The film opens to a very average suburban neighborhood before peeking into one house in particular. The loud and exaggerated sounds of rough sex are heard as the camera moves in on the vacuous face of a teenage boy—our main character. An unseen narrator relates the boy’s predicament: he lives in a home of rough folk, his mom and dad thinking nothing of engaging in boisterous sex in his presence, nor for that matter doing drugs and partying with other men. The narrator reveals himself to be the boy’s neighbor, and muses about the mom’s seeming indifference to the boy inbetween observations about how much he’d like to have sex with the older, permanently panty-clad woman.

The film in a way is a quest, albeit of the inward, self-reflecting type, as this neighbor attempts to empathize with and ultimately make sense of the boy. But for what reason? What is spurring the neighbors oratory? That is indeed what the film works up towards, but the exercise is perfunctory—you already know.

The short film thus exists as a meditative elegy, from the neighbor to the boy, and the visuals support the creation of such a mood, using frequent slow-motion to imagine scenes of alienation the boy might have experienced. Yet this empathy is disturbingly buttressed by the sexual fetishization of the mother, as the camera lingers erotically on the body she so frequently flounts in and around the home. Sexual longing on the neighbor’s part is part of his explanation for the boy’s state, yet that means the neighbor must in a way confront his complicity, a feeling if that is expressed in his voice, if not completely registered in his head.

There is no moral to the story per se, and if this elegaic mood fails to find spark within you, then you will find the short film bland and possibly even distasteful. Upon playing Sundance in 2008, many accused writer-director David Michôd of misogyny in the film’s depiction of sexuality. However I find the elegaic streak that Crossbow mines to be rare and wonderful in film, and kudos go to Michôd, because it is difficult to pull off. Indeed the film is strikingly reminiscent to one of the best films of this vein, Sofia Coppola’s work, The Virgin Suicides, a movie structured very similarly, with its title that undermines suspense, and its observant narration that wrestles with the exquisite sadness of seemingly senseless tragedy, and how it relates to sexuality and nostalgia.

Michôd is an Aussie who is part of the increasingly famous Blue-Tongue Collective, whose films have been featured numerously on this site and others. Spider and I Love Sarah Jane have appeared on our lists of our favorite reviews from 2009 and 2008 respectively. However I believe that this is the best short from the group that I’ve seen so far. Blue Tongue’s output relies heavily on surprises and twists, and nominally Crossbow is no different, and yet in practice the focus on atmosphere and mood rather than narrative trickery creates a feeling that the other films we’ve reviewed cannot match. Indeed Miracle Fish the Oscar nominee from this past year, is truly a film that I think wishes it could be Crossbow:  both films center on vacant, disaffected boys that suffer from some sort of abuse, before ending in violence. However whatever feeling the empty school in Miracle Fish tries to convey simply does not come across powerfully, unlike the images of the mother and the activity around the house in Crossbow, nor does the violence at the end of Miracle Fish,seemingly random, hold any sort of weight against Crossbow’s slow unfurling, made all the more powerful by how clearly it is foreshadowed.

Michôd has, like many of his other compatriots in the group, moved on to features. His debut, Animal Kingdom, played Sundance this year. I have yet to have a chance to see it, but will be taking the opportunity as soon as I can in order to see the continued development of this fascinating young  filmmaker.

via jasonbkohl.com

Well it seems that someone forget to tell Lucas Krost when he set out with his team from filmmaking collective Mondial Creative Labs to create the end of the world in Outliers for the International 48hr Film Competition. Outliers stars Mendy St.Ours, who came to the rescue when the previous lead jumped ship at the last minute, as a lone woman trying to make sense of and stay safe in a city besieged by an apparent lethal virus; where information is sketchy and the lone hope of a vaccine seems more than a little off. Throw in the mostly faceless voice of authority tracking the stages of human reactions to a crisis and you’ve got a nice conspiracy drama on your hands.

While Todd Brusnighan & Patrick Simkins’ script delivers believable dialogue and characters, the concept at the heart of Outliers is pretty run of the mill. What undoubtedly marks the film as noteworthy is the level of production value achieved over the 48 hour period. Given the genre ‘End of the World’ (the international round of 48hr didn’t require a line of dialogue, prop and character), Team Mondial have delivered a polished, entertaining short that is far superior to many of the films I see created without the arduous time restraint – despite the many howls of disbelief online they insist that the posted film is as presented at the end of the contest with no additional work.

To be fair to those thinking ‘WTF!’, Team Mondial came to this round of 48hr prepared with, “$500 + 200,000 in favors”, plus had already been through the 48hr process with their mockumentary short Neighborhood Watch, which is effective but no where near as ambitious. Locations were scouted and casting sessions held a week before the competition kicked off, then once the genre was assign the script was written from 7pm on the Friday to early Saturday morning and actors and locations finalised. The team shot straight for the next 24 hours, DPs Johnny St. Ours and Spencer Meffert armed with dual Reds fitted with Red Prime and Zeiss Super Speed lenses. To keep things moving, once a scene wrapped, the drive was hurried over to the Final Cut Pro editor, who worked from proxies, then 1080 cropped. Color correction was handled in RedCine, GFX in After Effects.

Outliers earnt Krost his second trip to the Cannes Film Festival Short Film Corner (his short Feels Like Drowning screened in 2008) and Team Mondial are said to have a feature in the works. Can’t see them needing more than week to pull that off.

Kseniya was in a tough spot just 2 years ago. She was a 23 year old Ukraine artist who had to let her business go during the worst of the financial meltdown. It was time for her to take a risk—and that risk was an unusual one—sand animation. Now sand isn’t an entirely new medium for animation. Caroline Leaf pioneered the technique back in 1968 with Sand or Peter and the Wolf by manipulating scenes of sand backlit on a light box and shooting each step frame by frame in what must have been agonizing work—and certainly not a captivating performance.

