drama

Rebels With a Cause

Chet Kozlowski — Sun, 12 Jan 2025 23:53:04 +0000

Rebels With a Cause Chet Kozlowski January 12, 2025 - 18:53

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The 4K restoration of Girls Town is a real treat. Originally released in 1996, the film is a fascinating look at a bygone era as well as a showcase for then-budding talent.

The plot: four high school girls roam the halls, hang out, and ponder life at a baseball field dugout. Emma (Anna Grace) is the most thoughtful and the most grounded. Angela (Bruklin Harris) is anxious to leave home and what she sees as the control of her single mother. Patti (Lili Taylor) is scrappy and has a child, whom she asks the others to watch while she goes to class. Nikki (Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor) is brooding and secretive.

When Nikki dies by suicide, the others steal her diary to suss out the reason for her death. In an entry, Nikki has written she was raped. One by one the remaining three consider their own experiences and conclude that they, too, had been casually raped during encounters with boys. The girls don't immediately see it as a crime. Emma considers it the way boys show love; she barely registered it when necking evolved into assault. Angela sees it as the price of dating. Patti got pregnant by a local asshole and has toughened up. They squabble: "We try to talk about it and look what happens. We fight for twenty minutes!" They pledge to avenge Nikki by going gangsta, and exact revenge on the culprits.

Girls Town takes place nearly 30 years ago: pre-cellphones, pre-social media, pre-piercings and tattoos. Rap hadn't yet become fully corporatized. By today's standards, the girls are hardly vigilantes. They limit their mayhem to vandalism, writing graffiti on the girls' room walls, and lobbing insults that seem lame today ("Go read a comic book!"). The girls delight in their rebellion: Patti exclaims: "We wouldn’t have been doing this shit a week ago!" Still, the film weighs topics as serious as abortion, class ("Patti takes car shop; you've been accepted to Columbia"), the Glass Ceiling, and subverting the patriarchy.

Girls Town sides with the girls and their acts of reckoning. Compared to, say, the Michelle Pfeiffer vehicle Dangerous Minds, which was released a year earlier, they are not tamed at the end. No adults influence the girls, no one tells them to calm down. So they merrily scorch the earth in front of them. Their brushes with authority are amongst the best scenes: Patti bursts into a classroom and preempts a teacher about to announce that Nikki has died; the girls visit Nikki's mother, realizing they are unwelcome, aliens in her pristine living room.

The 4K restoration is impeccable; the colors are bright and the images sing with clarity. Girls Town is clean: that’s to say it's set in what the show notes call "urban America" (which looks a lot like Brooklyn). The streets are not very mean and the homes not very ghetto. Director Jim McKay shoots confidently, and with a distinctive style (this was his first feature). Scenes linger on the girls' conversations, the camera often peering through windows, tracking slowly as the girls debate life and their task. The screen’s aspect ratio is a tight box: the images are packed into a frame with rounded corners that resembles an old viewfinder. It makes us voyeurs and adds heft to what we're witnessing. Mr. McKay has gone on to direct episodes of The Wire, Breaking Bad, and Better Call Saul.

The actors represent a Who's Who of aspiring New York talent of the time. Lili Taylor has been in I Shot Andy Warhol, HBO's Six Feet Under, and The Conjuring. She's a regular on Amazon Prime's Outer Range. Anna Grace was in Boys Don't Cry, and Bruklin Harris in Dangerous Minds, but both their IMDB credits stop around 2002. Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor as Nikki has had a long run and is currently in Nickel Boys. Look for Michael Imperioli and John Ventimiglia, two Sopranos alumni, in small roles. Guillermo Diaz has a cool turn as Emma's concerned boyfriend Dylan.

Girls Town is released by Film Movement, a force is the distribution of independent and foreign cinema.

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Girls Town. Directed by Jim McKay. 1996. From Film Movement. In theaters. 90 minutes.

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Babygirl's On Fire

Gary Lucas — Tue, 31 Dec 2024 21:02:46 +0000

Babygirl's On Fire Gary Lucas December 31, 2024 - 16:02

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Babygirl is really, really, REALLY GOOD.

Outstanding acting by sexy/brainy girl boss CEO Nicole Kidman (I saw her bare nekkid on Broadway many years ago, s'true. Her "apple-cheeked rear"—to quote Manohla Dargis in the NY Times review of Babygirl—was the actual USP of that Broadway play, whose name is lost to the mists of time. Oh wait, a quick Google search reveals it was David Hare's The Blue Room) and intern-on-the-make Harris Dickinson, who is a DICK with a Capital "D" here (and what's in a name?).

