Cinequest

CLOWNVETS: unexpectedly powerful

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CLOWNVETS

The winning documentary Clownvets pairs two groups of sufferers to bring relief to one and healing to the other.  First, we meet US military veterans in rural Michigan and learn about Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from their personal perspectives, and from their families and their health providers.  Then, unexpectedly, the famed hospital clown Patch Adams enters.  (Adams was portrayed by Robin Williams in a much reviled movie, but this is the real Patch Adams ).  Adams has the idea of teaching the vets how to clown and bringing them to entertain the most severely disabled in the Third World.

The result is remarkable.  Somehow Adams is able to introduce clowning to these macho guys, and then he brings them to facilities that warehouse the disabled in Guatemala.  The kindest description of these places might be “hell hole”. The plight of the patients/victims is heartbreaking.  The vets throw themselves wholeheartedly into brightening these deprived lives with clowning and with hands-on human compassion.

Why does clowning – of all things – seem to treat the veterans’ PTSD?  Perhaps it is the fully committed silliness and the absurd costumes – the vulnerability from intentionally looking ridiculous and acting ridiculous.  Somehow it seems to  refract/distract/heal the effects of PTSD.

I am generally not a fan of warmhearted movies, but Clownvets moved even me.  In a running time of little less than an hour, it’s able to pack an emotional punch.  I expect Clownvets to be the Feel Good hit of this year’s Cinequest.

Cinequest hosts the world premiere of Clownvets, and Patch Adams himself is expected to attend.

BLOOD PARADISE: fun with horror

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BLOOD PARADISE

In the horror comedy Blood Paradise, the author (Andrea Winter) of lurid best sellers is wallowing in malaise after her latest book bombs.  For a change of pace, she gets away to the Swedish version of an agriturismo, a remote and spartan farm.  The farm has every earmark of Gothic horror, and Blood Paradise has great fun with every creaky door and ominous scarecrow.  The farmer explains his wife’s grave out back, “she loved the garden but now it’s only a garden of death”.  The farmer’s creepy middle-aged sister is obsessed with dolls.  His menacingly silent, paunchy son is mostly shirtless and fondling a shotgun.  And the author’s driver is her biggest fan – and seriously unhinged.  Just when the blood starts splattering, the author’s hunky, dim and besotted boyfriend Teddy shows up for a surprise visit in a white suit.

Part of the fun is that the author has adventuresome sexual fantasies and makes a living envisioning gruesome scenarios; her especially rich imagination makes every ominous cue seem even more alarming.

Blood Paradise is written by its star Andrea Winter and directed by Patrick von Barkenberg (who also plays Teddy); it is the first narrative feature for both.  Winter is a good sport about her own nudity, and has fun playing the author as a brat.  She also has fun with Teddy’s allergies, which erupt at the most importune times.  And there’s a very amusing homage to Psycho.

This is a Swedish movie set in Sweden, but almost all the dialogue is in English.  Blood Paradise plays at the 2019 Cinequest.

AUGGIE: Who do you see when you put on the glasses?

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Richard Kind in AUGGIE

In the superb indie Auggie, Felix (Richard Kind) is pushed into retirement before he wants.  He’s given a goodbye gift that he never would have thought to wish for, augmented reality glasses. Suddenly plunged into inactivity just as his wife Anne’s career is thriving, Felix finally gets around to putting on the glasses.  The glasses give him a virtual companion, Auggie, equipped with the artificial intelligence to give the wearer his craved-for experiences.  Most insidiously, Auggie even delivers individually customized emotional support. Everyone’s digital companion takes the form of what they desire, and Felix’s Auggie is a smoking hot and adorable young woman.

The more Felix wears the glasses, the more Auggie is able to fulfill his every need, even triggering more inner desires that he was aware of.  This isn’t quite a Doctor Faust who knowingly opts into his fantasy; Auggie’s artificial intelligence is able to see Felix’s fantasies even before he can imagine them.  All things in moderation, of course, but Auggie’s infinite availability becomes additive.  This is no longer healthy for Felix or his family.

When a character asks, “Who do you see when you put on the glasses?”, it’s a devastating moment.