But Kseniya has changed all that. Over the course of a few years, she developed a new technique of illustrating her scenes in realtime before a live audience—swiping sand this way and dragging her fingers that way to craft scenes that slowly emerge from one another. The beauty of the technique is in it’s simplicity. It follows what most historians will tell you is one of the oldest forms of visual storytelling. Many early cultures used sticks, stones, and even their hands—carving scenes and characters into the sand around them—bringing life to their spoken stories. And yet, the sheer popularity of this film (it’s hit 14 million views on YouTube!) could only come about in an age where modern technology makes it possible to broadcast that story to millions of people around the world.

The story in Kseniya’s untitled 8-minute masterpiece tells of the German conquest of Ukraine in the second world war. Kseniya builds peaceful scenes of parks and baby cribs only to bombard them with a flurry of sand in which she crafts faces of agony and despair. The message is clear even if the details aren’t, and the weight of war on the women and children who survive is felt by the audience.

Though Kseniya has proved she has talent (she took home first place on the show along with $125,000), it’s unclear as to where she will go next. As with other talent show winners, much of their performance is built on the uniqueness of the contestant’s talent and their ability to dodge our expectations (Susan Boyle on Britain’s Got Talent). That sort of surprise makes for a great first viewing but is often difficult to sustain. Kseniya has a few other performances from the show on YouTube, however none seem to match the impact of the first. But who can say how her career will evolve. Perhaps in the face of another challenge, she will find a way to reinvent herself once again.

Memories are often all we have of past times and past loves, but what if we lost these memories, how would not remembering the there and then, affect us in the here and now.

Written and Directed by Briand, Apricot tells the story of a young couple on a date early in their relationship, they sit in a restaurant, reminiscing of first kisses and first loves over a fresh cup of coffee. However, as the date progresses it quickly becomes apparent that this trip down memory lane has an ulterior motive for one of the potential lovers.

For a film all about memories and what triggers them, Briand and his team have paid a close eye to details and created a film which evokes a dreamlike state for its viewers (almost as if the Director is encouraging the viewer to float off into their own memories whilst watching the his film). Beautifully shot by Cinematographer Adam Arkapaw, the dreamy visuals float across the screen, just as they would float across the memory banks of the mind. Every shot is composed and lit superbly, the date scene speckled with artificial light and framed so the couple seem the only people in the buzzing restaurant. The memory sequences opt for a more personal feel, bathed in sunlight with people and objects drifting in and out of focus (almost as if they are some of the best home movies you’ve ever seen). A sprawling, unobtrusive score from Basil Hogios, combines with a soundtrack of distant thunder and rumbling winds, helping to merge the worlds of reality and memory seamlessly together.

Dialogue also plays a huge part in the feel and the flow of Apricot and Briand has obviously taken great consideration into ensuring the pitch of the dialogue marries up with the other contributing elements of his short. With lines like “He could stare at the Sun longer than anyone I ever met” and “He always covered his collarbone” uttered throughout the film, the unrealistic, almost poetic dialogue also adds to the trancelike feel of Apricot.

There are some films made to provoke anger or disgust from its audience, some films made solely for laughs and some to evoke forgotten memories, Briand’s Apricot is definitely the latter. A film for the dreamers, A film for the romantics and in my opinion a film for film lovers.

Specific subject matter aside, what grabs me about Born Free is that it’s first and foremost a short film with a message and a promo second. It seems that with a few exceptions from time to time, music videos have become happy to occupy the ground of band performance piece or clever visual feast centred around a single kinetic idea or a ‘how did they do that?’ wow factor. What Gavras does, with the assistance of André Chemetoff’s gritty camerawork, is very quickly build a full and worrisome world through an abstraction, which to some may feel heavy handed, but is nonetheless powerful, probably because we’ve seen these images ‘for real’ in rolling news coverage of places we don’t live.

In hindsight the marriage of Gavras with the politically engaged M.I.A was an obvious coupling. Gavras is a co-founder of Kourtrajmé, an art and filmmaking collective in Paris, producing projects focused on social provocation such as the 2007 documentary, 365 days in Clichy-Montfermeil, which explores the issues of the 2005 French suburbs riots. Gavras also directed a hooded gang on a rampage through the streets of Paris in Justice’s controversial Stress promo, which was equally effecting but not loved by all; “For a few months, I was one of the most hated men in France, but it was fun.”

Within hours of its posting Born Free was yanked from YouTube for its graphic content and M.I.A has herself been slammed with accusations of sensationalism or ‘violence for violence sake’, contradicting her well known anti-violence stance. However, it’s a stretch to brand the promo as gratuitous; from the track’s sampling of Suicide’s 1977 Ghost Rider (which originally contained the lyrics, “America is killing its youth”), to M.I.A’s defiant chant of “I was born free”, this is a well crafted video with something to say in the vein of Peter Watkins’ Punishment Park. Perhaps 12 year old actor Ian Hamrick (whose character is shot in the head at point blank range) best surmised the film’s anti-genocide message when he was door-stepped by TMZ; “I think she was trying to show violence to end violence”.

I was happy to hear that Gavras is extending the dystopian world of Born Free in his coming feature Redheads, starring Vincent Cassel in a tale of “two outcast redheads on a road trip of hate, violence, and self-destruction.” We’ll have to see if the subject matter remains as compelling over the longer duration.

The film follows a wayward plastic grocery bag: sentient and voiced by Werner Herzog to amazing effect, as it searches for meaning to its existence. It is a heavy subject—existential angst—and in the form of a plastic bag’s personification, definitely absurd. However for the most part the film takes itself and its concept seriously, albeit with occasional breaks for wry humor. The result is a film that is a success as education and entertainment; one that musters a startling amount of pathos from its subject and a surprising amount of empathy from its audience.