This A24 film signals a return to a more adult approach to adult subjects in art cinema. It's all about power plays in the boardroom and bedroom. And fer sure, 'twas not a bored room at the Village East Angelika today. Lots and lots of rapt, silent teenage girls worshipping at the shrine of Nicole and taking notes (and a few alte kaker cineaste couples—like us).

Whiz kid Dutch director Halina Reijn (educated in Maastricht, my favorite city in the Netherlands, but of course!) grabs the reigns of Hollywood directorial power here in what probably will be the most talked about film of the year (shoots to #1 on my list anyway) once the dust settles on A Complete Unknown.

A mash-up of Eyes Wide Shut (Kidman's dream fantasies in that flick are here played out in real-time), Basic Instinct, Fatal Attraction, 9½ Weeks, and let's see, what else—I could cite a whole slew of other films (the problem for me as a reviewer of anything is I am cursed with highly developed pattern recognition skills), Babygirl will do for female masturbation on the big commercial screen what has been the stock in trade of underground Paris-based ex-pat erotic photographer Roy Stuart for many a year.

The whole concept of what goes into the making of a successful marriage/love relationship is anatomized and critiqued in a very seductive and entertaining way, with helpful hints given to cuck Antonio Banderas by Dickson in a "hale fellow well met" semi-reconciliation scene near the end.

Strutting macho Latino theater director Banderas is herein reduced to tears and a panic attack at the big reveal of his boss wife Kidman's torrid, panting-and-moaning orgasmatronic affair with lowly intern Dickinson, only to have (spoiler alert) the whole sordid mess, which threatens to destroy Kidman's hegemonic control of her personal service robotic corporation—I can't really explain what it is the company actually does—righted eventually by female person of color employee Sophie Wilde, who shames Nicole into doing the right thing and patching things up with hubby so that by the end EVERYTHING IS IN ITS RIGHT PLACE.

A middle-brow movie trope I know, I know. But you forgive Reijn anything here as her whole filmic enterprise is so audacious, smart, and shiny.

The dirty little secret, of course, is that when in the course of human events, it becomes necessary, nay imperative (just ask Caroline) that neither party have the upper hand ALL OF THE TIME. We take turns—She's the Boss! No, He's the Boss!—in the cut and thrust, the basic power dialectic of all successful, non-boring, non-S&M human relationships.

(And then, to further complicate matters, there is always, of course, the concept of "Topping from the Bottom," as John Waters once so elegantly put it at an Alliance Francaise screening of Marguerite Duras's 1977 film Le Camion).

Quite enjoyable, all in all, very well directed, an intriguing score based on what sounds like actual human huffing and puffing by Chilean-born composer Cristobal Tapia de Veer, immaculate cinematography, editing, and sensational acting fireworks by Kidman and Dickinson on display.

You've got to LOVE it.

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Don’t Call It A Comeback

Chet Kozlowski — Mon, 30 Dec 2024 19:11:49 +0000

Don’t Call It A Comeback Chet Kozlowski December 30, 2024 - 14:11

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Pamela Anderson is a survivor. She bounded into fame in 1992 in the original Baywatch TV series. She wore a red one-piece and made quite a splash. She curated her assets and played peek-a-boo until her husband, Tommy Lee, Motley Crue member and video raconteur, shared honeymoon pictures and blew it all, so to speak. She parlayed that into a (failed) franchise, Barb Wire, and has since done TV guest shots—many making fun of her image—and stalled retreads of Baywatch.

Now, with the new film The Last Showgirl, Pamela Anderson seeks to take her place, once again, in the public consciousness.

The Last Showgirl chronicles the closing of a Las Vegas club called Le Razzle Dazzle, an old-style rhinestones-and-feathers revue (described as "dancing nudes, not a nudie show"). Closing the club will put its star dancer, Shelly, played by Ms. Anderson, out of the job she's been doing for over 20 years.

Shelly is a goddess in her own mind. She's living the dream, at least her version of it: her credo is "Night after night. Being seen. Being beautiful," even as she goes home to a tiny domicile alone. She listens to opera, practices her moves, and takes her role as a theatrical performer very seriously. At first, she's ambivalent about the club closing—"I'm old, but I’m not that old"—but that gives way to dismay.

Pamela Anderson still sets a standard for beauty. Those cheekbones, that smile. In The Last Showgirl, she's scrubbed clean of pretension and eyeliner. As an actor, Ms. Anderson runs the range of emotions with precision and grace. Her Shelly is part idol and part doormat, a shoulder to cry on for the other showgirls. She mostly plays nice until she is dissed during an audition; then, her frustration comes out in a generational clash. Yes, Pamela Anderson can act. She's a pro.

