Category: reviews

Melancholia
sffs directed by Lars von Trier November 2011
SFFS members are invited to a free member-only preview screening of Melancholia starring Kirsten Dunst, Charlotte Gainsbourg, and Keifer Sutherland. Melancholia is a psychological disaster film from director Lars von Trier.

Lars von Trier’s work that I have seen:
In 2000, von Trier premiered a musical featuring Icelandic musician Björk, Dancer in the Dark. The film won the Palme d’Or at Cannes.
He then directed two films in his announced ‘U.S. trilogy’: Dogville (2003), starring Nicole Kidman
In 2006, von Trier released a Danish-language comedy film, The Boss of it All.
Von Trier’s latest work is Melancholia, a psychological disaster drama;[26] shot between 22 July and 8 September 2010 at Film i Väst’s studios in Trollhättan, Sweden,[27] and with exteriors in the area surrounding the Tjolöholm Castle

About the film: In this beautiful movie about the end of the world, Justine (Kirsten Dunst) and Michael (Alexander Skarsgård) are celebrating their marriage at a sumptuous party in the home of her sister Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg), and brother-in-law John (Kiefer Sutherland). Despite Claire’s best efforts, the wedding is a fiasco, with family tensions mounting and relationships fraying. Meanwhile, a planet called Melancholia is heading directly towards Earth…

MY TAKE – When we left the theater Carol and I remarked to one another how excruciatingly long and slow that film was… seemingly hours of Claire dragging around that child and Justine wandering around that golf course. And yet we both thought that parts were beautiful and the acting of the main characters was brilliant.
Mick LaSalle’s review was in the Chronicle the next day. He had the little man sitting straight up, expressionless, which means GOOD.
(Full reviews at the end of this)

He starts —

If only Lars von Trier took into account that audiences might actually want to enjoy “Melancholia,” rather than endure it, or sift through it, or submit to the director’s will, he might have made something extraordinary. The film’s arresting concept, its deeply felt understanding of depression, and its glossy and surreal cinematography — like a Magritte painting — could have been the ingredients of a masterpiece.

and concludes with —

At this point, you might be wondering why, in a middling review, I’ve concentrated only on the good. (In fact, I haven’t the space to talk about all the strengths of “Melancholia”; for example, Kiefer Sutherland as Gainsbourg’s sardonic husband or Charlotte Rampling as Dunst’s and Gainsbourg’s vicious mother.) The reason is that all the virtues of “Melancholia” are original and interesting.?Meanwhile, its flaws are so typical and pedestrian that it’s difficult to sound intelligent mentioning them.?But it must be said: “Melancholia” is grindingly slow and endless, with scenes that go nowhere and long, long stretches of directorial indulgence. There is almost no tension and barely enough story to carry it to feature length, much less 2¼ hours.

Carol and I totally agreed. But then, I went and found Roger Ebert’s review, on line. He gave it 3 1/2 stars (out of 4). What’s up with that? Continue reading “Melancholia, a commentary” →

The 54th San Francisco International Film Festival will run through May 5, featuring 192 films. Carol and I will be going about every day, sometimes to the same film, sometimes to different films. I will write capsule reviews of the films I see and post them here as soon as I get them written. The most expeditious way to do these reviews, for me, is to take the advance blurbs and edit them, then add MY TAKE. If you’re interested, you can see the advance blurbs at the SFIFF54 web site.

DETROIT WILD CITY
Fri, Apr 29   7:00 / Kabuki
Detroit ville sauvage, Documentaries, France/USA, 2010, 80 min, in English
director Florent Tillon