Ramin Bahrani, has developed quite a reputation on the basis of his three feature films: Chop Shop, Goodbye Solo and Man Push Cart, which all turn a humanistic eye to the American immigrant experience. This attitude coupled with his frequent use of non-actors, has lead some to classify him as something of a neo-neorealist. Thus on first blush it is strange to see him tackle a high-concept work such as this. However the same skills that prove successful in his features buoy Plastic Bag: a broad and sympathetic understanding of interior worlds, and a photographer’s eye for natural beauty in the exterior world.

The script that Herzog works with, and his interaction with it are a triumph. The charming foreignness of his Germanic handling of English is endearing, and establishes the Plastic Bag as sympathetic in its naivete. It is the same trope of the good-natured but confused traveler which allows films like Coming to America or Borat to succeed. It also allows for subtle and wry humor to break up the oppressing sadness of the piece. The bag’s recurring use of “monsters” to address non-human creatures is reliably funny. It additionally mines powerful archetypes of quests and journeys. His long attempts to find home slowly morph into a goal of discovering “the vortex”. Language is key here and serves as a testament to the script. The plastic bag prophets, “preaching” of the vortex, are powerful myth-making elements.

This outsider approach, while investing us in an all-too-human story, subtly reinforces the ecological undercurrents of the film. Via a process of estrangement, Plastic Bag allows us to see, through the plastic bag’s experience, our own world via new eyes. A world, eventually, without humans at all.

This investment in an inanimate material’s subjectivity can be accused of bordering on manipulative. However is it any different than Wall-E, another film with a similar environmentalist message? Perhaps the difference is the medium—the animation of Wall-E necessarily puts us at an additional remove, pushing us closer into the more comfortable embrace of fantasy. Bahrani’s cinematography however revels in the real, via picturesque landscapes of skyscrapers and plains, and closeups of fishes and beaches. Either way the imagery is quite lovely, serving up a engaging mix of artfully composed long shots and closeups with dreamy-soft shallow DOF.

The beauty of the images buttress the interior journey of the bag, reflecting its mental state in nature. Yet like the script itself, these images serve the dual purpose of engaging the ecological message through its simple and dramatic representation of our world. An elegy for what is ours, and, in the story, what it is we will eventually lose.

The best entry of Future States, a whole series of films commissioned by ITVS, Plastic Bag is a confident and polished piece of art that successfully navigates these two simultaneous threads: the interior and the exterior, humanity and nature, the particular and the environmental. It accomplishes both these angles with aplomb in a quite moving whole. I very much like this film and hope you take the time to enjoy it as well.

Based on Monologue About a Whole Life Written Down on Doors, the Testimony of Nikolai Fomich Kalugin by Belarusian journalist Svetlana Alexievich, Juanita Wilson’s poignant, emotive film begins with a very simple act, the stealing of a door. However, as the film progresses and the narrative unwinds, we discover this act is far more complex than we could have initially imagined. The door is in fact a vital part of a traditional ritual, carried out by a grieving family in the aftermath of the Chernobyl tragedy.

Written and directed by young Irish filmmaker Wilson, yet filmed in the Ukraine (in Pripyat, a city described as the most radioactive place on earth) and featuring regional actors speaking in their native tongue, The Door truly is an ambitious project. Thankfully, the ambitions of the filmmakers are matched to the rewards of this richly captivating, heartfelt short. The film is beautifully shot, with Director of Photography Tim Fleming taking exceptional care over the composition, camera movements and colour palette of every shot. It’s a remarkable achievement that the cinematography team of this production managed to create an aesthetic that works in tandem with such a commanding narrative.

Credit can’t only go to the visual team however, as The Door is also masterfully scored and powerfully acted. Brian Doyle’s music could have so easily been over-dramatic and distracting in trying to compete with other aspects of the film. Instead it gentle accompanies Wilson’s short, softly entering at all the right places. Being a film of little dialogue, its success was always going to quite heavily rely on the actors’ ability to portray emotion through body language and facial expression. As the couple going through an unimaginable grieving process and a drastic transitional period, Igor Sigov and Juliette Gering, do this perfectly, with their vacant stare and furrowed brow saying more than words ever could.

Winning an Irish Film and Television Award in 2009 and an Academy Award nomination in 2010, Juanita Wilson’s directorial debut is gaining the critical acclaim that a film this well made so rightly deserves.

With a feature film, As If I’m Not There, currently in post-production, Wilson’s directorial career is one I’ll be keeping a close eye on.

That man is of course Jia Zhangke, and I believe the preceding passage contains enough code words to ensure that you know the kind of art-house treatment to expect from this, his latest short film. Cry Me a River is, in his words, an attempt to, “see if I could tell a story that spanned 10 years in 15 or 20 minutes.” The story tracks a group of four college friends as they reconnect over a two-day reunion on the occasion of their college professor’s birthday. There exist unresolved tensions and feelings in the group dynamic that slowly work their way into the open throughout this subtle and observational film.

First a quick lecture. It is very easy to separate and track the great themes in contemporary Chinese cinema. After the opening up of the country in 1979, the celebrated “5th generation” of filmmakers—the first to be accepted into the newly reopened Beijing Film Academy— were eventually, inevitably, drawn to making sense of the profound upheavals the country had gone through: the establishment of the People’s Republic, the disastrous “Great Leap Forward”, and the “Cultural Revolution”. The result were poignant and brave epics, often banned in their home country, that nevertheless came to define a generation of Chinese film on the world stage: Chen Kaige’s Farewell My Concubine, Zhang Yimou’s To Live, or Tian ZhuangZhuang’s The Blue Kite.

Zhangke has come to be acknowledged as part of a “6th generation”, a successor to these former standard-bearers. No longer looking backward to reclaim a people’s history, these filmmakers tend to be more preoccupied with the present and the growing alienation and disconnection inherent in the rapid economic growth and social change of contemporary China. The formative events of their lives center not on the Cultural Revolution, but instead the 1989 student protests at Tiananmen Square. It is the dissolution of this youthful fire and idealism, that Cry Me a River, and indeed much of the 6th Generation’s work, implicitly mourns.