Shelly is reminded of mortality by her much younger co-dancers, most notably Mad Man's Sally, Kiernan Shipka (up for anything to shake off her TV past), Brenda Song, and Star Wars film and American Horror Story alumnus Billie Lourd as her estranged daughter Hannah. More age-adjacent actors complete the mix. Jamie Lee Curtis (also up for anything) plays Annette, the Shelly of Christmas past and a boisterous drunk. Ms. Curtis, fearless as always, tops her recent triumph in FX's The Bear by unabashedly showing off her middle-aged body, most notably in a dance scene set to Bonnie Tyler’s rendition of Jim Steinman's Total Eclipse of the Heart. Dave Bautista is another revelation. I am slowly coming around to Mr. Bautista as an actor when he's not typecast because of how he looks. Here, he plays Eddie, the club's sensitive manager, in a roadie wig that gives a mournful shape to his brutal features.

The Last Showgirl is directed by Gia Coppola, Francis Ford's granddaughter, whose credits include Palo Alto (2013), Mainstream (2020), and music videos for Halsey and Carley Rae Jepsen. She shoots this one handheld, vérité style, and pads runtime with shaky filler sequences of Ms. Anderson strolling around Vegas. But it really isn't important to be in Vegas when your story is primarily a character study. The essential action takes place inside the dressing room and Shelly's house. Come to think of it, The Last Showgirl could be turned into a minimalist off-Broadway play if Ms. Anderson was up for memorizing lines.

The Last Showgirl is a qualified success. The story is a showy late-career joint. It isn't perfect. At a critical juncture, Shelly does, after all, catch her extravagant costume in the doorway on the way to the stage.

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The Last Showgirl. Directed by Gia Coppola. 2024. From Roadside Attractions. In theaters Jan. 10.

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False Bottoms

Gary Lucas — Tue, 17 Dec 2024 22:40:24 +0000

False Bottoms Gary Lucas December 17, 2024 - 17:40

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LIE CLUB is one of the most absorbing evenings in the theatre I've spent in ages. I was lucky to catch the final performance of this mind-blowing existential conundrum on Wednesday, Dec. 11th at Studio 3R on St. Mark's Place in the East Village, which was time well spent.

An exhilarating, if not downright dizzying, two person character-driven dark drama all about the games people play and the lies we tell each other day after day after day, the play conveys a sense of crazy forward motion and jump-cut reversals of fortune in the raveling and unraveling of lies told and exposed at Liars Anonymous—a dramatic conceit of an actual therapy center in London. The play at once signifies Progress in stripping back all the layers of the human onion in revealing the Truth that Lies Beneath, and then almost immediately doubles down with yet another Lie—resulting in laughs a'plenty herein—as well as a short sharp gasp of audience surprise at every hair pin turn.

As an audience member, the experience of watching this play was like being strapped into a pleasurable thrill ride but also like being held captive on a careening out of control stagecoach to hell.

It's a disorienting experience which by the play's end, you feel as if you have actually BEEN SOMEWHERE (Heaven's Gate—or the Ninth Circle—you take your pick).

Every time the collective audience seems to be lifted into the blue empyrean with a character's philosophical peroration on this sad human amalgam, and how through the Power of Love we must all rise above the deceitful lies abounding that help self-perpetuate le condition humane tragique, the dramatic rug is rudely jerked out from under us—a reversal of circumstances/fortune which occurs over and over again during the play, as yet another lie is uttered onstage that negates the previous stab at the character in question's "truth-telling."

In that, the play might well have been titled Chinese Boxes—or better yet, False Bottoms (pace the original title of Wyndham Lewis’s masterpiece of a novel The Revenge for Love).

What could have been a mind-numbing exercise in "No Exit"-type existential hokum is totally redeemed by some of the best and freshest stage acting I've ever witnessed by Murmuration Studios' Rachel De Fontes (the co-author of the play, whose character of a lecturer at Liar's Anonymous balances poised elegance on a knife edge with a wicked killer's instinct), and Peter Jeffries (the other co-author, a Scottish actor with preternatural boyish charm and an open, and winning personality, who struggles throughout with Rachel's devilish teasing).

This pair can do it all. They can stop on a dramatic dime, fly through the air with the greatest of ease, deliver howlers and shift gears from farce to tragedy in a millisecond. They had total command of a young East Village audience that cheered them on and loved every minute of this play. Both actors exude a natural honesty and downright sexiness of persona I found extremely engaging. You kind of both fall in love with these two, and alternately, are repulsed by them, as they spider-like spin their glib patter—mainly comedic, but with a through-line that occasionally veers into shock/horror territory. They are that good.

I thoroughly recommend this show, which was a big hit at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and which has been touring internationally with great success.

Here's looking forward to further mind-blowing collaborations from Rachel De Fontes, Peter Jeffries, and Murmuration Studios.