Auggie is the first feature for director and co-writer Matt Kane.  Kane has avoided writing Felix as a stereotypical clumsy old grouch.   As written by Kane and co-writer Marc Underhill and played by Richard Kind, he’s very smart and perceptive.  He just isn’t ready for unimaginable temptation.

You’ll recognize Richard Kind, a reliable character actor and voice artist with 221 screen credits. My favorite Kind performance was the moving portrayal of a man seeking closure after the death of his wife in Clint Eastwood’s Hereafter.

Susan Blackwell is perfect at Felix’s wife Anne.  Blackwell has had small parts in some very fine films and hosts her own Broadway interview show on YouTube, Side By Side with Susan Blackwell.  Cristen Harper is suitably seductive as Auggie.

Cinequest hosts the world premiere of Auggie.

 

 

Streaming the best of Cinequest

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Brooke Purdy in QUALITY PROBLEMS

These 2012-2018 Cinequest favorites are available to stream now:

FEEL GOODS AND COMEDIES

  • Quality Problems: A screwball comedy for the sandwich generation. Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play.
  • Venus: Meeting your kid for the first time while transitioning. Amazon, iTunes.
  • The Sapphires: Here’s a crowd pleaser – Motown meets Aborigines. Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, Google Play.
  • Threesomething: Original and cheeky. Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play.
  • The Grand Seduction: An entire tiny hamlet is enlisted in an absurdly elaborate and risky ruse in this Canadian knee-slapper.  Amazon (included with Prime), Vudu, YouTube, Google Play.
  • Hunting Elephants: Apparently, Israelis see just as little generosity, fair-mindedness and decency in their bankers as we do in ours. iTunes.
Andrew Jenkins in Chris Scheuerman’s brilliant debut LOST SOLACE

INDIE DRAMAS

  • The Center: Sliding into a cult. Amazon (included with Prime), Vudu, YouTube, Google Play.
  • Lost Solace: a psychopath afflicted by empathy. Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play.
  • Dose of Reality: You won’t predict this ending. For SURE. Amazon.
  • The House on Pine Street: Does she see a ghost? Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play.
  • Prodigy: She doesn’t LOOK like a monster. Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play.

 

THERE WILL BE NO STAY

DOCS

  • The Brainwashing of My Dad: When TV changes not just opinions, but mood and personality, too. Amazon, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play.
  • Meet the Hitlers: Wouldn’t you change YOUR name? Amazon, iTunes, Vudu.
  • There Will Be No Stay: In a society with capital punishment, someone must perform the executions. iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play.

 

Mads Mikkelson in THE HUNT

WORLD CINEMA

  • Ida (Oscar winner): Identity rocked at a pivotal time. Amazon, Netflix, YouTube, Google Play.
  • The Hunt (Oscar-nominated): Terrifyingly plausible. Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play (and Netflix DVD).
  • Wild Tales (Oscar-nominated): Hilariously dark tales of revenge. Amazon, iTunes, Vudu (and Netflix DVD).
  • The Teacher: A peek into Communist dread. Amazon, iTunes, Vudu.
  • Revenge: The web is spun. Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play.
  • Fever at Dawn: Romance, identity and a moral choice. Hoopla.
  • The Wave: Everything you want in a disaster movie. Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play.
  • Magallanes: Some wrongs cannot be righted. iTunes, YouTube, Google Play.
  • The Memory of Water: Grief, exquisitely explored. Netflix.
  • Los Hamsters: Riotously dysfunctional. Amazon, iTunes, YouTube, Google Play.

Movies to See Right Now

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Paula Beer and Franz Rogowski in TRANSIT, playing at Cinequest next Wednesday. Courtesy of Music Box Films

The Oscars are finally over, And I was pretty much OK with the whole shebang – I loved Roma, and I really love Green Book, too. I was and am still grumpy about Rami Malek winning an ACTING Oscar for a performance in which he was often LIP SYNCHING; this was several rungs below Jamie Foxx’ Ray Charles and Joaquin Phoenix’ Johnny Cash; and Bradley Cooper acted as a singer, sang the song himself and even WROTE the song!

Anyway, The Wife and I did enjoy our annual Oscar Dinner, although we had to sub out a Bohemian Rhapsody pub ale because we couldn’t source the novelty teeth in time.