While the time frames involved are deliberately unclear, it is suggested that our group of four friends were students in the early 90’s. They wrote a single issue of a magazine called “This Generation”, the kind of strident, fully-felt manifesto that by some, like the professor’s businessman sponsor, is still felt today, even though he is no longer so “hot-blooded”. Unfortunately it seems our friends no longer are either. Random conversation establishes the monotony of their “grown-up” lives: making money, raising kids. The rebuke of their professor at the dinner in his honor is subtle, but unmistakable, “Mr. Chen, they were my students in the 90’s. Back then, they wrote a lot of poetry. But not anymore.”

These were the children of that rebellious and idealistic period, but now, 10 years later, they are accused of having lost their way. Zhangke encourages this parallel in an interview, pointing out that Cry Me River includes the lead couple of the movie Summer Palace, a 2006 film about Tiananmen Square, in order to subtly reinforce this connection for audiences. That film cost fellow 6th Generation director Lou Ye a 5 year filmmaking ban from the government, a sign that at least inconolastic art in China is not all dead.

While the this political subtext is available, the film is resolute in its focus on its characters. Slowly, through natural dialogue and patient minimalist camerawork that has drawn comparisons to Ozu and Hou Hsiao Hsien, certain relationships and disatisfactions become apparent. Ma’s self-mocking jokes about money reveal the financial class divide between him and Tang, while early on Zhou’s gentle touch of Ma, hints at a former intimacy to be revealed later on. Likewise for the iciness between Bao and Tang at around the 3 min mark.

The presence of others in the group keep the banter light and congenial despite the underlying turmoil. It is only the next day after the dinner that the tension is too much, as the couples share a wordless boat ride, introducing the river of the film’s title. The two couples split up at that time to say the words that 10 years had left unsaid.

Confucius compared time to a river, and ultimately it’s that sense of the elegaic that Cry Me a River hopes to capture. Characters getting older and becoming wistful over their youth and the missteps they may have made, is by no means a novel concept in film, yet it is rare for short film. Zhangke’s goal was to tell a story of 10 years in 20 minutes, and despite an abrupt ending lacking resolution, (what resolution could there be?) I dare say he succeeded. Cry Me a River is at once a sensitive and aware character study and poignant cultural statement.

(Note: The film is in two parts, follow the onscreen link after part 1, or click on the link underneath the “Play” button for part 2.)

Let’s be honest. The story is good, but the visual art direction (or “aesthetic orchestration” as the film puts it) is outstanding—a perfect blend of new age and nostalgia. David puts the digital aesthetic on display in a very authentic way. His compositions reflect the three quarter view of old video games (not unlike A Volta), and at times even uses raw 3D wireframes to portray a characters inner thoughts. Please Say Something makes no attempt to hide it’s construction methods.

The animation is amazing. The pacing and movement of the characters is fast. Watching David play with perspective in referencing security cameras and time-lapse photography, I’m reminded of my first time seeing Aronofsky’s experimental camerawork in Requiem For a Dream. My only quip would be the sometimes overly-exaggerated camera movements when sweeping through rooms.

But it’s the full package that make this film special—the juxtaposition of many opposing things. It’s uniqueness comes from it’s disparity. Told any other way, the story would be ho-hum. The visuals, used for any other brand of story would be entertaining but shallow. It’s a film that has to be done the way it is and must never change—not unlike Cracker Jacks.

I must admit that I am infatuated with this short. I realize that my love is likely disproportionate and temporary, but that is little consolation. Please Say Something is a new favorite of mine.

Note*  — “This was one of the 10 excellent Sundance offerings this year. Check out the other 9 selections here“

Bournemouth Film School graduate Rob Brown’s short takes a slightly different tack to other sex trafficking films you may be familiar with, such as Lukas Moodysson’s Lilya 4-ever. Instead of cataloging the indignities no doubt in store for victims of the forced sex trade, Echoes focuses on Anya, promoted from sex worker to trafficker, and her journey from Lithuania to London with the innocent (and secretly pregnant) Liliana.

Given that a large chunk of Echoes unfolds within the confines of the coach transporting the women across Europe, Brown and cinematographer Justin Brown make effective use of the handheld camera, capturing everyday locations in muted tones which reflect the film’s bleak world. I had initially presumed the decision to go handheld may have been born out of a necessity to steal shots in the London Underground, but as (I later discovered) Echoes was shot on Super 16 it’s more likely that this was solely a stylistic decision—one which completely works for the narrative and atmosphere of the film. The final shot of Anya, now boxed in by her decision to let Liliana go free, with nowhere to go except down the dark corridor that stretches out behind her is particularly foreboding.

Ultimately Echoes is a film about the willingness to sacrifice the future of others to secure your own position, it’s a sacrifice Anya is unable to make despite the hell that awaits her.

Filmed outside Barrow, Alaska, this short takes place on the beautiful yet terrible Arctic ice amongst the Inupiat peoples. The film’s dialogue is spoken in their language. A hunter, together with his pack of dogs, sees two men fighting on the barren horizon. From that point the film becomes a tense morality play, as the bystander must decide his level of engagement, and the participants must decide on the level of escalation. Further explication would spoil this simple, yet riveting story.

The challenge for a film like Sikumi (On the Ice), is overcoming its exotic location and culture—the same features that serve as an asset to lesser films. It is easy to dismiss shorts such as these by charging that their, admittedly alluring, foreigness is the primary source of appeal. Sikumi rises above such perceptions via superior craft, and a plot that is ultimately universal.

Rising star Cary Fukunaga served as DP on the project. His feature length directorial effort Sin Nombre, made many top 10 lists this past year, and he has now lined up a Hollywood adaptation of Jane Eyre for himself. While the vast white expanse of the arctic is an admittedly attractive backdrop, You have not seen it with this level of intimacy before. Planet Earth this is not. Fukunaga employs beautiful close ups and hand held POV’s to complement the obvious panoramas, shooting in anamorphic 35mm. All this while dealing with the challenging sub-zero Alaskan “summer”.

