective versions of Tori. Spencer Vaughn Kelly is very good as an almost mystically charismatic stranger Tori encounters.

This is the second film by Alex Haughey, whose debut Prodigy, a psychological thriller with paranormal elements, was one of the top films at the 2017 Cinequest.

Under the Influencer is topical, funny and, ultimately, sweet and hopeful. Cinequest is hosting the world premiere of Under the Influencer.

Movies to See Right Now

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Photo caption: Melvin Gregg in SHARE?, world premiere at Cinequest. Courtesy of Cinequest.

This week on The Movie Gourmet – a remembrance of master director William Friedkin and a preview of Cinequest, Silicon Valley’s own film festival, which begins next week.

REMEMBRANCE

Robbie Robertson (front center) in THE LAST WATZ.

Robbie Robertson was justifiably famous as a musician and a songwriter, fronting The Band with its many hits and backing Bob Dylan’s transition from acoustic to electric. In fact, I was introduced to Robertson on-screen as a subject of Martin Scorsese’s documentary The Last Waltz, still one of the handful of greatest concert films. But Robertson also became a significant force in the music of cinema, amassing almost 300 screen credits on IMDb as a composer, music supervisor or contributor to the soundtrack. Robertson’s behind the screen work included many collaborations with Scorsese, the last being the heralded Killers of the Flower Moon, to be released later this year. Robertson identified as an indigenous Canadian, whose mother was Cayuga and Mohawk from the Six Nations Reserve. 

CURRENT MOVIES

WATCH AT HOME

Fred Rogers in WON’T YOU BE MY NEIGHBOR?

The most eclectic watch-at-home recommendations you’ll find ANYWHERE:

  • Won’t You Be My Neighbor?: gentleness from ferocity. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube, redbox.
  • Land Ho!: rowdy geezer roadtrip to Iceland. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
  • Beast: finally unleashed … and untethered. Amazon (included with Prime), AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube, redbox.
  • The Imposter: a jaw dropper. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
  • The Secret in Their Eyes: Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
  • NUTS!: the rise and fall of a testicular empire. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
  • The Stopover: PTSD takes more than an umbrella drink…Amazon, AppleTV.

ON TV

Anthony Quinn in BARABBAS
Anthony Quinn in BARABBAS

Biblical epics were a staple of cinema until the mid-1960s when they petered out with The Greatest Story Ever Told and The Bible: In the Beginning. If you’re going to watch just one Sword-and-Sandal classic, I recommend going full tilt with Barrabas, broadcast by Turner Classic Movies on August 16. This 1961 cornball stars Anthony Quinn as the Zelig-like title character.

The story begins with the thief Barabbas avoiding crucifixion when Pontius Pilate swaps him out for Jesus (this part is actually in the Bible). Because the Crucifixion isn’t enough action for a two-hour 17-minute movie, Barabbas is soon sent off as a slave to the salt mines, where he is rescued by a miraculously timely earthquake. He then joins the Roman gladiators, complete with a javelin-firing squad, gets lost in the catacombs and emerges to the Burning of Rome. He has encounters with the Emperor Nero and the Apostle Peter before he converts to Christianity – just in time for the mass crucifixion. Watch for an uncredited Sharon Tate as a patrician in the arena.

William Friedkin: master of gripping cinema

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Gene Hackman in the car chase in William Friedkin’s THE FRENCH CONNECTION.

Director William Friedkin, one of the most significant filmmakers of the past 50 years, has died at 87. Friedkin is best known for his two great films, The French Connection and The Exorcist, each groundbreaking in its own way. The French Connection, despite an anti-hero with off-putting characteristics and a setting in NYC at its grimiest, had audiences on the the edge of their seats, and its car chase (before CGI) is still the gold standard. The Exorcist was the first horror movie to be nominated for Oscar (a recognition previously unthinkable).

Friedkin also made two LGBTQ-themed films well before other Hollywood mainstreamers – The Boys in the Band and Cruising (the latter controversial in the LGBTQ community).

Friedkin also had a gift for neo-noir, and his To Live and Die in L.A. has become a noir cult favorite. Perhaps burdened by the outrageousness of writer Tracy Letts’ perverse and taboo-centric story, the delicious neo-noir Killer Joe has never received its due. Less colorful than those two, The Brink’s Job is a solid and entertaining crime film.

And The Exorcist wasn’t Friedkin’s only foray into foray. The grievously overlooked Bug still stands up today.

