The Film Thugs Movie Show

Another cop out. But honestly, lighten up people. I left my place at 6:50 this morning and am just now getting home... at 12:48 am. According to my math that is 28 hours. Don't quote me on that, math was never my strong suit. Today I saw... 1)  Lee Shipman and Brian McGreevy discuss breaking into the business. 2) Shane Black being awesome. 3) Lawrence Kasdan 4) Shane Black again. 5) "The Extacy of Order: Masters of Tetris" outstanding documentary about the world Tetris championship. 6) "Freak Dance" a brilliant satire by the Upright Citizens Brigade's Matt Besser (Who I had a very drunken, me not him, conversation on a bus with). Great movie, great guy. Detailed coverage forthcoming.

This is a total cop out. Think of it as a placeholder. Know this... AFF 2011 is underway. Today. October 20th 2011 I saw the following... 1) When Dreams Take Flight (documentary feature) 2) Animated Short Film Program 3) Panel discussion on writing horror 4) Met the writer of the amazing "Mortal Kombat Rebirth" film. He is a solid cat. More on all of this later. That is all I have the energy to write at the moment. I have been out of the house for the past 18 hours and will need to be up and out the door in... well, far too few. Full reviews of every film will be posted, and full conference coverage is forthcoming.

Austin Film Festival Day Six Rundown

October 26, 2010

1) 127 Hours

2) Brothers Justice

1) 127 Hours (d. Danny Boyle)

This movie is the reason I don't go camping, hiking, or engage in any outdoor activity other than golf. I don't care how bad I play, I have never once been in the position to even consider cutting my own arm off to get back to the clubhouse.

That being said...

This is an incredibly intense, rough, and powerful film that is by no means easy to watch, but it is quite good.

If you don't knew the story, Aron Ralston, an avid outdoorsman, mountaineer, hiker, biker, all of that, goes off for a weekend ride and exploration without telling anyone where he's going and had the worst possible thing happen to him. No, he wasn't killed or sodomized by hill folk, a rock in a cave he was climbing gave way, pinning his arm to the wall of the cave. In the middle of nowhere, out of view, and running low on supplies his case seemed hopeless until he made the realization that "I have a great tourniquet."

Oh, and it's a true story.

This film focuses on the 127 hours from when he falls to the moment he makes a decision that most people couldn't even consider making. What you have here is a person, faced with a dire situation, no food, little water, unable to even turn around, having to jerry rig a climbing harness just to sleep, seeing his life for what it is, the good and the bad. This film presents a man laid bare and shows what you learn about yourself and life when it appears you will lose it.

The film itself is extremely well made. Danny Boyle pulls out as many stops as one can when dealing with a scenario that renders the camera immobile for a majority of the proceedings. Visually, he seems to be locked into his "Slumdog Millionaire" film grammar. It has that look and feel, the rich colors, the slightly slowed action, rewound scenes, flashbacks to small details we missed the first time, but the thematic elements keep it from feeling like a retread. He mixes a very stylized editing and grandiose establishing shots that show the vastness of the landscape with shaky hand held tracking shots that make you feel personally involved.

What I found most impressive was his use of sound. Not only to convey the isolation, but, more impressively, to communicate the intense pain of a self preformed amputation. The use of the camcorder, not only as source for onscreen footage but as a second character, is incredibly affecting, and allows James Franco (in the performance of his career) to show the emotional swings from a forced joy to borderline insanity, and finally into the determination to live that would drive a man to such action.

This is not an easy film to watch, but it is not the people fainting at screenings histrionic affair that some are making it out to be. What it is is a very honest and real portrayal of what happens when you are confronted with losing everything.

2) Brothers Justice (d. Dax Shepherd)

I have never disliked Dax Shepherd. His work on Punk'd was funny for what it was, he was great in "Idiocracy" and, from my limited exposure to him on that set, he is a damned nice guy. He has made some shit movies, that isn't in question, but when the checks start being written who among us is really gonna say no?

So, knowing that Dax can be quite funny, and reading the synopsis of this film I had decent hopes. This is a mocumentary about Dax trying to launch himself as a martial arts movie star, even though he has no training. We follow him and his producer friend around as they try to get studio interest, attach stars, and get the thing made.

The problem is that it isn't that funny. It's funny, but just not very. The problem with making a mocumentary is that you have to make it look real while still maintaining comic timing. These two things don't work together easily. This movie is full of overlong scenes, timing that is just slow enough to flatten jokes, and silences that go on too long. These things are a part of this type of film and can work if they are turned into comic beats of their own (look at the work of Chris Guest for how to do this). Sadly they aren't here.

