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Ken Burns on New Directors/New Films
"It was like a union card that says, 'Yes you can.' And yes, we all did."
"That afternoon at New Directors cemented what it meant to be a filmmaker for me."
Mads Brügger: The Ambassador (2011)--ND/NF
The maker of Red Chapel, a fake cultural mission to North Korea, poses in Africa as a diplomat-businessman carrying dubious documents brokered for him at high expense in Europe. His aim is to show that the blood diamonds business is crooked. But we kind of knew that.
This is the last of my New Directors reviews, because I didn't cover the shorts. I'll give a roundup with my choices of the best films. Most of them are worth watching though.
Alejandro Landes: PORFIRIO (2011)--ND/NF
Another new voice in the Latin American slow film school, blending documentary and fiction. This, based on a real crime story and starring the actual perpetrator, is stingy with narrative information but strong on its sensuous depiction of life for a paraplegic. Landes was born in Brazil. One parent was Ecuadorian and one was Colombian. He graduated from Brown University and worked on the Miami Herald. His previous film work was Cocolero, "a documentary centered on the union formed by Bolivian farmers in response to their government's effort (urged by the U.S.) to eradicate coca crops, and the man who would come to represent them, Evo Morales" -- IMDb.
Great stuff, Chris! Porfirio is playing as an exclusive in an art cinema in Miami, or will play next week when I get back to town. Currently in Boston for the Society for Cinema conference. As expected, Boston has a great Museum of Fine Arts. They had free admission this evening. Place was packed. Have you noticed how these Latin American films have a lot in common with the Romanian New Wave films. Rosenbaum calls it global synchronicity. Less is more is the motto in world cinema right now.
That's nice. Yes the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston is a good museum, and so is the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the ICA museum in Boston for contemporary art, and, quite significant, MASS MoCA in North Adams.
I certainly hope we do not have global synchronicity. But I don't see much sign of it. Certainly many of the recent Latin American ones have something in common, but I would think the Romanian ones are much different, though of course inexpensive digital cameras and the use of non actors and documentary situations may create some links. The differences, I hope, are greater than the similarities.
I love minimalism. I am a minimal artist myself. Less is more is a motto I like. But I do not believe in global cinema. I am interested in individual films and individual directors or film groups or production companies, not trends. Artists do not go in trends. Even though filmmaking is a collective endeavor, it can be very private too. I still find great filmmaking coming out of Western Europe. As evidence of this some of the best films in New Directors 2012 were THE MINISTER, OSLO, AUGUST 31ST, AND BREATHING. And some of the other exciting new ones, such as AN OVERSIMPLIFICATION OF HER BEAUTY, could hardly be called minimalist. There was nothing minimal about the films from Russia, TWILIGHT PORTRAIT and GENERATION P. The first was quite low budget, but I would not call it particularly minimal. Djinn Carrénard's DONOMA is quite complex in plot and editing, despite being very low budget, said to have been made for 150 euros. LAS ACACIAS, now that is minimal.
Nice Ken Burns clip!
Great advertisement for New Directors/New Films. Shows the series really means something.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YR_rs...ayer_embedded#!
BEST LISTS FOR THE TWO SERIES
BEST OF NEW DIRECTORS/NEW FILMS
Really all the ND/NF serlections seemed good but my personal favorites were (already seen) Pierre Schöller's THE MINISTER, Joachim Trier's OSLO, AUGUST 31st, Karl Markovics' BREATHING, and Kleber Menndoça Filho's NEIGHBORING SOUNDS. Dutch director Sacha Polak's debut HEMEL is also a very accomplished work. All of these were directors at the top of their game.
Below my top favorites ones that seemed important, exciting, cool, significant, promising were many, including especially:
AN OVERSIMPLIFICATION OF HER BEAUTY. Bursting with creativity. African American male. Self-referential, smart, complex.
DONOMA Young French collective effort. Interconnected ronde, lots of improvisation, but highly sophisticated editing despite costing only*€150 to make, allegedly.
NOW FORAGER. Dry ironies, amazing specific detail and good casting. American.
THE RAID. Ultimate hand-to-hand combat flick a la John Woo. Indonesian, Welsh director.
TWILIGHT PORTRAIT. Hard to characterize. Gritty, yet elegant. Russian. Rape, class issues. Or is it just boredom?
FILM COMMENT SELECTS.
I only saw four, but they seemed really good:
I WISH. Koreeda. Cute, but significant
FAUST. Sokurov. Crazy, but great.
MY OWN PRIVATE RIVER. Franco's revisit of one of the great American film actors of recent decades.
REBELLION. A return to form of Mathieu Kassovitz, a complex political actioner about French colonialism in the Eighties.