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Her Body, Her Choice

Chet Kozlowski — Tue, 17 Dec 2024 03:31:26 +0000

Her Body, Her Choice Chet Kozlowski December 16, 2024 - 22:31

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You'd be excused for thinking the new Czech film Her Body is something other than it is for the first hour. It's expertly shot and acted and appears to unfold as a tale of female empowerment.

Andrea Absolonová is a professional high diver who is Olympics-bound. She's been training since childhood and is in prime physical shape. Her body is maturing (her younger sister Lucie, also a diver, comments that Andrea's breasts are getting bigger) and she's on the cusp of adulthood. So if the years of training (and borderline bulimia) are going to pay off, the time is now. She is adored by fans, doted on by her parents, and standing tall and confident.

A tragic accident abruptly ends Andrea's career as a high diver. She is incapacitated, in a body brace, and still she pushes herself to return. Finally her coach tells her she's been replaced. She'll never attain her former status.

So Andrea starts to slack. She goes out clubbing. And she sleeps with a photographer who has been circling her since she rejected his advances while training. She knows that he has a "real job": he shoots porn movies and is tied in with the burgeoning underground industry (the film is set in the late 1990s-early 2000s). Andrea knows what he does and she wants in.

She throws herself into porn with abandon and is an instant star (now known as Lea De Mae). She trades a sport for celebrity or, as disapproving Lucie puts it, "fucking for cash." Andrea's parents take differing views: as the money rolls in, Mom delights in her daughter's good fortune. Her father tries to instill shame. Andrea is seduced by the wild life as her porn fame grows. She tracks her parents' estrangement and argues with her sister while partying and doing drugs.

The weight of this drama falls on Natalia Germani's able shoulders. She plays Andrea as focused and ambitious. Ms. Germani, a regular presence on Czech TV, is fit and attractive. Her demeanor suggests that what Andrea wants, Andrea will get. The actor's physical beauty and grace are capped by intelligent blue eyes that, while alluring, are steely. She simmers, giving Andrea Absolonová's quest deeper meaning.

Her Body is a solid film. Director Natálie Císarovská has a firm command of the material, giving Ms. Germani a strong showcase. Denisa Baresová as Lucie is a fine foil: young and waiflike, she gets stronger as her sister wanes. Zuzana Mauréry and Martin Finger as Andrea's parents adeptly portray the up-and-downsides of parental faith and ambition. Klara Belicova's cinematography is appropriately lush and tawdry as circumstances change. The sound design of Petr Cechák and Frantisek Sec accentuates Andrea's breathing, baring the effect of events on her metabolism; that sound is often the only thing we hear.

Warning: spoilers ahead.

The problem with Her Body is: it's a true story. The film must adhere to Andrea's biographical details. So it's disappointing that that story becomes so typical.

Porn is a stronger social force than we care to admit. It's as old as human communication. In these times it's toxic and corrupt—what isn't?—but porn's not just about human trafficking, as proven by the draw of non-pros to OnlyFans. In its purest form, porn epitomizes why we watch movies in the first place: to be aroused and to see something we haven't seen before. For the performer, it can be gratifying for its exhibition and endurance: See what my body can do? See how much it can take? For Andrea Absolonová, the experiences of diving and sexual display might have been similar: a pride in possessing a perfect physique and putting it through its paces.

In any case, it must have been more gratifying than a conventional tale of diminishing returns. And sadly, because we have Andrea's life story to work with, and she died young, we'll never know how she felt about it. The climax of her quest, and her life, amounts to an eleventh hour deus ex machina which does not grow organically out of her actions.

Ms. Císarovská's film has the potential to be a unique take on autonomy and the physicality that both sports and porn require. Andrea wants to exceed expectations and remain the center of attention. She goes from Princess to Harlot and manages to retain her dignity. While gorging on food and drink and sex, she secretly smiles. "I'm happy," she maintains. "Finally free."

So it’s too bad that ultimately Her Body’s message is trite and predictable. Andrea Absolonová’s story is interesting but not extraordinary. Director Natálie Císarovská and actor Natalia Germani make compelling drama of it until the facts demand banal morality. It's sometimes better to trust the fiction. It, like Ms. Germani's performance, reveals more when untethered from immutable "truths."

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Her Body. Directed by Natálie Císarovská. 2023. From Film Movement. On digital platforms. 105 minutes.

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Does Schindler’s List Meet Pink Flamingos in Solvent? Not Exactly.

Brandon Judell — Thu, 05 Dec 2024 02:04:41 +0000

Does Schindler’s List Meet Pink Flamingos in Solvent? Not Exactly. Brandon Judell December 4, 2024 - 21:04

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As the end credits roll by for Solvent, an awe-inspiring pseudo-documentary, you'll be relieved to learn that "no mice, dicks, or feelings were hurt in the making of this film." I was indeed worried about the rodent.