What we are left with, instead, is a somewhat funny movie that could have been a VERY funny movie. Dax does have ability, he just needs to take the time to develop it. I wasn't terribly disappointed, because there were some really great moments, fantastic cameos, and truly funny performances, but they aren't enough to get past the flat timing and lifeless direction.

Austin Film Festival Day Five Rundown

October 25, 2010

1) Raging Boll

2) Rubble Kings

Well, the conference is over and now it's all about the films. I am very excited about tomorrow nights "127 Hours" and Wednesday's "Black Swan," but tonight's screenings felt a bit more special. These are smaller films without the names attached to sell them immediately and I love that I get to push them out there.

1) Raging Boll (d. Dan Lee West)

Ewe Boll is an odd figure to discuss. Either you have never heard of him, or you hate him. Those seem to be the only two camps. He is considered by many to be the Ed Wood of this generation. This comparison is unfair to Mr. Wood. Yes, he was inept but he had a joy and a desire to do something great and really work at it. He lacked any real skill, but his limited output and budgets prevented him from developing. Basically he was like a child making a hand made birthday card for his mother. It might have been terrible, but there was so much joy and love in his process and so much excitement at the project that you kind of feel for the guy.

Boll, on the other hand, has an ability to raise money and produce finished films that is absolutely astonishing (he self produced a $60 million dollar movie). This is especially impressive considering that he creates artless, flat, and uninteresting films that use shocking imagery simply to evoke an emotional response with no desire to develop those emotions or add any deeper meaning.

George Lucas once said that you can create emotion by putting a puppy on the freeway. Yes, you get emotion, but not much more. That is what Boll does. He is only capable of achieving a raw emotional reaction with no weight or significance behind them. He is also known for fighting his critics (literally), challenging other directors to fights (for no apparent reason), and calling himself "the only true genius in film today" (again, for no apparent reason).

That is what makes this film so remarkable. It shows all of this plus the actual person and, in the end, allows you to choose what he is.

To me he is a carnival barker/ pro wrestler. He is a wildly intelligent man with a PhD in Literature from an actual respected university, has an unprecedented ability to raise money, and a tireless work ethic. However, his ambition, hubris, and thin skin negates all that. Instead of working and perfecting his style or growing as an artist all he does is finish films. This is a shame because there is some potential in his work. He could be good, he chooses not to be. I had to "fortune" to see his opus "Postal" in one of the six theatres it played in nation wide. They show footage from the premier and, including Boll, there were 16 people present, which was a packed house compared to the 5 at my screening. I really can't describe it other than to tell you that I didn't so much see it as it just kind of happened to me.

The film begins with an interview with Boll in which only his answers are heard. For most of the movie he is the only person who speaks. This allows him to present what he wants the world to see and, for all the bullshit that surrounds him, he comes off rather well. He is a guy who, like me, grew up loving films and wanting do make his own.

You see him, you see his family, you hear about how he found reprieve from isolation through film, you see the relentless study and cataloging of the films he grew up loving, you see him as a person you would have a beer and conversation with.

Then the ambition gets in the way. He raised a SHIT TON of money, slowly at first, then in greater quantities, and started churning out movies. They were not well received, yet he kept going and growing more ambitious.

All of this culminates in an open challenge to his internet critics to an exhibition boxing match. What was supposed to be fun turned ugly when the guys showed up expecting to be part of a show, and ended up in a fight. For all the humanity he gained, it's difficult to like a guy when you see a guy vomiting in the street and being put on an oxygen mask after getting the shit kicked out of him by someone who left out the fact that he was an amateur boxer in his youth.

There is one moment that pulls the curtain back. At one point Boll wonders why the "internet nerds" don't like him. He points out that he is an outsider who makes video game movies, so he should be championed by them. He says that because of that, "I'm the reason they have no excuse to try it themselves." He is an interesting man who has gone off the rails a bit, but somehow retains his humanity and, in an odd way, shows us that lack of talent shouldn't be an obstacle to achieving our dreams.

But there is no attempt by the filmmaker to tell you how to feel. It shows what happened and allows you to make up your own mind. "Raging Boll" is what good documentary filmmaking should be. It plainly presents the information and allows you to make up your mind. The editing, the music, the use of title cards, and the rawness of Boll's portrayal show an absolute expert filmmakers hand at work. Even if you don't like documentaries, or have no interest in Boll this is a fascinating story that is told impeccably well and is very much worth your time.

2) Rubble Kings (d. Shan Nicholson)

This is both an interesting and frustrating movie. The subject matter is fascinating and generally well executed, but the film itself feels kind of sloppy and loose.