Links to the reviews:
5 Broken Cameras (Emad Burat, Guy Davidi 2011)--ND/NF
Ambassador, The (Mads Brügger 2011)--ND/NF
Breathing (Karl Markovics 2011)--ND/NF
Crulic: The Path to Beyond (Anka Damian 2011)--ND/NF
Donoma (Djinn Carrénard 2011)--ND/NF
Faust (Aleksandr Sokurov 2011)--FCS
Found Memories (Júlia Murat 2011)--ND/NF
Generation P (Vincent Ginzburg 2011)--ND/NF
Gimme the Loot (Adam Leon 2012)--ND/NF
Goodbye (Mohammad Rasoulof 2011)--ND/NF
Hemel (Sacha Polak 2012)--ND/NF
How to Survive a Plague (David France 2012)--ND/NF
Huan Huan (Song Chuan 2011)--ND/NF
I Wish (Hirakazu Koreeda 2011)--FCS
It Looks Pretty from a Distance (Anka, Wilhelm Sasnal 2011)--ND/NF
Las Acacias (Pablo Giorgelli 2011)--ND/NF
Minister, The (Pierre Schöller 2011)--ND/NF
Oslo, August 31st (Joachim Trier 2011)--ND/NF
My Own Private River (James Franco 2012)--FCS
Neighboring Sounds (Kleber Mendoça Filho 2011)--ND/NF
Now, Forager (Jason Cortland, Julia Halperin 2012)--ND/NF
Omar Killed Me (Roschdy Zem 2011)--ND/NF
Oversimplification of Her Beauty, An (Terence Nance 2012)--ND/NF
Porfirio (Alejandro Landes 2011)--ND/NF
Rabbi's Cat, The (Joann Sfar, Antoine Delesvauz 2011)--ND/NF
Raid, The: Redemption (Gareth Evans 2012)--ND/NF
Rebellion (Mathieu Kassovitz 2011)--FCS
Romance Joe (Lee Kwang-kui 2011)--ND/NF
Teddy Bear (Mads Metthieson 2011)--ND/NF
Twilight Portrait (Angelina Nikonova 2011)--ND/NF
Where Do We Go Now (Nadine Labaki 2011)--ND/NF
Hirikazu koreeda's I WISH began a US theatrical release May 11, 2012. You'll fine my review of it here.
Júlia Murat's FOUND MEMORIES opened today at Lincoln Plaza cinemas in New York and has gotten excellent reviews (Metacritic 74). I shows there June 1-14. It will show at the San Francisco Film Society Cinema Juna 22-28, 2012. Although I may not have listed the film among my favorites, during this season it is a gem you would not want to miss if you're in the vicinity of these screenings. Will it show further? It is being distributed by Film Movement. You will find its page here. No other theatrical releases are scheduled apparently but US DVD release seems likely.
http://img585.imageshack.us/img585/4...memorieslo.jpg
HOT TO SURVIVE A PLAGUE
The film reviewed here in our Felstival Coverage section will be released by Sundance Selects in theaters September 21, 2012, it has now been announced.
Oslo, August 31 (Joachim Trier)
Unquestionably one of the best imports of the year, Oslo, August 31 is coming out on DVD from Strand Releasing in the US next month. Highly recommended.
http://img444.imageshack.us/img444/8597/clickx.jpg
Street Date:
Sept. 18, 2012
Pre-Book Date:
August 21, 2012
I also liked the Oslo film and I hope it gets better known now that it is on DVD. The other film you talk about, Found Memories, came out on DVD in June. Film Movement always releases DVD at the same time as very few theatrical showings. Its a miracle they have any since they have nil commercial clout.
This was already reviewed:
Karl Markovics: BREATHING (2011)--ND/NF
Markovics is the well-known Austrian actor who starred in the 2008 Best Foreign Oscar winner, The Couinterfeiters. This is his writing and directing debut, a beautifully made film about a 19-year-old in a prison-like juvenile correctional facility who takes a job at the Vienna municipal mortuary, hoping that finally he will be able to make good at a day-release job and gain parole. Limpid widescreen cinematography by Martin Gschlacht shows close collaboration and the performance of newcomer Thomas Schubert in the main role is a sympathetic study in slow opening up as the youth, who has known only an orphanage and prison, gains hope and self-respect and faces his past. A grim but nonetheless beautiful and hopeful film.
It has now been released, Friday August 31, 2012, in New York City, showing at Cinema Village. Netflix promises a DVD to be available. Already released in the UK in April.
"The Austrian film has already been awarded the Europa Cinemas Label as Best European Film at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival, as well as the Best Film award at the 2011 Sarajevo Film Festival." - Online blurb about the UK release.