The credits also note that "some pipe shots were taken in the plumbing system of Castle Leopoldskron in Salzburg, the film location of The Sound of Music." One can hear the Trapp Family slightly tossing in their caskets. (We'll get to those pipes in a second.)

Director/co-writer Johannes Grenzfurthner has noted that his latest filmic oddity is a spiritual successor to his two previous works, Making Threshold (2021) and Razzennest (2022). On experiencing Threshold at Festival Maudit, I was inspired to write: "With one of the best screenplays of recent years, . . . this deliriously witty, yet highly discomforting film is a wry, dissective look at modern society's derangement." The hero of that effort, a polymath, was searching for a cure for his extreme tinnitus utilizing worms, fungi, and a polyester shirt. He was shackled with a boyfriend who was an alcoholic acupuncturist and was also a bit of a pessimist: "If life gives you lemonade, inspect it closely. It might be piss."

Well, after enveloping myself in Solvent's similarly addictive frenziedness, I find myself once again writing: “This deliriously witty yet highly discomforting film is a wry, dissective look at modern society's derangement."

Solvent, however, has a slightly more optimistic hero: Gunner S. Holbrook (John Gries), an American former mercenary and recovering Catholic whose face we never view except for a quick snapshot. You see, he’s the head of a sort of documentary/research team, and he’s almost always behind the camera. His hands, his legs, and his private parts, though, do make appearances now and then.

The film opens in lower Austria on March 8, 2023, at 7:00 AM with Holbrook, his blonde academic Polish girlfriend Krystyna Szczepanska (Aleksandra Cwen), and several production aides setting up across from the farm of a former Nazi, Wolfgang Zinggl. Zinggl was involved with Chelmno, the first stationary facility where poison gas was used for the mass murder of Jews. (Please note there is frequent usage of Holocaust footage, mostly in photos and seconds-long clips, integrated throughout Solvent.)

Unpunished for his crimes against humanity, Zinggl apparently disappeared in 2014, and no one knows what happened to the gent who outwardly led a "normal" life after the war. Not even his grandson Ernst Bartholi (played by the director), who runs a woke PR boutique, has any answer. He does note of his relative, "[Gramps] never hit me. He was a nice guy," although admittedly, during the last years of Gramp's life, the man "became kookier and kookier." Rumors abound that a nearby swamp swallowed him up, and he is now haunted by his ghost.

What other ending would you propose for a man who often hung pigs from a door and then castrated them? His cats apparently enjoyed the tidbits Zinggl scattered on the ground. (Two butchers are also listed in the credits.)

Anyway, what Holbrook's group is after is the Nazi's "Judenkiste" (Jew Box), a container said to contain documents and personal accounts of those who died at Chelmno.

Well, where can such a container be hidden? In the Nazi's house? Entering the abandoned home, Holbrook and crew, attired in hazmat suits, discover a porn collection, banana-flavored antidiarrheals, and much untidiness. No box. So, was this venture going to be a complete loss?

A curious, buffoonish neighbor pops by and asks whether anyone has checked out Zinggl's wine cellar across the road? What wine cellar?

At full gallop, the squad rushes over into the dark, musky oenophile's liquor dungeon, but is anything there of importance? Not at first glance. Just an ordinary-looking pipe sticking up in the middle of the floor. Cold air seems to be escaping from this eerie metal cylinder. Is this proof of another room below? If so, what will happen if you twiddle with this inanimate metal curiosity? Or worse, if you lower a camera through the pipe into the cellar's lower depths? Oh, no!!!

What follows defies easy categorization. There is horror, comedy, surrealism, underground absurdity, and even a dash of romance, but these genres are called upon to do more than entertain. Along with his co-writer Ben Roberts, Grenzfurthner unites every aspect of filmmaking with his encyclopedic knowledge of science, history, and philosophy to expose how historical violence and hatred have refused to remain historical. Croatia, the Middle East, and Bolivia are among the areas that get a current nod here.

As the director notes in Solvent's press notes: "The film's grotesque imagery underscores its themes, depicting the twisted and deformed nature of the past that shapes our present. While Solvent features an artistically exaggerated core, it diverges from typical horror films that use Nazis as central motifs. My goal is to use this stylized approach to explore the enduring effects of Nazi ideology and its infiltration into modern society."

Grenzfurthner succeeds grandly.

(Solvent won "The Film from Hell (Best of the Fest)" award at the Nightmares Film Festival 2024.)