The Movie Gourmet’s Oscar Dinner 2019

Starting this weekend, my coverage of Cinequest will explode on to the Internet. Stay tuned.

OUT NOW

  • In They Shall Not Grow Old, Lord of the Rings filmmaker Peter Jackson has, for the first time, layered humanity over our understanding of World War I. By slowing down the speed of the jerky WWI film footage and adding sound and color, Jackson has allowed us to relate to the real people in the Great War. This is a generational achievement and a Must See.
  • Roma is an exquisite portrait of two enduring women and the masterpiece of Alfonso Cuarón (Gravity, Children of Men and Y Tu Mama Tambien). Won multiple Oscars. It is streaming now on Netflix.
  • Green Book: The Best Picture Oscar winner. Tony Lip is a marvelous character, and Viggo Mortensen’s performance is one of the great pleasures of this year in the movies.
  • Vice: in this bitingly funny biopic of Dick Cheney by writer-director Adam McKay (The Big Short), Cheney is played by a physically transformed and unrecognizable Christian Bale. A superb performance, .pretty good history, biography from a sharp point of view and a damn entertaining movie.
  • Stan & Ollie: Steve Coogan as Stan Laurel and John C. Reilly as Oliver Hardy deliver remarkable portraits of a partnership facing the inevitability of showbiz decline.
  • Pawel Pawlikowski’s sweeping romantic tragedy Cold War is not as compelling as his masterpiece Ida.
  • The Favourite: Great performances by three great actresses, sex and political intrigue are not enough; this critically praised film didn’t work for me.

ON VIDEO

The Hollywood movie Gloria Bell, starring Julianne Moore, is coming to theaters on March 8. Gloria Bell is a remake of the the Chilean gem Gloria. Fortunately, Sebastián Lelio, the original writer-director of Gloria (and A Fantastic Woman) is also directing Gloria Bell. Here’s your chance to see the original.

ON TV

Great movies abound on TV as Turner Classic Movies concludes its 31 Days of Oscar, but here’s a curiosity that I don’t remember ever seeing. On March 2, TCM plays the 1968 astronaut-lost-in-space drama Marooned with Gregory Peck, Richard Crenna and David Jannsen. A 1970 Mexican audience is shown watching Marooned n ALfonso Cuaron’s Roma; it’s a hint that Marooned may have been an influence on Cuaron’s Oscar-winning Gravity.

On March 4, TCM presents John Huston’s under-appreciated Fat City (1972). Stacy Keach plays a boxer on the slide, his skills unraveled by his alcoholism. He inspires a kid (a very young Jeff Bridges), who becomes a boxer on the rise. Keach and Susan Tyrrell give dead-on performances as pathetic, sad sack barflies. Tyrrell was nominated for the Best Supporting Actress Oscar.

Susan Tyrrell in FAT CITY
Stacy Keach and Jeff Bridges in FAT CITY

CINEQUEST 2019 is just around the corner

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Make your plans now to attend the 29th edition of Cinequest, Silicon Valley’s own major film festival. By some metrics the largest film festival in North America, Cinequest was recently voted the nation’s best by USA Today readers. The 2019 Cinequest is scheduled for March 5 through March 17 and will present almost 100 feature films and dozens of short films and virtual reality experiences from the US and over fifty other countries. And, at Cinequest, it’s easy to meet the filmmakers.

This year’s headline events include:

  • New movies with Elle Fanning, Rebecca Hall, Adam Driver, Emile Hirsch, Bruce Dern, Dev Patel, Jesse Eisenberg, Alexander Skarsgård, Stellan Skarsgård, Jeff Daniels, Salma Hayek, Martin Sheen,  Jonathan Pryce, Emilio Estevez, Christian Slater, Alec Baldwin, Jena Malone, Jeffrey Wright, Stephen Yeun, Katie Holmes, Elizabeth McGovern Blythe Danner, Levar Burton, Emily Mortimer, M. Emmet Walsh and Richard Kind.
  • New movies by directors Mike Leigh, Terry Gilliam, Christian Petzold, Michael Winterbottom and Kim Nguyen.
  • See it here FIRST:  Sometimes Always Never, Freaks, Hotel Mumbai, The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, The Hummingbird Project, Peterloo, The Public, Teen Spirit, The Third Wife, Transit, The Wedding Guest and Woman at War are all slated for theatrical release later this year.
  • For the first time at Cinequest – 5 U.S. premieres of Television series.
  • The 1928 Buster Keaton silent Steamboat Bill, Jr. projected in a period movie palace, the California Theatre, accompanied by world-renowned Dennis James on the Mighty Wurlitzer organ.