Rubble Kings traces the rise of gangs in New York in the 1970's. New York was going to hell. The ghetto was spreading, the poor had lost their hope, and things were bleak. From this rudderless community an army of gangs arose. They started as clubs and morphed into something else.

This presents the life cycle of those gangs. What started as a way to protect your neighborhood became more dangerous, then violent, then deadly, then something new and different. From the violence and wreckage a voice for peace and unity arose. As one gang member said, "We were in the ghetto because we created the ghetto," and some people tried to change this, to bring pride, a sense of ownership and responsibility, and unity their community. Through all this hip hop culture was born.

I wanted to like this more than I did. It is a good movie and is generally put together well, but there are technical problem. The music and narration switch too quickly and disrupt the flow, the structure feels non existent (it's as if they decided half way through editing what they wanted it to be about, and went about to make it that instead of figuring out what they wanted first), and the pacing is way off.

There is a lot of fascinating information here, but the presentation doesn't deliver it as cleanly as I would have liked. Too much feels repetitive, and half the time you are left wondering where you are going and how you got where you are.

Were this cleaned up it could be an excellent doc, as it is we are left with a good film that doesn't quite live up to it's potential.

Austin Film Festival Day Four Rundown

October 24, 2010

1) Panel Rundown

2) S&M Lawncare

3) Shorts 11 (Young Filmmakers)

1) Panel Rundown

So, the conference ended on a very, very high note. I hit two panels, The Art of Story telling with David Simon, David Peoples, and Robert Rodriguez, which was good, and Movie Endings, The Good, The Bad, and The Incredibly Awesome by Michael Arndt which was the best presentation I have ever seen.

It's late and I work tomorrow so I am putting off my notes yet again. This will be rectified in the coming weeks. So far as screenings...

2) S&M Lawn Care (d Mark Potts)

Comedy is a tricky thing to tackle. Everything has to be dead on or it just dies on screen. S&M Lawn Care, the story of two friends who run a lawn care company that is threatened by a new and mysterious rival, is a hit and miss affair that feels like it runs about twice as long as it needs to.

Don't get me wrong, there are some moments that work, and they work very well. There is some real talent here, this film just feels like it spends more time spinning it's wheels than moving forward.

The scenes with Mel's brother are particular standouts and really show what the filmmakers are capable of. They are crisp, funny, and engaging. There are some other moments but they seem to get a little bogged down and lost. There are characters that seem like they are there for a quick laugh and don't really do anything or go anywhere beyond that, scenes that start funny, end funny, or have funny middles but don't form a cohesive funny scene, and a slow pace that takes some of the momentum away and kills the timing of what could otherwise be very funny scenes.

Were this a 30 minute short it would have outstanding. There are good ideas, deliveries, and techniques on display here but there isn't sufficient story to make it interesting for it's rather short run time. It isn't terrible, it just has the feel of a short that got a little ambitious and lost a lot of what could have made it great.

2) Shorts 11 (Young Filmmakers)

I was a little leery going into this one. Young filmmakers (specifically high school age in this case) tend to go for cheap derivative comedy or make things that are so "inside" that anybody who doesn't know the filmmakers personally feels lost.

This was not the case here.

What was on display here was raw talent. While it hasn't yet been refined and sharpened by experience what was on display showed the promise of exceptional work to come. These films were moody, ambitious, and affecting.

I'm going to focus on four.

1) Do Not Enter (Bryan Rivelli, Ethan Greenfield, Sarah Alli) From forgotten subway tunnels to abandoned factories, New York City’s hidden environment is unknown to most yet it provides a unique window into the past.

This short documentary about people who explore the unknown corners of New York city was handled with a delicate and expert hand. It's moody, quiet, and conveys the vast, open spaces of a teeming metropolis with subtlety and nuance.

2) Research and Development (Riley Metcalfe) It’s the ink battle to end all time.

A very entertaining and well made stop motion film. This young director handled the technical difficulties with patience and a practiced hand. Very well done.

3) The Travelers' Verse (Trey Hardin) Trouble follows musicians Nick and Scott as they try and make it to an audition for what could be their big break.

Very ambitious and heartfelt. Trey went for some difficult camera work and it paid off. There is a lot of talent on display here. I look forward to seeing what he does next.

4) Une Journee Tragique (Andrew Edison) Sometimes the villain wins.

A very well executed parody of a classic silent movie standard. It does what all comedy should, gets to the point and surprises us.

The list could go on, but I am tired.

Now that the conference is over I am all about screenings.

In the next few days I should have reviews for the following:

Raging Boll

Rubble Kings

127 Hours

Brothers Justice

Black Swan

Made in Dagenham

Stay tuned.

(Note: For most of the features I am writing abbreviated reviews and will go back and do longer ones at some point in the future.)