Writer/director Andrew Okpeaha MacLean though does great work in providing the story and tone for Fukunaga to visually relate. A Barrow native, MacLean writes what he knows, but is also writing within a long filmmaking tradition. Sikumi you see is really a Western. The frontier has not been tamed it has simply moved. Westerns are often about competing moralities,  tensions between personal codes. The weight of personal responsibility in these instances is heightened and rendered in sharp relief by the absence of societal enforcement. Typical protections afforded by Hobbesian bargains do not apply. It is within this space—the frontier of the ice, that the entirety of the film resides, and thus Sikumi is alternately suspenseful, scary, yet humanistic. The hunter with whom we arrive upon the scene with speaks very little, he is almost a non-character, as the onus of action quickly shifts to the perpetrator. Instead he serves as a stand-in for larger concepts such as Community, which judges and sets standards of conduct for a people , and  Conscience,  which, even in the absence of witnesses, must live with itself.

A startling spare and beautiful update on the Western,  Sikumi (On the Ice) takes full advantage of the stark and dramatic setting it employs, yet nonetheless could have been effectively  told anywhere using anyone. Thus it transcends novelty on the way to becoming one of the best shorts of recent memory.

Skhizein begins with a fairly odd premise to match its odd name. In an interview Clapin says the word derives from the Greek, meaning “to split” or “to cleave”—sharing that root with schizophrenia. Adhering to that concept, early on our main character comes face to face with a meteorite, the aftermath of which causes him to exist exactly 91cm from himself. In practice this means that when he sits down he looks as though he is floating in the air because his visual presence is 91 cm away from the chair itself. This is a cause of consternation for our hero, as one might expect, and the early part of the film relates our character’s attempts to cope.

Clapin has improved his technique from Une Histoire…, Skhizein is a huge leap forward for the French animator in regards to design, background detail and character movement. This is surely a large component of why the film has experienced such success. Similarities between the two films though exist. The two films share a limited color palette and a central concern: an examination of outsider figures, whose deformities—physical or mental—keep them from being in harmony with their environment or with others. However, Une Histoire… developed its joke in a relatively lighthearted, rom-com fashion, leading to a telegraphed happy ending that contributed to why I did not care for it very much. I expected similar of Skhizein, and was actually frustrated during the viewing process by little things I chocked up to sloppiness; examples of continuity errors where the character did not abide by the conceit of the film for example. However Clapin takes the film and its character in a direction far different than I expected, and really caused me to reevaluate my initial impressions afterward. Many of the things that bugged me I now believe to be intentionally woven in to foreshadow the climax. Strange though it may be, the film is aptly titled, both for its character and for its audience—as my expectation of the film and perception of its story while viewing, ended up being quite split from the emotionally resonant statement Clapin had in mind.

Many thanks go to Film in Focus and Kodak for bringing this to the web as part of the promotional buildup for the film 9 (featuring several other good films like Oktapodi). That’s why you”ll see Shane Acker at the start of the video introducing the film. I’ve had some difficulty with the Film in Focus video hosting while writing this review so I’ve included a link to a better quality Vimeo link as well. Perhaps click on the Film in Focus link to pad their web stats and then use Vimeo’s bandwidth?

In Egmont Mayer’s animation, Red Rabbit, this is exactly the story the director chooses to tell. “The man lives alone in a small apartment. The little contact he had with other people has dropped to zero since the rabbit appeared. Every attempt to get the rabbit out of his apartment has failed and since he is not sure whether or not pets are allowed in the building, he does not let anybody enter his apartment”—(via egmontmayer.com)

Mayer’s student film is a beautifully paced, stylistic piece, where no dialogue is needed to convey the emotions of the main characters. Tensions and relationships are slowly and thoughtfully developed throughout the film and we seem to know exactly what the characters are thinking and feeling without anyone ever having to speak a word. Even though as a viewer you really feel the loneliness and isolation of the characters, there is still a certain warmth and touching poetry to this tale.

Rabbits seem to be constantly appearing in films and throughout film history have been used to symbolise many different things. There are many different theories as to what the giant rabbit in Harvey symbolizes, or what Frank the rabbit in Donnie Darko represents. I’m not quite sure what the giant rabbit in Mayer’s Red Rabbit symbolizes, but the one thing I am sure of, is that this is one of the best animations you’ll see all year.

For other Filmakademie work, check out Das Rad.

What I liked was the professional look and feel of the piece, which was accomplished famously through a volunteer crew recruited from the “Shooting People” online film community in the UK. Ashvin Kumar, the director, was a student at a London film school but dropped out, and there is a decidedly Western sensibility to his style. At the same time he is comfortable incorporating Indian crew and non-actors into the work,  and with shooting in remote areas of Rajasthan, such as he did with this short film.

This leads to a cinema-verite approach that I enjoyed, as the details of village life are documented in a standard continuity style, but with little artifice. The risk of the film is that in celebrating a one-world, one people agenda it collapses real and troublesome difference. To fight against this tendency, minor, unexplained aspects of the characters interactions–the issue with the plate for instance–are included to highlight the very real cultural-religious divide between these two countries which had been one, without diminishing the ultimate message of the short film.

Little Terrorist is part of the relatively recent trend of British-Indian film collaborations that should only grow more in the wake of Slumdog Millionaire. Kumar’s Indian background puts him in a good position to capitalize on said trend, and hopefully influence Indian filmmaking as well. Alluded to somewhat in this interview with Kumar, India, though well documented as the most prolific filmmaking country in the world, does not have much of an indie or art-house cinema per se. Formulaic offerings from the dominant production houses out of Bollywood are unusually dominant. An Oscar is a big deal though, and I’ve read more than one article about how the 2004 nomination of  Little Terrorist coupled  the rise of India’s middle class and the falling price of digital technology has stimulated a growing experimental and short film culture in India. I look forward to seeing the fruit of that in the future.