Indeed, the real treasure at Cinequest 2019 is likely to be found among the hitherto less well-known films. In the past four years, the Cinequest gems Eye in the Sky, Wild Tales, Ida, The Hunt, ’71, Corn Island, The Memory of Water, Magallanes, Quality Problems, The Sense of an Ending, For Grace, Lost Solace, Class Enemy, Heavenly Shift and Oh Boy/A Coffee in Berlin all made my Best of the Year lists.

Cinequest revels in its Downtown San Jose vibe, with concurrent screenings at the 1122-seat California, the 550-seat Hammer and the 257-seat 3Below, all within 1600 feet of the VIP lounge at The Continental Bar. There will still be satellite viewing in Redwood City.

At Cinequest, you can get a festival pass for as little as $165, and you can get individual tickets as well. The express pass for an additional tax-deductible $100 is a fantastic deal – you get to skip to the front of the lines!  Take a look at the entire program, the schedule and the passes and tickets.

As usual, I’ll be covering Cinequest rigorously with features and movie recommendations. I usually screen (and write about) over thirty films from around the world. Bookmark my Cinequest 2019 page, with links to all my coverage (links on the individual movies will start to go live on Sunday, March 3). Follow me on Twitter for the latest.

Stream of the Week: LOST SOLACE – a psychopath afflicted by empathy

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LOST SOLACE
LOST SOLACE

The Canadian psychological thriller Lost Solace takes a highly original premise and turns it into a pedal-to-the-metal thriller. It’s an astonishingly successful debut for director and co-writer Chris Scheuerman.

Co-writer Andrew Jenkins stars as the psychopath Spence, whose life is devoted to exploiting women, stealing their stuff and emotionally devastating them to boot. Spence is remarkably skilled and seems unstoppable until he unwisely ingests a recreational drug – he starts suffering hallucinatory episodes that are intensely emotional. Here’s the brilliantly original core of Lost Solace – having the occasional fit of feelings and empathy really gets in the way of being a coolly cruel psychopath.

Spence targets the emotionally fragile rich girl Azaria (Melissa Roxburgh). Melissa is burdened both by the care for her violently psychotic brother Jory (Charlie Kerr) and by years of verbal evisceration by her prick of a father, Chuck (Michael Kopsa). Able to peg Spence as a scumbag, Jory offers Spence a share of his inheritance to kill Chuck. It’s a plan hatched by a psychotic – what could possibly go wrong? Add an ambitious physician (Leah Gibson) who is eager to cash in on a cure for psychopathy, and we’re off to the races.

Scheuerman is an economical story-teller who lets the audience connect the dots. Spence doesn’t even speak until well into the movie. But Scheuerman spins a great tale, and as he reveals his characters, we see that Chuck may be every bit as fiendish as Spence and that Betty the doctor, may be just as greedy. There’s plenty that can unravel Spence’s Perfect Crime, and that’s what keeps us on the edges of our seats.

Andrew Jenkins is completely believable as both the supremely confident Spence and, later, as the Spence determined to steel his way through his unexpected confusion. The rest of the cast is exceptional, too, especially Kopsa and Gibson.

Lost Solace was my personal favorite at Cinequest 2016 and can be streamed from Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

WHAT THEY HAD: caring for Mom and a resisting Dad

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WHAT THEY HAD
Blythe Danner and Hilary Swank star as Ruth and Bridget Keller in WHAT THEY HAD, a Bleecker Street release. Photo courtesy of Bleecker Street

In the family drama What They Had, two siblings (Hilary Swank and Michael Shannon) face their mom (Blythe Danner) sinking into Alzheimer’s, and their father (Robert Forster) refusing to take action. To heighten the pressure, the out-of-town daughter wants to give the old folks more slack than does the local son. He’s been dealing with this situation up close, and he’s fed up. The dad is used to always being in charge, and he doesn’t cope well with needing help.