Florent Tillon’s film begins with familiar but inevitably arresting images of Detroit’s decay into postapocalyptic pastoralism, but doesn’t end there. While most cinematic pilgrims have portrayed the Motor City as a giant canvas onto which they project their outsider fantasies, Tillon has greater ambitions and greater respect. The obligatory urban tour of empty factories and the abandoned Michigan Central station quickly gives way to a contemplative, nuanced discussion of what futures might actually be possible. As we visit with a variety of Detroiters, we realize that most of what we think we know about Detroit is superficial, and begin to question easy assumptions about urban agriculture, urban pioneering and Detroit’s reversion to a “natural” state. While urban farmer Shirley Robinson suggests “a lot of people would go back to a simple life if they had a choice,” outsider historian/pundit Black Monk questions the long-term effect of today’s urban pioneering movement. “Urban pioneers find the edge, but don’t occupy it,” he tells us. “Cities are built by settlers, not pioneers.” Tavern proprietor Larry Mongo, on the other hand, likens today’s young inbound migrants to those who originally settled Detroit 300 years ago. A minimalist but intelligent travelogue that resists sensationalism, Detroit Wild City focuses on people rather than ruins. It suggests that while macronarratives may help us understand the past, micronarratives will describe the future, and Detroit’s destiny will be the product of many individual, small-group and localized efforts.?—Rick Prelinger?

MY TAKE — When I think of Detroit as a ruin, I think of Michael Kenna’s book, The Rouge, photographs of the Ford assembly plant, shut down. Still and stately black and white photographs of a time passed. I also think of the photographs of Bernd and Hilla Becher, though their many books of photographs of industrial facades do not include Detroit.
I’m not sure what Florent Tillon set out to do with Detroit, but as I see it, she produced a rich photographic essay: a thriving urban center gone bad and forming not ruins, but majestic shells of brick and concrete. To this, she added soul, formed in stories by individuals — whether the urban Mr. Fixit, the sideburned gentleman who loved to walk the ruins, or one or more philosophers — their rather unconnected narratives do suggest that Detroit lives, it did not and will not die. Cue the fireworks.

KANBAR AWARD: FRANK PIERSON
An Afternoon with Frank Pierson Saturday, April 30, 12:30 pm?Sundance Kabuki Cinemas?1881 Post Street (at Fillmore)

Frank Pierson is the recipient of the Kanbar Award for excellence in screenwriting at the 54th San Francisco International Film Festival. An onstage interview about his 50 years in the business will be followed by a screening of Dog Day Afternoon, a gripping, nuanced film directed by Sidney Lumet, about a heist gone wrong, that garnered an Academy Award for Pierson.

A former Time magazine correspondent, Pierson began his screen career as a story editor, and later producer/director, on the popular CBS TV series Have Gun Will Travel in the early 1960s. He also wrote for Studio One, Alcoa Goodyear Theater, Route 66 and Naked City, popular series during the so-called Golden Age of Television. Continue reading “SFIFF54 Our Second Week” →

The 54th San Francisco International Film Festival kicked off yesterday and will run through May 5, featuring 192 films. Carol and I will be going about every day, sometimes to the same film, sometimes to different films. I will write capsule reviews of the films I see and post them here as soon as I get them written. The most expeditious way to do these reviews, for me, is to take the advance blurbs and edit them for what I saw. If you’re interested, you can see the advance blurbs at the SFIFF54 web site. Reviews will be added at the end of this post.

SFIFF54 – 2011

APRIL
Thu 21 M and C – Beginners — (review below)
Fri 22 M – The City Below, C – Meeks Cutoff
Sat 23 C – The Last Buffalo Hunt, M – World on a Wire
Sun 24 M and C – At Ellen’s Age
Mon 25 M and C – Cave of Forgotten Dreams
Tue 26 M and C – New Skin for the Old Ceremony
Wed  27 M – The Sleeping Beauty, M – The Mill and the Cross
Thu 28 M and C – Love in a Puff
Fri 29 M and C – Detroit Wild City
Sat 30 M and C – Kanbar Award – Dog Day Afternoon, C – Blessed Events

MAY
Sun 1 – Member screening – won’t know what film until we see it
Sun 1 M and C – A Cat in Paris, M and C – Page One: NYT
Mon 2 M and C – The Stool Pigeon
Tue 3 M – Yves St Laurent L’Amour Fou, C – American Teacher
Wed 4 M and C – The Trip
Thu 5     M and C – Closing Night – On Tour

SFIFF54 Opening Night: Beginners

Opening Night of the San Francisco International Film Festival is two days away! Kick off the 54th year with Mike Mills’s Beginners, about a graphic artist (Ewan McGregor) absorbing the lessons imparted by his father’s late-blooming eagerness to let love into his life.
Mills and McGregor are expected to attend for a postscreening Q&A.