Note: There is about 30 seconds of black header in front of the google video file.

A young  girl watches TV, her mother absent. Edits imply a great passing of time. She sleeps some. She suddenly goes outside with her dog and after some exploring in the middle of a batch of tall grass, she meets a man. They share a charged and intimate moment. He touches her, picking off a small bug on her shoulder which he places in her hands. Across the field is her mother dishing out an icy glare. The girl walks back to the house. That is the film. It is up to subtext and beauty to give life to the experience: the ennui of a girl ignored, the simple joy and wonder of the outdoors and its unmediated experience,  the power of the man’s unflinching gaze. I cannot believe he is a stranger. The mother’s reaction is confirmation of as much. Suddenly an untold backstory fills in the edges of the picture. A story of love and loss, or maybe mistakes and regrets, a story that gives context to little innocent girls abandoned and ignored. The details are left to the viewer to guess, but their absence makes the film richer for it.

It is impossible to describe the grace of this film through words, but that’s why we link to the video as well. As it behooves me to try, I will start with the fact that is shot in 35mm using the ultra-wide 2.35:1 ratio. Great care is given to the cinematography, the caressing light of the television screen, the excellent focus pulling, all of which lends the seemingly ordinary events a sense of cinematic grandeur. Would have loved to have seen this on the big screen. The second technical element that deserves highlighting is the sound design. The outdoor scene is wonderful with the soft sounds of the wind, the birds and the bypassing cars. They help add to the lazy Sunday languor of the piece, yet rather than be mere background they draw you into an immediacy of the moment,  sharply attuning you to the vibrancy of a place and time. The care and attention to the details in both image and sound is not merely stylistic, it places us into the mind of the young girl, simultaneously oblivious and yet hyper-aware,  providing us with the vividness and romance which so often are the lasting hallmarks of momentous encounters for lives so young.

Alicia Duffy, where are you? Produced in 2002 by Breakthru Films, the company that produced Suzie Templeton’s Peter and the Wolf, and with help from the UK Film Council, this professional-quality production succeeded in its goals, winning a BAFTA nomination and playing Cannes. Yet it is the last entry on Ms. Duffy’s IMDB page. As designers and animators are increasingly taking over creative aspects of film, overwhelming us with advanced editing techniques and increased computer intergration, this is a calling card for a filmmaker who knows how to tell a story visually, with patience, space and emotion—the exact kind of qualities which I feel could use a comeback. So Alicia Duffy, please direct again.

In a funny opening sequence one sees, in full colour, the beast devouring the beauty, only to track upwards to the girl reading her comic and picking her nose. The sisters of the title are seen through their photo albums, their life revealed in an initially warm and joyous series of escapades as Bella steals the toilet tissue, their parents greet them at the peel of the school bell and the pair grow to womanhood amidst flowers. The mature women laugh riotously over the snapshots of their younger selves, red wine served in copious amounts. The mood changes abruptly with the arrival of the long haired young man on an excursion with the pair. His attention is diverted from one to the other, leaving one sister in raptures, the other seething on the long drive home.

The mood swings are reflected in a variety of styles incorporated in the one movie, the different forms somehow harmoniously, and always ingeniously, grouped in a movie of rare depth. Borge moves through shades of grey for the past, judicious use of colour elsewhere, whilst metaphor is used for the men as bees fly from their hives to the pubescent girls, very shapely now in mini skirts; or watch the girl circle the moon when the bee has landed! The animation is effortlessly drawn because, first and foremost, Borge is a consummate artist able to catch the moment—the two old ladies rolling around in glee, or clutching a sister’s arm as memories cause pain. There is also a dramatic scene towards the end that is riveting though the conclusion is not to be spoiled here. In under 8 minutes Borge moves from laughter to tears to… well, watch this warm  movie yourself. The YouTube link was posted by Anne-Mieke, Borge’s daughter.

Borge is a warm human being. He has just sent me a DVD of his work and, on discovering my secret past, swaps theatrical stories. He has lived in the Netherlands for many years though he was born in Denmark. He enjoys communicating with fans, of whom I am pleased to be included.

As for James, in what has been a very strong lineup over these 10 days, I do believe this film is my favorite. A heart-rendng gay/lesbian film of the classic “coming out” variety, James is the most emotionally powerful film of this year’s lineup, and through superior writing creates a worthy addition to this over-exposed genre. Focusing on a boy in Northern Ireland isolated by his sexuality, alienated from his family due to his parent’s marital troubles, the title character “James” reaches out in desperation to his teacher for support and guidance.

The director Connor Clements is a first-time writer/director. This film was his graduate project, and I almost feel bad for him because he hits a home-run right out of the chute. In documenting a universal experience among gays and lesbians, he discovers a new angle, crafting a story that is of course personal and local, but also challenges all viewers, not just those who are queer, with questions regarding teachers and students, that resonate in our culture.

As a student-production, there is nothing flashy about its execution. The direction isn’t unique or ostentatious, the filming is competent but not eye grabbing. It should provide heart to inexperienced filmmakers everywhere as an example that it is still true—a good script can lead to acclaim.

What I love, being again someone who likes to think about films, to chew on the topics and questions they present, is the ambiguity that is present in the film. In what is a SPOILER to those who haven’t watched yet, James comes out to his teacher, yet does not get the kind of warm response he desired. He is instead gently rebuffed from leaning upon the older man for support. Interestingly though, his teacher reveals that he was not surprised by James announcement. He also mentions somewhat forlornly about a boy a “few years back” who came out and had great difficulties, when he warns James to continue to keep his sexuality a secret. Is the teacher gay as well? That is the reading I got. And it lends an even greater sadness to the film, as it suggests that the nature of closeting oneself off continues through time. That even though the teacher understands James’ situation, he is psychologically unable to reveal himself in a true friendship. A second possibility is that the instructor feels empathy, but needs to push James away as a matter of perception. That, perhaps especially by being in a Catholic school setting, it would be too easily misunderstood by others for him to be engaging in such a personal relationship with a young student. If that is the case it is tragically ironic, that the the fear of, and potential for an inappropriate relationship, directly drives James into that exact situation.
It is these kind of deep readings which I find rare in the rather literal world of short film, and so i do appreciate it when I find them. With it also being a film that stuck with me for some time after watching it, I find it easy to heartily recommend James.