Despite the subject, What They Had is not a depressing movie, mostly because of the sunniness of Danner’s character. This is a character-driven story that benefits from this stellar cast. This is the first feature for writer/director Elizabeth Chomko, and she delivers an authentic and well-crafted story.

I saw What They Had at Cinequest. Here’s a clip.

Stream of the week: BRIMSTONE & GLORY – people who blow stuff up

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BRIMSTONE & GLORY
BRIMSTONE & GLORY
BRIMSTONE & GLORY

Life in Tultepec, a city of about 90,000, just north of Mexico City is dominated by the main local industry – fireworks manufacturing.  That’s the subject of the documentary Brimstone & Glory, which is alternatively jaw-dropping and visually amazing.

The overwhelming majority of Mexico’s fireworks are handmade in Tultepec.  Brimstone & Glory traces the townspeople’s march toward their annual National Pyrotechnic Festival. At the festival, giant toros are set afire as they roll blazing down the commercial streets.  People actually dance within a cacophony of fireworks.

This may not sound entirely safe to you.  Indeed, Brimstone & Glory takes us into the pre-festival training sessions, where paramedics review their triage protocols.  During the festival, we’re in the medical tent as the actual injuries flood in.

One of the festival highlights is a competition with 75-foot high towers embedded with fireworks.  As a lightning storm approaches, one guy climbs the metal tower to repair some wind damage.  It’s clear that Mexican safety regulations, if they exist, are quite relaxed.   Brimstone & Glory is probably a fantasy movie for American personal injury lawyers.

Remember that the manufacturing is by hand.  Without comment, Brimstone & Glory observes an old fireworks craftsman working with three digits left on one hand and none on other.

Brimstone & Glory follows one local kid, the boy Esau (“Santi”).  Everyone expects him to follow in the family fireworks tradition, but his own feelings about fireworks are very ambivalent.

Cinematographer Tobias von dem Borne and director Viktor Jakovleski deliver a feast for the eyes, as you can tell from the photos above.  Slo mo is used very effectively, and the night photography is very special.

Brimstone & Glory can be streamed from Amazon (included with Prime), iTunes and Vudu.

Stream of the Week: THREESOMETHING – original and cheeky

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Isabelle Chester and Sam Sonenshine in THREESOMETHING

In the cheeky and original comedy Threesomething, Charlie (Sam Sonenshine) and his buddy Isaac (James Morosini) invite Charlies’ friend Zoe (Isabelle Chester) to engage in a three-way sexual encounter. That pitch alone is one of the funniest three-minute, fifteen-second, openings to a film I’ve seen in years. But then Threesomething finds the ridiculous moments in both the sex itself and in the all-consuming passion of new infatuation. After a crisp 72 minutes, Threesomething‘s ending is very fresh and non-formulaic, posing just enough ambiguity about the characters’ futures.

Co-writers Morosini and Sonenshine have identified the comic possibilities within the notion that a threesome is more or less symmetrical. Let me explain it this way. What if your idea of a threesome is three participants, but it evolves into two participants and a spectator?

Lust and love are such ripe sources of comedy because we humans are our most ridiculous when we are the most absorbed and single-minded – and that is definitively the case while having sex. And everyone’s sexual fantasies and fetishes – even if shared with one’s sexual partner – are laughable or creepy to someone else. Threesomething reaps the laughs from these situations without being sit-commy.

This is the Are you good? generation. Threesomething’s commentary on the compulsive over-checking in and over-supportiveness is all very sharply witty. And over-sharing is the core of Charlie’s relationship with his mother (Dru Mouser, who steals all of her scenes).

Sonenshine is just about perfect in his reactions during the threesome. He is fantastically gifted at playing both awkward discomfort and contained frustration.

Chester’s performance has several highlights, beginning with Zoe’s takes on the initial proposition and a particularly ill-timed outburst of weeping (inspired). As the story concludes, watch Chester’s face as Zoe considers and reconsiders how comfortable she really is in her choice of partner(s).

Threesomething is Morosini’s directorial debut and the first feature screenplay for both Morodini and Sonenshine. Comedy is hard to write, especially comedy as smart and original as this. I saw Threesomething’s world premiere at this year’s Cinequest.  It is available to stream on Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.