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SONG LANG (Leon Le 2018)
A lead performer of traditional folk opera (opulently represented) and a hardened debt collector, two beautiful, lonely young men, are drawn together in 1980's Saigon in this homage to Wong Kar-wai in a continual sequence of beautifully lighted, richly saturated 3:2 ratio scenes less kinetic but otherwise worthy of Wong's superb cameraman, Christopher Doyle - though the dp, an Aussie like Chris, was free of such influences.
NYAFF Showtimes:
Sunday, July 7
6:30 PM
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LYING TO MOM 鈴木家の嘘 (Katsumi Nojiri 2018)
A film about dealing with death, particularly a suicide in your immediate family. The suicide was a hikikomori so this is a particularly Japanese treatment. Lots of topics are covered, but the film would have benefited from some strenuous tightening up.
In the NYAFF.
Showtimes
Wednesday, July 10
6:00 PM
Last edited by Chris Knipp; 07-04-2019 at 05:36 PM.
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MR. LONG ミスター・ロン (Sabu 2017)
This charismatic Taiwanese hitman so convincingly embodied by Chang Chen (who's worked for Edward Yang, Hou Hsieu-hsien, and Wong Kar-wai), who's so confident he uses only a short knife to wipe out a whole gang of baddies, gets marooned when a single hit goes wrong on the slummy outskirts of Tokyo with an adorable kid and his addict mom. At that unpromising venue, he displays his exceptional culinary skills for a while to satisfied neighbors. The movie is becalmed for a long middle section, and we almost like it. Sabu (Hiroyuki Tanaka) is a Japanese actor turned filmmaker. He has a second film included in the 2019 NYAFF, the omnibus film Jam.
See it at the Walter Reade Theater in Lincoln Center in three days. I'd go. As Mark Shilling of the Japan Times says, "Have fun."
NYAFF Showtime:
Monday, July 8
9:15 PM
Last edited by Chris Knipp; 07-06-2019 at 12:26 AM.
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ANOTHER CHILD 미성년 (Kim Yoon-seok 2019)
The noted Korean actor directs, and costars in, a vivid, sometimes odd, film on adultery, unplanned parenthood, & their effect on daughters of the separate parties. WRT the 11th.
NYAFF Showtime:
Thursday, July 11
8:30 PM
Last edited by Chris Knipp; 07-09-2019 at 05:24 PM.
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FIRST FAREWELL 第一次的离 (Wang Lina 2018)
An award-winning film, with top notch cinematography, editing, and score, about Uyghur people in XinjiangProvince where the filmmaker's own hometown is, and there is an elegiac note signaled in the title. They raise cotton and herd sheep, and the focus is on the children, who're under pressure to learn Mandarin. The film avoids overt political content about China's cultural persecution of this minority, but it's clear through the threat of going away to school. The scenes of young Isa and his best girl friend Kalbinur and their pet lamb are adorable. The mix of ethnography and humanism reminded me of Honeyland (2019 ND/NF).
NYAFF Showtime:
Thursday, July 11
6:00 PM
Last edited by Chris Knipp; 07-09-2019 at 05:28 PM.
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Last edited by Chris Knipp; 07-24-2019 at 11:54 AM.
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THE CROSSING 过春天 (Bai Xue 2018)
In this striking debut, the dangerously driven Peipei, just turned sixteen, is a 'danfei' with remote parents split between Hong Kong and China, and she goes back and forth between the mainland and Hong Kong to school every day in school uniform. This makes her perfect to smuggle new iPhones to China. She becomes the mascot of a wild crew of older boys headed by Mrs Hua, who's like a potentially treacherous den mother overseeing dangerous fun. The key figure to her in this new life becomes Hao, her best gf's bf, who draws her into a bolder maneuver. An original, vivid and intense film of teenage obsession that never lets up.
It showed in the NYAFF July 12.
Last edited by Chris Knipp; 07-14-2019 at 09:35 AM.
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