Score : 9/10

A Sundance 10/10 film: currently offline

This is a fun short film that makes something out of nothing—where suddenly the smallest obstacle becomes the most daunting. We’re shown Drew’s world of reversed priorities, and like any good film, are eventually drawn in to align it with our own.

The acting is great, and the production, though nothing innovative, is solid and provides an intimate stage for the story to play out. The dialog I love, because so little is said with so much. With all the emotion and repetition, it’s not really the individual phrases that carry meaning but the performance as a whole.

A Sundance 10/10 film: currently offline

Though caught off guard, I was hardly entertained through this early confusion. Still if you make it past the first 4 minutes the film starts to sink its teeth in a little deeper. The teacher is energetic and demonstrative in that way actors always seem to be, but in his efforts to reach and unlock the girl’s acting talent his behavior becomes questionable. Creepiness and uncomfortableness emerge, suggesting some impropriety without necessarily ever going over the edge. By the time the girl cries, my only surprise was that it took so long.

So on the one hand the film makes you as the viewer uncomfortable, so congrats are in order for making an affective film, but watching someone in a position of power act like a jackass is hardly entertainment in my book. It does speak to the influence and control of teachers, especially in a profession like acting where so much of one’s person is put on the line, and maybe if I was an actor and had experience in these types of settings the film would resonate more deeply. But I don’t and it doesn’t.

Ultimately in staging a personal and uncomfortable situation in a group setting, the film is wildly successful in its aims and like most of these Sundance films it is certainly crafted well. I just don’t know if those aims were worthwhile.

A Sundance 10/10 film: now online!

While not specifically identifying itself as a holiday movie, Security, with its ubiquitous snow and setting (a Wal-Mart-esque store) certainly display imagery consistent with the season. Peter Kurth plays a security guard for this box store. In the early portions of the film we see this character going about his duties—silent patrols around the store, interrupted by silent cigarette and food breaks in his dank office in the back of the building. The time does come for action though. A young, pretty woman is caught shoplifting. Our man does his job and stops her, but from here the story becomes more human, more gray. What is right or wrong is less clear as our security guard must juggle duty with compassion and perhaps…longing?

The leads, Peter Kurth, playing a tough no-nonsense type just trying to do his job, soul-crushing job though it may be, and Susanna Rozkosny as the shoplifting woman, do excellent work playing off each other. They beautifully extract a lot of complexity out of brief interactions. Lars Henning, the director does a very professional job as well, truly achieving that “invisible” style that used to be so prized in film work, where one does not aspire to flashiness, but in simply immersing your audience into the story in such a way that they forget about the film’s direction.

While a little long, Security is the kind of film that is confident in what it wants to achieve. It does not reach for too much, and ultimately leaves you in quiet contemplation long after it is over. Please enjoy this, our last film pick of the year. Check in next week again as we compile our top ten list of films we reviewed in 2008!

The film moves effortlessly between passages of time, tracing the break-down of the relationship precipitated by and relived through an obsessive requirement to record events the two have shared. The greater Rob’s fear of losing her the more desperate is he to preserve Alice’s image.

The narrative is presented in flip book animation and live action. Narrated by Rob (Simon Perry) we watch as Alice attempts to wrestle him back to reality. “Can you just STOP for one minute to talk about this?” she writes. I can scarcely conceive of a form of flip book ignored in this classy film: conventional, hand machine operated, toilet tissue unravelled, images discarded on the floor, cascading in the air, even, at one stage, pasted to the London Underground wall behind Alice as she sits alone with the possessions removed from their apartment.

If the use of animation is extraordinary, the filming is subtle with a curiously detached quality about it. Many of the shots of Alice are full on portraits, reflecting her partner’s obsessive need to record their relationship. The walls of the apartment itself are white and at times it is as if the director has drained much of the colour from the action so that it echoes the flickering white paper of the flip books. Technically and artistically accomplished, Adjustment is beautifully edited, cutting from past to present almost as if the photographs and drawn images are shuffled into a different order, as indeed they are in the film.

The movie formed part of Ian’s graduation from the Royal College of Art in 2006. He also studied and taught Computer Animation at Bournemouth University. He is one of the UK’s young directors with huge potential.

Wrong footing the audience is a difficult task for a filmmaker to pull off without leaving them ultimately feeling like the victim in a bait and switch scam, but in Unlocked the mis-stepping is completely a self-imposed affair. Perhaps it’s as a result of our implicit understanding of film language through narratives such as The Vanishing and Silence of the Lambs, reinforced by the caution inherited from parents and trusted adults that when a stranger with a van meets an attractive young women the natural result is capture closely followed by some kind of ordeal.

However, that’s not the path Wein takes us down despite signs to the contrary and a cut to black that gives you time to image a potentially gruesome fate for our heroine. His intentions are perhaps the opposite, although it’s not until the final shot of the film that you’re released to dissipate the built tension of ever present danger, and see that what we actually have is a chance encounter that acts as a severely needed catalyst for complete emotional release.

There’s no shame in letting it all go whilst you watch Unlocked.

That is the setup for Soft, a film which is lean, yet inventive and diverse in technique, a true coming out for a rising star, British writer/director Simon Ellis. Shot on film over 5 days for the sum of 50,000 pounds, the film is the product of a sponsorship by the UK Film Council and Film4 via their Cinema Extreme program, which identifies British film talent and supports their ability to step up to feature films by first tackling a professional short.