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Armand Assante: An Appreciation

Chet Kozlowski — Wed, 06 Nov 2024 02:45:39 +0000

Armand Assante: An Appreciation Chet Kozlowski November 5, 2024 - 21:45

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Allow me a brief appreciation of Armand Assante. The occasion calls for it: the release of Don Q, a new film in which he stars.

Few actors command the screen, like Armand Assante. I’d seen him first in 1978’s Paradise Alley as Sylvester Stallone’s brother. I’m a fan and have been since I saw him in I, The Jury, the 1982 version of the Mickey Spillane novel directed by Larry Cohen. His chiseled features (in his advanced age, he looks to be carved out of granite) and his naturalistic delivery brought Mike Hammer explosively to life.

Mr. Assante would go on to make a mark in TV, winning a Best Actor Emmy for his lead in 1996’s Gotti, and starring as Odysseus in an ambitious 1997 miniseries of The Odyssey. Other notable parts and awards followed, but to my mind he hasn’t attained the household-name and leading man status he deserves.

Which is odd, because he rose in the era of The Tough Guy. He was tough and he had soul. He played Gotti and Napolean and Nietzsche and was a mob boss in Hoffa. He was in American Gangster and The Mambo Kings and Private Benjamin. He’s the son of an artist and a poet. Despite his Italian (and Irish) heritage, he’s hasn’t appeared in a Martin Scorsese picture.

I don’t know the man. I only have my perceptions to go on, and he’s always struck me as an actor apart for his dynamism, which radiates off him. I saw him in a restaurant in the Village once, and even while relaxing, his presence was palpable.

Which brings me to Don Q. I’ve been thinking a lot about why certain movies are made. I know, I know: the profit motive. But there are easier ways to make money. Making movies is hard work: it takes a skill for organization, it’s subject to the whims of many, and it always ends up revealing something about the filmmaker, even if it’s only to ask why they took on the project in the first place.

In Don Q, Mr. Assante plays Al Quinto, a man full of bonhomie and goodwill. He considers himself the unofficial Don of New York’s Little Italy. Everybody knows him and hails him. He does good. He advises the owners of local businesses. He saves a Chinatown waitress from a sinister pimp. He cracks down on marauding skateboarders. He mentors a Mafia wannabee.

It comes around to the fact that Al Quinto is delusional. He’s not a Don at all, but a Walter Mitty type. Don Q. is Don Quixote. Which in the right hands could be an interesting premise. Think Brando in The Freshman. He pulled that off without tarnishing his image.

Don Q is a disjointed and amateurish film. It’s a parody of Mafia pictures and TV shows (The Soprano’s own Big Pussy, Vincent Pastore, appears in a thankless part) without understanding what makes them work. Don Q. pores over books of Mafia lore and has a voluminous library of DVDs and records which he plays on a vintage Victrola (?). He lives in a fantasy world and is advised by the ghosts of cartoonish gangsters dressed in Zoot suits (!) He instigates confrontations and says things like “Oh, you got balls?” and then walks away. Through much of it he seems harmless, so it’s incongruous when characters come to violent and bloody ends.

Don Q has the feel of a cut-and-paste just-pals production. Much of the film is improvised but lacks the skill and trust that convincing improvisation requires. It’s billed as a comedy but isn’t funny. The only comic element I see is the occasional Road Runner swoosh on quick pans.

So one wonders why, at this stage of his career, Mr. Assante goes along with all this, and even takes a producer credit. The early scenes of Don Q carousing Little Italy and Chinatown have a certain charm that is undone by what comes after.

I almost didn’t write this review. I have a rule: don’t review anything I can’t say something nice about. But I wanted to pay tribute to an actor I respect. And anticipate that more, better film roles await him in the future. Put Don Q behind us. Let’s toast a unique and strong actor who doesn’t seem to know his own strength.

___________________________________________

Don Q, Directed by Claudio Bellante. 2024. From Archstone Entertainment. Available on VOD. 84 minutes.

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Vulgar Ironies

Chet Kozlowski — Mon, 21 Oct 2024 01:17:16 +0000

Vulgar Ironies Chet Kozlowski October 20, 2024 - 21:17

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The man known as the Mayor of Aurora is a skinny, rumpled guy who looks like a vagrant but lives in a spacious mobile home. In the first scene of the documentary Sweetheart Deal, he sits on a park bench, lures in a pigeon, and captures it by hand. His name is Laughn Doescher, but he goes by his middle name, Elliott. He comes on as a sort of saint, affording comfort to a vulnerable population. Aurora is a section of Seattle, Washington, and is a center of drugs and prostitution, a sort of skid row of strip malls and neon signs.