For some reason, Friedkin’s own favorite work was the disappointing slog Sorcerer (although it doesn’t deserve to be reviled as much as Jade, the only really bad Friedkin movie I’ve seen.) 

At 87, Friedkin just completed his final film, The Caine Mutiny Court Martial.

Like another of my favorite directors, Sam Fuller, Friedkin was never too high-minded to embrace the lurid, which was manifested in The Exorcist, Bug, Cruising and Killer Joe. He enjoyed seeing himself as a bit of a rascal, and claimed to have bribed a NYC transit official $40,000 to permit staging the The French Connection car chase.

Friedkin was also a delightfully irascible raconteur, which I got to appreciate in-person at a San Francisco preview screening of Killer Joe in 2011.

Linda Blair in William Friedkin’s THE EXORCIST.

Cinequest returns LIVE on August 15

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Photo caption: Harris Dickinson and Lola Campbell in Charlotte Regan’s SCRAPPER at Cinequest. Courtesy of Kino Lorber.

Cinequest, Silicon Valley’s own major film festival, returns live and in-person August 15, back in downtown San Jose, with screenings August 15-24 at the California, Theatre and the Hammer Theater. For August 24-30, the program moves to the ShowPlace ICON Theatre in Mountain View. That means TWO opening nights (San Jose and Mountain View).

Highlights of the 2023 Cinequest include:

  • Films from Korea, Poland, China, Iran, Bulgaria, India, Australia, and Mexico, and I’ve already screened Cinequest features from North Macedonia, the Netherlands, Belgium, Romania, Germany, and the UK, too.
  • New movies with Timothy Spall, Jennifer Esposito, Anabella Sciorra, Dermot Mulroney, Bradley Whitford, Alice Braga, Harris Dickinson, Abigail Breslin, Ryan Philippe, Mena Suvari and Steve Zahn.
  • See it here FIRST: Scrapper is among the movies slated for theatrical release later this year.

And, at Cinequest, it’s easy to meet the filmmakers.

As usual, I’ll be covering Cinequest rigorously with features and movie recommendations. This year, of my top seven films, five are world premieres; six are the first or second films by their director, and the seventh is by an Oscar-nominated, veteran filmmaker.

I usually screen (and write about) over thirty Cinequest films from around the world. Bookmark my CINEQUEST 2023 page, with links to all my coverage (links on the individual movies will start to go live on Sunday, August 13).

Cinequest at San Jose’s California Theatre

Movies to See Right Now

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Photo caption: Paula Beer, Enno Trebs, Langston Uibel and Thomas Schubert in AFIRE. Courtesy of Janus Films.

This week on The Movie Gourmet – new reviews of two of the Best Movies of 2023 – So Far: Christian Petzold’s ultimately redemptive Afire and Greta Gerwig’s delightfully funny Barbie. Plus, a new review of the breezy comedy treat Theater Camp.

Cinequest is coming up on August 11, and I’ll be posting my usual extensive preview and recommendations.

REMEMBRANCE

Paul Reubens was the star of and the creative force behind the goodhearted and gloriously weird Pee-wee’s Big Adventure.

CURRENT MOVIES

WATCH AT HOME

Paul Eenhoorn and Earl Lynn Nelson in LAND HO!

The most eclectic watch-at-home recommendations you’ll find ANYWHERE:

  • Land Ho!: rowdy geezer roadtrip to Iceland. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
  • Beast: finally unleashed … and untethered. Amazon (included with Prime), AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube, redbox.
  • Won’t You Be My Neighbor?: gentleness from ferocity. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube, redbox.
  • The Imposter: a jaw dropper. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
  • The Secret in Their Eyes: Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
  • NUTS!: the rise and fall of a testicular empire. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
  • The Stopover: PTSD takes more than an umbrella drink…Amazon, AppleTV.

ON TV

Robert Ryan in THE SET-UP
Robert Ryan in THE SET-UP

On August 7, Turner Classic Movies will present The Set-Up (1949), one of the great film noirs and one of the very best boxing movies. Robert Ryan plays a washed-up boxer that nobody believes can win again, not even his long-suffering wife (Audrey Totter).  His manager doesn’t even bother to tell him that he is committed to taking a dive in his next fight.  But what if he wins?

Director Robert Wise makes use of real-time narrative, then highly innovative. Watch for the verisimilitude of the bar where the deal goes down.

Robert Ryan in THE SET-UP
Robert Ryan in THE SET-UP