Based on the film’s reception, that decision to invest in Mr. Ellis, seems wise. Soft was the recipient of the 2008 International Jury Prize at Sundance, as well as Best of the Fest at the ’07 Palm Springs Short Film Fest. What Soft accomplishs to garner such acclaim is multi-fold: the film is novel and yet relatable, timeless yet extremely topical, and while so much of the film is about relationships and emotions, its defining moment is a thunderbolt of shocking action.

The conflict is at the heart of the film’s allure, and it is complex—simultaneously playing out on a physical as well as ethical level, defying easy resolution or second-guessing on the audience’s part. Moreover, the conflict is twofold—the man and son up against nameless aggression, but also the man and son versus each other, setting up a novel premise that is yet still universal. Who has not confronted bullying? Tension is masterfully manipulated through a slow burn pacing that pushes the film to its 13min runtime. In his 15 prior shorts Ellis had yet to break the 10min mark in length, and I generally agree with him in that doctrine, yet in an interview, Ellis responds “In my opinion, most short films are almost always too long but I felt this one needed room to breathe.” Soft benefits from that choice not only in atmospherics, but also in developing its characters.

The 13min runtime allows for a second stellar aspect of the film to shine through, which is its acting. The tension that is central to the film is largely generated from the performances, and the liberal employment of extreme facial close-ups to convey subtle notes of apprehension, dawning comprehension and resolve, that move the film forward. It is rare that a short film so wholly relies on performance and character development as Soft does, but so much of the story is interior. It is truly the change and growth in its characters outlook and reactions which define the story, the explicit action is merely the consummation of information already conveyed.

Finally the film is topical, in a way that surely has benefited its reception in the UK. Having spent some time in London over the last few years, I can attest to a rising hysteria amongst media outlets and evidently the public at large, over the rise of “Hoodies”, Ellis definitely plays off of existing fears to great effect by imagining a villainous force of randomly violent, hip-hop inspired youth to serve as the catalyst for his story. Histories of Hoodie-hysteria often trace the rise of the phenomena to the controversial use of CCTV cameras on London’s streets and public places. The high angle shot which opens and closes the film is obviously meant to evoke this current reality of constant surveillance. And yet while the hoodies of the film are villains, thugs delighting in the delivering of abuse, I read a moral to the film that ultimately is dismissive of the threat of hoodies—yes there exist bullies and maladjusted youngsters, but they are merely bullies, not a sinister new force. The real threat is the disconnect of a society from its youth. Elders chide and judge without understanding, while the youngsters scoff at their hypocrisy. This crisis is happening in the homes of communities, not on the streets.

All this adds up to a compelling film that deserves the accolades it has received so far. Unfortunately the success of Soft means that like so many of its festival brethren, it will be a while before we see a legit high-quality internet version. In the meantime enjoy this version which seems to have been recorded off French Tv, complete with subtitles. Oh well, it is worth it still.

The ten minute movie opens as a lone swimmer makes his way to an island in the “wide blue sea where people hide away”. Caroline uses a rich blue emulsion here though the next frames are engraved onto black as we meet the two reclusive sisters, Marie and Viola Ge. Seated in darkness, to the background sound of a ticking clock, family cat and Viola’s typewriter, the pair converse. Marie is clearly the dominant one. The entry of the stranger fresh from the sea throws the women into panic. Viola’s talent for writing compensates for a facial disfigurement, though the meeting with her greatest fan changes the dynamics of the home. The elder sister has hidden Viola from the outside world and fights to continue her role as protector. Harsh words are spoken, the fragile harmony of the island broken.

Using the visual themes of light and dark, this richly allegorical tale has dialogue written by Grant Heisler that resonates with symbol and inference. The gradual unraveling of the women’s situation is paralleled by the light forcing its way into their previously dark world, in a classic animation that is both compelling drama and work of art.

I kinda feel I have to get something out of the way before I can discuss this week’s pick. I realise it’s fashionable, even expected, to hate on Tarantino nowadays. That we’ve moved from the early days of discovery and cult following, through the mass acceptance of his talent as a director and back out to a certain distain for his blatant fanboy love of cinema and the stolen motifs that pepper his work; except I haven’t. I continue to get excited when I hear about a new project he’s hatched and can still remember and connect to the reasons I fell for him in the first place. Yeah, his films are arguably great, but remember the video store clerk gobbling up films and writing scripts backstory to his career? That was so good, because that meant he could be you or you him. The referential and reverential cinema of Tarantino is the place many of us mentally occupy, happy to fly our film colours high and proud so we can share in ‘me too’ moments with our taste bedfellows.

And that is exactly how I felt watching the 15 min short Tarantino’s Mind, directed by Manitou Felipe and Bernardo Dutra, the faces behind the Hungry Man repped, Brazilian duo 300ml. The conversation between leads Seu Jorge and Selton Mello is a version of the numerous discussions fans have had about the work of the director, although the easy flowing and sometimes tangential, dialogue feels like it could have been directly clipped from a Tarantino flick, sandwiched between the intentions of a foot massage or an analysis of Madonna lyrics.

Their conversation unfolds in an unspecified dinner where the two sit more or less alone aside from the peppering of “poker players, intellectuals and philosophers”. As Mello espouses his theories of the Tarantino code we get illustrative flashes, either directly lifted from the films in question or seemingly culled from those worlds. The film’s opening is also one of the most sublime I’ve seen, with script typed fragments of Tarantino’s inspirations bonded to wood that forms the shorts title – in oriental script of course.

From the many reactions to the film it’s obvious that 300ml got the fervor of the Tarantino obsessed fan bang on, as the short itself mainly escapes criticism. Rather it’s the accuracy, logic or timeliness of the revealed Tarantino Code that’s held up for scrutiny, which is pretty much what happens between the characters on screen.

Tarantino’s Mind has got me thinking it’s time for a back to back marathon run through his films, but this time with my conspiracy notepad close to hand.