The movie about Elliot starts out laudatory. He’s a character and smooth talker with his scraggly hair and pocked complexion. On good days, he’s a silver-tongued merry prankster. Then he turns evangelical—he calls addiction “the Monster” as he watches his charge writhe and whine in agony. Elliott is oddly endearing. We look past his filthy habitat, the grimy pans and scummy dishes, the butt-filled ashtrays, because he’s doing good. He’s not an addict himself, yet he takes in these poor souls, giving them a place to be, feeding them, and helping them kick.

Word about him spreads. A female newspaper reporter comes to interview him. He takes a shine to her. “No wonder you have a stalker,” he says. “Now you’ve got another one.”

The women he watches over include Kristine, who is a welder who found herself out of work and options. She has a scathing sense of humor, even at her worst. Then there’s Tammy, who pays her disabled parents’ expenses by turning tricks. Her invalid mother complains she’s out of cigarettes; Tammy nonchalantly drops that she’ll solve that by “sucking an extra dick.” Sara is “dopesick” and can’t shake even after her grown kids disown her. Amy is in the brutal throes of crack withdrawal; her animal wails from the back bedroom, barely sounding human. She’ll return to her parents and try to live up to the photos that hang in their home of her in high school, before her fall, when she was known as “Krista.”

These women are rough and resilient and, while self-sufficient, have come to rely on the guy in the RV on the corner and the haven he provides. Sara says she knows he’s a “slimy old man,” but she goes back to him anyway. She’s got nowhere else to go, and she needs a place to even out.

And through it all is Saint Elliott, unflappable and unassuming. He lives in a shithole, but for all intents and purposes, as they say, his heart appears to be pure. He just wants to help.

Sweetheart Deal was originally released in 2022, and its title was the more innocuous sounding Aurora Stories. This gives us a hint about how the project started as an omnibus of life on the streets. Directors Elisa Levine and Gabriel Miller focus in on four sex workers, I’d guess not suspecting that Elliott was the real story. This is Ms. Levine’s first feature. Mr. Miller, who was the cinematographer, died in 2019 before the film’s release.

Sweetheart Deal is shot handheld verité style. The filmmakers are true flies on the wall. Their access to personal conversations is remarkable. Ms. Levine and Mr. Miller’s subjects trust them and are forthright. That they had a bank of footage for what looks to have been a conventional documentary, that they were there at all, was a career-making coincidence. They were ready and had scrupulously documented events when those events took a turn. That’s what makes Sweetheart Deal unforgettable.

The less you know about Sweetheart Deal going into it, the better. A trailer will necessarily steer the viewer. The film sometimes feels voyeuristic, encouraging an unhealthy interest in peoples’ pain (one of those “vulgar ironies” astutely referred to by a character). The narratives that come out of their surveillance are heartbreakingly observed. The proceedings that make up the last half hour seem only too inevitable and yet are riveting.

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Sweetheart Deal. Directed by Elisa Levine and Gabriel Miller. 2022. From Abramorama. In theaters in limited release. 99 minutes.

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Woman Overboard

Chet Kozlowski — Wed, 16 Oct 2024 01:57:46 +0000

Woman Overboard Chet Kozlowski October 15, 2024 - 21:57

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Film Review

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drama

In the new Turkish film Afloat, a family gathers for a cruise. Sister Zaynep flies in from America with her American husband, Stephen. Younger sister Yasemin is mopey and obstinate. Father Yusuf is a charismatic journalist who attracts fans wherever he goes. The cruise is his idea: while waiting to hear whether he will be jailed for his reporting, he wants the family together to take a relaxing trip "one last time."

It's anything but relaxing. Though they bask in sunshine and eat luscious food, tension roils under the surface. Yasemin envies her sister's lifestyle and that she moved away at all. Mom Alev remains cooly aloof. Zeynep gets little support for her nascent career as a documentary filmmaker. Stephen complains that she "likes the idea of being married more than the reality of it." Stephen's also concerned that his passport has been stolen and that his wife is off her meds.

While this crew island-hops among blue skies, open water, and ruins, they trade barbs and pointed silences. Secrets are revealed. Feelings are hurt and betrayed. Father is the fulcrum, but Afloat belongs to its women and their struggle loving a "political freedom warrior." They pose and kvetch and rebuff their father's advice to just enjoy the time. "Is it only you whose mistakes have to be tolerated?" one asks.

Afloat's scenery is lovely, and its cast is attractive. Nihan Aker as Zaynep is model-elegant, while Elit Iscan's Yasemin is pretty and pouty. Serhat Ünaldi (the director's father), as Yusuf, is the picture of stability, even as everything falls apart around him. Oscar Pearce's Stephen is clearly incongruent with his pale complexion, red hair, and inexperience with the language. (The characters alternate between Turkish and English with acuity). Lila Gürmen plays reticent Alev with poise.