Join the convivial throng at the Castro Theatre for a screening of Beginners, and then head to the lavish party to enjoy culinary delights from local restaurants, sophisticated cocktails and, of course, dancing. You must be 21+ to attend the party.

At the Castro, SFFS Executive Director Graham Leggat was paid tribute for 5 years of superb service by the President of the Board, J. Patterson McBaine. Under Graham’s leadership, SFFS has grown from 11 staff to 32, $1 million budget to $6 million, doubled its membership and become a year round operation. Continue reading “SFIFF54” →

FOREVER TANGO
January 11 at Marines Memorial Theater.

Created and directed by Luis Bravo, Forever Tango features a world-renowned cast of dancers and musicians who bring an intoxicating sense of excitement and passion to the stage. Through music, dance and vignettes, the production traces the tango’s colorful history, from its beginnings in turn-of-the-century Buenos Aires bordellos to its acceptance into high society. Sensuous and sophisticated, the tango inhabits a world where everything can be said with the flick of a leg, the tug of a hand, the tap of a foot and the arch of an eyebrow.
The original production took San Francisco by storm in 1994 where it played an unprecedented 92 weeks. In June of 1997, Forever Tango opened on Broadway where it played for 14 months and earned rave reviews from critics. The show garnered multiple Tony and Drama Desk Award nominations, and became the longest-running tango show in Broadway history – an honor it still holds today! Forever Tango has since toured major cities through the United States, Europe and Asia. The show’s last visit to San Francisco was in 2008.
Forever Tango’s cast includes 14 world-class dancers, a vocalist and an 8-piece, on-stage orchestra, anchored by the bandoneón, the accordion-like instrument that is the mainstay of tango music. The Forever Tango orchestra boasts three of only 200 bandoneón players known worldwide. The dances, performed to original and traditional music, are the result of collaboration between each couple and director/creator Bravo.
Also appearing in every performance of Luis Bravo’s Forever Tango is Cheryl Burke. With over 18 years dancing experience and several championship titles under her belt, Cheryl has tangoed and sambaed her way into the hearts of millions through the hit ABC television show Dancing With The Stars. She is one of the show’s professional dancers to have won the championship twice! In the spring of 2008, Cheryl opened her first dance studio, the highly successfuly Cheryl Burke Dance, which now has locations in Silicon Valley and Orange County.
– Marines Memorial Theater announcement

Cheryl Burke on Argentine Tango – Since I was a little girl, I’ve been a huge fan. When they were here in SF performing, I remember my mom and dad taking me. Argentine Tango and ballroom dancing are completely separate styles. I asked my agent to approach Luis Bravo and he said, “Well, OK, come to Argentina for the summer and some of my top dancers will teach you.”
In Argentine Tango there’s no hip action. It’s softer, it’s delicate, then sometimes it’s passionate. Sometimes there’s sharpness, although it almost always comes from the man, because it’s very much about lead and follow. – Notes from a SF Chronicle feature

MY TAKE – I vaguely remember Forever Tango from its earlier SF appearances – I think it was in a tent down on the Embarcadero. We went this time because of Cheryl Burke – she’s hot – but she only dances three or four times. This is all about the Luis Bravo dance troupe from Argentina.
The orchestra is on stage and it is fabulous. Piano, string bass, violin, viola, cello and three bandoneon players. Aside from playing for the dancers, the orchestra plays several numbers with male singer and several numbers alone. The dancers pairings are the same throughout the evening. They are brilliant and varied in style and even when they are three or more couples performing at once, they perform their own dance, not a synchronized thing.
At a little over two hours, including intermission, it felt a tad long, but what a great evening.
Bravo.