Writer/director Aslihan Unaldi was born in Turkey and is now based in Brooklyn. She teaches at Columbia University and NYU. She is also known for her previous feature, the environmental documentary Overdrive (2011). Not many films in Turkey are made from a woman's perspective. Ms. Unaldi seeks to rectify that.

Aslihan Unaldi lets the exotic locales and pretty people do the work. Granted, the deck of a boat doesn't offer many possibilities for camera angles unless the limited floor plan becomes claustrophobic. She manages to cull some stirring sequences: an interlude through island ruins, the sisters dancing to silent music in their earbuds, Yasemin biting ravenously into pomegranates.

As sumptuous and watchable as Afloat is, these characters don't learn much. If a narrative quest is structured to take characters through conflict and bring them self-knowledge, these folks remain predictably themselves. For all the potential built into these fictional (maybe autobiographical?) characters, they are pretty much the same at the end as when they cast off.

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Afloat. Directed by Aslihan Unaldi. 2024. 115 minutes

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Where The Heart Is

Chet Kozlowski — Mon, 26 Aug 2024 14:00:00 +0000

Where The Heart Is Chet Kozlowski August 26, 2024 - 10:00

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Film Review

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drama

The new film Know Your Place is set in a part of Seattle that's undergoing rapid gentrification. Money talks, those that don’t have walk. But where do you go if you are an immigrant to the U.S. and part of a vital community?

The community in question hails from Eritrea, one of Africa's poorest nations. Eritreans preserve their religion and their native language, difficult to do when you're being forced to scatter. Know Your Place centers on one family, the Hailes, and Robel, a 15-year-old Eritrean-American boy, in particular. Robel is known for keeping his feelings hidden. "You never say nothin', Bro," says his friend Fahmi on the basketball court. "What's on your mind?"

Robel wonders, simply, where he belongs. His father is dead; his mother struggles to keep the family afloat. His grandfather suffers from dementia and sleeps on the living room couch.

And then comes a plea from the parent's homeland: relatives are ailing, medical expenses are high, and they need financial help. Despite her family's own dire circumstances, Mother assembles clothes, money, and medicine to send over. Robel is tasked with delivering a large suitcase full of provisions across town to his aunts.

Writer/director Zia Mohajerjasbi turns this into a lyrical, profound quest, played out on city streets and light rail and buses. Of course, Robel and Fahmi encounter obstacles, but their comradery and street smarts make for a fascinating journey. Know Your Place is thick with Eritrean culture and interludes of quiet grace.

Seattle in autumn has rarely looked so bleak and beautiful. Mr. Mohajerjasbi counterpoints the drama of displacement by sending his camera to wander languidly amongst canopies of tree branches and street signs, segments of visual poetry. Buildings are being torn down. Residential streets are being decimated. Cranes loom over every horizon. Yet the gloom is often cut by pools of light, actual and symbolic. There's hope. The city becomes a living thing, aided by the fluid camera of Director of Photography Nicholas Wiesnet.

Match this with the naturalistic performances of Know Your Place's young protagonists. Joseph Smith's internal reserve as Robel is tweaked by Natnael Mebrahtu's brash Fahmi. Robel frets and Fahmi joshes. The pair make an engrossing odd couple, trekking across town with their literal McGuffin. Days after having watched the movie, I still feel the presence of these characters.

But the notion of "home" is the point. Where do you go when poverty undercuts your mobility yet forces you to keep moving? As Robel says in a moment of pique, "I wish everything would slow down so I can know where I'm supposed to be."

Their path takes unexpected detours and is dotted with compelling characters, most notably Selamawit Gebresus as Robel's mother (who delivers a stunning monologue with the camera tight on her face), Esther Kibreab as Robel's striving sister, Haileselassie Kidane as gansta cousin Aboy, and Tirhas Haile as the cantankerous Auntie Hana. Aaron Sahle plays Uncle Yonas, a rowdy yellow cab philosopher who contends that America is "drowning in a sea of names," but deep down everyone is where they should be. Every member of this ensemble is a believable and welcome swatch in this heartfelt tapestry.

Zia Mohajerjasbi is a filmmaker to watch. He has a particular vision and, for a first-time writer/director, the discretion to make it come alive. He takes risks: despite the rigors of the inner-city milieu, Mr. Mohajerjasbi isn't afraid to stop the action to make a point. One breathtaking montage is of people, just people, in all their normal glory, caught still and facing the camera.

Know Your Place is a warm, rich, and affectionate portrait of an ancient culture unmoored in the modern world.

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Know Your Place. 2022. Directed by Zia Mohajerjasbi. Available on VOD and in select theaters. 118 minutes.